Cathedrals of the Flesh (13 page)

Once out of the church, we hurried past the fleet of expensive black cars. Most cars had drivers taking a nap or reading the
paper and having their thirtieth cigarette of the day. My heart quickened as we searched for the entrance, weeks of anticipation
coming to fruition. The women's entrance is hard to find, around the corner and up the hill from the more stately men's entrance.
My suspicion is that the owners don't want the women to spend too long gazing jealously at the men's swimming pool encased
in stained glass. Rule three of bath culture: Men
always, always, always
get the superior facilities.

Drenched in acid rain, Marina and I approached the cashier at the foot of a staircase that curved up for two stories.

'This isn't what I pictured,' I said to Marina as I noticed the prevailing design aesthetic of Versace meets Roman decadanza.
In the lower atrium and in the recessed nooks leading up the staircase stood fake white statues from Roman mythology better
left on a Miami lawn and beveled mirrors better left in Tony Soprano's house. This was a prime example of the prefabricated
opulence so distinctive of Russians flaunting their money.

'Yes, I know, but this is what the New Russians consider classy.'

'What, it's five hundred rubles?' I said, looking at the sign.

The $20 fee was a near fortune in most pockets of Russian society. I had gotten used to living in the Russian ruble economy
in St Petersburg with Irina. Ten cents for the banya, 50 cents for coffee and a pastry. The hard-currency economy for foreigners
and New Russians runs about the same as New York City prices. The fee to get into the Sandunovskye was the same as my East
Village
shvitz
back home in Manhattan. But in this context it seemed like a czar's ransom. Of course, for $6 we could have purchased tickets
for the second class of service. But, paradoxically, here in Russia the highest class of service is the norm, and choosing
the regular class is like choosing standing room only at the theater. Even parsimonious Irina in St Petersburg told me she
chooses only the highest class of service.

We pulled ourselves up the balustrade and walked into the brightest, nicest banya changing room I'd ever seen, and my spirits
lifted. In fact, it was more of a reception room with six banquette areas designed for sitting in small groups and sipping
tea. Overhead there were hooks and shelves for storing clothes and bags. Several uniformed attendants buzzed around the wide
rectangular room, delivering glasses of tea and water. Most of the guests were twenty to thirty years old, younger than the
average St Petersburg banya-goer. Marina noticed this too and said, 'Oh, of course, it's
devushki
night. Simone said it might be.'

'Devushki
night?' I asked.

'I'll explain inside. But be on the lookout for silicone.'
Devushki,
I later learned, means literally 'young women' in Russian, but among expats it's used to describe a particular genre of young
woman — the attractive, hard-bodied chattel of the rich New Russians.

I did a cursory silicone scan, and everywhere I looked gravity-defying breasts reached skyward. Russian implants don't just
enlarge breasts, they actually levitate the breast to within inches of the owner's chin.

'There's Gallia!' said Marina.

I looked toward the entrance and saw a thin, wiry woman with wide green eyes and an anxious face that melted into a smile
when she saw us. Gallia raced over to Marina and kissed both her cheeks.

Gallia, I learned during the introductions, was a banya-phile and used to be the office manager at the bank where Marina sold
Russian equities during the heady times before the crash in 1998. Until eight years ago, Gallia struggled with chronic bronchial
problems and caught every virus being passed around the office. Finally a friend suggested that the banya would alleviate
the pains in her chest. She tried it; it worked; and now she never missed her weekly session. Gallia undressed quickly and
pulled a pink bowl out of her bag just like the hamam tasis. The wide shallow bowl contained a bar of soap, loofahs, washcloths,
and a packet of herbs - she was a banya insider. All business, she said,
'Devushki, paritsa'
(Girls, it's time to steam), and led the way hurriedly through a wooden door to the wet room. This wet room, with its white-tiled
floor and enormous elevated plunge pool, was the largest, most modern banya prep room I had yet seen. The brightly lit, high-ceilinged
room also had two soaking tubs overflowing with water near the door to the parilka, one made in wood in the Japanese soaking
style, the other white marble with ornate rosettes on the side, no doubt a leftover from the original 1896 furnishings. The
only other furnishings were the requisite rows of benches for resting in between sessions and for placing buckets stewing
with herbs and other salubrious unguents.

