Another Day

So, Samantha and I went for a picnic today near the university right by the Moscow River. It was fun. The weather was beautiful and we ate lots of snacks and just talked about what we've been doing and how much we both hate and yet love Denner for sending us here. We're not really sure how we got sucked into this major...it's like Denner just forces you into it while making you think it's your own decsion when really it wasn't. These are the things Sam and I talked about while sitting on the river. A perfect end to the weekend if I say so myself. On the way home I went picture happy with the yellowing leaves. Enjoy the photos. I'll update soon.

Where I Live

So, I don't think most people comprehend how HUGE this building is that I live in. Sometimes I don't even think I know how big it is. At night when I come home and it's all lit up I just stare and I think to myself "Holy crap. This is my house!" So, I decided that I would post some pictures of the outside of MGU so maybe you might have an idea of what I'm surrounded by everyday.

Pictures

So, people have been complaning that I haven't been putting up enough pictures and that the ones I do put up of buildings should have me in them. So, today after class (cause I finished at 12:20 today) Karoliina and I just decided that we didn't want to be inside the campus or anything and so we left. We went to Tverskaiya Ulitsia and just walked around took pictures. We stopped by a coffee house where we were able to pick up a copy of the Moscow Times which is an English newspaper and we had dinner had an Italian resturant on one of the little side streets. Then we walked down to Red Square and took pictures there for awhile and now we're home. The pictures in this post and the post before are from today. Some are from the University Metro station, Pushkin Square, Red Square, St. Basil's, Lennin's Mausoleum, places like that. All in all, it was a great day. Now I'm headed back to my room to do my homework and relax. I've been busy the last couple of days. :) :)

Saturday Night

Saturday night Karoliina, Anders and I went to a club called Propaganda. The night was very interesting. The club itself is actually really nice. It's kind of small which makes the atmosphere really cozy, you're able to actually GET to the bar (which is sometimes nearly impossible in the US) and yet the place was packed. The music was interesting. I'm not use to Techno music and people dancing. The three of us danced all night from like midnight till 4. I met a couple of English guys (one of whom was dancing with me and trying to make out with me without even knowing my name cause he was so drunk). It was actually kind of funny because his other friend was like 'Ok buddy, time to back away and go to the bar.' When the guys first started talking to me they were speaking in Russian and I asked where they came from and they said England (in Russian of course) and I told them I was from America and I don't think they quite understood because the one guy started saying in Russian how he was tired of dealing with Russians and it was nice to meet another foreigner and then I said in English "You know you can speak in English. I will understand, being from America and all" and his eyes just lit up with this "Holy shit another English speaking person." Needless to say the night was interesting. We all danced until 4 and then Anders found the 3 of us a cab and we came back to the university and then I got up early to go to the football game. Life is good in Russia right now.

Football! (and of course by football I mean soccer)

A bunch of us went to a football game today where two Russian teams played each other. Locomotive and Spartik. The fans were absolutly CRAZY! They yelled and screamed and chanted and cursed. Worse I think then American Football fans during games such as FSU and UF (and that's saying a lot). This was suppose to be one of the 'calm' games and there still must have been nearly 500 police officers and militia standing guard all over the stadium and grounds. The game itself was actually a very good one. The score was tied until the last like minute of the game when the home team (Locomotive) scored and won.
The pictures are all from the game. It was great fun.

Just a little update

Don't get me wrong...I'm LOVING it here, but the way things work here is absolutely crazy! The office keeps telling us that we don't need a registration and yet the police are stopping some of the people at night and demanding it and then bribing money from them up to like 1000 rubles which is about $40 American dollars. So the office tells us no such thing exists and then magically it does and to come back tomorrow but then it's still not ready and to come back the next day and the next and nothing ever seems to get done. Jim has decided that we should all just go sit in the office everyday after class and wait for something that isn't going to come. They're telling us that we don't need it but we do, they don't have it but they do, it'll be ready the next day but it's not. It's a lot of fun let me tell you. Besides that I really do love it here.
My class is a little bit of a joke. I mean really when the teacher looks at you and says скажите пожалуйста, сколько вам лет? (Tell me please, how old are you?) I almost want to slap them. Really, I don't need to be going over how old I am and what my name is and where I'm from. I need a conversational class that is going to expand my vocabulary and teach what I need to have everday conversations with Russians. Bah. Whatever. Too late to change now I guess.

