Second Week in Irkutsk – Working in Siberia

After leaving from a weekend trip to Listvyanka, we arrived back in Irkutsk for my second full week there. While I would say that things were much the same as my first week spent in this city, it was far from it after randomly working in Siberia later that week. However, things started off with a dinner at my friend’s grandparent’s house as soon as we returned.

Here are the highlights of my thoughts and observations as a foreign guest for the dinner…

Since I couldn’t speak Russian all that well amongst a table of non-English speakers, I knew it would be awkward during the ‘toast’. When came time to say something during this, I guess you could pretty much say anything and it wouldn’t much matter! However, what I do know is that I ate enough food that evening to have fed a pack of Rhinos.

I don’t know if its common to have bagged milk in other countries but this was new to me…

I am also confident at this point that I have successfully put on about 8 kilo since landing at the Irkutsk airport 2 weeks ago. Dinner was excellent though and an experience I’ll never forget. It’s just not commonplace for me to eat cucumber salad, take a shot of Vodka, move on to some kidney beans and then take another shot of Vodka while finishing it off with a glass of homemade wine and a side of tea. So what did I eat??? Lets see:

1 slab of chicken
6 pieces of ham
1 slice of fresh Baikal fish
3 helpings of sliced carrot
1 scoop of green radish surprise
4 slices of tomato topped with cheese
2 helpings of cucumber salad
4 spoonfuls of potato casserole
3 scoops worth of some type of bean salad
2 slices of rye bread
3 slices of cake
7 pieces of chocolate
1 glasses of homemade wine
2 cups of mint tea
And 3 shots of Irkutsk Vodka!

To say that my stomach was wondering what the hell just happened would be an understatement…

The Irkutsk Market

After my morning recovery, we headed out to one of the local markets here in Irkutsk. There are two main Irkutsk markets that most people frequent but the one I’m referring to here is specifically the one that is mainly outdoors. And due to the goods sold here as well as whom is doing the selling, I refer to it as the ‘Russian/Mongolian/Chinese goods market’…

Fur skin boots found in the Irktusk market. The inside was also lined with fur… somehow I was guessing these were some extremely warm boots! Makes sense though since this was Siberia after all!

The main goods sold in the Irkutsk market are clothes and I was actually on a hunt for a Russian ‘track suit’. This was not just for the novelty of it as its one of the more popular outfits worn by men but because it’s also a perfect fit on a long 4 day train ride which I’d soon be taking. After some prolonged searching and bargaining, I ended up with this:

The Classic Russian track suit!

You can actually find a good amount of deals here as most of these locals will do a good amount of bargaining back and forth with you. Just keep in mind however that a lot of them won’t be doing so in English so you’ll have to revert to either Russian, Chinese or some good ol’ tactics of non-verbal communication!

Working in Siberia

Later that week, the Irkutsk area had gotten the a good amount of snow and they were calling for close to a half meter (about 1′ 6″) of snow a few days after. It was then that my friend had received the ‘phone call’. We were quickly instructed to head back out to the notorious countryside house to do work only this time, working in Siberia was going to be an all out laborious event.

Neighboring Countryside Homes outside Irkutsk

We were called upon by her grandfather to harvest the cabbage that was now covered in snow. And folks, this was my first time cutting cabbage and needless to say, there was a ton of it in their garden. I was also grossly unprepared for this in regards my attire for the ‘hacking cabbage event’ on this snowy Siberian day. All I had with me to wear was what I brought in my backpack to Beijing more than a month earlier… a pair of jeans, a sweater and a thin shell of a knock off North Face from Sapa, Vietnam. No gloves, no thermal, no nothing. Working in Siberia today was going to be an event to remember. I think you’ll now understand why I was given this ridiculously large but warm leather overcoat and gloves when I arrived by her grandfather. To give you an idea of the weight of this leather coat, I don’t even think a Fireman’s coat would weight as much.

This gives new meaning to the nickname “Slim Reaper” !!

Yep, from this point on, it was all business. I took that hatchet in hand and began hacking away. It was actually fun though I seemed to be the only one enjoying themselves. Maybe it was the fact that I’d known this was a novelty for me and something I’d probably never be doing again, at least anytime soon I’d hoped. We ended up working for about 2 hours on this and the result was about 5 wheelbarrows worth of cabbage that got hauled off that day. Overall, it was a Siberian work experience I’ll never forget! Luckily, the rest of the week was fairly low-key and I was not called upon to do any more manual labor harvesting in the Siberian tundra with my jeans and a sweater. I can’t wait to see what next week brings!