When all goes well...and not. Yes, I will write something soon.
Siberia might invoke different pictures in different minds. For us it is so far clouds without rain, drizzle, rain or strong rain. Yet the countryside looks the same as it did after we entered Russia - a vast flat land consisting of meadows and fields with some mixed forest and a lot of birches. Only the Ural cuts the monotony of the view. Thus I am not taking pictures, but as a proper tourist in a foreign country I am enjoying the cultural differences by mainly eating and sleeping.
I am starting to get the idea why the Russians might want to vote the way they do. Of course, my ideas from time to time exert the impeccable quality of being totally wrong, but in that I will happily follow the paradigm successfully established by the politicians and the media. I look around and see the overwhelming majority of the cars being the new western made cars, roads that are getting repaired and there seems to be some stability to life. I also know that Russians are very proud and do not take it lightly being compared to some third world country or told that they are a "has-been-superpower". It seems that these conditions usually bring forward a man with strong ideas or rhetorical abilities (Reagan comes to mind in the malaise of the post Vietnam era), or just a pure strongman or dictator (Hitler comes to mind in the post Versailles era). So I think that the way you see Putin is probably influenced by the country you live in. A heavy dose of propaganda of course helps quite a bit too. As you may see, my topics are getting a bit irrelevant. That must be either because of the gas fumes leaking into the car or because all goes reasonably well. We had only some minor problems with a starter and with a carburetor. We also do not hit each other with blunt objects yet as could be expected in a submarine called Trabant. And while nobody comments on our exceedingly good looks, a lot of people comments on the unusual beauty of our Trabant. From the truck drivers to the local motorcycle clubs, all seem to be in awe. Yet, we are not envious. As long as the Trabant drives us towards the Mongolian border, it can have all the fame it is getting. Note: And the next day all the hell broke loose. As it usually does when all goes well. Once, as I drove across Canada, I stopped at an information center in Saskatchewan. As I was looking at the map, a young couple came in with a question:"What is the fastest way across the province?" They were on their way to Alberta to see the Rockies. At that time I wondered whether it wouldn't make sense to see all the provinces, rather than drive quickly through some of them to see others. Now we are in a similar situation as we drive through Russia as fast as we can to get to Mongolia. Fast, of course, is a relative term in our case.
There is also that small issue of the size. Russia appears to be endless. As we drive day after day, our perspective of things changes. What seemed to be a slightly dirty shirts just a few days ago looks perfectly clean today. The smell of the gas in the car seems to be not as pervasive and the overloaded low rear end of the car I worried about a week ago seems perfectly good now. We are into Ural now. The temperature has cooled down, but the people here seem to be quite warm and friendly. By now we are well versed in getting lost in the cities we are supposed to go around. Suddenly, that moment back in Canada when I was looking at the downloadable GPS of Russia thinking:"Eh, no need, we will have a map" comes to mind. As a consequence, yesterday we were driving aimlessly through Ufa trying to follow the different guidance of different people. Then, at one point, I have shouted from the window at a young couple in the car next to us trying to get our directions. And it worked. Dimitri and Nastia first tried to give us the guidance, but finding out that such an exercise might not succeed, they asked as to follow them and took us all the way through the town to the highway to Chelyabinsk. All we could do is to thank them. Even the rude gas attendant responding to my:"Good morning, how are you?" with a sharp:"What?" as in "What the hell do you want?" might have a hard time to erase the kindness of the others. As we crawl through higher and higher hills of Ural, put on warmer clothes and watch the rainy clouds, I wonder whether the Asia beyond the hills will bring us more of Dimitris and Nastia or the irritable gas attendants. I think it will be the former. When does one get "overborsched"? Soon we will find out. There is a Russian national soup called borsch. As we crossed the border we decided to try it at almost every place we stop to eat. And so we are savouring many different, yet similar, kinds of borsch. Of course, in every place the locals think that theirs is the only proper borsch in Russia. I only think that I have never eaten so much cabbage and red beet in my life.
