Bryn is an Oopsie

This morning, my hostess served me a farm-fresh breakfast of homemade cheese, milk, bread, butter, and pancakes, and then she drove me back to the Oshta town administration. There, everyone had already decided to make the question of where will stay tonight in Shyoltozero their top priority. They called everyone the knew and fixed me up nicely with lodgings, people to meet, and things to do.

I simply cannot get over the hospitality and the warmth of the people I meet here in Russia. Everyone wants to feed me and give me chocolate and presents. They offer me places to stay, free of charge, and worry about whether I will get to the next city alright. Yesterday, we dropped by the home of a Vepsian artist, who gave me a beautiful painting simply because we were there. It's called “Oshta in the Fall.” I don't know how I'll fit all these gifts in my suitcase.

Venya reappeared, as predicted. Evidently, he had returned to one of the Russian babushki whose homes we mistakenly invaded earlier and slept there. Just like that. He just shows up, meets people, and sleeps in their houses for free. Strange as he is, he certainly is charming with older women. He asks them to show him pictures of their grandchildren and tells stories that make them laugh and blush. And although he is well-educated, he likes to play a fool for other people's entertainment, constantly reciting poems and silly sayings.

Venya especially likes to say, “Bryn eats a pancake,” because in Russian, my name sounds a lot like the word for pancake (blin). Also, the sentence "Brin yest blin" is a play on words, as very closely sounds like the sentence, "Bryn is a pancake." Further, Russians also use their word for pancake as an exclamation of dismay, in the same capacity as the English "shoot" or "oops." So it could also be interpreted as, "Bryn is an mistake." An oopsie, if you will.

So Venya repeats this constantly in a singsong voice, telling every we meet that I eat pancakes. (I'm really starting to understand where Dostoevsky drew inspiration for his buffoon-type characters.)

Venya and I collected all the surveys we distributed yesterday. No one had refused to fill them out, although a couple had been hesitant. When we had asked if they were Veps, they rather shamefacedly confessed they couldn't speak the language, but we reassured them that it was all the same and we were only interested in their opinion. So they all gladly participated.

I glanced at a couple of the completed surveys, and I'm pleased with the responses I'm getting. Not everyone took it entirely seriously; for example, in response to my question, “If the Veps language were to die, what would be the biggest loss for the Veps people?”, one older Veps man with a particularly keen sense of humor wrote, “No pretty American girls would come to my home and wake me up anymore.” But on the whole, it looks like the Veps people have a lot to say about their language and are happy to share their opinions. In fact, several of them even thanked me for coming to them, as if I was doing them a favor and not the other way around.

The surveys collected, Venya and I left Oshta by bus to the village of Shyoltozero in the Republic of Karelia. We penetrated deeper and deeper into the heart of the Vepsan kel. It was quiet there.

On the bus, Venya was acting up and garnered some disapproving looks from a young woman across the aisle. So Venya introduced himself, sat next to her, and by the end of the bus ride, they were laughing like old friends. She invited both of us to come stay with her for free in Petrozavodsk when we get there. Venya is, to say the least, one-of-a-kind.

In Shyoltozero, we were met by a librarian, a relative of my hostess in Oshta last night. At first, the library workers seemed annoyed at my unexpected visit. However, they quickly warmed up to me after listening to me speak Russian, and before long they were thanking me for coming.

Unfortunately, in Karelia, Veps researchers come more often, while the Veps people living in the Vologda and Leningrad Oblasts have been virtually forgotten. This means, first of all, that I have to pay for my lodgings: 4,000 rubles for 3 nights ($130). It's a good thing I've been so frugal thus far. Second, it means I probably won't be as warmly received by Veps families, who feel a bit like lab rats by now.

Venya, however, has already made friends with a few Veps people, so it may not be so bad. And he, of course, has already found a babushka who is letting him stay with her free of charge. I would have scolded Venya for imposing on some poor 83-year-old woman and not paying her a penny, but after seeing how he makes her laugh with his jokes and how he helped her tend her garden, I decided to let Venya be Venya. If only I could be as infinitely outgoing as he is, I could have saved 4,000 rubles.

Tomorrow we start our campaign anew in Shyoltozero, distributing surveys among the Veps. Strange as it seems, I'm already homesick for Vytegra—don't even get me started on Ann Arbor. But soon enough, I will return to both.