Seville

No New Year’s Eve for me tonight. I’m So pooped and I’m not going to fight my way through thousands of people at the town square so I will just finish blogging and then go to bed.

Yesterday I took the public bus to my pick up point. I was there plenty early because I wasn’t sure how long it would take exactly. Put I went into the office a punctually at 8 a lady named Carmen came and took me to our touring bus. And to my surprise, I was the only traveler. It turns out we were going to pick up the rest of the group down near the Portuguese border. So I had a private tour with Carmen, the guide, and Felipe, the bus driver. So I got a lot of questions answered and lots of things explained.

So, we stopped in the town of Caceres, where we were to meet the rest of the group. I had two and a half hours to explore the walled city on my own. I visited the two ancient cisterns and climbed the tower in San Francisco church. Then I sat down to try the local specialty, ham. I first had a sausage tapa with my wine, the. I had a tapa with pork, peppers and asparagus. It was really delicious. And it was served with very thinly sliced friend potatoes which were excellent. 

Random info:The ham in this region is particularly good because the pigs are fed lots of acorns. The major groups here are, olives, wine and grain. There are many cork trees and a tree takes 9 years to recover after the cork has been harvested. There is a very strict seatbelt law. There’s a 200 Euro fine if you don’t have one on, even on the bus. Catalonia is the only region of Spain that outlaws bullfighting. Spain is covered with roundabouts. It turns out that the European Union likes to give subsidies for roundabouts so spain keeps asking to build them just to get the money. There are roundabouts on roads out in the middle of nowhere. There are lots of solar panel farms. The southern part of Spain is one of the poorest regions. They asked the federal government for money to help build a railroad, the money ran out, and now there are half-finished bridges just standing in the middle of nowhere too.

Then the group met us at the bus at 2:45 and we headed for Cordova. Carmen gave us lots of information along the way and the bus has WiFi, so if I’m not watching out the window, I will be able to keep current with the blog. When we got to Cordova, the bus was not able to drive down the street the hotel is own, so we transferred the luggage to a van and walked the 7 minutes. We all freshened up and met for supper.

I sat with a family of 5 from Paraguay. The two older daughters are studying in Germany, so it is a  good opportunity for me to speak German. Sonia, from Argentina, also sat our table. And interestingly enough , we are the people who do things together. They are a great group to talk with.

This morning after breakfast we toured the cathedral in Cordova which was built on the site of a mosque. Stunning architecture. As a mosque, it was built to hold 20,000. The church kept most of the structure standing, but place the Christian structure right InThe middle of it. The enormity of the structure takes your breath away. 

We then had to wait a few minutes longer because sonia  had left her wallet in the hotel and had to go back and get it so we had time to walk across the bridge that was built by the romans.it is only open  to pedestrian traffic and is also very impressive. And there were loads of cranes wading in the river.

Sonia got back so we walked to the bus and took off from Seville. Since tomorrow is Jan. 1, Carmen told us that the Castile would be closed on that day and if we wanted to see it , we should try when we arrived. We are split up in two hotels in Seville. I’m with, the Paraguayans, Sonia, Felix and Lisa from Malaysia and another family.

So after we got settled in,  Gabi, Paula, Anita, Sonia Headed for the Castile. We got in line and we’re told 10 minutes later that we could only get inif we had made a reservation. Fortunately for Felix and Lisa, they had googled it while we were still on the bus and they got it,

So, we walked over to the cathedral because Anita and I wanted to climb thr tower. It used to be the minaret of the mosque, but when the Christians reconquered the area, the destroyed the mosque but incorporated the minaret ad the bell tower. And, of course, in preparation for the New Year’s Eve mass, the church was closed. Maybe tomorrow after our tour of the city it will work.

So we basically just walked around town and then sat down for a cup of tea. I also had an ice cream bar! The waitress was very flirtatious with Rosanna, but it was in no way offensive. He was a genuinely friendly guy who knows his income depends on the tourists.

We slowly walked back to the hotel where we had about an hour to rest before we had to walk to a restaurant for supper. We all had been talking about going to the square to see the fireworks afterwards, but we are all so exhausted, I don’t think anyone’s leaving our hotel.

Tomorrow breakfast starts at  8 and the the tour at 10. So at least we can rest a little longer. I’m quitting now. I need to sleep.

Cordova and Seville

Caceres

The middle picture was my lunch. The region is very famous for its ham. I had it with peppers and wonderful friend potato slices. 

The last two days.

Yikes, so much to tell while I’m waiting for the pictures from Caceres to upload. Be prepared for a lot of typos. Here goes.
First, just general observations. Madrid is so busy because of the Christmas season. People are running around in neon colored wigs till all hours of the night. Then the cafes don’t open until nine because nobody’s up yet!
If you are standing at a bus stop where multiple lines stop, you must wave your bus down or it will not stop.  Also, the bus I was in this morning had a car seat for a baby. The parents are supposed to put their kids in that and fold up the stroller to save room. Very clever.
The marked lanes for bikes are just regular car lines which they share right in the middle of traffic. I did see one ghost bike. That’s a bike painted white and chained to a lamppost where a cyclist died.
Bullfights are seasonal, usually at the time when the town celebrates the festival of its patron saint.
The seatbelt law is strictly enforced and you must even have it on in a touring bus.

So, let’s get started with yesterday. I got up early and found Plaza de Espana, where I had to catch the bus for my day tour to Avila and Segovia. I was early, so I walked around and found where the bus station was for today’s  trip so that I wouldn’t have to search tomorrow morning. Fortunately, it was easy to find. Ok, so I got on the bus and we headed for the beautiful walled city of Avila. The walls are still 90% originally from centuries ago. On the way I noticed the boulders and the very rocky soil. There were a lot of stone fences which reminded me a lot of Ireland. And we had to go through a tunnel that was 3 kilometers long. On this trip I met a young woman from Ukraine named Anna. We hung together for the day. She had done a year of high school in Hoth Springs, Arkansas and spoke excellent English. She works for a company that produces clothes and armor for re-enactments and renaissance fairs. Very interesting.
After our stop there, we headed to Segovia where the roman’s 16 km long aqueduct which brought water from the mountains to the city is still standing. Anna and I had a nice lunch before the tour started. It’s just a lovely old Roman town with a lot of Arabic influence. I went into the Alcazar castle and loved the ceilings and the tiles the best. Tiles are an invention of the moslems in Spain. And any name or word in Spanish which starts with “Al” comes from Arabic.

