Birch Twigs and Naked Babushkas

yep, that's right the American college students
descended on the St. Petersburg public banya. culture
shock?? try culture clash. here's how it happened: The
banya talk has been circulating for weeks amongst us
Americans, the year round students said it was the
most memorable experience in Russia, and since our
program director seems incapable of any sort of
planning or scheduling (how she got the job remains
something of a mystery) we decided to go ourselves on
coed night. We went with one experienced banya boy,
who claims to frequent the banya almost every week
(this immediately came into question when he couldn't
find the banya). After a good deal of searching we
find the banya which from the outside looks like a
huge public toilet (disconcerting I know) we go inside
and of course it's not quite up to some of the girls
(or guys) standards, typical Russian building, about
as clean as the hospital i.e. less than you'd like
with all the nakedness that's about to go down. we
walk in and RENT sheets and pay the entrance fee, a
grand total of 4 dollars. Modesty is already thrown
out the door when we are all given 1 room for our
belongings and to change into our togas. After we
change in shifts we begin the trek to the banya, first
there is the bar/ lounge area serving beer, potato
chips and an absurd variety of dried fish. We then
make a bathroom break before entering, of course my
delightful comrades don't watch the door properly
(there seem to be few locking doors in the banya)
while i'm using it and damn if a Russian man didn't
see fit to share the one toilet with me, again modesty
out the door. Then we have to enter the shower room,
if there hadn't been 10 other Americans with me I
might have turned back at the river of mud coursing
through the shower room (those sandals I bought before
going: best investment ever) we did our rinsing along
with maybe 30 other crazy naked Russians who were all
beating each other with birch twigs/leaves (they
actually have quite a variety of branches each with
it's own mystical properties). Finally Banya time: we
go into the warm up room, a small wood paneled room
with the classic hot rocks in the center. Good sweat,
I felt like Kramer, alright I can do this it's hot but
relaxing; banya is not to crazy or anything just a
sauna. then I’m informed that this is the warm up
room: oh shit. we go into the next room and there is a
rickety wooden platform about ten feet high in this
room, you ascend the staircase, the railing is like
400 degrees and each step adds about 50 degrees. on
the top of this platform there are about 12(small
area) Russian men and women covered in sweat beating
the crap out of each other with these twigs, all ages
all sexes most naked. huh I guess this is kinda
insane. just as your eyes are adjusting to the dim
lighting you realize you're completely drenched and
the far wall is just a huge brick oven. I try and run
my hands through my hair...yeah don't do
that...untouchably hot. then the Russians notice that
there nice banya experience is being invaded by a
bunch of American college students. "Fuck that let's
see what these kids can take. Open the doors" oh yeah
they open the oven up throw some beer on it...yeah you
heard me beer for that nice bread baking smell.
suddenly a insane wave of heat hits you, you can't
even keep you eyes open (it's like when you open up a
400 degree oven in the kitchen and you get that blast,
except we were already in a 400 degree oven) you feel
like you might be getting burnt through and through.
then they do the helicopter, spinning a towel over
ones head and subjecting us all to insane blasts of
heat (you'd think it would be cooling, nope the only
thing you can do is assume the crash position and beg
for mercy) at this point every one including the
Russians are grunting and groaning in agony. Gotta
hold out, gotta show these Russians we're tough. I
think the first time we lasted about 7 minutes(that
was probably my best showing of the evening). then you
descend (which unfortunately brings you closer to the
firewall) and get out of there and run to the ice cold
bath do a quick dunk and head to the bar. phew that
was crazy, but that was just round one. we get to the
lounge area and watch some Russian Olympic hockey
(nothing better than a bunch of hooting and hollering
with some semi clad babushka's). next round we skip
the warm up room, buy our own beating leaves and let
the sweat fly (oh yeah did I mention the nastiness of
the flying sweat...I won't go into any further
detail). I strike up conversation with the man next to
me, we talk hockey. As you all know I know nothing
about hockey but it doesn't seem to matter as long as
I agree with him that Russia is going to win we have
no problems. He beats me for a while, I beat him, good
times. well it's getting on about 10 o clock or 10:30
at night, obviously the management has decided that
everyone has had enough to drink (your changing room
doubles as you private drinking room as I pass them
you see Russians pounding vodka and chasing it with
pickles, which apparently is tradition, I imagine it
primes you for that big chunk of salted herring in the
middle of the table) So it's time to open up the
outside pool!! the what!?!? you ask yeah next thing
you know instead of the cold pool indoors we are
running through the snow into the luke warm pool
outside under the stars, and just like Kramer says
"the air is cold the water is hot... it's
sweeeeeee-eet" of course the water might be like 95
degrees, so the effect isn't quite the same. but
nothing like a bunch of Americans doing cannon balls
at 11 at night to clear out the pool (before you
cringe about Americans being loud and offensive
everywhere we go I'll have you know that the biggest
splash came from a Russian grandpa or "Dadushka") yep
all in all it was a pretty spectacular time. I awoke
this morning to notice I probably lost like 7 layers
of skin so I know have that healthy pale Russian look.

In other events Jarrod went to his home stay meal
(the one before was someone else’s that he tagged
along for) where firstly the girl he went with was
forced to help cook the meal while he relaxed,
secondly the meal again was disgusting. it consisted
of fake crab meat mixed with mayo, sour cream, and
lemon juice mmmm, what could you possibly put that on
to make it even more tasty??? how about raw fish
soaked in a castor oil like substance??? yep that
might do it. (he managed to not puke until he got home
and neither did the girl who went with him, who was a
vegetarian and had never had fish before...ever) the
house itself I cannot describe any better than
Dostoevsky who we've come to the conclusion described
it about 150 years ago as in Marmeledov's house in
Crime and Punishment (according to jarrod not much has
changed except there are live wires hanging from the
ceiling) He will be sleeping on a couch in his own
room, the mother sleeps on a bunch of log's strapped
together and towels laid on top of it and the daughter
sleeps behind a partition. yeah we've got a pool going
on who's moving back into the dorms first and jarrod
is rather a popular bet. although I told him he can't
move back in until I go for dinner (apparently they
also ate the world's spiciest mustard, I must try it,
it came from a can and jarrod thinks it might be
Stalinist Era) well I can't believe it but I burnt
through a whole hour writing this silly email. I hope
it's not too boring. stay in touch ellski