I’m going to Moscow for the weekend. Laters!
The holidays are encroaching over here. Several gigantic plastic Christmas trees have been erected in a few main squares. Actually in Russian they’re New Year’s trees (yolka), because New Year’s is celebrated over Christmas here (and also Christmas isn’t on the same day). Anyway, to me they’re Christmas trees, and all the lights they’re stringing up are Christmas decorations. It’s crazy to think that the holiday season is here already. I feel like I just got here. I also feel like my life is still on the schedule of a college student (wonder why that might be?) so I keep thinking back and comparing my life to whatever I was doing last year at this time. Midterms! Thesis stuff! Christmas shopping! Ok, so I don’t usually get that done until after Christmas in some cases, but I miss walking around in New York when it’s cold, which is something I never thought I even enjoyed before. Strange to think how different things are now.
I have also, oddly, found myself trolling the interwebs in my moments of distraction for things to buy online! This is an old habit (hobby?) but it makes way less sense now because I can’t really buy anything. However I don’t usually buy things online anyway, just browse, which is just as satisfying in a way. Now that the holidays are here I can make a Christmas list!!! For presents I will not receive! Anyway, I have been having a desire to go shopping, but in fact shopping is really unpleasant to me; it makes me feel nauseous and angry. I bought a coat a few weeks ago and a hat last week or so, and, unsurprisingly, shopping in Russia is also annoying in the exact same way shopping in the US is. Everything is so confusing! The malls are so shiny and easy to get lost in! I am so stingy and picky! Also the absence of a ladyfriend to shop with makes the project less appealing, more business-like. All my friends are dudes who are less interested in checking out some new super-cute doodad.
If you want to see some super-cute doodads that I found online, lemmie know, ladies!
Yum Yums--Baby Bear in the North Chocolate!
Also, I live near a chocolate factory. Have you ever smelled a chocolate factory? Have you ever been walking down the street and, blocks away from the factory, found yourself in a cloud of the richest, chocolaty-est chocolate smell? A sensory experience so chocolatey it is almost indistinguishable from actually eating a truffle? Oh my god, I have never smelled something so literally mouth-watering! It’s almost hard for me to carry on a conversation when I’m smelling the smell. If my nose had teeth and a tongue I would walk in circles around the Krupskaya Factory all day. Last night a conference of noses uncovered hints of raspberry in the chocolate smell. I am reading Twilight right now and Edward keeps talking about how Bella’s smell is like all he can think about or something and when he smells it he wants to feast on her flesh. I thought that was really creepy, but now I know how he feels!
A Variety of Ways of Experiencing a Da Vinci, from L to R: talking on your cell phone, taking a picture of it, taking a picture of your wife and kid with it.
A few weeks ago, I went to the Hermitage. What a place! So resplendent! So bereft of Russian art! I have pretty mixed feelings about the ‘tage. It’s the biggest museum in the world. I kind of wish it were smaller. There is so much to see that wandering around is interesting, but you’ll probably have a hard time finding something that you’re actually interested in. You will probably see a lot of art. You will probably not know what to make of it. Honestly, I find a lot of the art housed here to be a bit boring. Although there’s so much art housed here, I don’t know how I can even venture to express so broad an opinion, but I’m going to stick with it.
Lucky for me, there is a lot to distract from the art!
Like oppulence!
Dizzingly long hallways! This is some famous hallway with mirrors that are supposed to make you more beautiful? Get you a husband? Make you rich? I forget.
Gigantic Stone Urns! Seems like there's at least one of these babies in every room.
A Golden Mechanical Peacock and Rooster Display!
I know, I’m a terrible philistine! Before you try to rub my face in a pile of oil paint, let me say that I actually like art and know a thing or two about it, but generally prefer 20th century stuff. Yes, I know they have modern art at the Hermitage. I challenge you to find it for me,
It’s genuinely hard for me to look at art when it’s displayed in rooms with ceilings like this:
In Russia, art watches you.
Luckily, the Winter Palace offers some of the best views of the city’s landmarks. You can see the Strelka and Peter and Paul Fortress from the windows. Plus, obviously, Palace Square.
Phallic Symbol of the Fatherland
Note the gazillion cranes in the background. They are probably tearing down some treasured/decrepit building from 1800 as I type this.
