What does winter look like?

Here are some photos from my recent walks around Ukhta. Today, Nadya told me that it takes an American to point out how beautiful this city can be.

I love the look of winter here.

Along Chibyu River in Vzrosly (Adult) Park

I love Ukhta graffiti in Adult Park 

"Lenin is Always with Us," Lenin with a nice snow hairdo

Playing in Children's Park

Walking home from yoga

Outside of town - Zeryunova

What's under there? The building in the back is the main campus of the university. 

The wedding locks on the longest bridge in town

What does Sunday look like?

I wasn't sure that I wanted to wake up right at nine today (I was at a four-year-old's birthday party until late last night), but Iolanta's call for yoga pulled me up out of bed, into the super-warm clothing I put on every day and then out into the not-so-cold weather. Again, not-so-cold means about 0 degrees Fahrenheit - but, really, no joke, that doesn't feel too cold to me anymore. It's good walking weather.

That started my Sunday. Here's how it continued:

I wasn't able to balance on my hands with my knees resting on my elbows today in yoga. Жаль! But, hey, what's new?

Blini - you could call them crepes - waited for me next. Iolanta filled them with tvorog (farmer's cheesy/cottage cheesy??) and then fried them. I put berry jam and honey on top. I love this meal, especially in a friend's kitchen listening to family small talk.

Next, I was invited to sing with a small choir that meets on the eighth floor of one campus building with a great view of the snowy city and surroundings. This was my first day singing with them. I liked how we first sang around the piano, then in our own circle facing inward, then outward. After singing, four of us got tea at the new pizza place around the corner. It's the second Senor Pomidor in town.

Next, focused Russian. A few months ago, I asked an English teacher at the university to be my Russian language tutor. This was my first class back after the long vacation. She works a lot on my pronunciation of hard and soft sounds, gives me grammar exercises, listening and summarizing practice, and we watch segments of a 1961 Soviet comedy - "Devchata." Today, after pointing to an article that I read in one of the university's publications about students taking exams, Olga told me something fun. The night before exams, students, praying that they will do well the next day, often open the small corner window that's in all big windows here, and scream халява (meaning, give me a freebie) 3 three times while waving the little booklet which contains all of there grades, written and signed by teachers. They do this right at midnight. I will definitely make sure to open my window at midnight some nights for a chance to hear these calls.

Next, my weekly Sunday meeting with a group of four students who are preparing to go to America this summer for work. They will go with the program Work and Travel, which sets them up with employers in the US. Usually we meet in the cafe across the road from my apartment, but tonight I invited them to my place. I wanted to host, and found myself preparing by running to the store for the regular 5 liter bottle of water to make our tea with and then putting candies on the table--neither which I could have done without. Usually, our meetings just consist of questioning and answering, sometimes role playing, hanging out with the English language. They can have pretty interesting questions for me about how things are done in America, how people carry themselves, what type of laws are there, etc. Today, though, I read little puzzle stories, had them repeat them and then answer them. They sat on my couch for practically two hours with scrunched up, thinking faces. We finished up the evening by playing a game of Bananagrams. Great game! It's been a hit with every group I've taken it to.

So now, it's night time. I ran to the store right before 11 when it closed, but it was out of milk and eggs, both. There was something extra which I hadn't seen before, though: a dog, hanging out around the noodles and sausage section. No one seemed to be too bothered. It was probably too cold for it to hang out on the streets, so I don't blame it for sneaking inside. I would also. And, I do - very often. When I'm out for a walk, I sneak into stores for the sake of warming up my toes.

That's my Sunday.

Thanks for reading. 

February apprenticeship

Happy 2011! And, while I'm at it, Happy February!

I'm a little late to greet the new year. But, February 1st is the beginning of the new semester, new teaching groups, new classes offered to me through Ukhta.... And I've actually made some resolutions. Not for the new year, but for this next chunk of my stay in Russia, starting right now. (And, no, of course I will not tell you my resolutions.)

So, I'm going go into February like it's something new.

