Random Update to add…

So I wrote a bit about how I am sick in my other post. Well Nina got home at some point and came in my room around 9, and I told her I didn’t go to school today because I didn’t feel well and she started interrogating me about if I had the flu or a cold ( I had to look those words up) and asking if I had a temperature and if my throat her, and about my sneezing. She was freaking out and I asked her if she had the flu and she said no but she didn’t want to get it, and that she has been sick lately and she doesn’t want to get more sick since she has already been getting shots. So she made me food and for the first time since I’ve been here she shut the hallway door so that she was enclosed in the living room (my room is in the hallway before the living room, as is the kitchen). I thought it was kind of weird, but went in my room anyway and just started writing in my journal while randomly sneezing. She then came in a bit later wearing a mask like what surgeons wear, and she brought a plate of what I realize now is chopped garlic!! I couldn’t smell it at first because my nose is stuffy. SO she comes in wearing this mask and brings the plate of chopped garlic and puts it on top of the tv by me. She then takes some and starts wiping the door and the doorknob and the wall with it!! I was trying to not laugh out right at her, and I managed to say sorry because I didn’t know what else to say, and then I proceeded to quietly laugh my head off. So I guess I am in quarantine now hahah. Just thought I’d share.

2 hours later:

Scratch that… there are random plates of garlic in EVERY room now.

Russia Day 11 9/24

Aside from the fact that I woke up feeling like death today, I do have some things to update.

Well since I felt crappy (I woke up and I couldn’t breath through my nose at all and my eyes were so puffy I couldn’t even see myself in the mirror, and I have been sneezing non-stop and my throat is itchy), I called Kate from class on Nina’s phone since I’m out of rubles on mine and asked her to tell Zoyla (our teacher) that I’m not coming to class today since I couldn’t get a hold of Lena. She was really nice about it and said she’d take notes for me and tell someone in GRINT, so I think I should be fine, although I’m kinda pissed because I stayed up really late with Nina going over my hw and it was actually pretty long and correct. But whatever. So today I’ve just been sleeping and periodically watching parts of shows, such as X-men in Russian (cartoon) and some freakin weird but kinda funny movie called Swamp Devil (it was in English but Russian dubbed). I think I’m on the Sci fi channel or something because now I’m watching a show that reminds me of Star Trek. Oh and Ele called me to see if I was ok and see if I needed anything, I thought that was really nice of her. Even though I’m pretty sure no one knows where I live haha. Nina has been gone all day, so Idk if she even knows I didn’t go to school, but she is pretty sneaky and spy-like some times so she might. I’ll tell her later though anyway. I just don’t want her freaking out that I’m sick, seeing as she probably just had a cold all this time she’s been sick and she has been going to the doctor every day for the past week.

Anyway, on Wednesdays (I don’t think I’ve mentioned this yet) we don’t have regular class, we have a history lecture with this older Russian guy named Alexander. He is freakin hilarious and says really random things, like that ‘Stalin was like the he who must not be named guy… voldemort?’ and Idk. He just highly amuses me. The first Wednesday lecture class was disrupted for a good 10 minutes because a butterfly was flying around and Kate wanted to free it, and his phone kept ringing. I feel like I may have already told this story. I also like Wednesdays because we get to start at 11 instead of 10, so it’s nice. But anyway, so yesterday after school there is randomly a Russian movie club now, and we watched White Sun Desert or something, it’s a really famous older movie, and when I told Nina and she was like ohhh that’s my favorite movie!! It was pretty interesting but kinda weird. It was about a guy who was trying to get home to his wife from the desert after a war, and he kept running in to people on the way who needed his help. There were subtitles ha that’s how I understood. It was a comedy too actually, and it was pretty funny. Overall I liked it. After that I was just at the dorm for awhile doing homework and watching some VERY interesting videos on youtube, and as I was on my way back at like 10pm Nina called me to see if I was coming home or going to the dorm again. Oh yeah I slept at the dorm the night before, but I’ll get to that. So I told her I was coming home, and as soon as I walked in the door she started offering me all this food and things to drink it was really cute. She actually gave me these little cottage cheese pancake things I have been wanting to try at the various coffee houses we go to, so I was really excited! I think she missed having someone to feed. Oh and I asked her about the laundry situation (apparently you are supposed to set something up with your baba where you pay her and she does your laundry), and I basically said ‘Can I use that?’ and she was like do you know how? And I said in Arizona I do… and she said the girl before me paid her and she’d do it. I was like that’s fine, how much? And she said we could deal with money later. Then she went on to talk about how the girl before me never ended up paying her, and that she was really fat apparently and ate A TON. I don’t know what that had to do with anything but it was kinda funny.

