Good days for sliding

I received a phone call almost every Sunday morning for the last few months. It was my friend Valera, breaking the news: "it's too cold to ski today." Ukhta had a very chilly February. Temperatures reached down to 40 below (that's Celsius or Fahrenheit) a few times and froze pretty consistently around -22 F
(pun intended). We decided that it would have to be warmer than -4 F if we wanted to get out to the woods and feel the chill pressing on our faces when we locked our skis into the cross-country tracks running downhill. So, we waited.

During the months of waiting, I slid around a few times on the ice-skating rink only 100 meters from my place. Iolanta had been an figure skater in childhood, but hadn't been on a rink in years. One night in January, I was walking around sorta bummed that I had spent the whole day indoors, heard music coming from behind the university's athletic center and followed it. The rink looked so inviting. I called Iolanta and we beelined there. The workers handling skate rentals got a kick out of my New York State driver's license that I handed them in exchange for the skates. Since then, they always welcome us by name and are happy to chat.

But, back to skis.... March's weather has been so beautiful. The temperatures have been sliding up and down between 17 F and 33 F this past week, to the delight of almost everyone. (Some people have told me that they would rather the temperatures stay really cold, so that we don't have any of this melting mess). So, last Saturday, my friend and I finally got out to the woods with skis, poles and boots. Although I had told him that I can ski (I mean, I can), I was slip-sliding all over the place while just trying to skate. Fell three times, but each time with laughs. The sun was shining and we were far enough away from the city and factories that the air felt fresh. I was so happy to be standing in snow, surrounded by pine trees. It's very rare that I leave the city for the forest outside of Ukhta, and I was craving nature. At a fork, we went left, and bushwhacked a little to get a good view of the city from a hilltop. We took our skis off and ran up a steep hill where there was an even better view, and lots of pieces of thick cardboard. Of course. I have seen this on multiple occasions. Cardboard sitting at the tops or bottoms of hills here, just waiting for someone to sit on top of it and speed-slide down a slope. So, we sled.

Funnily enough, I was invited to ski the next morning, too. By eight a.m., I was sitting with a teacher from the lyceum and her friend in a turquoise cottage in Airport, a town aptly named after the nearby airport that flies and receives a plane once a day, to and from Moscow. By nine, we heated up the cottage, and got on the skies--this time, classic style. We slid slowly, stopping many times to talk or admire the forest. The teacher in front found some cardboard in the woods, stopped, ripped it into a suitable size to be sat on and shoved it up her coat for later use on some hill. The cottage had gotten really cozy by the time we came back, so we sat and relaxed before heading back to our days in the city. The two women sang songs in old voices, sliding back and forth between tunes in Russian and those in other languages: Belorussian, Ukrainian and Komi.

These are good days for sliding.

Women's Day!

I get a little confused on days like this. Today is Saturday, a regular weekend day. But, the ladies at work asked if I could come into work today to celebrate. Of course I said yes. What are we celebrating? International Women's Day.

With a name that starts with International, I'd think that the 8th of March (the official day of the holiday) would be something I knew more about before I came to Russia. I'd heard that the day existed and knew that March is considered Women's History Month in America, but that's about it. For me there was no big fanfare or hurrah. Here, there's no way anyone could not know about it. In fact, International Women's Day is a national holiday--which basically means no school, no work. Leading up to the holiday, I am congratulated everywhere I go with a "Happy Upcoming Holiday" (you can't say "Happy Women's Day"-- or any other holiday or birthday for that matter--until the actual day of the happening) and sometimes a tulip or two.

The holiday itself wasn't what confused me. What confused me was why we are celebrating today--the holiday isn't for another 3 days. When I was invited into the office, I thought we might collect on the weekend solely to party in celebration of us-women. Maybe we'd run free through the halls of our institution like rebels on an off day just because we could. What I didn't realize until midnight last night when a friend said he would need to go to bed to get enough sleep before work, was that today is a work day. An official work day for all. That's why I was invited into work today.

So, my daydream of women bouncing off the walls of an otherwise empty large Soviet-style cement building on a Saturday did not come true. The logic of the Saturday workday is this--if everyone goes to work today, then no one will have to go to work on Monday. And, as we already have Tuesday off because of International Women's Day, we can all have a three day weekend: Sunday, Monday and Tuesday.

And, regardless of work, we also partied. At noon in the international office we ordered a 2 kg pizza from the cafeteria on the basement floor of the building and loudly celebrated. Nadya and I then took a taxi over to her husband's work where there was a large performance of singers, dancers and jokesters. We had to show our passports to get into the business building. The guards looked at mine, said, "what is this?" then asked me to show my Russian passport, not my American one. After this performance, we booked it back over to the university by hailing a car to take us over. A man pulled over, took us to the main campus and only made us pay 40 rubles. A formal taxi in Ukhta charges 60 rubles ($2 American). At the main campus, we had our third party of the day--sushi and tea with co-workers of an office connected to ours.

Women worked a half-day today, men a whole day. At least for workers at the university. (Teachers are probably an exception, working all the time).

So, now I still have three days of weekend ahead of me. I didn't know it was coming. On Tuesday, the 8th, I will go to the Miss University competition held at Ukhta's main performance center: "The Palace of Culture." The girls competing have been preparing for months. For the university, it's a big event. The rector with be on the judge panel.