Easter Apples

The night before an early departure and I ain't packed a thing. Nice, huh? Fortunately, the extent of my pack job will probably be a toothbrush, change of socks, and the charger for my camera. Somehow I'll probably still manage to forget something. In about 7 hours I'll be waking up and walking to the bus station. I'm sure I could find a cab, but there should be plenty of inebriated youth making there way home from the disco so I have a feeling I'll opt for the constitutional over the taxi.

This morning I was the first person at the church (if you don't count the two guys that live in the basement). I managed to learn all the songs the choir director indicated we would be singing today before people showed up. However, we didn't sing any of those songs. Go figure. Oh well, it was good practice. My solfege is rather rusty, but I'm starting to get back into the other aspects of singing.

Afterward I meandered out to the bus stop and was waiting for the bus when one of the young men from church came by in his delivery van. He offered me a ride, so I hopped in. This particular dude actually speaks English decently. Anyhow, he asked where I lived and I responded in English. Next thing I know he called one of his friends and asked where I lived in Russian. I played dumb and thanked him kindly for the ride.

Today my Valentine gave me an Easter present. First she told about how she celebrated Easter as a little girl. In Soviet times this wasn't allowed. However, Siberia is a far piece from nowhere, so they did as they liked. Meat pies, fish pies, apple pies, pie pies - sounded really tasty. Next she mentioned that yesterday she had baked an apple pie like she used to when she was a little girl. And that she wanted to take this occasion to present it to me. Sweet! (Actually not really - the pie was not your traditional American pie, so there was more crust and less apple, but still quite tasty)

Recently, I've received two small tree branches (one with flowers, and one with pussy-willow-like fuzzy things), a key-chain carved from a tooth of a large sea creature by a sailor the year after I was born, and the apple pie. The twigs still look remarkably good, but the pie didn't fare so well. In fact, there is nothing left of it. I was hungry so inhaled it an hour or so ago.

The Homestretch

This morning I downed the last Centrum Advanced Formula High Potency Multivitamin/Multimineral Supplement pill in my bottle. Considering how lopsided my usual diet was when I had somebody to cook for me in America, my mom suggested that I bring along some vitamins to supplement whatever nutrition I managed to kill and swallow. I wound up bringing two bottles of 180 pills each. 180 + 180 = 360, which is round about a year. Using my excellent deductive prowess, I reckon that since I just finished the first bottle I'm halfway through my Russian sojourn. I began taking the horse-pills on my first day here back in August so you can figure out how many days I skipped if you're interested. Oh yeah, there is one other piece of information. Each bottle has 20 free tablets (180 + 20 = 200).

I suppose it shouldn't come as a surprise, but in a way it does. The weather is back down around freezing. This is the third day. I had to go dig out my scarf and gloves to keep warm. As much as I love cold and was sad to see it go, I adjusted to the spring weather and now a leap back is playing games with my head. Fortunately it hasn't affected my health.

Following my class this afternoon I took a walk to the nearest cemetery. Russian cemeteries are pretty strange. Why would I choose to do that on such a lovely day? Well, last night I went on a slightly morbid trip during class and we discussed cemeteries for a good 20 minutes. Afterward I knew where the three cemeteries in Kaliningrad were and decided that I should visit. The typical American graveyard (in my mind) is very spacious, or if space is at a premium there is at least a lot of green things around. Things were green at the cemetery I went to, but not necessarily due to grass or trees or normal things. It seems that half the cemetery was submerged under 2-3 inches of water. I'd be walking down a little path when all of a sudden the water would start chasing me and I'd have to run right back from where I'd come! Most of the little plots have knee high fences around them with a walkway about 18 inches between. Now I am curious about the logistics of planting somebody. I mean it must be incredibly difficult for the pallbearers to maneuver a coffin back to its final resting place. Maybe they make like it is Venice and use the casket as a gondola. Now I'm being irreverent so I'll get back to the facts. Most of the tombstones had pictures of the deceased. Whether the portraits were etched into the stone or a photo was weather proofed and attached, at least a face was on virtually all markers. I came across one dude that was life-size etched into a big pillar. It was mildly humorous that the shirt he was wearing had a huge Reebok logo on it. The haves and have-nots were also painfully obvious. There could be a freshly painted fence with an immaculately manicured little lawn 18 inches from a crumbled headpiece with litter piled higher than the mound of ground. To any of you who think that there are only 5 Russian names, I'll have to disagree after my visit. For the hour and a little bit I meandered about I didn't see the exact same name once. Actually, I even discovered a couple cool ones. Watch out future kids, your dad may have picked your name out today from among some Communist's dilapidated tombstone!

