Ice Ice Baby

Gah it’s already Sunday! This weekend certainly went by quickly. On Friday night our program coordinator Elena arranged a dinner at a nearby Georgian restaurant for the Americans in the program and some Russian Smolny students. I sat at one end of the very long table, and I just happened to be surrounded by my other American friends, so I didn’t really have any one-on-one conversations with any of the Russian students. Irina, a sophomore at Smolny, sat the closest to us and she sat and listened, asking the occasional question, while we spoke at what probably felt like lightning speed English to her about random topics like Harry Potter, Siberia, and at one point we found out that our friend Clarissa from Williams College smuggled her pet chihuahua over the mexican border when it was a puppy... 

We had a bean, onion, egg, potato salad thing with lettuce as the first course, some cheesy bread pizza something which was the most delicious thing I had all weekend next, and then our main course was a meat, potato, pepper stew dish that came out sizzling so loudly it reminded me of when you get fajitas at a mexican restaurant. Except I like fajitas better. 

I thought it was very nice that they arranged a dinner between us and some Russian students, but I’m about to rant about something that’ll probably disappoint a lot of people (apologies in advance). In all honesty, I would love to make Russian friends. Isn’t that one, if not the most important, goal of studying abroad? To meet the locals so they can show you what [insert country] is really like? If you ask anyone for advice before studying abroad, I’m positive that one of the first things said will be to not get stuck in the American bubble and to make friends with the locals instead. They are your biggest resources, and befriending them will help you get the most out of your four or five months abroad. I completely agree with that. In fact, before the end of the first week of September this past fall I remember writing my study abroad application and answering questions about what my goals are for studying abroad. Meeting and befriending Russians was undoubtedly one of my goals, and it still is, but a lot has happened since I wrote that application, and my goals for studying abroad have changed drastically. All the goals I wrote on that initial application still hold true, but I have bigger, more selfish aims that have since taken priority. It became clear too early on in my fall semester that I needed to study abroad so that I could get away from Conn and be with new people in a new environment. I needed study abroad so I could escape the toxicity that had seeped into every part of my college and campus, which are two things that I have grown to love inside and out with all my heart over the past two and a half years. I needed study abroad to come faster than it did so I could heal, so I could breathe easier, so I could be reminded of all the things that make me happy. In other words, this semester abroad was going to be dedicated to ME and mostly me only, and I’m willing to do whatever it takes so that I get better. Consequentially, all my energy that I was planning to channel into integrating with the Smolny kids has been reallocated to finding whatever it is that distracts me, makes me comfortable, and makes me happy. That is my top goal, and while I understand I’m not trying my hardest to break through the American bubble, I don’t feel as bad as I should and I won’t apologize for that. At this point, I just want friends. I just want to have a good time, and while I don’t anticipate having this be the case for the next for months, if my only good friends happen to be those in my program then so be it. I’ve been having a great time with them so far, and I have been feeling more and more like myself since literally the day I arrived here. I’m not saying that I’m going to avoid Russians. Absolutely not. I want to make conversation and get to know them, but I’m not going to lose sleep over how many locals I’ve met. I also believe that befriending a Russian would be really frickin’ hard. Guys, I don’t speak Russian. If I can barely get through a conversation at breakfast with my host dad, how am I supposed to talk about the things that normal friends talk about with each other? I sound like the grinch of all study abroad right now, but these are my honest thoughts. I need more confidence and maybe more of a screw-it-all attitude? I don’t know, I have only been here for less than a month. Things are bound to change...

That was a long rant, but anyways, getting back to the dinner, it started late at 8:30, and by the time we got done it was practically 10:30. It was Friday night though, so when we got done a bunch of us went to a bar right by Smolny. I don’t know what type of bar it was, but it was SO COOL whatever it was. There were maps, license plates, retro photographs and posters, shark jaws, and other tourist trinkets covering the wooden walls, most of which were American. There were plenty of anchors and boat steering wheels too (what are those called?), so I guess there was a strong nautical theme. I don’t know, nor do I think the owners of the bar knew what they were going for, but I didn’t care! It reminded me of the store in Bar Harbor called Geddy’s. Moreover, when I was in line to get beer, out of the corner of my eye I spotted a picture of a man with a very unforgettable beard. I left my place in line, went up to the wall, and examined a picture of Rasputin. This guy follows me around EVERYWHERE (but that’s okay with me for now). 

I got what everybody else did, and we all sat in a booth, watched skiing, and chatted until midnight before people started leaving to catch the last metros of the night. Some of us stayed later though, for there was supposed to be a night bus to take many of my friends back to the top of Vasilievsky island. I, being the lucky duck that I am, merely had to walk home with friends as they made their way back to the metro. I am super grateful of my location for a lot of reasons, many of them stemming from the idea that on late nights I don’t really have to worry about catching transportation home unless I am with friends exceptionally far away, but also because I think I can avoid trying to figure out the bus or marshrutka system for the entire time that I’m here. If I really needed to take a bus I could definitely decipher the signs and I’ve done it before, but I do not want to hop on a marshrutka anytime too soon. Basically they are vans that have a specific route, but they don’t stop unless you shout at them to. Given my still shaky knowledge of the city and my unfortunate tendency to not assert myself at times, I would probably end up in on the other side of the city if I took one by myself at this point. I’m exaggerating, but only a little. Everything here is scary to me to a certain extent, and at some point you just have to say eyyy what the fuck, but if I can avoid it I am more than happy to do that. I also really like to walk everywhere. Everything is so pretty and I’m still at the point where my head swivels back and forth at a constant rate whenever I walk around the streets because I am still fascinated by all the signs and writing in shop windows. Part of me wonders if they placed me, the least experienced student with Russian, at probably the most convenient location because they thought it would be easier for me to not deal with transportation. Probably not, but I’m thankful nonetheless. 

I stayed up watching TV (I have a problem) when I got back from the bar, and I slept in until 11 the next morning, which was GLORIOUS. My host parents left for their dacha early in the morning, and I had the whole apartment to myself. While I am most definitely an extrovert and I need my daily dose of human and friend interaction, I value my sacred solitude. I have no problem with being left alone for a day or two. I would prefer to get out (which I did) and see people, but I actually love the idea of coming back to an empty apartment at times. It’s not like I take advantage of being alone or anything; I simply brought my laptop out to the kitchen table, put on the radio, made myself tea, ate breakfast, got a little bit of homework done, and thoroughly enjoyed being alone. It wasn’t long before I left my things and headed out to the gym. I told my friend Adam that I would meet him there around 1 and I got there on time. When I got back, I hopped in the shower and then heated up the large pot of pelmeni soup my host mom left me. I felt like I ate twice as many calories as I had just burned at the gym, but I didn’t mind. I am always extra proud of myself when I make it to the gym in the morning or before lunch at least. I had to slurp down my soup quickly though if I wanted to leave in time to make it to the Decemberist cafe at 4 pm where everybody was meeting to watch the USA vs. Russia hockey game. 

