More Pictures.

Due to a lot of grumbling, mainly from my mother and Steph, here is a link to my album of pictures on Facebook.

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=284725&id=565627999&l=b0268b7cef

Please let me know if it doesn't work correctly, if it does work, ENJOY! :D

Chmok Chmok,
TaanTaan

A Lunch Date with Putin

First, I have expanded my list of things I miss: Coffee, my mom, free bathrooms (you know about those ones), I also really miss coffee TO-GO, this does not exist. And I miss American speedlimits, there are zero speed limits here, and SIDEWALKS. My Russian mama asked me what I missed, and I very emphatically said: Ya skuchaio po trabuaru!! I miss sidewalks!!! And she just cracked up.

I love making my host mom laugh. I say the weirdest things sometimes.
For example, she asked me about Barack Obama. "Do you like Barack Obama? Tell me what you think about him as a president and as a person." I explained that I do like him, I am not a fanatic, but I like him well enough. I also explained that I think he has/had a lot of potential, but he hasn't done enough to take advantage of his potential. I also said, I find him very interesting as a person, and would love to meet him. So then of course, I asked her about Putin, and she said a lot of stuff I did not understand a WORD of, but she did say that at times she is ashamed of him. But, she added, not as ashamed as she was of Yeltsin, which I told her was very understandable. (If you don't know why she would be ashamed of Yeltsin, read this: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/341959.stm)
And then we talked about Putin for a while, and she told me that its difficult to live somewhere where the people are not expected to know or be a part of political affairs. I asked her about Medvedev and she said that she didn't dislike him, she likes him just fine, and that he's just a regular guy, there's not much to like OR dislike. Which I found FASCINATING, and totally true now that I think about it.
She asked me what I thought of Putin, and I told her, in complete honesty, that he scares me, but that I am absolutely intrigued by him.
"Why are you scared of him??" She said, starting to laugh.
This I could not explain well in Russia, so I said rather elementarily "He is strong, and cunning, and harpoons whales, and fly fishes, and judo fights, and rides horses and fights fires and he was in the KGB!"
She laughed again and nodded.
But I followed that up with "However, I would still love to have lunch with him someday."
"Does he know that??" She asked me.
I laughed loudly, and said, sheepishly "Nooo..."
She grinned and looked around the room, "Now he does!!" she said.
And my eyes just got reallllllllly big and I darted my eyes at the corner she had looked at with the vent in it.
Then we BOTH just laughed until we cried. Little did I know, all I had to do is say I wanted lunch with him out loud in Russia, and he'll know ;) God, my Russian mama is HILARIOUS. I am so lucky.


Also, gin and tonic in a CAN. SO SO SO SO SO good! And SO CHEAP. Like less then 2 dollars.
Anddddd even better than gin and tonic in a can? GIN AND GRAPEFRUIT in a can!!!
I'm never going back to America, this place rocks, I can survive a few sidewalks for this fantasy.

Kak Obyichna Chmok Chmok,
Vasha Taan Taan

I did it! Pictures! Finally. With the painstaking speed of death.

Here are the pictures, long awaited, with bated breath I am sure, they appear small, but if you click on them they are gigantic so check them out.

This is the incredibly pretty garden I found near Sarah's apartment.
It is such a little haven, as residential areas in Novgorod can be unkempt. I wanted to sit in it and read immediately...
but I guessed that would have been frowned upon.

Remember the bells I told you about?? HERE THEY ARE!!
Gorgeous right?

Mishkas! My fav Russian junk food. OMG they are SO CUTE and delicious.
They even have chocolate in them, and I like it so miracles can happen!

Yeah yeah I know, just tip your head. THIS is one of the TOWERS on the KREMLIN WALL. WHAAAAAAAT?!?!?!
YES I know hard to believe its reallll its so cool and so so so so old.

Yep thats me kinda disheveled on a bench in a park in Russia!

Yes. I ate a bacon flavored snack. It tasted like bacon. So of course, I was not wild about these "BEKON" snackz.

