12 June part dva.
At the outset, I promised a story but it requires a touch more history to provide some context particularly regarding the three complications that arose on this day. Notice that the date for this entry is 12 June. I’m going to postulate that most people reading this blog don’t know the significance of this date. You learn it quickly if you’re in Russia because it is the Day of Russia. Although the country’s new name of Russian Federation was officially adopted on 25 December 1991, the date of the declaration, 12 June 1990 is the national holiday. I think Russians feel a certain ambivalence toward this holiday because it marks not only the establishment of the Russian Federation but also the breakup of the Soviet Union.
Still, it’s a holiday. And what happens with many businesses on holidays? They close. But that was complication number two. Let’s look at complication number one. This began when, at the close of our tour, our driver was supposed to return us to the hotel where we had registered on our first day. However, the route was blocked by a parade – not one with marching bands and decorated floats but one that looked more like a protest march. Nevertheless, it constituted a parade and our route back to the hotel was blocked.
You might recall that our B & B host Nikolai seemed put out by the possibility that we might deviate a bit from our schedule. At this point, I began thinking that Russians in general don’t improvise very well. If we were supposed to be dropped off in front of the hotel, then we’d be dropped off in front of the hotel and nowhere else! Our driver tried generally unsuccessfully to circumvent the parade but it eventually cleared the square and, much to his delight and relief, he was able to drop us at the appointed place. This was, in fact, not terribly far from the train station.
However, the delay left us less time to do what we needed to do – eat lunch and provision our train ride. We were all feeling a bit daunted at the prospect of two days of instant noodles and canned food, so the eight of us set out to find a place to eat a real Russian lunch.
This led to complication number three: According to Groud, when the denizens of Irkutsk go out to eat, they generally eschew Russian cuisine – or as they might call it, food. They are more inclined to dine on Italian or Japanese cuisine and had we been willing to opt for either of those we might have had an easier time finding an open restaurant. But hey, it was our second day in Russia. We wanted Russian food.
G tried to help us but her initial efforts led only to closed establishments. The hour was growing late. Time for lunch was growing ever shorter because we would soon need to embark on our supermarket foraging and rush to board the train. (I should add that Lyuba insisted that we leave from the hotel for the station about two hours before our scheduled departure.) The clock was ticking and G’s seemingly endless knowledge appeared to have run its course as we approached one last restaurant / pub called Hobbiton. Lo and behold, it was open and while we had no dragons to slay, our midday meal was a bit of a precious adventure. And, lo and behold, we discovered upon entering, it was appropriately named. New challenges would emerge at every turn.
To begin, despite the fact that our group of eight was the only patron, the hostess / proprietress was quite particular about our table. We could sit at this table but not at that one. She did (I think grudgingly) join two tables of four so we could sit together. Next problem: She and one person in the kitchen were the only people working. Third, though she had a menu or two with English translations, they were generally inaccurate. For example, what was described in English as a potato pancake was actually a potato dumpling.
While we tried to settle this confusion, we attempted to order drinks. I think she got about half right. I ordered a small beer (pivo) and she initially brought some sort of juice. John and Anne also ordered beers and got nothing. When she did, at last, bring the beers they were all large.
The process of ordering the meal was straight out of a Buster Keaton movie or a Benny Hill sketch. We pointed to what we wanted on the menu. Groud, who speaks minimally functional Russian, bounced around the table occasionally climbing over the bench seat (Sorry, I forgot to mention the bench seating.) trying to clarify matters while, based on what followed, the hostess wrote down whatever she pleased anyway.
Now it was time to really fluster her. It was a bit past 13:00 and we needed to be served, to eat, to pay, and to be out of the Shire by 14:00 to have enough time to shop for the aforementioned provisions for our upcoming two-day train ride to Ekaterinburg.
(While we’re waiting for the meal to be served, take a moment to recall that in earlier posts I noted that these standard trains might or might not have dining cars and that in Russia, all the train timetables are set to Moscow time. Thus, even should the train have a dining car, it will operate on Moscow time which is, though we will pick up three time zones by the time we reach Ekaterinburg, when we depart Irkutsk five hours behind the local time. This means that though our departure from Irkutsk is at 16:04 local time, it appears on the schedule as 11:04 and a dining car would be serving lunch. As events unfolded, the train had no dining car.)
Meanwhile, back at Hobbiton, our hostess cum waitress was scurrying around between the kitchen and our table trying to serve our party of eight (still the only patrons) within our limited time frame. She brought the food dish by dish – a pattern to which we had become accustomed. And again, watching her, I couldn’t help but hear the Benny Hill Theme (also known as Yakety Sax) in my mind. For those of you unfamiliar with this:.
The lunch she brought me was as far from my order (the cold meat plate rather than the cold fish plate) as it could be. Groud and I tried to correct her but, in a manner we would find typified Russian service, she insisted she’d gotten it right. I let it slide. Fortunately, I’d also ordered the potato dumpling pancakes so I had a little solid food to soak up some of the half liter of beer she’d brought. There were other mistakes as well and by way of apology she brought us eight shots of something very chilled and very alcoholic.
In the end, everything turned out okay. We all had something to eat, were able to pay our bill, and leave the pub close to 14:00. We did our shopping and kept Lyuba happy by boarding the bus by 14:30. Then, we arrived at the train station and sat on the bus for an hour before we could board the train. Tonight we begin our journey across Siberia. Tune in tomorrow for the thrilling details.