Getting down to business

So the last few days have been good! I found a coat, found some more cheap clothes, found my class, found it boring… all important findings. The class really was kind of dull. The first day was really bad: way too many people, the…. professor… was.. talking… like… this, and the material really did seem to be at an intermediate level. I went back today, and it was a little better, so I’m going to go again tomorrow. I might look into switching to a literature class. I am paying after all.

I got my schedule for my English classes, well, half of them, and I start on Monday. From what I gather, I’m just going to be chatting about my experiences in America. When I asked if I’m supposed to give grades or homework, my boss answered, “You are not here to give grades. You are here to give pleasure!” Interesting work!

The international students had a tour of the candy factory, which turned out to be a lot of fun. We had to buy some funny little feet coverings called “bakhili” at the drug store, as well as a bottle of water. The water didn’t make sense to me at first. So we were there with all the international students from Germany, France, Switzerland, Austria, China, Vietnam, Korea, etc, and we suited up in little “Red Star” hats and t-shirts. They ran out of shirts, so I got to wear a big doctor’s smock thing. I got to practice some French and German while we were waiting, which was fun, but then the tour guide announced that since not everybody will understand, she would talk less and we would try more candy.

So we proceeded through these dreary, old corridors, and around every corner was a fresh batch of candy to try. They make over 150 types of candy there, including their famous “Bird’s milk”, and they’ve been in business since the 1800’s. Later I asked if it was always called the “Red Star” plant, and of course, it wasn’t. It was originally named after some Polish guy, but after the revolution, when they decided that the best thing to do with orphans was to let them work in the candy factory, the orphans, ripe with socialist fervor, renamed it “Red Star”. So the story goes. Anyway, I soon found out why we needed water. I ran out pretty quickly and was desperately thirst from all the mounds of candy. There’s also a beer factory we might get to tour. Maybe they’ll recommend that we bring some bar snacks. Well, soon the workers had their break and our tour ended. They showed us some top-secret candy from R&D, including various blatant rip offs of American candies, one of which, “SPRINT”, was stolen from Snickers (even the packaging), only with added energy (taurine, etc) to “improve your mood on a cold Siberian day”.

Well that was an adventure. Later that day, the international crowd invited me to dinner at some shabby but cheap place near the river. It was fun to act as a translator from Russian to German, from German to French, and every possible direction in between. Later, they decided to stop into a bar, and it ended up being the funniest little family establishment. The beer was ridiculously cheap, and they were just about the friendliest people you’d ever meet. They were so impressed by their international patrons that they had us all autograph a piece of paper. We chatted for a long time with the barman, then later played “durak” (only Russian card game, thanks Matt for teaching me) with the proprietress (I’m guessing). It’s turning out that my Russian is serving me pretty well! The barman Nikita told me all kinds of stories about his Grandpa the expert hunter of bears and elk. Later he tried to catch me up in an argument about the current political situation, but I deftly navigated myself into a fairly neutral position and assured him that I wanted nothing more than peace and friendship between our countries. I’ve had a little practice with this question, and I’m learning how to answer it! Anyway, it was a great experience, the whole thing, and I left feeling great about my whole situation (experience for the pouring rain).

Today Sveta (as she’s now called) and my boss spent all day helping me in my quest for an apartment. They worked long and hard, calling, discussing, recalling, answering calls. Finally we got to tour a couple of places. The first was incredible, truly surprising, but a little far away. The second was closer and terrible. My boss seemed to think the owner was an alcoholic and got us out as quickly as possible. The last one was also closer and also not great. Tomorrow we’re going to be able to check some more places out, including a couple that are very close. I’m really hoping they’ll be okay. They’re all priced a little higher than I had hoped, but I think it’ll be worth it.

Well, I’m working on my second week here, and things seem to be getting off the ground. For those of you that have been reading, thanks! Hopefully, I’ll be able to do a better job of keeping in touch once I get my own place. We’ll see!

Love ya’,
Jason