One reason I'm glad I switched positions

I left my old position and have been an instructor for the past 4 months.  I really enjoy traveling and seeing new parts of the world and I got the chance to see a few different places in Russia.  It had been a great experience but had I continued in that same position I wouldn't have seen new places, it would have been the same towns/locations over and over again.  So, with this change I was happy to give up the travel and settle into something resembling a 'life'.

My least favorite place was a town called Pyt-Yakh and it happened to be the place I traveled to most often.  The town itself is fine, it's a work town, but the geographical area of it made it the unfortunate recipient of some of the worst quality water I've had to deal with. 

normal water

I'm glad I didn't spend enough time there to find this out but I've been told that after living there for a while you might notice your fingernails turning yellowish and, if you happen to brush your teeth with it, it'll show there as well.   There's also an associated smell that goes with the color so those who think they can manage it with their eyes closed might still find it hard.

The Students

I mentioned in an earlier post that I was impressed how most of my students are learning the material in this very technical course in English when most of them have a different mother tongue.  Of course I will never tell them I'm impressed...from my perspective all they do is whine and complain about how hard everything is, how few days off they get, etc.  Well, back in MY day it was more difficult and we had fewer days off, but I digress.

There's about 7 years difference between me and the students which is quite a bit less than when I went through this school.  It's a fine line between being friendly with them but keeping the professional attitude required to be an effective instructor.  Naturally, being an overly-polite and helpful guy I have to error on the side of being more strict and tough with them to keep my proper level of superiority over these subordinates.

Every once in while though these kids get you to crack a smile.  This week we, as main instructors, have had some time out of the classroom while a guest instructor covers a specific topic.  I saw one of the students in the hallway and as he was passing he said 'Dave, we miss you in the class this week.'

These little bastards aren't so bad sometimes....

йога

I was recently convinced to go and try a yoga class in Tyumen.  Two friends of mine basically gave me no choice but promised me a good lunch following this obviously humiliating situation.  I'm not against yoga and have actually been eager to try it out someday and get into that whole lifestyle but I've HESITATED going with people from the oilfield since the time I walked in on two rig hands practicing what was apparently yoga in the gym of a floating rig.  They were properly dressed in coveralls and large work boots so I'm sure they were following the right procedure.  They asked if I wanted to join but I politely declined telling them I had to do a run for 'training', then I walked around the gym once and left as fast as I could.  It was just too much to take in all at once.

This time, however, it was going to be a different situation.  There would be a real yoga instructor, full yoga experience and maybe some fit girls there yoga-ing beside me to help the time go by.  When it comes to these situations where I have no idea what I'm doing, I don't speak the language well enough and i'm bound to look like a fool I strategically position myself in the back of the room so that I can falter without being seen by the rest of the people in the class.  My friends, who took the same approach, had already done a few classes so I was expecting to be the worst out of them but, as part of my strategy, I looked around the room for one person that might be worse.  I was pleasantly surprised to see a grizzly of a Russian sitting in the back row as well so I sat close to him figuring I was more flexible than 275lb man.

The instructor noticed my 'new face' and she knew a little bit of English so she asked me my name to welcome me to the class.  After answering, her face lights up....
'oohhh, David Swenson!'. 
The rest of the class had a nice little yoga-chuckle at her comment so I figured it was some sort of inside joke.  Turns out this David Swenson is some sore of master yoga instructor, about 60 years old and doesn't have much hair.  I hope it wasn't a comparison based on looks.

The 2 hour yoga session (I was told it would only be 1) was started off with a chant.  The translation of this chant having something to do with the Lotus Feet, Thousand headed men and conch shells.  I suppose one is supposed to feel very spiritual during this chant but I was focusing on biting my lip to keep from laughing.  It started off with an 'Ommmmmmm' and I barely made it through that first verse but decided I better go with the process I used when I was in high school choir (for the easy grades) of just opening my mouth but not making a sound.  I let the rest of the group get me through it while I pinched my skin and pulled on my leg hair so I could keep a straight face.  

With the chanting completed the instructor gave a 10 minute introduction/explanation of what Yoga is all about so it was great that I had no idea what she saying.  The next part was to change the way we breathe.  I'm generally quite happy with how I breathe but apparently, in Yoga, you need to breathe like you're a Rhino in heat.  The sounds that were filling the room completely destroyed any concentration I had.  I couldn't get this technique down.  When I tried to breathe louder I made sounds that more resembled a donkey.  I stuck with my quiet breathing in the end.  