Tuesday we went on a Boat tour of the Moscow river, and that was really cool! I took a lot of pictures, but my camera did die at one point. I’m not too worried though, because all of us are friends on facebook so I can steal other people’s pictures. We saw Moscow state university, which is freakin huge and if I can remember correctly one of the seven sister buildings that are pretty much all just freakin huge buildings with cool architecture. We saw some of the ‘high-scrapers’ as Lena called them (I thought it was cute) from the downtown part of Moscow, and a lot of bridges and parks and some more churches towards the end. Oh and there was a pretty large amusement park as well. We got off of the boat I think in Kitai gorod, which was by where the Indian restaurant we went to for Karry’s birthday was, so we split in to our little groups and just walked around some more. We ate at this place called Coffee House (transliterated, it’s pretty funny) and had an interesting time trying to get our bill figured out with some chicken sandwich issues, but I had an awesome banana split :D

After eating, we walked around in the other direction and found St Basil’s Cathedral and the outside of the Kremlin and Lenin’s mausoleum and the gigantic and really famous mall GUM haha. It was really pretty though because we got there at night and it was all lit up with a billion little Christmas light type of things that are apparently on GUM year round. That mall seriously was like a palace, it was like 3 stories tall and just…huge!! And really beautiful. We got a few pictures with the Cathedral and just kept walking around. When I got back Nina gave me Borscht (she keeps giving me dinner too for some reason, I don’t know why but I don’t complain).

On Monday, I think I just went home after school, but Ele called me later and asked if I wanted to go with them to this Georgian restaurant. When she called again saying she was leaving, meaning I was supposed to leave, I realized I had no idea where my keys were and I was searching around forever before I left. So I was already late meeting them, and since they are by the Vuihina (?? I have no idea how to transliterate that) metro by the school I was getting on the Novogerevo one by me, and I got really lost at the station I was supposed to transfer at and ended up on the street and had to pay to get back in. I knew it would happen eventually… So I finally found them like 30 minutes late and we were on the metro when we realized that Ele’s guidebook says that this restaurant is jacket and tie attire required. We were like uh… let’s just get off and find somewhere random to eat. So we walked around for a teeny bit and came across this place called like, Lemonade or something haha (it was Italian food…??) It was really good, and we found a Subway!!! And on the Metro on the way back, this drunk guy came up to Kelly and was talking to her in English, Russian, and Greek. He kept switching. He was from Moldova and said he was on an expedition here… He was literally like an inch from her face while talking to her, and wavering around while he stood. He got on the metro we got on, so we got off on a random spot to get away from him. While we were trying to leave, he told Kelly she has AMAZING teeth and asked for her phone number. She told him she didn’t have a phone and we got off and just got on the next metro going the same way. It was prettttttty funny. Oh and the guy next to me on the metro was like keeled over in his seat with his head between his legs, and some kind of liquid was definitely dripping from his face. I was very disturbed. Oh, trashed Russians at like 11 oclock on a Monday. This was the night by the time we were leaving to get on the Metro, it was like 10:50 (my curfew of being able to walk home by myself is 11) so I called Nina and told her I was staying at the dorms. Ele’s room has a spare bed so I just slept there, after being on facebook for an extended period of time and kind of doing my hw. And sorry if I don’t respond to everything on there, I get literally 60 or more alerts every time I get on now (since I get on so much less) and have quite a few messages to go through, which is why I figured it would be easiest to update everyone by a blog!

