Yes, I am still alive.

My deepest apologies for not posting sooner..Time has run away from me.

First here are a 4 things I’ve deeply realized since being here..

1. I am extremely privileged to have learned English as my first language.

Teaching English every MWF mornings and TTh evenings to kindergartners and every MW night to 15 year olds at least 2 hours every scheduled time -then attempting to learn Russian at our classes every TTh morning for two hours, plus homework in Russian, mixed with writing English lesson plans has been a bit tedious. However, it has helped me realized how confusing English really is..Russian is very mathematical and logical. Made for me right? However, English has so many random things that we just innately know. Example - Ctac pointed out the pronunciation of love and move. (luv and moov) Why? There’s no reason! That’s just how it is..also tough, though, trough, thought, doughnut, weigh - how would you ever memorize those pronunciations? Putting all the articles in the correct order in a sentence is interesting too..in Russian it doesn’t matter what order the words/phrases are in and it all depends on your intonation as to what you mean.

2. The Church is SO true. Yep. We found out today from the sister missionary from Fruit Heights, UT that translates for us at church that in Russia it’s almost like pioneer times persecution for the saints out here. People on the street will yell at you and call you a secularist. Yet, in RS the lesson was talking about how we all need to be nice to everyone we meet and love the people we meet on the street. It’s terrible and yet so inspiring. and the Relief Society is planning this big pioneer conference in March where each branch is going to be presenting something..so the women are sewing bonnets and aprons and are going to all dress up like pioneers and take a big picture with everyone doing something then read a poem they’ve written. The sister missionary also said that everyone out here loves to write so they will even have activities where they just read poems and stories they’ve written. It is amazing. She also told me that “I know that my Redeemer lives” is really cool in Russian because the last line is I know that my Redeemer lives so let’s go out and tell everyone that I know and it just got her so excited. I loved seeing the fire for sharing the gospel behind her eyes and then realizing what is small branch really has committed to defend when they joined the church. They all live in different directions and most probably don’t know each other extremely well but all meet every Sunday and have all of these great activities going on. It’s truly remarkable.

3. Americans need to slow down. I feel like American historical “culture” is such a mess compared to everywhere else. For the obvious reason that as a nation we have combined every culture into one country and ended up with a bunch of people that ignore everything around them and don’t put any TLC into anything because they’re in a hurry. In Russia, everyone is in a hurry, everyone looks mad, and walks a million miles an hour. However, visiting the buildings here has just put me in constant awe. I think that not knowing the language has made me so much more observant of everything around me at all times. Not just in the safety precaution aspect, but that just by walking into another room of these old buildings I get goosebumps, every time I walk out a different metro stop’s doors I get my breath taken away by the shear beauty of the world around me. It is a beautiful place and the old buildings that we visit have an immense amount of detail in every little facet and feature. The characteristics and history that make Saint Petersburg what it is are so unique. I hope that when I get back I will be able to keep this slower pace of appreciation and learn as much as I can about the places I visit. I think I miss alot of knowledge by simply not seeking it out as actively and I could.

4.I love cranes.

Not the little paper ones. Not the bird. The incredible device used to move extremely large masses.

Tons of parts of the city are under construction. Every time we see some going on I take a picture and I get so excited. Linlea asked me a couple days ago why I like cranes so much and I’d never really stopped to think about it. My following thought process made me even more excited. Take a huge mound of scrap material and then add ingenuity and a ton of precise labor and you’ll end up with a tool that will allow you to accomplish tasks in such an efficient and incredibly mobilizing way. Every time I get my breath taken away but a construction site of a gorgeous Cathedral, renovation of the Hermitage or any historical building, or just the intricacies of the exterior of a wall, I know that my goals and path that I’m cutting into the field of life is headed in the right direction. Yesterday we visited the Peter and Paul Fortress and I was blown away by the architecture. It just filled my entirety with motivation to work my way through school doing my best. It is the same thing that happened when I went to Kennecott Copper mine and was driving away..there is a huge plant that is part of the whole facility that had massive lines and poles surrounding the building and I thought, “I wonder how they built that?” Then I realized, I’ll never know unless I act on my desire to know. More importantly, I’ll never have the opportunity to be a part in the creation of something so beautiful and full of ingenuity unless I finish what I started and don’t just finish, but become great and applying the subject material. As much as I have been a nerdy student, I’ve never innately fit the “stereotypical” nerdy student because of a few factors; short-term memory loss and a left brain/ right brain 50%/50% usage balance. In other words, the conflict of my desire to be an artist and my desire to do everything in a symmetrical/logical/exact/OCD perfectionist way have never been reconciled until I thought about working on buildings where I can be creative until I reach a absolute physical limit and I will know the limit! Ultimately, I would love to work on temples. There aren’t any structures as exact and made of the the finest materials built anywhere today as our temples. I have no idea where I will end up but I am excited to find out.