I started this new February with a surprise (but all-in-all pleasant) home visit from a doctor, a low key day around my apartment, a visitor for tea, and a hour and a half knitting lessons from the guard who sits at the entrance of the dormitory. I decided to hang out on her couch for a while as an apprentice while she retaught me how to hold my hands around the needles. It's fun watching the interactions between the students and families who enter the dormitory and this guard...especially right at 11pm when she has to close up the building. She starts to speak up louder, telling whoever is in the shower that they better get out. She tells the girl who wants to get milk at the store quickly before she locks the entrance that she better run fast and only get milk, no alcohol or anything. She gives an eye to the people who straggle in five minutes after 11, or just a friendly tease. I'm so curious about these women who work at the door. They have such authority and so much knowledge of what goes on in the building. I think I'll be apprenticing a little more.

Yoga

For about a month and a half now, yoga has been part of my weekly routine. I usually go two or three times a week to a fitness club on "Factory road" with my friend Iolanta. It's great to have a yoga partner--we wake each other up in the morning and encourage each other to go to class. The first day I met Iolanta (after a lecture I gave to her public relations class at the university), I told her that I just started yoga. In a city of about 120,000 people, I was fairly surprised when she said that she goes to the exact yoga classes that I had tested out. She started about 6 months ago. We've been going together ever since that day.

Class is fun. I'm finally getting a hold of all the words I need to understand the exercises in class. That doesn't mean I'm able to repeat all the Russian yoga jargon, but can recognize it, for sure. Sometimes I giggle a little when I misunderstand a command and go one way while everyone else goes another. It happens. (It's like when I played French horn in an orchestra in Finland and sometimes tooted the horn in the wrong spot because I couldn't count in Finnish fast enough).

The gym seems to be the only place in Ukhta that sells Indian spices. At least that's what my friends tell me--and they are much more experienced with shopping for food around here. I've been checking grocery stores for more spices without too much luck. Does this mean that there is a higher demand for spicy foods among athletic people in Ukhta than among nonathletic people in Ukhta?

Integration

Last Tuesday, high school students came from all over Komi Republic (and from Labytnangi, as well) to present research projects at a conference called Integration. The conference was held at the local Technical Lyceum. Every Wednesday, I lead some classes and an English Club for high school students at this lyceum. Being a familiar face at the school, I was asked to judge the student presentations in the International Language section of this conference.

We listened to 14 presentations, only three which were not in English but Russian. Topics included: ghosts-believers in England, the history of the American dollar bill and how video games can help Russian youth learn English. I was fairly impressed by the students' language skills and the extent of some of their research. One girl, knowing she wanted to participate in this conference last summer, interviewed people during a trip to England in August.

I was also impressed by the awards ceremony at the end of the event. Everything--the MCs, dances, songs, short films--was very well choreographed and in a beautiful hall that I had never seen before in the university. (I'm always surprised by what the university holds). As the one native English speaker around, I almost had to act as Queen Elizabeth during the ceremony (right after the actor Karl Marx), but was let off the hook when another teacher wore an ornate dress. I presented the International Language awards, instead.

English Club

Our first meeting

So far, I have held eight English Club meetings for students at the Ukhta State Technical University. For each meeting, I pick a topic and we go from there. Sometimes I bring props, sometimes clips of movies or radio programs, sometimes fun handouts that I find on the internet or in the various English-as-a-foreign-language books I schlepped along with me in my luggage. So far, so good. My audience has dwindled a little from the first few weeks of about 20-30 English-enthusiasts, but I've still had a steady flow of 8-10 people. And, it's actually not accurate to call the students who come to the English club an audience. Really, I try to be in the audience for a good part of the club. I try to get the students to talk. Of course, it doesn't always work out that way, but I try.

