haircut, part 2

Isaac's last haircut, back in February, did not turn out as well as could be desired. Now, in June, though everyone was glad that it had grown out well enough, his hair was starting to get long. My parents agreed that Isaac was due for another cut. This time, though, my mom was not going to let my dad and his scissors get anywhere near Isaac. She would do it, she said, and I could help.

I was fine with this. I have assisted in a lot of haircuts over the years. Mainly holding the head while my mom runs over it with clippers, as we laugh hysterically and the poor child squirms and cries. But it usually turns out fine. I thought this would happen again, until I found out that there were no clippers. We were expected to do this in the bathtub, with an autistic, rambunctious child, and only a pair of scissors. No. Way. I backed out of that as fast as possible, and ten minutes later, my dad and a couple sisters and I were walking to the haircutting salon with Isaac in tow.

This time, all went well. He still squirmed:
and it took two people to hold him down:
but he didn't cry. There were no bald spots, no crying mother or Isaac (yes, he also cried when he saw the result last time, and wore a hat around for at least a week), and a pretty good haircut. He looks very cute now.

the Before shot:
And After:
Quite a bit gone. And all in all, not a bad cut. He seems to agree, minutes later:
*bonus shot: four Schupacks all wearing flip-flops. A family trait. We probably have over 20 pairs between the 9 of us:

local wildlife

A few days before I came, a litter of kittens appeared in the courtyard outside. Apparently this is not the first litter in recent weeks. The first ones either grew up and left or met with more unfortunate ends. These little kittens have been adopted by all the neighbor girls, and are regularly fed milk or some sort of food, and given lots of attention. However, of the four that started, only one remains. One was run over by a car, and two seem to have run off. At least I think this is how the story goes.

Anyway, Carrie has taken quite a liking to the remaining cat, and spends a lot of her time with it. I took the camera out there to get some pictures. Here is her transporting it to a better location for a picture:
When we protested the way she was carrying it, she defensively pointed out that that's the way the mother cat carries her kittens.

Here she is up close:
Then the other sisters got in on the action as well:
A pretty cute kitten, I will admit. Cute sisters, too.

However, that is not the only creaturely distraction that this fine city has to offer. It also boasts about seven hundred thousand stray dogs. Disgusting stray dogs. They usually reside in the most public places, namely bazaars. They are often fairly fat, and incredibly mangy and dirty. Often flies hang around them. I rarely see these dogs moving. Instead, they tend to be sprawled out somewhere in the shade, sleeping. So revolting. Here is a sampling, from the bus stop we were at on the way back from the bazaar yesterday:
It's hard to convey photographically, or even with words, the effect, both psychological and aesthetic, that these animals have on me and the appearance of the city. But anyway.

To keep you from having bad dreams, or whatever else all of this may provoke in you, I offer one more picture of Cute Carrie and the Cat:

as promised

Some pictures from the weekend trip to Kislovodsk with my dad. To get there, we took a marshrutka (van-sized bus) across the city to the bus station. There we got another one to Pyatigorsk, a city about an hour and a half away. Once there, we took a tram (bus that runs on tracks) across Pyatigorsk to the train station. Pyatigorsk in Russian means Five Mountains, because the city is surrounded by....five hills! amazing. At the train station we got on an elektrichka, which is a train/trolley - it is on train tracks, attached to a wire on top. Forty minutes on this took us to our destination not far from Kislovodsk.

It's really pretty out there, and the weather was perfect:
The roads are not so perfect, but still fairly picturesque:
On the way back to the elektrichka the next day:
We went to a river nearby:
We also took a bus into Kislovodsk itself. I really liked this city. The downtown area is really beautiful - hilly; wooded; steep, narrow roads; lots of people...it felt very European, especially for Russia.

The main boulevard:
I liked the balconies hanging out into the street:
Above the door it says "Главные Нарзанные Ванны," which means "Main Narzan (?) Baths":
Kislovodsk and several neighboring towns are built around mineral springs. You can go in this place, pay two roubles and receive a plastic cup. Then you go around to the different taps and taste the various local mineral waters. Which are disgusting. But apparently very good for you. People are sent to Kislovodsk (which means Bitter Water) or nearby (another city is named Mineral Waters - Mineraliye Vody), and prescribed a treatment of water consumption. Who knows. I guess it works for some people. But the sulfurous taste and carbonation were a little too much for me.
No filling up bottles:
We also wandered around in Kislovodsk's beautiful park. They have one of those flower-box-date things, but this one has a built-in clock as well:
Lots of picture-worthy people around, but I was afraid of offending, so I tried to be discreet. This guy was playing great guitar music:
And there were tons of old men playing cards or chess or backgammon:
All in all, an enjoyable trip.

at the park

I was going to upload more pictures tonight, but a faulty program and slow internet connection are limiting me. So, for now it is just pictures of our excursion to the local park.

