On the Banks of the Volga

A lot of Thanksgiving

2009-12-05T08:31:00.000-08:00

November has come and gone.
It was a very full month, one that really made me realize how much I love my life here. It's been a time of good food. I hosted a Thanksgiving dinner one weekend and a taco dinner the next, and then the next weekend went to another Thanksgiving dinner. I've been ice skating, to the planetarium, and out walking around the city. In addition to all this, I picked up an Elementary English class and actually started taking Russian lessons: an hour and a half Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. It's hard for me to remember what a quiet month September was.
The Thanksgiving dinner was kind of crazy. Since we work until 9 each weekday, we decided it would be best to have it on a Saturday. We made it early November as a compromise with the Canadian holiday and to give more of the teachers a chance to come. I recall the afternoon and evening through kind of a haze. After getting off work on Thursday night, I made cranberry sauce (really easy to do, by the way). Then, Friday night the real work began. I had decided to make a huge amount and variety of food: pumpkin soup, pumpkin ice cream pie, dinner rolls, green beans, macaroni and cheese, corn bread, mashed potatoes, and probably something else I now, thankfully, cannot recall. I did almost half Friday night, fell asleep, then woke up and tried to finish cooking and clean at the same time. I was very grateful that Randy, the Canadian, took care of the turkey and stuffing. Then came dinner. We talked, gave thanks, played Apples to Apples, and ate a ton. I sent home doggy bags with those who helped me clean, but I still didn't cook for a week. Which was one more thing to be thankful for.
The taco dinner the next week was a lot less work, but still provided me with food for the week. I made tacos and guacamole, as well as found corn chips. The result wasn't really even authentic by any definition, but it was good. My advanced class had a great time, I think, though they almost drove me crazy asking if different permutations of salsa, guacamole, meat, beans, tomatoes, etc were allowed! yes, yes, you can just have cheese and meat. Or cheese and salsa, if you really want. Go for it. They supplied fantastic Russian deserts: blini and apple "pie."
The Russian lessons may kill me. An hour and a half is a really long time. I find myself in a constant struggle. It is very easy for me to see the value of the lessons, and I see clear improvement in my speech, reading, and writing, but after 45 minutes I just keep glancing at the clock. Especially on Friday, when my tongue is often aching from trying to make the palatalized letters properly. My teacher assures me that the way Russians say them is the same way they are supposed to be said in German. Which leads me to 2 conclusion: 1. My German accent must be pretty bad. 2. Everyone still understood me, so how important can the difference in sounds really be? Ha. I'll keep trying.

Nazi?

2009-10-23T02:46:00.000-07:00

Over the last few weeks, I've been getting a little braver about trying out my Russian on people. You would think that, living in Russian, I wouldn't really have any option but practice. And it is true that I get plenty of practice saying "200 grams of that salad, please," "yes, a small bag," and "May I have a crepe filled with all sorts of Russian food like mashed potatoes, sour cream, and pickles" (easier to say in Russian, actually), but other than that it is actually really easy to avoid situations where more would be required.
A couple of weeks ago, I ran into one of those unavoidable situations, though. Everyday it seemed my apartment was just a little darker, and it wasn't all to blame on the quickly-shortening days. No, my lightbulbs were all burning out, one by one, and I had no idea really where to get new ones. My roommate always bought them last year. Of course, I should have looked up how to say "lightbulb" in my dictionary, but I never thought about it at the right time. So, with nothing but the idea that they might be in the supermarket, I went looking. No luck. I decided to go to a little grocery store where I'd be able to actually look at every shelf closely. Still, no luck. But there I found a nice woman willing to listen to me fumble with the Russian I did know to ask about this item. Basically, I said: "I need something, but I don't know how to call it in Russian. I have a lamp, but no light. I need this." and then motioned with my hands screwing in a bulb. She somehow understood me, told me the name of the item, and sent me to a store that actually sold them. I was elated, mostly because I was able to understand her entire answer.
That adventure gave me the courage to try more. Last Thursday, I decided to try to buy some peppers and tomatoes from this woman selling them from the back of a truck in a lot near my apartment. I wasn't really sure of the protocol for how to do this. I could see lots of vegetables and a scale, so I knew it would be by weight. I was nervous it was a bring your own bag occasion, but I decided to try and hope that they'd at least be willing to sell me a bag as I always forget to carry one.
I managed to bobble through figuring out the process and was then the proud owner of some incredibly cheap sweet peppers (the good tomatoes for the day had already been taken). Amused by my accent, the lady selling the produce asked me if I was German. In my defense, I'd like to point out that this woman was from the Caucasus and had a funny accent, but I didn't understand the questions. I asked her to repeat herself, and she just said "Nazi?" Horrified, I said "no, no, no (no's come in threes here) I'm from the USA." She and I chatted some more, with her accusing me of being a bad student of Russian. I explained that actually I taught English. I didn't catch everything she was saying, but pretty soon she was inviting me to that most traditional of Russian pasttimes, walking and sitting in parks and drinking beer. I didn't really know what to do, so I started pretending to understand less and changing the subject back to tomatoes. In the end, she put her cell phone in my hands so that I could type in my number and she could invite me later. It was important, you see, because she was a poet, as she proved by reciting poetry at me. I quickly typed a number that closely resembled mine, but differed on a few digits. The trick will be when I want more peppers...

What brought me back

2009-09-26T05:06:00.000-07:00

In Prince Caspian (the book, of course), Lucy asks Aslan why he didn't just make everything right, the way he did against the White Witch. As I recall, Aslan looks through her tears and says things never happen the same way twice. His answer is true in that story, I've seen it to be true in general, and it is certainly the truth in the case of my return to Volgograd.
Of course I knew things would be different this year, but somehow I still took a lot of the aspects of my life last year for granted. Last year, the young foreign teachers all hung out together. We had fun exploring the city's limited tourist attractions and trying out its various cuisines. This year the other teachers, while interesting and enjoyable people, are at too many different stages of life to make hanging out automatic or natural-seeming. That's where it's really good that at least on Sundays I get to spend time with some real friends in fellowship and good conversation.
While last year I shared an apartment overlooking the Volga river, this year I'm living alone in a comfortably run-down flat with its own set of unique quirks of personality. For example, when I wish to wash dishes in the kitchen, I must first turn on the hot water in the bathtub, then turn on the faucet in the kitchen, then turn down, but not off, the tap to the tub. And, as I discovered today, all the plugs in the whole apartment are on the same circuit. Thankfully, I quickly discovered the correct button to push and I'm rarely so busy that I would need to do laundry and vacuum at the same time.
My classes this year are also different, but I actually know a lot of the students from last year. Since I'm teaching exam preparation courses, many of my students were in my upper-intermediate classes last year. It's fun to get to see so many of the same faces, but the fact that I know them so well makes me feel more emotionally involved in making sure they are prepared to pass their exams. Of course, having a test looming in the distance means the lessons are a little less free-form and fun than they were last year.
All this is not to say that I'm having a bad time here. It's different, and there are certainly times when I wish it weren't. But the fact that things change is not the only lesson in Prince Caspian. There was a reason things were different, even if it was one that Lucy couldn't grasp. Lots of times, I don't really know why I'm here, but that's okay. What brought me back is surely nothing as dramatic as the blowing of Susan's horn, but I trust that there is something.

2009-09-12T09:59:00.003-07:00

Sept 3, 2009

As you can surmise from the fact that I’m writing this, I made it to Volgograd safely and without major incident. My flight from Atlanta to DC was fine, and I even got seated in the Economy Plus section, where the 5 extra inches of legroom were nice, but not really necessary for such a short flight. Sitting around the DC airport went okay, particularly because I was able to purchase a day’s worth of wireless access and thus say goodbye, again, to Adam and James and whoever happened to be online at the time, as well as kill time watching my own choice of TV. DC to Moscow was fine, but long. It was no great surprise that I got very little sleep.
When I arrived at the Moscow airport and got through security (the lines are longer but the process shorter than in the states) I soon became very grateful for my cell phone. No one was there to greet me, but I was able to get in touch with Volgograd, who confirmed for me first that there was someone on the way, then that that someone had had car troubles and a new driver was on the way. Crises averted, though sitting around the airport while dead tired is not much fun.
I found myself dozing off over and over the whole afternoon as I was shuttled between the airport, the school office, the apartment where they let me nap, the school again, and finally the train station. Even with that napping, I still fell asleep almost immediately when I got on the train at 7:30 in the evening and, short of maybe 2 hours of waking up and reading for a bit, slept straight through until 11:30 the next morning when my compartment mate finally decided I really needed to wake up.
As soon as I got off the train at 5 pm, I was greeted by Elena, one of our administrators. She took me to my new apartment, which happens to have been Sarah’s apartment last year. It is comfortable and close to the school, as well as a number of other things. It will have a washing machine starting Monday and internet access in about 9 days. The only thing I’m worried about right now is learning how to use the oven . The stovetop works fine and is easy to light, but I can’t figure out how to turn on the oven, and the landlord had no clue. I know Sarah used it last year, so I’m confident that it will eventually work out.
Classes start on Monday, so between now and then I’ll have lots of free time to settle in (and look around for internet for the coming days). It looks like the teaching staff will be sort of staggering in this year, coming at a number of different times. I hope this doesn’t make our schedule really tough at the beginning before others get here. Right now it looks like I’ll be teaching mostly exam prep courses. I’ll let you know more when I know more.

