Today starts the 10 day long russian holiday…unfortunately since I am not Russian, and am not in the office right now I don’t have the priviledge of receiving 10 days off. I did, however, get to celebrate new year’s eve and new year’s day in an unique way.
Last night, while staying on at a wellsite we gathered our crew and hosted as much of a new year’s party as we could. The guys made up an assortment of meats, cheese, pastries, fruit, and bread (always bread) that they had brought along in case we spent the holiday away from town. The promise was to include the vodka once we got back, so we substituted that with juice.
Each person took their chance to say goodbye to 2010 and recap on the good and bad and mention how they would like to start 2011. I was surprised to hear how open these guys were about some of the struggles they had in the past year. It’s the last chance to let it all out be midnight and then leave it in 2010. My piece was that I had a few ups and downs this year but that I was very lucky. I was living the good life in the US and luckily avoided a huge tragedy but it still managed to change my life situation…and then, one day, i received an email saying ‘Welcome To Russia’ and I was pleased to be in the country and look forward to starting clean in 2011 as it has been a big learning curve with work, language, life so far these past few months. We finished the night with a few more juice toasts and that was that.
New year’s day was less than ideal but still managed to have a new russian experience. Since we had been on this wellsite for a few days, and we knew nothing would get done work wise because of the holiday we went to a nearby ‘camp’ to get a hot meal and shower up. The guys were preparing me for Russian ‘Bania’ which has different meanings but is basically sitting in a steam room and then sometimes followed by jumping into a freezing cold body of water. This setup didn’t have the cold water but showers instead which was ok because I was overdue. As in north america, it’s normal for a few guys, fully undressed to sit in the sauna/steam room together but it just doesn’t feel as normal when you’re still out at a wellsite. I went with it though and was last to enter the steam room. The operating crew were trying to make me feel welcome and told me to come up and sit beside them. I had no towel with me and wondered if the seat would be hot but there wasn’t much I could do about it at that point so I went up and sat down. The seat was more than hot which caused me to jump up, and thanks to the low ceiling I hit my head on the roof. This then forced me back down and I guess I had shifted over a bit because I landed with direct leg to leg contact with my naked co-worker. Of course this was embarassing, I couldn’t sit down again, I couldn’t stand due to the roof so I stayed in a half-squatting, bent over position while the operator ran out and got me one of his extra towels to sit on. I didn’t even try to explain or apologize to these guys as the only english they knew was my name. The rest of the day was spent with the crew eating and watching Russian movies about war.
Good start to 2011.
Last night, while staying on at a wellsite we gathered our crew and hosted as much of a new year’s party as we could. The guys made up an assortment of meats, cheese, pastries, fruit, and bread (always bread) that they had brought along in case we spent the holiday away from town. The promise was to include the vodka once we got back, so we substituted that with juice.
Each person took their chance to say goodbye to 2010 and recap on the good and bad and mention how they would like to start 2011. I was surprised to hear how open these guys were about some of the struggles they had in the past year. It’s the last chance to let it all out be midnight and then leave it in 2010. My piece was that I had a few ups and downs this year but that I was very lucky. I was living the good life in the US and luckily avoided a huge tragedy but it still managed to change my life situation…and then, one day, i received an email saying ‘Welcome To Russia’ and I was pleased to be in the country and look forward to starting clean in 2011 as it has been a big learning curve with work, language, life so far these past few months. We finished the night with a few more juice toasts and that was that.
New year’s day was less than ideal but still managed to have a new russian experience. Since we had been on this wellsite for a few days, and we knew nothing would get done work wise because of the holiday we went to a nearby ‘camp’ to get a hot meal and shower up. The guys were preparing me for Russian ‘Bania’ which has different meanings but is basically sitting in a steam room and then sometimes followed by jumping into a freezing cold body of water. This setup didn’t have the cold water but showers instead which was ok because I was overdue. As in north america, it’s normal for a few guys, fully undressed to sit in the sauna/steam room together but it just doesn’t feel as normal when you’re still out at a wellsite. I went with it though and was last to enter the steam room. The operating crew were trying to make me feel welcome and told me to come up and sit beside them. I had no towel with me and wondered if the seat would be hot but there wasn’t much I could do about it at that point so I went up and sat down. The seat was more than hot which caused me to jump up, and thanks to the low ceiling I hit my head on the roof. This then forced me back down and I guess I had shifted over a bit because I landed with direct leg to leg contact with my naked co-worker. Of course this was embarassing, I couldn’t sit down again, I couldn’t stand due to the roof so I stayed in a half-squatting, bent over position while the operator ran out and got me one of his extra towels to sit on. I didn’t even try to explain or apologize to these guys as the only english they knew was my name. The rest of the day was spent with the crew eating and watching Russian movies about war.
Good start to 2011.
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