Russian Dinner
Feb. 11th, 2011 12:49 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
osprey_archerOne of my Russian profs invited us all to dinner at her house, and we had cabbage pie and some sort of Georgian soup and played Russian scrabble (or totally failed to play Russian scrabble) and hung out in the banya in her backyard.
I've never been in a banya before. At first it was about 80 degrees Celsius and all of us Americans were more or less instantly prostrate, while the Belarusian exchange student sprawled across the shelf and murmured that it was entirely too cool. But fear not! The temperature inched up toward 90, and she was pleased, even as the rest of us gasped in the searing air until, in a fit of heat-induced insanity, we raced outside to roll around naked in the snow.
Fun fact: when you run out of a banya into the cold, cold air, your skin mists like a river at dawn.
Also, my professor gave us old tea canisters, tall and thin and decorated with pictures by Waterhouse and Leighton and Alma-Tadema, all of whom I love, because my taste in art is terrible. I wanted to use mine as a postcard receptacle, but alas, it is to narrow, so I suppose I need to come up with another use for it. Any ideas? So far I've come up with pocky holder.
I've never been in a banya before. At first it was about 80 degrees Celsius and all of us Americans were more or less instantly prostrate, while the Belarusian exchange student sprawled across the shelf and murmured that it was entirely too cool. But fear not! The temperature inched up toward 90, and she was pleased, even as the rest of us gasped in the searing air until, in a fit of heat-induced insanity, we raced outside to roll around naked in the snow.
Fun fact: when you run out of a banya into the cold, cold air, your skin mists like a river at dawn.
Also, my professor gave us old tea canisters, tall and thin and decorated with pictures by Waterhouse and Leighton and Alma-Tadema, all of whom I love, because my taste in art is terrible. I wanted to use mine as a postcard receptacle, but alas, it is to narrow, so I suppose I need to come up with another use for it. Any ideas? So far I've come up with pocky holder.
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no subject
Date: 2011-02-11 08:13 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-11 02:54 pm (UTC)Viera-from-Belarus told us that occasionally banyas get up above 100. I would think that you would, well, boil at that temperature, but apparently the Belarusians are made of such stern stuff that a spot of boiling isn't a problem. (She also said you don't stay in long when it gets that hot.)
no subject
Date: 2011-02-11 08:38 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-11 02:56 pm (UTC)I should be able to describe it more specifically, but it was so shockingly cold that I can't remember it with any more precision than that. It's like plunging your hand in a bucket of ice water.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-12 12:00 am (UTC)Your taste in art is clearly awesome.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-12 02:00 am (UTC)Also, I have come up with a title for the Pushing Daisies fic: Five Great Escapes Chuck Never Made. Because it seems to me there is a desire to escape in Chuck - she reads all those books, learns all those languages - and yet she stays home with her aunts till her late thirties, and when Ned brings her back to life she doesn't go have adventures but stays with him. Which is sweet, but somewhat odd.
Just so you know. You've clearly created a monster.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-12 07:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-12 09:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-13 07:19 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-12 09:32 am (UTC)Did it hurt to roll around in the snow, because of the sudden change in temperature?
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Date: 2011-02-12 03:54 pm (UTC)The best moments are right after you scuttle back into the banya and the snow starts melting off you, and the air feels deliciously warm rather than oven-like.
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Date: 2011-02-12 10:08 am (UTC)I am jealous. I want a Russian dinner with Russian friends, followed by a steam in a banya.
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Date: 2011-02-12 09:35 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-12 10:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-12 03:51 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-12 03:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-12 04:04 pm (UTC)