All downhill after this

Even more than Christmas, this is the day I dream about: once we’re past it, there’s promise of longer days. It was like this in North Dakota, and I’m not sure if it was better or worse there, but it’s just super bleak when you can get up, hit the treadmill for a solid hour, shower, eat breakfast and check email – and it’s still not even close to sunrise.

Today, the sun rose at 9:26 and will set at 4:49. I can’t confirm that because it’s also 30 and cloudy all day, but that’s a step up from the last day I checked, when it was 28 and cloudy all day.  And what’s really sad to a native Floridian is that at this point, 30 – or even 28 – as downright balmy, at least if it’s not humid and snowing.

At the chocolate factory store

 So, like when I lived in Minot, I view it as once I make it through the winter solstice, I can make it through winter. Yeah, it only gets more and more cold after this, but at least the days get longer. Right now, I commute to work in the dark both ways. It’s just bleak.

 I’m intent on getting my steps in and an easy, but sometimes bitterly cold, way to do this is by walking home by the river, which I love. I normally take a one-hour walk home if it’s not too bad, but one day recently I took the really long way, which is an hour and a half. That was a mistake because not only was it extremely dark and cold but also because the stretch after Gorky park had a layer of ice on the walkway. This is not a detriment to Belarusians; they hustle right by me. But I am terrified of slipping and falling, and both my lack of balance and the residual knot on my head from last year’s fall and subsequent concussion remind me I am not as sure-footed as everyone else.

October Square near my house.
This was at 7:45 a.m. on my way to work.

This December 21 feels like more of a milestone than the last one because it’ll be my last one in Minsk. I love Minsk but man, it’s dark in the fall. I cannot understand how people in Scandinavia, Alaska and Siberia must feel. So far this year, I haven’t had to drag out my happy lamp – starting the day with 2 miles on the treadmill gets the endorphins going – but as lovely as sundown at 10 p.m. is in June, it is not worth the tradeoff. I wake up in the middle of the night and have absolutely no feel as to what time it is. Could be 1 a.m.; could be 5 a.m. This morning, I managed to sleep late and woke up at 7:50 a.m. but I seriously thought it was the middle of the night. Nope. By that time in summer, I would have 7k steps and would still be walking.

But I’m doing the best I can still. Last week, even after doing four miles on the treadmill, I walked down to the chocolate factory to buy my Secret Santa gift. There’s a store essentially right across the street from my apartment, but I like the factory store better because I can just reach in and get how much I want instead of trying to explain to someone what I need – my Russian is terrible. Plus, I don’t want half a kilo of any given candy; I want two pieces of this, two pieces of that, etc. And man, it was the place to be, which make me want to speed through there. I’d been there a couple times before but there were quite a few people in there. Everyone was wearing masks – they’re finally enforcing that here – but basically it was just people on top of people and I hate that. Plus, I bought these awesome overpants that I wear outside – gamechanger! – and although they make walking even an hour and a half by the river totally bearable, they turn into thigh saunas when I am inside. I went to the big market a few weekends ago and couldn’t have been inside 10 minutes but I felt sweat running down my legs as I crammed my cartons of eggs into my bag. Great for the outdoors, but miserable indoors.

I'm a cliché

After spending my R&R in America, I came back to COVID raging and a required-for-work two-week self-quarantine. I wasn’t forbidden to go to the store or anything but couldn’t go into the office. For me, this may have well of meant no human contact because I can’t communicate with anyone else. 

To counter it and to do something productive, I signed up for an online class, and in participating in it, became a cliché. Yes, I gave a presentation while wearing a bathrobe.

The first week of working from home was brutal due to the class, which was 5 p.m. to midnight my time, which fell, theoretically, 7.5 hours into my normal workday. This was especially nightmarish on Tuesday when, due to local time zones elsewhere, I also had a 4:30 a.m. webinar.

These are the times when I am really glad I don’t use the camera on my laptop, because no one needs to see me straight out of bed (or even in bed) while wearing a “Peace Corps – We Run the World” jogging tank top.