Well that is pretty much everything I can think of, and now I just wish I could get online easily to upload this and all my pictures! I think I will try talking to Nina about it again…I’m pretty sure she said the girl before me could get internet here. But I don’t know if it was using a wire or if Nina does have one of the secure wireless networks I can see but don’t know the password. I think I’m going to need a dictionary for this conversation. Well, tomorrow is Friday so it’s class and then who knows what, and Saturday we are going to this Tsaritsyno Estate place and a Honey Fair haha so I’ll have more to write… and I think some of the girls wanted to go to a dance club this weekend too, and I want to wear the one dress I brought before it gets to cold. But seeing as I’m sickly…eh I’ll still probably go. See ya!!

Russia Day 7

9/20/0

So! It’s around 2pm, and I just woke up like two hours ago. It was AMAZING to actually sleep in!! I love Nina for letting me sleep in that long, I thought for sure she’d wake me up. I had a VERY long night though, so I needed it! So pretty much yesterday was the longest day in my life, but in a very good way. We had to wake up really early to get to this metro stop at 9 30, and I was supposed to meet Sam and Joey at the Novo metro which is the one by my house, but I guess our phones’ texting is kind of off, because the times we were receiving the texts were way off, therefore making waiting for each other kind of impossible. So I ended up getting to the place we were supposed to meet at like 9 50, but Lena waits for people for half an hour before leaving or something like that, I forget. All I know is I was the last one there, but we still had to wait just in case. 2 people didn’t go at all!! The Kremlin takes almost a month in advance to get in to, you have to reserve a time to go and they didn’t even go!! I couldn’t believe people would get trashed the night before and miss that, but it happened. Anyway, so I was very proud of myself for successfully navigating the metro by myself, well, with the help of one of Nina’s home-made maps for me. I think she kind of likes how clueless I am because she seems to like being able to help me. ANYWAY so at the Kremlin we started outside of the walls and we had the most adorable little tour guide lady telling us all about the 3 different versions of the Kremlin in Moscow (the one we were at…obviously. There are many Kremlins in Russia though), one of wood and then of limestone and then of brick like it is now. And that Italians worked with Russians to make the last one, because that was during the Renaissance period in Europe and Italians were considered the best architects. Then we went inside and saw the building where the armoury was and where the soldiers lived, and saw the biggest cannon I think in the world, she talked REALLY quietly and barely anyone could hear her. I got a lot of pictures though. And we saw this giant bell that she described as ‘so heavy 40 elephants would be needed to pull it’, I was cracking up. Also that when the place was on fire, the people all saved the bell by pouring buckets of water on it, and it got I think 13 cracks in it, and there is a chunk of it broken off now. Oh and I don’t know how much you guys know about the Kremlin, but it is basically a giant fortress wall around a town. Everyone used to live inside the Kremlin and it was protected by the soldiers who lived inside it. There also were a ton of churches inside the walls, and we got to go in a few of them. There was the Church of Assumption and the ….. We weren’t allowed to take pictures, but a lot of us did anyway sneakily with the flash off. They were soooo freakin amazing. I hated how quickly we were going through everywhere. I did get to see a lot though, and it was fun trying to read the descriptions. Sometimes they had English also, and they always had at least one English sign generally describing the church. It was cool though because all the icons and the art on the walls and everywhere really was written in Church Slavic, which apparently Joey took a class of and could kind of read. I thought that was really cool. There also was an everyday church, because I guess Ivan the Terrible liked to just pray for everything. Someone said ‘oh is this the church he’d go to to thank God for his breakfast everymorning?’ I thought it was pretty funny. Also we saw part of the Moscow river that runs along it, and I just can’t get over how green everything is! I don’t know how I thought Russia would be, but there are forests everywhere! And trees and grass and flowers everywhere! It’s very pretty. There are large parks everywhere too, and people are always walking dogs. It seems like everyone either has a cat sitting in their window or they are walking a dog, I like it. Oh so after the Kremlin though, we separated in to smaller groups depending on what we wanted to do. I went with the people who wanted to go to the mall food court and then to a historical museum. I was taking a lot of pictures of the courtyard garden area of the Kremlin while we were walking to the mall, and I got separated from everyone. I called Adriana and she told me (kind of) where to go, since she didn’t really know the mall very well. I kind of didn’t care that I was lost though, and I found the Eternal flame and took pictures of this lady who had just gotten married. I guess in Russia when you get married you just get your marriage license and then parade around with your wedding party to all the historical sites and get your picture taken there. It was pretty cool! SO I finally found everyone and I ate, and then 5 of us went off to walk around and find the museum. Well, Kelly was going to find a vegan restaurant (she has been having a REALLY hard time finding places to eat, and has been pretty much starving) but the restaurant was on the way to the museum so we all walked together. I was really glad that other people wanted to do something like that, because