Day 24 ~ American Style Barbecue

26. July ~ American Style Cookout

So, it was a late morning. Magda left at 7. The rest of us slept until like 10:30. Masha left, I had some tea and Jim joined me. Eventually he left and then I got ready. Masha ended up coming back because Lena had something to do so she had to get ready at my house.

Today everyone was invited to a barbecue at a man named Sean’s house. Don knows Sean because his hosts’ neighbor had done some remodeling on Sean’s house. Sean is an older man who has lived in Novgorod for about 10 years. He is originally from the US.

Sean works with relations between American and Russian universities and hosts people to stay at his house. He also has a website: US-Russiannurses.com

Anyways, Sean planned on having an American Barbecue for all of us and some of our hosts. We had told Steve to meet Masha and I at my house and then we would all go together. Well, we gave Steve direction to my house, but he got lost again, got off at the wrong bus stop. He ended up meeting everyone across the walking bridge near Yaraslov court. Anyways, this made Masha and I a bit late to the party because we were waiting around trying to find Steve, haha.

We joke that the moto of the trip is: Where is Adrian, Where is Steve? Ironically enough, their host parents are best friends and they live next to each other.
Anyways, Masha and I made our way to Yaraslov court. When we were walking through Kremlin park, there were people everywhere. You see small children playing here and there and many families enjoying themselves. I’ve noticed that on the weekends and at night many families are out together walking. Thinking about it, the long summer nights I am sure come and go quickly so people utilize it to the fullest extent. I wonder what people do in winter when it’s dark most of the day.

Another thing, there are so many small children and babies. Everywhere you go you look and see someone pushing a stroller or a small toddler rushing to keep up with their parents. Additionally, many kids are all out together playing on playgrounds or what have you without their parents around. I often see young kids, probably as young as 6 or 7 that will get on a bus by themselves, or riding their bikes up and down the street. It is certainly a big difference from here and home. Certainly this is not the norm, nor could it be.

Eventually Don met us so we could find out way from there to Sean’s house. He lives on the outskirts it seems, surrounded by small cottage like houses. His house was a really pretty blue cottage house. When I arrived a got a quick tour of the inside. It was the nicest house I’ve seen in Novgorod. There was wood floors, walls, and ceilings. Almost everything was made of exposed wood, seemed like a log cabin in a way. The bathroom was larger than most Russian bathrooms. The wall of the bathroom was all mirrors with big blue tiles on the floor. The bathroom and toilet were pretty modern and new looking compared to what I’ve seen elsewhere. You could definitely tell that the person living here was a foreigner or had a lot of money. I don’t know enough about Sean to make a judgment, but his house was very impressive. He has many traditional Russian decorations and items around the house that looked quite expensive. It was very nice.

Sean showed Masha and I a matroska doll that he has custom made in Moscow (the birthplace of Matroshka dolls). He has designed what he wanted it to look like and an artist made it for him. There was a doll for each of his parents and his brother, really neat!

Outside he had a deck and a small yard. A deck is something else that really isn’t popular in Russia. Sean had devised a tournament with 8 teams of two. Everyone drew numbers out of a hat to find their partner. Masha and I ended up being partners ironically. In the tournament we played darts, horseshoes, boggle, uno, and badminton. Sean had it all figured out and would determine the winners based on who won each round.

Along with our group there were a few other people there that we’d never seen before. This included the son of Don’s hosts, Valya, a young lady named Oskana, a young man named Yuriy, and Adrian’s host brother Zach. Fransesca’s host also joined the party. There were almost 20 people here!

It was a lot of fun, Masha and I didn’t win any rounds, so we got last place, but it was nice anyways. I haven’t played badminton since high school but after a little bit I was playing decent. It was a lot of fun to play that again. I am bad at darts, and not that great at horseshoes, but I actually got one right around the steak! Uno and boggle were also fun, I lost at Uno because I kept getting pick up four our two here and there so it really was impossible to win! I haven’t played boggle in ages and so I was rusty and that. Adrian kicked everyone’s butt and had some high scores in the 90s and 100s.

While waiting around I played some casual games of Badminton and together Yuriy and I played against Matt and Oksana and we lost 16-21, but 16 was a pretty good score in my opinion. Yuriy and I were really happy. Then we went and played against Masha and Steve and won 5-4 only because someone else had to play for the tournament so our game was ended abruptly. All in all, it was a lot of fun!

There was a lot of snack food and Don’s hosts brought a bunch of food and cooked. For dinner we had kebobs made of meat with onions with bread, tomatoes, cucumbers, and dill. It was very good! The meat was similar to steak, you can tell this was an American style cookout and get together. These kebobs in Russian are pronounced “Shoshleek”. They are a popular food here.

During the party I was talking to Yuriy quite a bit. He is 23 and speaks English and Russian and some Spanish as well. He is going to school to be a doctor and says he will be finished in two years. We spent some time talking about health care and such between Russia and America. Apparently doctors in Russia are paid less than Nurses and that people who don’t go to college at all and just have a random job and work their way up make more money than doctors in Russia. Yuriy says he isn’t sure if he wants to incorporate his language skills with his work for he would earn more money that way. It certainly was interesting.

It made me think about perhaps someday incorporating Russian language with my Nursing job, that is if I ever become fluent again. That would take a long time, but we’ll see. Sean mentioned that he works with US nurses that know Russian and hosts conferences for them to come to Russia and forge communication and relations between Russian and American Nurses. I felt as if it was ironic that this is what Sean does. I go to Russia and coincidentally meet someone who works with nursing and Russian language also. So, it has certainly got me thinking again about how many options there are for Nurses.

I was surprised to learn that Russian doctors do not earn a lot compared to nurses and other professions. Yuriy mentioned that in some ways going to the university isn’t the best option when you can make more money by just getting an office job and working your way up, or doing other things.

After the party at Sean’s, Don’s host Sasha and his wife and son invited us all over to their house to hang out some more. Not everyone went, but most of the guys along with Masha and I went. There is a small pavilion in their backyard and a small grill. Sasha grilled some hotdogs (which were more like kielbasa) and we had some chips and bread with it. The guys bought some beer and we were all sitting around talking.

It was fun. Sasha brought out small candles and three plastic balls that change colors. Yuriy and I spent a lot of time finding ways to take interesting pictures. It was fun! I am easily amused by colors and so these things were lots of fun. We were occupied with those for most of the evening. Yuriy is a pretty fun person, speaks good English and he and Steve even sang some songs in Spanish. Although, it was funny, Steve was speaking half Russian and Spanish, it was entertaining.
Overall it was a great night. We had to call another taxi to get home. Steve told the guy the wrong address to his place so it was an adventure. Eventually he just got out with Masha and then she told him how to get home. The driver wasn’t sure I knew where I was going, and when I told him I was fine he didn’t believe me. I quickly walked to the door and got inside because I could hear him behind me getting out of the car. I think he thought that I had a friend who lived here and I didn’t have a key myself and was concerned about me being able to get inside. Novgorod Taxi services sure are entertaining in some way or another.

It sure is nice to have casual get togethers and such! I almost forgot about American cookouts and get togethers in the summer. Plus, meeting new friends is always nice!

Last week of school coming up, yay!
Love,
Sasha



Photo Link : American Style Barbecue