I add a little note as preparations continue for my next trip to mother Russia.

Once again I am running a plethora of errands. I have the phone number of a lady called Maria. I will meet her in Moscow next week and she will give me the equivalent of £200/300 in roubles. I will then buy circa eighty books from the book market at Olimpiiskiy. These are to be sent from Moscow to London wrapped in five kilo parcels. Any books published pre-1951 to be carefully concealed and separated if I have not declared them at the Ministry of Culture.

So, collecting money from a mystery lady, five kilo parcels to London.... My question is: Am I a spy yet?

Next weekend is a national holiday - Festival of the Defence of the Motherland. I shall be travelling between Moscow and Kazan at this time and I am curious as to what the mood might be on the sleeper train. Will people be drinking and singing? Or will they be sleeping? (I guess it's important to remark on the social nature of train travel in Russia: people don't simply ignore a stranger like might happen on the sleeper from London to Edinburgh).

I've also been watching the weather. Minus 14 degrees on Saturday. Brrrr!

Check my website at www.paulhansbury.co.uk for more Russophilia.

The final night - we went and saw a ska band playing in a basement bar. Very energetic, a little boistorous, very good fun. Then on to a nightclub to say goodbye to Moscow life.

I didn't mention this a couple of weeks back but I applied for a job on the Moscow Times. I received a reply mid-week. "Thank you for your interest, we will keep your c.v. on file." I am content with that. I've long claimed there's no such thing as being ready for a big change; you simply dive in and get on with it. But maybe I'm not quite ready to relocate to here.

Back to the pages of www.natalya.ru. ;)

Blog closed. When I originally conceived of this adventure I didn't contemplate how many people would help me and make it so damned brilliant. Thanks to Svetlana in London, Natalya and Marina in Kyiv, Masha in Moscow, and all at Extreme Travel in Omsk (Nina, Sveta, Yevgeny, Irina; & their friends Aleksey and Denis).

(Exit notes) Yesterday afternoon was pleasantly filled walking round an art gallery. I was thinking about Gaugain with an odd sort of respect. Not his art, you understand, because he was undoubtedly a terrible artist - he merely shows and utterly fails to make me feel - but he brought something exotic into people's lives and his commitment was enviable. Abandoning everything except the desire to do what he wanted. Sadly my own commitment is less brilliant. I placed my ad on slando.ru seking Natalyas but to no avail. A single response might have been sufficient to make me feel I'd achieved something.

Instead the evening was spent drinking wine in M's flat and talking about what I'd learned about Russians. There is a major division between generations in this country. The generations who grew up in the Soviet era are much more paranoid than the younger generations. When I ask them how they are the most common response is "Normalna." Normal. Not good, not excellent, simply normal and getting on with it. The younger Russians are much more confident and outgoing. I want to cheat and use a Ukrainian example: the traffic cop (the D.P.S. in Russia, not sure how they are called in Ukraine) blew his whistle and held out his black and white striped baton and M. pulled over, she brazenly showed her documents and sped away, high-fiving Natalya #3 in the front seat beside her. It was an flash of carefree independence.

Comparing the people in Omsk to Muscovites was interesting too. Residents of the former would typically remark, "I went to Moscow once and I didn't like it. Too busy and too noisy." These are people who don't imagine ever travelling outside of their country and many don't have the desire to. Omsk is the magnet that drew them from nearby villages and Omsk is the bright lights. Probably many Britons don't know where Omsk is.

I learned some other things too. I wrote a list of all the people I've met while travelling in Russia and Ukraine. There are over thirty names on the list and you know how many Natalyas. My GCSE maths is invaluable. I can conclude that more than twenty per cent of people living in Russia and Ukraine are called Natalya. Nineteen of the names are female and I therefore also confirm there are more women than men in this country.

I've withheld from commenting on diplomatic relations between the U.K. and Russia, which have been strained over the past couple of weeks. It has been discussed though, at the kitchen table in the small hours, and there is a sense of pride here among Russians about how their country has reacted. Russia is perhaps a country still finding its identity after the chaos of the past - but there is a coming generation of young adults, presently skateboarding on Arbat ulitsa, who were born Russian and not Soviet and maybe it is for them to define what it means to be Russian today.

Final blog entry will be tomorrow. For now I am getting ready for my final night. I've bought a bottle of Veda vodka to get things going. This is a pricey brand but I am told it's good.

The fat lady had sung but all is not over yet. I have one more trick up my sleeve when it comes to Natalyas. 'La Traviata' at the Moscow Musical Theatre was wonderful. I loved the stage set and Violetta was played with exemplary gusto. There was an odd gratuitous display of skin midway through act II but I'm not complaining. Masha and I took a cab home. This is the "stand at the roadside and stick your hand out and see who pulls up" style of taking a cab. A moustachioed man in a brown Lada was who. Briefly I thought of asking if he was named Natalya. Then I saw his biceps.

People in Russia are all trying to make extra money here or there. As impromptu cabbies, or the retired ladies maintaining portable toilets for 10R a pee. Well - we all have things to do in life - and I have Natalyas to find. One final push before departure Saturday. I placed my ad on slando.ru. "Are you Natalya? Man with mission seeks to meet with someone called Natalya. Rechnoi Voksal, Moscow, tomorrow." Is there to be a Natalya #9 and if so who exactly will Fate place in my path. http://znakomstva.slando.ru/moscow/1127295.html

The ad was placed at about 4pm yesterday afternoon. It's now 1.30pm the next day and I have no replies. It is not looking good. Plans between now and departure are limited; Friday night is free for Moscow nightlife with M. and friends. I need to scratch my head a bit and not lose focus!

