Promised Kassa note

So the касса (kassa – cashier) system in Russia is a throw-back to the Soviet union. You go into a store, and all of the goods for sale are on shelves behind counters. You aren’t supposed to go behind the counter to fetch your goods, but rather you tell the person behind the counter what you want, and they write down its price on a slip of paper. You then take the slip of paper to the cashier. Sometimes there is a different cashier for every section of the store. The cashier takes your money, and then prints out a different receipt for you. You take that receipt to the employee who originally helped you, and that employee gives you what you bought.

Besides being not a little bit inefficient, the kassa system is extraordinarily mystifying and daunting for foreigners. For example, what you want to buy isn’t always visible. So when I went to buy my power adapter, for example, I went to the electronics store. There were a bunch of different counters, none of which had power adapters behind them. So I had to pick a counter that looked like it might maybe have something to do with power adapters sometimes. I then have to push my way through a crowd, and avoid having my “place in line” (yeah, right) be taken by somebody more forceful than I. After finally getting the employees attention, I have to actually ask him (not point, as I would so like to do) if he has a power adapter, and if it is a Soviet-sized adapter as my European-sized adapters don’t work in Alla Alexandrovna’s Soviet-era apartment, and then answer his questions etc. Then fight my way through the crowds to the disgruntled cashier, have another conversation in Russian regarding price, and then back to the keeper of my power adapter who hopefully hasn’t by this time forgotten me and either lost or sold to somebody else my much desired product.

This is why the successful purchase of goods is always something to write home about!

So the formatting was messed up on those photos... sorry! But you shouldn't have too much trouble matching caption to photo :).

This is Natasha, Emily and me in front of the Neva. You can see the solid ice along the banks.
Courtney and me in front of the Smolny cathedral. It was a bit lighter than this, as can be seen in the next picture, but the moon was out.

Nastya, Courtney, me and Irina. Again, Smolny cathedral.

Me and Courtney in the hotel room at night... we all hung around and consumed the snacks and beverages that had been successfully purchased at the grocery store, kassa system notwithstanding.

First Impressions

Actually written Sunday, 1/28/07, but posted when I got around to it. More later :).

Disclaimer: This email is for my first impressions of my new city. I have a lot of them. This email will be a long one. Those of you who were unwillingly subjected to my travel emails of 2 years ago from Australia have, I hope, developed either an immunity to them, or at least some coping mechanisms. As for the rest of you… I’ve tried to make it entertaining. We’ll see what happens…

We arrived late last night in Petersburg, after a long flight on Rossia airlines, in a plane that was not exactly new and was decorated with gold and emerald green zebra stripes. We are staying in the Hotel Rus’, which is right off Nevskj Prospekt, the Champs Elyssie of Petersburg, although the hotel appears to have been the unfortunate victim of a gang war between the 1960s and the Jetsons. I have a roommate, Natasha, who is on the program with us but wasn’t able to make it to orientation. So far she and I have been getting along very well. Our room is quite comfortable, despite the late ‘70s office-style decoration (not to mention the Soviet-era wood-paneled conference room in which we had our orientation this morning…).

In fact the appearance of the whole city seems to be in the midst of a bit of an identity crisis; not between the 1960s and the Jetsons, but rather Russia’s epic battle between the West and Russia’s own traditions. Much of Petersburg is exactly what I expected - broad, snow-covered avenues bordered by pastel-colored and ornately decorated stately buildings in the distinctly French-Dutch-Italian style of Peter’s city. insert historical note But neon lights and flashing signs bearing strange Russianizations of American culture are pervasive; e.g. Карлс Джунер (Karls Djunier: Carl’s Junior) and Чикенбергер (Chikenberger: Chicken Burger).

