Another Week Gone By....

That's right. Another week gone by. Although Andrea will gladly argue the opposite, everything here seems to be going by so fast. I have to make a conscious effort to make mental notes, written notes, take photographs, etc. of things I see and experience. It's all almost too much to take in. Life with my host mom is wonderful. We talk all the time about everything and she still yells at me everyday about something. Today it was for ringing the doorbell more than once. I waited a good 20 seconds before ringing the second time, thinking maybe she didn't hear. She opened with, "Hi! How was your day? Did you finish all your homework? Why the hell did you ring the doorbell twice?" It was pretty funny. Last night we had a long talk about Russian-American relations. She won't come out and say it to me directly, but I think she thinks the majority of those who are poor in Russia are poor because the US has taken their money. This might be true in some way or another, but personally, I think the Russian government plays a larger role in the poverty of Russia than the American government does. After that joyfilled conversation, she said she didn't like talking about that stuff and turned on the Russian version of "America's Got Talent". Oh, another show that's huge here...Judge Judy. Only, it's a Russian judge, obviously. It's crazy how many American products, replications of American television shows, etc. you see on television here. It's like there's no escape. The only positive is that I can practice my "Active Listening" skills when they're on. Active listening is something we do when a topic is boring. We listen to decipher parts of speech, case usage, intonation, sentence structure etc. Basically, paying less attention to the overall meaning and more attention to the structure of what's being said.

School is going very well. Our teachers are professionals who know exactly what they're doing. They've been happy with us too. They say we're the best they've seen, which is nice to hear. Everyone, at least in my group, is in class everyday, active, ready to dive in. It's nice because the teachers don't just teach. They are so passionate about given topics. The last couple days in our conversation course have been devoted to a discussion of ecological problems in the US and Russia. We were asked the question, "As awareness and concern for the earth's natural environment grows, is it possible that in the US, the Green Party could potentially break up the age old two party system?" I think it's possible, but a long shot. Personally, there are other factors that will break apart the two party system (and I hope they do) long before conservation will.

Tomorrow we go to a traditional (I can only assumer formerly Pagan) holiday festival called "Sabantui", which I think means "Scythe holiday". We celebrate work from what I understand. There are supposed to be games, food, music, dance, etc. I'm looking forward to it. Tomorrow night will be the first of a couple operas as well, but I can't remember which we're seeing tomorrow. I'll write about it later. I suppose that's all for now. Another week gone by far too quickly. I'm going to try to start slowing things down, but I fear that will be impossible.