2009-09-12T09:59:00.001-07:00

Sept 2, 2009

The Statue is Still Standing

Last year in Volgograd, I heard some disturbing news: the statue of Mother Russia, the most visible landmark in the city, might be falling. Its base is slowly eroding, and while the Russian government assures the populace that they are correcting the situation, many remain unconvinced. Certainly the loss of this statue would be a devastating loss to the people of this city. Anyone with a passing knowledge of history knows of the battle that took place here, the deadliest battle in history, but how many outside Russia could tell you that Stalingrad is now known as Volgograd? The change in name, while laudable in intention, hides the “Hero-City’s” past from the casual observer. The statue, built on the strategically important Mamaev Hill, is a powerful link to this past. Also, as any of my students is quick to remind me, it is bigger than the Statue of Liberty.
All that said, as an outsider, I have no strong emotional attachment to the statue. It is extremely impressive, but when I learned the artist fashioned her after his wife, all I could think was “he must have hated his wife.” I had thought that the menacing look on her rather ugly face was simply meant to inspire fear into Soviet Russia’s enemies. If she fell, I’d feel bad for the citizens of Volgograd, but I’d be more concerned with 1) not having it land on me and 2) taking pictures and hoping to be an on the scene reporter for some English speaking news source with limited resources. In fact, some of the other (foreign) teachers and I had a running joke about starting a betting pool placing odds on when she would fall. Also on where, if one were to be visiting the hill when she fell, one should run in order to survive.
Still, I was pleased to see as my train chugged past that Mother Russia is still standing, tall and proud. I look forward to exploring the city in the next couple of weeks to see what changes have occurred over the summer, but it seems like a good sign that the statue, at least, is still standing.

286 down, 6 to go

2009-06-02T11:55:00.000-07:00

In each of our classrooms there is a clock, and on each of those clocks there is the date. For the last week, each time I see that date I'm a bit shocked. After being here for all this time, months and months on end, I'm actually going home. I'm certainly excited and can't wait to see everyone and experience America again, but it's hard to wrap my mind around. What will it feel like to see a policeman smile or to have to remember that a 5% tip is simply not acceptable?
It's going to be difficult to explain my experience. I know I've been guilty of asking incredibly vague and useless questions about people's travels and fully expect to get plenty of "How was Russia?" and the like. To prepare myself, I've decided to try to list 10 things I've learned.
1. In America we take reliability for granted. In Russia, if you see the cereal you like on the shelf, buy it. It might disappear tomorrow and be gone for a month. Also, keep several large containers of water in your apartment at all times so that when the water doesn't work for half a day, you can still function normally.
2. Not speaking the language of the surrounding culture has both advantages and disadvantages, but the second outweigh the first. I love the feeling of breakthrough when I communicate successfully in Russian and I have to admit that I enjoy the liberty to talk about people in front of them without their understanding, but I often wonder what I would do if I saw someone who really needed help. Also, not being able to speak Russian makes the post office that much worse.
3. In America we take the trustworthiness of our politicians for granted. Sure we have corrupt politicians and we make that stereotype the butt of many of our jokes, but we are honestly shocked when true corruption is revealed. Here it is simply expected.
4. Beets don't taste all that bad. Neither does cabbage. Especially when your body starts craving fresh vegetables. But mushrooms are still horrible.
5. British English and American English are actually remarkably different considering the common history and the frequent cultural interaction between the two nations. While the British system of saying "in hospital" does make sense, there are many ways I still hold that the American language is superior.
6. Living without faith in public figures seems to bind people more closely to their friends and loved ones.
7. I'm pretty sure fate has conspired to prevent us from ever finding Chinese food in Volgograd. Though since the "Mexican" food was covered in barbeque sauce and dill, that might have been for the better.
8. Anything can go on pizza, but that doesn't mean it is good. While fish is predictably horrible, fried egg is remarkably good.
9. While Americans could, and should, do more for the environment, we do care a lot more than some other nations.
10. The internet is probably the most wonderful invention of all time. As much as it pains me to say it, I think it equals the printing press.

In Russia, I mean, Ukraine pictures

2009-05-23T09:33:00.000-07:00

A few pictures from inside the 3rd class compartment. That little table flips down to the level of the benches and becomes a berth.

From the Kara-Dog nature preserve. Even with the clouds, it looked amazing.

From the Kara Dog museum. Sadly, we didn't see any of those fluffy eared squirrels in real life. Also our guide who looked like he could destroy us if we dared pick a flower.

Some flowers from Chekhov's dacha and the Ukrainian countryside, as seen from a bus.

Some pictures of Yalta from the bucket lift and a model posing at the Swallow's Nest

The Swallow's Nest: A tiny and apparently useless castle, but the scenery is amazing.

A Yaltan Confederate Flag anyone? In the Simferopol Panarama, notice that men in speedos and sombreros are banned. And the bucket lift of Yalta.

The scenery around Chersonessus, the cathedral built in honor of the baptism of the first Christian Czar, and the gazebo marking the place of the baptism.

In Russia, I mean, Ukraine

2009-05-23T08:24:00.000-07:00

Right now it is hard for me to believe that I will be home in less than two and a half weeks. Time moves in fits and starts, but for the most part it has been extremely fast. Some of my students have asked me if I'm looking forward to going home. I tell them "yes" very quickly, then try to put into words just how excited I am. Failing to think of anything that could be both understood by and interesting to an English Language Learner, I just grin and repeat "yes, I am looking forward to it very much."
I know I'm slack about posting on this blog, which is a shame. A lot has happened in the last month. The most exciting thing was our trip to Ukraine. The other two American teachers and I met up with one of their friends from back home and together the four of us toured the Crimean Peninsula for a week. There a person doesn't have to choose between the mountains and the sea. Both are to be found right next to each other to spectacular effect. Before I say more about Crimea, I must explain that culturally, Crimea is still very Russian. While the official language is Ukrainian, few people speak it nativily in this region which was given by the soviets as a gift to Ukraine back when it was one republic and nobody though it would ever actually matter who owned what. We began our journey, of course, with a long train ride. Volgograd to Simferopol takes a little over 24 hours, with over an hour of that devoted to border crossing. No one tried to extort a bribe out of us, so it was a fairly pleasant experience. We shared a coupe compartment with a man and his extremely active six year old son. They, along with about 14 other parents with children, were heading to do a bike tour of Crimea. At one point in the trip, a number of the children came into our compartment. Apparently thinking that we also were with their group, they sat down across from us. I don't know whether they were expecting entertainment or what, but when we explained who we were and where we were from, one little girl expressed her shock and the others just stared. It was pretty funny. The one girl talked to us a bit, but for the most part, it was just them staring at the first Americans they'd ever seen for about 15 minutes.
When we arrived, it was cold and rainy. This continued as we took a bus to Sevestopol, home of the Russian fleet and site of the baptism of the first Christian Czar. In fact, the rain continued most of the time we were in that city. That didn't stop us from recognizing that the city would be extremely beautiful in the sun, and we did get to visit the Greek colony which was the site of the baptism. We also met a strange young man with a pet rat who lived in his jacket. He offered to let us pet the rat, and the first thing I thought was "The plague entered Europe through Crimea." Of course, he only spoke Russian, so our conversation was quite limited. He did draw us a picture of the monument to the scuttled ships in the harbour (from the Crimean War). I'm not sure that if I had his drawing skills I would be so quick to put them on display, in fact, I think I do have his drawing skills, but to each his own. Speaking of the Crimean War, there is a panorama museum of the war in that city. Housed in a beautiful building with a convincing panarama depiction of one day of the battle, this museum could teach the Volgograd Panorama a thing or two. Our evenings were relaxing as we stayed in a church's guesthouse that was both comfortable and very affordable.
After a couple of days, we moved on to Yalta, the gaudy yet beautiful playground of Russian tourists. While our accommodations in Sevestopol had been very affordable, here they were dirt cheap. We found an old woman renting an entire apartment, granted, a relatively small one, for what worked out to be less than 5 dollars each per night. We enjoyed our time in Yalta as we mixed kitchy activities, like visiting the Swallows Nest (see pictures) and taking the bucket chair lift, with more intellectual ones, like visiting Anton Chekhov's dacha and the site of the Big 4 meeting. We tried to celebrate Cinco de Mayo there, but Lonely Planet failed us. The Mexican restaurant they touted was closed and dusty looking. We tried a place that looked Chinese instead, but it turned out to be regular Russian food with Chinese decor. Pretty typical. Determined to make our own fun, we went to one of the pebble beaches(there is no other kind in Crimea) to write a message, put it in a bottle, and throw the bottle in the ocean. A quick assessment of the tides showed us that the bottle would likely wash up on the same shore in about 45 minutes, so we claimed in the note to be from Bulgaria, just to add more interest in case anyone found it. We included our e-mail addresses but have so far heard nothing.
We continued on to Feodosia, which is similar to Yalta in many ways but, at least when we went, much less crowded and therefore more charming. The long-distance bus station is on the very edge of town, so at first we thought we were the victims of some elaborate ruse and had been left in a village. After getting settled in, we walked through the city some and along the ocean front. Maybe it was because it was the off season, but the city seemed to roll up its sidewalks at 9, leaving us to eat in a fast food place that turned out to be amazing. The next day we went on a hike in a nature preserve with stunning ancient rock formations, and a guide who alternated between stoical silence and blathering on during our frequent stops to appreciate some particular formation. Perhaps I would have enjoyed his speeches more if I knew Russian, but it was pretty cold and I think many of the Russians in our group felt as I did about these delays during which the wind whipped around us.
A little poor planning on our part meant that the busses stopped running before we got off the mountain. Some ladies in the information booth had told us that one should be there shortly if we waited, but we soon realized that it wasn't happening. They tried to find us a taxi number and failed, but recommended we walk down the road to a shop where taxis usually wait. The shop was closed and there were no taxis. We continued walking through this village about an hour outside of the city until we found a bus shelter. Thankfully there was an ad for a taxi there, so we called and he soon came and picked us up. You would think that a taxi trip like that, which involved him driving us nearly an hour and then returning home, would have been really expensive, but it turned out to be around twenty dollars. At that point I would have gratefully paid double.
Our return trip to Volgograd was a little less pleasant. We were riding in 3rd class to save money, which meant people coming and going all through the night. Also, we crossed the border at about 8:30 in the morning, and the lady in charge of our car decided that meant we should be woken up around 5:30 to fill out our migration cards. It took me all of 10 minutes to do so, and that was only becuase I was so tired I was having trouble seeing the boxes. I tried to go back to sleep, but this officious woman kept coming by to make sure everyone was ready.
All in all, the trip was wonderful. The views were fantastic and I got to walk where greatness had been. As a break from Russia, though, it was quite disappointing. We kept finding ourselves calling it part of Russia and then quickly self-correcting. I don't know nearly enough to have an opinion about such a politically loaded question, but if you want to see a lot of Russian people, eat a lot of Russian food, and hear a lot of Russian spoken, you can save yourself the hassle of getting a visa and just go to Crimea.