I soon learned that Gallia was an old-school banya-goer, and like other Russian women, she did more than advocate for her
method. When Marina and I headed over to the shower stalls along the wall to wash ourselves before going into the parilka,
Gallia did not even try to hold back her sneer. She was crouching in front of a spigot that poked out from the wall, dumping
small buckets of water over herself. 'This is the traditional way to clean yourself before banya,' she said meaningfully.
I vacillated between wanting to wash myself in the 'correct,' old-fashioned manner and wanting to stand up to a bossy Russian
woman. Soon I was crouching next to her, throwing steaming buckets of water over my back and listening to Gallia tell me,
'This country has no future.'

'Why do you say that, Gallia?'

'Don't listen to Gallia,' Marina yelled from the showers, 'she's in one of her moods.'

Gallia continued, 'As long as men prefer to drink vodka and make one hundred rubles a month selling potatoes instead of having
good job and an occasional bottle of wine, this country has no future. Russian men, they don't care about job, about family,
they just want to drink vodka.'

There was nothing to argue about. Russians, according to the World Health Organization, consume on average 15.5 liters of
alcohol per year, beating out every other European nation. Getting drunk is perfectly acceptable social behavior; in fact,
drunkenness is glorified among most Russian men, so temperance movements have difficulty finding a foothold. Gallia's life
had clearly been affected by vodka. She spoke proudly of her nineteen-year-old daughter, whom she had raised alone. Gallia,
I was shocked to learn, was forty-four. In general, Russian women don't age that well, or as Marina pointed out, they age
overnight. Gallia, however, looked to be in her late twenties. Her daughter studied at an American college, and Gallia said,
beaming, 'I'm so happy she has a future. In this country she would have no future.'

Gallia was well-known to the Sandunovskye's
poddavshitsa,
the 'mistress of steam.'

'Come meet Natasha,' said Gallia. Then she whispered, 'She's a witch.'

'Who is Natasha?'

'She heats the banya and announces new sessions. She also stews magic herbs, makes the best steam, and is an artist with the
veynik. You'll see.'

Just then, a stout young woman with dirty blond hair wearing a thick pink cotton bathrobe and a pointy felt hat emerged from
the parilka. Underneath her elfish hat was an elfin, small-featured face, pink and glistening with sweat. In her right hand
she held two veyniks, one made of birch and the other of pine, and with the other hand she held up the limp, red body of a
young woman who looked as though she needed to be revived with smelling salts. Everyone stood out of the way, as if gathered
around a road accident, while Natasha brought the red woman to the marble tub and drenched her with water to remove all the
leaves and pine needles from her body. Then she helped the woman step into the cold tub to cool off after the treatment. Only
then did she remove her own hefty robe and revive herself with cold water. After she'd had a chance to resuscitate herself,
Natasha noticed Gallia and gave her a kiss.

'Are you next?' Marina whispered to me.

'No, I think I'd rather give the treatment. Why don't I learn on you? C'mon, it's not as if I'm practicing a medical procedure.
Natasha looks like a good teacher.'

Gallia had told us earlier that when Natasha performs the veynik treatments, it looks more like a shamanistic ritual or a
Martha Graham dance than a mere beating with twigs. I glanced over at Natasha again. She was young, maybe thirty or so, and
had a natural, earthy look compared with the other silicone women. Her breasts sagged slightly, and her hips were wide and
sturdy. In short, she was normal looking, whereas the young Russian patrons had the svelte, statuesque Slavic build. I noticed
another, more subtle difference. All of the women under fifty had shaved or waxed off all of their pubic hair save for a narrow
Mohawk. Natasha hadn't. Even Gallia, who was unequivocal on her position that Russian men were swine, had a tidy Mohawk. Later
I asked Marina why Russian women groomed themselves so specifically. 'It's pretty standard for young urban women. They don't
do it for men, they prefer the hairless feeling themselves. We can have it done tomorrow if you're curious. I think Simone
knows a good place. I used to get it done when I lived here, and, trust me, Russians are gifted waxers.'

After Gallia and Natasha had finished catching up, Gallia rejoined us on the benches. 'Gallia, has Natasha always been a
banshitsa?
I mean, is it a profession that you are born into?' I asked, remembering that half the hamam ladies came from the village
of Tokat.