So we're 1.5 hours into this 'Plank, Downward facing Dog' routine and I'm feeling like I'm at least doing better than the rollie-pollie fellow sitting next to me.  The instructor then says a couple words, claps her hands twice quickly and then all I see are legs flying in the air....and staying there.  I'd seen this move in a movie once but thought it was an exaggeration of the yoga technique but here I am still trying to get out of child's pose and people are balancing on top of their heads like it's the easiest thing in the world.  I have more trouble standing on my feet then they do upside down.  As I look to my supposed safety net, the gigantor beside me, I'm crushed as he's completely vertical, upside down, holding the straightest pose of the whole group.  All this time he was just pretending to be terrible and the hustles me right at the end.  I really felt like pushing him over.


Anyways, I survived the class and I was now looking forward to the post-yoga lunch that I was promised.  That part did not disappoint.  We went to a cafe serving Uzbek food and as you can see from the pictures below it was the perfect yoga recovery meal.  Namaste.

Where's Dave been?

To the faithful followers I apologize for the long stretch in between blogs.  In June I abruptly changed positions, went on an overdue holiday back home, started in my new position in August, somehow ran a marathon in September in Berlin and since then have been back in Russia working at one of our training centers. 


The move from a quality supervisor to an instructor has been a challenge.  I've never really been comfortable speaking to a group of people so it seems that for me to teach a class 6 days a week for 3 months wouldn't be the wisest choice.  Having said that, it was a good move for me.  I was getting tired in my position and lacking some direction.  The constant traveling was wearing me down a bit so I was happy to get into a position that would keep me in one place.  I'm still working my long hours, possibly even longer than before but now I stick to a schedule. The only problem came in terms of blogs in that I've found I have fewer stories now that my life is more 'normal'.   I guess I'll just have to search out those entertaining situations. 


The challenge comes with teaching technical topics to new grads from all different parts of the world.  I have one American in my class and the rest are all non-native English speakers.  They are combined from four Russians, four from Thailand, two from Mexico, two from Iraq, one from Ecuador, one from Brazil, one from Malaysia, one from Poland, and one from Libya.  In the end this means that at best I have one person in the class who will understand every word that I say.   I'm very impressed with the kids that are learning in English as their second, or third, language.  This course is tough for native english speakers so they have their work cut out for them.  I still have improvements to make in how I speak to them but I've adapted the way I speak so that they can at least understand the bulk of what I'm saying.   The best part of having all of these people coming to Russia from warmer climates is watching them freeze and complain in only -5C weather.  On the other hand, their excitement to see snow irks me...let's see how much they enjoy it after a few months. 



This post didn't have much for entertainment but mostly used as an update of what I'm doing these days.  I have a few more posts in brewing and I'll try to get back to updating regularly.  

Quick vacation back home

I just got back from a mostly relaxing vacation which included a trip back home and then a blurry adventure in Ireland on my way back to work in Russia.  It's always nice to be back at home visiting with friends and family and as for Ireland, I have one piece of advice...don't accept any drinking challenges against an Irishman, especially 6 of them at once. It won't end well.  

On my way back to Russia, dealing with an Irish hangover, I boarded my second last leg of the trip from Frankfurt to Moscow.  After a month of not practicing any Russian or, at the very least, seeing any Russian women I'm happy to hear a familiar unfamiliar language and notice a few girls that are worth noticing while boarding.  It just so happens that two of them are sitting across the aisle from me and the closest one started checking me out every so often during the flight.  Of course I'm keeping it cool, sitting back and watching the animated kids movie on my TV screen.  I figure she's going to break at some point since she can't seem to stop staring at me.  As we start our final descent she finally reaches over and grabs my arm.  I calmly take off my headphones to look over as she holds out her air sickness bag and asks if I need to use it.   With a look of complete confusion, I politely decline.

The two Russian beauties could not stop laughing (at me, presumably) until the plane landed.  I suppose I need to re-evaluate my 'cool' look as it seems to get mistaken for a look of imminent vomiting.... but I can still make them laugh.