A church at the wooden architecture museum! Super neato right? Thats what my future home is going to look like.

Ok so work with me and tip your head because I suck at rotating things.
THIS IS THE COOLEST MONUMENT EVER.
Ok so its the 1000 years of Russia monument.
It has 3 tiers. On top is the angel blessing...Mary I think?
Then the second tier down has the great rulers of Russia/Novgorod.
The archbishop and tsars and Rurik the first prince of Novgorod etc
Then the third tier is all statesmen, clergy, rulers, and writers/artists. ITS SO COOL.
More pictures of this will come. There are 129 figures on it total. SO COOL!!!!

My room after my first night sleeping. Those are my adorable bee
sheets which are SO comfy. And cheering. I forgot
to take a picture of the rest of the room.

Well, those are the pictures I have the patience to put up. It takes about 5 mins to upload each one and I am sleepy. Getting up tomorrow for a Skype date with my REAL MOM!!!!!! Unfortunately I have to rise at 630 am, but I'll do anything for that special lady.

Enjoy the pics, I'll report back soon with tales of my NEW RUSSIAN FRIENDS! :)))

Chmok Chmok

Taan Taan

COFFEE!

I HAD REAL NON-INSTANT COFFEE TODAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I had two mugs of coffee at Lindsay's house, and it was SO GOOD. So everyone sing the praises of Lindsay for being a true friend and getting me super hopped up on caffiene.

ALSO, today we planned our vacation in October to Moscow and SOCHI! Yes Sochi, here is an example of how BEAUTIFUL and WONDERFUL and WARM it is there. They call it the Russian Riviera. Doesn't get better than that. We will be in Moscow for 5 days, take the two day train to Sochi, and stay for 7 days!

Pictures this week I SWEAR.

Chmok Chmok,
Taan Taan

Belini, Beer, the Black Continent Cafe, and Pushkin: Finding the High Life in Russia

So I have failed to write for like over a week, but let that be a testament to the BLASTY blast I have been having.

Ok Belini, I think I did a run down on these earlier but let me restate, they are the light of my life. I mentioned to my mom how much I freaking LOVE cheese. (Russians ALL eat watermelon like its injected with crack or MSG or something) So I told her, I eat cheese, like Russians eat watermelon. And her eyes got REAL big and she was like That is a lot. Following this, she now finds me all kinds of cheese to put on anything and I am in hog heaven. Russian cheese is probably the only thing I will love almost as much as Wisconsin cheese. Holy jeez its good. OK so today I was dying ill. I woke up late, with a migraine, and a cold. She took one look at me and started bustling about, calling my profs telling them I wouldn't be in and pour hot tea berry currant honey mixture down my throat and WATCHING me take medicine to be sure I did it. I slept for a total of 16 hours today, and when I woke she specially made me my favorite soup: shi. And CHEESE FILLED BELINI. I felt a lot better. And of course had more tea juice honey.

Let's go over another favorite of mine as a Russian foodie: Smetana, SOUR CREAM. Do you ever feel your food is missing something? How about adding sour cream? It will always make it better. Veggies in a bowl? Add and its a SALAT. Cabbage soup? Add and its the greatest bowl of soup in your life! Potatoes and mushrooms? Slather, and TADA sauce. Smetana makes my world go round and I dont care what people say I am going to put it all over everything. See my Russian Mama just came and asked me if I wanted chicken with pasta or rice, I said pasta because I know I am going to throw some smetana on that and be happy as a clam. Who knew doing a dollop of Daisy was REALLY a good idea all along.

