Regarding my marriage post, you also have to consider the fact that while I'm a decent looking young lady...


My female students (and most Russian women in general) are stunningly gorgeous, like this...


Anyway, this post is really just to remind you all that my new blog is at http://www.latitudebylongitude.com. READ IT.

From now on, I'll be posting my adventures here:

http://www.latitudebylongitude.com

Long and cumbersome name, but it's mine!

As a response to those who joke about me finding gorgeous charming Russian men and getting married, I've decided to make a list of criteria for finding appropriate men and women to marry in this fantastic country I'm in.

Re: Russian Men
Does he look like most of the other men around? - If no, continue.
Is he even slightly attractive? - If yes, continue.
Legal? - If yes, continue.
Are his shoes pointy? - If no, continue.
Does he have a manpurse? - If no, continue.
Is he drunk? - If no, double check and then continue.
Obviously hungover? - If no, continue.
Smelly? - If no, continue.
Married? - If no, continue.
Does he get up for old women on the bus? - If yes, continue.

If the Russian man you meet matches these criteria, marry him immediately.

Re: Russian Women
Does she look like most of the other women around? - If yes, continue.
Legal? - Depending on your moral code/willingness to wait, continue.
Wedding ring? - If no, continue.
Are you drunk? - If no, continue.
Does she know that you're American? - If yes, continue.

If the Russian woman you've met matches these criteria, she's probably already found a way to make you marry her.

----
Disclaimer: This is not intended to be taken seriously in the slightest, keeping in mind i'm completely serious)

The Good:

I went to a party that Bob's neighbor Lena threw last night, mostly because her friends (the folks I went mushroom hunting with) are the most eternally happy and energetic people in the world. They're always ready for laughing, drinking, and dancing- it's pretty overwhelming, but uplifting at the same time. Here's a picture of two of them- Maxim and Misha. In this photo, Maxim is hitting Misha over the head with a bag of white wine. Yes, for those of us too classy to drink wine from a box, Russia introduces wine in a BAG.



Then today, I took a lovely walk in the alleys behind the main street of town because the weather was warm, though still semi-yucky in terms of muddiness. I walked back through Puskin Park and met up with Nicole at Cafe Montana for brownie batter hot chocolate and good hanging-out conversation. Good, relaxing weekend overall.

The Bad:

Midterms and oral exams this week. I'm worried about polishing up my tests and worried about how on earth my darling students (especially my hooligans) are going to pass. Доживём, увидим.

The Ugly:

I woke up this morning to a very grey and dull morning. At breakfast, Nina M. gave me a brief hello and then launched into a dramatic story about how our neighbor killed himself yesterday. Apparently he was this young guy who got divorced a month or so ago, he's got a daughter, but he's just a tragically unlucky guy who can't find a job and just couldn't take it anymore. Incredibly depressing start to the day, but so it goes.

До свидания, друг мой, до свидания
Не грусти и не печаль бровей,
В этой жизнь умирать не ново
Но и жить, конечно, не новей.

See? I'm utterly useless.

A. I had a pretty stellar weekend. Between conversation group (where we talk about various topics in English with Russians), pizza at Tashir, hookah, bowling, walking in the woods and hot chocolate that tastes like brownie batter, I'm a pretty happy girl.


Yuri and Alex at Vanil Cafe smokin' the hookah.


Mmm... hot brownie batter and misspelled words...

B. Russian grandmothers are the most amazing cooks in the world. One of the guys from conversation group, Yura, invited us over for a Russian meal. She made schi (cabbage soup) and a chicken dish with mushrooms and pineapples (?!) that was delicious.


If I look twenty pounds heavier now, blame the woman on my right.

C. Went walking with an AH student on Saturday in Park Druzhba (Friendship Park) o. Since Kate posted some fall-ish pictures, I figured I might as well post some too.


Fall came and went wayyy too fast this year.


Dark, but pretty view of the forest of Park Druzhba.

D. Nina M's granddaughter Olya visited last week and we spent hours watching cartoons. Good times. Also, here's a lovely fall picture of my building...



And an equally lovely picture of a syringe I found not too far from my door...


Yay Russia! (or maybe it's just my knack for finding syringes in foreign countries. see: beaches near Naples)

E. It's snowing. (Finally.) It's also FREEZING. Whenever I point this out to any Russian, they kindly inform me that it's only going to get worse. How helpful. They also inform me that my beautiful London-style coat will be completely inadequate for the upcoming months and I need to buy a new one. Which is fine by me (I like to buy new things), but a decent winter coat costs something around 4000 rubles, decent winter boots cost around 2000, and a hat/scarf combo is an obscene 1000. That's 7000 rubles for my winter wardrobe, folks (not including warm tights and more socks). Since that's roughly my monthly salary, thinking about the upcoming freeze is occasionally disheartening.


