So I'm lazy. Fuck me. or alternately Updates from the Front

Will post seven page musings of the past few weeks later, for now this shall have to do...

Btw...Anyone else really friggin scared of registration? I just emailed my classes and I feel like I signed my life away!!! God damnit, aren't we supposed to be over this by now?

Date: Mon, 17 Oct 2005 03:35:46 -0700 (PDT)
From: "Margaret Fulda" Add to Address Book Add Mobile Alert
Subject: Updates from the Front
To: rfradkin@umd.edu


Realizing I havent dropped you a line in about a month, and figured it was about time I let ya know whats going on...

The weather finally changed this weekend, and only now am I getting a real taste of Russia in the fall. Its funny, since things have gotten cold and dark and wet I find myself in a much better mood, I cant really explain it. I was walking along the Mojka embankment yesterday, and it was drizzling and cold, and generally unplesant, but I found myself in such a good mood. Its as if I can handle cold and dark, its really the sunshine that confused. Strange, one should not be contented by such an unforgiving climate...but since when do I fit such expectations...

I've come to the grudging conclusion that my program just needs to be endured, classes pass the time, and even occasionally enlighten. I know that I'm learning tons, and now that things are finally picking up outside of school, I can much better tolerate the bureacracy and just general annoyance that is CIEE. Choir is giving our first concert next week, and I dont know which I'm more excited by, the concert or the legitimate excuse to go to Moscow a day later then the group, so as not to end up couped up while 45 americans get roaring drunk and rowdy. You were right though, music is definitly the coolest thing that I'm doing here, theres some truth to the whole universality that is music and art, I think I'm only just realizing. Its doing wonders for my phonetics and my social life, I'll tell you that.

The funny thing, which in retrospect I guess you also warned me about, the longer I'm here and the better I get, the more my Czech really is beginning to screw with my mind. I think its just because when I know that I'll be understood regardless, or I'm tired, or annoyed, or when my brain skips a few steps I get lazy and Czech comes out first. And there are still a few expressions that just feel better to me in Czech than in Russian. My hozjaka has started calling me her ykrainka, because every time I say something in Czech she thinks its ukrainian. Not nearly as many as there used to be, but still, quite a few. I'm going back for a visit during our kanikyli next week, did I mention that yet? THe best thing was, I attempted to email my host family to find out if I could stay with them for a few days, and did my damndest to write in Czech, and I get a note back from the daughter saying "Hi Peggy...be glad that both my parents had 20 years of required Russian, because otherwise we would not have a clue what you were trying to tell us..." Oh well...the thought that counts? Now its just interesting to try to find something I can bring from here as a host gift that does not have any particular russian connotations, kind of an excercise in cross cultural analysis if I've ever encountered one.

Yes, there are children in the flat, two daughters and a boyfriend. And for the moment three cats and two kittens. They're all actually really good about talking to me, my host mother and I end up having pretty regular heart to hearts, which I appreaciate, though sometiems I think she assumes I understand better than I actually do. On the off chance that I do stop her and ask for clarification she thinks its absurd that I dont know something, and then I explain to her that yes I have in fact only been here for less than 2 months, and have only been learning russian for 2 years. Two weeks ago it was one of the daughters birthday, one of my first tastes of celebration. I lost count after toast number 4 or 5, but I figure thats the point, right? Seeing the whole family and just being in the middle of the attmosphere was one of the coolest things so far, and sitting and talking to the aunts and uncles and grandparents. I have come to the conclusion though that my host family definitly speaks, shall we say, a more colloquial language than is generally accepted. I got into an argument with my grammar teacher today about when and how you can use "chevo". My family uses it almost exclusively instead of "chto" and my teacher thinks that this is demeaning and only low class and uneducated, and why would I ever want to know how to speak in such a manner. I calmly tried to explain that its neccesary to know the usage so you can understand people on the street and real russians outside of academia...this very much did not go over so well. She said that Russians have a different relationship to language than americans do, which I"m sure is true, and that speaking in such a manner will have people think that you are rude and unmannered, and they might even be offended. THat I find hard to believe, and very much wanted to tell her that she probably thinks that because shes an academic living a high class life with an appartment off Nevsky...but I refrained.

Now the interesting experiences start right? Now that I can get past the definition and into the meaning.

Thoughts?
N