I left half an hour before 4, and I set off with my iPod plugged in. I walked through the streets, crossing the right ones without a second thought like I had lived there all my life, and I found myself experiencing this feeling that I had for the first time when I got to college. I guess the easiest way to describe it would be simply the sense of independence, but I feel like its much more epic and powerful than that. It involves the confidence that comes with being the boss of my own schedule I think. I remember feeling it when I was a freshman at Conn, after the first two initial months of feeling uncomfortable and homesick, when I would walk to the gym by myself on a saturday, completely on my own time, along the overpass with views of the Thames river. I felt it all the time when I was at Berkeley this past summer, and I felt it yesterday so clearly that I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that I have reached a state of comfort here and that I am becoming happier. Perhaps I am still in the honeymoon phase of being in Petersburg, perhaps I’m still living in this vacation-like mindset that doesn’t involve me working hard or being back at Conn (is that just the honeymoon phase rephrased?), but I cannot deny how much coming here has refreshed my very core. 

Okay, enough with this philosophical nonsense!

I arrived at the Decembrist cafe a little bit early, but Sean was there waiting before me, and we went downstairs to the basement at our reserved tables in front of the flatscreen. We watched speed skating (how mesmerizing!) as people trickled in one by one. I sipped on mulled wine as we watched the hockey game, and when I wasn’t conversing with friends over Facebook thanks to the wifi, I was shrieking and cheering on our team. We all ate dinner there, and I ordered a burger that had an egg on it, mushrooms, blue cheese, and BBQ sauce. Oh, how deliciously messy that was. The game went on, much faster than I remember hockey games being, and before we knew it, we were in overtime. And then, as most of you who watched the game know, we went into a shootout. I don’t think that I’ve ever watched a real-life shootout live before (the Mighty Ducks doesn’t count), so this made things SO MUCH more fun and intense. We were the only ones down in the basement, while all the Russians were watching the game upstairs. Whenever we scored, we all hollered from the basement, and then we noticed that whenever the Russians scored on us, we could hear everybody clapping upstairs. WE MUST CLAP AND SHOUT LOUDER. Look at that smirk on Putin’s face!! In the end, we won, and it was awesome. I felt a little bad for my lack of compassion with the Russian team, but not really. Sucks to suck, мои русские друзбя! 

After the game, it was still pretty early, so some of us went to another bar on Vasilievsky (I’m becoming an alcoholic). This place was huge with lots of comfy couches. We spent the next few hours drinking beer and chatting about the most debate-worthy topics. We asked each other what we thought about Syria, Realism, China, atomic bombs, the Geneva Conventions, torture, abortion, our favorite president, conspiracy theories, whether or not there are morals in war, Edward Snowden, the Watergate Scandal, and the list went on and on. You could almost hear my brain purring as we jumped from one conversation to another. Everybody had read different books, taken different classes, learned different facts that were all thrown into the conversation. Ahh, happiness. 

So that was my weekend in a long nutshell. And now I’m in my room, and I don’t plan on leaving the apartment today. I have to catch up on homework, and my body is tired. Hopefully I’ll have some good material to write about in the next few days; my birthday is on Tuesday, and I have no classes that day. So what do I plan to do? Well, as fate would have it, there is a special Romanov exhibit on Vasilievsky starting on the 16th and going until March 2nd. Can I think of a better way to spend my day? NOPE. 

Sophomore Slump or Comeback of the Year

I’ve noticed a significant gap in my energy levels in just two days. Real classes started on Tuesday at Smolny, and I was there from 11 am to 8 pm yesterday. I had phonetics and my reading and writing class, and then I went to the Nabokov class to see how I like it. The class contained maybe 20 students, way more girls than guys. There were only me and three other Americans in it though, so that’s a plus. The class itself was okay. The professor, a middle-aged bald man with blue eyes who reminded me slightly of Rowan Atkinson, gave us a writing prompt to start, but he didn’t explain himself at all so we all looked at each other confused wondering, “what the hell are we supposed to do with ‘Н’ stands for Nabokov”? After 10 minutes the professor finally told us that he wanted us to try and answer the question of whether or not Russia had the right to boast about Nabokov in the olympic opening ceremony. Well why didn’t you just say that, dude? Besides the initial miscommunication, I was interested for most of the rest of the class. It became immediately clear that our professor is very knowledgable about Nabokov, which I liked, and this particular professor quoted Nabokov and shared random anecdotal stories about him and his works which is a teaching strategy that will hook me every single time. My professor's british accent when he speaks english is also a little more defined than others I've encountered. For some reason, there are a lot of Russians here that, when they speak english, tend to do so with a slight British accent; I think it’s more common in those of the older generation, but I get such a kick out of it. As a result, I thoroughly enjoyed listening to my professor talk. Unfortunately, the class is really only going to focus on Nabokov’s book “Ada,” but I’ve never read it before and I decided that I'm going to keep the class. I’ve always wanted to read more of Nabokov’s books, and I think that I will get a really good idea of not only what he’s written, but who he was as a person from this class. Overall, one of the mains goal for us, our professor explained,  is to determine the grounds on which a writer belongs to a certain country or nation (the official title of the course is something like “Russian American Nabokov.”) 

My second academic class that day, the Cold War, began 20 minutes later at 4:40 and didn’t get out until 7:30, which was actually half an hour earlier than expected. I went into this class skeptical. My academic advisor had warned me that some students complained about the professor’s lack of organization and all the technical difficulties that come with Skype (the class is team taught via skype with a retired history professor from Ramapo college in NJ), and another friend who was here last semester with Bard-Smolny said that she would not take a class with the same professor again. You’d think I would have felt the same, but I would almost completely disagree with those two opinions after only having had one class with this professor. Skype did not work, and there were some lost minutes trying to connect with Tom Heed in Florida, but I honestly couldn’t care less. 

Moreover, I thought the professor for the class, who looks like a combination of Lenin and John Malkovich, is a riot. He, like my Nabokov professor, knows a ton about the subject. He only teaches part time at Smolny; he has a full time position at Saint Petersburg State University. He also has been writing a book about American higher education and American colleges, so when he made us go around the table and introduce ourselves he had commentary for almost all the Americans and their home institutions. “Ahh you go to Georgetown you say? Very, very good university!” “Oh Columbia! One of the best universities in the world. I heard last year that they added over 100 new buildings!” “Connecticut College, but not the University of Connecticut, correct? Much more prestigious.” (Holllaaaaaa). But yes, the class is split about 50/50 American and Russians, which, for a class on the Cold War, is symbolically hilarious and perfect. Throughout this class we spent 75% of the time going over the syllabus, but my professor shared stories (he has met THREE American presidents) and fun facts about the material, much like my Nabokov professor. I’m not sure if its because most Russians are forced to memorize poems throughout their childhood, but the way my two professors told stories and quoted famous figures made the material so much better. In just that one class, I managed to learn that Pepsi and Nixon supported each other during the latter’s election, why Truman was an unpopular president, how Khrushchev thought Kennedy was naive and too young to be teaching him about diplomacy, what the escalation theory in international relations is, how both George Washington and Ike emphasized the distinction between making decisions as a former military person and as a politician... etc... I also learned that my professor hated all of Ronald Reagan’s movies (except one), that there aren’t very many good sources on the Cold War in Russia because it’s still a touchy subject for Russians, that Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan are apparently America’s most beloved presidents, and that my professor could possibly be like, REALLY famous in the world Russian studies. He has taught at so many places and he mentioned being at the “Kennan Institute” in DC often. Uhh, hello, can you please get me a job there?! (But actually). 