We drove to Moscow and since we missed the highway that goes around the city we drove right through. As our luck would have it, the time was right for a traffic jam. And it was a world class traffic jam. After about five hours we left Moscow full of new buildings, western cars and new wealth. We have also learned about the Russian driving style. Extremely aggressive and impatient, the Russian driving style possibly reflects their new approach to life. The driving style of some of the drivers can only be described as "get ahead by any means" - they pass you on the right shoulder of the highway, cut you off and generally do not give a damn about your driving rights. Yet, surprisingly, there are not too many car accidents. They also do not get upset when someone else drives on the shoulder trying to jump the line of cars waiting at any of the many road construction slowdowns. One other thing is quite bothersome here. To say that the man's rooms here are sometimes a mess might not fully describe what you see after opening the door in some of them. Yet, this topic has been covered by many people visiting Russia and so I just mention it here in passing. Because we drive all day long, the most we know relates to the local highways. The gas stations here are world class and there are many restaurants along the road of mixed appearances and food quality. The traffic flow has an uncanny tendency to change suddenly from a nice pace to a traffic jam as the road suddenly narrows, or the traffic lights appear out of nowhere and for no apparent reason, or there is a construction of the road (many of then with no workers in sight). The slowdown is worsened by the drivers who try to jump the line any which way. The country vastness only really, really hits you after a few days in a relatively slow car like our. We have been driving and driving and driving and we are still in Europe with about 700 km to go to Ural which separates Europe and Asia. And, just as a note aside, we have already driven almost 3,500 km. The economic disparities are probably pretty wast here too. Apparently, the clerk at a local store makes about 7,000 - 9,000 Rubles. Considering that one borsch costs about 60 - 70 Rubles, one night accommodation in a roadside hotel about 1,500 Rubles and one liter of gas (which is very cheap in Russia) about 35 Rubles, the clerk must manage his or her money pretty carefully to get by. On the other hand, there is a lot of Mercedeses and similar cars on the roads possibly driven by those with wages quite different from the store clerk's. Slowly we realize that what is left for us is to drive on, get some gas, eat some borsch and wait for Urals to show up. But the car runs well, the sun is shinning and we move on with a good luck wished to us by the locals. And if going on without any problems is all the luck we get, we will take it. Like Napoleon we are closing on Moscow. But there are some differences. First of all he had more horses than we do. He was also a bit shorter. I think that at my 6'6" I would not be a very popular soldier in his army. He would probably put me into a small enclosure for a punishment. Into something of the size of a Trabant. The one thing is the same though. He planned to get quite far in Russia and so do we. And, for now, let us not bring up his results.
Yesterday Hynek fixed the starter which was shorting out and I reloaded the car. Like any placebo it gave me a good feeling of accomplishment without really achieving anything of a substance. To my surprise the law of physics stating that any rearrangement of the load will not decrease its weight applies everywhere. And then it was through the rest of Lithuania and Latvia to the Russian border. Of course, the map took us the shortest way which could have been the fastest. Could have been...if the road did not progressively deteriorate into a worse and worse one, ending up in a gravel road with occasional bumpy pieces of asphalt. But remember, we drive Trabant and not some pampered show-off like Corvette, and so, there were no issues. It was also good to visit the "land of the past" in the northern Latvia, where you meet a women carrying her shopping bags on the road home. But there is no shop and no house for about 10 km. Time is just a different concept here. In general, as we move East, time loses its oppressive shout of:"Hurry up!" and replaces it with another oppression of:"You might have to wait for a while". Which, of course, brings me to the Russian border. The dreaded Russian border was, in fact, quite good. Of course, I am not comparing it to the US - Canada border. You go through a few more checks here, and then through a few more again. But since by luck we arrived as a first car, there was no lining up and waiting for us. First we went through three Latvian exit stations and then through three Russian entry stations. There we received some entry papers with the indication that if we lose this one little paper we will be only shot by the firing squad immediately. However, if we lose that larger paper, we will get immersed in the boiling oil first and then shot. Luckily, I have been learning Russian for the past year and I certainly know the importance of the word "bumazka" (papers) quite well. The only real problem ensued when I entered our spare engine as an item that we are bringing into Russia (under the column "goods weighting over 30 kg"). I have been asked about the receipt for the engine and the purpose of bringing it to Russia. Receipt? No, I do not have it as I bought the engine about 20 years ago. Henceforth, I was told, that it will take a while and the meeting of subordinates with their superiors and their superiors ensued. Ultimately, I noted that the engine was not actually weighted and perhaps it is less than 30 kg and I made a mistake? At which point the engine was mentally weighted by the superior and found to weight less than 30 kg. After re-filling the new form we were waived on. In less than one hour we cleared the border. There were no bribes given or asked for, and the border patrol officials were quite nice to us; which I cannot explain since we ran out of charming looks quite a few years ago. Yes, there were no smiles on the faces of the border officials, but which border guard anywhere in the world offers you a great smile? And so here we are, in the land designed in the old communist times as the "land of the future of the mankind, where the wished for tomorrow is actually in existence today", then denigrated in the West as the land of wannabe superpower and now, once again, as the enemy of the West. Which is understandable, as every politician needs to put some actual or imagined fear into his/hers voters. I just hope to meet people other than politicians and not to share Napoleon's fate here. There seems to be an undefined and rather hazy divide between a great adventure, too much danger and just a plain annoyance. So far, our adventure has the features of the last, but for some reason I prefer it to a sight of a loaded gun. That might be the reason why I choose Mongolia and not Syria as our destination. The car was finished on Sunday and we tested it by driving it for about 80 km. Later on Hynek adjusted the timing and we were ready to start loading. Or, to use a bit more fitting term, we were ready to start overloading the car. If the experience of the endurance races taught me one thing, then it is that whatever you carry with you is never useful for anything and whatever you decide to leave behind (or forget at home) is the one critical part you will need the most. And so we loaded a lot of spare parts including a spare engine, half shafts, front main spring leaf etc. and yes, so far it worked. We are in Poland and did not need anything other than a starter. Which, of course, we do not have. For a while I have been wondering how to describe our car. Yes, I could give you a technical specification, listing the horse power, the torque etc. But that might only interest my friends - the petrolheads. For the rest of you, here is a better way to do so - just think of a disheveled old man. The car whines a lot, does not want to climb the hills and if so then only slowly, the parts are deteriorating, and, of course, it does not smell too great. And it is grumpy at times. I also suspect that during the night it criticizes and badmouths us to the nearby cars. So, as with any old man you need a lot of patience to deal with it. When it started to cough and it spit out a spark plug about two days ago, we gave it a new one. Then yesterday at a gas station it did not want to start. Was it a battery or a starter? Considering that the car had a new battery and a freshly rebuilt starter, we had to figure out which new part was rejected. Since it looked like the starter was the bad guy, we decided to drive on to Lithuania and fix it there. Oh, the memories of my youth! "Hi neighbor, could you give me a push? Yes, I did forget to park it up the hill. You know the handbrake isn't too useful either..." And so it is as we grind our way through Poland with a splendid vision of a Mongolian ger 6,000 km away. But Poland? What can I say about Poland? There is the modern, western like bypass of Warszawa where the Audis and Mercedeses abound, but there are also the people with no Audis or Mercedeses in the places of closed down coal mines who sell the blackberries by the roadside. As it is, I guess, everywhere in the world, if you look away from the monuments and cheerful speeches of upcoming politicians (note that the daily allotment of one cliche was just exhausted). For those of you who promised to donate to Mi Casa Esperanza based on km reached I want to let you know, that as I write this, we crossed the 1,100 km. Some people, as they pass our Trabi, honk and give us a thumb up. I think that it is for all of you who pledged some money for the Casa. P.O.R. - Push On Regardless has a nice ring to it. It used to be one of the North American rallies and the North American rally drivers often use it as a mild form of a praise, or, as in "the wheels came off the car, but I pushed on regardless" as a description of events while savouring some larger quantities of stronger liquids after an unfinished race. Although we have not moved a single inch on our way to Mongolia yet, I think I can say even without the benefit of alcoholic beverages that we try to push on as much as we can. We took a temporary accommodation at Mr. Simek's car repair shop in the western part of the Czech republic and worked on car mainly during the nights when the shop was closed. Umm, there used to be a time in my youth when nights were for socializing with my girlfriends or enjoying a pub