It's gonna be a cold one, folks.

Like most 21 year olds, I spent a good majority of yesterday morning in that great limbo between nauseated and vomiting. Tragically, in my case, it wasn't a result of a night of celebratory tequila shots and fruity mixed drinks, but a nasty stomach virus of sorts. Despite my miserable state of health, the rest of the day progressed fairly well...

The AH staff gave me a pretty necklace/earring set made from enamel (which at first makes me think of teeth, oddly enough) and we drank white wine and enjoyed a fruit pastry pseudo cake that was quite tasty. Galya made a toast to my health (cue laughter), future, etc etc. and I had my one and only sip of alcohol on my 21st. Bob gave me a ridiculously cute Cheburaska doll (see my icon) that talks and giggles. For the non Russo-philes, Cheburashka is the epitome of Soviet cartoons and I've got a minor obsession with the half-monkey/half-bear creature, so it was an excellent gift.

My first class (the hooligani) erupted in a Happy Birthday chorus when I entered the room. If you've ever been sung to by an enthusiastic group of 12-15 year olds, you know how simultaneously out-of-tune and endearing it is. They gave me pretty wildflowers and a small grey stuffed Russian dog that barks (which I swear is different from how American dogs bark). Combined with Bob's gift and the stuffed horse my family sent me in my package, I now have the veritable beginnings of a stuffed animal army. Take that, other 21-ers.

Two of the girls had taken photos with me earlier, and gave me copies with their names on the back. My hooligans are cute, sometimes. To the great excitement of the class, I brought not only candy, but also Harry Potter. I made the great mistake of showing them the case before class, in the hopes it would make them study harder, but suddenly all of their grammar examples ended with "and then we watch Garry Potter" (Russians don't have an H) and the focus was gone. In the end, I gave them copious amounts of homework for practice and we watched 20 minutes of Quidditch.

My second class had no idea it was my birthday (frankly, I don't know how the others did) and looked a little sheepish when I gave them their candy. They were, fortunately, very cooperative as a result, even my less enthusiastic students.

I was running late for my final class, and I walked in to find them all gathered at the whiteboard (which was decked in various balloons), saying 'Surprise!' They sang Happy Birthday and gave me a gorgeous bouquet of roses (see below) and a box of chocolate. Fortunately, they were able to contain their excitement about Harry Potter until the end.

Riding home on the bus with two giant bouquets and a bag of gifts is both incredibly cumbersome and uplifting (in that 'everyone stares at you' sort of way). I managed to survive until the end of the day and arrived home to freshly made borscht. (Honestly, if I had nothing but good borscht on birthdays, I'd be a damn happy girl) All in all, for an anticlimatic 21st, it was a pretty fantastic day.



Aaaand...since we don't have classes tomorrow, tonight I'm making home-made pizza for the group (hoping it turns out as successfully as the chocolate chip cookies and hamburgers) and then we're heading out to see The Departed at Kinomax to properly celebrate. Ура!

As I mentioned before, my previous Russian experience has saved me from the uncomfortable "culture shock" period that I experienced last fall. Granted, there are a few differences this time around and I'm still learning everyday. But there hasn't been an earth-shattering "what the hell?" moment in quite some time.

Until today.

Usually for breakfast, I get kasha (oatmeal), an egg with toast, or vareniki (sweet ravioli-type things). This morning, Nina M. decided to be adventurous and make me...cereal. Now, I love cereal, so I was pretty excited for this new development. She wouldn't let me come into the kitchen until it was ready. Ready, you ask?

Well, I was finally allowed in and Nina proudly presented me with a bag of corn flakes and a jar of milk (oh Russians). There was a cup for my tea, but no bowl yet, so I just started pouring the tea into the cup. Nina waved her hands frantically- "What are you doing? Eat your cereal first!" Since it's all the same to me, I stood up and got a bowl out of the cabinet and poured the cereal into the bowl. Nina looked confused, but I assumed she was wowed by my uber-independence. I began pouring the milk from the jar and successfully managed to spill it all over myself, at which point I discovered that the milk was HOT. Now we both looked confused. Explanations were in order.

