This weekend we had a trip on the "teplahod", or, as Colin pointed out to us as we were chanting it down the street, "big boat".
-"TEPLAHOD! TEPLAHOD! TEPLAHOD!"
-"You all know you're chanting 'big boat', right?"
-"TEPLAHOD! BIG BOAT! TEPLAHOD! BIG BOAT!"
Needless to say, we were slightly excited.
We went on a three day river cruise up the Volga (the largest river in Europe, also unfortunatly the dirtiest despite what locals tell you) to the city of Samara, which is about the same size as Kazan, million and a half. Samara is a center for Russian industry; there are plane factories, a chocolate factory, and various other industries. The real gem of the city, howerver (at least from a touristic standpoint) is Stalin's Bunker. More on that later.
We got onto the boat around six on Friday; we made up about 1/3 of the crowd going on the cruise, and we were the only young people. Everyone else was middle aged or older. That did not, however, stop anyone from having a party. We may have partied a little too much, in my opinion. I don't drink, so I had a very interesting time watching everyone else who did. About five or six of us stayed sober, everyone else, less so. I'm fairly certain that there were some Russians who didn't sleep at all that first night. It wasn't necessarily miserable, but it wasn't exactly a gas either. Fortunatly, that was a real low point of self-control on the trip, so it wasn't a total "booze cruize" the whole time.
On Saturday, we arrived in Samara around two and hopped on a tour bus. We looked around downtown, saw some of the new developments, and then went to see the highlight of the tour, Stalin's Bunker. Back in 1941 the USSR began construction of a secret bunker in Samara, where Stalin could flee in case the Nazi's took Moscow (which they never did, but they were very very close). It goes some seven stories underground and could house a lot of personel. So, we walked down who knows how many flights of stairs and saw all the rooms of Stalin's bunker, even the staff room with the giant map of Western Europe and the ominous desk, reminiscent of an old movie. But here's the kicker: Stalin was never actually at the bunker. Never went there. Never saw it. Didn't need it. Acutally, some people think that maybe there was a chance that Stalin could have possibly at some time secretly visited the bunker in disguise, but there's no concrete evidence. Hoorah?
For me, the most interesting thing was at the monument we visited, a huge paved square with a giant tower of socialist realism in the middle. In Russia, most weddings start at the government office, signing the papers, and the most popular day for weddings is Saturday. After the signing at the office and before the party, Russian couples get into decorated cars (they usually have little wedding-ring flower displays strapped to the top and lots of ribbons) and go to some memorial to take pictures. I probably saw seven brides at this memorial, all wearing almost the same dress (tight and a little too revealing on top, a tulle explosion on the bottom). They and their wedding parties walked around the square, took photos, and occasionally stopped for a cigarette break. Ah, love.
We got back on the boat four hours later and the next afternoon, we arrived back in Kazan, and were all feeling really really grateful that we didn't live in Samara. It just didn't have the same vibe as Kazan.
The best part of the trip was being so close together, because normally we're pretty spread out. On the boat, we could walk down the hall and find our friends, or we could all do things spontaneoulsy together. In that respect it was really great. I think the cultural value of this trip was relativly low, but as a fun vacation, it was good.
The food on the boat, by the way, was horrendous. BUT, that was very soon forgotten because the night we got back, some of us found a Georgian restaurant. Incredible.
That's the trip up the Volga! Three more weeks, and "Georgian restaurant" will mean Famous Daves.
Jane
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