Cathedrals of the Flesh (15 page)

Village Banya for Rent

Colin, Marina's raffish boyfriend, arrived the next day. While he met with his banking colleagues, Marina and I played
devushki
and got waxed to within an inch of our lives at a fancy place Simone suggested. 'Let's make you look like a Russian woman,'
teased the masochistic Russian depilator while waving a tongue depressor of hot green wax. I left, my body smooth and hairless,
a little less of a mammal. Suffering in the name of good health and vanity was, I was learning, a common theme in Moscow.

Our plan was to visit the Golden Ring cities of Vladimir and Suzdal and as many others as we had time for. The Golden Ring
is the tourist trade name of the fabled constellation of nine cities that form a ring east of Moscow. They constitute the
historic core of ecclesiastical Old Russia, the Russia of the eleventh century and onward, when the patriarch had the ultimate
power.

On the highway leading out of Moscow, we saw women sitting in lawn chairs just a few feet back from the rush of cars. They
were surrounded by their wares: ten-gallon bags of cheese puffs. When they have no revenue, or when all the money has been
skimmed off the top, Russian companies pay their employees in goods, but you can't pay the rent or buy potatoes with cheese
puffs. Just as we were discussing all of the injustice in Russia, we got pulled over by a police car. It wasn't our speed
that arose suspicion, but rather a blend of our obvious foreignness and the car that transported us, a new Volvo sedan, the
car (and driver) of an out-of-town banker friend of Marina's. (Note to self: Learn more about banking.) The uniformed

Vladimir, 130 miles due east of Moscow, is the logical first stop on any Golden Ring tour. Historians are fond of pointing
out that had the Mongols not sacked Vladimir in 1238, it might well be the capital of Russia today and Moscow a small provincial
backwater. Vladimir was founded by the Slavs in 1108, 350 years before Moscow's Kremlin was a glimmer in Ivan the Great's
eyes, and was the Slavs' major cultural and religious center after the eleventh century. All of the Golden Ring cities, which
rose to prominence from the eleventh to the thirteenth centuries, had one thing in common: They were located along the river
that connected the Black Sea to the Baltic Sea. police officer was obviously bored with no one to harass but the ladies selling
cheese puffs. To amuse himself, he wanted to check our papers and get a better look at Marina. Then he waved us on.

The massive arches of Vladimir's Golden Gates were our introduction to the Golden Ring; however, Vladimir today doesn't have
much else to recommend itself. Communism has transformed this once glorious, cathedral-dotted countryside into a gray, concrete
strip of unappetizing restaurants and overpriced, junk-filled tchotchke shops. Most of the churches have long since been demolished
by Communist decree so the brick could be used for other more utilitarian buildings. Marina, undeterred by the blight that
was Vladimir, was soon trolling through an antique shop with an impressive collection of Russian icons.

Suzdal is the Golden Ring city with the greatest draw. This tiny fairy-tale hamlet is often described as what Russia would
look like if communism hadn't happened. Suzdal is laid out on the banks of the narrow, meandering Kamenka River. Little wooden
footbridges make it possible to cross the Kamenka, more brook than river at this point, and look down on the lush water lilies
below. The Kremlin on the hill is enclosed with white stone walls built in 1299, and inside the Kremlin walls are prime examples
of every type of ecclesiastical architecture for the last eight hundred years. In the eighteenth century, Suzdal had four
hundred households and fifty churches, and I doubt this proportion has changed much today. Suzdal owes its bounty of churches
to two local historians who, when the Communists demanded that cathedrals across Russia be demolished for the bricks, sacrificed
only the least valuable buildings and saved the masterpieces.

We toured the town, a merry band transported into an Arcadian fairy tale of clover and sheep, starry pink churches and bell
tower concerts, and villagers selling pickles and pancakes. The Russia of ten-gallon bags of cheese puffs, shabbily constructed
concrete blocks, and soot-covered facades was conspicuously absent. In short, this was the Russia of a Marc Chagall painting;
I looked up half expecting to see a green unicorn floating upward toward the stars.

