Originally sent June 16:
New update. And thanks for the replies! Cris-- nice job figuring out that priklyucheniya means adventures. If I ever say anything you don't understand, look it up on multitran.ru.
After I wrote on Monday, V. Sr. showed up in the night. The man is HUGE. He's about 6'3", and could strangle a bear. Also he has a massive moustache and long, thinning hair. Basically, he is a Cossack. We talked until 3 in the morning about life in the Soviet Union vs. in contemporary Russia. The reason the conversation was so long was that he preferred life in Soviet times, for a variety of very valid reasons. Like the fact that there were no homeless people, and basically everything was free. But he did admit that the repression was inconvenient.
Went to ANE for the first time yesterday, after a breakfast of fried cabbage cutlets (actually delicious, no joke)-- this is the organization that organizes the program. ANE, i.e. Academy of the National Economy (Akademiya Natsionalnogo Khozyaystva). Basically, I take Russian in the morning, and in the afternoon, I'll end up doing an internship or two-- more on this in a bit. The ANE is at the Yugo-Zapadnaya, which is in the South-West of Moscow (Yugo-Zapadnaya means South-West, by the way). A pretty grim place, made grimmer by the fact that it has rained basically non-stop for the last three days, and the temp. has not exceeded 65.
There on the platform, I met the other students-- but I was looking forward to seeing Danya (as I'll call him for the blog), a Harvard kid, who was not there. Apparently, he was trying out an internship. You will understand that I was looking forward to speaking in a familiar language with a familiar person in a very foreign land, but eto ne poluchilos'-- which means it didn't happen. I tend not to be super-outgoing in brand new situations, especially since there was a large contingent who all knew each other from Georgia Tech/ U. of Georgia. But all was good. A.A., the mustachioed dude who runs the program, is a hilarious and friendly dude who made us all feel at ease. We then took a tour of the premises, and finally divided up into advanced and intermediate students. We also met our two ANE student hosts, Boris and Alina.
There are six of us in the advanced group, and it's a pretty vesyolaya gruppa-- i.e. a jolly group. There's Danya and me from Harvard, T. and D. from U. Georgia, A. from SUNY Stonybrook, and K. from McGill. D. is gay and speaks Russian way too well, and thinks nothing of yelling at the rest of us when our Russian lapses or we make a mistake. If he weren't so nice outside the classroom, I would want to kill him. Our teacher is Sasha, a recent MGU (Moscow State) journalism graduate, who is AWESOME. He decided he hated saying positive things about Putin all the time, and he now teaches elementary school.
After class, we advanced kids decided to have lunch together at one of the on-campus restaurants, Il Patio. Delicious Italian food! I got a Greek salad, 8-inch veggie pizza, and glass of coke, all for about 8 bucks, which is considered expensive here, and this is a sit-down restaurant no less. After that, we went in vain search of SimCard stuff for another one of the kids with Boris. Then we went our separate ways, the other kids to watch a movie at one of their apartments, and I to the Babushka's 80th birthday party.
Here follows an account of what has definitely been the most awesome part of the trip so far. O.'s mother turned 80 yesterday, and there was a birthday party at her place. An 80-year-old's birthday party? That was fun, you say? Oh, gentle reader, oh yes. After much difficulty finding my way on the metro and on the street in the pouring rain, I finally arrived at a stately brown Stalinist building (the nasty grey buildings you associate with Communism are Khrushchev-era; under Stalin, the standard of architecture was quite high). And then up to apartment, which I tell you, was so old, and so beautiful, and so Russian, I thought I would explode. Wooden parquet floors, high ceilings, crown mouldings, lime-green wallpaper, sweet-smelling brown furniture, a long corridor lined with hundreds of books. I expected Nabokov to emerge from the office, offering the guests glasses of cognac.
Nabokov there was not, but cognac there was aplenty. I went into one of the rooms behind O. It was so jaw-droppingly Russian-- two long tables, with white tablecloths and lovely silverware, and all laden with Russian party food (mayonnaisy salads and cold fish dishes, and so on) and Soviet-era champagne. And on one end of one of the tables, a gaggle of classy babushkas, all softly and respectfully talking to each other and partaking of the banquet. I sat at the other end of the table and ate the only stuff I could, stewed mushrooms and pickled tomato. Then, the most wonderful thing started happening-- each of the babushkas took it in turn to stand up and say really, really nice things about the 80-year-old birthday girl. Lots of toasts all around. The place could not have been more cozy if we were all wearing snuggies.
It gets better still. At some point a couple showed up and sat next to me. The wife was boring, but the husband, Victor, became my best friend. His first thing to me, having seen me for the first time and putting his arm around my shoulder: "I don't remember your name, comrade, please remind me!" I said I was new here-- and to the country. He said cool. That was all for the time being, because we both knew that this party was all about the babushkas, and not to have side conversations. But later, he got up to have a look from the balcony. I found my way there, because I wanted fresh air. Victor and I ended up talking for about half an hour-- about the climate, about Stalinist architecture, about the reading of foreign literature in the Soviet Union, etc. Then we returned to the table, and there I tried the cognac. But Victor kept refilling the glass, and I ended up drinking about a third of the bottle. Yes, my friends, at a babushka's 80th birthday party, around 8:30 PM, I was drunk.
Now, Alina had invited all us advanced kids to a bar that night, so around 10 PM I set out. My family yelled at me and insisted I be back before midnight, because apparently after 11 PM the "khuligany" (hooligans) start roving the streets. Believe me, after Babushka's 80th, the bar kind of sucked. I left after an hour, but it took 45 minutes on the metro to get home, and I flopped down.
Today I got up at 7:25, shat, showered, shaved, and shined, had three fried eggs from O. (why does everything she makes turn out delicious?), and went off to school again. I arrived 10 minutes late, thinking I'd be the last. I was the first. A very nice day of class with Sasha, and started the internship search! Now, I plan to intern with the Slavyansky Pravovoy Tsentr, i.e. the Slavic Center for Law and Justice, a human-rights related law firm, but the ANE internship coordinator had an idea for a second internship for me, and at 1:30 today I was informed I had a 2 PM interview at the so-called Institute of Europe. Whoa. An ANE woman took me on the metro to Okhotny Ryad station, which is right on Red Square. We went to an old, round building, the headquarters of the Institute of Europe, which is a think-tank on European issues. There, I had an interview with the Director himself. I tell you, there is nothing like a well-educated Russian for worldliness, friendliness, and intellectual curiosity. He talked to me about the Institute and what it does and all his personal interests-- for an hour. Then he asked what I wanted to do here. I thought-- I don't know, you tell me! But I told him that any kind of academic research experience would be cool, and that I was open to anything. He said, I have an idea-- my English sucks, but I need to read a lot of stuff in English. You want to read stuff for me, translate, and send me analytical summaries in Russian? So I said sounds interesting. And he said think about it! But first, he ordered me to enjoy myself and see Moscow. Why are Russians so awesome?
Then, I decided to walk through Red Square, but randomly on the street-- I ran into a couple of my classmates! They had already been on the Square, but were on their way to the Arbat, which happens to be my way home. So I went with them. It suddently started raining cats and dogs, so by the time we got home, I was totally soaked.
Anyway-- that's all for now. After getting home, all I've done is watched Spain vs. Switzerland with V. Sr., who again talked fondly about Soviet life. Also, more delicious fried cabbage cutlets. That's all folks!
--Aseemsky
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