Rundani

At the farm, I met Andris and Marina. They were there to work as volunteers for the day. Andris told me that he could arrange for me to stay at some friends' place in Rundeni. He made a phone call and everything was fixed.

Rundeni is a little town with a school, a post office and two shops and a church. The city is divided into two districts, one made of housing estate, wooden houses with barns and garden, and the other one made of rows of low-rise building, soviet type architecture.

I left the farm in late morning. The day was so bright and sunny, and even very warm, around 6°C. I crossed many fields on a kind of pathway till a reached a sand road. There were some housing there, small farms and little cottages.

With the sun shining, the colour of grass as turned to golden brown. There was no wind, and the smell of the drying ground was filling the air.

The way was extremely pleasant and I made plenty stop to admire the view. At many occasions I could see herds of deer grazing in the fields, but without tele-photo lens it was impossible to take clean shot.

When I arrived at Rundeni, I made a phone call to Andris, as planned. After a while, a car came to pick me up to drive me to the place I should stay overnight. A told strong man, Stas, came and drove me to a little house where a man was living alone, and was willing to offer me a bed for the night.

Victor is the owner of the house. He is a former tank commander of the soviet army. He served in Afghanistan for many years.

Victor showed me many photos of his companions and the tank he was commanding. I was 9 years old when this was started, so I have no souvenirs of it.

We didn't talk about the war itself and its outcome. It seems that this Afghanistan is for the Russians what Vietnam is for the USA, a money pit and a moral exhaustion for the soldiers.

Victor is a very good D.I.Y man. He was proud of showing me the wood central heating system he created in is house.

He was asking me to translate many Russian words into French cause he has the wish to visit Paris someday. He took pages of words from me, and started to speak to me with some basic words.

I had a good time with him,so I decided to stay one more day with him. I took advantage of the opportunity to have my clothes washed, my orange trouser really needed it. It was also a good opportunity to relax my feet and rest.

I am now close to the end of my trip. From Rundeni, only remained 33km to walk till the arrival point; just two days if I take it easy.