'Appy Birrzday to me

2009-04-25T07:20:00.000-07:00

If you can't celebrate your birthday at home, I strongly recommend celebrating it in Russia. When I polled my students, they all said their birthday was their favorite time of year, topping out Christmas, New Year's, and any other contenders without a struggle. While the birthday person is responsible for picking up the tab for, well, everything on her birthday, there are lots of gifts and attention showered on the person, and it is very nice.
As I shared my birthday with one other person at the school, we were able to split some of the costs of throwing a little luncheon of pizza, fruit, cake, candy, and, of course, wine for the toasts. Well, he brought cognac, but there weren't very many takers on that. Mostly we stuck to a small glass of wine and then fruit juice or coke of some sort. It was fun. Sergei (our nearly silent accountant) and Randy (the guy celebrating his 41st birthday) each gave me a flower and a got a plant, a mug, and a copy of Rambo 4. Each of those presents has a bit of a story with it, but the only interesting story is about Rambo. One of the teachers at the school who has never left Russia but speaks excellent English talks nearly exclusively about one of approximately 3 topics: UFO's, Russian athletic prowess, and Sylvester Stallone. I will now be equipped, if I take the movie out of the wrapper and watch it, to actually be able to respond to one of the 3 conversations.
I didn't tell my teens that it was my birthday, but my upper-intermediate adults knew and greeted me by standing and singing "Happy Birthday" in "Russian". If you don't know, "Happy Birthday" is a very international song with only slight variations in each country, and in Russian it goes something like: "'Appy Birrzday to you." They also gave me a nice box of chocolates named for the river Don in a gift bag celebrating Volgograd. There is great national pride here.
My individual student, Alexander, presented me with a bouquet of 5 red roses this morning, along with a box of chocolates. My room smells great now.
Tonight we will have a party here at the flat with some of my students, coworkers, and friends. I suspect I will hear another round of "'Appy Birrzday."

Attack of the Babeshkas

2009-03-25T02:21:00.000-07:00

Spring has finally started to come to Volgograd. After months of mostly gray days with a blanket of ice and snow covering the ground, I was very excited about three weeks ago to see temperatures begin to rise above freezing and the snow begin to melt during the day. To celebrate, I opened a window. Last week I was glad to see days in which, in a 24 hour period, never got below freezing. This helped to melt away all but the densest of icy patches. Now, this week, we are looking at normal day temperatures above 50 and even hitting 60. So now my balcony doors are open and I can look out at the park along the river and see Russians strolling, enjoying the beginnings of spring. Plants are also starting to take notice. Though very little is green yet, I can see buds on many trees and some plants on the ground, yellow from being covered in snow, are becoming a little brighter each day.
This is not to say, however, that all the people here have left their furs and boots behind. While many have switched to shorter jackets and there are fewer knee-high boots to be seen in the streets, bundling up still seems to be the rule rather than the exception. Sunday I decided that, as it was the first Sunday in Spring, I should be able to wear short sleeves under my wool coat. This seemed like a good plan to me and I was perfectly warm on my way to church, but as soon as I took off my coat to hang it up, several old ladies came straight towards me with shawls outstretched. I tried to explain, first in broken Russian : "no, thank you. No cold. I Okay" and then through the help of Olya's interpretation, that I would be fine. It was to no avail. A lady put her shawl on me, pronounced the effect beautiful, and then made sure I understood to stay warm. As I tried to return it, I noticed another woman ready to put her own on me, so I conceded. I just hope I don't have to continue to wear long sleeves through June.

Burning winter

2009-03-09T05:05:00.000-07:00

While a thick blanket of icy snow still covers the ground, Russians here in Volgograd are starting to mention spring a little more often. This is a result, not so much of the rising temperatures, though it looks like we will be above freezing most of this week, but of the lengthening days and the holidays that come with them.
Masleneetza is a week long holiday that was the same week as Mardi Gras, with roughly the same original meaning. For the Orthodox, it is a time of celebration leading up to a Sunday service which I believe centers on contrition and then about 45 days of fasting. Their version of fasting has to do with not eating meat or other animal products, and probably some other things as well. I've talked to a few people who are fasting, but haven't really gotten the whole list. The Masleneetza events aren't as crazy as a New Orleans Mardi Gras. The celebration mostly consists of eating lots and lots of blini, known in America as blinzes. These are a very thin pancake topped with either sweet or savory fillings and then wrapped up. They resemble, but taste nothing like, a small burrito or a flat eggroll. And they are really, really good. One of our Russian friends, Pasha, got his mom to make us some since we had only had the kind that come from the blini stands. These had tvorg (like cottage cheese) and fruit filling.
The other aspect of Masleneetza, which I heard about but didn't get to see, consists of crazy winter games. These are apparently very ancient in origin, and I think they were encouraged during Soviet times as they weren't religious. One tradition is for men to climb tall poles, bare chested, to retrieve a pair of shoes from the top. Another is to build a large snow fort and to have a pitched battle over it. Ivor attended one of these near Moscow last year and said that grown men were literally pushing each other off large snow battlements and one had to be carted away by ambulance.
Those who celebrate from this perspective see Masleneetza as marking the end of winter. In keeping with this, effigies of Winter (which happens to be female) are burned. Not too many people participate in this tradition outside of the villages or school festivals, according to my students, but Pasha did. The next day, the first day of Lent, we had a very heavy snowfall. We've been told that we should blame it all on Pasha's inability to properly burn Winter.
In addition to this festival, we've had 2 public holidays: Defender's of the Fatherland Day, also known as Men's Day, and International Women's Day, which was yesterday and is why I'm not at school now. I haven't been able to learn of any traditions associated with these holidays, other than enjoying a day off of work or school, but they've been fun. We had people over at our apartment until about 2:30 this morning. There are some British students here to study Russian, and three girls from that group came, and about 10 or so Russians who were friends or friends of friends. It was the first time I'd every met most of them, but lots of them spoke good English and one even spoke pretty good German. I was surprised none of our neighbors complained, but I don't think we were the only ones having a party in our block. Maybe our older neighbors just expected noisy parties and escaped to their dachas for the extended weekend.

This Russian Life

2009-02-01T11:07:00.001-08:00

I know it has been far too long since I've posted, so I thought (prompted by subtle and not so subtle hints from a few people) that I should write again. This post is about some of the unusual things I've noticed while here in Volgograd. I call the post "This Russian Life" because I'm not sure how universal any of these things are, but they've all happened to me. Some of these differences have annoyed or angered me, but most are fairly neutral. A few are even things that I would like to keep up when I return to America.
-leaflets: anywhere there are likely to be people walking, there are people passing out leaflets, some glossy, some on newsprint. I've been told that they are paid by how many they pass out and that they don't make much money, so I generally take them.
-tea drinking: This is something I would like to continue in America. The average Russian drinks about 6 cups of tea a day (my rough estimation, but I don't actually think it is an exaggeration). The practice is wonderfully flexible. It can be nearly an art with elaborate teapots and such, an excuse to have people over and sit and talk for hours, or simply a drink that tastes better than the boiled water you would be drinking instead.
-horrible post office: Do not trust the Russian postal service. I thought they would be a lesson in patience, but they've turned into a lesson in disappointment.
-marshutkas: There are several forms of public transport in Volgograd. I prefer going by trolleybus when I can't go by foot. It is inexpensive (25 cents) and straightforward, though a little slow. Marshutkas are another form. They are yellow vans that run along set routes. They are about 75 cents and much faster than trolleybus. You hail them by sticking your arm straight out. The difficulty is that you have to tell the driver when to stop. This can be pretty nervewracking if you are like me.
-tapetchki: When entering a Russian home, you must take off your shoes. Some Americans prefer this, but here it is an absolute requirement. Unless there are a large number of guests, you'll be offered tapetchki, house slippers. I don't have any at my place, which makes me feel kind of bad.
-obsession with clean floors: I didn't understand the tapetchki thing at first, but then the snow came and the streets got really muddy. All public buildings soon had nasty floors. The cleaning ladies then spent their time chasing customers around with a mop. I feel bad when the cleaning lady at the school follows me around in the mornings, but after wiping my feet, there's not much more I can do. Other places solve the problem by requiring you to wear blue booties over your shoes when you are in their building.
-odd repair jobs: When there is a problem here, they don't always fix it in a very permanent-seeming manner. For example, a pipe for my radiator was leaking. Instead of turning off the water and doing a real job, they just covered the hole with a kind of rubber belt with a metal clamp over that. Effective, but messy looking.
-bundling children up: One of the cutest things about the winter is that Russians bundle their children up beyond anything I've ever seen. The kids can't move properly. When they fall asleep on the trolleybus and their fathers carry them out, their arms are splayed out perpendicular to the ground.
-tiny dumpsters: I'm not sure why, but the dumpsters here are very small. There are two that serve my block of apartments. By the end of the day, they are full to overflowing.
-tiny dumptrucks to go with these dumpsters: each morning, the dumptrucks come. They are about the size of a medium U-Haul. It really doesn't seem very efficient. They must have to make a number of trips to the dump.
-crows: This isn't anything they can control, I guess, but surrounding the dumpster areas is a flock of crows. They steal food and shiny things and scatter them around.
-being late: People here are more laid back about times. This means things are often late. I'm learning to be okay with this.
-pointy shoes: Men here wear pointy toed shoes, and women wear pointy-heeled shoes. It is amusing to me.
-sporadic water: The water here sometimes is turned off. There is no warning and we never know how long it will last. We've learned to keep several 5 liter containers full of water just in case.
-primary colors: Things for children tend to be painted in primary colors. Every playground I've seen is painted this way. The majority of schools are painted colors, like the bright, but light, blue school next to my apartment.