An unusual thing happened this semester. I teach Levels 2-6 with a significant jump between 4 and 5 in my opinion. This semester was the first time somebody that started in Level 2 when I arrived last fall made the jump. Come to think of it, it was also the first time that any of my pre-Level 5 students moved up. It didn't go too well. And I'm not sure whether to blame myself, the books, or the attitude I have to the different classes. My lower three levels use books from the same series. In these books, there is a lot of good information integrated with new grammar rules. The upper levels have a grammar resource at the back of the book and during the lesson I tend to focus much less on grammar and basically just discuss the information and tangents that spring up. At the beginning of my second semester I decided that since the center was in need of students (money) and the difference between the textbooks for Levels 5 and 6 is marginal, that the highest I would place an incoming student was Level 5. So up until now, I've been able to maintain a very high English level and the material has been interesting, or at least I think it has been. Now, however, I have people who are fluent side by side those who aren't anywhere near that level and I feel that both are suffering. To paraphrase my old trumpet teacher's thoughts on American public school: "The smart get dumber and the dumb get dumber." Not exactly something I'd like to be remembered for.

One of the people who attend the weekend classes regularly gave me an excellent pointer today about how to learn Russian. I hope that I can make myself do it. She relayed how her brother learned German when he was living in Germany. He just talked to people like crazy. Head to the travel agency and ask about a trip to Egypt, try on expensive clothes and ask for them in a different size, go dishwasher shopping, talk to the old lady selling plastic flowers for the recently deceased. Unfortunately, she concluded by saying that her brother was unique and a bit strange. That is unfortunate because people have told me the same thing on occasion. Therefore I feel obligated to give it a whirl. I need to buy a few plane tickets within the next week. Maybe I'll go make a fool out of myself at the ticket office and begin my terrorizing of local merchants.

This is a nice random thought that occurred to me on a bus ride today. The accountant for the ELC is a really nice lady with two daughters about my age. I think that I'll send her a New Year's present next year - a nice hardcover book of some pictures that I took. Sorry, but I think I'll leave the nude self-portraits out (see second comment on prior entry)!

Rancid Butter

It appears that I spoke to soon on my last weather prediction. The next morning when I woke up, a fresh blanket of snow covered the ground. It continued snowing on and off until the following Monday. Then that Wednesday, true to my student's prediction, the weather was warm - really warm. Needless to say, there's been no snow since that time and pretty much any reminders of winter are gone. Since the last week of March the road repair crews have been making their rounds so apparently even the government thinks winter is over. Who am I to argue with the duma?

I've deliberately not posted for so long because I wanted to have pictures up beforehand. And now that that is finally accomplished, I can relate my rambling prose. Perhaps a few words on the pictures is in order. I appear to have been wrong on that account also. After beating my head multiple times against my laptop (I actually found a great fit for my head - in the slot loading cd drive), I was able to recover all my lost Women's Day pictures except for one movie I made. Maybe later I'll get that too. Then on April 2 I arrived home around 17:30 and sorted / edited my shots. I got them all ready to go and the computer crashed. Stupid me, I hosed the program to upload pictures to the web at the same time. But now, at last, things are more or less working the way they should. Please enjoy (or hate) my Women's Day on the River, Sunday Seaside Rendezvous, and Fort Number 5.

Monday, April 4, all of my pants were either dirty or in the to-be-mended pile. so I wore a pair that I hadn't touched since mid-September. When I went shopping last August, there was one pair of pants that did not look particularly good on me, but were extremely comfortable. I bought them, but decided to get the light khaki color so it would appear more professional. This turned out to be a rather bad idea. After the first time wearing them and getting an ample dose of Kaliningrad mud on my rear I decided to retire them for this year. Actually, it was more due to the fact that the stains didn't come out after several times through the wash that led me to this decision. Anyhow, I resurrected the abandoned slacks today and was a bit surprised. They are still as comfortable as ever, but I've got a healthy sag goin' on with them now. "What, what, what?" I hear you query. "How is it impossible to down a kilo of mayo every other week and lose weight?" My response is that I haven't a clue, but it works for me. (Actually, I only just finished my second kilo bag of mayonnaise since the first post over two months ago.)

