This week has flown by; only two weeks
left to go now! On Wednesday I came back fairly early from university and took
advantage of the empty flat to get some work done. Vanya and I stayed in that
evening and watched films until the early hours; the whole family seem used to
getting very little sleep here.
By Thursday, the lack of sleep was
beginning to catch up on me and I was ready for an early night – but this wasn't to be. After university, Alexia and I went to a café so I could help her out
with some work, and when I got back at around 3 I decided it would be a good
idea to have a little nap.
When Vanya came back he told me he was
meeting a friend for dinner at Academia
if I wanted to come. Thinking this would be a quiet evening out, I agreed, not
realising that the meal would only be a small part of the evening. There were
only three of us initially, and we ordered food and split a shisha and a bottle
of vodka between us, which we took in shots, of course. At around ten, another
friend arrived and we ordered another bottle. When the restaurant was closing,
we walked through the snow back to Maxim’s place so he could grab some more
money, before moving on to Your Bar. We stayed there until closing at 2, when
we moved on to Cocktail Bar before taking a taxi back.
Getting up the next day was not fun,
but I made it into class nonetheless. I was lucky enough to be ready just in
time to grab a lift with Ivan, Vanya’s dad, who said he would take me in as far
as he could before he had to go in the other direction to get to work. Once again,
luck was in my favour as the bus I needed to catch ended up behind us and I was
able just to jump from one form of transport to another, and arrived at
university only a few minutes late.
I was late leaving university that day
as we were all agonising over the choice the university had presented us of how
to get home. RLUS has decided that it’s too much of a risk to send us to the
airport on the bus, since the previous group had arrived too late at the
airport and missed their flight. This was a week ago, and they have only just
flown back today, having been stranded in Russia as their visas ran out,
meaning they were illegally in the country and unable to leave until the new
visas came through. Consequently, RLUS have said they will provide us with
train tickets instead – leaving us to decide between a train on Friday
afternoon, Friday evening or Saturday morning. We’re divided about 50/50 and I've decided the most hassle-free method is to go on Saturday morning, which leaves
us with six hours to play with once we reach the train station in Moscow.
After collecting my boots from the
shoe repair, I went straight back to flat. I had a quick bite to eat before
sneaking in a two-hour nap. When I woke up at 4pm I was told I needed to get
ready as quickly as I could because we were going to Vanya’s grandparents’
house – why, I wasn't quite sure. Having just woken up and being in a rush to
wash my hair and get ready, I didn't really have time to argue and just
accepted what was going on without complaint, despite the fact we were meant to
be meeting Joe and his Russian friends at a restaurant in town at 6.
At Vanya’s grandparents’ house we were
given copious amounts of food once again – pirozhki (pies), fish, bread and
salad – which I felt too guilty to refuse, despite the fact I was about to go
to a restaurant. Vanya had to go back to the flat to fetch his wallet and sent
me off on a marshrutka, which I could only hope was the right one. It turned
out he was right and I arrived at the restaurant at around 7. It was clearly an
up-market place – I had to leave my coat in the cloakroom before entering and
after giving the name of the party was shown upstairs to a large, chic room. Joe
and I bought a bottle of cherry wine to share and, for appearances more than
out of hunger, I ordered a salad. Vanya arrived a little later, but the party
turned out to be a quiet group. At 9 we moved on the Oktoberfest, but there weren't many people there either so we moved
on to Your Bar after one round.
Things got a bit better at Your Bar, especially when Alexia, Ben,
Ed, Yana and Akob arrived. We stayed there until around 2, by which time I was
ready to fall asleep on the dance floor there and then. Luckily, today we didn't have to be anywhere until 5 so we slept in till late. At 5 we’re popping in to
see Vanya’s granddad again because he’s on his own for the weekend, and after
that the plan is to meet a few of Vanya’s friends at Your Bar (I think I may as well move in there to be honest).
Tomorrow is Vanya’s friend’s birthday too – let’s hope we go somewhere else
(although since Your Bar is one of
the few good bars in Yaroslavl, that’s fairly unlikely).
Apart from that, we don’t have any
plans for this weekend, which should give me chance to catch up on some work
and rest. It feels strange only to have one weekend left here, when the end
once seemed so far away.
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