International Café

Well,

The next day Kaitlin was the first to rise and shine, and I was up shortly after. Anna said she would meet us at the bistro, and I went ahead to meet up with Kaitlin.

Kaitlin and I sat around silently drinking tea, and eating our breakfast of blini and eggs, while she read her book.

After a while Kaitlin went back to get Anna. Finally Becca came in and told us that Brendan was accepted into Columbia, which was his top choice, so big congrats to Brendan for joining the IV League.

He will be living in NYC for the next five years; so maybe, just maybe we will be able to meet up again if me and Amanda happen to be living there too. Also there is a good chance we would vacation there, and then I would still like to meet up with them again. Unless of course something were to happen over the next 4 months that would make us hate each other.

Anyway, so eventually Brendan rolls in and we congratulate him on his very outstanding achievement. He took so long getting in for breakfast because he was busy sending and receiving emails.

After lunch, we went back to our rooms to nap. At some point we decided that we would go for a walk to the store. When we reached an intersection we parted ways. Anna and Kaitlin went to the store, and I went to the frozen harbor to take pictures.

I went out on a broken pier, and the only footsteps in the snow were that of a dog. I wanted out to the very edge and took a lot of pictures. The entire pier was covered in ice, it was quite a sight.

I soon got bored with the non-moving frozen boats, and went back the bistro. There Kaitlin and Anna were chatting it up with some new faces.

There was the guy from Ireland, or Scotland, he reminded me of a guy straight out of father ted. He kept saying things like, “what is the time just now,” and “what kind of food are they serving for lunch just now,” and, “what is up with airport food just now.”

I wish I could remember his name, but he was traveling from his home east to all around the world. He took a year off of work so he could see the world, and I guess Lake Baikal was on his list of places to see. He had met a South Korean on the way to Baikal, who was moving in the opposite direction on the Transiberian.

The guy from Scotland told us that on the train he was showing Russian pictures on his camera, when they found one of him dressed as a Tibetan monk, and they thought that he was, so, they laden him with many gifts of mir and gold.

The was a woman from Tibet who has live in New Zealand for the last 8 years , and a couple from the French part of Canada. We all sat around drinking tea talking about our travel plans, and all of the places that everyone had already been.

Turns out that everyone else there had been to many places before coming to Irkutsk, and unless you count the other side of Niagara falls, this is the first time I have been out of the USA.

It was really interesting being in that little bistro with so many people who came from all over the world, heading in every which way on the Trans-Siberian railroad.

Anyway, this day was really not that interesting, and by now it happened a week ago, so the point is, lots of people, from all over the world, in a café.

We all went back out to the Shaman Rocks, and Anna and I helped hoist Brendan up on top of the boat, and then Brendan and I helped Anna up. Kaitlin, Becca, and Brendan tried to help me up, but it was too icy, and my arms to weak to get me up on top of that boat. It was a little embarrassing but mostly disappointing, I really wanted to get up on the boat.

We also explored the tall rocks on the shore of the ice lake, and Brendan and I discussed movies we like, both good and bad. It turns out we both have a thing for Red Dawn. This came up because the rocks here reminded me of the rock on which the young highs school guerrillas would write the names of their dead.

We also talked about the Big Lebowski. I never noticed that Donnie leaves one pin standing right before he dies, and that is foreshadowing. So, next time I watch it, I will totally check that out.

Thinking about these movies makes me home sick, so, we went back to Nikita’s.

So, we had another delicious meal and had another good night of sleep.

The next day I got up early to take photographs of the Shaman Rocks at dawn. I then went to the café for breakfast.

We then packed up and headed to the marshrutka to leave. On the way back Anna used my camera to take pictures of outside the windshield as she was sitting in the front passenger seat.

After we crossed the lake, we stopped at the other side to wait for our transfer. That driver did not deserve 300 Руб from each of us for driving only that far. The next ride, which lasted 5 hours cost us 400 Руб a piece.

It was at this stop that I got the picture of the toilet, and that seemingly out of place grave of that one guy overlooking the lake.

The ride back was pretty bad. My feet were pretty cold and we were packed in even tighter than the way there, and we did not stop at a halfway point either. I sat next to this asshole who kept on pushing me and this lady more and more into the side of the vehicle while he listened to his annoying music, I really wanted to tell him off near the end, or beat him over the head with his sony ericsson phone.

We were 13 kilometers outside of Irkutsk when they decided to pull over on the side of the road and take a smoke break while they refilled the gas tank.

Soon enough we were back in Irkutsk and our amazing trip to Ольхон was over. It felt good to finally be back in a place that I could call home.

AWAY!