Day 11, Day 12, Day 13 ~

Day 11 ~ 13. July ~ Monday ~ First Day of History Class

Before I continue let me call your attention here:
Photo Link: Russia ~ Day 9 ~ Staraya Russa Continued

It’s been soo humid here the past couple of days. It downpoured but it’s still really humid. I feel all gross and sticky; I actually kind of miss air conditioning.
So anyways, today was good. School is going better, I studied a lot, and understand the uses for all of the cases better, although, I still have to memorize a lot of endings and have a long ways to do with just learning new things daily. Being able to have a better understanding is better.

We’re done with art, and I finally got to take my plate and spatula things home. They were lacquered and look all shiny, it’s awesome. I showed Olga and she loved them! They turned out really neat. I am going to miss art class.

We now have Russian history class after art. I don’t really like history overall, but it’s so interesting to me. The fact that it’s being taught from the Russian perspective is interesting in itself. I feel that having at least a small amount of Russian history will be beneficial. Our teacher is named Stac (Stanislov is actual name), and he runs a lot of the logistics of the program and deals with our internships, so he’s more than just our history teacher.

He started off the lesson by telling us about the geography and environment of Russia that have influenced it’s large history. Many of the new information I had never learned before or even thought of, even though it made common sense, it’s just nothing I ever considered thinking about. For instance, Russia does not have any natural borders, and therefore has always had to have a strong army and defense. The US has the ocean on both sides, and two neighbors, Russia has 18 countries that surround its borders and has always been at risk of invasion because it’s a flat and huge land. It doesn’t have mountains, channels, seas, or anything like that to separate it from other countries like in Europe. What it does have though is its cold climate, so we all know how helpful that is for the Russian army from past history. Many enemies have attributed defeat to the cold.

The climate of Russia allows for only 100 days of agriculture and farming so that’s another thing I never thought of. Russia has many natural resources, including 10% oil, 30% gas, and on that note it supplies a 1/3 of west Europe’s gas.
Stac believes that at least for the next ten to twenty years the future of world politics will be decided by natural resources, (Oil and gas.. ). He said the American Economic crisis is bad for Russia because it’s not profitable because we are not buying gas and other natural resources.

Stac posed a really good question: What is the real value of economy? Is it having lots of money and a lot of zero’s after a number on a piece of paper, or is it natural resources or goods, a factory or modern transport for instance. Stac believed that the real value of the economy is natural resources. You may not be living as lavishly, or as richly as Americans or other countries that are wealthier than Russia, but at least Russia has natural resources.

All of these topics I never really spend time thinking about, and have not a lot of background knowledge about either, but it was really interesting to think about. It’s also interesting to hear it from a Russian citizen’s perspective. Stac has been to America three times, and overall spent about 3 months there. He speaks English very well. He loves to read American mystery novels and watch American Television shows like House MD. I think that the class will be really interesting!

After school Steve, Doug and I went to the university to check email, I forgot my plug adapter so I didn’t upload any pictures because my battery only lasts for about 30 minutes. I have a lot to upload. By the time I update this blog (when you read this) all of my pictures should hopefully be up to date. I plan on having everything all set before Thursday. Thursday through Sunday we are all going to St. Petersburg. I am super excited! It’s nice we only have three days of school. =P

Anyways from there we decided to go to the Pizza place. We all like that place because we can actually order and pay pretty confidently and it’s just a relaxed atmosphere. I got a expresso and then ordered something random off the menu not knowing what it was. It turned out to be a small salald, it was good.