Sonia had recommended both towns and I was glad I got to see them both. When We got to Madrid at 6, I immediately went to the main square where I joined the tour about the inquisition. People were just milking around all over, shooting off firecrackers, blowing bubbles and just doing crazy things. And the Christmas light is spectacular.  Not overdone or gaudy. Just very tasteful.

The tour lasted two hours and I was getting tired. Just before we got to the last stop, I saw my bus stop so I broke away and came back to the hotel because I knew I had to be up extra early this morning.

I’ll write about the start of the Andalusia tour tomorrow. I really have to sleep now.

Avila and Segovia

Madrid, part 2

To start with, I have to explain that neither Russian airport I was in announced that the plane at the gate was boarding. They expected you to pay attention and look whe. It started. No platinum boarding. No sections. Everyone stands in the same lines and goes in. You’re responsible for yourself and you’re  to “special” because you paid a shitload of cash for a business class seat.

It was great to be picked up at the airport by Sonia and her mom. They even brought me a ham sandwich and some sweets, which I took on the walking tour today and ate for lunch. She also signed me up for a free walking tour since the bike tour had been cancelled.
The hotel is nice and 10 minutes from the airport and about a 50 minute bus ride to the center of the city. The first think I did this morning after breakfast was go to an ATM and then walk to the bus stop. The driver wouldn’t let m3 on because he couldn’t change 10 euros. So I walked back to the hotel, got change and walked back to the bus stop. This time the bus driver asked me where I was going. When I told him, he told me I had to talk the bus in the other direction. Everyone is speaking Spanish to me and I’m getting along pretty well with it. Anyway, I got off at the right stop and walked to the plaza major, where the tour started at 11. The city was still dead then. You should have seen it 3 hours later. Man, you can barely move.
It seems the people in Madrid love to celebrate the 12 days of Christmas, and I mean all 12. There was a big Christmas Mart on the plaza major around the statue of Felipe the stinky. (His hollow bronze statue was open at the horse’s mouth. Seems lots of birds flew in and never got back out. Only until the statue was partially destroyed did they find the carcasses and fix the problem when they repaired the statue.)
The tour was good and I saw a lot. During the break I figured I would talk the afternoon tour (no longer free) and decided to sign up for their one day bus tour of Segovia. I had wanted to take the train there, but the train ticket alone would have cost more than the tour and I would have had to explore the sites without a guide. This offer seemed like a better option. And when I get back from that tour tomorrow, I’m going to take the walking tour about the inquisition. I’ll really be ready to sit in a bus all day after all the walking!
It was cold today, in the low 50s, and I was glad I had my winter stuff on. Unfortunately I lost my hat.  Crap.
I love the narrow streets and all the balconies in the buildings. I like that the rent-a-bikes are all e-bikes. There are well-marked bike lanes and a lot of people ride. And there’s a lot of pedestrian/bike space downtown. And I like that the Prado art museum is free from 6-8 every evening.

After the last tour, I stopped across from the Prado for a plate of paella, the. Went over to the Prado at abou 5:40. The line was already a quarter of a mile line with lots of people still lining up behind me. It took me 45 minutes to get in. By then I was so tired, I didn’t even stay as long as I would have liked.
I headed for my bus stop and came on back. The bus was packed almost the entire way. I was glad that I finally got a seat.
More adventure tomorrow.

Madrid

Pictures I took during the morning walking tour.

More about Christmas and birthday

So, Christmas Day the last kid didn’t get picked until almost 7. I’m glad Matthew and Valeriya also live right around the corner from school so I was there in 5 minutes. Matthew is the international department head and his wife Valeriya is Russian and also works at the school. The two bosses were there and the chinese teacher and her husband,, who is a vascular surgeon. There was goose, Turkey, veggies, Russian string cheese, other cheeses and, of course, way too much for everyone to eat. It was all delicious and conversation ranges from what the program will look like next year to hover boards. Turns out, the male boss fell off of one a while back and had shoulder pain for 1.5 years.

Today one of the moms came in with the great Russian boots made out of felt, that all the parents bought me. I wore the, when I took the kids outside and they are amazingly warm. I do not understand how they do not get wet. They kids were a little hyper today with all the excitement of the present,.there were bites, hits and scratches. But at least they all went to sleep reasonable well. Then one of the staff came and said she needed my help. She asked my housekeeper to stay with kids and she took me down to the party room where they had planned a surpris3 party for me.

I think they were also worried about me freezing in Kazan because they gave me the nice socks, mittens and shawl. Plus, I got two bouquets of flowers. We had a nice little sit-down dinner and just relaxed for about an hour. Again, the conversation went toward how teaching children English can be accomplished. The people in school are so incredibly kind. (Even if you have to remind some of them 20 times to do something.)

When I went back to the room, the kids were still sleeping. I had ovwakecthe. Up because they had music class. Then we ate supper and afterwards played until they got picked up. Today the last one got picked up a 6. But wouldn’t you know it, right before one little girl left, she crapped her pants. And of course the housekeeper was already gone. Just what I wanted to do before I leave for Spain, change a  shitty diaper. But I couldn’t send the kid home like that.

The last mom gave me a ride because I had so much to carry. I was glad she did. But even to drive 2 minutes, she used her GPS to find it. I reallly could have explained it to her. Anyway, I got home, cleaned up, finished packing and am ready to go.

I was going to do a 3-hour bike tour of Madrid on Thursday, but since I was they only one who signed up for it, it got canceled. Crap. Oh well, public transportation will do just fine.

Tomorrow will be a long traveling day because I have a 6-hour layover in Moscow. That’s what happens when you book cheap flights. That’s ok. I. Looking forward to 55 degree  temps instead of 15 degrees. I’ll keep you up-to-date on the trip and take lots of pictures.

Christmas goose

The goose that Matthew cooked for Christmas dinner.

Russian boots out of felt, or how to stay warm in Kazan

This is a picture of the valenkiy, felt boots and the warm socks which the parents gave me  for my birthday. The other picture is of the hand-made angora socks and mittens, plus a nice scarf that the staff gave me at a surprise birthday party.

