Shake Your Bosom!

Me, B, Y, L

Yesterday afternoon B, Y, G, M, and I trekked out to Dobroye (suburb of Vladimir) to visit L. It takes about 30 minutes to make it out there by bus, which would have been substantially more comfortable had the bus been heated. But what can one do? Anyway, it was an absurdly fun and silly afternoon and evening. At some point, we all began practicing belly-dancing. Now, any of you who might remember my one abortive attempt at post-early-childhood dancing (think back to that embarrassing tutu incident during my senior year of high school) will know that dancing is not exactly my strong suit, but we were being giggly and silly, and we weren't exactly dancing, per say. (I should insert here that L takes belly dancing lessons, and that B - who is a kick-ass swing dancer - has taken a couple of belly-dancing lessons herself.) L and B were attempting to teach me and Y how to do a shoulder shimmy, the goal of which, as far as I can tell, is to make one's boobs shake back and forth. I think this is probably a lost cause with me, no matter how much my shoulders shimmy, and when you add in my lack of coordination, it simply becomes hysterical. We had a lot of fun. And G and M were pretty amused. The whole trying-to-shoulder-shimmy is kind of addictive (I found myself trying to do it in front of the mirror this morning - I'm glad Nina M. didn't catch me!), not to mention it works your stomach muscles tremendously. We are all seriously contemplating taking Saturday morning belly-dancing lessons.

In addition to making total asses of our selves (or, should I say, making total boobs of ourselves?) we dined on some lovely plov and blini (like crepes) stuffed with a yummy meat-and-potatoes mix, and watched Spirited Away, a beautiful if somewhat confusing piece of Japanimation that I would love to watch again...

When we left L's it was after 10pm, and cold, windy and snowing. B and I ended up on a different bus than the rest of the gang, and (like the bus we rode on our way out to Dobroye) it was unheated. These unheated busses are the perfect breeding ground for a thick coating of ice on the inside of the windows. This means that if you're way the hell out in Dobroye, where you've only been a small handful of times, you spend the bulk of your busride home wondering where the hell you are. Luckily, Brooke and I made it to my busstop with no problems other than the fact that my feet were frozen blocks of ice by the time I got off the bus. I waited with B for her marshrutka (mini-bus-taxi) to arrive, then all but ran into my apartment, and spent about ten minutes with my ice-block feet on the heater waiting to regain sensation.

The heat in average Russian apartments is supplied by the state. In normal winter temps (0 to -10C) this is great: the apartment is always warm and toasty and you don't have to worry about turning down the heat to save money because it's free. Of course, the state supplied heat is supplied at the same rate from the point at which they turn it on to the point at which they turn it off. When they first put it on, it was still fairly warm, and we all had our windows open and were sleeping naked atop the covers. And now that it's so utterly frigid out we have no means of cranking it up to a decent temp. I'd say it's around 55F inside my apartment. L's lucky, living out in Dobroye: she's near to the hot-water plants (these things that look like nuclear reactors, but which are really giant boilers designed to heat the water that will then be pumped into State operated radiators across the city). According to Nina M, residents of Dobroye are the warmest right now, because the water is the hottest when it hits their apartments. But, I said I was going to stop bitching. After all, the AH (being an American home after all) has its own heaters, and it's nice and toasty in here.