Outside the window the snow is falling heavily, great clumps of messy flakes drifting by like ghosts against the black of night. They won't last for long, as it's only 0 degrees Celsius right now, and tomorrow will most likely be a royal, muddy mess. These are the beginnings of winter here in northwestern Siberia.
A mere month ago when I first arrived in Noyabrsk, the deciduous firs were providing a pleasant contrast to their evergreen cousins and the first snows were beginning to fall. Since then I've come 1000 miles and seen the temperature drop down to -12C and rise as high as 6C, but always it is precipitating in some form, and forever it feels cold, even if it isn't. I don't even like the cold, to be honest. I would much rather be back at some of my haunts along the equator, swatting mosquitoes, drinking from a coconut, and enjoying the finest of unhygeinic street foods. I see the cold as a novelty, at best, something to be seen and endured every once in awhile just to be certain to appreciate when it's gone again. But here the cold will kill you. Not now, no, but you can feel the first bits creeping in when it drops down close to -10C, when it starts to hurt to breath and steam coming off of the mud pits crystallizes in the air to create a sparkling mist that falls out of the air in a shimmering cascade. I am assured it will get much colder than this too, possibly down to -60C or colder by January.
Here, by the way, is an oil rig. We are two hours by car and one hour by helicopter west southwest of Khanty-Mansyiysk. At night there are two glows on the horizon from the lights of nearby oil wells in addition to the light from our own derrick, which when there is no snow has nothing to reflect on and so leaves the world 100 paces away as black as the unlit reaches of nightmare. When there is snow though there is something for the few photons that make it that far to shine off of, and that horrific void becomes a fairytale wonderland, and the surrounding woods beckon to me. Most people here don't feel that way, of course, and insist that my nightly excursions to the far off helipad (five minutes from the nearest street light) are liable to get me eaten by bears, and they have looked at me as though I'm insane for even mentioning thoughts of trekking into the woods themselves, and yet I do wonder.... Perhaps once the soggy spots of the ground are properly frozen the trees will be more accessible.
This is the Siberian taiga. I think. I've been told that the difference between taiga and tundra is an obvious one, though no one seems capable of defining this obvious delineation. I have gathered that a tundra can have trees, but they can't be too tall or too dense, because once they hit that certain point they become a taiga. But you have to have just the right amount of just the right size of tree for this to be the case. So this area, with fairly dense, fairly short trees and large patches of marshy grass and lakes could go either way. What I can say for certain is that it does show the potential for a certain scenic beauty, once you turn your back on the industry that prospers here and look to the trees.
Visiting, of course, is not as easy as one would hope it to be, so I cannot imagine many people outside this scope make it to here in a given year. To begin with there's the Russian visa process, which is expensive and a hassle. Granted, I had to get a business visa and then a work permit on top of that, but I hear it's about as bad for a simple tourist visa. Then there's getting out this far, which means flying to the nearest airport and then somehow finding transportation to where you're headed. In Noyabrsk, for example, this is incredibly difficult. There appear to be few conventional taxis, fewer hotels, and no hostels. In it, like in many of these small towns, Google Maps does not even have the full street plan of the town and so can offer no help with directions even if you do have data. Then, assuming you make it to a hotel, a simple room runs for nearly $100US/night because it's catering almost exclusively to oilfield personnel who work for companies that don't mind how much money they're dishing out. To add to that, travel between cities is difficult, at best, due to distances and the availability, or lack thereof, of transportation.
BUT, if one were to make one's way here, I would advise eating at roadside stands when on the road, and always ask for the borsch. I would say that even if you guess and point randomly at items on a menu, picking one at random from every category in a business lunch menu is probably a good way to pick a meal. I can also say that my boss's suggestion that the fish is always safer than the chicken has proven itself to be true thus far, and if one were to come here I would definitely advise bringing your seasoning of choice, and have a decent translator device on hand.
Anyway, back to work.