Eastern Siberia Part 2: Mood Swings

Finally I have time to post on the possibly awaited second part of my trip to Eastern Siberia.  During the flight I had many thoughts going through my head of 'why am i here?', 'what did I do to deserve this punishment?' and strongly considering making a life change if i survived the flight.

I had mixed feelings while getting off the plane as I knew I would be spending around 3 weeks in this area before I could go home AND the only way out was going back on that awful flight.  My mood started to improve after getting a chance to see our base, meet the crews and get into work mode.  The one good thing about working in such an isolated place is that you don't have anyone on-site except for people doing the physical work.  I was the closest thing to a boss at that location so it was nice just to focus on work and not have to deal  with all the extras.   

2am

 

One of the first things I was warned about when I was heading this far north is the concept of 'white nights'.  This is the time of the year when there is no darkness, 24 hours of sunlight.  In the northern regions of Russia this lasts for about 3 months.  I prefer it to the winter when there is only a couple hours of sunlight a day but it makes it very difficult to get a good night's sleep when the sun won't go down. 

The initial reason I had made this trip to Eastern Siberia was to witness an on-the-job operation of a young engineer to see if he was comfortable to this job without supervision. So this meant I had to visit a rig and watch him through the entire operation. 

No, it's not a pterodactyl..it's a mosquito

It was going to be a long job, middle of nowhere, mosquitoes in both size and numbers that I have never seen before, and having to resist the urge to do the work and only supervise.  On day one of three I was already bored and the weather was less than ideal. I was sinking into a low, nothing to do, nowhere to go and dreaming of the day I could finally leave this place. 

Then, in the morning of day 2 the skies cleared up and the sun came out. There was a light breeze which kept the mosquitoes away.  The job was going very smoothly and I found myself relaxing, enjoying the weather, the peace and quiet (aside from the drilling rig in front of us).  You can see my level of calm as I sit in our work unit enjoying a cup of tea, an apple and working on my Siberian sun tan. These days it's one of the most coveted types of tans. 

a natural at Siberian sun tanning

 There was one manual laborer who spoke a bit of English and every chance he had he wanted to test out his pronunciation with me.  So, once in a while we would go grab another cup of tea, have a couple snacks and he would ask me something in English and I would respond in Russian.  On this second day my Russian was starting to flow and I was feeling like I was finally getting a grasp on some basic conversation. The rest of the day was much of the same...working outside in the sun, light breeze, lots of food/tea breaks, russian/english conversation.  I was feeling good again, it was such a significant change in mood from day 1 to day 2 and as I sat in my chair, watching the sun NOT go down (ever), thinking back on how good the day was I take a sip of tea, completely forget where my mouth was and pour hot tea all over my crotch.    Back to neutral.

The rest of my trip was mostly uneventful until July 1st when I left and celebrated Canada Day in the airport. (which can  be read about in my previous blog post).

Canada day in Russia

This post should be Part 2 of my trip to Eastern Siberia but i had to interrupt that process to describe my Canada day.

This was my third Canada day I spent living in a different country and it was setting up to be the worst one since the last two were spent with other Canadians living abroad or, at least, with friends. The majority of this one was spent traveling in helicopters and planes from vankor oilfield to Krasnoyarsk. There wasn't any real chance even for some solo celebration.

I did get satisfaction but in a unique way. I was in the airport of the vankor oilfield and wasting a lot of time waiting on my ride out of there. There were two coworkers with me with different levels of English skills. As we chatted in english I could see confused looks coming from other passengers directed at me. It was not for a while after we had been speaking in english when I decided to stand up and stretch. There was a quick break in conversation and the other passengers piped up and started questioning the Russian person I was traveling with. My Russian is poor but I know when people are talking about me so I turned to my coworker and asked what they had said. She told me they were asking where I was from, what I was doing here, etc. I asked her if she had answered them. She said she hadn't and told me they were waiting for my answer.

So here I am, now standing in front of a crowd of 20 Russians, all staring at me and waiting for me to speak. As it was Canada day I took my chance to say, loud and proud,

'I Am Canadian!'

felt good. Then the post-statement russian conversation turned to questions of why I was
there, how much I was getting paid and other curiosities as they we're amazed that someone from another country would actually choose to be in this part of Russia. A few people wanted to come up and meet me and shake my hand. It was like being a celebrity just for being Canadian...the way it should be.