There are others, I'm sure. But right now I think I should wrap up this post. I may follow up with more later.

The Bull Market

2009-01-03T00:25:00.000-08:00

Here in Russia, the major holiday for the year is New Year's. I got to celebrate this with some friends and friends of friends and so see what the traditional celebration is like. Basically it means sitting around a table with friends and/or family at someone's home with loads of food, juice, and champagne (well, vodka is traditional, I think, but these were classy people) and talking, watching tv, and singing karaoke until the wee hours of the morning. At around 11:55 the president of Russia gets on television every year to give a short speech and wish the country a happy New Year. (Well, literally, he congratulates them on a New Year, but that's just an idiosyncrasy of the language.) I was told it was a nice speech, but all I understood of it was "New Year" and "2009". They asked me whether our president does that, and I told them I didn't think so. But apparently the Queen of England gives a speech, but hers is more like half an hour than 5 minutes.
Many people were shooting off fireworks outside, and the men from our party braved the cold to go out and do so. I assume that no one was trying to sleep anywhere, which helped me not feel bad about our loud karaoke at 5 am. They kept trying to make everyone participate and so pulled up all the songs they had in English for me and Ivor to try. The idea that we didn't actually know most of these songs at all, and only the choruses of the others, didn't seem to be accepted. So we faked it, making up our own non-melodious melodies. Listening to some of the Russians sing, I suspect they were doing the same thing.
I took a taxi back to my place at around 6:30 and spent most of New Year's in bed sleeping or reading. I think my neighbors had a party that continued until around 2 pm on the first, which is pretty impressive stamina. The day was pretty dull, for the most part.
Yesterday I braved the telephone company's office to go and pay for the internet. It actually went smoothly and easily. There weren't many people there, so they were relaxed and helped me. Megan told me I needed to fill out two different sheets, one for the modem rental, but they told me, after I did the one for the internet itself and had paid the money, that my internet was working and so that was all. I tried to explain that I should pay for the modem, but failed. They just said "It's working, that's all" (in Russian), so I left. And it is indeed working. I'm hoping they don't come to reposess our modem, but it's only about 2 bucks anyway.
After that, I went ice skating with Ira, one of the Russian English teachers, her friend Olya, Ivor, and this guy named Dima, who we know through Zhenya, another teacher. Dima is a really interesting guy. He spent 4 years in a monostary before deciding he liked sports and interacting with people too much to make that his life. That's a strange path anywhere, but especially in Russia. But since his English is extremely limited, I can't really ask him about it.
Ice skating was an interesting experience. The first place we went was closed without explaination. The second was in a shopping center, tiny, and over run with the under-ten set. We finally found a place that was large and open, but the management was, well, Russian. There was a small entry way with a window to pay for and rent skates. When we got there, we were told they were out of our sizes and we would have to wait until the current session got out and turned in their skates. The current session was just then starting, so we had to wait an hour. First indoors, then outside in the cold so they could clean the floors, and then back inside. As the time drew nearer, more and more people arrived, squeezing into this small lobby. It only got worse when people came out of the rink as they had to return their skates to this window and push through the crowd to get out of the building. If anyone had fainted, I'm sure they would have remained upright as there was not even room to fall down.
Skating was fun, but pretty difficult for me. Better exercise than I've had in a while, and I was kind of glad to see there were plenty of Russians having difficulty too. It isn't a congenital thing that they can strap on skates to two year olds with an inborn knowledge. After an hour, it was time to experience the other side of the crush, pushing through the crowd to return my skates and escape the building. One thing I'll learn from my Russian experience is the willingness to shove through a crowd.
Now it is the year of the bull. Russians seem to get into the Chinese year symbols, and I've been given two stuffed cows already. I don't know about the rest of the economy, but in Russia, the bull market is doing well.

Christmas Eve

2008-12-24T05:23:00.000-08:00

The sun is now setting on the first day of nearly three weeks of vacation from teaching. (Of course, it being winter, that doesn't mean the day is over.) The last few days of teaching went really well. We did a lot of Christmas-sy kinds of things, like little parties for the children and teenagers and Christmas discussions and communications games for the adults. Maybe it shouldn't have, but it surprised me how unimportant Christmas is to Russians. I had already found it impossible to buy actual Christmas cards (which means many of you will be receiving New Years cards eventually), but it hadn't really sunk in. All of the commercial and secular aspects of our Christmas have been transfered to New Years, leaving Christmas as a religous holiday. Since not too many people are religious, it is apparently a pretty quiet day. I'll comment more on that after I see the Russian Christmas in January.
Several of my students did give me presents. The business men I teach gave me a matrushka nesting doll, and my upper-intermediate adult class chipped in to give me a linen tablecloth with matching napkins. The best part of that present was the accompanying card with an original "rap" in English inside. The words are as follows: "Droppin' this line at the time when Christmas & New Year is around the corner we sorry 4 our actin' up & wich U 2 be full of beans all 2009 year. We back on your teachin' us next year. What's more U're our neat teacher! We honestly try 2 rack our brain but we couldn't create more words ;))) !!! Happy 2009!!!"
I'm glad to be their "neat teacher."

Tomorrow will be my first, and likely only, white Christmas. Volgograd was very nice looking during the end of summer when we arrived, but after the leaves all fell, it looked dreary for a long time. Now, it looks really beautiful under a layer of snow. I'll be going to Christmas dinner and then to church in the evening, so I'll get to celebrate the holiday properly, if not traditionally. Aunt Karla's card even arrived yesterday, so I even have something to open!
Since it has been a while since I've posted there is much more I could say, but I'll save it for a later post.
Merry Christmas, everyone
!

Red light, green light

2008-12-03T08:43:00.000-08:00

As I walked out of school tonight, I looked up and saw the light change from red to green at the large intersection near my apartment. Now, this would be unremarkable in America, but this particular intersection has lacked traffic lights since we arrived at the beginning of September. For the three months we've been here, cars have treated this intersection as a giant four way almost-stop-unless-you-are-in-a-hurry. I didn't mention it before because I cross this intersection on a more than daily basis and I didn't want to provoke any undue, or even very due, concern. But now it is all better and I can cross when the little man is green. Before my method had often been to wait until a Russian also needed to cross and cross with him or her, with myself on the side away from the traffic.
That's just one little oddity of Russian life I had started to feel was normal. Another was the proclivity of Russians to put meat in pastries. This isn't unheard of in America, of course, but here it is the expected norm. Mike, the short-term missionary here, learned of this the hard way, biting into what he thought was going to be a huge roll but which turned out to be full of greasy and no longer heated meat. My lesson came a little differently when I expected normal meat and was surprised to find tongue. At the Thanksgiving dinner at our flat, the Russians kept expecting to see meat in all our bread. They were suspicious when I told them that the dinner rolls were just bread, and they even asked if the pumpkin pie had meat in it!
By the time June comes, I think I will have a lot of surprises waiting for me when I get home and have to re-define normal. The other day we were reminiscing about having clothes driers when I suddenly realized I had been picturing them in bathrooms and I had to remind myself that that is a Russian assumption, that it is different in America. Don't worry, though, I'm very much looking forward to getting to re-define my normality back to American standards.

Knock on Wood

2008-11-30T09:55:00.000-08:00

I sent my brother David to Thanksgiving dinner with an update about my year for him to read in my place. In it, I said I was thankful that we hadn't had a freeze here yet. So, of course, as I was walking to Adam and Olya's on Friday, I saw a young boy skidding from one length of a long puddle to the other, unabashedly enjoying the first ice of the season. The city now looks more like the mental image I had of Russia, with trees covered in frost and the sky a low, cold blanket of grey. Thankfully, my apartment is still warm.
Speaking of thanks (trust me, that transition was completely organic), I enjoyed both my Friday Thanksgiving and the one we had at our apartment on Saturday. Adam and Olya have really been great about making me feel wonderful and welcome, and Olya is a really fantastic cook. She even made green bean casserole complete with homemade onion things on top. A lot more has to be made from scratch here, which is inconvenient at times but seems to have really good results. I was the only non-missionary at this gathering of Americans, and it was great to hear all that these men and women were thankful for. Mike, a short-term missionary who is here, and I stayed late as the four of us watched Becoming Jane and then talked late into the night.
I was a little nervous about our Saturday dinner as I've never done anything close to preparing a Thanksgiving meal. We were really excited about the prospect of turkey but prepared to settle for cooking a couple of chickens if the turkey couldn't be found. Thankfully, we did find a 4 1/4 kg turkey (9.4 lbs). Though at about 40 bucks it was probably a bit pricy, sometimes you just have to spring for it. I went to class and Megan got to prepare and cook the turkey, as well as mashed potatoes and some green bean casserole, all of which came out very well. I got back to finish preparing some dinner rolls and to make some pumpkin pie. The Russians hadn't ever seen dinner rolls before, at least not the kind that are rolled, and asked if they had meat inside them. I'll explain why that's funny in a different post. The pumpkin pie wasn't especially pumpkiny, but it did taste good. The crust was good, too. I think I might have assisted in the making of a crust before, but I never really paid attention, an oversight I regretted as I tried to figure out how the crumbly mess I had in a frying pan (we don't actually have mixing bowls in our apartment) was supposed to look flat and appealing in a pie tin. The result just went to show that anything with that much butter in it is going to be pretty hard to mess up. The meal also included cranberry sauce made by Sarah from Russian cranberrys and gravy prepared by Randy, the Canadian. While the conversation at the dinner did keep going back to Stallone, Rambo, and Schwarzenneger, I did enjoy sharing Thanksgiving with this international group.
After church today I got to go to lunch with Adam, Olya, Mike, and kids to the house of a couple from the church. This was the first time I had been in an actual house here in Russia. It was very nice and impressive. Originally it was an old train car, but it has been improved and expanded to the point that only in the entry way where we hung our coats could you see a hint of the original. I kind of hope they leave that siding exposed. In America some people would pay a lot of money to put in an accent piece like that to hint at being rustic. The people themselves were also neat and the son, who I think was about eleven, read from his English book for us.
Now I'm pretty tired, and I do have to teach in the morning, so I'm going to try to call home and then head to bed.

