Dealing with Jet Lag

We’ve been here a week, and I’m fairly well adjusted to the 10-hour time zone difference. I no longer sleep late in the morning, take four-hour naps in the afternoon, and stay up all night reading. I only take short naps and read just a little in the middle of the night.

I’ve gotten used to reading the Washington Post online in the evening (8:00 am EDT is 6:00 pm here). More importantly my stomach and kidneys and liver don’t signal that they’d rather sleep when I have breakfast, lunch, or dinner.

An understanding of jet lag explains some recent public behavior of President Obama. You may recall that he hosted Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on one occasion, and French President Nicolas Sarkozy on another. They were return visits made after Obama had been to their countries.

I’m very sure that Obama was feted with an elaborate state dinner in the Kremlin, and was served rich French food when he was in Paris. He vowed to get revenge, and the only thing he could think of that would be worse than all that rich food on a jet-lagged stomach was to take his guests to a greasy spoon restaurant. So he took Sarkozy to Ben’s Chili Bowl, and Medvedev to Ray’s HellBurgers.

A really nice thing to do for a jet-lagged head of state would be to have a picnic in a park. Lafayette Park is convenient to the White House, but it lacks seclusion. I recommend that Obama take guests to Rock Creek Park and let them relax. Grateful guests would think of Obama as a true friend.

I’m glad that my foggy brain is finally working well enough to solve problems in international relations.

Yearnings

I miss having hot water…

There’s one time a year when the city-supplied hot water is turned off in Ekaterinburg, and pipes are cleaned of corrosion, or some such thing. That happens for a week or so, and usually there are posters announcing it in advance. Not this time. Nobody knows why. And nobody we’ve talked to knows when the hot water will come back on. 

Although we didn’t have hot water our first day here, we did the next day. I thought we had had a temporary problem, and didn’t know that we’d lose warm water again. Fortunately I did some laundry and washed my hair that day.

There’s an obvious solution to the lack of hot water: make it yourself on the stove. It’s the way I do dishes. But a second problem arises, because the flow of cold water here is never very strong. It’s better in the kitchen than in the bathroom, however. The flow from the bath faucet is more like a leak. Today it took me 30 minutes to get water ankle deep in the tub – and that was with adding pots and pots of water that I had heated on the stove.

For the time being I’m having trouble going with the flow…

Secrets of a Russian Housewife

In my earlier life I didn’t need to know how to deal with dozens and dozens of long-stemmed roses at a time. Russian women confront this problem from time to time, such as on birthdays and on the 8th of March, which is Women’s Day.  

Roses last longer if they’re allowed to rest at night in a water-filled bathtub. Not only does the bath keep them from wilting, it refreshes them if they have started to wilt. This amazing factoid is one for which I have little use in the U.S.

Every self-respecting Russian housewife makes her own jams from fresh berries. The grocery store where we shop doesn’t even carry factory-produced jams and preserves. Fortunately Slava likes honey.

It is a proud local tradition in the Urals for women to make Russian-style ravioli, known here as pelmeni. No, pelmeni and ravioli aren’t the same, and Slava has a hard time ever eating ravioli because for him it’s a poor substitute for pelmeni. To be really good the pelmeni meat filling must be ground by hand, and the yeast dough wrappings made from scratch. Every Russian husband in this region, except mine, says that his wife’s pelmeni is the best. Making pelmeni is a labor of love, but I figure that love can be a side dish to store-bought pelmeni.

Kitchen Mishaps

This morning I ruined the French toast. Here’s what happened:

I started out with some good demidovsky, a dark bread with raisins. In a bowl I mixed together an egg, some nutmeg, several glurps of milk, and a tablespoon of salt. It would have been much better if I had used sugar instead of salt, but I can tell you that Slava made the problem worse…

In the U.S. Slava will put maple syrup on French toast. He decided to top his French toast here in Russia with a spoonful of sour cream, to which he added a tablespoon of salt from the sugar bowl. I’ll pause for a moment for you to imagine his reaction when he tasted this mess…

How did this happen? Well, yesterday I took on the task of reorganizing the kitchen. One part of that job was to take many small plastic bags with white ingredients, and label them. A carry-over from Soviet days is that there are many foodstuffs that are still sold in bulk, scooped into plain plastic bags. You can buy flour that way, and cream of wheat, too. Plus sugar…salt... Slava says that this is not a problem – if you’re not sure what’s in a bag at home, all you have to do is look at the grains very carefully, or scoop up some to taste. Wanting to put the Soviet system behind us I gathered a collection of glass jars, and labeled them with the intended contents. In various places around the kitchen I found several bags to combine of “mannaya kasha” (cream of wheat), “caxap” (that’s the Russian spelling for sugar, pronounced “sakhar”), “myka” (flour), and col (“sol” or salt). One bag that had just a small amount of sugar I simply dumped into the sugar bowl. That was yesterday’s mistake, which Slava discovered when he went to put sugar into his tea and discovered instead what salty tea tastes like.

