Well, that was optimistic

Hello all, we are having a terrible time getting internet at the university or apartment.  So, finally I am in and get to give you the low-down on what’s been happening.  Let’s see, we’ve been here almost a week, we have had several classes and no real adventures, unless you count trying to get internet. We were really tired apparently and slept most of the weekend.  We were finally able to get to the grocery store on Friday afternoon, so we were set for a few days.  We did go for pelmeni with our friend Sergey, also maybe on Friday, I can’t remember by now, and to our friends’ Leonid and Natasha for dinner on Sunday, and with their son, Eggar, who speaks great English.  Natasha understands English but won’t speak it, Leonid said he had not used English in 10 years, but it came back swiftly, I thought.  OMG, Daniel, you would have squealed like a girl at all the food and the deliciousness of it all.  6 or 7 salads, pickles, herring and some other stuff for starters, then a delicious meat and mushroom pie and rice for dinner.  We had blackberry wine, which isn’t really wine because it doesn’t have alcohol, but good nonetheless; vodka for toasts; Armenian brandy, also for toast; wine; and scotch if we had wanted.  we laughed all night long — what a great good time we had!

Monday we came to the university and started the bureaucratic process to get our passes, our permits and whatever else.  We realized, alas, too late, that Del Norte credit union couldn’t take international transfers.  Chris, so sorry, but you might have to go set up an account for us at Bank of America or Wells Fargo.  I liked your response to Laird’s query about whether we could use your account to transfer our pay — 1.  is this a scam?  good to be cautious!  Nope, just dumb parents.

Most nights, we’ve gone home at end of the day, made dinner and gone to bed to read.  Our apartment is basic to say the least.  We have one large room, foyer, bathroom, closet and kitchen. Did I tell you the only furniture is three twin beds (at least with small bedside tables) scattered around the room, one desk, three dinette chairs and another desk serving as table in the kitchen.  We need lots of things to make ourselves comfortable.  I fantasize about a club chair, but know that’s going too far; but maybe some pillows to lean against when sitting on bed.  We have four shallow bowls, four small plates, a cheese grader, an old-fashioned can opener (good thing we’re as old as we are, otherwise we would not have recognized it!), one large pot with lid and one large frying pan.  Two ladles, three forks, two soup spoons, four tea spoons (the kind used for hot tea, not long handled ones) and only one serrated knife.  Oh, and a cutting board.  No gourmet cooking in THIS apartment!  Either the next guests will be happy to follow us, or someone who deals with the apartment will be happy, as we must buy so much.  Sometime Friday when I was napping, Laird went out to buy a phone (Verizon will not allow foreign sim cards so we brought our phones for nothing) and two bedside lamps.  On Sunday, on the way home from dinner, Eggar took us to a store to buy bath towels and hangers, couple of other things.  I think tomorrow we will have someone else to drive us somewhere to get other stuff on our list. We are exchanging English lessons for rides.   Also, we have met a neighbor who works at the university who gave us his private router info so maybe, maybe we can get on internet, and who we will have tea with tonight.

Teaching has been fun, but I think we must get more serious about it next week.  Do actual lessons for them rather than just talking or asking them to talk.  We have second year students, fourth year, post-graduate students (I have not understood what that means) and last class tonight we will be working with translators-referents (also don’t know what that means) and get paid for teaching them — in addition to our regular pay.  Laird has his public presentation on Monday, mine is on Thursday.  But I don’t get it, they’ve invited all these students and teachers, but we’re in a room that only holds 30 people.  I’m telling a story, so I’ll need room to move around — this could turn out badly.  Not least of which is because I’ve never told this story before and heard it only once a loooooong time ago.  It’s a story about Baba Yaga, a folktale that the audience will know, so they can focus on the English.  Then poetry, including that of Renee and John, Judyth Hill, Joan Logge and Mary McGinnis.  And mine.  Turns out they are really selling me as a poet — I guess because they could not sell me as a post-graduate degreed person.  One of the teachers is a poet and keeps asking to see mine.  Yikes.  Turns out, too much of my work only works for select audiences.  Not sure a proper Russian lady who likes British poets like Kilmer will be very impressed by mine.  There will have to be a certain measure of censorship when I select poems to give her.   The department has decided that asking us to do two public lectures was too much, so we only have the one.  And I was getting all prepared for two.  Damn.

We went to the girls’ jazz choir last night — the group Laird worked with when he was here on his Fulbright year — and they were AMAZING!  I didn’t really recognize the first part as jazz — often just sounds, like that of sea or jungle — but astounding how good they were.  The last part of the program was American jazz, so at least I knew that.  There was also choreography, which was spot on, with about 56 girls moving in sync.  They are between maybe 12 and 17 years old — young, beautiful, skinny.  Sigh.  So much fun to look at the audience, too.  It is very clear that we stand out — people stared at us, too. Of course, no one smiles, particularly on the streets.  I look like some demento as I automatically smile when I make eye contact with someone. Oh well.

We are off tomorrow — unless we have no internet in the apartment, in which case we might come to the department office to hook up — get our banking issues straightened out, maybe.  We meet our driver/English student tomorrow about 4:30, so I’m hoping for some store with stuff we need.  There is IKEA here, so maybe we can go there!  Dona, I thought of you, outfitting David’s apartment from IKEA — I want  to do the same on a much smaller scale.

OK, probably I’m just babbling at this point — I’m just so excited to be talking to you!  Teachingly yours, jm & lg