Piva, beer, is so ridiculously cheap and always amazingly delicious. All single 16 oz cans of beer are around a dollar. I am as always a HUGE fan of Baltika, and highly recommend it. Not only does it come in varying degrees of alcohol percentage. it is always delicious. I am a fan of Baltika Sem, 7. You should allll go to your specialty liquor store and try it. Unless you live in the Cities in which case go to Kramurczurks and get it there with some delicious Ukrainian food. Also tried a white Russian beer, very very good, even Lydia, who is no fan of beer, likes it. Also Hoegaarden is a fav of Lindsay and I, which is def available in the US. Lydia had a "Fresh Lemon" beer from a company named "Gold Mine" in Moskva, Moscow, and she didnt mind it but I definitely felt like I was sipping a liquid Halls-Honey-Cough-Drop-Beer. There was something funky going on there, so I dont recommend that until we see if anything happens to Lydia for drinking it ;)

Our new favorite haunt is Chyornyi Kontinyent, Black Continent, which is a diamond in the rough here in Russia. (Yes it is called Black Continent....) First let me explain: THERE IS NO absolutely ZERO drip coffee in Russia. And it might kill me. Fortunately we found out MacDonalds of all places has drip coffee so who knew, I might be needing to hit that place up. Sad but true. I have vices and coffee is one of them. Chyornyi Kontinyent, has espresso at least in varying forms of addicting. I had a Baileys concoction which is delish, but expensive around 5 or 6 bucks for a smallish glass. There is Arabic coffee which is espresso with caramel, and Russian, which is espresso with chocolate, and some other kind with has spices and a pepper kernel in it that is good, all for around a buck or 1.50. They also have tasty belini, my addiction, for 2-4 dollars. Its got great atmosphere, other than the weird sports channel. So if you are ever in Novgorod dying for a moment of coffee shop splendour go to Chyornyi Kontinyent.

Classes are boring boring, except for Literature with Marina Anatolyevna who is the most powerful intimidating woman I have ever met. She is broad shouldered and a little bigger, but its pure muscle I SWEAR and I think, as I told Stephanie, that she is secretly running Russia. GOD love her. So she has us reading Pushkin, The Queen of Spades, which you all must read. I read it in English once, but reading it in Russian is like, THIS is what I wanted to do. READ PUSHKIN in RUSSIA. Its incredibly hard, but the reason Pushkin is like the Demigod of Russia is because he was the first writer to actually write in RUSSIAN not highfalutin  bullshit. And he wrote about real life things, granted these were 1800s real life things, but still! So I think every one was just like FINALLY when he started publishing, and he really is a master. So I must go attend to that translating business. But definitely go and check out ANY Pushkin. Or Blok who is my favyfav of all Russian writers.

I am going to leave you with one last story. Andrew and I went to Cafe Le Chocolat, which is over by the hotel because its like the expensive coffee shop where all the rich tourist go, but we went in to have coffee and SUSHI. And they totally gave us the Russian menu. WE were MISTAKEN for RUSSIANS. It was the best, and we were very very happy. So I officially look like a Novgorodka, a girl from Novgorod, anddd I am still living it up. I miss you all, but I don't miss America one bit.

PICTURES this week I promise.

Chmok Chmok,

Taan Taan

I eat forests, DUH GEORGE WASHINGTON, and we don't have Easter in America: misunderstood with my family

So many things, in such a short amount of time.
We went on a tour of the city, downtown, where the Kremlin, Kreml,  is this is where the wall is around the old churches and monuments and things like this. I have lots of pictures, and I am sure I will be down there again. I'll describe that more when I get the pictures up because its hard to make a mental image look exactly right.
We were walking across the bridge from the historical churches area, to the Kreml and we saw alllllll these people around this monument. We asked our teacher what was happening, and she said it was the anniversary of the end of the Second World War. It was very telling that we did not know that it was the anniversary, because as Americans it is hard to understand it beyond the loss of lives, but in the scarring of their land and how it changed the entire shape of Europe and their own homes. I am fascinated by this feeling of historical difference, how we purely talk about WWII as human loss, but every European I meet, or Russian, also delves into where, and how, and what happened to that place after the war. Very interesting.