WARNING:Following content is an accumulation of 2 weeks of my scatter-brained observations and may take you so long to read you will need breaks for meals and naps. Such breaks have been inserted. Continue at your own risk.

Here’s a more detailed analysis of my little life thus far..the “_____” lines signify the separation of daily notes.

January 28/29, 2010

Welp. First international flight of my life.

Here’s the analysis.

1.Everything is in German before English which is quite fun to listen to. I figured it’s a glimpse of the next four months of my life in a less harsh preliminary experience because things aren’t going to always be followed up by an English translation.

2.I’m the minority, the “secondary” language speaker, and I think Germans don’t like Americans much.

Exhibit A -the stewardess was very cold with me and super-duper friendly with the German people sitting across the isle from me. I now am slightly motivated to learn how to communicate basically in all languages.

3.There are many attractive young German men.

4.All the services are amazing. Hot, moist towelette to clean my hands? Why yes, I would love one.

5.HEAVENS they have ALOT of alcohol on this plane..

I watched part of the Michael Jackson Movie and then watched all the movie Fame. (I’m a fan.)

Pasta was a terrible meal choice on my part. I was expecting some kind of alfredo sauce but the marinara sauce tasted like greasy, fried ketchup. All that was in it besides weird shaped shells was peas?

I would definitely recommend Lufthansa to anyone flying to/through Europe-just not the pasta.

Also, since I’m guessing this is technically under “German Jurisdiction” the drinking age is only 18 and for once someone didn’t ask how old I was! Or assume I am 15...Not that I wanted any of the hundreds of dollars worth of alcoholic beverages on that cart..but I felt slightly validated.

It has only been 3.5 hours. 4 more hours to go. The flight to Chicago was only 3 hours and I feel like that was 1/4 as long. Time is not going quickly.

When we boarded the plane our local time was Thursday, 4:25 PM. When I get off the plane local time will be 11:23 AM.

It is truly incredible to me that me, little person, can walk through a tube into a capped tube with wings and when I walk back out I will be on the other side of our dear friend Earth. What happened to days of travel by horse to a train..weeks to the coast..weeks on a boat..train..boat..not to mention your whole life savings..the eventually be on the other side of the world. IF you even make it. It’s a definite testimony builder of the Restoration of the Gospel; because we would not have any of the technology we have, if Heavenly Father didn’t want us to use it to spread the Gospel. Maybe someday proselyting will require us to have teleportation devices like a watch and we won’t need planes anymore! I’ll patiently wait for that day to come.

Here's a picture from the future..right before landing in St. Petersburg.

So, our layover in Dusseldorf will be about three hours and I am kind of excited to see what it is like to be a foreigner. A real foreigner. Not a fake one. I have an odd hunch that other cultures don’t think our accent is “dreamy” like Americans do about all other foreigners..just an odd hunch. However, whatever my “hunch” is I will soon experience it.

......We chilled in the German airport. Not as cool as I was expecting. Except for the fact we got to ride a shuttle out to our little plane and walk up the steps to our tiny plane. That was pretty sweet. I love when you get to walk of the steps from the ground for some reason it is just so fantastic.

Of course, it was snowing. My eyes are stinging super bad from only getting like 5 hours of sleep max in the past day and a half. Which really will be like two days once the plane lands with the 10 hour time change. Our head teacher also told us that it is rude to yawn in public. Let’s just say I’m going to have a hard time with that one for the next week at least. If not the whole time.