Steve Doug and I were there for about 45 minutes just talking and eating. On our way, we walked from the University, it was about a 15 minute walk, but it took longer because we were accompanied by a drunken Russian man looking for money. He randomly appeared and Steve made the mistake of acknowledging his existence. He had cigarettes in one hand and you could smell the alcohol on his breath. He was asking us where we were from, and said other stuff. Steve tried to keep telling him we didn’t understand Russian. He kept following us, and I decided to just be on the other side of the sidewalk and up a little ways from the guys just to keep my distance from him. It was awkward and rather uncomfortable. I was worried that as he was talking to us someone else might try to be going in our bags, but none of the sort happened. Steve was trying to really get rid of the guy and suggested we go to the Adidas store. We go in and I tell Doug, I bet he will just wait for us, well that’s exactly what he did. We were all like oh man, common! Eventually when he asked us where we were going from there Doug pointed in a random direction and the guy finally actually went the way Doug pointed!

Steve said that when we came out of the Adidas store the guy had American money in his hand, and made motions with his fingers like shooting up into his arm with a needle. We weren’t sure if he was trying to get money from us, or drugs, or trying to get us to buy drugs or whatever, but it was an interesting experience none the less.
Thankfully he was just really annoying and didn’t actually do us any harm. Getting harassed by a drunk Russian guy certainly is interesting.
So that’s been my day. I had dinner with Olga, its nice to have her, Beesha and Shira back. She spent the weekend at her Dacha which is about 150 km away, about 2 hours. She came home with buckets and bags full of produce and fruit. For dinner we had more stuffed cabbage, which is good, but there was a spice in it that I didn’t particularly like, I can’t remember the name.

Some random thing about Russia, there are 24 hour flower shops all over, and at a lot of the bus stops there are mini market things, you can buy alcohol and all types of random things. This includes nail polish and hair products to playing cards, small toys, magazines, small purses and wallets, and even snacks. Some of them have ATMs also. I would never purchase anything from them, but still, it’s interesting. Personally, I don’t know what occasion would warrant having to buy flowers in the middle of the night so the idea of a 24 hour flower shop seems kind of silly.

Hope all is well; I must go do homework now!

Love,
Sasha.


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Day 12 ~ 14. July ~ Tuesday

The day started off as usual, Olga made eggs with dill for breakfast, off to school. I usually leave for school by 8 and arrive by 8:40 after taking the bus and walking a short distance.

Language class is well, class. We all got the sense today that the teacher was getting frustrated with us. My problem is that she asks most of her questions in Russian and the setup of the class is just so different from Brockport. Half the time I am just trying to process her question and try to understand it if it has new vocabulary. Then it’s like ok which case do I need to answer this, which endings! It’s a lot, and when you sit there thinking, the teacher interprets it as if you don’t have any idea. *sigh*

Half the time I am like what did she say!? Plus, I am not that good at pronouncing words I don’t know, so all in all it’s a rough time. It’s a good thing that Liza determines the final letter grade and that other things are going into our overall grade.

I give credit to the teacher for having the patience she does have. I understand why she would get frustrated; I would be frustrated about us too. Oh wait, yeah, I am. Russian is one of the hardest languages to learn I hear and now I can see why!
Anyways, lunch is the time when most of the class talks about how the class went, we usually are venting our frustrations or whatever. Today for lunch Olga made me a potato like salad with egg and meat cut up in it. It was amazing. Everyone always sees what I get from Olga for lunch, it’s usually really good stuff and a lot of it too. Everyone else is eating there slices of bread and cheese and here I am with my salads, and huge sandwiches, vegetables, an apple or chocolates and orange juice. Doug was joking that I should ask her to make me more because I like it so much and then sell it to people in the class. Masha commented she should pay me for my lunches. Haha, doing that maybe I could come back having earned some money.
Oh well, history class is very interesting, however listening to the teacher lecture for two hours is tiring! For some reason I’ve always had trouble not falling asleep in lectures, unless it was Anatomy, Russian, or a science/nursing class.
Today we were talking about the formation of the Russian state as told in the Russian Chronicles. This included information about the first Russian princes, Riurik, Oleg, Igor, Olga, Swiatoslav, Vladimir, and Jaroslav. Olga was the first Christian ruler of Russia after her husband Igor was murdered. Other interesting facts, the name Russia comes from the word “Rus” (or maybe “Russ”), either way pronounced as, ros, as in the word roster. However, no one knows the origins of the word Rus. Russia was baptized by Vladamir and adopted Christianity. The first Russian written law was established by Jaroslav (pronounced Yaroslav I believe).
I usually don’t prefer history but this is very interesting and I actually enjoy learning about it!