Rejoining the 21st Century

2008-11-26T12:46:00.000-08:00

Before leaving America, I passed on my cell phone to John. It would be pretty useless in Russia, and I was interested to see what life without a cell phone would be like. Since it had been five or six years since I had been without the ability to communicate constantly with other, I wanted to see if I had grown dependent, if I would experience withdrawal.
I consider the experiment a mixed success. While I failed to notice any symptoms of cell phone withdrawal, there were confounding variables that I didn't take into account. For one, my feelings at the loss of family, friends, and all things American could have effectively masked those of separation from a phone. Also, I really didn't have much of anyone to call.
Yesterday, however, I gave in and bought a phone. I realized that what was a very minor inconvenience to me was much more of an inconvenience to other people. Besides, I could get a phone for about 40 dollars, and the minutes are very cheap. Rather than signing a contract and having a plan, here in Russia they just have little SIM cards in the phones and do a pay-as-you-go deal. If something happens to my phone, I can just take the SIM card out (it is smaller than the memory card for a digital camera) and put it in a different phone, and my phone number will work. I can even save my phone book to the card so that it will transfer easily too. America could learn something from this system, I think, but the phone companies would probably prefer we didn't. Another cool thing about the SIM card is that it is effectively free. It cost 50 rubles (2 dollars), and came with 50 rubles worth of minutes on it. The only difficulty is that the shops have to do some paperwork when you buy one, and a lot of paperwork if your passport isn't Russian. So, they just tell you you need a Russian passport. Thankfully, one of my friends was willing to make the purchase for me.
Well, that's my technological adventure for the week. I hope you all have a great Thanksgiving. I have to work all day on Thanksgiving, but Friday I will have dinner with some church friends and Saturday with my work friends. I'll write up how those go. Hopefully we can get a hold of a turkey. There is a frozen goose at the grocery store, but I don't think it would be quite the same.

If it's Tuesday, this must be Alexei, oops

2008-11-17T23:10:00.000-08:00

So, I woke up this morning recharged from a good night's sleep. After eating a bowl of oatmeal and grapes and doing a little reading, I went to school with time to spare to get ready for my lesson with Alexei. Only, that lesson is on Wednesday. I don't have anything until noon today. So, being up early and energized, I decided to update this blog.
I had a really great weekend. My Friday was restful and amusing as I watched my landlord bring a variety of handymen into our apartment to replace a broken shower hose. I don't know where he was finding these men or why they were needed, but the new hose broke and Megan was able to replace it herself on Monday.
Saturday my classes went well. In the conversation class we talked about immigration issues. There is very little in the way of political correctness here, and so they openly said they weren't too happy about people from the Caucasus who lived in Russia. Of course, they tried to call these people Caucasians. When I said, "Well, actually, I'm a Caucasian," their faces looked both shocked and confused. I went on to explain, and they just laughed. After that the teachers had a seminar on teaching vocabulary and then went to "The Steak House" one of the nicer restaurants in town and which caters to English speakers.
Sunday was the great day. I got a call from some missionaries here who I had gotten in touch with thanks to friends of a friend, and they invited me to go to a Russian Baptist church. Two and a half hours and three sermons later, I will never complain (I hope) about a pastor who preaches until 12:10 again. Not only was listening and singing hymns a great way to practice my Russian (Olya, the missionary wife, translated for me), it was also great to see the work God is doing here. After Russia opened up to religion, the government gave the land to a Baptist pastor. At the time, there was no church building or members, but now there is a small congregation about to move from meeting in the basement to their newly completed sanctuary. The service was most like the Mennonite service I went to in that the congregation was very active and vocal and children were noisy through the whole thing. The kids left during part for a Sunday school time, but the back area was full of benches where a few mothers sat and the kids could come and go as their parents permited.
After church I went with Adam, Olya, and their four little girls to their apartment. A short term missionary from America who has been working with them also was there. We had great food and fellowship. We were able to have great discussions about life and theology like I haven't been able to have since coming to Russia. They were gracious and let me stay a really long time and even are going to have me over for Thanksgiving. Hospitality is something I really want to cultivate, and they are great examples. They were also kind enough to lend me several books in English, which everyone knows is a great way to win my affection and appreciation.
After I got back to my apartment, I found that the others were at Zhenya's place for his birthday. He's been kind of down and hadn't let anyone know about it, so this was all very last minute. I got to see the tradition of "If you respect me, you'll drink," but women are allowed to drink wine instead of cognac or vodka. Don't worry. It wasn't a drunken night or anything like that. I also got to try some traditional Russian foods, like a kind of fish jello. If I hadn't been so full from lunch I would likely have appreciated it more, but I doubt I'll be making it myself.
Today, walking back from school, I got stopped by a woman looking for directions from some store. This keeps happening, and each time I'm able to get a little closer to understanding enough to be helpful. This time it actually took her a bit to realize I'm not Russian. Even though I feel sometimes like I must stick out as obviously foreign, it seems I actually blend in pretty well.

Some fall pictures

2008-11-06T12:04:00.000-08:00

Wow, that last post was pretty long. If you prefer it in picture form, here it is. Though you will miss the part about cute kids. I'll try to get pictures of them up sometime.

This is the Panorama museum, which we visited several weeks ago. It contains a huge circular mural of the battle of Stalingrad as well as many exhibits about the battle and the war. At least the European theater. The Russians don't seem to acknowledge that the Japanese were ever a threat. Below are pictures of the ruins of a bombed out flour mill, which stand to remind Russians of all they sacrificed in the war and to help Americans understand why Russians believe they shared unequally in the sufferings of the war.

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The next four pictures are of the Central Park of Culture and Leisure. You can see the pitiful amusement park rides that I hope are non-operational. Still, with the changing colors and the natural setting, it was a very nice park. Someone even wanted to make sure the birds could enjoy it and put up a milk-carton bird feeder. There are no squirrels here to steal the seed.
This final picture is of the sunrise the morning after the elections. Currently the sun rises around 6:30, so admiring it filled in one of the gaps in between results.

A Lack of Fireworks, but a nice time

2008-11-06T11:07:00.000-08:00

I realize that it has been some time since I last posted. Sorry about that.
The last few weeks have gone well. My classes all seem to be on the right track and having a good time. The children's class has been going much better. The textbook we use is called Happy House and contains absolutely no reading or writing assignments. It is designed to be a non-threatening, fun introduction to the English language. While that sounds nice and would be great for 4 year olds, by 7-9 year olds love to write in English. Maybe it is because the alphabet is so different and so it is like a puzzle or maybe it is just that they like to show off, but they enjoy it. So I've been taking opportunities to supplement the workbook with writing activites. This has the advantages of helping them learn more, keeping them more focused on English, and serving as evidence to their parents that their children are learning. I actually look forward to this class all week. Not only is it very different from and more high energy than the others, no other class acts as excited to see me as these kids do.
It continues to get colder and colder here, though it hasn't snowed yet. Tuesday was the Day of National Unity, a holiday not celebrated during Soviet times, and which really still isn't celebrated. Though it was a public holiday and school and work was officially canceled, nothing really happened. They didn't shoot off fireworks, even, and here they often shoot off fireworks to celebrate the fact that it is Friday or that the Volga continues to flow south. We, that is, Ivor, Sarah, Megan, and I, went on a walk to find The Central Park of Culture and Leisure. This park didn't quite live up to its name. While we live in the city center, which is in the northern part of the city, this park was quite far to the north of us, so I'm really not sure what it is in the center of. Also, there really wasn't much "culture" there, though we did see very run-down fair rides that I very much hope are non-operational. We had a good time despite the very noticible cold, windy weather.
Taking notice of the fact that it was Election Day and wanting something American (at least the 3 of us Americans did; Ivor didn't really care), we went to McDonalds for supper. While this is kind of pathetic, the only two American establishments in town are McDonalds and Baskin Robbins, and we were somehow not in the mood for ice cream.
Megan, Sarah, and I were tempted to stay up all night to watch the results. I then remembered that I had class at 9:30 in the morning, so we came up with the brilliant plan of waking up at 4 in the morning to watch. Surprisingly enough, we followed through on this plan and had a good time of it. This was one of the many, many times we were grateful for high-speed internet as we were able to watch the speeches along with the rest of America. While I'm sure some of you reading are far less thrilled with the results than we were, you've got to admit it was a great moment in history to be watching.
While most Russian people know very little about American politics, they do know that they didn't really want Bush anymore, or anyone in his party. None of them have mentioned the Russian president's threatening remarks yet, and I really haven't wanted to bring it up.
I was able to find a church this past Sunday. It is small and meets in a conference room, but it is in English, which is wonderful. Most of the congregants are Malaysian or Kenyan medical students, but many of them speak English very well, and the pastor and his wife are American. The songs are a mix between praise and worship and hymns, and they sing the Doxology in three languages. I'm looking forward to going back.