Since the class was a solid eight hours, I didn’t mind if I took it easy during the day’s work, so suffering from both jet lag and something I’m fairly confident was(/is) a cold, I alternated checking emails with crashing on the sofa and watching “Schitt’s Creek.”

This, as many now know, is an awesome show that ran on the CBC in Canada, home of Hockey Night in Canada. (It never occurred to me they did other programming.) The episodes during its six-season run were under 25 minutes each, so it was fairly easy to crash and watch one and somehow, a mere two hours later, have completed half a season’s worth.

“Schitt’s Creek,” for those who don’t know, is the story of a family that loses its money and relocates into a small town the patriarch bought as a gag gift for his adult son. The actors who portray the father and son are real-life father and son and the mom is the Beetlejuice/Home Alone mom. There’s also a daughter and several other main characters. It’s all Canada nice; I was struck that the socialite daughter, who’s probably in her 20s, said please and thank you – something that would not ordinarily be written into most shows. Mostly I liked the fact that it went somewhere – there was a definite progression and growth of the characters. You don’t see that much in TV, and that made it a reason show. (Looking at you, Conners.) The son, who was pretty flamboyant, reminded me very much of a roommate I had in Detroit, who was one of the best roommates I’ve ever had.

Even including work and the class, completing that show was probably the most productive part of that first week back. I was just exhausted, even though I still walked every day. I just couldn’t get out of bed.

We’re in the crappy part of the year where the sun doesn’t show itself much. If it comes out at all, it’s not until after 9 a.m. and then it is gone by 5 p.m. It’s just bleak, but at least as of today I tell myself the days will start getting longer soon. (Countdown: 20 days!)

By the weekend of week 1, I decided that I could leave the house and took a long walk on Saturday, I think it was. Even hit a grocery store, but I had previously decided to do most shopping on Thanksgiving, after my massage. (Remember: it was self-quarantine, and I wore a mask the whole time.)

Shopping on Thanksgiving was fine here; obviously it’s not a holiday. But I was struck by two things: there appears to be no spinach in Minsk right now and, for some reason, there were Black Friday sales. Really? Black Friday is an American thing. How have we infected other countries with our commercialism?

Thanksgiving itself, the food part, as a sad little affair. I had decided to splurge and go to TGI Friday’s to get American food, but when I looked online at the menu, I saw that Tuesday is 2-for-1 burger day, so it seemed like if I got a burger it should be that day, and I saw the chicken – the closest I can get to turkey right now – came with sides of mashed potatoes and broccoli. Well, I make good mashed potatoes and have broccoli (but no spinach), so I just couldn’t justify an overpriced meal, especially at a dine-in restaurant during COVID. And why would I take chicken, broccoli and mashed potatoes home when I had chicken, mashed potatoes and broccoli at home?

In the end, it was tasty but still quite sad. I miss people. I can’t say I miss wearing a bra, but I miss people.

Belarus tractors ... so sexy!

Couple of weeks ago, I was out walking and passed by a display of a tractor show. I had been on my way to an event when I passed it and was running late, so I couldn’t stop and get photos, but after the event ended, I went back again for a closer look. Why, well, like #PaulOverstreet points out, tractors are sexy!

Tractors are a big deal in Minsk and Belarus; there’s a factory here: Minsk Tractor Works.  As my Russian skills are … lacking, I don’t really know if the exhibition was specifically for that factory or not, but I was totally sucked into the show, which, fortunately, was outside so I could wander around without feeling like I was risking COVID, although I did wear a mask.

Here’s a bit from their site:

Minsk tractor works was founded on May 29, 1946. Today the works, which employs more than 16000 people, has turned into one of the largest manufacturers of agricultural machinery not only in CIS countries, but also worldwide. And the famous trademark “Belarus” is of great value to us — not only commercial, but also to a certain extent patriotic.

