In which I'm a heinous bitch. Again.

"He said I looked for you, I don't know why. I said I was wearing black so you could see me against the sky..."

Whomever names that tune wins my undying love and affection forever and ever amen.

No really.

You know you've been in a bus too long when you swear the parents of your favorite sitcom "Not born beautiful" (Yes, exactly like Oskliva Betty...like...completely) just drove by in the other lane...

The only neccesary summary of this weekend's CIEE enforced tour number one to Novgorod:

Tour guide: Oh look at all the beautiful churches! blah blah blah blahy Russian hour two and my brain kicks off
Us: Blah Blah Blah we're loud and anoying and disrespectful and we swear in churches and just generally ingratiating...
Tour guide: Novgorod was the ancient seat of Russian Orthodoxy, blah blah...cultural mecca blah blah
Us: Oh look, kittens!

Yeah, thats all I'm gonna bother to say without sounding like the pretentious prick that I am.

I'm realizing again what a different experience I had living in the boondocks that year in Kostelec. The places that we visited and the landscape we've been driving through reminds me soo much of Bohemia. The condition of the buildings, the houses with patched tin roofs, and the huge garden plot out back encompassing three quarters of the property, the babyshki sitting by the road trying to sell potatoes, even the scary-ass drivers. THe problem is that I keep expecting Kostelec to explain Petersburg questions, and while it can, atleast personality wise, and on the surface, sociologically the mindset is totally different. The extremes are much broader here, between city and country, rich and poor, whatever the determiner, the space between black and white is much more distinct. Even though everything I know culturally from Czech probably applies here, and probably moreso than I know, its just buried under city life and european cosmopolitan urges. This country has a lot further to catch up from than Czech does, those who can run thus run faster. Those who can't are stuck in villages not much different than the ones I knew.

In the end, its what you know of a place, how well you've established yourself, made it your own. Thats all that determines perspective, comfort, attitude, whatever you wanna call it. And I'm not quite there yet, though its coming.