I feel like I have just been sitting around and being right by the school, and I just want to walk around and explore. So anyway it was Elle (girl from the first group, I like her a lot) Brandon, Joey and me going to the museum, and we had a few interesting experiences. After taking pictures with the really old tank outside of the museum, we had an interesting time trying to get tickets and dealing with the coat lady, and then went upstairs to the actual museum. It was really cool, the first room was modern, and had stuff about Putin and Medvedev, and just pictures and medals and the national anthem and stuff. Then as you went back, there were clothing and tools and just random stuff from older times. Also certain rooms were dedicated to certain wars, I remember one room was all Russo Japanese war, with the Japanese armor and the guns and swords they used. But this one room had a piano in it, and we all were putting our hands over the glass ( I don’t know why…) and the alarm went off. It had gone off earlier though, so I guess it happens a lot, but we all got startled and ran to the next room laughing loudly. So then we are turning the corner to go to the next room, and this gray mulleted Russian guy (OMG mullets are SOOOO common here! I want to start trying to get pictures of them all, but it’s probably impossible) comes up to Joey and pokes him really hard in the chest, and is like ‘ Where are you from!’ and he was like uhhh America… and he was like ‘Shut up, please!’ and walked away. I was almost in tears trying to not laugh really loudly at that point, and then I turn around and Brandon is holding some paper trying to read it, and the museum lady who had been following us around starts yelling at him in Russian, we decided that she didn’t want him holding it. So I’m like let’s just go I can’t handle anything else, and we are trying to leave and to not laugh loudly and then we hear a cell phone ring coming from Elle. Brandon is like ‘that is my same ring tone!’ and just keeps walking. She’s like IT’S YOUR PHONE!!! And I was just like jesus Christ silence it!! So more museum people are following us and it’s Kelly calling (we said we’d meet her when we were done) so he answers it! We are all like HANG UP NOW! But he just keeps talking. So we finally get out and yeah. That was just ridiculous and hilarious. So then we are just walking around and go to this really common chain coffee house/dessert place that everyone in the first group loves called Shokoladnitsa (like chocolate) and we hang out for awhile. Then we went to this 2 story book story called Dom Knigi (house of books) and I got ‘Garry Potter’ (they don’t really have an H sound in Russian, so he is Garry haha) and I got a book of short stories by Chekov that I’ve decided I’m going to try to understand. Yes these are both in Russian. Harry Potter will probably be easy just because I’ve read it so many times, but the short stories should help with vocabulary. I can get my teacher to help me with it too. Then we were hungry so we went to the vegan restaurant so Kelly could actually eat with us, and it was actually really good. Oh and when we and Kelly were in line talking this guy was like’ where are you from’ and it just scared us because we weren’t expecting anyone to speak English. He ended up being a student at the Higher school of Economics in Moscow, and he was at the restaurant with a guy from Buenos Aires and a guy from the Netherlands who also taught at the school and went to the school. We ended up sitting with them, and that was ok but kinda weird. They were really nice and Kelly got their numbers in case we wanted to hang out with them, and they had lived here for a few years so they know their way around. So then we went to a few stores because Kelly wanted a coat, but we were mainly looking for this Kareoke place we saw earlier. We ended up meeting up with a few of the other people, like 5 of them, and we all went to this random Jazz club we found underground. It was really cool, and pretty big, and had a live jazz band playing. We got put in our own room since we were a huge group, and we just had drinks and talked. I don’t know it was really fun. And there was a tv in the room that showed the stage, and after the band was done they played dance music and there were like 2 people dancing, one guy who was dancing really funny. So me and this girl Jenny went out there and danced because they said they would give me 200 rubles if I danced with him. I only ended up getting kind of near him and just danced with Jenny, because he freakin REEKED!!! So I only got 100 rubles but still. That covered the shot I got, I think. I mostly just had cocktails though, but Brandon wanted to do a shot of Absinthe so I did one with him. VERY different from the kind in America, I’ll say that much. My tongue was completely numb after it ha. Luckily by the time we were leaving it was done raining (it was raining only while we were inside luckily) and me and Joey and Sam had to transfer to our Metro and they walked me home since it was like, 1 in the morning. I felt really bad I think Nina waited up for me, she turned off her light as I was coming in. There are two doors that take a long time to unlock, so she probably heard me coming in. I wasn’t tired at all though, so I made some potatoes and peppers and watched some of my Office episodes!! Cpasiba mama!! :D I woke up around 1, and Nina made me breakfast and we were talking for a bit, and her daughter in law came over and brought her apples from Nina’s dacha (summer house. I was SOO excited I understood all that ha). I had cantaloupe with breakfast too!! (I don’t like cantaloupe, for those of you who don’t know me that well). Also, I am obsessed with this cheese that I found out is COTTAGE CHEESE and yogurt!! (I also don’t like cottage cheese) And I almost always have green onions in the food she makes me, and sometimes tomatoes, but luckily she likes peppers a lot so that’s in a lot of my food.

