Camp

Hi Guys!

I just got back from a fun four days at at a Russian summer camp! It is a camp owned by our university, so most of the people there were students at the Linguistics University, and almost all were learning English. It was a lot of fun. The camp was about an hour and a half out of the city, and it was in the woods, as were many, many, many mosquitoes. Russian mosquitoes, it should also be noted, are ENORMOUS. There was also a lake and a nice beach where we swam some, but it was a man-made lake leftover from the Soviet era, and it was very shallow, so it was kind of hard to swim. You could probably walk all the way across it. We took boats across the lake to go berry-picking one day, and we also did things like have a sand-castle building contest, and sing American karaoke for the Russian students. It was nice to relax- we celebrated the 4th of July there, and we had to make a short skit telling the history of the 4th of July for all the Russian students. We attempted to sing the National Anthem in the middle of it, not too successfully. We still had class there, but less frequently, and they were more low-key. On the last day there, in our history class, we learned that it was Ivan Kupala Day (an old Russian pagan god.) Apparently, people celebrate Ivan Kupala Day by having beach parties! I was in a cabin with 3 other girls in our group, and our cabin was literally located right next to the beach. We got to our cabin late, after our evening camp activities, and our cabin was shaking from the music they were playing. It was as if someone had placed loudspeakers in every corner of the tiny cabin. So at first it was fun- they were playing American pop music that we all knew, so we danced along in our cabin, and then we got tired, so we just kind of sat in the main room in the dark and talked (and really confused our Resident Director when she came to check on us.) The music got progressively worse, and progressively louder as the night wore on. We ended up falling asleep probably around 4 am once it ended. Looking back on it, it's actually hilarious, but I am very, very tired.

Today we left the camp, and we spent the day touring around a small Russian town called Gorodets. It was really pretty, and we visited a museum entirely of samovars! That's not something you see every day.

Then we took a bus back to the university, where each of us got on our local buses to go home. "Home" as in our host families' houses. It was kind of odd, after spending 4 days with our group of Americans outside of the city, to be going "home"- except it's not really home, it's someone else's home in an entirely different country! But I am really settling in well, and having a great time.

More soon!

Nina

Not in Kansas Anymore

Hi Everybody!

I realize it's been quite a long time since I last posted on here, but yes...I am now in Russia! I have been here so far exactly a week, and I've just been too busy to post anything. The orientation in DC was fun, and then last Saturday we all flew out of DC. We had an all-night flight, and then we landed in Moscow around 10 am local time. Then, our Nizhny group (there are 14 of us) got on a bus for about six hours, where we pretty much alternated between sleeping, singing Eminem songs, and frantically looking up words in Russian so that we would be able to communicate with our host families later.

(Oh yeah, host families!)

I have a very lovely host family. My host mom's name is Elena, my host dad is Anatoly, and my host sister is named Olesya. She is 16. I was also happy to discover they have pets; they have a dog and two cats, which is the same as my American family. We live in an apartment on the 9th floor. It's very cozy.

This is basically my daily schedule:

-Wake up at 8 am, eat breakfast, get dressed, etc
-Walk to the bus stop at 9:10-ish
-Take bus to the university
-10 am: First class, Russian history
-11 am: First Russian lesson of the day
-11:50 ish: Ten minute break
-12 pm: Second Russian lesson
-1 pm: Walk to cafe for lunch
-2 pm: Last Russian lesson of the day

Usually there is something after this as well; either consultation with the teachers or going on some excursion. Then I take the bus home, eat, do homework, usually eat again when my host parents come home from work, and then do something with my host sister. Yesterday was Saturday, so I pretty much caught up on sleep all day, did homework, and then my host sister took me to this amusement park. Unfortunately, between the two of us we were scared of most of the rides, so we ended up just going on 3. But there was this lovely path through the woods that went along the Volga, so we walked there, and some guy took a picture of us, which was kinda awkward.

Well, I have to go-- will try and post again soon!

-Nina