Needless to say I’m definitely going to keep this class. My professor’s english is far from perfect, and sometimes you have to bend your mind a bit to understand what he’s saying (he sadly doesn’t have a british accent when he speaks), but he says funny things and I would even go as far as to say that he is animated and energetic. I’m also quite interested to see how this class will be taught using lectures from a retired professor in the states... Wednesdays are going to be hell, but I don’t really have any motivation to sit through a class I only somewhat like in order to change that. I originally was going to sit in on the Soviet Architecture class today, but I decided against it and I’m lazy (what’s happened to me?). I’m convinced that a Soviet Architecture sounds really cool in theory, but I just pictured how much I would want to shoot myself if the class involved memorizing vocabulary about columns and/or types of roofs or angles. Now that I think of it, what did I expect the class to be about? Kommunikalka? Geez. 

We’ll see how much I agree or disagree with my gut instinct on these classes in a few weeks... But in other news, today Jenna and I went to Stockmans, which is a mall with a grocery store that has foreign foods in it. It made me happy to see that Newman’s Own salsa has made it all the way over here to Russia. I bought weird circular pretzels to go with my, ah-hem, $10 peanut butter (so worth it), yogurt, strawberries, pineapple, green tea, pringles (whaaaaat), and some granola bars. Yumm... 

Heads Roll Off

Today Jackie and I went to Peter the Great’s Chamber of Curiosities, and dear lord I am still shaken up from it. The chamber is located inside the Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography, so not ALL of its possessions are freaky. We walked through exhibits featuring various artifacts from Japanese culture, African culture, South American, Indonesian, South Asian, East Asian, some Middle Eastern, and even a section on Eskimo life. In glass cases there were wax figures complete with traditional clothes, instruments, weapons, tea sets, jewelry, etc... There were also lots of miniature models of houses and buildings. I’m glad we came to this type of museum. I don’t know anything really about anthropology (sadness), so it was cool and educational in that sense. It’s also something very different in comparison to the Hermitage or the Russian Museum, for instance. 

But that’s not to say I’ll ever go back there again. Definitely not. What is housed in the Chamber of Curiosities may enthrall some, but mostly I think it will gross everybody else out. The Chamber came into being when Peter the Great wanted to basically get rid of the Russian people’s superstitious beliefs about monsters (so I read) by proving to them that scary things exist in nature and biology, and therefore, theres nothing really to be afraid of (was that what his goal was? Huh). Anyways, during his reign he drafted a bill encouraging Russians throughout his empire to collect rare, bizarre oddities, and the majority of these rare, bizarre oddities just happened to take the shape of deformed fetuses. In the chamber, there are jars upon jars of fetuses with either two heads, fused legs, squashed limbs, no limbs, harelip, no lips, oversized heads, parts of their siamese twin attached, all the above, etc... And that’s only the beginning. You’re drawn to these small, white masses in jars that are filled with yellowish, green liquid at first, but after a while, you don’t want to look at them anymore. They are so disturbing, and Jackie and I understood very shortly after we entered the Chamber why our friend Meg told us not to go there on a full stomach. I didn’t get nauseous, but my stomach definitely started to knot. I feel bad saying this because these fetuses were human at some point and whatnot, but some of them were absolutely disgusting. I realize that sounds harsh, but it's honestly how I felt. At times I noticed my hands were clasped tightly together or that my hand would unconsciously rise to cover my mouth. I also did those random whole body shivers every once in a while (JUST GOTTA SHAKE IT OFF). 

In addition to these fetuses, there were also skeletons of a newborn, a  7 year old child, and a giant who just happened to be Peter the Great’s footman (of course Peter the Great would hire a legit giant to be his footman!). Additionally, we saw various body parts in jars, including heads, a forearm and right hand with skin and bone still intact, the skeleton of a double headed calf, a chicken with four legs in a jar, turtles in a jar, snakes in a jar, (more animals in jars), Peter the Great’s footman’s heart, a baby’s heart and lungs, part of a guy’s cranium, a complete set of teeth (extracted by Peter the Great himself), an amputation tool set, shells, starfish, a stuffed opossum, and some random butterflies. That’s all that comes to mind for now, but don’t worry, we were not allowed to take pictures. 

I am still learning about all of Peter the Great’s accomplishments. That guy did a ton, if not the most that anybody has ever done for Russia, and he was undoubtedly brilliant and daring. Nevertheless, if I learned anything about Peter today that I wasn’t already 100% sure of before, it is that Peter the Great was one sick son of a bitch. 

Thankfully we had more anthropological exhibits to see after the Chamber, and by the time we left the museum our appetites had returned and we were ready for lunch. We took a bus back to the area around the Vasileostrovskaya metro station where we found the Soviet Cafe for lunch. The interior of the Soviet Cafe is designed to look exactly how a house or apartment would look like under the Soviet Union. My guess is during the 50s, to be more specific. The wall paper is somewhat floral and white, there are old fashioned box TVs everywhere, and there are old photographs and newspaper headlines hanging in frames on the walls. It was wicked cool! We picked our food from the special lunch menu, and I ended up getting a something with ham salad, shi soup (lots of cabbage), and spaghetti carbonara. It was all delicious, and I left the cafe, and the 50s, feeling full. 

Today is my host dad’s birthday, so after we left the cafe we went in search of a small gift for him. I don’t know Alexander Grigorevich well at all, and I just found out about his birthday yesterday, so my expectations for finding him a super awesome gift were not that high. After a while of going in and out of stores that looked like they could possible have something gift-worthy (there was one random store that had some loreal men’s product with Patrick Dempsey’s face on it teehee), Jackie and I ended up shopping for ourselves. We found a really cool bookstore which I will remember to come back to. There were touristy flasks, magnets, chocolates, and calendars, but I didn’t end up getting anything for myself (too much pressure!). In the end, I bought Alexander a birthday card and some chocolate, and he thanked me multiple times for it. I also found out yesterday that Nina Vasilievna’s birthday is in May, so I have much more time to think of what to get her... 