This morning I picked up the jar labeled “caxap” and put a spoonful into the French toast batter. I then discovered my second mistake in the kitchen.

Tomorrow morning I think we’ll have “mannaya kasha” for breakfast.

Slava's Jubilee

Let me invite you to Slava’s jubilee birthday, held in the large conference room of his offices. There are about 25 people sitting at a large T-shaped table, with family at the end. You find a place, and within easy reach are platters of open-faced sandwiches, several types of pirogi, bowls of olives and pickles, and three-tiered trays of fruit. Also within easy reach are bottles of French Bordeaux, Russian vodka, Armenian cognac, various fruit juices, and water. Please help yourself.

Do remember that it is not Russian tradition to sit and sip. There will be plenty of time to drink your drink in response to toasts made throughout the evening.

At a birthday party, what do you give to The Man Who Has Everything? In Russia the answer to that is easy -- flowers. Sviatoslav Anatolyevich (a.k.a. Slava) got bouquet after bouquet of roses, lilies, mums, and more. There were other very Russian gifts: a beautiful sterling silver bowl made specifically for serving caviar, an elaborate tea set, and Russian Orthodox icons. One thoughtful gift was a book about the city of Harbin, the Russian enclave in China where Slava was born. Slava also got a couple of unusual cases for business cards, a keepsake Australian coin of pure silver, a pair of silver champagne flutes, a fancy new cell phone, and several years’ supply of cognac, his favorite drink (one bottle lasts him a year).

Gifts are presented with poetic tribute and song. Since Slava has clever people at his Center for Science and Engineering, I presume that the tributes were done with wit and style. Fortunately they were also done with broad humor, which I could appreciate, even if I couldn’t get the nuances of language.

One tribute started off with a poem by the beloved Russian poet Alexander Pushkin, and then had verses added for today. Another person mimicked the stiff Soviet leader Brezhnev, and gave Slava a hero’s medal. A group of people announced that they were part of Chinese Children’s Radio (recalling Slava’s childhood in China), and to get high sing-song voices they inhaled balloons of helium.

A good time was had by all.


 

The Director's Wife

The party for Slava was not the first time I’ve seen how much Slava is appreciated by his staff. They know that he has given them opportunities they would not have had working in a regular bureaucratic institute in the Russian Academy of Sciences. It is therefore an honor for me to be the director’s wife, and I’m reminded of an old Russian joke that goes like this:

A military officer is selected to become a general. The day he achieves this rank is a day of great pomp and celebration. The new general and his wife return home, exhausted. The general goes to sleep right away, but his wife is too excited to sleep. She punches her husband awake and exclaims, “Genya, can you believe it? You are now married to a general’s wife!”

Arrival in Moscow

Jet-lagged after a long flight, there’s no better treatment than to be coddled and pampered until you recover. The best place for such treatment in Moscow is at the bed and breakfast run by Ludmila Rodina.

Ludmila is a long-time friend as well as a generous hostess. Slava and I were bad guests. I hope we didn’t strain Ludmila’s friendship.

I had told Ludmila that our flight arrived at 10:10 am, and we expected to be at her place around noon. At 12:00 we called to say that we’d not be there until 1:00 or 2:00. Our behavior so far was not unreasonable, and as I expected, she had lunch waiting for us. But we were not hungry. Our stomachs were still operating on Eastern Daylight Time. Ludmila delayed her own lunch until we were ready to eat at about 4:00 pm. Naturally, we weren’t ready for supper at 6:00 or 7:00. It was well after 9:00 pm that Ludmila had her evening meal with us.

Ludmila is rightly proud of being a gourmet cook, featuring many recipes from the Caucasus, and using ingredients from the gardens at her dacha. We had a cold beet soup, zucchini fritters, a Caucasian variant of ratatouille, turkey cutlets (rare in Russia), a platter of cold meats (Ludmila is largely vegetarian), traditional Russian brown bread, and caviar. This was served with champagne and cognac. With tea we had rhubarb-apple pie with a choice of homemade strawberry, raspberry, or blackberry fruit preserves.

Ludmila was gracious hostess to a pair of zombies. Slava functions better than I when jet lagged, but both of us needed naps. When we can stay for a few days Ludmila usually arranges for us to go to a concert somewhere, and we have plenty of time to talk. This visit was short, however, because we had to fly the next day to Ekaterinburg.