More Pictures

Some more pictures!!! There's one of me just near Red Square, one of the street that the Tretyakov is on, one of the front of the Tretyakov and one with the enterance to Red Square (the big red building.)

Kremlim visit

We went to the Kermlin today and it was absolutely amazing. I would have taken pictures of the outside but it was wet and raining and very very cold. It's the first cold day we've actually had in Russia. It reminded me a lot of Florida because it was a wet cold and it kind of soaked you to the bone. I've had a chill since I woke up this morning. Our guide for the Kermlin, Lena, was very very nice. She took us through some of the churches. The Church of the Assumption is where the Tsars were married and coranated. The inside was decorated in frescos and icons depicting the Virgin's Assumption to Heaven. I wish I could have taken pictures but of course you can't for obvious reasons with caring for the art. The second church was of the Archangel Michael where Russian rulers were buried up until the time of Peter the Great I believe but I can't quite remember so don't quote me on that.
I really loved getting to see these churches. I had studied them with Dr. Steeves in his Survery of Russian Civilization class and I was fascinated by them and their vast history. These churches have stood through wars and political upheavel. One can't help but be in complete awe of their simple elegance and design.
Lena also took us to the Armory which is a state museum now. It houses carriages, clothing, jewals, silverware, and weapons. We were able to see the coronation gown of Catherine the Great and Alexandra, the last Tsarina of Russia. In some cases it was almost impossible to imagine that woman such as Catherine had been so tiny. I mean really their waists must have been the size of my thigh or something. THEY WERE SOOO TINY! Honestly, as I was looking at some of the robes and jewals I felt like it was such a waste of pearls and diamonds. I mean seriously, does a horse really need a jewal studded headpeice encrusted with over 1,000 diamonds? I think not....but whatever.
I'm really starting to make friends here as well. We have like this little international group. Jim is from England, Ozge is a Turkish Greek who lives in America, Hilda is from Normay and Marilyn is from Sweden. Then we also have Jessica from Florida and Johann from Sweden who sometimes join us. It's nice because sometimes we speak Russian to each other and then when we don't understand we just switch to English. We also have one thing in common that really pulls us together and that's our complete and inexplainable fascination with Russia. None of us can explain it but we've just always been drawn to this country for some reason and now we are all getting to experience it together.

Some pictures...

The first is Samantha, Becka and I in front of the Lennin Library, followed a picture of the common room on my floor. The next three are views from my window. The first of these is directly across from me so this is exactly what my sector of the dorm looks like. The last picture is the front of the main sector where all the shops and cafes are.

Correction

So of course Denner has been reading my blog and I've now had two corrections on my Russian. It's not рыка (which actually means roar) it's рынок. There I've corrected myself. I never said my Russian was perfect and I'm sure Denner would atest that it's not. ;)

Don't get use to this...

I will not be posting everyday, but since I had my first class today and I met with the man who will be my supervisor at the Tretyakov I figured I should post about it.
My First class was very interesting. It was four hours long with a 20 minute break from 12:20 to 12:40. My teacher's name is Anna Leopoldovna. She is very nice and although it's a little frustrating that she doesn't speak english at all (she knows a few words here and there) I kind of like the fact that I'm completely submersed in the language and forced to use all of my knowledge to answer a question only half right. I don't think I did badly. She excellent after a few of my answers which made me feel good. I guess we'll as time progresses. I have classes everyday for 4 hours. One would think my Russian would be much better by the time I leave. Time will only tell.
My meeting at the Tretyakov went well. Everyone I met was very nice, especially the man who met me at the enterence. He spoke very little english but I knew enough Russian to understand most of what he was saying. He took me through a couple of the galleries and even though we barely understood each other you could tell that we both were completely happy walking around the museum silent, staring at these priceless works of Russian art. He's going to have me translate Russian to English for their website and most of it I can do from my dorm room which is nice. I think I might actually go to the museum once a week as my classes make it difficult to be there very often since they are in the middle of the day really. I'll get a museum pass with my picture on it and everything. The cool thing about that is that the pass allows me to get into every museum in Moscow for FREE! Museums of Moscow here I come!