Apparently, Nina had expected me to pour the hot milk into the tea cup and eat the cereal separately. The whole bowl concept was entirely alien to her and she was convinced that I didn't have enough milk. Since she was already in a state of confusion, I broke the tragic news that I (and most Americans) typically eat cereal with cold milk, and we put it in a bowl. She looked pretty crushed, so I decided against slicing up my banana to put on my cereal.

Okay, so maybe not earth-shattering. But the milk was HOT.

And just so you don't feel like you've wasted five minutes reading this, here's a picture of me with my hooligan class on the first day of class (notice how there are NO books on the table).

My students occasionally write journal entries as part of their homework- I collect them and correct random mistakes. Occasionally, I get some pretty prize entries. Okay, so I'll admit, my sense of humor while I'm in Russia is extremely lower than normal, but give me a break.

And so, without further adieu, here are some of this week's winners:

-Dima writes...

Hm... I broke my pencil.

*starts writing me questions in blue pen...*

Ok, I bought new! (in pencil)



-"Kristina" writes...

We are looking at this world in the same way and first of all estimate a person's mind and kindness. We don't understand meanness and treachery...

(this is entertaining because she's a second-level student and this is quite clearly not her work, as in the entry before, she included sentences like She am name Liza)


And I'm done, for now.

On Friday night, I met Bob's neighbor Lena, who proceeded to introduce us to nine or ten of her closest friends. We all walked and talked in Russian (while they drank copious amounts of trash beer) until about 2 am. They were pretty shocked to hear that most Americans have never been mushroom hunting (in Russian, there's a specific phrase for it- ходить за грибами- and it's incredibly popular) ,so they invited us to join them on Sunday. We drove about fifteen minutes outside the city and began the hunt...


Before heading out into the woods, we enjoyed some freshly-picked apples (probably the biggest I've ever seen)


Then, the woods awaited...with hundred of mushrooms to be picked...


I found one. Really. Just one.


I found a dozen that looked like this cool guy, but apparently they're poisonous or something.



Lena's friend, on the other hand, gathered an entire basket's worth of prize finds. I SUCK.


The whole group, post-hunt

Good times were had, and now the American Home has two full bags of mushrooms. Maybe I'll put my newly-acquired cooking skills to use and make something tasty.

Or maybe I'll finally do what I came here to do and finish my lesson plans and my mini-test for ZII instead of updating. Nah.

Finished Grapes of Wrath and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, despite my best efforts to sleep 8 hours a night.

Teaching is progressing gradually- my ZII classes are darlings (even my hooligans who never stop talking). I'm not sure if I'm teaching them anything at all, but they looked as though they understand. My one AI class is completely dead to the world- they're my Buzzkill class after my hyperactive hooligans. It's just aggravating to be up there making wild motions with my hands and to have absolutely no response.

Here's the whole group of AH teachers- finally together for a group photo. If we look exhausted, it's because we just finished our first day of class. Most of us have blogs- I've added the other links in my profile- check 'em out.

Friday night, in honor of Sara's birthday (and payday), we all trekked out to Shesh Besh for some quality Caucasian food.



Suffice it to say that after a long week of teaching, harcho (spicy lamb soup), hachapuri (cheese bread), wine and brownie shrapnel (guess who baked that disaster), we were all quite ready to pass out in a food coma.

Saturday, we spent most of the day at Tatiana's (one of the Russian teachers) dacha. For Russians, dachas are like summer homes- a place to relax in the country, grow vegetables and herbs and just relax on the weekends. That being said we had a pretty typical day in the country- fun, cold, and involving lots of food.
( our day at the dacha )

Cynicism aside, I'm a sucker for cheesy moments.

An older student of mine, Yuri, came up to me after class today and wanted to tell me something. Determined, he tried in English. "I Natasha see you TV..." etc in very standard ZII-speak. Basically, he managed to convey (in English!) that he and another student saw me on TV last night talking about 9-11 and (in Russian) that their souls went out to us in our troubles. He looked at me with the most sympathizing, wide eyes ever and I was totally taken aback by his enthusiasm.

Faith in humanity = successfully restored for the moment.

A few Russian TV stations and a newspaper came to the AH yesterday to hear real American perspectives on 9-11 (if you were in Russia, you might have seen my debut on Russian TV last night). They asked about our first impressions and how we look back on the attacks and feel about them now.

In all fairness, I was shocked when I watched the coverage from my high school cafeteria. But at the same time, the callous 15-year old in me was secretly dreading the weeks and weeks of media coverage that was guaranteed to follow. Now, I look back and I see a tragedy that led to more, lesser-known tragedies.