So I was thinking about this, and I talked to my Russian mama about it, and she was intrigued that I noticed a difference. She had supposed it was different for us, but never knew for sure. We talked about the blokade, and she told me something our teacher mentioned on the tour: There is an ancient belfry with giant church bells from probably around the 12th century, beautiful, and exquistitely detailed, but they are all very tarnished. This is because when the Germans were headed through Russia, they put the bells in the river, so they wouldn't steal, wreck, or melt them I am guessing, and they stayed there until much later. These bells are HUGE like could crush cars, and it was very moving that they got them in the river. Russians are very prideful, and they take thier history very seriously. Which OF COURSE, I just lap up like a kitty with milk because RUSSIAN HISTORY yessss my reason for being.

As I am talking to my host mom about WWII, she was asking me if I like fish and about meat and I was like "YES I LOOOOVE TO EAT LYES!!" "Lyes?" She asks me, "No, you mean ryba, fish." "No," I say with confidence, "Lyes is one of my favorite foods." Then I pause, only to realize. Lyes means forest. I wanted to say lasos, salmon. She was laughing so hard, and so did I. Forests. Kakoi kashmar, what a nightmare.

So after that, we were eating, her delicious delicious food, I think I had cabbage tomato basil soup, and this fritatta type thing, with salmon and spinach (YES SPINACH lots of spinach thank god!) in it, and watermelon. So we are talkinig about watermelon, and what grows in Wisconsin, and then I tell her I want to go to Lake Baikal because I too have an AMAZING lake in my country, Ozera Superior, Lake Superior, and she is asking me about it, and so I start to tell her that my family is from there and that I always travel up there with my mom in the summer, and then I start to say but not lately because we have been so busy, and I just LOSE it cryyyying like a big wimp. And I am laughing, because, as I tell her with tears literally STREAMING out of my face, I am not sad, I love being in Russia, but whenever I think about my mom subconciously I must be really upset about it because I burst into tears. Keep in mind this was yesterday.

Today, I woke up and had another 3892183 glasses of compote because it is the greatest thing I have ever tasted. She told me get up early and I will make you belini, which are like not quite crepes, but not as thick as pancakes either. The best of both in my opinion, delish not too thin not too thick, absolutely DELISH. And so I get up at 8 allllll excited for belini, and 8 is not early enough by Russia standards fyi. Sooo, I have some sandwiches she left me and Sergey, my Russian dad, got me tea, and we chatted for a bit. He likes to tease me because I am always studying out of my dictionary. He says he hopes I dont leave Russia blind.

My host sister, Nastia, and her husband, Zhenya, who are both ridiculously cool and really nice to me, picked me up so I could go to the museum in the country. Again, better to explain with pictures, but we picked up Andrusha, Andy, and Misha, Mike, who are also from St. Olaf.

Then we stop at the store, because yes, my LUGGAGE is stillll GONE. It was hard to shop and I was not happy because I do not want anything but my own things. I am not sad or petty about my stuff, I just feel lost like I was an alien dropped here or something. Anyways, I got home and had a cry fest, of course, Mama Lena happened to find me and she comforted me and said we would figure it all out and she totally understood. I felt a lot better, but I slept a lot afterward, its kind of my respite from the stress.

But then I ate, late, because I passed out asleep, and she made me mashed potatos, WAY better in Russia, and these chicken patties? I think? They were well seasoned which is all I care about. And an assortment of veggies, yes Russia has LOADS of veggies! Fresh too. And of course, my biggest vice, compote. I swear I will need to get a second bladder to handle all the compote I drink.
We looked at pictures, and they were showing me this is paskha, and I was like I have no idea what that is, lots of eggs and candles and I was like nope we do not have that in America, then I look it up in my dictionary. It's EASTER, of course, EGGS, CROSSES, etc. So I corrected myself, when I said out loud, OH MY GOD, Eaaaaaaaster! They laughed.
And then I left a penny out and I was talking about Lincoln and then I had my last dollar out and I was like THIS is George Washington! I meant to show excitement because I loooove GWash, but they thought I thought they had never heard of him, and they were like um yes, we know about George Washington, of course.....I FELT AWFUL....Anyways, I adore them, and I think they like me back, despite the crazy things I say.