So this afternoon, after a brief orientation meeting, some members of the group went on an expedition to get some American dollars with which to pay our host families tomorrow. We went to several ATMs, none of which had dollars. We then found a bank and decided to ask them. Here’s the exciting part: I asked them. Then they answered. Then I asked a follow-up question. They then answered my follow-up question. Then I said thank-you. IN RUSSIAN. Then on to the next bank – same thing. And finally, on the third bank, my efforts succeeded not only in having a conversation, but in obtaining money. Woot! Similar experiences occurred throughout the evening – I purchased time at an internet café IN RUSSIAN and purchased some water and snacks at a grocery store not only IN RUSSIAN, but also at the mercy of the kassa system. insert касса note

So on my first day in Petersburg, I successfully spoke Russian with Russians to get what I wanted! It feels fantastic! And I’ve got to say, I feel really proud of myself. I expected that the first week or so, at least, I would be really shy and try and get other people to ask questions and buy things, etc., but I just went for it and was met with moderate success. So I think I get a gold star for today. It’s amazing to me that all of the symbols, words and phrases I learned while sitting at a seminar table with a bunch of other Americans in Swarthmore, PA actually has meaning to a bunch of people in another country. It just sort of seems like a sort of leap of faith to be able to go to a country in which you have no experience whatsoever and expect to be able to communicate with people. It’s a pretty cool world we live in, I guess! (They told us during orientation that culture shock usually begins with a “honeymoon period” followed by reality hitting and a person’s getting really depressed, then moderately happy, then moderately depressed, and continuing on until said person is just sort of content and settled. Any guesses as to my stage?)

Later in the afternoon we took a bus tour of the city. The tour guide gave the whole tour in Russian, so while I understood basically what we were looking at and how it came into existence, there were probably a bunch of nifty factoids that I would usually be more than happy to share, but of which I am sadly completely unaware. But this tour was where it finally sunk in that I’m actually in Russia. You’d think that the Soviet hotel and the Russian speaking and the cold shower would have clued me in, but I hadn’t really stopped to think about it. But then we were driving down Nevskij and I caught sight of an orthodox Russian-style cathedral. As we approached it, I saw its onion domes, bright colors, icons… the whole nine yards. I sat there and looked at the cathedral, and at the fur-clad pink-cheeked passers-by, and all of a sudden it hit me. I’m in Russia. The same Russia that was ruled by tsars for hundreds of years. The same Russia whose music was created by Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff, Stravinsky and Prokofiev. The same Russia with the rich folk culture I’ve been learning about for so long – with their superstitions, folk music, and fairy tales. The same Russia that Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Chekhov and Pushkin wrote about. For that matter, the same Russia where Raskolnikov and my beloved Pierre Bezuhov found their redemption, and where Levin mowed his fields. (Explanatory note: Raskolnikov is the main character of Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment, in which he kills a pawnbroker then mopes around the city whining about it for 600 pages. Levin is the only well-balanced character in Anna Karenina, and he mows his fields with his peasants for a good 40 pages or so, which turns out to be quite a meaningful and redemptive experience. And finally, Pierre is my absolute favorite character in all of the literature I have ever read or probably ever will read – in War and Peace he bumbles around for about 1300 pages before he finds free will and meaning, takes control of his life, and becomes a strong and dignified human being.)

So yes, I am in fact in Russia. On a much less self-absorbed and awed note, there are two observations that I would like to make at this juncture. First, you CAN NOT escape techno-ish dance music at every turn. In lobbies, in restaurants, in stores, in elevators… it’s like a dance party all the time. On the one hand it’s rather distracting, on the other I feel extremely hip.

My second observation has to do with boots and their proper usage. In Oregon, if you tuck your jeans into your boots it means you’re off to feed the pigs or milk to cows or ride a horse or something. On the East Coast, tucking your jeans into your boots means that you want to look cool and European. As I desire to send neither of those messages, I always wear my jeans outside of my boots. In Russia, however, wearing your boots with the jeans tucked in means simply that you don’t want to be a total idiot and have to wear three different pairs of pants in one day because you spent all afternoon traipsing around the city getting your pants totally soaked in the three inches of brown, slimy, disgusting snow-dirt-mud-slush that makes its home on every sidewalk, street, and staircase. I learned that this is the meaning of such a fashion statement in Russia today. I learned this lesson the hard way. I hereby vow to wear my jeans inside my boots at all times.