After class the group all went and weaved birchbark baskets. It takes about 2-3 hours to make a small basket, although I think we were only there two and a half hours. Professionals would obviously take less time to make a basket of the same size. At first I didn’t think it would take that long, but it’s a very tedious job. The beginnings of making it are a lot harder; once you get the bottom, corners, and sides set up it’s not as difficult from there. I would try to explain how I did it, but it’s too difficult. But, I do remember that we had to put vegetable oil on the birchbark so it would bend and be easier to use. We used twelve pieces and made a 6 by 6 basket.

Overall it was really fun, and relaxing. Our teacher’s name was Vladimir and he is Matt’s host father. He has been weaving for 26 years. He had previously spent a year traveling all over America, the east and west coast and other places also teaching students in our country how to make these baskets. He has written a book about it that you can purchase on Amazon and he said next spring he is going back to America to teach more.

Around Vladimir’s studio he had baskets and other things he’s made of all different sizes including shoes and animals. I certainly wish I was this crafty in something; it’s neat to see the many different things people can make.
The place where the studio was located had a Church and other buildings around it that were really pretty. I was in a part of the city I had never walked in before, but it certainly was nice. The feel of all the nature in Novgorod is so apparent as you walk around the city, it truly is so beautiful!
When I got home Olga and I had dinner. She left to go get a manicure, which I thought was interesting. She doesn’t look like someone who would get a manicure, although a Russian manicure may be different than in America? When she returns I will have to see.

I don’t know if I mentioned it or not but the women in Russia are always nicely dressed. Most of them are wearing some sort of high heels. I don’t understand how they can walk around in the city with them. Some of the streets are so dirty and warn and the buses aren’t in the newest shape. It is certainly interesting. Even just to go to the store women are dressed up, including makeup and hair and jewelry. The men aren’t as dressed up; they wear casual pants, sometimes dress pants, but also jeans and shorts. It’s interesting. Clothes here are ridiculous in price! I wonder what Russians would think of American clothes, other than their being cheap.
It was cooler today but now that its night it seems to be more humid again! Tomorrow we are going on another trip to some type of museum. It should be interesting.
I am getting excited for St. Petersburg, yay!
Much Love,
Sasha

Photo Link: Russia ~ Day 10, 11, 12 ~ Food and Birchbark Weaving
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Day 13 ~ 15. July ~ Wednesday

Today was a most interesting day! For breakfast I had pasta with eggs, looks different that you’d expect, but it was pretty good. School was good and during history class we all went to the local Art Museum near the Kremlin. The museum had a lot of works by local artists as well as other things pertaining to the history of Novgorod, and Russia in general. It was a nice place, lots of really pretty paintings. I can’t remember all the details of the artwork we saw, there was too much!

After school Masha, Doug, Steve, Adrian and I decided to go to a coffee shop that was right down the street from the museum. Doug suggested it so we decided to give it a try, something to pass the time. The place was called Coffee Land, and their slogan was “Tea and Life”. The style of the shop was very European, and Michael Jackson was playing on the radio, I guess Russia is still mourning. The waitresses gave us English and Russian menus. Looking through it, we came across a breakfast item called, “Big English Breakfast”. It consisted of omelet with roast bacon, sausages, field mushrooms, as well as toast. It was amusing to see what is considered an English breakfast.

