Monday, May 14, 2012

Not by bread alone

Living in our dormitory is a lot like camping. The building, The "Chajka" (Seagull) Hotel, is on the very edge of the gulf of Finland. Lots of fresh air and fewer cars than downtown, but we are also pretty isolated out here. Sure there are corner groceries (not on the corner) and a few places to eat, but mostly people live here so they make all their meals at home.

And that's what we do. Each apartment here has a small kitchen with a tiny 30 year-old stovetop. The ovens are all turned off and usually only one burner works. However, I discovered tonight that if I turn on the "magic" burner, then a second one is also willing to heat up for me. 

The setup is the same in every apartment. Same kitchen. Same dorm fridge. Same small table. The only difference is the number of bedrooms. I was given a single, but the students all live in apartments with either 2 or 3 bedrooms (= 4 or 6 inhabitants).

Since I've been here before, I knew the setup so I packed my frying pan and a nice sturdy wooden spoon -- have I mentioned all this before? This feels like repetition.Perhaps the jet lag is making me repeat myself.  In any event, I'm all set up here and have been more able than I expected to cook for myself. 

I'm attaching a couple of pictures of typical meals for me. Breakfast consists of a fried egg along with some sturdy black bread topped with mustard and a sizable chunk of cheese. Dinner recently was some nice tomatoes that I cooked down, added some canned beans and some whole wheat pasta ($6/bag). It lasted me a few days and was very yummy. 

I've succeeded in finding several different vegetarian restaurants. Well, let me amend that to saying I've been to one vegetarian restaurant. Another one was closed when it was supposed to be open, so I was forced (by hunger) to go to a weird-looking Mexican restaurant in which the non-smoking section consisted of a single table, separated from the smoking section by two strings of beads (I wish I were kidding). 

Bottom line. I'm eating just fine . . . so far

[gratuitous foreshadowing]