The school New Year’s party

Just got back from the end of year school party and had a great time. Awards were handed out. A nice dinner was served. Some people put on skits. Some sang. Games were played. But the best was the dancing. Wow, can Tatar women dance. There were a few guys there who danced occasionally, but the women really have moves. Everyone, and I mean women of all ages, just get up and stand in circle. Sometimes it’s one big circle, sometimes several smaller circles. Then when the music plays everyone just does their own thing. Sometimes one person will dance into the middle of the circle and call someone out to dance with them. And yes, I danced. The DJ played everything from Rock Around the Clock, to Russian songs, to Tatar songs. The teachers danced, the housekeepers danced and the maintenance men danced. I danced with the boss. It was just fun for everyone.

I took a cab back home with Matthew , Valeriya and Svetlana. It had been snowing and there are a couple more inches on the ground, but the cab driver drove as if the streets were snow free. It wasn’t a dangerous ride, just surprising how well the guys manage to drive in this weather.

Tomorrow after school there will be a proper British Christmas dinner at Matthew and Valeriya’s. I’m looking forward to that, too.

Merry Christmas to everyone. Frohe Weihnachten.

A relaxing day

I figured I would get in another swim before I leave for Spain so I walked to the pool at noon. To get there, I have to go past a construction site. So, what they do is put up a plastic band across the sidewalk so pedestrians can’t go through, but they offer no alternative routes, so you have to find your own way around. A couple of weeks ago we all ended up walking into the road. Today we walked between the guy who was welding and the guy shoveling sand in the loader. We also had to walk over the water hose. I’m sure there aren’t a lot of frivolous lawsuits here so the construction company’s not worried about being sued if something happens.

Later I went out to the bank and noticed that people are selling Christmas trees. They are used a lot as decoration here. And when I walked home over the open market, the vendors were packing their stuff up on long sleds to take it home. It’s probably the most efficient way to do it because there are still inches of ice covering everything.

I’m going to start packing tonight. I’m even going to pack sunscreen!

Yikes! Two more days of this.

So, keep in mind that the 25th is not a holiday here. Now, recall that my teaching assistant took today, the 25th and the 26th off. I agreed to cover for here and start my vacation 2 days later as long as I could extend it for two days. And I also am going to take an extra two days off at the end of January when I go with the ex-pats to nizhny novogorod for the weekend.

So, now picture that I am with 10 kids who speak minimal English and just have the housekeeper to help with mealtimes. And picture also, that the youngest one is going through a biting faze. I had to remove him from the room three times. He has become super aggressive.

Now imagine that I have to get all of these kids to take a nap. Of course, the boss’s kid decides to act up. After he got out of bed and peed on the floor he finally went to sleep. But another little guy wasn’t having any of it. He refused to sleep and tried to wake the other kids up. I finally brought him out into the room with me and made him lie down in the book corner will I prepared projects and refused to talk to him.

Then, while the other kids are getting up and the housekeeper and I are getting them all dressed, he sneaks into the kitchen and eats two sweet rolls. I was not happy with this kid today. The best thing about the day was that the international team surprised me with an early birthday tea while the kids were all down for their naps. Sonia and Emma are leaving on vacation tomorrow so they snuck in the party early.

The last kid didn’t leave until 7. And who was it? The boss’s kid.

A night At the Opera (with apologies to the Marx brothers)

I left work at a little before 4 because the opera started at 6 and I had to go home from school and change. I debated whether I should take a cab, but I decided I would have enough time to take the subway. But the going was so slippery again, I thought there was no way I would take the subway home. I figured if I feel walking home from the station at night, nobody would find me until I’d frozen to death!

By the way, the temperature today was in the high 20s and it felt positively warm.

I should also note before I forget, that the landlady did not object to my puzzle being on the floor and she’s going to Lithuania to visit her daughter for a few months, so I get to finish it at my leasure.

But back to the opera. I walked the 10 minutes to the opera house from the subway station and the sidewalks there were really clean. Anna met me there and, after checking our coats, we went to look around first. The place is stunning. Anna also pointed out to me that the decorations have a distinctly Tatar character.

So, when I bought the tickets, the lady told me it was standing room only. When we got there we saw that we actually had two chairs in the 2nd row in a loge on the side. The problem is, if you sit down, you can’t even see the damn stage. So we stood during the performance as close as we could to the side of the loge and then I could see half of the stage. The problem was, it was the half where the least amount of action was.

We saw The Magic Flute. It was in sung German and a Russian translation ran above the top of the stage. That was almost as fun as the opera itself. The sets were beautiful and the direction was very cleverly done. (What I could see of it.) it was really well sung  and turned out to be a very pleasant experience.

Going home I took a cab from in front of the opera to my door for $2. I don’t understand how cab drivers exist here.

Today the 2nd graders but on a 30-minute performance about Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer totally in English. It was excellent. These kids are really beginning to grasp the English language tand Emma and Matthew are doing a great job teaching them.

Tomorrow, Monday and Tuesday I will have to work very long days because my TA will be taking a short vacation. It will be a handful, but I’ll take two extra days off for it at the end of January. I’m ready to call it a day now.

Kazan Opera House

 A lovely venue built in 1851.

The good thing about Kazan winters

I guess the best thing about Kazan winters is that the dog turds on the sidewalks freeze instantly and you don’t have to worry about scraping crap off your boots later. Nobody picks up after his dog and they dump right on the middle of the sidewalks. Gross buckets.

And I finally fell on my butt on the ice. We were walking so slowly and being so careful but my left foot just hit a patch of ice and down I went. My backpack cushioned the fall a bit and no damage was done, but it was just disconcerting.

Yesterday Sonia, Fouad,, Rabil and I went to the Ak Bars ice hockey game. It is the local professional team and they are good. It’s a very, very popular sport here in Russia in general. What’s great about this game was that it was really hockey, and well-played hockey at that. No gratuitous fighting, no trying to decapitate the opponents with a hockey stick, just real sport. Plus, it was a great game and we won. We found a bus from the arena that takes us right to my front door. It was wonderful not to have to walk 15 minutes from the bus stop to the apartment.

Tomorrow is landlady meter-reading day. I’ve started a 1000-piece puzzle of Amsterdam on my bedroom floor and I refuse to pick it up until I’ve finished it. So I just swept and mopped around it. I can’t wait to hear if this is something she will object to.

