The day started early in the morning. We had to take the subway to get to the train. The train ride itself was about an hour, but there were some cool things to see. There was tons of graffiti art on the walls surrounding the railroad tracks and this man who played the harmonica was walking around. Once we got off the train at the station, it was very apparent that we were no longer in the city. There was lots of green space. We arrived at a church that sat outside of the train station. The church was surrounded by lilac bushes and pigeons. After we looked around at the church for a few minutes, we had about a fifteen minute walk through the rows of dachas.
Masha’s family’s dacha was huge. There were like three or four buildings on the property and tons of space for planting stuff. When we arrived, we were greeted by Masha’s family – her mom, dad, and son. The first activity we did was to make borscht, both with meat and vegetarian and we got a mini tour of the main house. It had a few bedrooms and lots of family heirlooms. After the borscht was finished cooking and we ate, we played a trivia game with a ball where we could win chocolate. Then we painted our own matryoshka dolls! This, in my opinion, was the highlight of the day. They all turned out so good and everyone’s dolls looked so different and creative! We probably spent at least an hour doing it.
Next we made our dinner. It was pelmeni, both with meat and vegetarian again, and this lemon chicken, called shashlik in Russian, that was made over a little fire. I was pretty skeptical about this chicken, but it turned out to be amazing. It had some onions and a little bit of garlic. We were all so hungry by the time dinner was ready, that we ate almost everything. Then Masha tried to get us to sing some songs in Russian while her dad played the accordion. The lyrics jumped around, but that was still an experience.
After dinner, we started playing some games that I am pretty sure Masha made up. It was like charades with a jump rope and teams. It was pretty weird, but I was pleasantly surprised at how long we could jump rope as a team. Then we had to learn these “dances.” I put that in quotes because I am also semi-sure that Masha made them up. They were pretty fun but they were pretty fast and I struggled with them just a tad.
By this time it started getting dark and the bugs were getting way worse. We had been plagued with mosquitoes all day and we tried using bug spray to no avail. The sun was starting to get lower and the bugs were really coming out. The hosts made us tea and had some candy on the table. We kind of had to speed through that because it was starting to get late and we had to catch our train. They ended up driving us back to the station just because we were running out of time, which was very nice of them, especially because of the bugs. We finally made it to that station and got back on our train. By the time we made it to the station we were all exhausted.
The dacha was really fun overall and the food was really good. They said that all of the produce was from their gardens which is really cool. Painting the dolls was definitely the best part of the day. It was nice to have a chill day where we didn’t have to do too much stuff. I really liked this experience.
I loved the dacha!! It was by far one of my favorite days, I loved spending time with Masha and her family, her mom is so sweet. I was glad to see there didn’t seem to be a real difference in family dynamics from what we are used to, all people are generally the same in that way. I thought it was funny that Masha and her mom kept telling us how small their dacha was, because I agree, I thought it was a sizable home to say the least! If their dacha is small, it makes me wonder what the more extravagant dachas are like. I was also skeptical of the chicken cooked on an open fire, but I was pleasantly surprised, dare I say it was the best thing on the menu? I had so much fun just doing family games and being in nature, it was refreshing form the constant city tours and business we’d grown accustomed too.
The dacha was amazing! It was an interesting perspective to Russian culture that I am glad we all got to experience. Preparing meals together and listening to traditional Russian music were absolutely fantastic. I had such a great time painting matryoshka dolls. I agree, it was so cute how everyone’s matryoshka dolls were different. The food was great and so was the company!!
The mosquitoes were unbearable, but otherwise I really enjoyed the dacha as well. It reminded me a lot of the time that I’ve spent with my family from rural Texas, Missouri, and Illinois. Homemade mors, outdoor grilling and cooking outside, music and dancing, and spending time together is comparable to what would be seen as the country or southern experience in the United States. That lemon shashlik was fantastic. It’s a cultural lesson I’ll definitely have to take back to my family.