When we got done shopping, I went to the gym and then came back home. I knew that Nina Vasilievna and Alexander Grigorevich were having their son, Nikita, and his girlfriend over for the birthday dinner, so I was a little nervous. I love meeting new people, but meeting new people in a foreign language is NOT my forte. Getting to know people at all when I can't express myself in a foreign language really sucks. I almost told my host parents the other day at dinner how sometimes I wish they understood English; not because it would make communicating easier, but because they would know what my personality is like. I'm sure they have somewhat of an idea already, but I can't say Liv things with them (perhaps this is a good thing). They don't really know who I am, and sometimes I get mad because they only know me as some ignorant young girl who can only express herself in broken, incorrect Russian. 

Anyways, I had no choice but to meet Nikita and his girlfriend. I waited until I was called for dinner before leaving my room, and when I entered the kitchen/dining room I did so in my normal tshirt, sweatpants combo (in Russia, you are expected to change into a more relaxed, pj-style outfit once you get home from work/school; "street clothes" are considered dirty). Needless to say, I should have put on a nice shirt (it's a BIRTHDAY DINNER, Liv, what was going through your head?). Nina Vasilievna was wearing a nice button down and slacks, and Alexander was also wearing a button down, but he still wore his track suit pants thankfully. Nikita had on a t-shirt and jeans (phew), but his girlfriend had a cocktail dress on. I felt underdressed, like I always do at these sort of things, and I asked myself why I was in my champion navy sweatpants and purple vneck tshirt all throughout dinner. Why, Liv why! 

Nevertheless, the feast set out for us tonight was colorful and fit for celebration. There was a cucumber salad with yellow peppers and tomatoes (and lots of dill), plov (kind of like rice pilaf with onions and chicken), chicken cutlets and potatoes (with more dill), some fish with onions (I tried a bit and immediately refused any more), and of course, homemade Georgian wine. I had seconds and thirds of each dish, and I lost track of how many cheers and shots of Georgian wine we had (excuse all my typos and sloppy sentences ;). The food was all really yummy, as usual, and I am currently in my bed spread out like a fat elephant seal on a sunny day. 

Luckily, Nina Vasilievna and Alexander Grigorevich were so busy catching up with their son that I was not addressed or asked very many questions at all, and that was more than fine with me. I was simply happy to be sitting there, listening to all these Russian voices ramble on at full speed ahead. Of course I didn't understand much, just tidbits of conversation here and there. Something about money and apartments, then something about the metro, then something about some Natasha. Blah, blah, blah. Regardlessly, it didn't take long for the Georgian wine to affect me, and before I knew it, I was laughing at things I didn't understand. 

Throughout dinner, everybody rotated giving cheers to Alexander. Thank god I picked up on that, because when they asked me if I had anything to say I was somewhat ready for it. Feeling a little more confident, a little more "eyyy why the hell not!" I lead our last cheer. I firstly apologized for being in a t-shirt. After that, I said that I was sorry I couldn't say more sincere words, and that I was still learning Russian. I am very happy to be here, I continued, and I think that you (Nina and Alexander) are very good Russian parents. Thank you very, very much (except take that and make it sound awful)! Even so, they seemed pleased, and I was proud I managed to say something coherent. 

When we finished with the real food we moved onto the banana chocolate cake, and Nina Vasilievna made us all tea (I LOVE that they drink so much tea here!). When Nikita and his girlfriend left, I said that it was nice to meet you and goodbye. While they were all saying goodbye in the foyer, I loaded dishes in the sink and sneakily finished the rest of Nikita's girlfriends uneaten cake (no shame). Nikita's girlfriend may be able to communicake (haah! that was a typo but I'm going to keep it :) with his parents, but I ate and drank SO much more than she did that I must have stood my own ground against this young Russian woman on some level. Did that last sentence make any sense whatsoever? No, Liv, it did not. 

Dance on our Graves

I am so ready for bed. Today wasn’t even that strenuous but I think it may be just because it's Monday. Official academic classes at Smolny start tomorrow, but we had language classes today at 11 and at 1 like during our two week intensive. The day went by slowly, but I followed along and left feeling satisfied I made it through another day of Russian classes. 

Despite the grey, rainy weather, Sean, Jackie and I set off for the Peter and Paul Fortress immediately after classes got out at 2:30. We got off at the metro station Gorkovskaya, and walked through a park that would have otherwise been lovely minus the soggy ground that was a mix of dirty snow and drowning grass. We made it to the Fortress only a few minutes later, having passed by a mosque, streets filled with stores, a few monuments and statues, and a cafe/bar/club in the park that was made of stone and, as a result of its built-in location to a hill, resembled a hobbit house. We made a mental note to come back there at some point. 

When we made it through the park, we crossed the street and then walked along St. Johns bridge and then through St. John’s gate which eventually lead us into the fortress. The sidewalks of the bridge were lined with old lamps with designs on the tops, and the railings of the bridge had a nice metal design throughout. We saw ducks playing in the water underneath us, and there was even a small statue of a rabbit on one of the wooden trunks sticking out of the water that was sprinkled with coins. Perhaps for good luck? The bridge to the fortress had views of different parts of the city that I hadn’t seen before, and I could see what seemed like miles of the Neva’s white, melting ice weave throughout the islands and curves of the city’s landmasses. 

The fortress was built at the same time that St. Petersburg was in the early years of the 18th century, and it’s location on Hare Island was where Peter the Great had hoped would be the center of the city. I don’t know too much about it other than that the fortress has never had to face any enemy and that obviously the island on which the fortress is built is not what Peter had hoped it would be. Nevertheless, it’s pretty cool once you get inside. 

My main mission for visiting the Peter and Paul Fortress was so I could enter the Peter and Paul Cathedral and visit the site where the last Romanovs, along with everybody else who was executed with them in Ekaterinburg in 1918, are buried. On our way to the cathedral, which has a golden steeple-like spear that is so tall you can see it from mostly anywhere in the city, we passed by many buildings, most of which I did not know. We did, however, walk past a rather bizarre statue of Peter the Great. He was sitting in a chair in front of some orange yellow palace. The statue of Peter the Great’s body was enormous, with large fitting clothes to match, but his head was disproportionately small, and his hands, which stick out from his giant coat, are skeleton hands. It’s actually kind of creepy, but I liked it regardless. 

When we finally entered the Peter and Paul Cathedral, we found ourselves in a big open room. This main room was the inside of the cathedral don’t forget, so we were surrounded by pastel colored ceilings, religious paintings, heavy, sparkly chandeliers, and gold every which way you turned. The back wall straight ahead was a golden shrine to some religious figure (please don’t ask me who), and the reflections of the light on the gold are somewhat blinding. The first thing you may notice, however, are the above ground tombs scattered all over the floor. Most of them are behind metal barriers, but there are a few that don’t have any barriers at all. In fact, I had to weave around these tombs at some points so I could get better pictures of the tombs that did have some sort of fence around them. My only problem with these tombs was that the cyrillic writing on them is written in such an old fashioned script that I couldn’t read the tops of some tombs (were they even in cyrillic??). We had maps though, so every once in a while you’d hear one of us shout “I found Alexander II! He’s over here!” or “I think Peter the Great is right in front of us...” It was SO COOL to be in the same room as all these Romanov rulers. Of course, they’re all dead and we were just looking at their tombs, but it is still a very powerful to know that you’re standing right next to where they’re remains are. Its hard for me to imagine that they’re actually IN there. For all we know they could be empty, but I guess you just have to believe. 