Anyway, it was really sad though. While I was eating, she asked what I did yesterday, and I was telling her and she was like but where were you that you came back SO late? And I told her about the jazz club and she thought that was nice but she was telling me she was very afraid because she doesn’t like me walking back that late and that something could happen to me. I told her they walked me home and she was a little happier, but she said she doesn’t want me walking home that late anymore. She said I should stay at the dorm with the other students so I’m not by myself at all because I’m a nice girl walking by myself not afraid and I could be taken away. It was pretty funny how she acted it out, but I did feel really bad that she was worried. They did walk me to my house though, so I wasn’t by myself, but whatever. I understand her being worried, she is pretty much responsible for me. Well I think I’m going to go find that McDonalds now so that I can actually upload all these things. Oh and Friday night we all went to this Indian restaurant for this girl K birthday, she was turning 20. That was pretty fun and very good, and we all walked around a bit and went to Shokoladnitsa that night as well. But ok I think this is enough, I have a lot of hw again too so I need to get going! I’ll TRY to be better about updating not all at once!

Paka!

Russia Day... 5

Sept. 17

So. I haven’t had very easy access to the internet, and I feel bad using my friend’s computer all the time, so I’ve decided to dedicate Sunday (today is Thursday) to finding a McDonald’s by me for the free wi-fi. Also I want to upload my pictures and videos (although maybe not, because I don’t have a lot yet).

I’ve been in Russia for like 5 days now, and it has been interesting. I seriously think I am in love with my baba, she is the cutest thing ever. She wakes me up every morning (except this morning, but that was a misunderstanding on my part… ha) by coming in and shaking me a little and then starts talking quickly to me, and when I just wake up I can’t even comprehend English so it always confuses me. But I generally am coherent by the time she is saying goodbye so I say it back and that’s it haha. She cooks me huge feast breakfasts (wish seems common in homestays) which I have discovered if I eat a smaller portion of it, I can save it and eat it for dinner when I get back! School is from 10 until 2, but I don’t normally get back until 6 or 7, well at least this week because we have been going shopping for school supplies or just busy with Lena (the student coordinator for GRINT who shows us around and taught us to use the Metro and shiz) or grocery shopping or the other day we went to the ‘New Opera’ and saw ‘Raclin and Liudmila’ (that is my transliteration anyway) and today we went out to get cell phones. Plus I just end up sitting at the dorms for awhile because pretty much everyone is there.

