Indian Summer - Oct, 1999

Photo: Autumn color in Ekaterinburg


When Slava and I returned to Ekaterinburg a couple of weeks ago, we were enveloped in the warmth of Indian summer -- although in Russian, it's called "peasant woman summer." Daytime temperatures have been in the upper 60's, but at night it's been cool enough to turn birch trees a golden hue. The city itself is more colorful than ever. Summer is the season for fixing up and painting buildings, and stuccoed fronts have been freshened up with pale shades across a painter's palette.

Our apartment building has a new sign by the door. It says, "To keep out terrorists, please keep the door locked." Actuallly, that's not exactly what it says. The sign reminds residents of "recent events" and suggests that the door be kept closed. Nevertheless, the door is left open more often than not, indicating perhaps that most residents don't really expect Chechen terrorists to deliver dynamite to this particular building.

The heating system has been turned on since October 1 just because it's scheduled to be on then. Since the weather has been warm, our building has been more than warm, and we've had to keep our windows open to cool down the place as much as possible. Everybody in this metropolitan area of 4.5 million people is doing this, and I figure we must be heating up the outside by a good degree or two.

Slava and I went to a couple of parties our first week back. One was a celebration of the 50th anniversary of Communist rule in China. The celebrants were the twenty or so people in the Russians-born-in-China Club. Since every single one of them, like Slava, had suffered under Communist rule when they came to the Soviet Union, they weren't really interested in cheering for Communism. The anniversary just happened to be an excuse for a party -- the first I've attended in Russia that was pot luck style. My contribution was stuffed peppers. I buy red peppers by the binful in the fall because they're so cheap -- about 20 cents a pound. Green peppers are the same price, and I get just a few of them for color contrast. Alas, in a few weeks the only vegetables that will be available will be root veggies and cabbage.

The second party we attended was hosted by the accounting firm which Slava has had do auditing. It was the firm's fifth anniversary, and they threw a party for their clients. It was an elegant "forchette," which is something like an American cocktail party, but in Russia the food at such an occasion is always French style -- lots of highly decorated canapes, puff pastry shells, etc. Guests are expected to bring bouquets of flowers and a gift that is presented publicly after a short speech. Because there were many guests, there were many speeches, mostly in the form of toasts. A small combo played American pop music throughout the evening, interrupted by two sets of Russian folk songs by a trio in traditional dress.

Last weekend we went to our dacha and inspected the greenhouse that Alexander Konstantinovich had constructed this summer. We had another small party to celebrate the birthday of Alexander's wife, Alla Nikolaievna. Slava and I had several small gifts for her, the most appreciated one being a bottle of Centrum vitamins. Centrum is a brand name that is known here and is regarded as totally unaffordable, so a bottle of that is a useful luxury that can be given to any man, woman, or child.

There's no shortage of Vitamin A in the Russian diet because carrots may appear on the menu for breakfast, lunch, or dinner. Cabbage, which is eaten daily, is a source of Vitamin C. Beets must have something good in them, but I don't know what -- I don't think it's Vitamin B.

We divided up the harvest in thirds, as usual -- one-third for Alexander and Alla, who do almost all of the work; one-third for Slava and me, because we own the dacha, and one-third for Dima and Julia, our joint children-in-law. This year I pleaded with Slava to take less than our allotment, for several good reasons. Publicly I pointed out that we're going to be gone for much of the winter, so we didn't need so much food. My private reason is that I always feel overwhelmed by the canning and preserving of so many veggies. Well, Alexander insisted that we take our share, and this year we have the following:
20 lbs of squash, 2 large grocery bags of carrots, a heavy burlap bag of potatoes, a kilogram of giant radishes, 60 beets, 45 heads of garlic, and more cabbages than I want to make into sauerkraut.

In addition to the above, we've loaded up on another couple of staples. Alla got us 3 liters of honey at a market (we supplied the 3-qt. jar), and Slava got us 10 kilograms (22 lbs) of his favorite berry, brusnika. Brusnika berries are in the cranberry family, but they're midget sized, and edible without cooking. We've frozen some, and the rest are in the refrigerator, to be taken out 8 oz. at a time, crushed, and then mixed with sugar, to be eaten by spoonfuls with a cup of tea.

So, the harvest is in, Indian summer is over, and in Russia we're preparing for yet another winter.