Week 1!

Apologies for not keeping up with this more, I'll try to give an overview of this past week but so much has happened I will hardly be able to cover all of it. First, however, a story about my first meal in Yaroslavl that was not provided by a бабушка (grandmother).

I was with my group (4 people total) and, after a morning of touring the city, we stop by a local diner for lunch where, not to my surprise at all, I could barely understand the menu. But I stand there for a while, looking at it and finally I see something I recognize "фасол с мясом" (fasole s myasom) and i think "well, I have no idea wat the first word is but I'm pretty sure the second word means meat". Not only is meat good but I know what it is so I go ahead and order that, the entire time wondering pleasantly what "fasole" (the first word) might be. So I wait. And I wait. And finally the waitress arrives.

With the most gigantic mound of red kidney beans I have ever seen in my life.

And I think "ok, well, I like beans, at least there will be meat"

"с мясом" I hear her ask, and I nod my head at least 4 times and say "Да!" (yes)

And so she takes out a giant vat of butter and begins to pour it over the aforementioned mound of beans.

And then I realize that not only have I forgotten the correct way to decline the word 'meat" in the instrumental case but, of more immediate importance, there will be no meat served with this meal.

For those of you that don't speak russian the word с маслом means "with butter" and is somewhat close to my incorrect idea of what "with meat" was.

And so my first lunch in Yaroslavl consisted of water, butter, and about a pound of kidney beans.

Interestingly enough, I wrote a poetic parody about it that strikes me, and probably only me, as humorous. For those of you unfamiliar with the Russian poet Blok, you should be. He's great. Anyways, he has this one poem which is one of my favorites and which I shall post here. Included afterwards is a direct word for word translation just so people hwo don't speak russian will have an idea of what it is about - granted it completerly lacks the beauty, flow and rythym of the original:

Ночь, улица, фонарь аптека,
Бессмысленный и тусклый свет
Живи еще хоть четверть века
Все будет так. Исхода нет.

Умреш- начнеш опять сначала,
И повторится все, как встар;
Ночь ледяная, рябь канала,
Аптека, улица, фонарь.

-А Блок

Night, street, streetlamp, store
Meaningless and dim light
Living still after a fourth of a century
All will be so. No escape.

[You] Die- [you] start again from the beginning
And repeat everything, as before.
Night, icy ripples of the canal,
Store, street, streetlamp.

It is this poem I chose to write a parody of. It follows the rythm decently and has absolutely none of the artistic value of the original,

Нож, кухня, фасоль, тарелка.
Красная гора - это обедь.
Смотрел на ней хоть три минута-
Я уж купил. Исхода нет.

И так – я ем. Что можно делать?
Судба- единственный король.
Нож, мой голод- души, живота,
Тарелка, кухня, фасоль

and a word for word translation:

Knife, cafe, beans, plate
A red mountain- this is lunch
[I've] stared at it already three minutes-
Already bought. No escape.

And so - I eat. What can I do?
Fate - the only king.
Knife, my hunger - of soul, of stomach,
Plate, cafe, beans.


I can almost hear Блок turning in his grave.

Ok I dont want to make this too long so I will wrap up listing a few things I have done this week.

-Had classes

-Walked around the city for hours on end

-Asked for (and recieved) help finding various places

-Went to a music and time museum, got a tour of which I understood about 50 percent

-Saw a play at the theater in town.

-Saw an Ingmar Bergman film in russian at a local film club (scenes from something it was called), understood almost all of it, and made two russian friends there with whom I have hung out with.

-Volunteered at the russian equivalent of a YMCA, spoke english to young russians, was promptly told by said young russians that Russia was better than the USA, and, above all, spent about 5 hours at the YMCA with other volunteers about my age and made friends (russians would say "aquaintances) with about 6 or 7 real russians, all of whom are very friendly, very funny, and just wonderful people in general.

-Had my first birthday in Russia which was amazing. Recieved chocolate, and ice cream from my class, chocolate and a special dinner from my babooshka, various birthday greetings from aforementioned russians and ate 3 dinners.

Really things have been great so far but I should wrap up this post. Today I tried to find a course to take at the Russian university and it was an ужасный experience because the schedules are so hard to read. I will talk about this later.

До скорого,

Гриша