I really like everyone in our little group, and there is another group of students that got here 2 weeks before us that isn’t with our program, and I really like them too. I am just annoyed because tonight I am trying (although currently taking a break from) catching up in the books we have with the 3 people in my class who have already been here and gotten through 2 chapters. But it is all review, but it really is disgusting how much I’ve forgotten. I feel like this homework is helping though, and I have pretty decent conversations with Nina (my babushka, I don’t remember if I ever said) which amazes me, because she just waits while I try to figure out round a bout ways of describing things when I can’t get my point across. Also my grammar is terrible but she just tries to figure out what I’m saying, and today she was correcting me! I was really glad, because yesterday she just kept guessing what I was saying and answering me, and I was kinda disappointed because I had no idea how to say what I wanted to say and she wasn’t giving me the chance to, but I imagine it would be somewhat annoying to have someone at my level living with her every day ha. Oh yeah but it’s hilarious I will just go up to her and start trying to talk to her, and we occasionally will have to get the dictionary, and she will whip out her magnifying glass (she already wears glasses) and she will try to see what I am saying from the dictionary. Also today I bought a calling card and was trying to ask her how to use it, and she used her magnifying glass to see that also. She always yells to me to come look at her cat also, because he is ridiculous and fat and does stupid things. I love him, I’m soooo glad she has a pet. He sleeps in her bed, but I want to steal him one day. I was asking her about where he slept and said I missed my cat and she asked if he could sleep in my room, but I’m pretty sure she was kidding. I recorded her playing with him the other day, it’s pretty funny I’ll have to remember to upload that too.

Oh yeah but so uh… Wednesday? No it had to be Tuesday, we went on the metro as a giant group and saw Red Square, I got a few pictures and a video of a random guy with two dressed up monkeys and a giant hawk, but we are going back to see the Kremlin Saturday so I will be able to get a WHOLE lot more. And I believe she said we are getting a tour of the Kremlin, so that will be SWEET! Oh yeah and so Wednesday we went to the Opera, which was really fun(ny). It was fun to see and the singing was beautiful, and since the guy who sat next to me (Sam, the guy from ASU also in a homestay oh and David he does Ju-jitsu there… and he said he knows you. Haha!) apparently had that opera on dvd and knew the entire plot so he explained it to me, basically a princess is being courted by these 3 guys, and she I guess marries one of them, and then this evil dude who looked like a skunk steals her, and the married guy is trying to find her. There were some REALLY strange characters, and I got a few videos of that because I was cracking up. One of the guys from the other group was sitting on the other side of me, Brandon, and he seems to also find pretty much everything funny so we had a good time laughing at things like the giant dog slug and giant fruit characters and dancing mushrooms. Also when everyone was bowing at the end, there was randomly a very fat mermaid that everyone is sure wasn’t in the opera, and she was right in the center of the stage like she was the most important. Also got video of that.

Eh what else. Besides the fact that I REALLY should be doing my homework. I am so tired; I think the jet lag is finally catching up to me or something, because I definitely have not just come home and crashed once yet. And now I keep having fairly decent amounts of homework so I can’t. And I always come home and eat and talk to Nina for a long time, but I like doing that so sleep can wait until… Sunday I guess ha. I think it’s someone’s birthday Friday, and we are all going out Saturday to celebrate so I will see how my first night ‘out’ in Russia goes!

Oh and random fact. Russian girls really do get REALLY REALLY dressed up for anything. Literally 96% of girls are in very high heels, or at least heels in general, and a good 3/4ths are very made up with perfect hair, and there are a good portion who are way over the top with make up and matching clothes and nails and everything. Adriana is convinced that Russian guys probably find us attractive because we are ‘exotic looking’ and not the same old thing, but I definitely only felt like I was getting attention when I dressed up for the opera and was fully made up and in heels. Not that I mind, I mean I’m not looking for someone and the study abroad advisors have made me paranoid of AIDS, but it’s just …different. Today I didn’t do my hair or make up or anything and I just wonder if when Russian girls see us they are like good god, BUM! Just like we are like good god, too much work to look like that every day!