Unfortunately for my photo ops, I wasn’t the only one sucked into it I think every little boy under the age of 5 was there with his mom or dad. I saw a few little girls, but it there were mostly boys interfering cheerfully with my attempts to take pictures without anyone in them. (And yes, I would have totally taken a turn at the wheel myself had I had the chance, but it seemed kinda mean to shove the little boys out of my way.)

According to the one tractor’s paint job, it was the 75^th anniversary of something, but I’m not entirely sure of what since the company was founded in 1946. But it was really cook to browse around and see the old-timey farm equipment, which went beyond just tractors. 

Although Minsk is a European capital, the tractors are prominent here. The actual factory is in the area somewhere – the workers went on strike in protest of the elections at one point – and tractors are seen frequently on the streets. I can’t help but wonder if once in awhile in Paris or Madrid people see tractors in the middle of town, but we sure do here.

I see them outside my window. The photo of the orange one was taken outside my window, and today another one chugged by. At this point, I’m getting used to it but the first time it happened, I had been on the phone and was so surprised I think I broke my friend’s eardrum. I’m not sure how often people get a view of a KGB building and a tractor in one glance.

White, red, white

Today’s the day that the Belarus opposition, whom all but the current president recognize as having won the August 9 elections by collecting at least 60 percent of the vote, set as the day the current president resign from office. The current president, who is no longer considered president by the overwhelming majority of Belarusians and … well, pretty much most people, didn’t resign. No surprise there. He’s held onto power for 26 years – “Europe’s Last Dictator”—and claims to have won 80 percent of the vote.

Deadline time has come and gone, so we’ll see what happens next. The opposition leader, who is exiled in Lithuania, has called for strikes. What that means, I don’t know, but I’m staying by my phone in case we have any alerts of anything.

 here’s no expectation of violence, but it could be that people don’t go into work tomorrow and continue to protest. (NOTE: reiterating again that “protests” here equate people walking along the sidewalks with flowers. These are not violent protests whatsoever.) I may not have internet and there could be police standing around tomorrow.

They do that every weekend and today I realized I’ve become somewhat immune to it. I walk early on the weekends to be in by the 2 p.m. protest start – Saturdays there are women’s marches and then the general ones are on Sunday – to walk. This morning I’d walked by several of the pro-government trucks that carry the enforcers before realizing they were there. I guess it’s just a given that the squares will be blocked off and there will be uniformed thugs every so many meters. I just walk right by them.

The pro-government buses are distinguished by the Belarusian flags. The pro-opposition protestors have adopted the “white, red, white” flag. It was the official flag when Belarus was declared a republic in 1918. The whole republic thing didn’t last long, but the flag re-emerged after the fall of the USSR. At this point, it basically means “not Lukashenka.”

It’s everywhere, too. Once you realize what to look for, you see white-red-white all over. People very subtle intertwine it sometimes, but often it’s boldly displayed. In those cases, the pro-government gets out really quick to paint it over or remove it.

Still, white-red-white persists. I have no idea where people buy red and white umbrellas, but I see people using them every day. (It rains here as much as it does in London.) The funny thing is, once you start looking you can find the pattern in lots of weird places. You know the road barricades that normally come in orange in America? They come in both red and white here, and normally they alternate colors. I found it funny that in the construction across from the sitting president’s palace, there is a half-kilometer stretch of white-red-white-red-white barricades.

Red and white ribbons hang from trees; rogue graffiti artists spray paint red stripes on the signs featuring white-painted silhouettes that mark which sidewalk lane is for walking and which is for bikers. (The school crossing sign, which has a big person walking a little person, can be found with a police stick added to the big person, giving the illusion of that one beating down the little one. I haven’t seen one of those but have seen them in the press.)

 I snap photos of all I run into and am constantly surprised by the creativity – and the ballsiness. Of the three pictures in this post, the flag – I couldn’t rotate it on the blogspot software – was on a walk by the river and was painted over fairly quickly.

The series of planters have been covered up as well; they are off the beaten path and lasted a little longer. They’re in the courtyard area of my apartment building.