The last three English clubs have been particularly memorable. First: the Turkey Club. Despite my Thanksgiving dinner cooking dilemmas I wrote about in my last blog entry, Thanksgiving with the English Club went wonderfully. On Thursday--Thanksgiving Day--I was a little sick. I taught a few classes in the morning, but by midday just wanted to crash. A teacher could tell I wasn't feeling too well and asked about English Club: What would I do? Would I still have English Club and prepare food for Thanksgiving? What? I was going to prepare the food and carry it across town myself! That wouldn't do! I told her that it would be fine. But, as soon as I left for home, she must have called some of her students, because next thing I knew, two girls from class were trying to locate me. Well, they aren't just girls from class--Kristina and Nastya are good friends. They just happen to be in one of the weekly classes that I teach. Bearing loads of potatoes, they found me. Together we managed to make mashed potatoes in the nick of time. I gathered the other foods I had prepared (right along with the Pilgrim, Indian and turkey hats) and we called a taxi to bring us across town. Only four minutes late to club, we placed the hot food on the table! We ate, chatted and laughed. I asked the club to put on an impromptu play using the hats. The students preformed wonderfully: a strange plot involving a turkey in a Russian McDonalds.

Memorable club number two--the theme: superheroes. Last week, a few new students came to the club, so I decided to start off with a name game. Say an adjective that starts with the first letter of your name and then your name. Mine was easy: Super Sara. (I mean, it went well with the topic, right?) We went around the room with a couple funny adjective suggestions (it can get hard with many names starting with K and O or Y). We only let one noun slide: Cucumber Ksenia. The names stuck till this week. Next, I asked the students an important question: if you could choose flight OR invisibility, and you are the only person in the world who could have this power, which would you pick? (I got this idea from an episode of This American Life last summer--the first segment of "Superpowers" is great. ) This led to a great discussion of powers and capes.

Memorable club number three: funny laws. I found lists of outdated or just funny laws around the world, both in English and Russian. I gave the students the Russian lists and asked them to translate any ones that they liked. We laughed quite a bit. Did you know that in France, it is illegal to call a pig Napoleon? (That one came from: http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/law/article2251280.ece)

Halloween with the English Club

Getting the thanks ready for English club

Tomorrow's Thanksgiving, and I've been thinking about it constantly. What can I make here that I can share with my English clubs? What decorations? What food? What activities? But, the question isn't only what can I prepare--it's how. I have thought about the possibilities of presenting a turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, pies, cranberry sauce--just about anything--to the clubs. But, I've run into difficulties with ingredients, my own time, my lack of an oven and lots of equipment for cooking and the fact that I don't have many hands to get everything to the clubs, warm and on time. I could have solved this with more planning, but unfortunately, I didn't ask for much help. So, it's the night before Thanksgiving, and I'm trying to be creative in the kitchen. First, I decided to make some cornbread in the fifth floor oven.  One cornbread down (shaped like a flower, because I borrowed my friend's flower oven-safe pan), and one more to go. It's funny running up five flights of stairs every time I check the oven, but I'm thankful that I am allowed to use it. The fifth floor is a special floor, with a special guard at the entrance. I don't know what sets the students living on that floor apart, but I know I'm allowed in because I am the American who is living in the building for the year. They let me wash my clothes in their washer and, as I found out today, use their oven. It's very kind. The rest of the people living in the dorm do not have such luxuries.

(Side note about the dormitories: At our university, the curfew for the dorms is 11pm. This means that if you are out later than 11, you must notify a guard beforehand. If you don't notify a guard, and you come back late, you probably won't be allowed out the next night. I somehow don't fall under these rules, though, so I can ring the doorbell whenever I'd like and a guard will open the door. A guard is one of the several women who rotate shifts, constantly sitting in a room next to the entrance. One of these women always puts my hood up before I go out into the cold. Today she told me that it was -5 degrees Fahrenheit before I headed out for a half and hour walk across the city. Chilly.)

Next, I was hoping to make some pie. Unfortunately, I can't find all the pans I need, so I've decided to make just pumpkin pie filling. (Update: I just cooked the pumpkin, and it turns out that it's a spaghetti squash. Who knew?) Lastly, I'm making cranberry relish. I bought fresh cranberries from someone selling at a stand on the street. (There are regularly people selling berries on the street. Berries, potatoes and woolen clothing.) I understand that these dishes only represent a little bit of the Thanksgiving table and that they, alone, don't really go together. I'm excited to share them, nonetheless. English club's on Thursday at 5. Hope you can make it.