However, the meal on this flight was much better. They have the food kind of native to the country that they are flying out of. This pasta was tortellini and the crusted bread was better and the desert wasn’t a crusty brownie it was a german chocolate wafer bar and the side wasn’t big super cold rice with corn it was a water bottle. I’ve decided American food is crap in general. Because it started out from a bunch of different, authentic specialties and was all jumbled together and is required to be made so much faster and with much less TLC. I hope to be a “authentic”/good cook. No weird pasta with nasty sauce and random peas. My mother has always been a phenomenal italian cook; maybe that has tainted me to eating crappy food. This trip is going to be interesting meal wise.

Lastly, my eyes sting.

...once the plane landed in St. Pete’s...

Naturally, EVERYTHING is white. It was beautiful.

Rossiya is great.

First thing I saw when we got in the airport was a huge add, “MTC”. ha. It’s a cellphone company but it made my day. Went through passport control, customs, got our luggage, and met up with the native coordinator then split up and left with parents of our host families. Linlea and I went with Linlea’s host dad, Alec (Oleg) and he is a funny, short, fantastic little Russian man. However, his sweet BMW was completely stuck where he parked. Our first experience in Russia is an hour of attempting to get the car out. I wanted to take a picture of the huge mounds of snow but I didn’t..We felt so bad. Totally pushed it like three times with another random Russian man helping to no avail. Naturally, I biffed it. ha. What else could I of expected? No worries, minor bruising. 30 minutes of shoveling with a little shovel and a busted bumper later, we were out! All he said when we got back in the car with his super thick accent was, “Welcome to Russia!” I loved it.

He spoke English very well but I think that he thought the word for “bridge” was “golden gates” because when we drove over a bridge to St. Petersburg that is all he said. Not followed by “bridges”. ha.

After two days..

Still great.

Very first impressions...

If I knew the language I would never leave.

I love it.

Saint Petersburg is absolutely amazing.

I don’t understand anything anyone is saying but they don’t understand anything I am saying either.

I love the look of everyone! It’s so picturesque; the pointy shoes, the huge fur coats, the huge fur hats, stiletto boots, mounds of snow that are taller than me. It is all wonderful. My host family consists of Volodya, dad; Tanya, mom (mid 60’s); Anna, age 10; Dima, age 6. They are great. The apartment is very modern European style and I love it.

This is my bedroom. Otherwise known as the entertainment central station. I sleep on a couch and Dima comes in to watch TV every morning on that plasma screen...Not exactly the dirty cold and uncomfortable room I was expecting.

Short-term memory loss got the best of me. I put my passport in a “safe place”, considering I didn’t think I was going to need all those important documents for four months..don’t worry. Found it. We’re okay. I have the worst memory ever. If it is important to me - I’ll lose it in 5 seconds. Whatever “it” is. If it is important to someone else - I’ll never lose it. That’s just one of my imperfections that I fight everyday. In the end, it keeps me humble and ensures that my life will never be boring. Clumsiness helps too.

We went to church today and rode the metro to church and to downtown. Nine in the morning and there was a guy wasted out of his mind that looked like he was dead. Legitly a dead person toppled over on a seat. I don’t even know if he wasn’t really dead.. Sketchy people everywhere. However, there are people everywhere that are obviously attempting to look American..ski jackets..light jeans. It’s funny. The women not so much. Some of them have puffy coats that are super brightly colored or metallic. I’ll have to remember to tell my mom that my silver, metallic, down, “baked potato”-looking coat that I love could’ve been in style if I lived in Russia. Ha.

I hope I can learn alot of Russian while I’m here. To the point where I’ll name one of my kids with a Russian middle name and make them write it in characters. ha. That’d be sweet. Different kid with a french middle name..hmm...American presidents last names as their first names? Da. We also went to a old Cathedral in downtown St. Petersburg today that was incredible on the inside. The workmanship was wonderful and it was so ornate on the interior just covered in gold leafing. I loved it. The dome ceilings with engraved, identical square patterns that had so much depth but would probably look like pretty tiles if were 2-D. It was so beautiful.

Here is the outside..

The architecture is absolutely remarkable on the exterior of the buildings as well. Just like right out of the picture that convinced me to come. It’s wonderful. They also always wear slippers inside which I find to be like Asia. It’s nice though. They are buying us some to wear while we are at the school, because all shoes get covered in sludge from outside. They through dirt with a little bit of salt in it sometimes on the road and side walk instead of plowing so it’s nasty. I told a couple girls today that Russia kind of reminds me of Chicago during the depression. Peoples’ attitude in public, the fact that there aren’t really consequences for your actions and everyone knows that so it’s a lot less safe, and the push and shove about everything. It’s interesting..I did hold the door open for a old lady today though and she said thank you. There are old lady’s everywhere.

