As if in celebration of my birthday, the Olympic torch passed through Vladimir yesterday. And, it typical Russian fashion, it was a big production. There was a gaudy ceremony, replete with songs, dancing, tributes to Vladimir's past Olympic champions, and glorious speeches by political leaders: The governor of Vladimir Oblast said that this day would shine out as one of the brightest and best in our lives, a day that we would tell our grandchildren about. Perhaps things were verging on hyperbole. Then, after a troupe of Russian folk dancers did their thing and children from sport-focused schools demonstrated Vladimir's future athletic prowess, the Olympic flame was run onto the stage by some future Olympians, and the torch was lit. The torch was then paraded around the city, which shut down all the major roads and completely stopped public transportation, stranding people at work from 3 until 9pm. I got some pictures of this most-memorable occurrence on my Ipod:

The Sochi Olympics--brought to you by Coke. Oh globalism 

The governor and mayor

The lighted torch

Vladimir's future athletes showing their stuff 

A great article about the state of rural Russia. The same conditions definitely exist here just outside of Vladimir.

http://www.nytimes.com/newsgraphics/2013/10/13/russia/?ref=global-home

Russia's size is one of its greatest assets and greatest hindrances. The country has a tremendous amount of natural resources, but everything is amazingly spread out, and low density is expensive. Russians always say their country suffers from a lack of modern infrastructure--roads, air transportation, supply networks--and infrastructure improvement is a constant topic in political discussions. Huge amounts of expensive infrastructure have to be built to serve small, isolated communities, particularly in Siberia.

Roads and especially bridges are Russia's most lacking infrastructure area. Ivanovo, Vladimir, and Murom--cities with a combined population of over 800,000--are connected by a single, bumpy, two-lane road. That road passes through the center of Vladimir and crosses the little river Klyama on a two-lane bridge, which is always packed with traffic. That's because it's the only river crossing in the city and one of the only for many miles. When I was in Siberia, I noticed that ferries, hovercrafts, or ice crossings are the preferred way to get across rivers--there simply aren't many bridges.

This led me to realize how amazingly rich America is with bridges. The idea of having to drive far out of your way to get to a river crossing is unheard of, at least in the parts of America I've visited. Bridges are plentiful and generally not plagued by capacity problems. In a way, America has a bit of the opposite problem--too many bridges. We face big bills to maintain the bridges we have, whereas Russia suffers from a shortage of bridges and the expense of building new ones in far-flung regions. And it's not just in Siberia: A few years ago, Medvedev came to Murom to cut the ribbon on a large new bridge that replaced a rickety floating bridge--the kind that the army uses for temporary crossings--that had been the only crossing for many years. And that's in a city of over 100,000 people. Here's the new bridge, which I visited this past spring:

Russian fall outside my apartment window:

Here's a classic from the Russia/former USSR taxi playlist. It was released in 1979 by the Soviet group Yalla, and it's called "Uchkuduk"--the name of a city in Uzbekistan. This song reminds me of bouncing along a bumpy road in a dirty old bus, on my way to see Lake Baikal and watching Siberia's pine forest go by.

Also, you've gotta love the retro looks these guys have going on:

  

Russian food can be a bit difficult to explain to people. Honestly, if you're a foodie, Russia is a terrible country for you. The food that most people eat day in and day out is, in a word, terrible. I mean, ketchup is considered an acceptable thing to put on pasta--and it's not just acceptable, it's what most people use for pasta sauce. Gross. In general, Russian food is hearty, flavorless fare that is good for filling your stomach but doesn't exactly leave you wanting more. 

That said, there are some really good parts of Russian cuisine, and there are some really strange (for Americans) parts. When it's done well, traditional Russian food can be quite good. It's not a flavor-packed experience like Indian food, but it's very comforting, satisfying food that is perfect for, say, a long-awaited dinner after a frigid winter day spent slogging through snowdrifts. Here's a great summation of some of the more unique--and extremely common--foods that make up Russian cuisine: 17 bizarre foods every Russian grew up with  

The first of the month is a mixed blessing. On one hand, it brings a paycheck, but, on the other, it means bills are due. At my apartment here in Vladimir, the bills start showing up in our little mailbox in the stairwell after the fifteenth of the month, and they need to be paid before about the tenth of the next month. Russia is mostly a cash economy, and I have never seen bank checks used, so most people pay their bills in cash at post offices or at utility offices (I think online paying is becoming more common). Fortunately, our landlady takes care of the actual paying of the bills, freeing us from having to stand in lines of grumpy old women at the post office.

We get bills for water (hot and cold--there are different meters for those), gas (no meter), electricity (I think our meter is broken), heating (we have no control over that one), and building and grounds maintenance (given the condition of our building, I'm not exactly sure what we are paying for). The biggest bill is for heating, which is calculated by the area of the apartment. Our 54-square-meter apartment costs 1,694 rubles a month to heat (about $50). Building maintenance is the next-biggest item, at around $40, and then it's hot water and electricity at about $10 each. The gas, which we only use for the stove, is figured not by usage but by the number of people registered to the apartment--in our case, that's four (I guess those four people are our landlady and her family). The price for gas? Fifty two rubles per person (ya that's $1.62). I'd say I can afford that. 

My dad always spreads out all the bills and paperwork on the kitchen table, pours himself a cup of coffee (or a few), and gets down to paying bills every month. This is my homage to him (alas, that is tea with lemon--I was doing this around midnight last night):