Bananas and Blinochki

Fall seems to have finally fallen on Slavyansk-na-Kubani—and quite literally, given that fall marks the beginning of the rainy season, which continues through winter. The rain started on Sunday evening and, except for the evenings today and yesterday, it’s been gloomy out ever since. A group of students took advantage of the comparably nice weather last night and were playing guitar and singing outside the dorm, which I was able to listen to through my open window (I was already in my pajamas and too tired to go out, alas).

I’m glad, though, that I remembered to take my camera with me when I went for a walk on Sunday, the last truly nice summer-y day.

My walk took me down the town’s main street, ул. Красная (ulitsa Krasnaya / Red Street) (as an aside, the street names here are largely a fun mix of communism- and literature-influenced names—there’s Pushkin Street and Lermontov Street, and Komsomol Street ~Communal Youth [this one is harder to translate] Street).

I like taking this street to the riverbank because it has several very nice parks and playgrounds along the way, all surrounded by trees and flowers.

I can say that one thing Slavyansk-na-Kubani definitely does better than any city or town in the U.S. that I’ve been to is playgrounds. They have the coolest toys and rides. Honestly, I’m really jealous of the kids who get to play here. Every park has, moreover, a little cafй area where you can get tea, cakes, and “milk cocktails” (snazzy milkshakes), sit in the shade, and relax.

The riverbank is my favorite destination on walks. It’s lined with flowerbeds and bright blue benches, which are always full of young people enjoying the nice southern weather. I always see gypsies there, too—but more on them in another entry.

I saw a little old man sitting on the opposite bank. There was something about him that struck me as perfectly narodni (if I can use the word—folk, of the people—like that). I had to take a picture (unfortunately, you can hardly see him in the small version).

This is the view along the river:

I wanted to walk along the river for a little while, but after an uncomfortable encounter with a soldier boy (more on that another time, too), I decided it would be wiser to turn back.

On my way back (after a cup of tea and some Dostoevsky at one of the park cafes), I took a look at the town’s war (or more appropriately, perhaps, wars) memorial.

I also took a picture of the yard in front of what I think is the courthouse (…or maybe it’s the building next to the courthouse). There’s a statue in front that you can sort of see in this picture—I bet you can guess who it is without even seeing him!

It’s not the only statue of this man in town, either.

I’m still taking classes in the literature department and hanging around the main campus this week. I actually stumbled upon a class on Turgenev, Dobroliubov, and the raznochintsy today—the same people and the same topic I wrote about in comparison to Dostoevsky in my B.A. thesis, so that was pretty neat. I also made a pretty fantastic find this afternoon. Continuing my search for cleaning equipment and a computer microphone, I got off the marshrutka in the town center today, where I saw advertisements for just the kinds of stores I needed, but what attracted my eye first of all was the big grocery store. I have been shopping at the market down the street from my dorm, which is big compared to the rest of the produkti magazini around town (it can actually call itself a universam), but this place was at least three times as big. I found microwavable blinochki, this interesting little candy bar that’s like pudding meets cheesecake, and, best of all, BANANAS. The greatest thing about this place though was that it took care of what has been my greatest problem with the markets here—weighing produce. I get flustered when it comes to numbers (I know them, of course, but for some reason I get really tongue-tied), and I still haven’t figured out how kilos correspond to ounces, etc. But at this store, they weighed your produce for you, thus eliminating any, you know, effort, on my part.

It’s funny how it’s the littlest things, like weighing my own produce, that have proved to be the most problematic. Maybe I should be relieved that my troubles have not been any worse than that! And now, at least, I have bananas (and apples and oranges and grapes, oh my!).