Here are some live Russians and a pretty street in the Center.

I’m so glad I decided to do this. It has shrunk the world so much in my mind. I already knew that mormon world was tiny because even I know LDS people all over the world, but really, traveling is so sweet. I hope I get to do alot more in my life. It is wonderful.

----Nap Break----

After 4 days..

I found out that my host family has hosted 7 other American English teachers and that I am the first who eats fish..haha. I think it’s probably a precaution the previous teachers took because the fish here is the most radioactive in the world..but it’s good! My host dad just about flipped out. It was great. I adore them alot and I can’t wait to be able to communicate with them more effectively once I learn more Russian. They don’t speak English hardly at all..We went to the school we’re going to be teaching at today. The kids are adorable and the school is pretty sweet. I love it. Then we went to the University where we’ll be having Russian lessons and it is going to be great also. I’m pretty excited. I hope we can learn things fast so I’m semi decent by the time we leave. Our first class is tomorrow at 10 am at the university. I feel like when I get back to America I’m going to have a hard time speaking English without an accent because every time I think the word “University” my host mom’s voice comes into my head saying it.

___________

We ate at McDonald’s today. It was a super nice place. Everything American is so much better outside of America.. I think it’s going to be a very interesting four months but so far so good. I talked to Grandma briefly today and she loved every word I said as if I was her favorite person. I love her.

We had our first lesson at the Russian University. I feel like we covered alot of material. I can read..as long as I remember all the letters..and we discussed what makes the gender of words different.

Our first cafeteria lunch - Soup, beets, mashed potatoes with carrot bits in it, meat, and bread. It was delicious. Then we discovered the state of the supply room..complete disaster..WOW..nothing was organized at all.. The classroom I taught in today was a toy room. Huge book shelf of toys, table covered in toys, toys on the floor..you have to step on toys to get in the door..there is a huge ribbon thing hanging from the ceiling from right above the kids head that they can reach it they stand up. There’s a little couch they sit on since there wasn’t enough seats..which makes the rest of the kids less attentive..it was ridiculous. My lesson went as planned two out of four times..

___________

I went shopping today and bought a bunch of containers for organizing. Tomorrow I will confront the beast of a supply room with all of my might. It makes sense that there was no updated list of supplies..there’s no way to tell what’s in there! I guess all the teachers before us were kind of trouble makers.

We definitely have our work cut out for us. Also sidenote, I really like all the girls alot. But this is still way better living habitats then what I was expecting. In SO many ways..Hopefully I’ll take pics of my apartment soon but it is SO nice..as for now here’s part of my room.

Here is the view from my window of some great construction on a Telecommunications Institute. Notice the fantastic cranes.The rest of my view. This is Linlea's building. Also Mirror of what my building looks like.

___________

So, remember how I mentioned they want to be American? A little girl I had in class yesterday who doesn’t speak any English had a shirt on that said, “Barbie” in sequins. We went grocery shopping and the store had tons of American products that were not in Russian..like Snickers, M & M’s, a Red Bull Energy Drink Dispenser at the check out. How do they know what it is if they can’t read it? Lots of random people wear bright ski jackets and light jeans with funny pockets, and tennis shoes, and bright beanies. I saw a kid on the metro with a New York Yankees hat on. Kinda funny. Also, Milky way sells tons of chocolate bars here that they don’t in America..it’s kinda crazy. They are so much better than American Milky Way bars. I loved them. It’s crazy. Everyone hates Americans, yet, they all want to be us and won’t admit it? It’s so weird to think about.

Other note, during our first Russian lesson at the University, which is probably the size of 7 small faculty offices on campus at BYU from what I could tell..Our teacher is awesome. He is really funny and speaks English better than I do. He told us he went to Cuba for 2 weeks to study Spanish accents recently, then went on a minor tangent and told us, “here is my perspective from a foreigner, I think you guys should help them out. I want to make video clips of here and show it to them and say, ‘we have been out from under communist dictatorship for 20 years and look where we are now.’” Just about sparked a political discussion..but Brandon..the marine..only said, “Yeah, but people get mad at us when we help people.” Which is true. I kind of wanted to ask him what he thought about Iraq but didn’t because I thought going back to learning Russian was probably a better idea and stayed silent until we did. It was interesting though..and Linlea and I talked later about how interesting it is that he probably didn’t speak Spanish, and the Cubans he visited I’m guessing didn’t speak Russian - so they must’ve communicated in English. A second language for both of them, and our national language. It an incredible thought.