I also got to thinking- What makes something a tragedy worth commemorating world-wide years after it happens? Do we need to be able to give it a date, time, and place? Does it have to be attached to the destruction of an icon? We can look at genocides in Africa, Bosnia, and Armenia, bombings in Lebanon, tsunamis in the Pacific and think "God, that's tragic". But we certainly don't have a TV miniseries or hours of network coverage five years later. Hell, there are tragedies happening every day in places like Darfur and the bombings in Baghdad are only headline news if there are American or British casualties.

See, I don't personally know anyone who died in the attacks, but I'm obligated to care more about their deaths than any deaths in Rwanda, Sudan, Sarajevo, etc. That's not fair. I recognize our political and economical ties to western European countries and our personal interest in our own country. But these ties that we claim to have don't excuse us from being human beings first and foremost.

At the same time, we can't be sad all of the time. If I saw every tragedy and felt pity for every lost life, I wouldn't have the energy to get up in the morning. There's so many terrible things in the world happening, you have to pick and choose your sympathies, at the risk of seeming callous.

I might not agree with the American government most of the time, but I do believe in America's ideals- freedom, equal representation, a fair and just government. (in fact, the reason I don't agree with the government is that most of the time they're working in direct opposition to these original ideals). If I thought 9-11 was an attack on the Constitution or the Declaration of Independence, I might feel more passionately about destroying the people who organized it. But I don't think this was an attack on our ideals as it's marketed to be; I see it as an attack on our recent government. So, as inhumane as it may make me, I can't bring myself to feel worse about this day than any other tragedy. Most of my sympathy is derived from the effects of 9-11, not the attacks themselves. The increased restriction of personal liberties, the increase in hate crimes, a war in Iraq with shaky foundations, and the general hatred towards Americans and our growing empirical aspirations pain me more than one day in human history. Those 3,000 people who died in a day sadden me just as much as the 800,000 who died in 100 days in Rwanda. Maybe I'm a bad American for that, but I think it still makes me an okay human being.

Ranting aside, classes are going well. День Города (the City's holiday) was last weekend- which amounted to lots of clowns wandering down Main Street and drunkards galore by the end of the evening. Today has been the first non-rainy day in several weeks and my mood is incredibly thankful for it. Hopefully this weekend we'll have a picnic :)

Classes finally started yesterday, so here's my unnecessarily long entry on Judgment Day.

All of our classrooms are decorated based on a decade in American history (our 1920's room is the "Speakeasy", 50's is Mel's Diner, 60's is Woodstock, and the 80's room is "Super Mario World"), so the teachers put on a "time machine" skit for each session of classes to introduce ourselves. Nicole and Bob did a little swing dance, Aaron and I had a "Honey, I'm home!" moment, Sara and Joanna sang Bob Dylan and Erik and Molly (eventually) nailed the Electric Slide.

Oh, you know we're the coolest people ever. Anyway, on to classes!

My Monday/Thursday classes are all in the 1950's room- appropriately painted an atrocious shade of pink. I drew a big jukebox for the room that I'm pretty proud of, given my distinct lack of artistic ability, and I had to explain what it was in every class. Good times :)

My first class was at 4:00- accurately named "Hooligan Hour". All of the older students are still at university and the adults are working, so my first ZII class is made up of 13 schoolkids between 12-15. As expected, they were rambunctious and noisy, but not intolerable. And so, following suit with former teachers, I've dubbed my 4:00 ZII class the Зоопарк (the zoo).
/first class. *insert cheesy skit, take 2*

I was plenty ready for my adult AI class at 5:45. They looked slightly bored when I was reviewing the past tense, but when we venture into unfamiliar territory, maybe they'll be more engaged. A highlight was when we were playing a vocab game where the class has to describe a word to one student. I wrote "chess" on the board, and the one girl who is dying to participate bursts out with "MOUSE IT EATS". It took me two seconds to realize she was describing 'cheese'. After the зоопарк, I was totally hyped up on 12 year old style adrenaline, which this class killed within ten minutes. I hope they'll
/second class. *insert cheesy skit, take 3*

My final class (ZII) at 7:30 was definitely my favorite. Most of the students are university-age or in their mid-twenties, and they're all incredibly eager to soak up whatever knowledge I bestow upon them. They asked about my family/friends pictures and thought I was hilarious (if you know me, I'm not funny in the slightest, so this was an ego boost). As in the other classes, the ratio of girls to guys is about 6:1- in my last class, I kind of feel like I'm teaching English to a class of models, it's ridiculous.
/third class

After all of the classes were over, we came to the kitchen totally exhausted to find the table loaded with assorted meats and cheeses, cakes, fruit and champagne. Party-time, American Home style. Alexei took plenty of undoubtedly awful pictures of us and we laughed off the last few hours.
I went home, persuaded Nina M that I was much too tired to eat again, finished Mansfield Park and promptly passed out at 11.

