Russians put ketchup in all the wrong places.

Eggs. Rice. Vegetables. Pizza. All places ketchup should not be.

But I expected that. I knew when I came to Russia that I wasn't doing it for the food. I mean, it's Russian food! They eat beats and cabbage and potatoes and mushrooms and all those other things that grow underground and survive long winters and heavy snows. Heck, if I wanted delicious food and good weather I would've gone to Italy [someone please remind me: why didn't I go to Italy??].

I was wrong. Russian food is delicious, and a testament to the saying that limitations inspire innovation. Borsch, blini, pickled tomatoes, "salads" (which generally contain meat and potato, no lettuce), jam, fresh bread and Russian cheese, yum.

Fine fine pickle brine,
Salt and sweet intertwine!
Together we can dine divine..
I'll be yours if you'll be pickle

Bureaucratic Sharks

Dealing with Russian bureaucracy is a lot like being mauled by a shark. It's awful, messy, painful and terrifying - but if you survive, at least you have a cool story/scar to tell people about at cocktail parties.

I say this on the eve of my attempts to get:

1. Paid for my job.
2. A Russian tourist VISA for the summer.
3. A Chinese VISA for the summer as well.

Wish me luck.

Consulting Ghosts

I've applied to Brown as a transfer student for Fall 2009, and my response should come from Admissions any day now. I'm not sure what I should do if I'm accepted - I have great friends at Vassar (I really miss my pals), it's a beautiful school, great reputation, great professors (whom I've already located), the departments I'm interested in may be stronger at Vassar than they are at Brown, it's safe, comfortable, and I just picked out my classes for next semester and they look fantastic:

Art 385 - The Art of Nature (Peck/Lucic)
Eng 328 - Literature of the American Renaissance (Peck)
Art 370 – Rome of the Imagination (Adams)
Art 331 – Durer and Rembrandt (Kuretsky)
Eng 235 - Old English (Amodio)
[Audit] Russ 371 Myth of Saint-Petersburg (Firtich)

Tatyana tells me it is better to be a big fish in a small pond than a nobody in the ocean.

So, when my Tarot cards failed to give me an answer I could reasonably decipher, I went to consult with my main man - the local hero - my idol, Peter the Great, and ask him what he'd do. Generally, it's important to be careful what sort of advice one asks of Peter; for example, when drinking, it is never a good idea to ask this man (who, along with his colleagues, drank so much in his lifetime that the stereotype of the "vodka guzzling Russian" lives on to this day and whose death was the result of slow, painful kidney failure, followed by a gangrenous urinary tract infection, peeing blood, and the removal of extraneous fluids via whatever was the 18th century equivalent of a giant syringe) whether or not it is a good idea to have another beer.

However in matters of war, leadership, vision, actualizing potential, and building cities in awkward places, he's really quite good. So I went to the grave of Peter the Great and asked:

"What do I do if I get in, Peter? Should I go?"

And he sighed, and stared, and mentioned something about the frivolity of asking the man who changed the capital of Russia whether or not to change schools.

"And if I am denied?"

To which he replied: "Work harder, sleep less, burn the land before your enemies, and never, ever let that asshole Charles XII dictate the terms of defeat".

"Victory" Day

Some weeks ago our teacher asked us if anyone knew what День Победы ("Day of Victory") was. I joked that it was the day for dinner (the word for "dinner" sounds similar to the word for "victory") and got a good laugh.

Unfortunately, I had never heard the word "victory" before, and — jokes aside — actually didn't know what the holiday was for; so I asked. This was my teacher's response:

You don't know?
—No.
Are you serious?
—Yes.
You're joking, right?
—Really, I don't know. Seriously.
Do you know what WWII is?
—I am American. We Americans don't know anything.

At this point in my public humiliation, a friend of mind just whispered it to me in English and I spent the rest of the class simmering simmering simmering, outraged to be asked whether or not I knew what WWII was and condescended to for not knowing a word that wasn't at all obvious, nor was I the only one ignorant of it.

They say Necessity is the best teacher — I think Humiliation wins a close second.

Well here we are, it's May 9th at last : Den Pabyedi!















The "Day of Victory" is so called by the Russians who lost some 23 million soldiers and civilians in WWII before embarking upon another half decade of Stalinist repression and persecution.

No wonder I had trouble understanding why the end of WWII would be considered a "victory day" for Russia: the name demonstrates the residual, Soviet revisionistic view of history with sickening irony. 23 million dead civilians and a ruined country is not a victory by anyone's standards (except Stalin's, for whom the ends always justify the means).

In America, where WWII casualties are around half a million, there is a similar holiday at the end of May known as "Memorial Day".

God, however, is a true lover of irony. I'm not one to invoke God, but today I really think something was there. I watched a blue sky darken and an enormous black cloud billow up from the Gulf of Finland and spill over the Admiralty into Palace Square where, at first, gusts of winds inspired whirlwinds of dust, followed by heavy, heavy rain just as the Parade was arriving.




Ironic fact number 2: Tatyana, who is always reminding me not to forget my jacket, or wear a hat etc., forgot her jacket today.
















I did publicly drink a Coke in honor of Victory Day.