I feel like I don’t really understand the Hermitage. Not all of the art makes it inside
It's lonely at the top.
Even when there’s extra room!
This whole room was full of empty cabinets.
Sometimes, the glitz is too much,
In some of the display cases were some reproductions of coins. Some of the display cases were just empty.
But if you want to sit down, you may have a hard time finding an appropriate chair.
VIP Seating Only
You may need medical attention. Luckily, a group of doctors reported for work while I was there. There were also several wedding photo shoots going on. I wish I had had the foresight to join the gaggle of Japanese tourists taking pictures of the Russian bride getting her picture taken. Alas! Surely a post on Russian weddings will occur at some later date.
Eventually, I always get lost in the bowels of the Hermitage. There, you can find pieces of pottery from ancient civilizations, museum babushka-guards having some girl talk, and some stuff they haven’t gotten around to unpacking.
Treasures of the Lost Ark?
It’s not hard to imagine how the idea for the Russian Ark came about. The Russian Ark was a 2002 movie filmed in the Hermiage, that was one continuous 96-minute shot that conveys 300 years of Russian history. If you went to Branson, you might remember that movie as the one we were supposed to watch in Ms. Gude’s Russian Lit class, but we didn’t and lied about it.
Ah, the Hermitage. So hard to find your way out.
My first piece for the SPB Times is up online here. It’s a review of a restaurant none of you, I’m sure, will ever go to, called Secrets, which supplies some of the boring Italian food we all know and love in the US. Hard-hitting journalism! I was going to say this is my first piece in a real physical newspaper, but the SPB Times is about as real as the Columbia Spec, and actually published less often, and distributed far less widely…so there you have it. Hardie and I are scouting potential restaurants for subsequent reviews, preferably a restaurant where we can eat bear. I’ll keep ya’ll posted.
I am in the process of giving my studenti midterms.
My pre-intermediate freshmen had to take a quiz about the five senses. Part of it was a fill in the blank. It produced the following responses:
- I smelled a rose smell yesterday. It was amazing smell which I have even smelled.
- The most important sense is touch because we need to feel pain for life.
- I smelled a beeping smell yesterday. It was awful.
- The most important sense is eyeing because if you see the world in bright, different colors you can be happy due to it. And I’m absolutely sure, that we must to appreciate all our sences in the beginning, not when we will lose even one of them.
- I love the taste of hot chocolate and the sense of fur.
- I remember the taste of hot chocolate and the Jenny.
For American Character, I gave them a list of 20 important American figures to do a presentation on. Two girls elected to skip reading the list and ask if they could present on Marilyn Monroe and Jackie O. Evidently, Marilyn Monroe is the most important American figure because “she was very smart and lived only for herself and her dreams. She showed that you can be successful even without any talent, because that is the American dream. At the end of her life she read lots of books and was completely independent, even without any talent, just hard work, and the original sex symbol, a true American woman.” I told this girl that in the US a lot of people see Marilyn Monroe as a sort of tragic figure who totally sacrificed herself for fame and died a tragic death. She said, simply, that that wasn’t true. Meanwhle, Jackie O’s contribution to American society was style, most notably the pill box hat. Secondly, she was a good wife and stood by her husband–but mostly, style. A third girl, appearing in class for the third or fourth time simply in order to take the midterm, said she had done her presentation on Britney Spears. Britney Spears??? Not on the list! Also, not an important American figure! I told her she would have to choose someone from the list.
I don’t mean to continue ragging on the feminism in Russia thing. These presentations didn’t surprise me from that perspective. Actually I shouldn’t have let them pick someone who wasn’t on the list because they just ended up not doing the assingment, which involved doing some research so you knew something beyond your personal opinion. It’s merely strange to me that someone, when assigned to do a presentation on an important American figure, could choose to talk mainly about hats that no one wears anymore, for example. There was a presentation on Betty Friedan (who was on the list!) which was excellent because the person actually attempted to learn something about who Betty Friedan was. Another girl is presenting on Margaret Sanger. I know it seems I’m trying to convert them to my wacky American ways, but they could also have presented on Jerry Falwell, Homer Simpson or Arnold Schwarzenegger, so its not like all the choices were feminist, far from it.
How sweet is my shuba?
The generous and all-around wonderful Tanya lent me an old fur coat. Now I am ready for anything, including some kind of animal masquerade!
Recent Comments