Karelia // Day 3

Text edited and translated by Dasha Kotenko.

 


‘We were greeting all the people on our way’, Alexander says, ‘but they didn’t seem to like us. I guess, in summer it’s ok to ride a bike, but in winter we looked like complete idiots to them.’ The guys were expecting the locals to be more nice and hospitable, but they had a lot of troubles trying to find a place to sleep in Girvas, nor at a warm house neither even at a cattle shed, where it would still be warmer than outside. Nobody wanted to let them in for just one night even for money. At some point Andrey decided to ask at the library and met a nice woman there. ‘Librarians are all very kind, like mothers’. The woman was ready to help, but she was leaving town that same day. So she started calling someone, but the people on the other side of the phone called the guys idiots one more time and refused to help.

The church was closed, people at the post office didn’t want to let the guys sleep inside either. Finally, they caught a woman closing the door of a small local club. She was willing to the guys a shelter in a small room inside the club. There was no heating, and the temperature in the room was about -5 C, but the guys instantly got warm. They cooked dinner and had a nice long sleep.