Time for another update. I’ve now had my first non-orientation week. It was busy, but I’m starting to think that on most of my days I will have periods of free time.
I went to my first choir practice on Friday. It was long, but I enjoyed it. For the most part it felt as if I could have been in a choir in the U.S. At least when were singing. True I did have to sight read words that I’d never seen before. But if I was singing in French or Spanish I’d have to sight read words too. It was only during the “business” end of the choir, when the director was going over administrative details that I struggled a bit with the language. Thankfully a couple of other girls in the alto section were more than willing to help me figure out what was going on. Dorita is an exchange student from Germany, so she was able to relate well to my struggles, and is a bit of an inspiration to me as she speaks Russian very well after 5 months of being here, and was obviously able to converse with ease with others in the choir. Dasha was friendly, somewhat familiar with English and with American culture, and so was eager to talk to me, and willing to have patience when my grammar failed me and I’d have to stop for a moment to think of how I could phrase something and have the meaning come out right.
Yesterday I went to the Russian Museum with a group of other American students. I still have yet to find the main exhibition area after two visits, but the hall we ended up in yesterday was different from the one I’d been in before. I’m glad we got there when we did. They ran out of space in the Coat-rooms, and people had to wait for spaces to open up before they were allowed inside to by tickets by the time our group of students left.
We headed over to Termok for lunch. I really think this chain should open in the United States. They are a fast food restaurant with a simple concept. They serve 3 dishes, salads, soups, and blini. You can get just about any kind of salad, soup, or blini that you can imagine. Everything from a light veggie salad, to traditional borsht . I got a mushroom and cheese blini that was excellent.
I came back to my apartment and told Tanya about my dad over dinner. I think I’m going to have to ask her for recipes before I leave. She makes excellent soups! Soup is something that Russian cuisine has down well and it is definitely appreciated on a cold winter’s day.
After dinner their nephew – Lyona came over. I think he is about 17. He was pretty quiet though so I didn’t learn much about him.
Last night was also my first night watching reports on American politics on the Russian news. The focus is definitely on the democratic primaries. The Republican party was almost completely ignored. I think they had about 1 minute out of the 15 or so minute report. As far as I can tell from conversations with Russians, and from the point of view of the Russian American-Politics Analyst on the news last night, Hilary Clinton is the favored candidate from the Russian perspective. According to my conversation Professor, it is because Russia had good relations with Bill Clinton, and would like to see him again.
There was a lot of speculation by the analyst as to why Americans would support Obama over Clinton. Some of it might have been accurate, other statements I kind of had to wonder at. However I also struggled a bit with the language again and didn’t understand everything that the man was saying, so perhaps his argument did make more sense.
In any case it was interesting to watch.
Today is probably the first real snow we’ve had since I’ve been here. It’s not incredibly cold but it has been snowing since morning. As I’m writing this I can see a pair of bulldozer/tractor snow-plows driving down the street.
I went to my first choir practice on Friday. It was long, but I enjoyed it. For the most part it felt as if I could have been in a choir in the U.S. At least when were singing. True I did have to sight read words that I’d never seen before. But if I was singing in French or Spanish I’d have to sight read words too. It was only during the “business” end of the choir, when the director was going over administrative details that I struggled a bit with the language. Thankfully a couple of other girls in the alto section were more than willing to help me figure out what was going on. Dorita is an exchange student from Germany, so she was able to relate well to my struggles, and is a bit of an inspiration to me as she speaks Russian very well after 5 months of being here, and was obviously able to converse with ease with others in the choir. Dasha was friendly, somewhat familiar with English and with American culture, and so was eager to talk to me, and willing to have patience when my grammar failed me and I’d have to stop for a moment to think of how I could phrase something and have the meaning come out right.
Yesterday I went to the Russian Museum with a group of other American students. I still have yet to find the main exhibition area after two visits, but the hall we ended up in yesterday was different from the one I’d been in before. I’m glad we got there when we did. They ran out of space in the Coat-rooms, and people had to wait for spaces to open up before they were allowed inside to by tickets by the time our group of students left.
We headed over to Termok for lunch. I really think this chain should open in the United States. They are a fast food restaurant with a simple concept. They serve 3 dishes, salads, soups, and blini. You can get just about any kind of salad, soup, or blini that you can imagine. Everything from a light veggie salad, to traditional borsht . I got a mushroom and cheese blini that was excellent.
I came back to my apartment and told Tanya about my dad over dinner. I think I’m going to have to ask her for recipes before I leave. She makes excellent soups! Soup is something that Russian cuisine has down well and it is definitely appreciated on a cold winter’s day.
After dinner their nephew – Lyona came over. I think he is about 17. He was pretty quiet though so I didn’t learn much about him.
Last night was also my first night watching reports on American politics on the Russian news. The focus is definitely on the democratic primaries. The Republican party was almost completely ignored. I think they had about 1 minute out of the 15 or so minute report. As far as I can tell from conversations with Russians, and from the point of view of the Russian American-Politics Analyst on the news last night, Hilary Clinton is the favored candidate from the Russian perspective. According to my conversation Professor, it is because Russia had good relations with Bill Clinton, and would like to see him again.
There was a lot of speculation by the analyst as to why Americans would support Obama over Clinton. Some of it might have been accurate, other statements I kind of had to wonder at. However I also struggled a bit with the language again and didn’t understand everything that the man was saying, so perhaps his argument did make more sense.
In any case it was interesting to watch.
Today is probably the first real snow we’ve had since I’ve been here. It’s not incredibly cold but it has been snowing since morning. As I’m writing this I can see a pair of bulldozer/tractor snow-plows driving down the street.
posted by gewreinn at 2:23 PM (St Petersburg time)
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