While hosting us Ludmila also had two Spanish women as guests. Ludmila operates her business largely by word of mouth, and so she’s not as busy as she could be. She likes to have guests she can enjoy. I recommend her services to any traveler who fits that description.

Transatlantic Travel

It’s been three years since I last flew to Russia. Delta Airlines has made the trip daily, with incremental changes along the way. I found that passenger electronics are better than three years ago. Food is not.

Instead of having a featured movie that starts after dinner, all passengers have touchscreens that can order up a menu of movies for their viewing pleasure. I found time for two – the pleasant comedy “Date Night,” with Tina Fey and Steve Carell, and the inspirational “Invictus” starring Morgan Freeman as Nelson Mandela.

We used to have a number of music channels, like radio stations. Now we can put together our own playlists. It’s much more fun.

But, ah, the food. I looked for the printed menu of our dinner choices; the write ups always sounded good, even if the plates didn’t live up to their promise. Today there’s no need for a printed menu. Our choice, we were told, was “with chicken or without chicken.” I chose “with chicken,” and got a small plate with a calorie content suitable to the dwarf for which the seating was designed. For most of the men on the flight, I can’t imagine this being a happy experience.

After 8 hours of flying – just shortly before landing -- we got breakfast. It was shaped like a hockey puck and thrown by the flight attendant going down the aisle. Luckily the thing was wrapped in plastic, so it was okay if it dropped to the floor. After unwrapping and eating it I guessed that it was something like an English muffin with a scrambled egg white. The flight attendant made a second toss going down the aisle, and that time we got bananas.

What will transatlantic travel be like in another five years? I have no idea. I am grateful that the airline industry continues to have a good safety record, and in spite of my complaining, I’m glad that airlines try to keep costs down.

Chautauqua, NY

Imagine a quaint village built in the late 1870’s, with small wooden cottages decorated with Victorian trim… Now populate that village with people from the 21st Century… Question: Would the people transform the village, or would the village transform the people?

Based on what I’ve seen at Chautauqua, New York, the transformation works both ways.  

Chautauqua was founded in 1874 as a lake-side summer place where hard-working Sunday school teachers could go for rest, relaxation, and of course, religion. Few had a college education, which was rare in those days, yet many yearned for intellectual stimulation. Chautauqua Institution set up a challenging reading group, and invited speakers on lively topics. Chautauqua was broadly ecumenical from the start, and developed a flourishing arts program in music, dance, and visual arts.

Chautauqua is still a small village, with a summer population of about 7,500 that changes week to week. It attracts a variety of people, most of whom stay in guest houses that eschew air conditioning, but there are other facilities available. Some people cook their meals in community kitchens or private apartments, others eat out. Automobiles are rarely seen on the grounds and in fact are forbidden in many areas. The daily newspaper carries news of arts programming, nature walks, announcements of special studies, and synopses of remarks by featured speakers. No mention is made of anything happening outside Chautauqua. 

Welcome back to the late 1800’s. A week at Chautauqua is addictive, with first-time visitors invariably vowing to return year after year. Slava and I just completed our seventh visit.

Aiding the transition from the 21st Century to the 19th Century are some modern features that various people can’t live without. Starbucks coffee, for one. Internet connection, for another. We found several Wi-Fi networks we could use, one of which required a password. The password was “whatever.” A nice choice for the laid-back atmosphere of the place!

No two people experience Chautauqua the same way. The planned program, with simultaneous events throughout the day, is augmented by special interest groups that pop up on their own. If there are three people out of 7,500 who share a particular passion, they’re likely to find each other at a “brown bag lunch” or some other event.  

The theme for the main lectures of the week we visited Chautauqua was “From Asia to the Middle East: Energy, Capital, and Conflict.” Here’s what we have to choose from in 2011:
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“Global Health as Foreign Policy”-- June 26 - July 2

“Applied Ethics: Government & the Search for the Common Good” – July 3 - 9

 “American Intelligence: Technology, Espionage, and Alliances” – July 10 - 16

 “A Case for the Arts” – July 17 - 23

 “Women in Crisis: The Road to Social and Economic Growth” – July 24 - 30

 “Iran: From Ancient Persia to Middle East Powder Keg” – July 31 – August 6

 “The U.S. Economy: Beyond a Quick Fix” – August 7 - 13

 “Sparking a Culture of Creativity and Innovation” – August 14 - 20

 “The Path to the Civil War” – August 21 – 27

For more information about this wonderful puzzle of a place, go to www.ciweb.org