Nina is heating up more food for Simon. She feeds that cat SOOO much, and it’s all human food pretty much. Also she is sick so she walks around haulking (sp?) lugies (sp!?!) it’s kinda funny. But actually sad because she has been going to the hospital a lot. She says they don’t know what she has. Shiz if she has swine flu I’m gonna get it! ;) ha . Oh and I ride the bus every day, and have had some interesting experiences with that, only taking the wrong bus ONCE and I was able to talk to the driver and figure out where I should go and why I couldn’t take that bus. It was SWEET!! I feel so accomplished when I can have conversations with actual Russians haha I’m retarded. I think I get the Metro pretty well now too, but I still am kinda afraid to go by myself. Luckily Joey and Sam live somewhere by me, I’m not sure where, so whenever we decide to find the Metro that’s by us and not by the school, they will probably go with me. One of them is usually on the bus when I am going back home from school. And randomly there were just fireworks outside...I’m not sure why. I really want to go to sleep though, so I should START my homework, but wait my class! Ok so I’m in a class with 4 other people; that guy Brandon I sat by in the opera, Joey, Kat.. I’m not sure what she likes to be called but her name is Kathleen, but in our class she goes by Katya so that’s what we all call her, and Katherine (Katarina). I can’t wait until next week when we can have our 2 hour meeting with the teacher by ourselves. That will help SO much I think. I’m having mine as soon as she’s available. Oh and the teacher. She is an interesting character. She is hilarious, but kinda harsh. I think that is how I learn though. She will embarrass you a little, but she always ends nicely, and then you (well at least I) get pissed at myself and study more. Although I’m not sure how effective I am right now, I seriously feel like I could sleep for an entire day. It kinda sucks that this first weekend we have an early Saturday excursion. Maybe I’ll actually come home on time tomorrow and take a nap for whatever we end up doing. I think most people didn’t want to do much so that they would actually wake up for the Kremlin trip. Anyway but the teacher. Her eyeliner always matches her clothes, I don’t know why I need to throw that in there. I’m hoping she will wear red or orange one day and see what she does for eyeliner. That would be intense. Anyway, but she made us all ask each other if we had boyfriends because of how I accidentally answered a question one of the guys asked me. Also Katya was telling us that she thinks that the teacher thinks she is a lesbian because of all these different things she has answered, it’s really funny actually. And one day the teacher randomly (sorry I forgot her name…) asks me to seductively ask Katya something, and I was just like… huh? But then she told me that story. And the teacher always makes us say things like what we like to eat and then she’ll have the guys say how they would ask us on dates. And today what kind of flowers I like so that I can receive them from them. I told her I don’t really know flowers because I just don’t really care to get them, and she was like WHAT! (flowers are literally EVERYWHERE in Russia, like a billion babushkas on the road sell them and there are literally flower shops on every block) and I was like I like to get other things. And she was like ohhh jewelry! (I meant things that are more meaningful than just a pre-made grouping of a plant, or even something funny). And I told her I like fish and she was like oh expensive date! So she probably thinks I’m this like snooty rich girl haha that only likes expensive things. Oh language barriers. She does speak English, but I’m only supposed to answer her in Russian and I am VERY limited on what I can say so I just give in and let her think whatever half the time. She is hilarious though, I like her.

Ok so I think that is pretty much everything… I need to start doing my domashne zadanie anyway (excuse my poor transliteration, I’m tired. As I’ve complained at least 15 times this blog). So hopefully I will get to a place with internet that isn’t the dorms, because for some reason my computer won’t connect to the internet there, and I will actually be able to upload these thingies!! And there are more fireworks going off…I’m so confused! I live in an apartment building in a residential area in a small city…there really isn’t anywhere to be setting off fireworks!! K peace!! Paka!