Relating to Relativism

2008-10-18T05:09:00.000-07:00

Today, Saturday, is the day that I have my conversation class. For three academic hours, which is two hours and fifteen minutes of real time, I lead a group of around 10-15 adults in discussion in English. In some ways, this is a very nice deal for me. There are never any tests to grade or papers to correct, and I don't have to worry too much about introducing complicated grammatical structures. On the other hand, my students range in age from about 15 to 45 and in ability level from intermediate to advanced. Also, this is a fairly long time to talk, so the topics must be very interesting, which generally means controversial. Thankfully we have a little library of books like A-Z Conversation Topics which prove to be very helpful.
Today the topic was "Decisions." The worksheet basically presented situations in which a difficult decision must be made, and we discussed these. As per our training, I would have the students first discuss in pairs or small groups, following which we would have a general class discussion. Some of the questions were mostly just for fun, as in "Would you rather be extremely ugly but very intelligent or unbelievably beautiful and particularly stupid?" Others, however, were more serious, like "Do you believe that men like Hitler were evil or were they simply acting according to their own morality?" and "You are 45 and pregnant and the doctor says there is a %50 chance your baby will have Downs Syndrome, what do you do?"
It quickly became apparent to me that I was no longer in America and certainly no longer in the Bible Belt. I expected that many of the students would have positions I disagreed with, but I was unprepared for the degree of difference. When faced with the question of whether they would prefer to be a cruel tyrant or one of his slaves who was kind and just, all but one chose the king. Partly, I think this is due to the fact that Russians are more straightforward and don't tend to give the politically correct answer to look good, but they all said that is better to have power than to be ruled. One used The Prince to justify her position. They honestly look at Machiavellian morals with approval. Now, I do agree with cultural relativism to a point. While I think that murder is always wrong, I think that while revenge killing is murder for us it could be justice in a different time and place. But to say that Hitler wasn't evil because he was doing what he believed in is simply insane to me. To be fair, half the class did say he was evil, but the idea that the other half found his actions in any way acceptable astonishes me. I didn't really know how to respond.
Later in the class, I had to walk away from one group after hearing one girl make the statement that people with Down's Syndrome aren't really people. I didn't call her out on it, but I made it clear in my subsequent remarks that I knew and cared about a number of people with Down's. I just didn't want her to make such a statement again since I wasn't sure how angry my voice would sound in direct response. I then found out, upon asking, that the usual course of action in Russia when a mother gives birth to a child with Down's is to send the child to a special hospital. There the child is largely ignored until it dies around age 15. That explains why I've only seen one person with a mental disability in all the time I've been here. Thankfully, the majority of the class did speak up and say this is a horrible thing.
I don't really know what to do. As a teacher of English, it is not my place to give sermons. I don't want to give my opinion in such a way that students feel pressured to adopt it to gain favor. But really, how can I be silent?

As American as Television

2008-10-11T07:10:00.000-07:00

I honestly don't know if I could have done this in the era before the internet. Even though I'm nearly halfway around the world, my friends and family are just a computer screen away. My daily routine now includes reading the New York Times, checking Facebook, and watching The Daily Show. I sometimes feel like I'm cheating, like being in Russia should be more isolating.
That is not to say, however, that being here is just like being in a new city in America. Not only is there are real language barrier, there are cultural differences that surround me and make me aware that I am foreign. Some of these are minor, like the way grocery stores are laid out, while others are major, like the attitude of the people towards cheating and bribery. Things are nothing like the stereotypical images of soviet Russia, but it is clear the people here tend to think differently than people in America. We had a chapter on criminals and the justice system in my class for upper-intermediate adults, and they all took it for granted that it is better to err on the side of locking up innocent people than to let guilty people go free. When I tried to explain that the American justice system is built around the opposite idea, that the rights of the innocent are protected, they looked at me with doubt and confusion.
I suppose it is normal that going someplace foreign makes me appreciate being American more. What surprises me is the role that television plays in this. My roommate, Megan, brought The West Wing with her on DVD. I never saw this show when it was actually on the air, so I'm learning to appreciate it now. I know it is highly fictional and overly idealistic show, but it really does a lot to make me proud of America and to love our government, especially when compared to what I see on a regular basis here. Oddly enough, The Daily Show and The Colbert Report, which Comedy Central graciously makes available online to everyone, regardless of geographic location (the only network, as far as I can tell, to do this), also help me to feel more American while I'm here. The good humor they have, even when mocking and complaining, is strikingly different than the attitudes I see around me normally.

Speaking slowly and drinking tea.

2008-10-10T10:15:00.000-07:00

It is incredible how long I've been here. Literally. I've been in Russia for one month and twenty days, but it doesn't feel that long at all. Still, I've gotten used to so many things here. It seems pretty normal to spend most of my time talking to people who only sort of understand me, so much so that when I talk to other native English speakers I often find myself speaking more slowly and using lots of hand gestures. They do the same thing, though, so it isn't particularly insulting to anyone. My classes are starting to fall into a routine. The days that I thought were long have gotten longer, but at the same time they are now easier for me, so it's no problem. I do still drink lots of tea, especially on Thursdays. Since I don't like coffee it is very nice for me to be in a place where they drink hot tea to get caffeine.
The children's class I have on Thursdays went much better yesterday than it had the week before. It was very heartening that things improved so much. The class is difficult for a number of reasons: The kids have a very low level of English; I have a very low level of Russian; the kids are fairly undisciplined; and the textbook encourages a more free-flowing rather than structured lesson. This week, however, it all worked well. The lesson objective was to learn "Is it a ...?" and I think that 6 or 7 out of the 8 kids learned it. That's the other odd thing about this class. The textbook doesn't expect them to actually learn much in a given lesson. It is amazing what you can do to stretch learning this simple 4 word sentence into an entire hour.
Tonight I made chili and we had honeydew melon (or something like it) and bread with it. There wasn't any cheddar cheese to put on it, but sour cream made it really good. We watched an episode of the West Wing on DVD while we drank our tea. In a few minutes I'm going to head to bed. Tomorrow I have an individual lesson at 11 and my conversation class at 1.

Pictures of my apartment.

2008-10-03T02:29:00.000-07:00

I meant to put up some pictures of the apartment a long time ago, but I'll do that now.
The first picture is of our hall. This is also the location of my wardrobe. The telephone is here, as are the coat rack and a small sofa. The second picture is of the Volga out my window. Next is my bed, which is about 3 times the size of the one I had in Moscow. The downside of it, besides no sheets fitting properly, is that the light from the window shines directly in my eyes at a fairly early hour.The next is our entry way, which isn't at all impressive looking and kind of made me worry I'd be living somewhere sketchy. It turns out the Russians simply don't care that much about making their entryways look nice. The next pictures are of our dining and eating space. We have a nice stove and really nice refrigerator. The cabinets are all really high up, though, and so the top shelf is almost useless. The final picture is of the Volga at night. Sadly, my camera is no good at taking night pictures, but it is really beautiful, trust me.

Salsa in Volgograd

2008-09-25T00:17:00.000-07:00

September 21, 2008
Yesterday was a pretty long but really fun day.
I went to the school at 9:30 to observe the class of 8 year olds I'm to teach. They are certainly energetic, but they seem like a lot of fun. They don't know much English and it is hard for them to wrap their heads around the fact that I don't know Russian (and wouldn't speak it in class if I did). There was one little girl in the class, and she was so excited to sit beside me and hold my hand. The little boys also seemed to enjoy having me there as the other teacher is a lot older and probably not as much fun. Her teaching style is not what Language Link considers best practice. I then had my individual lesson, which was fine.
We had decided to have a taco party for all the teachers as sort of a house warming, so after I got out of class we headed to Real, one of the biggest supermarkets in the city. By odd chance Sarah had found taco shells in another grocery store called Gourmand and we already had Mexican seasoning, but we were hoping Volgograd would have salsa, corn chips, and avocados somewhere. We were very pleased to find the first two items, as well as a number of other things for our apartment, in this store, which is a lot like a very, very badly organized Walmart. The salsa was near a bunch of Lays potato chips while the corn chips were across the store nearer to the toilet tissue and dog food. One aisle would have flour and the next would have shoes. It was hard to find things, but we did and were happy. Avocadoes don't seem to be here.
When we got back, we had plenty of time to get ready. The party went off well and was a lot of fun.

