Dennis is Ohara’s host brother, I think he’s in his late 30’s though. It was hilarious to finally see him after hearing only stories about him. He sort of moved in when Ohara’s host mother got sick and is currently sleeping in the kitchen, which makes for awkward morning. He normally lives somewhere else in the city and drives a bus. Ohara said he always tries to dress like Marlon Brando from Streetcar Named Desire (except he’s really skinny and pretty heinous). He wears a lot of black and this really big leather bracelet thing. He kind of fits into the dorky, dark anime crowd, or maybe the type that would be into fantasy games. He also takes karate and is currently an orange belt (he showed us a picture of himself in his karate class amongst a bunch of elementary school aged kids, and his instructor is a 15 year old black belt). Awesome. When Ohara first met him she told us this gigantic rat all of a sudden started crawling up his leg and around his shoulders, neck, and head. She almost started screaming to tell him that he had vermin crawling all over him, but then he introduced the rat as his pet Max (although Ohara thought the rat’s name was Marx, which would’ve been a lot funnier). I guess the weirdness of the son makes sense when you take into account the weirdness of the mother who is extremely OCD and goes around the house moving things a million times and will even go through Ohara and Louise’s stuff rearranging it how she wants it. Ohara was happy to get out.
So here’s our man:
Studly, no?
David and Lydia on the van:
This is Louise looking sad, and Ohara looking excited:
We finally got the airport several hours early, which was completely unnecessary. They don’t even allow you to really enter the airport until an hour before your flight. So you just sit in this little holding tank area with all your baggage until your flight pops up on a screen. There was nowhere to sit so we piled all our stuff on the floor and lounged around, bought some snacks, and looked at Russian fashion magazines until our flight was listed and we joined the mad dash to the doors, getting in a huge line of people. Ohara had tons of stuff, since she was bringing back most of her hockey gear (minus the sticks she gave away to other hockey guys since it wasn’t worth bringing them back). Her stuff was in monster duffles, so we had to drag those slowly through the line. It looked pretty ridiculous because they were just so big and had no rollers on them, and also because it said “BROWN HOCKEY” everywhere on them. Oh and Ohara was wearing a Brown Hockey t-shirt and shorts and bright pink sneakers. We made our way through the stupid line until we made it up to the front where one person just looks at your boarding pass briefly before you go through another security thing and then can finally wait in another line to check your bags. David was of course pulled out of line to be hassled by the police (for no real reason). I don’t know how much my bag weighed, but they didn’t charge me so I was happy.
Then was more waiting in line, oh and another holding tank area where we had to wait till our flight was called before we could go to the next stage and actually to our gate. So stupid. We made our flight ok and I was seated fairly close to both Ohara and David which was good. We flew to London (I didn’t sleep), had a short layover and played spot the slav while waiting in more lines. The bright colors, baby mullet on the little boy and see-through shirt on the woman gave these two away (although this lady is so much classier than a lot of Russian woman). Her дом книги bag when we got closer confirmed it. The little boy was so cute.
David being a dork on the little bus between terminals:
We got a bite to eat before getting on our next plane for Boston. It was really nice to eat real American style food (even if we were in England). I got pizza which tasted a lot like pizza. WHOAH!
These two British kids at the table next to us got a kick out of David:
Then a longer plane ride back, on which I also did not sleep. I don’t like to sleep on planes because it messes with my ears. I also just wasn’t really in the mood to sleep even though I was extremely tired. I mostly just listened to music, stared into space, tried to watch a movie, and went to bother Ohara a couple times. The woman next to her was the quintessential masshole, so it was funny to talk about her in Russian to each other without her understanding—rather than the other way around (speaking English about a Russian, although you have to be more careful when doing that). It will be strange being in an English speaking country again. I feel like Russia has made me both more patient (because you just have to be) but also more rude. I’ll have to remember that people can understand me now, haha. Everything will feel so easy, and I’ll miss feeling the sense of accomplishment at being able to do the smallest things like buy a pack of gum or being able to answer what time it is to someone on the street. I’ll miss trying to think out Russian phrases in my head on the way home. Life is just way more of an adventure when you only understand a tenth of what’s going on around you, it makes you aware of so much more that you would normally miss or take for granted, it forces you to reach out more in order to break through that bubble that separates you from everyone and everything else.
And then I was in America. My plane took off at 5:10pm in St Petersburg, Russia and arrived at 9:30pm ("same day") in Boston, USA. Surreal how time works when you fly, only four hours, a difference in numbers, only 12 hours or something in the air. I wondered what Petersburg was like at 5:30am, if Olga was still out with friends, if Eeena had woken up early, what the strangers in my pictures might be thinking or dreaming about. It seems too easy to leave one place and hop over to another. Maybe that's why I couldn't fall asleep on the plane, I needed those 12 half awake hours. And it’s startling how quickly you just fall into another rhythm of life, that sliding of perception, as if you’d never left in a way.
But it was good to see my dad and a relief to be back in the states. I really hate flying (especially over the ocean), so it’s always a relief to land safely (it kind of freaked me out hearing about the whole bomb Heathrow thing after I got home though). Going through customs was surprisingly easy, mostly because I declared nothing (even though I still had a bunch of food and produce Eena insisted I take with me for the trip). They lost Lydia’s bags, so she went off to figure that out. Ohara’s mom met her (she had to go to training camp) and David was spending the night in Boston before taking a flight in the morning to Denver.
Ohara in the Petersburg airport looking American:
Ohara in the Boston airport looking a tad Russian:
Arriving in the US:
YAY AMERICA!
The 2 and a half hour drive home went quickly, although we didn’t arrive till something like 12 or 1am. I ended up going to bed very late--staying up talking to my parents and giving them little gifts from Russia. It was nice to be in my own bed and house, but very weird as well. I am looking forward to some rest before heading back to Brown and to seeing my brother and Patrick. Yay!
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