The house that Lenin built....

Week one of the summer quarter is nearly over.  And yet, I feel like so much has happened in the past three days.  On Monday we started class.  I was late.  Everyone clapped when I came into the room.  It wasn't really my fault though.  I have this really bad habit of not using maps and not asking for help, basically just using my great sense of direction to get where I need to go.  Those of you who know me personally will agree that I always know where I'm going.  I have an inner compass of sorts.  Yeah that's it.  Well, this particular time, the stars didn't align right and Fermilab sold me shitty magnets, therefore greatly increasing the probability that I would be late to the first day of class.  The fact that the building we now meet in is half a mile from the one we originally met in also did not help.  The first day of class was test day.  This was the day I realized I can't actually speak or understand Russian.  Let me explain.  We sit down in class and we are told there will be a series of written and oral examinations, each used to determine into which of the three groups we'd be placed for the remainder of the summer.  They've split our group of 20 students into three smaller groups, each more or less arranged in terms of ability, knowledge of grammar, conversational level, etc.  The first of these tests was oral, meaning a cd was placed into the radio, some words came out at lighting speed, echoed and bounced off the walls of the auditorium, further garbling the already incomprehensible mumbo jumbo that we were supposed to be answering questions about.  Honestly, I didn't write anything because I thought they just put in the wrong cd.  No.  Not the wrong cd.  After it was over, one of the professors asked, "Well okay, are you ready for the next dialog?"  I just laughed.  First of all, it wasn't a dialog.  It was Alvin and the Chipmunks on crack.  It was okay though.  I'm 99% sure that no one understood a word of that first dialog.  The remaining ones, however, did get easier.  

 

After our oral examinations were a series of written ones testing, specifically, our knowledge of grammar.  Imagine the reading comprehension, sentence structure, and vocabulary sections of the ACT, only in a language that is in no currently discernable way related to your own.  I actually felt pretty comfortable with this portion of test day, and therefore, was placed, in my opinion, into a group that fits my level pretty well.  I'd like to think that I'm in the "best" group, but I suppose we'll never know for sure.  From what I've noticed so far, everyone in my group, which consists of 7  people, converses at a fairly reasonable level and knows the inns and outs of most Russian grammar topics.  Our teachers are great. Everyday begins with conversation hour, in which our professor, Rais (Ra - ees), gives us topics to converse about.  I enjoy it.  He's awesome.  Lately we've been discussing the problems "Mega polis" cities like Moscow, Hong Kong, New Delhi, New York, etc. face in terms of overcrowding, jobs, crime, pollution, etc.  It's interesting.  One of my classmates is a graduate student from Detroit who has seen firsthand the effect the crumbling of the US auto industry has had on the region.  Crazy stuff.  After conversation hour, which is everyday, we have other courses on grammar, phonetics, reading Russian authors, and "the language of Mass Media".  I'm really looking forward to the Mass Media class.  Basically, that's it in terms of school so far.   Today we were surprised with a very kind "Welcoming Party" provided by the university. There was champagne, Russian cuisine, nice conversation and lots of toasts.  Again, very enjoyable.   Masha, Natalya (and sometimes Zhenya) are three wonderful Russian girls who have been given the difficult task of working with a group of 20 wiley Americans throughout the summer. They've all been very hospitable and patient.  Although I'm sure the three of them speak English better than I do, I won't have the privilege of hearing it on this trip as English is forbidden until we've crossed Russia's western border once again 8 weeks from now.  This means the girls must constantly repeat themselves, speak as if to 5 year olds, explain the true meanings of idioms, answer questions about everything from currency exchange to verb choice and, of course, no day would be complete without 75,000 "How do you say this's".  Again, not an easy job.  Plus, they're all just really nice and in more ways than not, exactly like us....just makin' ends as they say.  

 

I've taken an interest in things not exactly on the syllabus.  Nothing bad.  I'm not over here shooting heroin.  I've been using my free time to take pictures of Russian graffiti.  I don't really know why yet.  Maybe I'll write a book about it someday.  So far, my favorite thing to do is grab my bag, my camera and, most importantly, my shades and just walk around along the central boulevard, listening, observing, etc.  I am but a fly on the wall, a distant observer.  I slip amongst them like a transparent....thing.  Yesterday, Masha took 4 of us to a concert.  It was pretty unbelievable.  The concert was at a music school in the city.  One of the students played Chopin with great precision.  He studied for a long time in the Chopin school of music on Poland.  I was most impressed.  Today we took tours of two museums.  The first of which was the "History of Kazan' State University" museum.  Pretty cool stuff.  I was able to sit not only in the same auditorium that Tolstoy studied law, but in the exact same seat that Lenin took everyday during his studies.  It felt weird.  And hard.  The benches were like those old style catholic church pews.  You know, the one's that force you to have great posture.  My house mom showed me the large, red cabin-looking place that Lenin used to live in.  It's a block away.  No big deal.  Sasha, the 16 yr old I live with, has taken an interest in how many pushups I can do.  I told him the truth.  One thousand.  On a bad day.  He showed me the small "stadium" by our apartment, in which I've been working out lately.  There's a track, pull-up bars, tires (not sure yet what these are used for) and always a group of kids playing basketball.  Old school.  

 

Just a couple more observations before I go.  The majority of the graffiti I've seen has been in English, but not cuss words.  Why would that be?  I haven't yet photographed it, but I saw a spray painted outline of a young woman on a wall and next to it, in somewhat broken English, was written, "All I really want is you to love me...".  I still don't know what to make of it.  What else?  Oh yes.  Think back to your stoner days.  Remember hacky sack?  Yeah, that's huge here now.  Make of it what you will.  I haven't yet decided if the hacky sack fad is just now reaching Kazan'17 years later, or if it's found its rebirth in Kazan' and will soon return (from the future) to take the sporting universe by storm.  ESPN 8 "The Ocho".  Oh yes.  White nights.  I don't care what anyone says.  There are white nights in Kazan.  Meaning, the sky is a light shade of blue until midnight.  Vsyo.  And then there's a dusk color all night followed by more light at 4am.  White nights.  Last night I saw a family pushing two strollers, laughing, drinking and eating ice cream...normal right?  It was 11:30pm.  

 

I suppose that's all for now.  I leave you with a question that puzzled me tonight.  How would you characterize the American view of friendship?  Is it wrong to tell someone you don't actually miss that you do miss them?  The idea is that this is someone from way back that perhaps at some point you were close to, but now maybe not so much.  Is it better just to tell the truth and say that you aren't really friends anymore?  Or to just go on keeping up the facade?  Consider yourself lucky you don't have to attempt to answer this god-forsaken question in Russian.  

 -Sam