Leslie and the Russian Birthday Party

I spent the first semester of my junior year of undergrad studying in Russia.  There are more hilarious, confusing, and otherwise-noteworthy events during that semester than I could ever write down, but some rise to the surface, even two decades later.  Here's one of my favorites.

Leslie and the Russian Birthday Party

For six weeks of my semester in Russia, I lived with a wonderful Russian host family (see them in the picture?  Are they adorable or what?!?).  Papa Zhenya (who often shouted randon German words at me in an attempt to communicate) and Mama Vera (who offered me tea and/or food nearly every time she saw me), and their children Masha (a high school senior) and Little Zhenya (maybe 9 or 10?), welcomed me into their tiny, 2 1/2 bedroom apartment with an abundance of enthusiasm and zealous hospitality.  From the moment I stepped into their home, I was family.  And if you know anything about Russian culture, you know that being family makes all the difference.

As family, one event I got to be part of was a birthday party for a life-long friend of my host sister and her cousin (who visited us often).  The friend lived in a small industrial city, an hour or so outside of our GIANT city of Nizhni Novgorod.  Masha, her cousin Tanya, and I headed there together the morning of the party.

We walked/bussed/trained/walked to Tanya's family's one bedroom apartment first.  Yep, you read that right.  This family of four shared a one bedroom apartment.  We would spend the night there after the party rather than return to NN so late.  Tanya's father and little brother (her mom was away for some reason which was probably explained to me and which I probably didn't understand) were warm and welcoming in bold, Russian strokes.  Lots of noisy greetings; lots of excitement to meet me (an American), lots of offers of food and drink.  If you ever need an ego boost, I recommend this experience.  

After a couple hours, the three of us trudged through the snow to an identical apartment in an identical apartment building, just a few hundred yards away from Tanya's.  In this tiny apartment's kitchen and living/dining rooms were crammed about 20 people, most of them around my age.  No one but Masha spoke English, but this was about 10 weeks into my time in Russia, so I could at least manage the standard greeting and getting-to-know-you stuff.  Masha was a great interpreter.

Until she and Tanya left.

For over an hour.

I never understood fully where they went or why (not understanding things is pretty standard when you live in a foreign country), but in the meantime I was in an apartment with a group of total strangers, not one of whom spoke English.  It was hot and crowded; loud and overwhelming; and it was an experience of a lifetime.  Everyone was fascinated by me (in spite of my mostly non-verbal state).  I was a foreigner.  I was an American.  I was a native English speaker.  I was INTERESTING!  Masha told me later than some of the people I met there had never before met a non-Russian.  

Think about that.  It's pretty humbling and surreal to be someone's first-ever experience of a foreigner! 

One guy in particular assigned himself as my new interpreter, in spite of the fact that he knew about five English words.  You can see him sitting next to me in the photo below (I'm in a red shirt), toasting the camera.  When someone would speak too quickly for me to understand, he would chide them and tell them to slow down.  He spent LONG minutes trying to say things to me in English...generally just random words.  :)  Eventually someone came up with a Russian/English dictionary, and he commandeered that baby the whole time.  I did a lot of smiling and nodding.  Occasionally, he would encouraged everyone to back up a bit, so as not to crowd me.  He constantly tried to get me to eat and drink various things.  Just about the time I thought my brain was going to start oozing out of my ears, Masha and Tanya returned, and the party began in earnest.

Into the already-crowded rooms came more and more people.  I believe the final count around the table was 20 or 21.  The table had been placed in the living room- the biggest space in the apartment), so we were surrounded by a couch, a tv, and the rest of the living room furniture.  To get up from the table, you had to stand on the seat of your chair and step over it onto the furniture behind.  But we weren't getting up; we were too busy eating and toasting.  Russians are not slouches when it comes to putting out a good spread for a special occasion!  There was food for days.  And drinks!  The men drank vodka (of course!) and the women drank white wine.  I drank juice (along with the couple children there), thanks to the community contract I had signed for the study abroad program.  

My unwillingness to consume alcohol seemed to be a personal insult to my dear protector.  He tried and tried to convince me to try just a sip!  "Eet ok, Lyehzlyee!  No problyem!  Nooooo problyem!" ("It's ok, Leslie!  No problem!  Noooooo problem!")

When we were all stuffed to the point of explosion, and more hard liquor had been consumed than I had ever witnessed in my life (I had not yet lived in China at this point), the table was cleared, and then removed.  The parents and younger siblings of the host family left the rest of us and headed to bed.

The photo above is Masha, Tanya, and the little sister of the birthday girl, singing one of the many songs I heard that night. We played some party games; they danced (by this point I was struggling to stay awake), and eventually the whole crew decided to go for a walk.   It was nearing midnight, but it was snowing, which made it easy to see as we walked.  After a snowball fight we all returned to the apartment and said our goodbyes.

Masha, Tanya, and I, along with Tanya's boyfriend and my personal protector, returned to Tanya's home.  We were all staying there for the night, and then we would take the train back to the city the following morning.

At this point you might be scrolling back up to verify the number of bedrooms in this place.  One.  One bedroom.  It had two twin beds in it.  Counting Tanya's dad and brother, there were seven of us staying overnight.  I figured Masha, Tanya, and I would get the bedroom, and all the guys would camp out in the living room.  But that's because I'm an American.  Were I a Russian, I would have known better.

I would have known that the most honor is shown to the guest least-closely related to the family ( you know; they are the most properly "company").  So the blood-family members (Tanya, her dad, her brother, and cousin Masha) shared the living room.  We three guests (the boyfriend, the friend, and the American) shared the bedroom.

When you're studying abroad, there are some things you do not mention when you talk with your mom.  Like how that one time you shared a bedroom with two drunk Russian men you'd just met a few hours before, and how they slept in their boxers, cause, you know, that's what Russian men do, I guess.

But in reality, the worst part of the whole event was when Masha explained the sleeping arrangements, and everyone stood around laughing good-naturedly as understanding dawned on my face as the two guys started stripping down, and I began to blush.  In the morning I woke up to my protector, thankfully once again fully clothed, rolling up his pallet of blankets and encouraging me, with broken English and lots of sign language, that it was early and I should go back to sleep.

As our crew I rode the train back home, I knew that attending that party had been a gift for me.  That trip was a special glimpse into the Russian culture that not many foreigners have the privilege of experiencing.   I came home totally exhausted, physically and mentally, but the whole event was more than worth it!