First we started off getting coffee drinks, I had an orange dream which consisted of Orange Juice, espresso, caramel syrup and ice. I would have never thought to put orange juice with coffee but it tasted very good! With it I got a green cherry (instead of a maraschino cherry) and I thought it tasted prett y bad.
After our coffee we were still hungry and so we asked the waiter for the menu again, laughing at what they thought. Silly Americans. Anyways, another thing on the menu was something entitled “Thawy in the Mouth” .. yes, thawy. It was ice cream wrapped in a hot pancake, basically ice cream with Blini.

So, this Thawy desert arrives and it’s pretty big and delicious looking. It was topped with whipped cream and shaves of chocolate, a mint leaf, and orange glaze with white raisins all around it. It was pretty much the best way to prepare blini in my opinion.

I’ve come to realize that the options of how to prepare Blini are endless, but this was very satisfying! Masha and I shared it, and I ended up eating the mint leaf which was very interesting.

From the coffee place four of us, minus Adrian, went to the bank and then the university to post pictures! As I was coming home and up the stairs I could hear a lot of noise coming from Olga’s house and smell a lot of smoke. I wondered what had burned and when I got in there the house was filled with smoke. The living room and my room were closed and in the kitchen I see Olga cooking. Whatever she had made had turned a little black on the bottoms, nothing actually was on fire.

Meanwhile, the house was filled with guests. Olga’s childhood friend, Ilena, and her daughter, Masha, were here to visit from a town up north near St. Petersburg. The friend’s mother is a neighbor. Later on another friend of Olga’s arrived, Tatiana. For dinner Olga went all out and a big table was set up in the living room. Olga prepared a soup that had five different types of meat in it, as well as a few vegetables. It was delicious. Along with it she made these pita looking things that were filled with meat or cheese and dill. This is what caused the smoke! Anyways, Olga’s food never ceases to please and it certainly was great! I ate too much as usual. The consistency of the pita things is hard to describe but they were very doughy and had lots of oil on them from cooking. The cheese in the one was similar to ricotta cheese in consistency. I should find out the names of the food. For desert we had tea and vanilla ice cream!

When eating the soup I put lemon in it and this stuff that looks like mayonnaise. What the stuff is in English I do not know, but it’s put on many things, and in lots of soups, including borsch.

The tea was too hot to drink so I sat there and would blow on it. Masha spoke a little English and translated that there is a Russian tradition, when the tea is too hot you pour some onto the saucer and drink it from that. It was interesting, I was afraid of spilling it! However, it did cool it down enough to drink. It looks kind of silly, slurping tea from the saucer.

After tea and ice cream (vanilla ice cream also tastes good in tea), Masha and I went into my room to talk. She wanted to help me with my Russian. The first thing she asked me however was, “How do you feel about the death of Michael Jackson?” I was amused that this was the first thing she asked me! I told her I thought it was sad, that he was a great performer. Masha responded by saying that she thought he was killed. Masha went onto tell me about herself. She is 17 and has played violin for the past 6 years and currently plays in a band. She shared some of her bands music with me as well as pictures. We went through some of the music on my computer because Masha was interested in what I liked to listen to. I shared with her what she liked. It was fun. From there she wanted to have tea again, so we went back into the living room. I started working on my homework, and she helped me with my pronunciation. She said that the key to learning is to repeat words over and over and work on pronunciation.

When I wasn’t talking to Masha I spent most of the time listening to the women all get together and speak. Overall it was hard for me to understand what they were saying, however I recognized many words they used. It’s hard putting them together to figure out what’s going on. The women didn’t really ask me too much, I told them my name and where I lived and that was it. I understand that they only get together once or twice a year.

I have come to realize that eating here is an event. Russians spend so much time in the preparation of food its very fascinating, down to the monotonous chopping of vegetables and meats and they are very offended if you do not eat what you’re offered.

Overall it was a nice evening and it was nice to have someone to speak English and Russian with who was around my age! So, since they left I have been packing for St. Petersburg, and did a little reading and writing. The rest of the week will be fun!
That’s all for now!
Love,
Sasha

Photo Link: Russia ~ Day 13 ~ Novgorod Art Museum