The big-ass flag wasn’t near my house; a colleague saw it as he set out on a bike ride; it was gone by the time he came back. Word had it that firemen were dispatched to take it down; the fireman who wound up with it tossed it off to a protester, who ran off with it. Maybe we’ll see it again. If not that, I’m sure there will be plenty more.

No idea how this is going to turn out, but it really is fascinating witnessing a revolution.

Up, up and away

Weekends have been fairly boring for awhile. The days are getting a lot shorter, the sun goes missing, rain threatens and it’s normally bleak looking outside. Summer is definitely gone and the prelude to winter that’s fall is kind of depressing.

And then there are still protests, meaning I really can’t exit my apartment courtyard after, say 1 p.m. The protests are peaceful but I never know where they are going to be. Saturday’s protests are women’s marches, which means today I can peek out the window and see women wearing white-red-white scarves or carrying white-red-white umbrellas out for a walk. Occasionally, a driver will go by and lay on the horn, but for the most part, I see women carrying flowers, which are a symbol of protest.

There’s no telling when – or how – this is going to end, but it seems like it’s going to go on for awhile. The president here inaugurated himself a couple of weeks ago, prompting weekday protests in addition to the weekend ones, but nothing is resolved. Belarus un-invited several EU countries’ ambassadors, leading a couple of others to depart in solidarity.

Meanwhile, we’re still without an ambassador. There’s one lined up but still has to be confirmed by the Senate, and, let’s face it, as much as we need an ambassador here, there are more pressing domestic issues. At this point, no one expects her to arrive until mid-November at the earliest.

That thwarted my hopes of taking off the first two weeks in December. I had no place to go, but if I don’t use just over a week of annual leave, I will lose it and I don’t want to that happen. Considering we’re supposed to “quarantine” where we go, I figured I’d just have to be gone two weeks. I have a virtual class planned for the third week in December, so taking off the first two seemed reasonable.

Now, though, knowing we *might* get an ambassador soon after, I can’t count on that. My additional wrinkle is that so long as the ambassador doesn’t have an assistant, I will fill in. Essentially, I’m pretty much counting on not going anywhere from the time she arrives – whenever that might be – for at least a month after and possibly longer. I’m perfectly fine with that; it’s just that I don’t want to lose my week of vacation.

Still, knowing I’m trapped here makes me kind of want to get out, so it was a relief when we got a TDYer who came to post by car. She hoped to explore a bit on weekends and I offered to tag along. (So considerate, I know.)

We’re limited in range because of the time; she needed to be back by 2 p.m. or something, so I got on Viator and poked around for a place to go and came up with a little outdoor museum that’s only a half-hour from the central part of the city, if that. IT’s called the Belarusian State Museum of Folk Architecture and Rural life, and it mainly consisted of wood buildings depicting life in the late 1800s in Belarus. I love stuff like that, and it was a non-crowded area in which to walk around.

They had little homes and buildings set up to show what life was like throughout the country during the late 19^th and early 20^th century, including a little tavern, a couple windmills, a church and a school.

Just as we were getting ready to turn into the place, Colleague saw an ultralight flying around, and we thought, wow, that’s pretty cool; I wonder where they take off from. Immediately upon entering the museum, we discovered it: right there.

My Russian isn’t good enough to query about it, but Colleague discovered it only cost about $20 for a 10-minute ride and asked if I wanted to do it. She said she didn’t because she’d been up in a little plane and had gotten sick.

Me? YES. Absolutely.

My only hesitation is that it was chilly and a bit overcast, but the place had this giant jacket for me to borrow so I tossed it on over my LL Bean barn coat. (Upon return, I learned I could have borrowed snow pants, too, and should have – it was COLD.)

Oh, it was so much fun. All we did was a giant circle but it was beautiful. I thought I’d be able to take photos, but they – fortunately – also loaned me some gloves in Shaquille O’Neal’s size. Trying to take a photo would have put either the phone at risk due to clumsiness or my fingers from frostbite, so I just took it in. There was one shot I regretted missing – an overhead (obviously) view Belarusian tractor working a field – but other than that, it was mostly just pretty landscape. Seeing the little open-air museum from the air gave me a good perspective of how big it was, too.