(Москва, снова) For the first time during this adventure I'm missing London. Everything seems behind me now. Ukraine, Siberia. Done and dusted. I'm back in Moscow for five more days and it feels a little like playing out time. Then it's back to the smoke. Except there might be less smoke now. There are things I love and things I hate about Russia - and one of the things I dislike is the smoke. The country reeks of tobacco. I'm wondering about the smoking ban in England and Wales because it came into effect after I left.

Will fill in the blanks on this blog later. I'm not sure anyone is reading it. It will be updated for my own satisfaction. I've fallen off the scent of Natalyas.... arghh. Off to see La Traviata tonight. That promises to be wonderful.

Domestic flight -- Skinny-dipping for God -- Siberian village life -- My brush with the law -- Hunting the bolota -- Exit pursued by a bear (PART III)

I head out onto the Tara River with Volodya and his son. V. places a square of dirty red carpet down for me to sit on. I'm being treated like a Prince! V. rows and his son sits at the front pulling nets out of the water to remove caught fish. V. shows me how to remove the fish from the nets so as they slip flapping into the boat and not back into the water. The evening ended with a Russian banya - too hot and too long for my liking, plus slapping naked bodies with pine branches felt far too 'Venus in Furs.'

The izba was comfortable enough. Morning dawned and the hunter's wife brought us freshly-drawn milk and eggs for breakfast. Then the V. tookme to feed the boars. We rode through the forest on his decrepit motorbike, with the sacks of boar-feed in a sidecar. My interpreter meanwhile had been driven to Tara and was on the marshrutka back to Omsk where he would endeavour to solve my sticky visa registration problems. I was not registered and overdue so being.

With A. on his way back to Omsk I was left walking through the taiga with the hunter's wife seeking the 'bolota.' I had no idea what this mythical creature was. "Big!" exclaimed Galyna and I gestured at a size with my hands. "Bigger, bigger," she implored. Every fallen tree seemed to be the work of the bolota. Were we to see this mythical beast? (to be continued...)

We broke for lunch. Mushroom soup prepared by the daughter, Ina, washed down with comport. The mushrooms Galyna and I had gathered earlier. I ran the standard gamut of questions about life in the UK. No protection rackets aren't usual. Yes many crimes really do get solved. No we don't have mosquitos like you do. No we don't all brush our teeth after breakfast. Actually I was beginning to doubt the effectiveness of my mosquito repellant when I found a mosquito sunbathing on its roll-head. Still I continued to cake my face and body and clothes in the stuff. The search for the bolota continued.

As G. began to talk about tree stumps and bridging the water I began to form an idea. We were looking for a beaver. Later I would consult my pcoket Russian-English dictionary.
Boloto (-a) cp. marsh, bog
Hey! Hang on there! What? I was confused and bemused as I remembered myself asking the size of the boloto by gesturing with my hands. What must G. have thought of me!

Come evening and this time we WERE seeking beavers. Volodya took me out onto the river in his rowing boat once more. If coming up to the taiga talking to the locals in villages I had felt like Michael Palin, now I felt like David Attenborough. We had rowed for a while and seen many markings on the riverbank but no beavers and Volodya decided to call it a day. I hoped there was to be a happy ending and that as we rowed back the beavers would suddenly show up. Unfortunately there was to be no happy ending because it started to rain which was guaranteed to push the beavers into hiding. This was a shame.

Before leaving the hunters' lodge G. gave me a volume of poetry by Sergey Yesenin. In the front is inscribed "To Paul - From Siberia, from Medvedev family - Bobrovskaya Dacha, July 2007." I was touched and sad to be leaving the isolation of this mid-nowhere.

Then Y. and I hit the road again. Despite being in the middle of nowhere we picked up a hitchhiker. She was going to Tara as would anyone be on the road. I can't quite work out what she was doing standing so far from anywhere on her own. The tears, smeared mascara and torn clothes only added to the mystery. (This is not true, obviously). I was too tired to ask her name and so instead - as we came toward Tara and I had mobile reception for the first time in four days and read the incoming text - I asked her if she knew the date. She didn't. Nor did Yevgeny. Nor did I. I didn't ask her name but let's call her Natalya #8; who knows - maybe she was.

Tara is a tranquil town of wooden houses and wide tree-lined streets. 15 000 people live here. We ate lunch in a roadside canteen opposite the bus station. Okroshka followed by kolbassa for me, washed down with Baltika beer. Next stop was Borshecherche.

(Omsk, once more) I spent the night at Y's parents. He dropped me at their door and told me he'd collect me in the morning. His mother chose to talk to me in a raised voice and his father chose tightly-pursed lips and pointing. Then they realised we could actually have a conversation. Dinner began with an apology. "We've only returned from our dacha this afternoon. We haven't been to the shop yet. I can only offer you fried potatoes." It quickly becomes a stuff-Paul-until-he-bursts competition. There are also cucumbers from the dacha. And peppers. And spring onions. And lettuce. And raspberries. And marmalade cakes. And blueberries. And grass for tea.

I felt compelled to visit the city's literature museum. There is something wonderful about small town museums where the curator goes round ahead of you to turn on the lights. Omsk was the site of a labour camp and it was here Dostoevsky spent his exile in Siberia. The museum is naturally centred round his life and works.

Y. also took me to an arts studio. We drove through an industrial area of the city and pulled up in front of a derelict looking shack. Dimar came and met us at the metal gates and showed us inside. Ten students were gathered smoking and drinking tea, surrounded by their works-in-progress. I talked to them about their art. There were three girls but no Natalyas.