Here are Carrie and Isaac waiting for the bus to come:
He's quite photogenic, if you can get to the right angle:

Schupack kids on a park bench. Trying to look cool or something:
We rode the ferris wheel, which was cool. Rickety:They are afraid of heights. So scary on top!

The view on a cloudy day. Some nice Soviet-era apartment buildings, some foothills, some clouds. Apparently you can see bigger mountains farther away on a clear day, but I have yet to see them.
Next post will probably be pictures from the visit to Kislovodsk over the weekend. Other than that most of my pictures are just around the house. I have just over two weeks left here. Time is going by pretty quickly.

Last night Russia beat the Netherlands 3-1 in overtime to advance to the Euro2008 semi-finals. Right now Italy is playing Spain. 0-0 at 67 minutes in. It's been fun watching the games here. They come on at 10:30, so by the end of it I'm watching alone in my makeshift bedroom. And this afternoon were the Euro2008 track and field championships. I hadn't realized how I missed all the random European sports that come on here, that I never saw while living in Norman with no TV. I can't wait till the Olympics.
08/08/08!

up late

And it's not even jet lag. I had black tea after dinner and now it's keeping me up. Oops. I've been drinking a lot of tea. Oh, and watching the European Championships in football. The Netherlands beat Romania last night, and Russia beat Sweden just now. Both 2-0. The commentators were ecstatic, of course. Go Motherland.

So, the last few days have been good. Hanging out with the kids, laughing at Isaac's antics, running various errands with the parents as a way of seeing the city, trying to speak more Russian...the usual, you know?

And, of course, taking pictures. Here is Carrie wearing new sunglasses, all set for the trip to the bazaar (outdoor market) with Mom and I:
The bazaar was great. Crowded, hot, noisy, narrow aisles, stall after stall of the same thing, fresh food, disgusting food, all sorts of people and smells and sights...carrying purchases back home, a 15 minute walk away...just like old times.

Selling various brightly-colored salads:
Fresh vegetables:
Nuts, dried fruit, etc:
We ate genuine Uzbek plov. It's better than what I make, of course, though mine has less grease:
Towards the center of the city they have this display which they rearrange every day to show the date. Seems rather labor-intensive to me (with little tangible return on the investment), but I guess nice to look at:
Coming up on the White House. There was a good number of security guards around and in front, so I took this from a ways off. I may try for a better one from across the street:
Saw this one on the side of a building. It says "in this house lived a true son of the Party, Director of the Kabardino-Balkarian Bolsheviks, Betal Kalmykov." I thought it was funny.
Now some shots of the kids. Tall, twelve-year-old Emily and I being goofy:
A lot happening in this one:
Crazy, hyperactive, lovable, autistic, 4-year-old Isaac hamming it up:
I was trying to get one of the two of us and he kissed me. haha. Confused, I think. I'll take it.
Ten-year-old Dina takes one of herself, kitchen-side:
She also got one of Carrie and some neighbor friends:
I don't remember all their names yet, but I'm working on it.

So far things have been good. I'm sleeping on the living room floor (trying not to think of what might be crawling over me at night), reading books, relaxing, and talking with people. Family, neighbor kids, other foreigners, local acquaintances. It's strange how things are different, yet so normal. I'm not experiencing culture shock. It's not weird to be here. But at the same time my life is in the United States, and I'm separated from that. I don't live here, and I don't really belong. I guess that's the weird part.

photos through dirty windows

[Warning: this is very long. Click photos to enlarge.]
Здравствуйте, товарищи! I am here in Russia. Door-to-door, my trip was 58 hours long. For once I kept a trip log, and took pictures along the way, so I'm turning that into a blog post.

At 1pm eastern time I left Princeton and took trains to the Philadelphia airport. The flight to London was late taking off, and was uneventful but for the requisite squawking baby in front of me and old, overweight, belching gentleman beside me. I slept some and we landed late, giving me a layover in Heathrow of less than one hour. Let me just say right here that I have never had a good experience in the LHR airport. Last time I flew internationally through there, my incoming flight was late, I barely made it onto the second one, and my bags didn't make it. Well...That happened again. I sped through the airport, switched terminals and made it to the gate as it was closing, praying my bags made it. I asked as I was boarding and they hadn't made it yet. The next flight was even less notable. I slept more, and had a window seat.
Goodbye, London:

Hello, Moscow:
[not a fair comparison]

We landed in Moscow on time. After getting through customs and not seeing my suitcase at the baggage claim, I found an airport worker and explained the situation. Soon there was a crowd of people who flew from the East Coast through LHR whose bags didn't make it. Hm. They had information on my bag and I was sent to another person. There I answered questions and filled out forms, and the bag was flown here and we picked it up this afternoon, a few hours after I got here on the train.

