Kazan — summer 2012

All is well in Kazan.

City tour today for CLI students. 14 of the 16 had never been to a mosque before. Very neat.

I'm really proud of this group. They are out exploring and trying their Russian. Not every American has that type of courage.

My cooking skills are improving here. I can now tell when to turn the garlic meat patties simply by smell.

CLI Kazan students today visited the Kazan Kremlin, which includes a visit to the Qul Sharif mosque (stunning) and the Blagoveshchenskiy Cathedral (impressive). We were pleased to be joined by Marina Akins and her family.

I had to laugh. I wore Marina's kids into the ground with walking. From my Russian perspective, we hardly walked at all, only five miles, but the kids were tuckered.

My colleague Marina and her family are in Kazan for a couple of days. Last night they stayed at my place. It's so nice to be in a young family environment. Son Henry is 7, daughter Naomi is 9. Kids are freaking wonderful. I'm always grateful when families share their time with me.

Marina and I observed classes today. The students are doing great. The first year students have only had Russian for nine weeks, but they are already saying things like, “On my days off I hunt ducks” or “I eat soup and bread for breakfast.” One can't always necessarily tell if they are telling the truth, but as long as they are communicating, that really doesn't matter. The second year students are increasing in accuracy in ridiculously complex Russian grammar. I was particularly proud of my student Amanda. Wonderful progress.

Afterwards the family and I went to visit Danila's family, where Flyura fed us all until we couldn't move. She's a great cook. Homemade noodles in the chicken noodle soup, homemade broth, homemade dough in the manty, homemade balish. Marina's family is staying the night there, but I've come back to my apartment. That was a good decision because it turned out that there was a medical issue in our Kiev group that needed to be responded to. I think everything will be fine, but we aren't going to take any chances; the student will go to the doctor in the morning.

Marina's husband Billy is a natural extrovert. It's amazing for me to watch him. He draws energy from human contact. He makes friends practically on every street corner. I'm a natural introvert. After too much human contact I need space to regain my equilibrium. I've rarely seen the difference so clearly demonstrated.

I was snickering to myself yesterday about how very different attitudes towards food can be. When Danila's brother Sasha came home from work, he sat down to eat manty, which for the moment we'll say are like large hemispherical ravioli. He pulled out of the fridge a small plate with a lot of butter on it. He stuck a teaspoon in the butter, came up with a teaspoon sized chunk, combined it with a third of one of the ravioli, and then wolfed down the mess with gusto. He did this for each one of the manty.

Back in the States people would be gasping in horror. Oh, the obesity! Oh, the heart disease! But Sasha at 30 doesn't have an ounce of fat on him. (We hit the banya together a couple weeks ago, and I can guarantee this is true. He is one of only three people I can say I have beaten me with birch branches while naked...)

Danila and his brother and his sister are all as thin as rails, which I'm sure is very much genetic. But it also has to do with portion sizes; Russian portion sizes are more reasonable than American. And it has to do with walking... they walk a lot more than Americans.

I currently buy the line of thought that says that high cholesterol issues have nothing to do with fat and eveything to do with carbohydrates, so once I return to the States, I'm definitely returning to the mostly meat and fat diet, and no carbs outside of green leafy vegetables.

Manty

Last night Marina and her family spent with the Osipovs. This evening they have come back. So what snacks have I laid out on the table for their arrival? Here is the short version.

From the top going counterclockwise:

1. Pistachios from Arizona
2. Mazapan (peanut marzipan) wafers from Mexico
3. Sunflower seed halva from Russia
4. Red-white-green Mexican flag coconut candy from Mexico
5. Dates
6. Cashews
7. Bananas
8. Chocolate potatoes
9. Candy: Миша косолапый (Pigeon-Toed Bear, which is a wafer cookie covered in a chocolate) and Сливочная (Buttery, a melt-in your mouth caramel, much less chewy than the Brach's version)

This ignores the following bits that were eaten before the picture was taken:

• Two types of white cheese from the Ukraine
• Fresh herring
• Pastrami with marvelous fat
• Beef with marvelous fat
• Brown bread
• Garnishes: hot Chinese mustard, hot horseradish, Adzhika (red pepper and garlic spread)
• Tea
• Coffee
• Coca-cola
• Cold water (very non-Russian)
• Dried apricots