Tomorrow is also our little holiday play for the parents. The music teacher has written a script in English. Rudolph the red-nosed Reindeer, the Snow Maiden and Father Frost will all come while we sing songs. Of course, we’ll have to change the kids into their good clothes before we go to the auditorium so the moms will think their kids don’t get dirty when they play. And Father Frost will have presents for the kids. They kids also made presents for the moms. We filled white socks with rice and decorated them to make snowmen. The kids loved it.

Then my TA goes on vacation from Friday until Tuesday so I will be on my own for those days. The kids will have to understand me whether they like it or not.  Sunday will be the school’s holiday bash at a nice restaurant. The 25th after work, I’m going to the department head’s for a traditional  Christmas dinner, and on the 26th, the boss is planning on having a party for my birthday. So I will be busy right up until I leave on the 27th and will have a lot to report later.

String cheese ala Kazan

This is a local kind of string cheese. This particular kind was smoked and very salty.

Holy crap, it’s cold!

Whoa, Nelly! That wind is just whipping down the streets. Rabil is right. You can’t survive in Kazan without a hood on your jacket. I can hear the wind rattling my windows now.

So Sonia and I started out together because she had to go downtown and I was going to meet Anna at the exhibit. I noticed that, in some places, the ice has been chipped off the sidewalks and you can even see the pavement in some places. But it usually only lasts about 50 feet until you hit another long patch of ice. They’ve got ice chunks piled up in the pedestrian zone. I’m presuming they might come in and remove them during the week.

I Got to the exhibit all right and rented another audio guide for the historical portion from 1917 to the present. Nothing runs here without bureaucracy, of course, so I had to show my passport and fill out and sign two forms to rent the audio guide. So, armed with my audio guide and earphones, we started to make our way through. This portion was just as thorough as the pre-revolutionary portion. And I found it pretty even-handed. There was criticism of Lenin, Stalin and the  Bolsheviks.  Aturally things are from a Russian point of view, which is sometimes different from how I learned it in school. It’s interesting to see the different perspectives.

Before we left the exhibit, we wrote in the guest book. And of course, the ladies at the info desk wanted to know if I had enjoyed it. The citizens of Kazan really want to leave foreigners with a good impression and want to make sure they have enjoyed themselves. Even when I got on the bus and asked a guy if it was going to the place I wanted to go, he made sure he sat near me to tell me when my stop was. The people here just make you feel so welcome. 

After the exhibit we headed back to the pedestrian zone where we ate at a great Italian restaurant. We yakked for 2 hours before I headed home on the subway. The walk home from the Metro was invigorating, but I wasn’t cold. The worst part is when I have to take off a mitten to fish a scented German kleenex out of pocket and blow my nose.

 

14 degrees F, real feel -7

Christmas lighting downtown.

The German Kleenexes

So, there is nothing better than a German Kleenex. When you blow your nose in one, you don’t end up with a handful of snot like you do with American kleenexes. I bought some Russian ones a couple of weeks ago and they weren’t bad, but didn’t have the thickness of German brands. So when I saw some from Zehe on the shelf recently I bought them. Hooray! Real German kleenexes.  I come home and open one of the individual packets and.....they are scented. Oh Lordy. They smell terrible. I suppose I should wait to use them when I have a cold again so that I won’t be able to smell them.

Sonia and I met at 11 to get some shopping done. I mostly needed supplies for projects at school and she was looking for typical souvenirs to take back to Spain with her for the holidays. The souvenirs were the easy part. I cannot find plain white paper plates for Santa Claus’s to save my soul. Emil, who speaks some English at the grocery store, led me to what they had. But it was mostly plastic stuff with the dividers in the middle.

In any case, we went to the craft store at the mall and we texted Fouad to meet us there for lunch because his dorm is not far from there. We ate at a Russian chain at the food court which had some exceptionally good onion rings and ended up discussing politics for an hour and a half.

Sonia had to go to meet some people she’s going to give Spanish lessons to, so we parted ways and I headed home and she and Fouad still hung out. It is bitter cold today, but nobody in Kazan really seems to mind. It is a fact of life here and everyone deals with it. And I must say, I’m so warmly dressed, it doesn’t bother me. It’s just annoying to have to take off hat, gloves and mittens every time you go into a warm building or the subway.

Tomorrow I’ll take the bus to meet Anna at the Russian history exhibit. We went to see the second half of it, which covers the time since the revolution. Then we’ll probably catch a bite to eat. And when I get home, I want to skype back to the States.

Monday’s the ice hockey game and Wednesday is payday and The Magic Flute at the opera house. The only tickets I could get were standing room only, but I didn’t want to miss this. Wednesday the kids also have to put on their little performance for the parents. Some of the kids are doing so well with their English, they are even generating their own sentences now and not just repeating what I say. It’s fun to converse with them in English.

And even though I speak English most of the time, I’m definitely understanding a lot more Russian. So there’s progress all around. So I’ll let you know how the rest of the exhibit was tomorrow night.

The first fall in the snow.

So, it’s been snowing all day and the wind is blowing like crazy. Sonia texts me and says she needs to walk to the store down by the subway station to buy body milk and did I want to come along? I bet I was wearing 15 Pounds of clothing. We were super careful crossing the streets because we weren’t sure if the cars could even stop on time at the crosswalks. And, of course, I’m so bundled up, I can’t turn me head to see if anything is coming. I have to turn my whole body.

It took us about 10 extra minutes to get there, walking through snow mixed with sand on top of the ice. But we made it, bought our few things, talked with Emil, the nice clerk who speaks a little English, then went to our hole-in-the-wall bakery for the good bread and headed home. Keep in mind that Sonia is from Spain and has never seen snow like this. So she bought herself som spikes to attach to the bottoms of her shoes. But it was still treacherous.

On the way home a lady noticed us speaking English and stopped and talked to us for 15 minutes in the snow and wind. The people of Kazan are so friendly and so excited to have foreigners in their city. We were almost home when my left foot hit a patch of ice and I went down on one knee. I had so many damned clothes on, it took me ages to get back up, even with Sonia helping. My god, it’s only December. How am I going to maneuver until April?!

Bala City birthday party pictures

People really go all out for performances here. The little 4 -year-old girls wore white floor length dresses. And the kids had to practice their dances and skits fir weeks. Appearances are very important here. And the performances were very impressive 

The news from the beginning of the week

I just got home from the pool, ate something and did a wash, so now I’m ready to catch up on the blog.