We learned the alphabet so we can start to read. I have also loved hearing about everyone’s life stories “during Soviet times”. It’s practically a completely different country now and everyone’s stories are all so unique. “Stas” (that’s our teacher’s name pronunciation) told us about when he was in school during Soviet times, the letter “я” is the last letter in the alphabet and also means “I” or “me” if it is by itself. During the Soviet time they made a metaphor out of it and teachers would all tell their students “There’s a reason why it is at the end of the alphabet.” that you need to put yourself last. It was so amazing and so terrible.

----Snack Break----

___________

I’m dead. !00% exhausted. This was definitely an effective way to learn patience. I will definitely not be kindergarten teacher for the rest of my life..that is unless I want a quick way to die. The kids are INSANE. I almost can’t blame them though considering they have no idea what I am saying and the room I am teaching in is ridiculous. There are ribbons hanging from the ceiling that they can reach if they stand up. Toys on shelves on all the walls. Toys on tables all around. Toys on the floor. Not enough chairs. A little brightly colored couch that they all sit on and shove each other on. It was ridiculous. The other teachers have classrooms but I somehow ended up in the party room? ha. Oh well.. To say the least. I just wanted to cry after. They were out of control and I felt like the worst teacher ever. Oh heavens. However, I know tomorrow will be a new day a new Thursday and it will be whatever I make it. I hope I can do better. Linlea organized the supply closet with me today. We taught our classes from 10-12 then had lunch at 1 then hit the organizing hard. 5.5 hours later we went home. FIVE AND A HALF HOURS. In a tiny closet and tiny room it connects to with the heater in it and with no ventilation, because a Russian teacher was teaching in the class next to us and shut the door. It was SO hot in there..but it looks a million times better. We should’ve taken a picture before we started but we just took one about halfway through. It was CRAZY. I hope it helps everyone prepare better. I am so dead I just sat here and stared off into space while my mind raced for ten minutes and didn’t realize it until my host came back in and said something to the kids playing computer games. I’ve loved all the food they’ve fed me. It’s been great. I am so tired. They just came in and looked at pictures. I really do like my family. They are great. Hopefully write more tomorrow. Ciao.

Here is some of what went into the closet of death.

and here we are after our triumphant finish.

___________

We went to the Hermitage today. It was absolutely incredible. ABSOLUTELY incredible. I love love loved everything about it. Wow. I saw two paintings by Leonardo da Vinci and a sculpture by Michel Angelo. It was amazing!!! Seriously. Ever since I learned about Michel Angelo painting the Sistine Chapel in elementary school he has been my idol. I almost fainted with how fantastic every room was. It was like being right in a text book. I loved it.

Exterior of the Hermitage.

Just about fainting next to the "Crouching Boy" sculpture.

I had mashed potatoes and borsch or however you spell it for breakfast..quite the hearty breakfast. Then we went to a blini place for lunch. It is so good..

It’s funny to see the outdated American things in Russia. Like that Dima turned on the TV and there was the old Casper on TV in Russian. Even not outdated..like that Disney is huge here even. He is currently watching Hercules in Russian.

We had a “Girls Night” last night (Friday) and a few of us got to know each other better..it was great fun. The girls are all great. We are all completely different and from very different backgrounds going different directions but it’s going to be lots of fun to work together.

After 2 full weeks..

I am hoping that this trip will help me gain more self-discipline....including but not limited to writing in my journal everyday for more than random spurts at a time and exercising daily. Oops. I do count the distances hiking through the snow everyday as exercise but I don’t think it’s balancing out my increased chocolate intake. Minus a couple weird candies that another teacher bought - I’ve loved everything I’ve eaten since I got here.. I feel like my teaching is slowly improving. There are little frustrating aspects but I’m slowly feeling more confident all the time. and I know it will just take practice and repetition.

The kids just watched the Russian version of power rangers. haha.