We found Alexander II and his wife, Nicholas’ parents, Peter the Great, Catherine the Great, and many others before we began searching for Nicholas’ grave. I have seen pictures of it on the internet, and when I looked around the main room of the cathedral and didn’t see it, I opened the map. Once we found where he was on the map, I searched for it’s corresponding location in the cathedral. Within seconds I spotted a small room hidden at the end of the cathedral. That must be it! I sped walked up to the room, leaving Sean and Jackie in my dust. I approached the room, but I was forced to stop for there were lines prohibiting visitors from getting any closer. Part of me was really mad that out of all the tombs in this damn cathedral that Nicholas and his family's were the only ones I couldn't get close to, but at the same time, another part of me tickled with satisfaction that MY Romanovs get more special treatment in this cathedral than Peter or Catherine the Great. 

Nevertheless, my frustration with the lines didn’t genuinely get a chance to manifest itself before that emotion was completely swept away by another. What that emotion is, I don’t think I can put my finger on, but it definitely contained a whole lot of excitement and awe. Almost five years after having started my term paper on Nicholas II in my sophomore year of high school, I finally found myself right in front of his tomb. If I knew at 16 that my term paper for my Modern European history class would to a large extent determine the course of my life and eventually lead me here, to St. Petersburg, Russia five years later, I think I would have fainted. Who knew. Who knew?! I cannot believe that I have finally made it here. I have wanted to come to this place for years now, and I am lucky enough to have the opportunity to live here for a semester. 

You know, to be honest, I don’t think it’s really sunk into me yet that I’m in Russia. I know that may sound silly at this point, but I think I’ve been living in another reality since I got here, and while I still believe I’m a little bit out of the loop in terms of where I am and truly comprehending that moreover, I think that writing all this down, all this about the moment I found myself staring at the memorial to Nicholas and his family, that I’ve gotten the closest I ever have to really GETTING it. I mean, this is what started it all! This is why I’m here in the first place! Of course, I’ve changed so much since I was 16 (at the same time without changing AT ALL, if that makes any sense), and my interests in Russia and politics have definitely deepened and expanded beyond Nicholas II and the last Romanovs, I will always, ALWAYS come back to their story. They’ve been building a nice little nest in a corner of my heart for some time now, and I am so glad that the Romanovs of my imagination finally had the opportunity today to meet the Romanovs of real life. 

I think I sound a bit ridiculous. After reading this, you’d think that finding my passion for Russia through the last Romanovs is the closest thing I have to a religion. In a way, it is true. I’m obsessed, and while I can and have listed off the reasons why I like them, there’s still a part of me that wonders how in the world, why in the world, I found somethings as specific and weird to love as them and Russia. At this point, Russian history and my love for the story of the last Romanovs is such a huge part of my identity that I can’t imagine myself without it. Yet, at the same time, part of me still cannot believe that this is who I turned out to be. I love so many things. Part of me would still love to work for People or Vanity Fair. Other parts of me wonder if I would feel most fulfilled in life if I simply worked with homeless dogs, if I studied sociology and worked with people my age, if I would have fun being a marriage counselor (that seemed so entertaining before), if I should have fostered a passion for community service at an early age. But, if I ever have moments where I doubt myself and what I love to do, these moments never last too long. I’m sure that I would be happy doing many things, but there’s nothing I would rather be doing MORE than studying this country that, even after years of classes and now a first-hand experience of the culture, has continued to confuse and amaze me. I say this now, and while I have been confident about my career choices for a while, I try to keep an open mind about where my academic interests will take me. Something just as random could come up and inspire me in a different way, but I’m pretty sure that if anything were to do so, it would come up WITHIN Russian studies. We’ll see, but today was just so surreal. I got the closest any human could ever possibly be to the Romanovs (realistically) at this point in time, and I can only hope that somewhere, somehow, they knew that their #1 fan had finally come to say hello. 

I stood there for a good few minutes, before and after having snapped some bagillion pictures, but I didn’t want to hold Sean and Jackie up. Without further ado, I blew the Romanovs a kiss goodbye, and jogged to catch up with my friends. We walked out of the main room, exited through a gift shop, and stopped to look at some picture gallery before leaving for good. Our next stop in the fortress was the prison. To be brief, this place was creepy, but not overly so (Alcatraz was much worse). Our time visiting the prison was spent walking though halls upon halls and walking into different cell rooms. On the outside of the prison cells, which were actually really large rooms, were plaques with the names of its famous inhabitants. Most of them were involved in some radical, terrorist political group from late Imperial Russia, but there were some randos thrown in there as well. Some of the most notable prisoners included Dostoevsky, Gorky, Trotsky, and Lenin’s brother. The prison cells had the metal frames of the beds still intact and attached to the walls, and some of them even had props and lamps in them. The drizzling rain and abundance of clouds outside certainly added to the prison’s gloomy feel. 

After the prison we headed back to the metro. We were hungry, it was raining, everything was wet, and it was time to go home. When I got back home I ate dinner with my host parents and then added more photos to Facebook, so check them out of if you're interested. 

Tomorrow Jackie and I plan to continue to check things off our Petersburg bucketlist. She also has the day off tomorrow, and with academic classes starting this week (which means real homework), we want to get as much in as possible while we can. 

Until next time!

Such Great Heights

I’ve had a few random thoughts I’ve been meaning to write about for a while now but I keep forgetting to do. So here they are!

1) If my host mom was an animal, she would, without a second thought, be an owl. She doesn’t wear glasses, nor does she have big eyes, but her mannerisms remind me of an owl so much. She is such a happy woman, and I can’t find a better way to say that when she gets excited she kind of hoots and ruffles her feathers. She’s quite adorable. 

2) Yesterday after the Hermitage we stopped into a little cafe place to eat пышки (peeshkey). Basically they are small donuts made out of something like fried dough, and they come with powdered sugar sprinkled on top. I ate two, which only costed 24 rubles (less than a dollar), and I could have easily eaten six more, but I would have definitely gotten sick. I am very happy I tried пышки, but the bad news is I discovered last night a пышки cafe literally right across from my apartment. Rut roh. 

3) There are so many men in uniform around here that I would almost call seeing them walking around the streets a daily occurrence. They wear green uniforms, head to toe, and they wear the stereotypical furry Russian hats. When they are all together and moving as a crowd you feel like you’re back in the Soviet Union... and obviously I’ve never been there before. There are a lot of moments where you see people, how they’re dressed more often than not, and you forget that the USSR collapsed over twenty years ago. It’s really cool, but also quite frightening when you see them out of the corner of your eye before you realize they’re not actually after YOU. 