We pulled into the Central Tourist Complex (CTC), which was about as beautiful as the name would suggest. A Soviet monstrosity,
it was the one blight on Suzdal's horizon. It hadn't been our first choice, or second choice, for that matter, when we booked
from Moscow the day before. We had wanted to stay in one of the little
izbi
(wooden cabins) at the famously charming Intercession Convent but were perfunctorily told by the Central Booking Office that
the convent was fully booked and we would have to stay at the CTC. N ow at the CTC we were told that the CBC had been mistaken:
there was no room for us in this impersonal aircraft hangar hotel, but that we could find a room at the convent before they
closed. 'But quick, hurry.'

The 'fully booked' convent turned out to be empty except for the three receptionists nursing tea next to a samovar inside
the reception cabin. 'Yes,' they said, laughing, 'we have many rooms.' Our cabin was the fifth in a circle of identical
izbi.
Along the stone path we saw several nuns who nodded to us. Were any of these nuns Romanov descendants? I wondered. This fourteenth-century
convent was once famous for housing discarded noblewomen like Evdokia, the first wife of Peter the Great, and the wife of
Ivan the Terrible.

'Is there a banya in the convent?' Marina asked, as I stood next to her in silent gratitude.

'Well, yes, normally, but it's closed this time of year.'

It was the part of summer, we were told, when all municipal water in Suzdal was shut off for two weeks while they cleaned
the pipes.

'Can we rent a banya?'

'No one has ever asked to rent a banya, but I think something may be possible.'

She looked up a phone number and made a call with the rotary phone.

I winked at Marina to thank her for the ongoing translation services and for indulging my village banya excursion. She and
Colin loved baths as much as me, besides what else were we going to do at night in Suzdal?

'Are we going to wear bathing suits?' she teased.

'I have three people who'd like to use your banya. How much would it be?' asked the Russian receptionist into the phone.

She paused.

'Yes,
how much?
she said emphatically and rather leadingly. It was obvious that the person on the other end had never rented out her banya
and hadn't the first idea how much to charge. Had Marina and her fluent Russian not been here, undoubtedly the convent receptionist
would have sized up the cost of our luggage and suggested a steep price to the banya owner. The price that was finally suggested
was 1,000 rubles, or roughly $32, which seemed a bit excessive to borrow someone's banya in the Russian countryside, but by
the end of the evening it would seem the ultimate bargain.

A rusty blue Lada sat idle outside the tall gates of the convent at 8:00 P.M. A man sat slumped in the driver's seat, smoking
a filterless cigarette. It was not a very prosperous-looking picture. 'Marina, what will this guy's banya look like?' I pictured
benches with cigarette burns and flies buzzing about the place.

'Trust me,' she said, 'it will be the nicest part of the house. Remember what Gallia said about building her banya before
her dacha in the country?'

Colin sat in the front seat, earnestly trying to make conversation in Russian. Marina had gotten huffy today when Colin, who
according to Marina speaks perfectly serviceable Russian, left all the duties of communicating and translating to her. She
said she was feeling like the
devushka
of two foreigners, though I am forgiven because my efforts at speaking Russian were, frankly, embarrassing.

After a five-minute drive through the sleepy streets of Suzdal, we pulled into a one-door garage. The garage's interior resembled
a dismembered forest. Hundreds of veyniks hung from the rafters, and cords of firewood lined both sides of the garage. The
driver, who turned out to be the master of the dacha, smiled, revealing a gold tooth, and said proudly, 'Enough veynik to
bring us through the winter. Pick out a veynik for tonight. Any one you want.' I picked one that looked thick with foliage
and tightly wrapped. 'Oh, you have a good eye. This one's very full, like a good head of hair, and will not fall apart no
matter how hard you hit him.' He laughed and pointed to Colin. This was translated for me later. Often people spoke Russian
to me because I looked white Russian, and because I played along, nodding my head and saying
'Da'
at appropriate intervals, it was assumed that I understood what was going on around me. This is a fine impression to give,
as long as people around you can translate and bail you out if you get in over your head and accidentally say
'Da
to the wrong question.