I've only got one more 'first class' left- my 5:45 ZII class. Fortunately, we get to do the cheesy skit three more times, so my life does have purpose. :)

One year to go!

Most of our group went to Nizhnii Novgorod this weekend. Since I'm incredibly poor and trying to save some of my salary to pay off those impending loans, I decided to hang around Vladimir. I finished A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court and an autobiography by Anderson Cooper. I also wandered around the market and had to explain the idea of student loans to Nina M.

To satisfy a little bit of my wanderlust, on Sunday I decided to get up early and hop on a bus to Боголюбово (prounounced Bagalyubava, just ignore all of those O's), which is a small town right outside of Vladimir. It's also home to one of Russia's most famous churches- Покрова на Нерли (Church of the Intercession on the Nerl River).



The start of my mini-hike to the church


Church + Nerl River (which is now more of a pond than a river)


The church is made entirely out of white stone- I couldn't take pictures inside, but there were a lot of engravings in the stone from gajillions of years ago


Proof that I can't make this exciting stuff up


My incredibly not-artsy artsy picture of the Bogolyubovo train station


Now it's back to writing lesson plans for my classes that start on Thursday!

September 1st is one of my favorite days in Russia. Pretty much every school starts classes today, from kindergarten to university, and it's considered a bit of a holiday here. Since I always thought the first day of school was a holiday anyway, I am totally okay with this.

I got on the trolleybus this morning, as the construction area I normally walk through is incredibly muddy after all of the rain. At the stop after mine, a veritable army of 8-year old girls got on, all dressed up- ribbons, lace, prom-style hairdos and all. Every time the bus made a sharp turn, there was an explosion of high-pitched giggling. At the next stop, a group of young boys who looked like were getting on the train for Hogwarts, got on and immediately started pestering the girls, which led to more giggling. It made sitting next to the man who smells like sausage much more tolerable. Hooray for cute children and the first day of school.

However, as I was basking in the cuteness and looking at an elementary school with a huge banner that said "С Праздником!" (To the Holiday!), one of the Hogwarts-boys leaned over to his friend and said, in classic form,

"That's a joke. It's not a holiday, it's SCHOOL."

Amen, brother.

Oh, and here's a picture of the American Home, in case you were too lazy to look at the other blogs...


(taken on one of the only days it hasn't rained in Vladimir)

edit: Last night I finished Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and Dubliners by James Joyce. :)

Tomorrow I'm presenting a full-length mock lesson to the other teachers. I probably shouldn't be so incredibly nervous about fake-teaching, but irregardless, here I am, staring at my fake lesson plan and trying  to figure out how it all fits into a perfect 90 minute framework. The lesson is a ZI (first level) lesson, so the grammar/structure is similar to what I'll end up teaching (next week!)- meaning it's good practice, but nerve-wracking nonetheless.

Meaningless Complaint of the Day: The Vladimir mosquitos are brutal- they're tiny to the point of being invisible and all over my apartment. This means that I wake up with a dozen little bites on my feet (because I'm lame and can't sleep with my feet covered) everyday. *whine whine*

Picture of the Day:



Traktir, the restaurant right next to the American Home, had a fire sometime last week and it pretty much destroyed the entire roof (that pile of wood on the ground). They've since torn down the entire roof and are ideally rebuilding to open again.

AAAND...

Joke of the Day:

I finally figured out why, after invading both Afghanistan and Iraq, Bush
now wants to invade Iran. It's got nothing to do with terrorism, oil, 9/11,
Osama, WMDs or nukes.

If he gets all three in a row, he can start building houses and hotels.

Now that's scandalous.

My schedule for teaching! (Classes start September 7th, if I haven't mentioned that already)

Monday/Thursday:
4:00: ZII
5:45: AI
7:30: ZII

Tuesday/Friday:
5:45: ZII

Essentially, Mon/Thurs will be crazy busy and Tues/Fri will be spent planning for my crazy busy days. ZII and AI are the ultimate beginning classes, so I'll be spending a lot of time talking...like... this. Irregardless, I'm pretty excited to finally get started with real teaching work :)

If you're looking for pictures of the AH, check out either Bob's blog or Sara's.