Okay, that’s all for now. Tomorrow we move in with our host families, and Tuesday we take a language placement test in preparation for language classes starting Wednesday. We will have two weeks of the language intensive before regular classes start. I hope all is well with all of you! I’d love to hear how everything is going back home.

Love,

Annie

Orientation

I arrived at Bard's campus on Monday late afternoon for our pre-departure orientation. Everyone on the program (there are twelve of us, some of whom are pictured above) has been eating together, hanging out, and attending "sessions" on safety in St. Petersburg, academic expectations, transportation, current events, etc. We leave for Russia on Friday, although two of our group left today for various reasons.

Anyway, it's been really fun. Today we went on a hike around Bard's campus, and looked at the Hudson river. It was a nice hike, and we saw a swan, and the Hudson river was frozen over and beautiful. Everyone involved with the program is really friendly, and it's a new and exciting experience to be around a bunch of Russian nerds! At Swarthmore I have a couple of friends who are interested in Russian, whether they speak it or not, but now there are a dozen of us walking around talking about Russian literature, our programs at home, and occasionally slipping into Russian for a sentence or two. I think the program is going to be really challenging once we get to Petersburg, but I'm feeling a lot better about it now that I know some of the other people on the program. I think I've successfully recruited a handful of fellow Mariinsky theatre-goers, and I think that most of the kids on the program will be willing to speak Russian in Russia, so it should be a good experience in all social respects.

So that's my brief update for now... I'm getting simultaneously more nervous about and more looking forward to going to Russia as our departure date closes in on us. We've been warned of mayonnaise on salads, lard on spaghetti, and butter on everything else, so I think we're just about ready!

I hope all is well with everyone at home!

A note on the title...

"В России," which would be transcribed as "V Rossii," means "in Russia."

"V Rossij," which is the title of my blog and the transcription of "В Россий," doesn't actually mean anything and is my mis-spelling of the above. So we'll pretend that the title of my blog is "In Russia," and this little post is just for those of my readers who actually speak/read/write Russian so that they won't make fun of me. Although perhaps they really ought to...

It's starting to sink in...

As my friends from Swarthmore start to prepare themselves for heading back to campus, it's finally starting to sink in that this semester I won't be. Instead, I will be studying for a semester in St. Petersburg, Russia. God- and procrastinationhabits-willing, this blog will be a regularly updated travel diary of my trip, and thus a way for me to keep in touch with friends and family at home and abroad elsewhere.
For the benefit of those of you with whom I haven't been as in touch as I probably ought, a brief Annie-update: I just finished the fall semester of my junior year at Swarthmore. I'm in the Honors Program there, which means basically that rather than regular courses in my major and minor I take seminars worth twice the credit, and then there is an external examination at the end of my senior year on that material rather than a thesis or some other kind of internal evaluation. I've decided on an honors major in Political Science, with an honors minor and regular ("course") major in Russian. Hence the Russia trip.
First, some information about the program. I will be studying at the Smolny Institute of Arts and Sciences, Russia's first liberal arts college. The college was founded as a joint project of Bard College and St. Petersburg State University, and has about 400 students. It's a sort of experiment in the democratization of the Russian education system. Other than the Russian language courses that program participants are required to take, I'll basically just be enrolling in the college and taking courses in Russian with Russians. I'll also be living with a host family. So far all that I know about this is my adress, and that I'll be living with a woman called Alla Alexandrovna who, as far as I know, doesn't have any other family, or pets, living with her.
The last several weeks have consisted primarily of getting ready to go; installing Russian spell-check software, getting necessary vaccines and blood work, buying a full-length down coat (St. Petersburg is on something like the 60th parallel...) and the like. On Friday I leave home to spend the weekend at Swarthmore and say goodbye to everyone who is around, and the following Monday leave for Bard College for a pre-departure orientation. We all fly to St. Petersburg together on the 24th.
As email and other internet-based forms of communication will be my primary way of keeping in touch at home, please post lots of comments or questions, write me emails (to which I promise I will respond!) and also to share this with anyone and everyone who you think might be interested. Also, if you want to receive a postcard, just email me your mailing address and I will be happy to oblige!

I hope everyone is well. Keep in touch!