The Russian Bazaar

Today, I went to St. John the Baptist’s Annual Russian Bazaar.  In essence, it was a small cultural event at the Russian Orthodox Church to celebrate Russian culture through music, food, and booths selling crafts, jewelry, books, and music.  I love Russian culture, so I was very excited when I heard about it.

To eat, I had stroganoff (a beef dish with mushrooms and onions), begos (or bigos – sausage and cabbage), teftel’ki (or tefteli – Russian meatballs), kasha (buckwheat), and a cucumber salad.  To drink I had kvas (a drink with very low alcohol content) and I also had a Baltika (a Russian beer).  After that, I had several Russian style desserts.  Everything was delicious, and it was a nice change from my steady diet of bagels and pasta.

After I ate, I enjoyed some live music.  Several musicians performed renditions of Russian folk songs.  While they played, several people would dance.  It was a lot of fun.

After that, I perused the various stands selling crafts and other items.  As I was looking at some Russian poetry, the man next to me said “I wrote that, you know.”  I look up and see an older man wearing an ushanka staring back at me.  The man, Valentin Fetisoff, and I continued to talk, and he told me about how he got his first album recorded.  He not only writes poems, but also romantic songs.  I bought a CD and listened to it when I got home.  I am really glad I met him because I probably wouldn’t have bought a CD if I didn’t hear the compelling story behind it.  It was also nice just to talk to him; he was a really nice guy.

I also bought this for myself, because I love them:

I had only heard about the bazaar last night and I almost didn’t go today.  I’m really glad I did though.  The food was awesome, the music was great, and it was just a great environment.  It had a very “local” feel to it, which is something you don’t get very often in DC.