Sunday Sonia and had ad tickets for the 4 p.m. basketball game so we figured we we stop at Amigo Miguels’s at 1, before hoping on the bus to the Basket-hall. And wouldn’t you know it. Amigo Miguel’s didn’t open until 2. We knew we couldn’t risk it because we were going to meet Fouad and Rabil at the game. So we caught the bus and started heading towards a restaurant we knew when we came across a place called Aroma Coffee. We thought we’d give it a try and boy, were we glad we did.

First of all, our waiter had worked in Tennessee and Florida and spoke excellent English. It wouldn’t have mattered too much because there were English translations in the menu. But it was pleasant to have someone truly understand what we wanted without having to point to pictures. I had a a great Cobb salad and a cappuccino. I even went for dessert and had a chocolate muffin filled with a warm, gooey center, served with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. Lucious.

Then we walked over the icy sidewalks to the game. People just pull their kids down the street on sleds and the strollers that convert to a sled are brilliant. I have been told that we will not see the ground until April. In fact, it has been snowing all day today . In fact, we haven’t seen the sun in over a week. This is Kazan in winter!

But back to the game. It was really good, in spite of the fact that we lost. Sonia was so excited because a Spanish guy who used to play for the 76ers was on the Moscow team. This was the first live basketball game the guys had seen and they enjoyed it too.

The game was over at 6 so we decided to go for a cup of tea and a bite to eat. Would you believe, as we walked out, we ran into another American guy who also attends the ex-pat’s City Club. We just said a quick hello and walked down to a place called Beanheart’s. It’s a nice place that serves a great bunch and all sorts of things. The guys were hungry, so they went all out. But Sonia and I were still so stuffed from our late lunch that she just had something to drink and I tried the solyanka, a local soup specialty with sausage in it. It was really very tasty and reminded me of the soup I tried when I was on a bike trip in the Spreewald by Berlin a while ago.

The waitress didn’t know how to ask us questions in English , so she had one of her colleagues write a note for her to show us. When we explained that Rabil spoke perfect Russian , she was relieved. It saved a lot of writing and translating. The big discussion of the evening was about the situations in Catalonia and Lebanon. It’s nice to have first-hand knowledge in the conversation. You get well-rounded point of view. It was lots of fun.

When we left the restaurant we were lucky because our bus was standing right there. We hopped on and were at the bus stop in 20 minutes. And it took us about that long again to walk from the bus stop through the snow to our buildings.

Yesterday was also an interesting day. It was the 5th anniversary of the creation of Bala City School. So the boss threw a big party downtown at the same theater were I saw the great Tatar dance performance. It was ostensibly a birthday party, but it was more of an advertisement for the school to try to get new parents to enroll their kids. Of course, all the older classes did skits and dances. It really, really was well performed. I wonder how effective it will be in recruiting new students.

It went from 5 until after 7. And since my TA was involved with it but the boss wanted me to attend, they had to arrange for our kids to go to another classroom for a couple of hours. I didn’t hear that any parents complained, so I guess nobody minded.

By the way, we now have 10 kids in the class. A new boy started today. He’s two and a half and unbelievably tall. He did well and really didn’t shed too many tears.

So now it’s just relaxing for the rest of the evening. I’m waiting to catch the results of the special election in Alabama.

The sidewalks of Kazan

These were taken on Sunday afternoon. The last picture is one of several construction sites where people are working 7 days a week, even through the winter. The 2nd picture is what the sidewalks will look like until the end of March. The 3rd one is one of those clever strollers which converts to a sled when you lower the runners. So you can push your kid all year round, under any weather conditions. And people are outside in every type of weather.

Walking in a winter wonderland

OK, so, it snowed hard all last Sunday but people were out and about and the snow got packed down. This did not get cleaned up on the sidewalks and shared walkways/side streets before the next snow came. And the next. And the next. There is now a 2-3 inch layer of ice covered by dirty snow everywhere. Occasionally I see someone out scraping at it, but by and large it’s gonna stay right there the whole winter. If you wore a pair of ice skates and didn’t care what the blades looked like afterwards, you could skate all the way downtown from our area. Even in the high pedestrian traffic areas, snow is not removed from the sidewalks. Salt is not used here on the roads at all, but sand is. I’m probably going to end up falling on my ass at least once this winter.

I started the day at the post office where I mailed a package and a letter. Now I understand just about everything the clerks say to me. They pack the package for me and all I have to do is fill out the forms. And they are unfailingly helpful and polite. Three cheers for the Russian postal system.

After a quick hamburger at MacDonald’s, I caught the subway to meet Anna. We took a bus to an exhibit of Russian history. The exhibit is so extensive it has three sections spread through two different buildings. We spent 3 hours just on the section about the Romanov czars. It was extremely interesting and we both felt that it was somewhat embellished. When we asked, we found out that the exhibit is sponsored largely by the  Orthodox Church. It almost seemed as if some things were purposely not mentioned. As in our American history lessons, lots of unpleasant things are swept under the rug.

After 3 hours we just had to call it quits and decided we would go back next week to see the rest of the exhibit. The great thing is that it’s free. You can’t beat that. And by this time we were starved, so we headed back to that great Georgian restaurant near the pedestrian zone. We shared one of those dough boats filled with cheese and we each had stuffed grape leaves. Everything was luxurious. And we really had a great discussion about the exhibit. It was interesting to see how much our opinions are shaped by the cultures in which we grew up.

I headed home and stopped at the grocery store when in got out of the subway. So now I have milk for my cornflakes in the morning. Tomorrow’s plans are the Mexican restaurant and a basketball game. That should be fun.

Kazan Dance Ensemble and the Kremlin by night, part 2.

So, Michelle W, Sandra, Peej and T, will understand what I mean. Think Brockport Sankofa performance. Now think Tatar language, 20-year-old professional dance company which performs around the world, 3-hour performance and Tatar Minister of Culture sitting right behind us.

This dance performance was spectacular. The dancers showed amazing athleticism, the sets were imaginative, and the costumes were beautiful. A lot of the dances told a story, of course. But they also did a flamenco and and Irish line dance. The choreography was absolutely amazing.  I’m so glad I got to go to this.