4) I don’t know why this story matters, but I still think about it in the metro sometimes. Last weekend, when I was waiting above the escalators in the metro for friends, I watched a little girl walk by me, hand in hand with her father (I hope). Like all the children I’ve seen walking around the city, this little girl (she must have been 5 or 6) was walking in a giant snow suit. She swished back and forth like a giant marshmallow, with only her pink face and hands sticking out of her outfit. Again, I don’t know why this hit me so hard, but when she got off the escalator and I watched her walk towards me, I noticed that her eyes were red as if she had just been crying a minute ago. The thing is though, she was still recovering. Her little chest must have been heaving slightly unevenly for me to notice, but the weirdest part was that she wasn’t really crying. She was silently weeping, in my opinion. Now, have you ever seen a child of 5 or 6 weep? Of course they cry (I cried all the time when I was little; I was THAT kid [Oh Liv you still cry all the time stoppit]), but they sob and howl if they do in fact cry. It’s never a quiet affair. If a little kid cries, dear lord do they cry. Actually, hearing children cry makes me want to strangle something, but I digress. Let’s not get my blood boiling from the safety of my quiet, peaceful, comfy bed. Anyways, this girl was hiding any sorrow she felt, and she struck me as so outrageously courageous and brave I wanted to die right then and there. Her dad seemed to walk along, holding her hand, as if he had no idea. I, on the other hand, felt my stomach flip when I saw this little girl, and that NEVER happens to me. My god! What an image that will forever be burned into my memory! 

I think that’s all the random thoughts I wanted to get down for now. Without further ado, I’ll pick up from where I left off last time. "Mykonos" ended when I told you all I was getting ready to go out. Not too long after I stopped writing I met Jackie, Beryl, and Fabi outside the metro station closest to me, and we walked back towards my apartment towards the bar called Толстой Фраер (Fat Friar). We were lucky enough to get a both right in front of the big projection screen where they had the Olympics on. We ordered our beers and talked while we watched luge and skiing. The waitress gave us complimentary beer snacks which consisted of salty pretzels, weird, hard bread tidbits, a slice of cheese, and a skinny, long fish. Yes, I kid you not there was a grey fish on our plate, with scales and eyes and everything. We all looked at each other like, “how are we supposed to eat this?” Like we would actually eat it if we knew how. I think they were herring (Rasputin loved herring, fun fact), but between that and the fish soup I had yesterday for lunch, I had had enough of fish for the day. As a result, we piled the fish onto one plate and made them say funny things (yayyy maturity). I had a really fun time, and I definitely want to go back to that bar again sometime. 

When I woke up the next morning I only had a few hours before I was supposed to walk to St. Isaac’s Cathedral where we were having an excursion at 1 pm. To be honest, I don’t know very much about St. Isaac’s Cathedral. It’s fairly close to Smolny and I walk past it often, so I appreciated our excursion there. As you would expect, this Cathedral, which has a huge golden dome at the top and giant columns around the whole building's exterior, is shiny and magnificent inside. Its much bigger than the Church on Spilled blood, but no less ornate. There are mosaics everywhere and the ceilings are works of art. The doors are huge and have statues coming out of them (are those called reliefs? I don’t know). There is so much gold, of course, and the colors catch your attention every which way. Our tour guide was a sweet old woman with white hair and bright blue eyes who spoke very slowly and enunciated every word, much to our appreciation. The tour lasted half an hour, and after a little intermission to take pictures, we all headed to the top of the cathedral where visitors are allowed priceless views of the city. We proceeded to climb up stairs that wound up in a way I thought would make me nauseous (not as bad as Blarney Castle though). When we finally got to the top, however, you forgot all about the walk up. You were instantly greeted with panoramic views of the city. While the sky was super grey out today, you could still spot all your main points of interest. It was wicked cool to be able to spot the top of the Church on Spilled Blood and see its location relative to the Hermitage, whose up close green color looks more blue and aqua from a distance. You could see smoke stacks in the distance, and the tops of all these tall, colorful buildings. It was my favorite part of today, and while my trusty camera can capture images really well, I don’t think any photograph could grasp what your eyes could see from all the way up there (which wasn’t too too high up for the record). When we finished with St. Isaac’s, we walked a few streets over for lunch. There, we had a cucumber, tomato, cilantro and eggplant salad, borsht soup, some kind of chicken with mashed potatoes, and then some apple (?) crumble for dessert. I snagged a seat right in front of a tv, and I watched speed skating as I ate. 

Thoroughly feeling our food comas, we all made our way back to the metro to head home. Once I got back, I turned on my host parents' radio to Эхо Москвы and listened to it in the background as I worked on edits for an application. Nina Vasilievna and Alexander were at their dacha today, so I took my laptop to the kitchen table, made myself some peppermint tea, and worked there until my laptop’s battery went red. Later, I heated up the pelmeni soup Nina Vasilievna left for me, and read my book and ate. 

Sunday well spent I’d say! 

Mykonos

Of two things right now I am absolutely certain. The first is that I am about to burst I am so full. I got back to the apartment feeling as if I may starve to death, and maybe 25 minutes later I felt like I would collapse of a full stomach. The second is that I am beyond paranoid that the Russians are monitoring all my internet activity and that they don’t like what I write about on this blog and that they’ve decided to shut me down! I published a new post earlier today and I haven’t been able to access my blog since. The page loads but there is no writing. Did they not like my comment about Medvedev’s flippers?! Was it something I said about the 5 year plan?? I’M SORRY RUSSIA! I certainly hope that my fear is irrational and that you all can see this post as well as the one I published this morning, “We Will Rock You.” 

Given that its not you, it’s me, I will continue. This morning I had the Russian version of oatmeal, and some bread with some slice of sausage and cheese. Fairly typical, but I gobbled it up. For lunch I had fish soup. The soup had in it, besides the boiled fish, potatoes, carrots, onions, and other green herbs. My dad would have licked the bowl clean and gone back for thirds, but this fish soup conquered me. I ate everything minus the fish, which was too slippery for me to swallow. Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE fish. I eat it all the time at home and at Conn, but texture matters to me, and I prefer my fish baked. When I can see scaly fish heads floating in a pot on the stove, and then parts of its still grey body in my soup, I wasn’t sure I could do it. When Nina Vasilievna asked me if I liked it, I hesitated and said that I liked it but with a tone that said I was seriously unsure. I felt bad leaving the bowl empty minus the fish; Nina Vasilievna and her husband do not waste food, and I usually don’t like to either. Thousands of lectures growing up under my dad's roof has taught me that. I felt pretty bad, but I have since clarified my disposition towards this soup with my host mom, and I don’t think she’ll make me eat it again. Thankfully she didn’t eat with me either so she didn’t have to see me hesitate through each gulp. At one point I couldn’t get the song “fish heads” out of my head. In fourth or fifth grade Meghan made me a mixed CD (“Dig it” from the Holes sound track as well as Uncle Cracker’s “Fish in the Sea” were also featured on it) and one of the songs was called “Fish Heads.” The only line you really remember from it, even 10 years later goes like this: “Fish heads, fish heads, rollie pollie fish heads/ Fish heads fish heads floating in your soup! Fish heads, fish heads, rollie pollie fish heads/ Fish heads fish heads eat them up yum!” I can’t believe I still remember that, and no, rollie pollie fish heads, I will not eat you up yum. 