Russia Day 1

So! Today I left to Russia :D I was right on time in Phoenix leaving, as well as Chicago, but when I got to London holy crap! Besides the fact that I got lost for a little bit and kept getting stuck holding doors for fleets of people on the elevators, I finally decide to ask someone where to go because I don’t see Moscow on the Connecting Flights anywhere! So I ask someone and she’s like (British accent)… Oh honey… You are gonna miss this! You have to be there in ten minutes! And I was like no you don’t understand I’m getting picked up by someone I can’t get a hold of… I have to try! So she tells me where to go and I literally run. Pick up my rolley bag and my freakin heavy laptop bag smacking around on me and run up escalators, down escalators, and through security, who temporarily lose my boarding pass and almost had me in tears because I was down to 5 minutes at that point. So I get it and push by people running some more and make it to my gate as my area is boarding. I see my two people already sitting (the two also on the program) so that was bueno. Oh and there were a TON of mid forties Russian men on this flight, and they either A) couldn’t understand anything or B) didn’t care to, because they were freakin hilarious. They just kept getting up and walking or whatever and the flight attendant guys were pissed chasing them down saying ‘Sir!! This is the 5^th time I’ve told you to sit down!!’ And he would just look back at him and then keep going. I was laughing so hard. They were all doing things like that all over the plane. I sat by a nice guy from India who was telling me stuff about Moscow (he’s lived in Russia the past 6 years for med school) and showed me his cell phone and stuff, which I apparently can’t get for 4 days because I’m not registered in Russia yet.

SO we get off the plane and Joey is waiting there and then we wait for Adriana. We had a grand old time trying to deal with our ginormous luggage (mostly mine) and had to redistribute them like 5 times. Also it doesn’t help that Russians apparently don’t understand waiting in line or personal space at all, and would shove their carts of luggage with their kids hanging off right in front of you/into your bag so you would stop. I was like crying I was laughing so hard. Way to use your kids! So we find non-English speaking Dmitry and he does not offer to help with any of our bags even though all three of us are CLEARLY struggling. Adriana managed to stay up with him, but Joey and I kept dropping stuff and getting stuck on stuff and Dmitry would just stop for a second and keep walking. If Adriana wasn’t a bit behind him, I would have had no idea where he went. Oh also he just walks in front of cars, and of course while crossing the road I get stuck AND Joey drops a luggage in the road. Luckily they honked and just got pissed; apparently if they flash their lights at you they aren’t going to stop for you no matter what ha.

So a highly interesting ride to Moscow with Silent Dmitry and his techno dance beats, and we all just talked the whole time. Adriana got dropped off at the dorm, and then I got taken to my homestay next. I have the cutest little old lady who is really nice and seems to be really patient to my lack of Russian knowledge. She doesn’t know but a few words of English, so it’s been interesting but I am finding even just saying words to get the gist of what I mean work with her. Maybe once I start school (Tomorrow) I’ll be able to throw some grammar in there and make entire sentences! Ha. I have a much larger room than I expected though, and she gave me a wardrobe armoire thingy with hangars and she showed me her food in the fridge and oh she has a freakin poofy cat I’ve decided is named Simon, but when she says it, it sounds like Semen. It is a boy Kot so it could be Simon. She like loves him though that made me like her more. Every time he comes in the room and makes noise she talks to him. I’m pretty sure she said her neighbor is going to take the bus with me to go to GRINT tomorrow for my orientation and my placement test, just so I know where it is. I have keys to the house now and was a little confused at the layout of the apartment building so that should be interesting ha. She drew me out a map though :D Well I believe I’m getting woken up at 745 so I’m going to sleep!!! I’m so tired already but I think I’m too excited now!! It’s weird though; I feel like I’m just here for a week or something.

Ok so I just wrote a huge essay and I'm using my friend's make and I did something that made it delete everything I just wrote.... so yeah. Short version, I live with a babushka who is really nice and makes me huge breakfasts and I can somehow communicate with her, although she generally talks slower to me. I had my first day of class today too, and I just have 4 other people with me. They are really nice and we are all on like the same level of knowledge, and we just pretty much talk the whole time so it's nice I'll be a LOT better if this is how the class is always gonna be. Ok but I will write more later, I need to go get ready for the Opera we are going to tonight!! :DD See ya!