We had planned to take the subway home, but a Tatar colleague offered to give the three of us a ride and ended up taking us sightseeing through the snowy city after the performance. We got out at the Kremlin and walked around for a long time. There weren’t more than 5 people there. We had it all to ourselves and it looked lovely in the snow. The pictures are of the Orthodox Church and the Kul Sharif Mosque, which dominate the Kremlin landscape.

The city is lit nicely and is not overdone and gaudy. I had wanted to take a picture of the decorations at the Stockmann store but by the time we got out of the performance, the lights had already been switched off. The tour was such a great way to end a great evening.

Today my TA had to leave early so I said I would stay until the kids got picked up. The last parents game at about 6:45 and I wasn’t home until 7:15. I’m going to bed right after this.

Tomorrow I’ve got to get stuff mailed and doing some cleaning up before Anna and I hit a museum. Then on Sunday it’s Amigo Miguel and a basketball game with Sonia, Found and Rabil.

Kazan dance ensemble and the Kremlin by night.

Bits and pieces

Fun fact: the first bike made specifically for women was produced by the Starley company in England in 1880 and was call the Psycho ladies. Cool name. Of course the word didn’t have the connotation then that it does today. But I think it would be a great name for a women’s cycling club!
Speaking of words, one little boy in my class calls a balloon a “hoyball”. The same little boy was able to translate for me today when I didn’t understand what another kid was saying. Then, my youngest girl who doesn’t verbalize in Russian but understands everything in English, is now saying individual words. But for the word sheep she says “pish”. Interesting which sound is most prominent for her.
Today we had a “snowball” fight in the classroom with rolled up socks. Then we made a fort out of blankets and chairs. It was certainly something different.
Got paid today and walked to the bank after work and deposited my money in an account which I now understand. Hooray.
Tomorrow the international team is headed for a performance of traditional Tatar dance at the Tatar theater. One of the parents of a kid in the first grade invited us all. I’m looking forward to that. It will be in the theater I went to a couple of weeks ago when I saw the play in Tatar and had the headphones for the translation.
Had a weird bout  with a very sore esophagus. It didn’t seem like a normal cold. But I went to the nurse at school and she gave me a spray which has really helped. Her other recommendation was drinking warm cranberry juice. I think I’m good with the spray for now.
I’m working on my 1000 piece puzzle everyday. It’s fun but also addictive. I always want to find just once more piece before I quit for the day. And then I never quit.
I’ll let you know how the performance is. I’ll also take a picture of the Stockmann store tomorrow with the striking decorations.

The pitter patter of little feet.

Oh joy. The lady in the apartment above me had here grandson over for a visit last night. At 10 pm he was still running around, stomping like an elephant. I went up and knocked on her door and told her that he was too loud. To her credit, the kid was quiet after that. But then I started doing my puzzle to relax before I turned in, but it turned out not to be relaxing. I was always looking for just one more piece. I think I got to sleep at about 1.

When I got up this morning, there were 3 inches of snow on the ground. I putzed around for awhile, then I decided to take the bus to the book store for a book I had seen and thought it might be a good read on vacation. I got off too early and had to walk a few blocks and the sidewalks were not particularly cleaned. But there were lots of families out with baby strollers and sleds,  plus two cyclists. Yikes! But the snowplows were busy working the streets.

I got home at 3:30 and went to do some grocery shopping. Now I’m finishing up lessons plans and reading. Tomorrow I walk to work!

Forgot about the decorations.

There are lots of trees festively decorated for the new year. The Stockmann store downtown really looks beautiful and I will have to post a picture of it. Very simply decorated but very effective. You don’t see many elves, or Santas, or reindeer. But you see lots of decorated trees.

Holiday decorations and green spaghetti, part 2

It is now Saturday morning, and it is DAMN cold. My phone says 27 degrees F, but the wind bites right through you. I just went to fill up my drinking water jug and saw how much spilled water had frozen on the automat. Yikes! And Sonia and I want to get out and do something’s this morning.

But let me back up now to Wednesday. It was picture day at school. You know how you send your kids to school in their nice clothes on those days and make sure their hair is combed and they don’t have cornflakes smeared all over their faces. Well, here the photographer brings props like skis, bathrobes and Christmas trees and poses the kids with the stuff. I’m not sure what the intention is, but it’s Intersting to see. I guess it made me think of US family Christmas letters, somehow.

Thursday we had our Mother’s Day party. Russian Mother’s Day was last Sunday. Since the boss’s kid is in my class, the boss organized a party in our party room at school. Everybody worried that everything had to be so “perfect”. I tried to tell my TA that the parents don’t need perfect, they’d like things to be genuine. In any case, we got down to the party room after the moms changed their kids into good clothes in the classroom and all 7 of them sat on the chairs will the kids sang to songs for them. Of the 7 kids, the 4 who practiced the least did the best job and the other 3 just ran around the room while the moms watched. Then the boss had a entertainer come in who did a project with the kids, pictures were taken and then we all got to eat cake. The parents were all very pleasant and all say that their kids are learning English, but some  of them let their kids just run around. The hired photographer is trying to take pictures of one mom and her kid, and another kid will run right in and photobomb and that mom doesn’t say a word. Things are pretty much the same the world over.

I got home around         6:30 and at 7 I met Sonia to head out for the ex-pats’ club. It was a really great gathering again. Russia, the USA, the UK, Spain, Uzbekistan, Turkey, Peru, Lebanon, and South Africa were represented. I’m sure I’m leaving  some country out, because there were 24 of us there. This really gives you a change to hear a lot of different viewpoints.

The Peruvian guy had just opened a restaurant in town, so we decided to meet there on Friday. We were hoping to get some really good, spicy food, but it was disappointing. The spaghetti was way over cooked and it just doesn’t beat our little restaurant, Amigo Miguel. In any case, we had another nice crowd. This time it was Russia, the USA, the U.K., France, Spain, Usbekistan, Lebanon, Austria and the Netherlands. I made it till about 10 again.

