The Saturday Beach Resort

This weekend was the inbound orientation for every exchange student going to district 2225, or all of Eastern Russia. There are 10 of us. Only seven made it to the orientation, two more Brazilians had delayed Visas and another American is coming later this week. It was a small, quite group: one student from Mexico, Germany, Japan, Taiwan, France and Brazil. I, of course, was the student from the USA. Their laid back attitude and general silence was due mostly to exhaustion from travel, and the shock of entering into another culture, but they were a fun, easygoing, friendly bunch, and it was such a great weekend.

The orientation was in a small town/resort. It was on a small ocean cove about an hour outside of Vladivostok. It is the strangest place I think I've ever been to. There were two hotels, right next to each other. The one street (dirt track) was lined on one side with small buildings, which looked like plywood nailed together to form small shacks. Some were shops, others were completely empty, and others, well we had no idea what they were. One sorry looking place that could have been a barbecue/picnic shelter was blasting zippy Russian music, but the place was empty and dark. There were hardly any people, maybe one or two on the beach. There looked like some remains of restaurants. One faded bill board had a take out Chinese menu with a phone number, but no restaurant in sight. The paint was peeling, buildings falling down, weeds and trash chocked the small flower beds. The beach was covered in seaweed, and on the hill sides, stark concrete buildings with gaping open windows. They were empty. It was like a ghost town, but obviously a beach "resort". It had an eerie feeling about, walking through an empty town while accordion music drifted from one of the buildings.

The hotels and the town were straight out of the 1950's. Whitewashed brick walls, balconies with stunning views of the sea, and a long board walk out over the sea with white, Art Deco style railings. The canteen had salmon colored walls, rounded doorways and old tables. An overgrown playground sat empty in the yard. No TV, no internet. I could almost see people on the beach in the quaint, striped bathing suits of the fifties, and ladies in frilly white, with parasols, strolling on the boardwalk.

However Saturday was another story. We woke up and the beach was full, the sun was bright and everything seemed alive. The hotel had filled up overnight while busses pulled in from the city and beach goers piled out. Barbecuers, picnicers, swimmers, tanners, sandcastle builders and all manner of rubber rafts filled the beach and the waves. On Saturday, it was a beach resort.