Standing a marathon

2008-09-18T00:33:00.000-07:00

September 15
Well, actually it is currently September 16, a little after midnight. Tuesdays and Thursdays are my marathon days. I start with an individual lesson at 12-1:30, then I have 3 classes back to back from 4-9. That might not sound like much, but with lesson planning it adds up pretty quickly. I planned one lesson yesterday and could have planned a second, but the other 2 had to wait until today so that I could see how far we got yesterday. That means I came in at 11 and stayed, except for 15 minutes to pick up some lunch, until about 9:10. My Thursdays will soon be worse as I’m supposed to be picking up a group of 8 year olds which will begin at 1:35.
I’m kind of excited about teaching kids, but the way they’ve been described to me is less than appealing. I’ve been told they made one teacher quit in tears and that they are spoiled rich kids. I’ve also heard kids described as “little devils”. Of course, it was also mentioned how horrible the teenagers would be, and I haven’t experienced that yet. It should be fun to get to play lots of games and sing songs. I won’t have to do too much writing or grading of papers. This Thursday I’m going to meet the kids, to take over next week. I’m going to have to figure out a way to do a lot more of my planning on Wednesdays.
Before you think that my schedule is too severe, let me point out that on Mondays and Wednesdays I just teach 2 classes from 4-7:15. I have Fridays off and just have one class on Saturdays from 11-12:30. All in all, it is pretty relaxed.
The main reason I’m writing this so late tonight is that Sarah was kind enough to cook dinner for us tonight after we got off work. She had a few problems with her oven, so the meatloaf wasn’t ready for some time. When it was, though, it was very good.
The appliances here really are confusing to figure out. We feel a little silly sometimes having so much trouble with washing machines, ovens, and hot water heaters, but they really are different. Our washer, for instance, is top-loading, but the spinning action is like that of a front-loader. To make matters “easier,” the settings have pictures and symbols rather than words. That’s a bit frustrating as I haven’t yet found an icon-English dictionary to interpret what setting the picture of a puddle indicates.
Our water situation is tricky, too. We have a tank-less water heater, it appears. While this is convenient and means that we always have a steady supply of hot water, it is very hard to get the correct temperature. It seems to switch from scalding to tepid and back again as one moves the knobs, with a very small in-between. Added to this is the fact that it is located in the shower, which means the shower head cannot be mounted anywhere. We must hold it. I always get a little nervous about accidentally spraying the heater and extinguishing the pilot light. I don’t really know where the gas shut off is and, while I’m sure I could find it quickly, we’d have to figure out a way to get it re-lit before we had any more hot water.
Well, I’m going to try for some sleep now. I doubt I will have to try very hard.

It feels like the beach

2008-09-10T23:55:00.000-07:00

After being in Moscow, Volgograd is a very nice, welcome change. We have a great apartment. The living room, which is also Megan's bedroom, is air conditioned and has a tv and dvd player. My room has a balcony, where I love to stand and look out on the Volga. The first night we were here there were fireworks, which we had an excellent view of from the balcony. Actually, all of our windows overlook the Volga.
The school is just a 7 minute walk from the apartment. When they told us that, I figured it would really take 15 minutes because in Moscow, all the Russians walked double time. Here, however, people walk at a much more relaxed pace. If I ever had to, I think I could make it in 5.
By the way, my mailing address here is:
Volgograd 400131
Ul. Komsomolskaya
Building 6
Language Link
Katherine Evans
The weather here feels kind of beach-like right now with the wind coming off the river. I've been told that in the wintertime, though, that will turn into a cruel wind.
I enjoy my job. Each class gets more fun as I teach it the second and third time, which seems promising. I'll give more updates later, and I'll put up some pictures I took.

In Volgograd

2008-09-10T23:53:00.000-07:00

September 9, 2008
It has been a long time since I last got online. As I write this, I still don’t know how I’m going to post it. The school is supposed to get a computer with internet access soon, and Megan was able to use the Ethernet cord there for a while today, but then it stopped working. I’m not sure why. Many of the Russians working at Language Link seem to have no interest in the internet and so aren’t very helpful on that count.
The train trip from Moscow to Volgograd was fantastic. We were riding second class, or coupe. That means that the train car is divided into about 6 compartments, each of which has 4 berths. The bottom bunks are also the seats and there is a table. Megan and I were in one coupe and Ivor and Sarah were in the other. Somehow we lucked out and no one else was in either coupe. Our compartments were pretty nice, too. We had a teapot and four teacups, with hot water at one end of the train car. They gave us a box with salami, rolls, cheese, tea, and such. We also got a hot meal. Since we hadn’t expected this we also had a bunch of food with us.
My apartment is very nice. It is right on the river, which we can see from all of our windows. Our ceilings are high with nice molding. We have a large fridge, a modern oven, and a washing machine. Mostly it is just really nice to look out the window at the river, surrounded by trees. When I am going to sleep it feels like I am at the beach.
I started teaching Monday. My classes seem pretty good. So far I have 5 classes: upper intermediate adults, upper intermediate teens, beginning adults, an upper-intermediate individual teen, and an elementary individual adult. I was told I would get some 7 year olds next week. The elementary and children’s classes (except the individual) are shared with a Russian teacher. I teach the beginning adults on Tuesday and Thursday, and an English-speaking Russian teaches them on Fridays. I’m hoping he is also able to give me some advice for working with the elementary level. It is more difficult than I was expecting because the class is very large. One good thing is that it can only get easier as they learn more.
As one might expect, many of the people I’m teaching are fairly wealthy or important. My individuals are an engineer with an oil company and his daughter. Many of the adults in my classes have introduced themselves as engineers and specialists, which usually means scientists. One of my elementary students introduced himself as “deputy chief of police of Volgograd city” which seemed to impress and somewhat intimidate the class. I think he found the reaction amusing. When I had them tell why they were learning English, his answer was “for the international mission.” I was glad that class was ending then, because I wasn’t really sure I wanted to know what that meant.
Tuesdays and Thursdays will be my busiest days with 4 classes each. Right now I have just 2 classes on Monday and Wednesday. I have Fridays off and one tutoring session for an hour and a half on Saturday. That is so short that I basically have a 3 day weekend.
If only we could find internet, I would feel very satisfied here.

More pictures

2008-09-02T23:16:00.001-07:00

This was my breakfast the first morning. It's pretty typical. That's berry jam in the dish on the plate. Sometimes they eat it just straight. That's very hard for me as it is even sweeter than American jam.

This is a picture I took at the Prospect Mira metro station. I wanted to show how elaborately some are decorated. I had to be a little furtive with the picture taking as I don't think it is strictly allowed.
This blurry photo is of the lights in the Mendelev station. They look very atomic, so we were trying to remember who Mendelev was. Speaking of which, some of the metro stations can very obviously be easily converted into bomb shelters. I always wonder as I walk through whether those very heavy doors close on their own if a disaster butten is pushed or whether a bunch of soldiers would suddenly appear to push them closed.
I'll try to get some better pictures ready to post the next time.

You asked for some pictures

2008-09-02T23:01:00.000-07:00

September 3, 2008

It is very odd feeling like I'm getting into a routine here, especially since I'll be leaving and going to a completely different town so very soon. I found out our train is supposed to leave at 1:30 on Saturday, so that's good. I didn't want to leave or arrive in the middle of the night, so this works well. I think it puts us at arriving at 9:30 in Volgograd.
I haven't really had a chance to take very many pictures, but I do have some. I'll put them up now, if I can figure out how.
The picture here on the left is my bed. Very interesting, I'm sure.
The picture on the top left is the view out my window. There are lots of trees. The two buildings are pretty old apartment buildings.
The picture below is the view out of the living room window. Those apartment buildings you see are exactly like the one I am staying in. There are a lot of them. It is staggering to think of how many people live in them. The cloudiness of the sky is entirely typical also. I've only seen the moon once since I've been here. I think I'll start a new post to put more pictures in. This is getting unwieldy as I try to figure out how to use it.

See a kopek, pick it up...

2008-09-02T22:59:00.000-07:00

September 1, 2008
Instead of dollars, in Russia there are rubles. It takes nearly 25 of them to make a dollar. Instead of pennies, they have kopeks. That means that each kopek is worth about .04 cents. One might think that such a small amount would be too trifling to actually be represented in coin form, but that would be silly. This is Russia! Of course there are coins that cost more to transport than they are actually worth. Today at the baked potato stand, the woman asked me to give her 2 more rubles so that the change would come out more nicely. I did so and she handed me my change, which included two 50 kopek pieces. I think everyone hates kopeks and just looks for ways to get rid of them. As an American, I was an easy target, I suppose.

Cat Exhibition

2008-08-31T23:24:00.001-07:00

Yesterday I went with some of my new friends to this place called VDtset. It used to be called VDNK back in Soviet times, but they changed that and sort of look at you like you are crazy if you call it by its old name now. Oddly enough, the decided not to change the name of the Metro station serving it. I suppose some things are just too hard to change. I was pretty excited about going because this place was built to showcase the grandeur of the Soviet Union. There were exhibition halls for all the territories and nations that made up the Soviet Union as well as places to showcase agricultural, metallurgical, electrical, etc achievements. I really wanted to see what they had told their people.
Sadly, none of this neat stuff remained. The buildings were still huge and impressive, but that's it. Inside it was like a street bazaar with vendors selling all sorts of goods, from camcorders to fur coats to blenders. Very strange. There still were exhibitions, but they were random museums. We almost went into something called the "Cat exhibition" because it was only about 2 dollars and it was called the cat exhibition. We figured, however, that it was just a place to buy cats. Judging from the number of people we saw carrying kittens, I think our guess was correct.
The other thing we learned, besides the fact that the glory days of the Soviet Union seem to be completely over, was that a meal can become pretty expensive if you don't realize that they quote a price for one amount, but the default portion is three times as big. We got a lot of food, but none of us had planned to spend 18 dollars on that meal.

The cold: it's not just propaganda

2008-08-31T23:10:00.000-07:00

August 31, 2008

Well, it’s the last day of August and the thermometer reads 9 degrees. For all those, like me, for whom that information means little more than “it’s not freezing and it’s a long way from boiling,” 10 degrees Celsius is 50 degrees Farenheit (which it was when I got in yesterday evening), so 9 degrees is between 47 and 48. So, it’s very cold. As I’m bundling up in long sleeves, sweater, scarf, and jacket, I’m imagining everyone back home feeling rather warm in short sleeves and flip flops. The first few days I was here were in the 80’s, so I was feeling good. It was the ideal summer temperature for me and I could be comfortable while all the Russians, Brits, and Midwesterners sweltered. For a little while there I even thought the whole “Russia is really cold” thing might even have been exaggerated in films, maybe a subtle form of Cold War propaganda or something. But it wasn’t. It is going to be cold here. Very, very cold. That’s why I’m glad that I’ll be heading south in six days. I think it is supposed to be, on average, about 20 of our degrees warmer there. One warm place here is the metro. So even though it smells funny, I always like stepping through those doors.