As I mentioned, this morning was cold!!! Sonia and I met at 12 because she didn’t get back from the party until 5. She had to return a blender she bought which made the lights dim and it also smelled when she plugged it in. So, this is how that works. The security guard at the store pointed us to the machine where you pull a number and wait until it is called to go to the register indicated on the overhead screen. A nice young man named Alexander listened to our story. The fun part was explaining how the lights flickered when she plugged it in. I needed both hands for that one. But he got it. She gave him the blender and the receipt. He wanted to know whether she wanted an exchange or her money back. She wanted money. She then had to show her passport. He next printed out a form that had 5 separate pages. He filled in all five and she signed in 6 or 7 different places. Alexander’s manager had to approve it. After everything was official, Alexander took us to the cashier around the corner where we waited in line again. The cashier entered everything in her computer and then gave Sonia her money. This whole thing took awhile.

We left there and I quickly went into a store to buy a pair of tights to put on under my jeans. And I’m so glad I did. I mentioned that it was cold, right? We headed to the subway station and took the Metro   To the soccer team’s shop to get a jersey for her brother for Christmas. It was a pretty nice place and could have been a fan shop for any sports team in Europe. The guy spoke English and we talked about the World Cup Matches coming up next year in  Kazan. (Many people consider Kazan the “sports capital” of Russia because of all the eevents and training facilities here.)

After that we set out for the shopping mall to get a puzzle that I had seen there last week. It’s a   picture of Amsterdam with lots of bikes in it and it figured it would keep me busy over the long, cold  winter.  We also went into another appliance store and found another blender for Sonia. I’d laugh if we end up returning this one, too.

After picking up a Sudoku book for myself (I haven’t done any in ages.), we headed back to the subway station. After getting off at our station, we stopped for my bread and we went into the bank before we walked home. The guy from Uzbekistan was right. If you have a good on your coat to protect yourself from the wind, you will make it through a Kazan winter. But the tights help too.

Holiday decorations and green spaghetti

Last night I had green spaghetti at a Peruvian restaurant. I'm just going to record

 all the colors of spaghetti that I find. Holiday decorations are now showing up in town. But not as excessive  as in the States. And the little tree is one I made with  the kids out of toilet paper rolls. It turned out  well.

Ode to a donut.

Oh lovely little cake of yeast
Which beckoned from the store.
I loved your calories the least,
But I loved your chocolate frosting more.

And why did I write this lovely piece, worthy of Shakespeare? Because I found donuts!!! I even took a picture which I was going to include on the blog but I must have screwed it up because I can’t find it in my gallery anymore and, of course, the donut didn’t last 20 seconds after I took the picture.  Which means I’ll have to go get another one so you can see that a Russian donut looks the same as an American donut. At least, that’s the excuse I’m going to tell myself when I buy another donut.

Valeriya and I decided we were going to start going swimming so we started tonight. I acquired the official papers I needed (Don’t ask.) and we walked over to the state-of-the-art Olympic pool about 15 minutes from us at the university. We had checked beforehand and had decided to get the 12-time pass, which you have to use within 3 months.

First you walk in through security, then you check your coat at the coat-check. After that I had to go into the little store and buy a bathing cap and flipflops. Then you go to the counter and tell the lady what kind of swim pass you want. (She was very kind and told me I could buy the senior citizen pass, even though I’m not Russian.) Next you go to the ATM, press the button for the kind of pass you are getting and pay your money. You go back to the lady and give her a copy of your receipt. I was supposed to give her a picture too, but forgot to bring it. She told me I could bring it the next time. She gave us our passes and another lady gave us our electric bracelets which trigger the locks on the lockers.

Then you change into your Flipflops in the lobby and go upstairs to the dressing room. Again, as in the clinic, it’s just one open room. No privacy, but lockers. You change, go through a narrow shower and then into an absolutely gorgeous pool. No kiddie pool in sight. This was serious business for serious swimmers who want exercise. No people standing at the end of the wall and yakking so that you can’t kick off when you get there.

And I have to say, it felt really good. Since it doesn’t get light here until 7:30 and it gets dark at 3:30, I really don’t get much exercise on my bike. Back and forth to work just isn’t enough. (It’s maybe a quarter of a mile each way.) I’m definitely going to make a regular habit of this. I’m going to see if I can’t get myself down there every Monday and Friday. My goal is to be able to crawl for 50 meters straight without having to revert to the breast stroke.

On another note, a couple of my kids are now using full sentences when they speak to me. That is just so exciting. They are catching on really fast. Thursday we’re going to do our Mother’s Day celebration and the moms are going to come. It will be nice for me to meet some of the moms since I usually just see chauffeurs and nannies. It will also be a longer day for me because it goes from 5 till 6. But I’ll just come in later on another day.

Kazan 0, Moscow 1

Sonia and I were at our meeting place at 12:30 to walk to the team to get out to Kazan Arena for the soccer game.would you believe it, shortly after we get on, the conductor starts announcing something about the compressor. Obviously something is happening, but I’m not catching the whole thing. When we got halfway to the stadium and they kicked us all off the tram, then I got it. I also got that we should hold onto our tickets and show it on the next tram that comes by and we would get to the stadium. It’s nice to understand enough to get by.

The Arena wasn’t even one quarter full. Yes, it was cold, about freezing, but we were warmly dressed. The game was really stinky. Neither time had a decent attack. Everybody was just bunched up in the middle field , kicking it back and forth. Moscow scored a goal right before halftime and that was it for the entire game. The highlight, however, was when the Kazan goalie held a penalty kick right before the end of the game. He was superb. He was also the outstanding g player during the last match we saw. Maybe they don’t have more spectators because they have a lousy team. Geez, we’lol have to try basketball again.

We got shoehorned into the tram again on the ride back. We got off at our stop and quickly went to the Mexican restaurant. The waitress knows us by now. The food was xcellent, as usual. I tried tomato soup this time in addition to my burrito. Everything is so fresh. It tastes amazing. But even this place serves the food as it is ready, not waiting to bring everyone’s meal out together.  We played Jenga while we waited and sat there for a long time. There were a couple of college students in there who started speaking English with us. They are from a state to the south of Tatarstan and are studying here in Kazan.

Now I’m just chilling and will get things ready for school in a few minutes. I plan on going to the pool tomorrow. I’ve been told a bathing cap and Flipflops are required. Oh, geez. I’ll let you know how that goes.

