The Banya....

I am unsure how to even begin… We had our first presentation on Wednesday night and it was a much disorganized situation, but from the Russian standpoint well received. At least we think it was. There were many toasts of Vodka involved… FYI when in Russia do not pour any drink while holding the glass or plastic cup (as we had) in your hand. It is considered rude or you are believed to be ignorant/poor??? We did not have much of a chance to eat. Between the presentation and the toast we did not eat much and we happened to mention that we wanted to go to the Banya. Not that we really knew what it was. Before we knew it the hostess was pulling us up from the table and bringing us to a log cabin on their property. We walked in and it was like a sauna times ten. Sarah’s glasses fogged up in less than a second! She then went on to explain to us what we were supposed to do (in Russian). So of course we had no idea. What we got out of it was the following:
1. Go into the first room and take off your clothes.
2. Then shower or rinse off in the second room with what we thought was cold water.
3. Enter the sauna-like room and be sure to take the branch-like objects with us. The branch-like objects were actually a birch tree and oak tree branch leaves that were suppose to smell good according to Robin.
4. Then relax
So we went out and got our bathing suits because there was no way in heck us prudish Americans were going o go naked into a sauna with the Russians. We went convinced Robin to join us and as we were going John and his new Russian buddy decided it would be fun to join. To make a long story short the following are the events in the Banya...
1. Robin, Sarah and Jen enter and change into bathing suits.
2. They all shower
3. Jen has to go to the bathroom……..
4. They enter the sauna with the branches and start hitting themselves because they thought this was therapeutic. Soon after, their Russian host demonstrated the proper technique on them, J
5. Robin decides she knows what she is doing and throws water on the hot coals in the 10x15 foot sauna room.
6. The temperature increases by at least 40 degrees causing us all to evacuate the Banya momentarily while at the same time laughing and choking hysterically. Problem is we cannot go outside because we do not want all of the Russians to see us in our bathing suits.
7. We go back in when we decide we are not going to die and it is safe and less hot.
8. John and Alexi join us
9. Alexi sees us hitting ourselves with the braches and starts to laugh. He takes the branches and tells me (Jen) to lie on the top level and we all look at each other thinking “is this really happening”? Of course being the gung ho trooper I am I lay down and wait……..
10. Alexi begins whacking me with the branches all up and down my backside while the rest of the crew looked on in amusement thanking God it was not them.
11. They were not amused for too long because all including Robin, Sarah and yes John got a turn with each of us taking a turn doing the whacking. I would say it was a very interesting experience.
12. We then sweated to death for about ten minutes and discussed how we could find John a Russian Bride from the “City of Brides”.
13. Then we jumped into the swimming pool with shots of vodka to warm us up in the cold night air!!!!
14. Then we finished the night up by the fire drying our hair and talking about politics, learning some more Russian, peeling oranges, relaxing, and contemplating what we were going to wear to the picnic and trip on the Volga River the following Day!!!

Looking forward to the final two days of our trip in the wonderful and welcoming town of Ivanovo!!!

Editor Jen
Byline Sarah and Robin