200 m

Have I mentioned that we live 200 m from a forest?

You can walk up hill for 10 mins and stop seeing other people, or hearing city sounds other than the nearby military base’s rifle practice. It’s all just there, and if you come prepared with mosquito repellant, quick reflexes to brush away the ticks, and keep an eye out for bears, you have nothing to worry about but enjoying the forest you’re in.

It truly is lovely and, though I know little about flora, especially here, I find it quite remarkable. There are plenty of coniferous trees, typical of cold climates- but then there are huge herbs, and plants I would describe as tropical. I like the way a friend once put it- there’s so much energy in the ground here, that all this greenery leaps up, and shoots enormous stalks and leaves into the air, making the most of the short summer months.

Our friend Ira invited us to join her for a picnic in the forest this week. We ended up walking nearly to the top of the hill, when Luke found a trail leading down to a river, with an open grassy area (that the bears had cleared ;-) just perfect for eating in. It’s only an hour’s walk from our house!

Horses

Janet has a horse, Chaika, who gave birth to a foal last week. She took us out to see the young one- he was very shy, and quite appealing to her dogs ;-)

At less than a week old, he was already past the wobbly stage. I don’t know that I’d ever seen such a young foal before. He’s beautiful.

A Crowded House

It's summer and ... that's why it's raining. Go figure

So we're all inside, there's a movie on, no one's talking to me and I can spare a thought for our crazy week! Anton and Nastya got kicked out of their apartment this week, for reasons unexplained, and rather than have them sleep on the street, of course they came to stay with us! And their dog Gruff. We had the questionable pleasure of taking care of Gruff when he was a wee little one, and that's what he did, everywhere- that and yelp. Well the weeing has become less than constant in the last three months, but the yelping has kept pace with his body size. Thankfully they only needed to stay one night.
It was good to see them though. Anton used to live with us, but since moving out and getting a job he doesn't have a lot of time to visit anymore.
How does the proverb go? Distance and the heart...?

Our days off got a bit sabotaged by the whole event, and others (non-youth) needing to visit and talk, etc. I decided to take some drastic measure to preserve my sanity, so I went walking.

"Gulat' " is a concept I've only encountered here. It may be a Russian thing, a youth thing, a lower socio-economic thing... I don't know. Our young folks here fall into all these categories. Gulat' means to go out. Usually with someone else, but I went on my own. To go out and to hang out, walk around, not do anything but just spend time. It's often related with drinking binges... I won't go into that here. But basically, what I did was I walked around town, ALL afternoon. I wouldn't want to do it every day, I couldn't walk much at all the following day!! But I got my much-needed time out, alone. And- I might just do it again sometime.

Because he lives I can face tomorrow- because he lives, all fear is gone! Because I know he holds the future, and life is worth the living just because he lives.

Home Groups

Our church has organised home groups to meet across the city- we host one at our house on Monday nights.
Pastor Peter gave us material for the first three weeks, and he came to lead our group himself last week- which was our first meeting. There was only he and ourselves there- although that's no mean number. 10 of us altogether. And he spoke in Russian, explaining the message to us in limited English as he went along.
We sang songs together. In turns- English and then he sang in Russian.
Jenya, Anton and Sasha began to really listen, and Pastor Pete's jovial nature and Belorussian background brought out a few smiles.

As he left he gave me a pile of material for the next two weeks. He'd be away, and I may have to lead the group.

I have spent the last three days on the sofa with a dictionary, trying to translate the four pages of stuff for Monday night. Last night I finished and typed in English the first two pages. Hopefully the second half uses a lot of the same words (>_<)
Today my task is to find and type out songs that we know in both English and Russian.
Please help me God!

Khabarovsk

Pete's family came to visit us early in June- just a couple of hours after the Grace team had left! Several days later, we trooped off to Khabarovsk, to visit a young man there who is having a hard time serving his country.


I found Khabarovsk to be a beautiful city; far more European in appearance than Sakhalin! Sakhalin, full of buildings we fondly call "Soviet blocks" - Sakhalin, with a different history to the rest of Russia- settled over the last 60 years at first as a penal colony, later advertised as a land of new opportunity... sound familiar? But Khabarovsk has old buildings and infrastructure, lovely facades, wide paved streets and built along the river Amur.

And it's hot. It was hot in early June, reaching 36 degrees on our last day! High humidity and a large mosquito population make it a curse for some, but for me it was a slice of hope- summer has finally arrived!

Khabarovsk is quite a remarkable place. About an hour drive north of the Chinese border, Khabarovsk experiences temperatures of -40 degrees in winter, and +40 degrees in summer! That is... a difference of 80 degrees. Celcius.
The cost of living there is two thirds, or sometimes even half to cost of living in Sakhalin. Now that I've been there, I understand why so many Sakhaliners are moving to the mainland. Soon only the wealthy will be able to afford to live on Sakhalin.

We had the great joy of spending the week with Helen, a young woman who just graduated from university and acted as our interpreter and guide while we were there. She made it possible for us to visit our young soldier. Praise God, after many threats and interviews with the bureau of National Security, he was released to visit us for three days!!


Now that we are back in Sakhalin, we are waiting for the next 4 months until he completes his time and comes home.

Gently gently

Call it paranoia, call it a love of conspiracy theories, call it an inflated sense of self-importance.

But the three of us here have discussed it and decided that, taking evidence, recent circumstances and political forecast into account, it is best to be less forthcoming with facts, names and pictures on this blog than I have been. So please- read between the lines, and try to guess the rest ;-)

Felicity

Luke

200 metres from home

On a certain day

We weren't allowed to forget that May 31st is a special date, and should be so marked in our calendars: It is Anya's birthday. She turned a sweet 17.
And was overjoyed that our Australian visitors would share it with her. She speaks English reasonably well and thrives on attention. The perfect birthday gift.