If you’d have asked me on Friday what I would do this morning, that would have been a blip on the conscious-o-meter, but boy, it was fun.

Dog gone

 Well, I’m dogless again, and it’s going to stay that way. Shelby isn’t in America yet, but she’s going to catch a ride with a colleague on October 1. The colleague covers Belarus but lives in Vilnius and last week he made his last trip here and took Shelby back. It was pretty hectic down the line to get her ready but we did and she’s gone. At the minute, she has a temporary stepbrother and they’re having a ball.

I miss her but there’s just no way I can get a dog in this lifestyle. Shelby’s mom is paying close to $1k to get her back to America and let’s face it, I’m too cheap for that.

She left me on a Thursday and that night I washed the blanket I kept in the window for her and then Friday I spent several hours cleaning the rug she’d been sick on the previous week. It looks perfectly fine now, but I’m not going to eat off of it, that’s for sure.

And I miss her. For two days, I kept looking for her and it took longer than that to remember I shouldn’t leave a spoonful of food to mix with her kibble. Today I dropped popcorn on the floor and looked around for the canine Hoover before I realized I’d have to pick it up.

But as a result of not having a four-legged dependent, I can take longer and farther walks than I did before. Yeah, I could have technically done them with her but not without carrying her backpack with water and bowls, plus I make better time without her because I don’t stop and sniff every nine inches.

Last Sunday, I took 20k steps before 1 p.m. I went up the river from my house all the way to Victory Park, which is much farther than I’ve been so far, at least on foot. I found a little island in the river that boasted of being a good bird-watching spot. I didn’t see any birds, but I didn’t see any other humans, either. It was entirely peaceful and I’d totally do that walk again, although I’d pack my own water bottle. I was gone much longer than I anticipated.

When I popped back up on the main road, I realized I was about out book fair had been way back when people were allowed to go out in public without masks.  At that point, I decided I’d hit a grocery store and grab a candy bar and then head back, but when I followed the directions from the phone to the grocery store, I found it wasn’t open that day. I wasn’t the only one trying to get in, so I think it might have been a protest game-day decision to close.

At that point, though, I was tired but had talked myself into a candy bar, which at that point I felt I deserved. I headed home by way of another grocery store and got luckier when I ran into a different store that worked out. It had some of the really good Ukrainian chocolate (Roshen) and I got some frozen Thai veggies to mix with my rice at lunch.

So life is fairly boring without a dog, but I’ll adjust. The weather is changing – already – and I am honestly glad to not be walking her at 6:30 in the morning. It’s already pretty chilly outside and I do not look forward to winter.

With Shelby, I was easily able to get in 10k steps a day, but now that’s a challenge. Fortunately, I now have a hand-me-down treadmill and have finished out evenings trying to get in a little workout before bed, which sometimes means walking at a brisk pace in my PJs and slipper feet. I’m vowing to start running again but that doesn’t sound like the best of ideas at put-up-ot-shut-up time. Walking is so much easier, and since it appears the Minsk half-marathon was canceled this year – it was supposed to be last Sunday ... there’s no incentive.

But walking is something I’m pretty faithful to and it’s certainly helped me keep off the COVID-15.Protests continue but the government is shutting down many of the areas where people protest so they’re not walking by my window anymore. I do, however, see various types of trucks and vans parked outside my window on Sundays, where the “OMON” and other enforcers hang out.

People are still being rounded up and detained, but I no longer have a front-row seat for it. I’m not sure how to feel about that.

It's fairly easy to see how Belarusians still feel, though. See the photo taken of a cartoonist's rendition of the "OMAN" enforcers. I saw it on the sidewalk on my way to work one morning this past week. It was thoroughly covered by the time I went home.

Dog days of summer

 

 

 

Summer is winding down buy my loaner canine and I are out making the most of the days that are left, covering at least 10k steps a day but usually more. On weekends, we tend to hit 10k steps by 9 a.m.