As I type this I am sitting in my room of the apartment I’m staying in. There is someone in the building with wireless, so I keep trying various passwords hoping I’ll somehow hit upon one that works. This is mostly just to fill my time. The odds of me hitting upon a password that a Russian would use are very small, especially since we don’t really share a language. It would be really nice if I could get it, though. Then I could sit here in relative warmth and post this. As it is, I’ll probably do it tomorrow on the way to school.

Today I’m going to meet with some of my fellow interns, and maybe a work-study person or two, to go sight-seeing. We plan on going to VDNK, which is an old Soviet amusement park. There is supposed to be a Ferris wheel there, but we were told yesterday that they’ve already stopped running it for the summer. That may be just as well as I’m not sure whether I really want to get on a piece of Soviet machinery, especially that is that old. Of course, I do so every day when I get on the metro, but oh well. I don’t know if anyone else will want to, but I may do just a bit of metro sightseeing, going around and looking at various stations. Not only is that virtually free entertainment as a lot of them are very elaborately decorated, it has the added benefit of being warm.

The whole training thing continues to go as well as could be expected. Yesterday we talked about test-prep classes. For about 5 hours. It just reinforced in me a hatred of teaching to the test. I hope I don’t get assigned one of those.

After about a week

2008-08-31T23:09:00.000-07:00

August 29, 2008

Well, I’ve had five days of training now. I’ve taught twice and I’ve observed an experienced teacher once. I’ve gotten up the nerve to get real Russian food at a food stand near the Metro, even ordering in Russian. I’ve gotten the hang of the Metro. It feels like everything is flowing a little better now.

That being said, I’ve started to miss home more. I suppose when things become more automatic, one gets more time to think and become a little homesick. While it is fun and exciting to see all these new things and meet all these new people, I want to hear the voices and see the faces of my people, the ones that I know.

Still, I distract myself from these thoughts when I start having them. There are plenty of distractions here. It is so crowded here that there is always a lot to see in every direction. I don’t know the square mileage (or meterage, here), but it feels like the city of Moscow takes up about as much space, maybe a little more, than Atlanta, but there are about 5 times as many people here. When I get on the Metro at about 10 in the morning, it is amazing to see the hordes of people filling the whole station. Half the room is moving one direction, the other half the opposite. It looks like those diagrams of ocean currents. I think that I see more people in 5 minutes than I did in a semester at Erskine. The apartment building where I’m staying right now has 17 floors. It is divided into about 6 vertical sections. In my section each floor seems to have about 3 apartments. Some have 4 and at least 1 looks like it is just 1 large apartment. That works out to be 6-9 bedrooms to each floor in my section. I could do the arithmetic, but that works out to be a lot of floors. And this is just one of about 4 identical buildings within a five minute’s walk. Plus there are other older and smaller buildings around.

I had been warned before coming about how big a problem alcoholism is here, but I really hadn’t seen it until today. Of course I had seen a few people with bottles in the streets and once seen a very pathetic looking man get on the Metro in the morning while clearly drunk, but that seemed rare. Tonight, however, it seemed like half the city was drunk when I was in the Metro station at 9:30. People were reeling around, barely able to walk. Keeping in mind how late everything tends to happen here, that seems ridiculously and pathetically early.

2008-08-26T09:29:00.000-07:00

This will be a short post as I am writing it on the spot. It had been quite warm in Russia, but today came rain and cooler weather. I am guessing it will last for a while, at least the coolness. I also taught Russian students for the first time today. It was only for half the time and it was with people observing, but it was still difficult but kind of fun. It is hard to give instructions to people who think they know more than they do. The people I observed said I did well but that i would have to be a little meaner and get the students to stay on the same page. Well, that's all for now. I'm sitting outside McDonalds and the wind is really starting to pick up. I'd rather not get numb fingers in August.

Trying to get to church, getting a slight blister instead

2008-08-24T07:22:00.000-07:00

August 24

This morning I got up intending to go to church. I had seen an advertisement in the English language paper “The Moscow Times” for an English-speaking Anglican church on the metro line, and that seemed like my best bet. My host, however, was surprised that I was up so early and so breakfast was a little later than I had hoped, though it was good. The other days she had given me cucumber with my breakfast, but today it was tomato. As I also had a banana I feel it is fairly easy here to get in five fruits and vegetables each day. We also had a nice chat about church. It turns out that my host normally goes to church as well and that she had been baptized as a child thanks to a grandmother who felt baptism to be more important than soviet law.

After this I was kind of running late, and misreading the metro map meant that I was impossibly late. At first I didn’t realize I had gone to the wrong stop and so walked around, hoping to see the church and slip in the back. After I realized my mistake, I decided that while I was out, I might as well see more of the city. This decision led to my walking around, somewhat aimlessly, for about two and a half hours. It would have been better if I had been wearing walking shoes, but I did enjoy it. Of course, I didn’t really know what I was looking at a lot of the time, but I did see a traditional-looking market, a market that looked as though it catered to immigrants from the south of Russia, a monument to Lenin, some parks, a really big, Soviet-looking building, and the river. I also took a break in the middle to enjoy a Coke at McDonalds. Partly this was so I could see if it was true that McDonalds has wireless. According to a sign inside, it does. There is one right near my apartment that has the same sign, so I think I’m going to go there tonight and try to post this. I may also get something to eat. One of the interns who has spent time in Russia before says that McDonalds has higher quality food here than it does in America. Still, I haven’t had much of an appetite since getting here. I keep eating breakfast and then either drinking milk or eating bread and cheese or a salad or something like that throughout the day at regular-seeming meal times. The milk seems to do well, but it tastes strange, kind of goat-y. I suppose the cows eat something different here.

The difference in milk is just one of the small strange things here in Russia. The coke was also way sweeter. One strange thing is that though not that many people speak English, there are lots of random things written in English. Like the electronic lock to get into the apartment building reads “open” when the fob is pressed to it and it unlocks. Likewise, the toilet seat cover has a warning that it is not a stepstool. This is written first in English, then in German and French, but nowhere is it written in Russian. Another little oddity is scented toilet paper. Maybe we have that in America, too, but I’ve never experienced it before and it took me awhile to figure out why my hands smelled like soap before I’d even washed them.

Tomorrow I’ll begin my training, and then my days will have far more structure and less free time. While I enjoy being able to relax, it feels very odd not having anything to do and not really just wanting to sit around the house of a woman I do not know. I look forward to being able to get to know people during training. While I met people at the getting-to-know-you supper, it was a pretty awkward evening for everyone. I have now met the two girls who are going to Volgograd with me and both seem very nice. We’ve decided to look into splitting the cost of internet when we get there, which would be very much more convenient than carting my computer around in hopes of a signal. Hopefully I will be successful in that endeavor when I go out this evening to get one.

In Moscow

2008-08-23T06:01:00.000-07:00

August 22, 2008

I don’t know when I will get wireless access or for how long, so I will type this up now and send it when I get the chance. For a while I was scared to even turn on my computer because I didn’t yet have an adapter, but now I’ve purchased one so I don’t have to worry about how to use my two and a half hours of battery life.

Things do seem to be going well here. I am in a homestay with a woman named Karina. I decided not to tell her that was one of my gerbil’s names. One of the plusses of a homestay is that breakfast is provided. The apartment is currently being renovated, so there is a bathtub in the hallway (thankfully also one in the bathroom) and there is no bathroom sink. She does have a refrigerator/freezer almost the size of ours, plus one in the hallway. I don’t know if it is also part of the renovation or if she just has two. My room is fairly large with plenty of hanger space. Today I just wore whatever was unwrinkled, but there is an iron here, so I don’t have to go to work rumpled.

I met the boss who will be going down with us to Volgograd. Well, I don’t know if he will actually be riding the train at the same time, but he is here now and will be there as our boss then. His name is Ivor and he’s from Scotland. He seems really nice as he helped us with all of our paperwork and gave us suggestions on where to get food, calling cards, etc. It helps that the DOS people (the bosses of interns) seem to have all been interns themselves at one point or another.

I also met a girl named Sarah who just graduated from Tulsa State and will be with me in Volgograd. That makes three of us that I know of. The other girl won’t be getting in until tomorrow (Saturday) evening. Sarah speaks more Russian than I do as she had two years of it in college. She studied Russian history with an English minor.

Sarah and I went down to Red Square together after we were done with paperwork. We saw a lot of impressive things, like St Basil’s cathedral and the Kremlin, from the outside, (Lenin’s tomb seemed closed today), but mostly we proved to ourselves that we could figure out how to get places on the Metro all by ourselves. It is very nice to be in a place with a good Metro system. The stations are all over the place, so it isn’t hard to find one and automatically know how to get back. The lines look very complicated, but they are color-coded and fairly straightforward.

Oh, I did want to tell you about the drive from the airport to the apartment. The man, Alexei, who picked me up spoke no English but was very nice and helpful anyway, even carrying all those bags down a flight of stairs at the airport. On the road, though, he was a little scary. Normally in the fast lane, at least in America, a person might ride the tail a little of a slow car if he wants to be obnoxious, but here Alexei would just flash his lights and speed up, giving no choice. Other people were doing the same thing, so I guess they know to expect it. The airport is a ways out of the city, but that gave me a chance to confirm that there is corn growing here, too. The problem came when there was highway construction. Apparently they don’t announce it here in advance, and it made the trip take about two hours. Still, I’m settled in now, at least until I have to move after two weeks. I’ll meet most of the rest of the interns tomorrow at 5 when there is a get together in a restaurant right by the school. Mostly my plan is that tomorrow I will sleep as late as I can to try to catch up on sleep and get into this time zone, go grocery shopping, and see if I can find the internet somewhere.

PS I will add more later, but figuring out the system took too much time and now I'm late to supper.