Tonight I had my little America hours, which was super nice, I talked to Mama Boolava, or Amy as some may know her. What a relief, let me say that. She of course, got me right back on track and teased me appropriately. I feel much better now, at peace I guess. I also got an email from Stephanie! And my Oles have been great about supporting me and my blog stuff via email :D So THANK YOU. Its important to me!


Chmok Chmok,
Taan Taan

A long ride, a chemodan, and a new life with excellent vittles

So I am finally here! Everything is ochen harasho, very good, and I am really enjoying myself. But let's start with the trip here. I got to MSP flew with Sarah to Chicago, no problem! Other than being pulled aside for my water bottle which the security at MSP found VERY SUSPICIOUS even though NO other airport stopped me for it.... Anyways, then I took a LONG flight from Chicago to Stockholm, after reuniting with Lindsay, Lydia, Andrew, and Sarah obviously and eating the most expensive sandwich ever.

So the flight wasn't that bad, the last three hours were definitely the hardest. I watched Valentines Day, and maybe it was because I was stuck on a plane, but I actually liked it? I mean, I cried TWICE, which might speak more for my excessively emotive state rather than the quality of the film. Then I started watching the Swedish movie available and had to stop immediately because I realized that Ma:n Something Something Kvinnor means Girl with the Dragon Tattoo! And that is the book my lovely momma and I have chosen as our international book club reading. Fortunately it being in Swedish with teeeeeny tiny subtitles helps me not really know anything that happened. I sat next to Lindsay thank god, and a nice Swedish girl who said nada for 8 hrs. Got woken up by the lovely Linsday and her new friend the head flight attendant telling me, my luggage was in Chicago... SUPER. We get to Arlanda and just hang out, it was so cool there, seriously the prettiest airport I have EVER seen. I got a Latte mmm, and Svenska Lant Chips, Potato Chips, aand my first legal beverage with alcohol! Of course, not carded because Sweden and Europe are cool and the US is not. It was a tasty Czech beer as well. Celebrating my heritage.

So we get to Russia, on this little plane, and literally Lindsay and I sat down on the plane and passed out from exhaustion all of a sudden we woke up and we were over the sea and it was so weird. Then we went in Pulkovo, St Petersburg airport which was kinda sketchy, but had Free WiFi unlike every other airport ever. And I had to fill out this crazzzy form thing about my luggage. and it took forEVER. My suitcase, chemodan, is still AWOL. Then changed money, got supa stressed, and we finally took the 'bus' aka van, which was really nice and so was the driver.
We got to the University, and my host sister, and her boyfriend? Husband? picked me up, they were realllllyyy nice, and we got home where I met my family Lena and Sergey. I basically just went to bed I was so tired.

This morning I got up at 9, had these little tvorog pastry fried things YUM some chai, tea, and compote my new fav thing in the world. Its like tasty tart juice. My host mom, actually makes it! And she totes made a WHOLE other batch because I said I loooove it. Its made from sliva, plums, which are a lot smaller than ours. And for dinner I had fish, which was DELISH, and rice, she asked me about rees and I was like I dont know what that is, and then she showed me and I was like HAHA I should have known that rees is rice. Silly. Lots of silly language moments right now, but in a day, I feel better, so imagine what I will have under my belt in one month or at the end of four!

I met my teachers today and they all seem great, one talked SO fast. But I think I can handle this, I gotchyou  Russia! Everyone seems content, happy, a little awkward, and mostly tired in the group. At this point, I am happy, so happy, but life is overwhelming so I make sure I am calming myself down a lot. Preventative care :) When I get my suitcase, and all of my things, I will definitely feel more comfortable, I feel a wee bit displaced right now. Then again, I am in Russia, so a little displacement is nothing compared to my euphoria.

Anwyays, its 1130, and I want to study a bit before bed. But I am here, safe, and sound, and blissful.
Thank you, whoever is reading, for taking the time and I can't wait to have more of my dreams come true! (Cheesy, but accurate)

ChmokChmok,
TaanTaan