I found the man from GoToRussia.com holding the sign with my name emblazoned across it, and set off for the train station. He pretty quickly started asking me questions:
- You're English?
- I'm from America but I flew through London.
- Where in America?
- Oklahoma
- Ucklakhoama?
- ...it's near Texas...
He had slipped into the informal "you" from the beginning. We're weaving through traffic, arbitrarily using and not using blinkers. I am surprised to merge onto a 4-land highway with lane markings (which later disappeared for a while, then reappeared, only disturbing traffic patterns a little, but my peace of mind a little more), but then I reason that this is a European capital after all, so shouldn't be surprising. I don't remember the whole conversation, but here are snippets:
- Have you been to Russia before?
- Yeah, I flew through Moscow ten years ago.
- So you would have been pretty little then!...How old are you?
- twenty.
- Are you married?
- Me?! no.
Unfortunately he has no ring on his finger. I sort of wonder why he asked me that. Later he verifies that I need to go the the Kazansky station, and asked when the train was leaving. Not for about two and a half hours.
- You have a lot of time. Do you want me to show you Moscow first?
He has the same smile as when he asked if I was married. I mumbled something about straight to the station.
- Or would it be better to go straight to the station?
- Yes, I think it would be better to go straight to the station, thank you.
He found out that I speak Russian because I lived in Central Asia for eleven years: "So you're basically a Russian!" Well, I wouldn't say that, I answered...

At some point we pass speed limit signs for 100 km/hr. We are easily at 130, flitting around and in front of slower cars. Yikes. He asks what I think of his car, a blue European one. I said I liked it, and he starts talking about it. I understand none of this except when he ends with, "...which is pretty weak, but better than Russian cars."
- Oh...what kind of car is this?
- French.
He asks if I drive in the States (yes), and if I have a car (I did). What kind? A Toyota. I omit the part about it being a 13-year-old, rusty has-been. Especially after he says that Toyotas are good cars. I mean, I guess mine still gets good gas mileage...

We eventually make it to the station. It is good to be back in the former Soviet Union. Somewhere new, out of Oklahoma and the US. There are lots of billboards along the road, some with English writing. An Avon ad with Reese Witherspoon. I wonder if they know who she is. "Reese" in Russian means rice. I had forgotten they paint the bottom yard of tree trunks white to protect the bark from bugs, and now it looks weird and ugly. Russians look the same. I don't feel out of place, but smile to think of how much I must stand out with my blue backpack, OU shirt and multicolored converse shoes. Oh well.

The station:
Here I buy some food and water for the road, struggling to use a new currency. I wander around, buy and eat a popsicle and samsa:
Finally the board shows which track my train is on and I wander down to car six an hour and a half early. They eventually let us on.
The station from outside:
My train:
After switching twice, I make it to a satisfactory compartment with only one other woman in it. One of the moves was to escape sharing a compartment for 36 hours with just one other man, who had already asked me if I was married. Why do I keep getting that question. Here is a typical compartment:We finally get moving around 8. By the way, I must recommend, readers, that you never travel without a watch. This was my first time to travel since taking the watch off last year, and it was bad. On the flights I didn't know what time it was, how late my flight was, or how much time I had in the airport. It was incredibly disconcerting to travel for two nights and a day without a watch in a country where you are not familiar with the sun's patterns. There seems to be a lot of daylight in Russia, especially up north. I went to sleep before dark the first night, probably around 10, and slept until sometime the next afternoon, probably around 2, never waking up for more than 5-10 minutes, usually when the train stopped. I spent the rest of the day reading, writing and thinking.

Towards evening I was back to dozing when uniformed men barged in demanding documents. I handed them over and was subjected to several minutes' loud questioning. Days of traveling and a mere two minutes' wakefulness made the stupid American act very easy, as I struggled to understand them or know how to answer. Apparently I should have had a copy of my letter of invitation. For some reason they gave up without me giving them one, and never came back.

I slept a little more around midnight, but then was awake the rest of the night until the train pulled in at 6:30 am. Cursed jetlag. More reading, writing, watching the dark countryside slide by. It must have gotten light around 4 or 5 am. In the space of 36 hours I ate one granola bar, drank 1.5L of water, and took many pictures through dirty windows.

Russian sunset, second night:

Russian sunrise, not too many hours later:
countryside, not too different from what I left in OK:
Saw this while we were stopped. On the wall it says "RAP STIFLER":
First view of mountains (!!) through a nasty window:
My dad and Emily and Dina met me at the station. It is good to be with the family again. The kids have all grown a lot, but are still the same. Isaac is cheerful and quiet, and warmed up to me quickly. The apartment is very soviet, but I like it. The city is smaller than Almaty, and less modern, but I like it too. I've been around it a little, but will see more soon. Our pastor and his wife came over for breakfast and to meet me. I pulled out my rusty Russian and tried to join conversation. they are great. And all day there was a stream of neighbor girls through our house, introducing themselves to me and playing with my sisters. I guess I'm somewhat of a novelty, being 8-10 years older than them and from America. I'm trying not to disappoint.

One last shot. This is on the side of a building on Lenin Street. Yes, every city in the former Soviet Union still has a Lenin street. Classic.