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Remember, Remember The 5th of November
I forgot. Oops. I thought all week how I was going to do something to remember Guy Fawks' Day! "Click" I totally forgot, until now that is. It's a bit too late to celebrate, but at least I've remembered BEFORE the 6th. That's what counts...right?
In other news, we had a disco the other night at a school. Pretty fun. Really hot. Hopefully we aren't too uncool. : )
Excursion to Moscow
Russia
Late Wednesday night, we made our way to the train station to go to Moscow. I was not sure what to expect once I got on the train. Would it be like the trains you see in old movies? To my pleasant surprise it was similar to the ones you see in movies, although not so romanticized.
We traveled Plotzcar. This means that everything is wide open. There are two sets of bunks and then another set longwise. Difficult to explain without photos, unfortunately, I don't have them at this point. Back to the story...Mandi and I shared a bunk and Will slept opposite. You see, it was the night train. We arrived in Moscow on the early side. The sun hadn't come up yet. We crashed soon after arriving at our respective apartments. After waking, I went to Red Square to meet Tim, Sue, Danny, Mandi, Will, and Natasha.
It was a rather rainy, dreary day. Red Square was blocked off. This was as close to the Kremlin as we could get. Apparently there was some sort of official party or something going on. We didn't actually understand the guard who explained it. Thus we satisfied ourselves with walking around everything. We walked through GOOM (ЛУМ).
After this everyone went on to do some more site seeing and I stayed behind to meet with a friend. He got there rather late and we didn't have time to really do much, other than walk to the metro station. Thankfully we were going the same direction on the same line, so we rode together. He walked me to my next destination, the Brink's! With this wonderful family, I had dinner and we watched a movie. They sent me off with some prayers!
Friday started off with traveling with the SV Moscow team by metro to some new skyscrapers being build. We intended to go up one to a viewing deck, but it the clouds were too low. So we walked to Starbucks and bought ridiculously priced drinks. Here Kyle and Irina met up with us. From here we went to the Starlight Dinner. True-blue American food. Dinner food. After this we went bowling, had a meeting, and celebrated Julia's birthday.
Saturday was SHOPPING day! I met up with Sue, Jenny, and Will to just shop. That was wonderful. I purchased my crockpot! What an accomplishment. I also picked up a few other fun items. It was such a fun time to just actually have some fun girl time. Will was included in this girl time. We found him some fun scarves, a hat, and a man bag! He is going to be Russian by the time I'm finished with him.
After shopping, I went to dinner with another friend. Again we went to Starlight Dinner. (I had Wings! YUM!) We kind of "tricked" him into helping to bring all of Mandi's things to the train station. He was very obliging. On the train home, Mandi, Will, and I were all on top bunks. This train was HOT. I don't just mean a little hot. I mean, sweating so much that I actually dreamt about sweating. Gross.
Arrived home again in the pitch black. Got back to the apartment in the pitch black. Did I mention the sun comes up after 9:00 here?
Things I should be doing
Russia
I have a hard time updating this blog. I often feel like I have so very little to say of interest. I don't want to be one of those blogs that people never check because I don't update it often enough OR for the opposite reason of updating it too often.
I also have a difficult time knowing what to write home to all of those people who have so faithfully come along side of me in this adventure! THUS, I've decide to write what a week in my life looks like. : ) This is difficult because it changes every week, but I'll try to sum it all up.
Sunday
10:00 - leave for church (I tend to be early because I don't want to be late...it doesn't actually take an hour to get there)
11:00 - Church at ICA St. Petersburg
12:30 - fellowship after church
13:30 - arrive home
Monday
This days seems to be becoming a Sabbath day for me. I usually get to spend the day reading, praying, and just resting! Resting for me includes scrubbing the bathroom and toilet room, laundry, and other things that need to be done. Oddly enough these things are restful for me.
Study and do language homework.
Tuesday
9:00 - Leave house
10:00 - Language class
12:30 - get lunch or go home
14:00 - Meet with students
Wednesday
8:45 - Leave house and take the marshutka to Tim and Sue's
9:30 - Staff Meeting
13:00 - Lunch some where
14:30 - English Club
16:00 - Go home
Thursday
Changes too much to describe, but this is the day that I usually get "things done." These things include walking to the grocery store to buy my food. Buying other items that are needed - modem, under the bed storage, etc. Get in touch with friends here in St. Petersburg. Try to plan for events. The list goes on.
Study and do language homework.
Friday
9:00 - Leave house
10:00 - Language class
12:30 - Polish off a pizza with Will at our local pizza place. (It's fun to have become a regular)
14:00 - Meet with students
19:00 - English Movie Night
Saturday
See Thursday : )
At any moment all or none of these thing could happen. I've really learned to be flexible! Next week for instance, my week looks NOTHING like this. I'm headed to Moscow for a few days! Thus you can see that in Russia a schedule is just a loosely stated theme of events. : )
Here are a couple of photos from the last couple of weeks.
These are some of my friends : ) The guys (L to R: Frank, Emmanuel, and Daniel) are from Ghana and are studying medicine here in St. Pete. We go to church together. The gal in the pink shirt is Masha, my roommate. The girl next to her is Anya, a dear friend. And of course, Will is there on the right.
This is Natasha and I at a friend's wedding. We also attend the same church.
These are some friends of Masha's that we had over for her birthday. L to R: Yulia, Ksenya, and Dennis. We are playing the game when you have to guess who is written on your forehead. :)
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