His wife came out to greet us. She was a lovely plump woman with gorgeous skin and bad teeth. 'Welcome to our banya,' she
gushed. We were treated like important guests, and I suppose that to them what they were charging us was a small fortune.
They led us around the side of the house, past a small, tidy garden where potatoes and turnips grew and into a separate dwelling.
'This is our banya,' they declared, 'but tonight you should treat it as your own.' They gave us a proud tour. First the lounge,
a modest, clean room with two cots and a dining room table covered with a flowered cloth. On the table stood a huge samovar
to pour ourselves endless cups of tea, with a pot of apricot jam. A savvy twist on saccharine. The room was decorated with
framed embroidered scenes: grandmothers drinking tea in front of a samovar, the omnipresent symbol of Russian culture, and
a scene of bathers beating each other with veyniks. Another enduring image. The man demonstrated how to use a little boom
box in the corner with the one-tape collection of Russian pop music that would grow on us with every glass of vodka and in
the end sounded like Stravinsky. It was modest, but it also was charming and clean, and it felt like a privilege to be inside
their banya. It was like being led into a writer's study, an artist's studio, or a cook's kitchen. In other words, a sacred
place where a lot of time is spent and much attention is given to the details.

Then the man, who was forty-two but looked seventy, showed us the parilka. First he led us into the antechamber where one
derobes and showers. He pointed out a small door that I thought would reveal a cubby filled with banya hats and mittens but
instead was the blazing mouth of the parilka furnace. He showed us a stack of firewood that we should use throughout the evening
to keep the parilka stoked up. 'It's been heating for over an hour,' he said. 'It should be just perfect now.' Then he brought
us inside the parilka, where we saw a bed of fist-size rocks heaped on top of the furnace. He threw a ladleful of water on
the rocks, and they sizzled like pancakes on a griddle.
'V parilku!'
he said, which literally means 'Into the parilka' but idiomatically means 'Time to steam.' Colin said something to him in
Russian, and he replied with a cocked eyebrow and seeming confusion.

'A for effort, Colin,' I said.

'See, I don't really speak Russian,' Colin said. 'I don't know why Marina thinks I do.'

From behind him Marina said, 'Colin, you do speak Russian, you're just too lazy to try.' Marina and Colin had the kind of
constant squabbles usually reserved for people who have been married upward of fifteen years. It wasn't uncomfortable to be
around them, say, the way it was to be around a couple truly at war. Their bickering became white noise, and after a while
I learned to watch it like a low-grade boxing match in its twenty-ninth round.

The tour complete, the lovely couple excused themselves to do whatever Russian couples do at night when they are not using
the banya. A few weeks ago, I wouldn't have understood the implied protocol and the assumptions that were made after they
gave us a tour of our borrowed banya kingdom. It was assumed that we weren't coming just to have a quick steam and then leave.
It was assumed we had come for several hours of entertainment, unwinding, and intimate conversation. It was assumed that we'd
be having a party and that they would cater it. It wasn't considered strange when we intercomed the main house (a bizarre
interloping of technology) to ask for a liter of vodka.

First we undressed. Normally one wears not a stitch of clothing inside a banya.
Nothing comes between me and my banya.
A bathing suit is thought to be an insult to the sweating process. Only a banya heretic would wear a swimsuit. I suppose the
normal protocol of unmarried men and women together at a banya party would be to politely drape sheets over now hairless parts,
but toga-style sheets were not part of this village banya package. So that left us in a wardrobe quandary. Colin was my friend's
boyfriend. Much as I liked him and occasionally thought of him like a brother, I certainly didn't want him to see me naked.
I am like the majority of people who look much better in clothes. Marina is in that small minority of people who look best
in a state of nature, and since she was with her boyfriend and best friend, she felt perfectly comfortable being naked. She
tossed her clothes in the corner and said, 'Come on, guys, what are you waiting for?' Of course, she knew what we were waiting
for. For a cold day in the banya.

There was no way either of us was getting naked. I was a prudish New Englander, and Colin was a prudish English bloke. I could
see getting naked in front of a bunch of gregarious, chilled-out Italians, but not in front of someone who managed to dot
his i's during casual conversation. We both pulled bathing suits out of our bags; apparently we'd had similar thoughts on
how to handle this delicate situation. And we all burst out laughing that, despite our best intentions to the contrary, we
simply weren't swingers.