Locked Up Abroad: Part 1 - The Pearl of Siberia in Magical Realism

So in late March 2021 I received the second dose and started to feel a little less worried. Life continued on, perhaps with a bit less stress than usual from COVID, but then work started to get crazy. I had been doing well with my regular programs and workload but in Spring 2021 my regular goals doubled and plus I had some additional work added from completely outside my normal remit. It was completely unscalable so raised the issue that I was already overextended and did get some additional headcount added to my area. And then an internal referral requested to transfer to one of my newly open roles. I didn’t know this person well but my manager (strongly) encouraged it, so I made the offer. Big mistake. Huge. They transferred to my group in late June, maybe early July. Started training and things seemed to be going okay. Hold that thought - we’ll get back to it sometime, but first we need to cross the world and back.

At the same time, way back in 2020 I had committed to do this international swim relay across Lake Baikal, the fabled Pearl of Siberia. While I had always yearned to swim the deepest and oldest lake in the world and it seemed like an amazing event filled with people I was excited to spend time with, I would have bet a lot at the time that it was not going to actually happen as scheduled. But then somehow it did.

I had dreamt of Baikal throughout the entire pandemic. I was fully vaccinated, so I could travel again without putting myself or others at risk, right? Right? Again hindsight is 20/20 but I honestly thought so at the time. But I still needed a visa, which isn’t super easy to get in normal times, and my usual fixer service said it couldn’t be done. The Russian embassy in NYC was closed. Then suddenly they re-opened a satellite consulate about a week before I’d need to fly out. Like so many things in my life, I figured I’d give it a go at least. I remember sitting with A at the bizarro consulate and this guy was pretty much laughing at me when I told him why I was requesting the visa. The look on his face said there was no way it was going to happen, and while I knew I’d have FOMO, I was a bit relieved. Then he made a few phone calls and his face changed completely. Somehow the organizers pulled a rabbit out of their ushankas and I had a humanitarian visa from the UN the very next day.

A few days later, I was on the once-familiar flight from JFK to SVO, then Moscow to Irkutsk, a leg I had never traveled before. It felt a bit odd, but I figured that was normal. I arrived in the night and was greeted by my swim friend/organizer Andrei along with Katya, a translator, and Ilya, a photographer. Andrei and Ilya were both local to Irkutsk, and Katya was a Russian/Ukrainian language teacher now living in London who had travelled specifically for the event. As we drove from the airport to the hotel, the sun was just starting to coming up and they pulled over to introduce me to Baikal.

We got out of the car and the lake was magical, everything I had wished for and more. The sunrise was all rosy pinks and blues, perfectly reflected in the crystal clear waters. In the midst of the colours, I could see to the bottom, each rounded stone in high relief. I touched the water and it was cold but welcoming. I moved my hands around and then splashed a bit on my face and neck. I struggle to find the right words, but it was something akin to spiritual - baptism, communion. Bliss.

Last updated April 21, 2022