After walking along the sea for a few hours on Sunday, April 3, the people I was with decided to go for pizza. I opted to miss the evening's concert and go with them. Let me just say that Russian pizza is not pizza. What I had was good, but it just isn't deep dish. I think I could get used to it, if it wasn't called pizza. One of the ladies asked me if I cook for myself or if I eat out. I mumbled something about cooking for myself as I wasn't in a particularly talkative mood. If the truth is known, I've eaten out under five times since coming to Kaliningrad. Coupled with the apparent lost weight of the prior paragraph, please let me clarify that I'm not skin and bones - I've still got plenty of meat left on me.

Perhaps all this talk of meat, bones, and whatnot is a good place to recount my rancid butter story. Shortly after I arrived, I shopped around for some staples. Unable to decide which brand of butter was better, I got four tubs. One of them soon had a funny smell to it, but it was rather sweet, so I didn't think much of it. Most things I cook only call for a dab of butter, so other than a peculiar smell, I wasn't able to figure out my butter might be bad. Then nearly a month ago I made a cottage cheese loaf (or the equivalent, as we don't have cottage cheese over here). It calls for a big hunk of butter and the smell was the same as before but so strong I had to open the window. Usually the batter for this quasi-vegetarian meatloaf tastes pretty good. However, when I tasted it I reeled backward in pain - it was downright raunchy. I should've taken that as a sign that my batter was not oven-worthy, but I thought that perhaps the heat would kill whatever made it taste so bad. It didn't, but I still ate about half the roast. With enough ketchup and mayo, anything will slide down your throat. My largest regret is that I had put extra walnuts in the middle of the roast and was not able to enjoy them. On the bright side, the butter is gone so I am now free to search for other rancid wannabes.

As is to be expected, things do happen in life. Three weeks ago two men from the Euro-Asian Division of SDAs (in other words, my boss's bosses) visited our English Language Center. I sat in on the main meeting and things seem to be well. Some recommendations were discussed but I somehow doubt that I will be here long enough to reap any benefits or repercussions. The nice thing is that another employee back in Moscow was headed to DC that weekend, so I sent a birthday card to my dad and was able to avoid the Post Office yet again! I think while the two men were there I was observed for the first time since arriving here too. An entourage of about four people barged into my lowest level class and saw me try to explain comparative and superlative adjectives. Fortunately, a decently goofy picture of me 'teaching' was captured by Sergei, the man from the division that helped me get my documents in order when I first arrived.

Over the past two months I've played translator for one of the guys from church named Sasha. He loves to write poetry in Russian. But one of his primary recipients is an English speaker (well, Australian to be precise, but they speak something close to English). Enter the magnificent Trojan Poet. I've learned a bunch of Russian phrases and expressions along the way and it is challenging to preserve some of the poetic nature of a text while still getting the same meaning across in a different language.

This past Sunday evening Sasha came with his latest melancholy piece in tow right when I was cleaning my bathroom. At a later date I'll try to explain the ingenious invention of the quasi-waterless Russian loo, but suffice it to say I left a tiny green sponge in the bowl where I was scrubbing away the waterline. Midway through the translation session, Sasha's friend needed to relieve himself and exploded laughing when he saw a friendly green sponge gazing up at him from a seat-less toilet (the seat was drying on the balcony). Now my bathroom is probably the cleanest it has been since I moved in - I even bought a new shower head finally. The kitchen is the next thing that needs some attention before the little lady makes her once in a lifetime pilgrimage to Kaliningrad, which happens in about a month.

Yesterday I ran into the German teacher I ate lunch with a few weeks back on my way to school. He suggested that we make a weekend trip to Gdansk, Poland. It sounds like a great idea but we need to find the best way to get there and back while still seeing a bit of the city. The way it is looking now, that would happen the weekend before I head back to Moscow to visit some people. Good things come in bunches I suppose.

Speaking of bunches, there are in fact flowers here now. On Saturday I commented that I walk to my Russian lessons that happen on Tuesday and Friday. A few days doesn't seem like a huge difference, but it really is noticeable. The route that I use takes me by more verdant environs than those which I see on my way to school usually. What I said was that two weeks ago on Friday, April 1, there was still ice covering the lake. The following Tuesday the ice was gone and people were lazing about in greater numbers than I had remembered seeing before. April 12 brought buds on the trees and by last Friday the 15th I saw decent sized flowers blooming. Yes, I'd say spring is a bustin' out all over, if you catch my drift...