night. Now I work. Sometimes I really miss my younger years... The problem with the car is twofold. First, the car is old and so some of the parts would prefer to die rather than being installed back into the car. As a defensive measures they use rust, easy breakage, unavailability of spare parts etc. Of course we fight back with the mechanics' strongest tool - a wide ranging selection of swear words. The second problem is a result of the car being completely stripped for the purposes of painting the chassis. This brings the problems of trying to force into the car all the ill-fitting windows, accessories and similar parts that may not be necessary for the trip, but that are required by the local Ministry of Transportation. The car had to be painted as a result of a wide ranging welding of the chassis and this decision was made by my friend while there was still a plenty of time. And then, how it always happens, he ran out of time. I should also say a thing or two about the country. I guess it is always good to follow many travelers who do their best to annoy the locals with their opinionated comments on the life in the country of their one week vacation. Yet it might be a bit difficult for me as I lived in the Czech republic for almost the full first half of my life and thus I collected a nice assortment of biases. Now, being back here, I feel like being in a well known foreign country. One of the facts of life here is that, as some people say, nothing seems to be possible to get done here, but everything gets done in the end. People do not smile much and the usual answer to "How are you" is fairly negative as in "It sucks". However, this answer provides as much information as the stock Canadian answer "Great, thanks" - i.e. nothing. This society is also a "form over content" society which brigs some challenges for a common law country traveler. Now, in order to use my quota of one cliche a day, I have to say that in general the people here are more or less the same as people back at home. And, as our experience shows, they are also very helpful. The countryside is lovely and there are historical buildings everywhere (with a lot of Gothic ones). If you want to visit, do so. Just do not stay here for too long if you try to reach Mongolia. So here we are, one week into our trip, sleeping on a floor of the local car shop. But the car is getting finished and soon we will push on regardless. And a few pictures of the countryside where the hops come from with the plant itself added for your pleasure and education my beer loving friends.
The car is alive. not well yet, but alive enough to move a bit. And we need a lot of sleep...
https://www.facebook.com/paul.hartl/posts/1103599539668037 There is an old Greek myth of Daedalus and Icarus who fashioned their wings from feathers and wax in order to fly. Icarus flew too high, too close to the sun; the wax melted and he fell from the sky. The story should probably tell you not to aim too high. But I think it is all about a set of flimsy wings. There was a bit of this icarian thinking when I arrived in Prague and found out that the Trabant we were supposed to use for our trip to Mongolia and beyond consisted of a freshly painted bare chassis and a pile of spare parts scattered along the floor of a car shop. Well, you can see it for yourself. The myths and legends are supposed to be about achievements. My myth seemed to be about something totally different - a daily grind of assembling the car as quickly as possible in order to get going to Mongolia. But perhaps I am wrong and all the myths are about the silly little problems and how to solve them. These problems worn you down and make you think that flying with the feather and wax wings is just a plain stupid idea. Which it probably is. Since we cannot work on the car during the day as the car shop where the car is stored needs the space, we are putting in some night shifts. When I say we, I mean I and Hynek who goes with me on the trip. But this is Czech Republic where work often isn't about work, but also about talking and drinking. And so the work results are a bit slimmer than in some "just grab a burger and get back to work" countries. That is only one side of the coin though. If you go with the flow your work might progress way slower than say in Canada or Germany, but you might find enough people who would come to help you to get the project going. In this, it reminds me of Mexico. The Mexico of my first Baja 1000 where I was very worried that the race car might never get finished, but in the end the car was ready with the help of numerous friends of the team members. And a good car I must say. So here we are supposed to get some help too. Apparently, the owner of the shop and a few friends should come this Sunday and we might speed it up a bit. That would be a nice development. I think you all know that we are trying to raise some funds for Mi Casa Esperanza, a shelter for battered women in Mexico. A Christian shelter. And so I would expect Denis, who heads the shelter's capital projects might note:"I will pray for you." I, not being much into the prayers, can only say:"I hope it will all work pretty well in the end." Which, after all, might amount to the same. |
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August 2017
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