After lunch I took the metro to Gostiny Dvor on Nevsky Prospekt where I met Jackie, Beryl, Hunter and Sierra for the Hermitage part deux. It was very warm outside. I had to take my jacket off in the metro, and while you could still see your breath when you walked outside, you have to believe me when I say the temperature wasn’t bad. It didn’t take us that long from there to get to palace square and then into the Hermitage. There were much longer lines this week, and we had to wait for 20 minutes before reaching the ticket offices. We all showed our student ID’s, I payed 200 rubles to take pictures, we checked our coats, and we were off. We resumed where Jackie, Beryl and I left off. In short, we spent another 3 hours in the Hermitage, and we covered most of the second half of the first floor. I don’t think we got through it all, but pretty darn close. I don’t know what it is, but there’s something about museums that seriously drains me of all my energy. Just standing and looking at art I guess exhausts me! When we got done, I think I was ready to have been done half an hour before that. 

We mostly saw Greek and Italian art today. The first half of our time there was spent walking through Greek sculptures whose stone looked so soft and cold I just wanted to touch every statue I walked past. What do those curls feel like? How about that beard? Your chiseled abs? Touch, touch, touch. If I did, however, I probably wouldn’t be here to write about it, for they would have thrown me into one of Russia’s toughest prisons by now for having caused an entire statue to disintegrate by merely touching it (remember what happened when I went to get Sochi gear?). No matter. We walked through more statues and vases, busts and tables with coins and jewels. We passed briefly through an Egyptian section where there was a mummy. Now, I don’t know how old he or she is, but damn. It’s really hard to imagine that that body (and those teeth!) have not been reduced to dust by this point. Very impressive. After the Greek and Roman section we continued onto rooms and rooms of Italian paintings, that, after a while, all started to look the same. The people started to look the same, the babies all seemed to become one little roll of pink pudge, and all the angels became the backgrounds of the paintings instead of something worth focusing on. I’m sorry for all of you that love and appreciate art. I sincerely wish I knew what I was looking at most of the time, but these were my reactions. Nevertheless, I’m really glad I saw it all. There were even a few Leonardo Da Vincis and Michelangelos which was cool. 

We concluded our time at the Hermitage with a look through the medieval armor (?) section. There, full suits of armor, complete with heavy swords, knives, and guns were presented behind glass cages. There were also four stuffed horses with suits of armor riding them in the middle of the exhibit which was wicked cool. Meanwhile I kept thinking about how excited I was for the new Game of Thrones season to come out...

Okie dokes, I’m going to get ready to go out and I don't have time to edit so excuse all my typos! Tomorrow we’re having an excurison to St. Isaac’s Cathedral. Sweet! 

We Will Rock You

Ladies and gentlemen THE WINTER OLYMPICS!! To be honest, I haven’t really followed the winter olympics too religiously before (I much prefer the summer ones), but I'm hoping to change that and watch as much of the games here as I can. The TV in my host family’s apartment is in my host parents’ bedroom, and I don’t see myself trying to configure their radio (I may change my mind about that later), so it may be tough to keep up with every single event, but I’m definitely going to try. 

Most of yesterday was spent waiting for the opening ceremony. We had tests in grammar and conversation, and I think they went fairly well. To be frank, while I would very much like to do well on these tests, I want to give them as accurate an assessment of my language skills as possible. Don't get me wrong, I would be more than happy if I did really well, but I just don’t want them to get the idea that I know what I’m doing. That would be false. I want to get placed into the group (we were already placed into groups for the 2 week language intensive, but this test we just took with further determine whether I will stay or move around to a different group) that does the most review because most of that “review” will actually be new material for me. The possibility of me changing groups is not based solely on these tests, however. My RSL professors also know me and my level from working with me in class, so chances are I won’t go anywhere and I am totally okay with that. 

After the test I made my way back to Vasilievsky. I went to the gym, which was less scary than it was the day before, and then I went back home to unwind for the rest of the afternoon.  I caught up on emails, Facebook messages, and instead of working on an application for future plans while I had some free time and no homework, I decided to crawl in bed and read instead. I picked up Eat Pray Love from where I left off last, and for the next few hours I followed Elizabeth Gilbert around the Ashram in rural India and painfully chanted the Gurugita along with her for however many pages I got through. 

Then, at 5:30, I signed onto Skype and waited for Laurel Daly to call me. For one week every year, the Lower School at Waynflete has whats called “Global Focus Week.” They pick one country to study for that week, and I remember from my time in Lower School that we had special events devoted to culture and sometimes we even cooked traditional dishes. Basically, this year the Lower School chose Russia for Global Focus Week, and I was asked if I could Skype 2-3 and 4-5 to talk a little bit about my time in St. Petersburg. I Skyped with the 2nd and 3rd graders first, and I talked about why I was in Russia, what the main differences between Russia and the US are that I’ve noticed so far, what the food is like, what the city is like, etc... I think it went well! I don’t know how to talk to children AT ALL though. I don’t know how much they know, and to be safe I simply talk to them as if they were my age (because my god do I remember vividly how much I loathed adults talking to be as if I were a child). I don’t mean to, but I cannot be cute with kids. I just don’t know how! Some people have a natural gift for being around kids, and that’s great for them, but I have no such talent. Dogs, on the other hand, are a completely different story. I converse with dogs like I should interact with children. My voice gets stupid. I stick my tongue out and just want to squeeze them. I call them cute and adorable and I will literally get on the floor to play with them. I just can’t do that with kids! Unless they’re something REALLY special, in which case my heart will swell and I may spontaneously burst into tears (a rare, but possible occurrence). Babysitting stresses me out. I’m convinced whoever I’m babysitting will choke on milk and/or just stop breathing without any reason, at any moment. I’m a complete mess over little humans, and while I’m jealous of those who can whisper to younglings, I’m okay with how I am for now (and there goes any possible babysitting job someone may offer me). Let’s be real, I prefer dogs! But, as I always tell myself in these moments of why-aren’t-you-like-any-other-girl-in-society-who-is-100%-certain-they-want-kids, I think I would feel differently about my own child. Have I ever ranted to you about how much I wish I could travel back in time to hang out with myself when I was 5? 10? 16?! Oh man. If I could hang out with little Livy at 6 I would absolutely die. I believe Little Livy would think Bigger Livy was pretty cool, tee hee. But that’s a completely different can of worms, children, and I won’t bore you any further with that  topic. However, I was thinking on the walk back from the gym yesterday that if I knew as a 2nd or 4th grader that in however many years as an alumni that I would be Skyping with 2-3 and 4-5 about why I was in Russia, I would have been beyond confused. If I knew the expression “what the fuck?!” existed and/or felt brave enough to use it back then, that would have been the first thing out of my mouth. 