I call this park Squirrel Park

 The rain’s come again and between that and the protests, it’s hard to get out much later in the afternoon. It’s raining now. Shelby just asked to go out and I figured she needed to pee but she had me standing in the rain for 10 minutes but she just sniffed.

 She’s quite a sniffer. She’s a Ukrainian street dog and they must be sniffers. She roots out street food constantly and I wonder if that’s what caused her little stomach problems earlier this week. 

 Sunday, with the protests in full swing, she got the runs. I could see riot police out my window but when the dog needs out, she needs out.

 I’d run out of one of her brands of food – I’ve been mixing two – and gotten a Purina kind. She does not like it and stalls eating it. The pieces are bigger than the other food I mix in but I notice that she eats around the Purina to get to the other. I also loaded her Kong with it and she’s ignored that for days.

 Sunday night, we went to bed after a late walk and I hoped she would wake me up in case of emergency. She did not, but when she wasn’t in my room in the morning, I knew something was wrong. Indeed, my embassy-provided rug looked like it lost a paintball game.  The poor baby.

 So this week, in my spare time, I’ve been scrubbing the carpet. We made it through Tuesday, but the same thing happened on Wednesday. I think she is doing better now, though, and she is on and off eating the Purina.

I got her a couple of other treats from the pet shop on Saturday, including this bone that I thought was rawhide but appears to be indestructible. I figured, much like this bacon-looking stuff I also got, that one would last maybe an afternoon so I got two, but a week later she hasn’t even dented the first one.

I have taken up all of my rugs and locked them in the guest room, so the floors are all hardwood. When I throw the bone down the long hall, she just skids down the length of it. We do that over and over, so that’s why I’m thinking she’s all right now. She loves it and it’s a fairly good indoor workout.

She also loves to sit out on my balcony. She came with a lounge chair cushion and that’s where I tossed it; she just loves to sit in the sun, when there is sun. It faces east, and when I finish breakfast and start walking back there in the morning, she runs ahead and dances at the sliding glass door so I can let her out. She lays on the cushion like a queen and allows me to brush her. We do it every morning and normally at least once more during the day. It’s kind of incredible that she still sheds.

We do long walks in the morning and I’ve come to realize that there are some really idiotic dog owners out there. One morning, probably 7 of the 10 other dogs we ran into were not leashed and the dogs just came running up to us. I really try to steer Shelby away from other dogs and it gets annoying when you see another dog and owner and try to avoid them but they see you and come over anyway. But the unleashed ones are the ones that are really annoying because they are unpredictable.

Sunday's reality show

Shelby has made lots of friends, though, and there’s a big area we pass where a lot of people run their dogs. There is a couple that have two dogs, a Lab-ish and some kind of Corgi/terrier-one. We’ve seen them there on weekends at about a certain time, and Shelby has it figured out. Saturday she almost jerked my arm out of the socket trying to get to them. She runs wild after them and tires herself out quickly, which is fortunate for me.

We also met a Great Dane who slobbered all over her. Shelby is very spooky and the Great Dane owner thought she was intimidated by her dog, but in reality, she’s just as spooked by a Yorkie. Recently, she went up and sniffed a fisherman’s bag and jumped back as something in it flapped around. I laughed and laughed, and so did the fisherman.

Other than Shelby, it’s just protests on the weekend. They continue to be peaceful, with people holding hands in a line or carrying flags, flowers and balloons. The president is pulling out the intimidators, who are unloading outside my window, but for the most part, it’s just masked men standing around with shields and sticks. I see the media reports where people are reporting around my neighborhood, but I don’t see it from my window, which is where I’m planted on Sunday afternoons.

Yesterday, the protests went up a road that runs perpendicular to mine a block away. (The president is now having one of the big squares cordoned off early in the mornings, so the crows divert to other places and no longer parade down the main road.) Shelby was still feeling a bit wonky and I had to take her out during the time when the “police” were standing around. I just said “excuse me” and went around them.