The not Faraway Forest

I consider myself blessed to be living on the outskirts of the city, at the edge of a forest.
The only time the forest is not a blessing is when the snow is melting- but, thank God, that season is long gone! Picnics and sunbathing by crazy Russian girls (not me, mum!!) are to be had for the thinking.

Another great point is that our drinking water is free- it just takes a little effort to fill up and carry the 19L pump bottle home. But that's the boys' job!



To walk about 100m from our front doorstep and be surrounded by trees is beautiful. It's a place of escape- from the house, from people, to pray, to think, to play...

Antoucha

Off the back of a truck

I know that the market-eers here are regulated- each store displays it's own array of certificates of approval, registration, familial protection... judging by the offical-looking blue rubber stamp adorning them.

But there is another kind of seller, which tends to move about, setting up tables outside market buildings, selling bunches of hand-picked flowers from the forests, home-made relishes, pickles, and korean salads, hand-knitted socks, booties, scarves and gloves, and cheap plastic house slippers.

There's the "cheap table"- a lady who regularly sets up a trestle table on the sidewalk and sells out-of-date (usually edible) food stuffs for minimal prices.

There's a couple who seem to grow their own produce, mostly potatoes, and sell them direct;

And there's the back of the truck.

Sunday Morning

Jesus is RISEN!!

Bussing it

When the weather's good and we don't have too much to carry, it's nice to walk. Otherwise, we take a bus.


Catching a bus in Sakhalin is an experience in itself. Most of the buses that serve the city are 15-seater minivans, and they are numbered with a list of their stops, or a circuit map, on the door. The 45 takes us to the Chinese Markets, Grace church, and home. The 16 will end up at the mental hospital. We can catch the 92 or the 63 to the airport; and to go to church on Sundays we can take the 15, 16, 81 or 105.

Good on ya, 81!

A kiss of snow

We are forever grateful to Sakhalin for showing off our ski slope to the Grace team: it snowed overnight, and the snow hung around, gracing Gorny Vostok for the rest of the day

A range of weather

A definite stress of inviting visitors to Russia, and particularly Sakhalin Island, is the registration process that we must begin (we have discovered) as soon as possible. That way the process may be completed within the first week of stay, and avoid unnecessary, inconvenient and somewhat expensive repurcussions... enough said.


On the first full day of stay, we took the team into town to register. Facefulls of sleet later, we made it panting and wet to our doorstep. I don't know that I have ever been so wet while fully dressed.




Kate met us and filled in the forms. Filling them in by hand, in duplicate, for three people takes a bit of time. But she was more than happy to take the morning off work for us. Thank you Kate!!


The team stayed in a flat we rented for 10 days. It was very close to our place, just 5 mins walk! And was the perfect place to hang out, have meetings and to pray. The kids were impressed- not only did the flat have a TV, they could watch the National Geographic Channel!!!

From an outsider's perspective

After living in a place for more than 2 weeks, first impressions begin to fade and it's very difficult to recognise the differences. Well, to some extent.

Here are some photos of the city that Dave took on the taxi ride from the airport. Note: Sakhalin is not always this overcast!

A wooden Dacha (cottage) along the road. Families often own a dacha- they are out of town, and usually don't have electricity, water, sewerage... families that live in town use their cottages as vegetable gardens and day-time or holiday get-aways. But many people do call a dacha their home. Picturesque, but terribly prone to fire.



The hospital at the top of our street.


An apartment block in less than the best state... but there are a lot of such buildings around.



View of apartment blocks from the kitchen window. Usually Russian apartments look pretty crumby on the outside, but inside can be very comfortable.

The Grace team arrived!

Sakhalin airport, May 25th 2007: Dave, Frank and Jenny (mum) take their first footsteps on Russian soil.

Sakhalin airport is very small and it does feel quite parochial, climbing down the steps of the plane to the tarmac, hand luggage clutched tightly under one arm as the other is busy ensuring your stability on the rickety staircase, pushing onto a crowded bus and getting dropped of at the immigration desk where you wait for everyone from business class to be processed before you are- but your laughter will quickly die down when you see the unblinking eyes, stilletos and gruff commands from the woman wearing a khaki suit and possibly holding a gun.
Keep your eyes cast down and pray they won't send you back to Seoul on the plane you just 'disembarked' from.

But we were there to meet them- the Harrisons and me. I'd last seen mum (and Frank and Dave) in November, 6 months before. But for the Harrisons, it had been over 12 months since having face-to-face contact with visitors from home. Very exciting.

They brought a LOT of luggage with them, and left with very little. The purpose of their trip was to encourage us, see what we do, how we live, and give us some good and Godly advice and support. The short 10 days they spent here was jam-packed full of talking and tears, jokes and laughter, sleet, sunshine, snow and mist- they left us with new ideas, fresh vision, encouraged and supported and loved. What a team! What a taste of things to come!

In the last week of spring

Paaarrrtteeeee!

Party it was for May 23rd- we'd planned and invited and it finally came together- with 30 or more guests we had a full house, and plenty of new introductions. But it was good to have everyone together. Next time we might have less people at once...
Masha, me getting older and Ira- both Masha and Ira have interpreted for us at different times, and are good friends.
Trac, Felicity, Lena and Ira
I said goodbye to Jenya and Anton before they headed out after the party.
Ryan found his favourite corner of the room and stayed there!

Trac cooked for two days straight, making everything but the cake!! Thanks for such a great party Trac.

Scott Elders, group photographer and former resident of Clifton Park- 10 mins drive away from my home in Australind!


I can't deny it any more- I'm a quarter of a century, and there is no turning back. :-(
Best to go through it with a bang!