Moving on, because I was skyping with the 4-5 until about 7 pm my time, I had told my friends that I would be late and that I would meet them at the bar. The original plan was to meet at the Belgian Beer Bar and have dinner there so we could get good seats in front of the TV there. Unfortunately, the second I left the apartment I got a call from Jackie saying that the whole bar was full and that there were so tables left. They were on their way back to Adam and Alicia’s dorm, where they have a TV, and that which is literally right across the street from Smolny, and that they would meet me at the end of the bridge on the other side. No problem. I made my way to the bridge, taking the same route I do every morning. When I finally got to the embankment before the bridge, I thought I spotted a group of people up ahead and I started to run towards it. Turns out it wasn’t my group of friends, and I thought that maybe I had gotten to the bridge before my group. Suddenly, something caught my eye on the other side of the bridge. It’s Hunter’s red jacket! I immediately spot the group following him, but for some reason, they’re on the other side of the bridge (but guys, the bar was on my side... did you do a big loop?). Nevertheless, I walked in sync with them on the other side of the bridge. When I thought I caught someone’s glance, I started jumping up and down and waving my hands like a bafoon (characteristic Liv). I actually tried shouting “JENNNAAAA!!!” and “SEANNNN!!!” but of course, to no avail over the noise of the passing cars. Ten minutes later I met up with them and we made our way over to Alicia and Adam’s place. We stopped at a small grocery store to get beer, and I randomly picked two with St. Petersburg written on the label. It was definitely a risk, but they bottles looked legit (lovely reasoning on my part). For two large beers I payed $3, and they were actually really good! One was sweeter than the other, and I even wrote the name down so that I could look for it again. 

Once in Adam and Alicia’s suite, we spread ourselves out throughout the room with the TV in it. Over the next 30-45 minutes, we struggled to find a place that delivers pizza. Oh you could imagine all of us. A herd of Americans trying to order pizza in Russia. Most of us had not eaten dinner, and we were getting a little ravenous. Luckily, Will and Sean came through. Adam collected all the money, and in what seemed like hours later, 4 large pizzas arrived (they weren't bad either!). We all sat crammed in Adam’s room and waited anxiously for the opening ceremony to begin. People were checking the time constantly, and you could tell that we were all excited. It felt like New Year’s and the Super Bowl all wrapped in one. We were a group of Americans fortunate enough to be in Russia during the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi. I’m going to be telling people that for the rest of my life!  

I’m a little ashamed to say that I haven’t seen that many olympic opening ceremonies. I was working as a hostess at a restaurant during the opening for the summer olympics in London, and the second I caught a glimpse of Daniel Craig on the TV over the bar I left my post and sat down on a bar stool. If anyone needed to come in for dinner, they would have to wait until 007’s appearance was finished. My original point was that I don’t have too much to compare Russia’s opening ceremony to, but I thought that it was pretty cool nonetheless. The initial tour through the alphabet was a lot of fun for us students of Russian. We started guessing what would come next, and people said things like “uh oh, what are they going to do with the soft sign ь?” 

I cannot tell you how happy I was to be surrounded by these people in my program. It was so awesome to be around people my age who all got our weird and incredibly specific references. I’ve been able to have nerdy conversations with my friends at Conn about Russia, but this was taken to a whole different level. We all knew what we were all taking about. We got the same jokes, we made likeminded comments, we finished each others sentences, and I loved it all. As you can imagine, I laughed the whole night. Two of the people in my program, Jenna and Beryl, have the greatest sense of humor, and their commentary throughout the whole ceremony was icing on the cake. I tried to keep a mental list going of all the ridiculous things that we’re said, and I regret not writing them down. I remember at one point I heard someone say “Once upon a december...” and then Will replied with, “Have you heard?!” to which I shouted “THERE’S A RUMOR IN ST. PETERSBURG!” If you don’t know what I’m talking about here, you missed a serious part of your childhood (or adulthood, whichever). Go out and find that animated movie “Anastasia.” It’s funny, cute, somewhat accurate (minus Anastasia’s alleged escape and Rasputin’s magic powers... OH WAIT that might actually be true too!), and totally worth the 100 minutes of your life. 

About every 20 minutes, Jackie and I asked each other why Putin was still siting in a chair, and why he wasn’t shirtless riding a bear. We all waited for that so patiently! We imitated Medvedev’s clap. Please tell me you all saw him clap. “He’s got flippers!” I cried. We spotted hammers and sickles in the background right off the bat, and we all translated the cyrillic writing before we all, with a little disappointment, saw that everybody else who doesn’t know Russian also knows what it meant too because they phrases were all translated into English. We made fun of swan lake (“are those the jellyfish from Avatar?” - Jenna), and when we saw all the dancers come out in their old fashion gowns, all the girls freaked out because one of our future excursions involves ballroom dancing lessons in dresses from the 18th or 19th century (“ladies CHILL OUT” - Hunter). We all got a kick out of the Russian hipsters from the 50s, and when everything turned red and you saw tractors and everybody working to build the Soviet state, I said, “guys, I think this is a 5 year plan.” 

That’s just a tidbit of all the different commentary we had going on during the ceremony. I had a great time. I felt silly, and after 3.5 slices of pizza (thats the number only because all the pizza ran out), my stomach was as happy as a clam. I know I’ve only been here for 2 weeks, but sometimes I feel like I’ve known these people for much longer than that. It usually takes me a while to feel comfortable with a new group of people, but I’ve become open with them so quickly, and I attribute a lot of my incredible experiences here so far to that fact. I know that once classes get started we’ll all get into our own routines and that we won’t see each other as much, but I’m glad that we’ve started off the semester with such a solid foundation. I mean, if you willingly decide to spend a semester of your college career in St. Petersburg out of all places, to continue to study Russian, you’ve got to be a little weird, a little insane, and really freakin’ cool by my standards. Before meeting these people, I knew that we were all going to have a lot in common, just by the very fact that we all decided to come here. 

Unfortunately, we were kicked out of the dorm at 11 pm (why? that’s a good question- the big guy who came in was speaking too quickly). A bunch of us walked back to Vasilievsky, and it was the first time that I walked over that bridge at night. If I thought my walk to school in the morning was beautiful, you should have been there with us on the walk back. The lights and reflection of moonlight on the snow was picturesk (how does one spell that word?). It was definitely one of those moments where I stopped and said to myself, “Ok. It’s official. I love this city.” In no time I was back home. Although we all wanted to stay out longer, the metro was going to close in too short of an amount of time to find a place to hang out. Perhaps we will get together again tonight. 

But for now, I have to go. I’m meeting up with some friends to go back to the Hermitage, where our goal is to complete the second half of the first floor, and if we’re lucky, perhaps move onto the second floor. My camera battery is charged, and with no homework to worry about, I am amped and ready to go. 

I shall report back when I can! Ta-ta.