'No, no, no.' Responses are always emphatic in Russia, as if you've asked a stupid question. 'She used to be a Russian-to
German translator, but when she lost that j ob she started working here.'

'What kind of wage do you think she makes?'

'Well, her actual wage is probably very low, like fifty dollars a month, but because there are so many hard-currency clients
she probably does really well with tips.'

'Do you think she'd give me a lesson on how to use the veynik?'

'Yah, I'm sure she would be flattered that you are so interested in what she does.'

But I would have to wait a while before my lesson. Natasha puts on her robe and mittens to perform her veynik dance only once
an hour. 'I have to pace myself, otherwise I'll get too dehydrated and maybe pass out,' she explained.

It was time to get the parilka ready for a new session. Banyas, unlike saunas, are not left continuously at the same heat.
The biggest banya surprise was how much structure and discipline was applied to the sweating ritual. You don't simply shower,
sweat, shower, and leave. Having a real banya involves partaking in several rounds of carefully moderated heat - ideally 140
to 180 degrees Fahrenheit with a 20 to 40 percent humidity range - and submitting to the will of the
poddavshitsa.

At the Sandunovskye, along with the other Moscovian banyas of the highest echelon, heating the parilka is a formal affair
compared to the haphazard heating up that takes place in St Petersburg. At the 3-ruble Tchaykovsky, there is certainly no
paid
poddavshitsa,
so the queen bee of the moment heats the parilka to the loudly voiced specifications of the other bathers. If she does a bad
job, if the steam doesn't disperse evenly, or if she pours too much water on the rocks, thereby smoking out the room and sending
the women running from the parilka, they will yell,
'Khvatit! khvatit!'
or 'Enough!' and it will be a long time before this banya amateur is allowed to pick up the ladle again.

Natasha, a self-described
lyubitel
(die-hard fan) turned professional, has a more formal and exacting approach to heating up the parilka. To label Natasha a
mere
poddavshitsa
would be ridiculously unfair. Rightfully she is a
banshitsa,
part herbalist, part homeopath, part performance artist, and part witch, in the words of one Sandunovskye regular. The women
rush up to her. 'Natasha, Natasha, is the parilka ready? What herb is stewing in the red bucket over there?' Banya devotees
schedule their sweats around her working hours.

First she cleared the parilka of bathers, telling them it was time to start a new session and she needed it empty to do her
work. When Gallia explained to her that I too was a
lyubitel,
Natasha let me accompany her into the banya to observe the heating process. So I stood next to her, both of us naked, holding
ladles and wearing pointy felt hats. I thought of the priest's holding icons for the faithful down the street.

Once the room was empty, she unhooked the furnace's metal doors using the butt end of the ladle. Inside the massive furnace
was a platform holding a pyramid of round metal balls that looked like miniature cannonballs. She began to scoop warm water
from the bucket into the furnace. She counted forty ladlefuls of water in Russian. 'Why warm water?' I asked, the dutiful
pupil.

'Because cold water makes a weak steam. The steam from cold water falls directly to the floor. The steam from warm water is
spread throughout the room evenly.'

Then she shut the oven door and replaced the latch. Next she grabbed the black garden hose from outside the parilka door and
dragged it in. She sprayed the ceiling and the walls of the parilka generously but without getting water on the floor. The
temperature of the room was rising by the second. The walls and ceiling exhaled steam, and, as if I were captive in a stormcloud,
beads of precipitation began forming on my body.

'Natasha, I think I'm getting dizzy,' I admitted.

'This is nothing yet.'

She led me out of the parilka and shut the door firmly behind her. We waited for exactly two minutes outside while the steam
dispersed evenly throughout the room. The forty ladles of water sizzled on the cannonballs and fired rays of heat and steam
through every square inch of the parilka's treehouse structure. As I peered through the window, I felt that I was witnessing
the process of some profound chemical decomposition process, even though it was just water molecules bursting from liquid
to vapor. After a few minutes, Natasha walked out to the reception area, where many of the bathers were drinking tea or eating
salted sardines called volba to replenish all the salt lost through sweating. From the other room, I could hear her calling
out the now familiar, 'Ladies, it's time to steam.'