Photos from the Dacha

Yesterday Tatiana got out the photo album and showed me probably a hundred and fifty pictures from the dacha. (A dacha a country house––usually no more than a cabin––which most Russian families maintain for weekends and holidays). The actual theme of the album is the ongoing renovation that the Shcheptiskos are doing to their dacha. In the ‘before’ pictures, we see a little cabin, overgrown with tall grasses on the outside and excessively spare on the inside. Then come a montage of ‘work’ photos, including my favorites––the babushka photos (don’t forget to stress the first ‘a’ in pronunciation). Babushka is either not working, or doing work that appears to be completely irrelevant to the greater project. In one, she’s plowing an impossibly large garden so far from the dacha in the distant background that it can’t possibly be part of their property. Babushka, see that field? Go plow it. Last come the “after” photos, though as I’ll talk about another time, its Russians never actually finish their remonty (renovations). The album got a little dull by about the second hundred, but I decided not to care. Part of the deal when you go to Russia, and live as a guest in a Russian family is that you look through photo albums from the dacha and take in the little cupcake stories. In return, among many things, you get to laugh at the thought of hoodwinking a babushka.