Beer Factory

So the other day my host mom brought her neighbor and friend over unexpectedly. I was sitting in the kitchen, drinking a cup of tea and reading a book. As soon as the friend came in Marina began her introductions, "Emma, this is Olga Dimitrievna, Olya this is Emma." She then begins what she always does when introducing me to Swedish, which is describe some of what she considers to be my finer attributes, and it sort of sounds like she's trying to sell me, or rather, the animal version of me. She says things like "Look how beautiful she is, she's Swedish." "The lines on her mother and father's side are both Swedish." "Look how BIG she is." "Emma, show your hands, look at her hands!" I then expect her to have me get up and walk around the room so the friend may examine my stride, or pat my flank with a little "that'll do, that'll do." This friend, however, was completely not interested in me. She was an older lady, maybe 70, and she had cut her finger and so all her attention was concentrated on the finger. She kind of nodded at me and started out with "Marina, do you have iodine?" Marina still tried to recapture the interest, like any good horse breeder, "she's improved soooo much since she's lived here with me..." "you should have heard her when she first came, god help us." They then began to discuss how Marina redid her kitchen a few years back.

Yesterday was our last excursion, to the beer factory! It ended, of course, with a beer sampling that lasted around 40 minutes. As much beer and kvass as you can possibly drink in that amount of time. Needless to say, we all left at least a little buzzed or, in the case of a few select people, completely trashed. The beer, in my opinion, was marginally good at it's very best so I didn't care to drink too much of it. They did have an interesting little creation, that being children's kvass. Kvass is

"sometimes translated into English as bread drink, is a fermented mildly alcoholic beverage made from black or rye bread. It is popular in Russia, Belarus, Ukraine and other Eastern and Central European countries as well as in all ex-Soviet states, like Uzbekistan, where one can see many kvass vendors in the streets. Its origins go back 5,000 years to the beginnings of beer production. The alcohol content is so low (0.05-1.44%) that it is considered acceptable for consumption by children. It is often flavored with fruits or herbs such as strawberries or mint." (from Wikipedia)

So we tried children's apple kvass, which was sweeter than regular kvass and tasted a little like cider. There was also horseradish kid's kvass available, but after allison tried it and said "ugh. it tastes like saline. or brine. Or boullion beer" I figured I'd pass.

Later last night we all met up to try to keep the good times going and celebrate our final excursion in a bar, but it was 9 on a friday night and there were 11 of us. No such luck. We ended up at the "coffee bean" drinking coffee, eating pie (well, me and jan ate pie), looking at Matt and Anton's drivers licenses and school id's (matt's school id features him with a beard and a huge 'fro, Anton's looks like his prison application for the Aryan Brotherhood), and listening to Ben do impressions of everyone in the group (his Carlos is fantastic). I then came home and Marina complimented me on how pretty I can look when I put on makeup, which always seems like a backhanded compliment to me. Oh well.

and here's a great video Ryan sent me