These are a couple pictures of my dorm room. I don't have a roomate and I'm not sure if I'll get one but right now I'm ok with that. There are two rooms that share a little enterence way with a toilet on one side and a shower and sink on the other. More pictures to come. Promise!

The First Few Days

Well I've been here since Monday and it's now Wednesday. So far it's been quite interesting. I don't think my feel have ever hurt so badly in my entire life.
My room isn't all that bad really. It reminds me somewhat of the new dorms but less nice of course. I have my own room which is very small but I have a bed, a big closet, a dresser with shelves and a desk. I'm also on the ninth floor so I have a fantastic view of the rest of the main building and the rest of the city. The main building is HUGE! It can house 30,000 students, has two cafeterias, a few cafes, a laundry room, multiple kiosks that sell everything from water to meat, a bank, ATMS, phone services, clothing stores, and numerous other areas where students recieve their books and buy notebooks, paper and pens. The building is so huge that it alone has it's own zipcode! Jim and I (Jim is an English guy who is using the same program I am and toured with me the first day I got here with the director) were trying to find our way to the рыка (Ree-Ka) which is an open air market and we accidently took an entire loop around the main building and that took us the best part of an hour! This is why my feet are now killing me because I was wearing highheels in an effort to fit in and my feet just can't take that.
The way the dorms are set up are very strange. The entire building is connected but yet in order to get to the main sector of the building you have to go outside your sector of the dorm and reenter throug the middle into the main part of the building. Also they issue each student a Propeskt which you have to show a guard inorder to enter the grounds of the University. Then when you enter your dorm sector you have to show another guard you student ID (I don't have one yet so I have to show them my passport) and my Propeskt so they know that I actually live in that sector. If you don't live in that sector you must leave your ID with the guard until you leave again. I don't think they allow anyone without a Propeskt into the main University/dorm area (unless of course you bribe the guards which happens often and works very well). A few hundred rubles is all it costs to get your friends into the dorm grounds. very strange indeed.
I finally met Molly (a woman Dr. Denner put me in touch with) She, Jim and I had dinner last night at a Georgian resturant. The food was amazing. I had a spiced chicken, something with eggplant in it that you put on the bread this Georgian specialty bread that has egg and cheese in it. SO GOOD!
When I first got here I had very little time to do anything. I wandered around and found CafeMax where I used the internet to make my first post and then I went back to my room and 30 minutes later Josh showed up with Jim ready to take me to the center of Moscow. First he showed up around the main university building where we live, then he showed us where to registar the next day (which is a completely different building), took us to the рыка and down to a shopping center that's basically a mall but smaller and it has a продукты (products) store where you can buy groceries as well as cloths and other things. It's like a mall with a grocery store. The Josh took us on the Metro and showed up where to buy passes to use the Metro and he then took up to the Lennin Library and walked from there to Red Sqaure. I didn't have my camera on me or else I would have posted pictures but we are taking a trip to the Kermlin this coming Sunday so I'll be sure to take pictures then.
Jim and I went to registar for class yesterday day and since yesterday they've made us take two of almost the exact same test to gage our level of Russian. We start class tomorrow at 10:50 with another girl, also from Florida (She graduated from UCF) and it's to be just the three of us in our class. That will be very interesting indeed.

I'm here!

Well, I've been in Moscow since 10:30 this morning (Moscow time) and so far it's been quite an adventure. Absolutely NO one understands what I'm trying to say and my Russian isn't quite good enough to communicate everything needs. My bedroom isn't all that bad but the matress isn't all that comfortable and my sink spits water at me everytime I turn it on. The shower looks like there's mold growing on it (I checked and there isn't but it still LOOKS like it) and the girls here dress so nicely they'd put my cousin Stephanie to shame. I'm not quite sure what I got myself into but I'm hoping this turns out to be everything I dreamed it would. I've waited my whole life to be out on my own in a foriegn country; let's hope I don't screw it up.