Banya Bliss
Last weekend, Sara, my student Ksenia, and I were invited by Sara's student Lena to Lena's home in Kovrov. Her parents live there in their own house with a big yard and, most importantly, a banya. I love the public banya with all its gossiping grandmothers, but it's great to kick back at a real, private Russian banya. A private banya is mainly a room with a stove and a couple wooden benches. It can get pretty hot, especially when you start throwing water on the rocks in the stove and you sit up on the top level. It gets really good when someone starts beating you with a venik (a bundle of branches with leaves on them). The combination of waves of heat and wet leaves is supposed to be really good for you...
We left on Sunday morning and when we got to Kovrov (it takes about an hour an a half by bus) Lena's mom had prepared a feast for us, including the king of Russian food, blini. Also notice the liver pate in the shape of a pig sitting in front of me.
After we stuffed ourselves thoroughly with blini (I wasn't brave enough to dig into the pig) we slept for over an hour, and then headed out to the banya, which was already nice and hot. We went between sweating in the banya to sitting outside in the cool air, drinking tea with steam rising from our bodies.
And what could be better than banya, tea, and food, than all those things plus guns? Her dad busted out a BB gun and we had some target practice between banya runs. Here's Sara with the gun:
And me with the gun:
And here's me with the dog and Lena's mom:
This is Lena and her dad, and a bottle he found in the banya. Her dad was our banchik, whipping us good with a venik. There was some screaming, but that didn't stop the beating. It's good for you.
After a few hours of banya relaxation and fun, we finished the night off the best way possible: more eating. Lena's mom made one of the best kinds of Russian soup, salyanka, and her dad grilled shashlik, which you can see in the picture:
We stayed overnight and came back to Vladimir early in the morning, still worn out and full from our fun in Kovrov. We got to experience the three best things about Russia: food, banya, and hospitality.
Last weekend, Sara, my student Ksenia, and I were invited by Sara's student Lena to Lena's home in Kovrov. Her parents live there in their own house with a big yard and, most importantly, a banya. I love the public banya with all its gossiping grandmothers, but it's great to kick back at a real, private Russian banya. A private banya is mainly a room with a stove and a couple wooden benches. It can get pretty hot, especially when you start throwing water on the rocks in the stove and you sit up on the top level. It gets really good when someone starts beating you with a venik (a bundle of branches with leaves on them). The combination of waves of heat and wet leaves is supposed to be really good for you...
We left on Sunday morning and when we got to Kovrov (it takes about an hour an a half by bus) Lena's mom had prepared a feast for us, including the king of Russian food, blini. Also notice the liver pate in the shape of a pig sitting in front of me.
After we stuffed ourselves thoroughly with blini (I wasn't brave enough to dig into the pig) we slept for over an hour, and then headed out to the banya, which was already nice and hot. We went between sweating in the banya to sitting outside in the cool air, drinking tea with steam rising from our bodies.
And what could be better than banya, tea, and food, than all those things plus guns? Her dad busted out a BB gun and we had some target practice between banya runs. Here's Sara with the gun:
And me with the gun:
And here's me with the dog and Lena's mom:
This is Lena and her dad, and a bottle he found in the banya. Her dad was our banchik, whipping us good with a venik. There was some screaming, but that didn't stop the beating. It's good for you.
After a few hours of banya relaxation and fun, we finished the night off the best way possible: more eating. Lena's mom made one of the best kinds of Russian soup, salyanka, and her dad grilled shashlik, which you can see in the picture:
We stayed overnight and came back to Vladimir early in the morning, still worn out and full from our fun in Kovrov. We got to experience the three best things about Russia: food, banya, and hospitality.
posted by Joanna at 7:25 PM
6 Comments:
Christ, that second last picture looks like something out of Borat.
JEALOUS!!
I second the jealous comment. You're awesome Jobob, as is Russia.
Joanna,
This might sound strange, but I am an author working on a book about bath traditions and I would love to interview you via e-mail. You can check out my web site at www.klgoing.com if you're interested. There's a link to contact me on the site. I'd love to hear from you!
KL
Whoa Jobob, you should totally get interviewed on banyas, you are the world's leading expert as far as I know....just that the world doesn't know it yet. Well, now they will ;)
Thanks for the post, looks like you pretty much distilled everything I love about Russia into one amazing day. Live it up for the rest of us, Bobby! And pour out a libation once in a while, you know we did it for you ;)
We have visited his blog-web and find it interesting, congratulations
There visits ours, the irreverent and iconoclast of the world,
is in Catalunya - Spain
Http: // telamamaria.blogspot.com
Thank you very much for the visit
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