The Thanksgiving water faucet

Of course Thanksgiving is not a holiday on Russia. So, of course we had school. The kids had yoga class and after that we sent them in to the bathroom to wash their hands before lunch. Picture a communal washroom with 4 or 5 sinks and several bathroom stalls. Has I’m helping one little boy at a higher sink, I hear kids behind me starting to scream. One of the faucets had broken and was spraying water all over the place! I had my TA get the kids out of the room and told her to find the custodian. Meanwhile, I’m pressing down on the faucet for all I’m worth to prevent too much water damage.
It took him about 3 minutes to get there and shut up everything off. By this time, I was soaked from the waist down. I went back to the room and ate lunch with the kids before riding home to change. So it was a good day to be thankful that I live so close to the school and was able to get home to change. And since the kids were down fo their naps, I also took the time to enjoy a cup of coffee. What the hell.

The afternoon was uneventful. I got back home at 4:30 and started setting up for Thanksgiving  dinner. There were three of us. We had sauerbraten, red cabbage, tortilla, cucumber sandwiches, apple crumble and baked potatoes, not necessarily in that order. We ended up having a three-hour conversation about child-raising techniques in different countries. With America, Germany, Spain, Russia and the UK represented, it was really and interesting discussion.

Yesterday I was again enlightened. I was informed that girls who are given feminized versions of masculine names (Alberta, Edwina, Josephine, etc.) grown up to be rude and bossy. When I told my conversation partner that my aunt was named Alberta, she just sort of backed down.

I went to bed early last night and got up early this morning. After puttering around here for awhile, Sonia and I went shopping. We walked through the open market to say hello to our friendly market ladies, the. We went straight to the print shop to print out the two soccer tickets we have for a great game tomorrow. It’s between Kazan (of course) and a team from Moscow which is higher I. The standings.  It should be a great game.

Then she took me to one of the biggest honking stores Ive ever seen. It’s called Ashan, it’s basically like Walmart, with absolutely everything. They have a section where you can buy rice, spices, candy, whatever by scooping as much a you want out of a bin and paying by weight. So you don’t have to get a bag full of something you only need a teaspoon of. And they had large assortments of everything. They are as consumption crazy here as we are in the States.

We ate a quick pizza at the mall. I notice that many places here don’t put tomato sauce on their pizzas. Just cheeses and toppings. They are not bad. Sonia’s pizza margarita was covered with a layer of cheese which had some chunks of tomatoes on it. I had a mushroom and ham pizza. It had a different kind of cheese than Sonia’s, then had the mushrooms and pieces of ham on top of the cheese layer.

After our leisurely lunch break, we headed into the craft shop to find something to decorate the classroom in for winter time. I was pretty much told that this is what has to be done in a classroom in winter. I am not a big decorator, so I took a couple of pictures of possible things I could use and texted them to my TA to make sure I am on the right track. She approved, so I will stop on the way home from the soccer game tomorrow and pick them up.

We also went into The sport shop  Decathlon. This is the place where I bought my bike basket. The store has moved to a new location, but the guy who sold me the bike basket was there and remembered me. He was so pleasant and made sure I got my store discount card. I can’t wait to really see if I get discounts from the stores where I have these cards some day.

Since this plaza is right next to my favorite “home depot”, of course we had to stop in there too.  I’m looking for two wooden mallets that the kids can pound pegs into a board with. No luck finding them so far. Not in “home depot”, not in a kids’ toy store. I’m going to have to do more research on this one.

On our way back home, I stopped in to get my haircut. I ca Nutella my Russian is getting better because this time she didn’t cut it as short as she did the last time. She really understood when I said “enough”.

So now I’m in for the night. I wand to get some reading done, listen to “Wait, Wait...” and then eat leftover sauerbraten. I’ll be eating it the rest of the week. Sonia and I did decide, however, that after the game tomorrow we will stop at Amigo Miguel’s for a burrito.

I’ll let you know tomorrow how the game goes.

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, part 2

Since I had said I was going to cook sauerbraten and red cabbage for our international Thanksgiving, i figured I’d better get hoping and get what i needed because Thursday is. To a holiday here, so I knew I’d have to have everything ready by tonight. Since it has to marinate for at least two days, I hopped on my bike after work and rode through a steady mist to a new different grocery store I’d heard about that was supposed to have red cabbage. I hadn’t seen any in the other stores, but I really hadn’t paid much attention.

Bachetle is only about a 10 minute ride from the apartment. And holy cow. Picture the Pittsford Wegmanns, but more upscale. It had lots of wines and all the fresh veggies were wrapped in cellophane. They had a deli that stretched the length of the store. It’s not like I’ll be doing all my shopping there, but I will definitely be going back.

After I got home, I started marinating the meat and realized I’d forgotten the brown sugar for the red cabbage. No problem, I thought. I knew I was going to go to the theater where they do the plays in the Tatar language on Tuesday, so I figured I’d just stop at the grocery store on my  way to the Metro station.

And that’s exactly what I did. I met my friend outside the theater and when we went through the security check, the guard lifted up my backpack and made me open it. He wasn’t expecting a bottle of vinegar and an onion. We got in and checked our coats and then I went to get earphones. There is a simultaneous translation in Russian and in English. The play was pretty good.  It was a comedy set about 600 years ago and was actually very clever. The translation left a lot to be desired. It took me awhile to realize that “The elephant has wilted our sewings,” was supposed to mean “The elephant has  destroyed our crops.” The translator was either using a dictionary from Shakespeare’s time or google translations. In spite of that, the play was very entertaining.

Today we worked on our Mother’s Day gifts because Mother’s Day is this Friday. We made flowers out of salt dough and then painted them. I’m sure the moms will be thrilled. But probably the most interesting  thing was a conversation I had with my TA. She goes to seminars put on by the school psychologists every once in awhile to get new ideas about how to deal with kids. Today, after she came back, she told me that we should tell all the boys how strong and brave they are and we should tell the girls they are fine young ladies. Otherwise, they will grow up to be gay. Say what?

That one just about knocked my socks off. I told her that I totally disagreed with her. If you are gay, it’s because you were born that way. No, was the answer. That was true of only about 1% of gay people. The rest are socialized to be gay. Holy crap. I had heard rumors that Russians were homophobic. This was the first time I had any real proof of it.

After work I rode to the post office to pick up a package that arrived then rode on to my bread store and the bank before I came home to start cooking the Sauerbraten. Oh, damn, it smells so good , even if I did have to tweak the recipe a little bit because of the different ingredients. Lordy, I will have leftovers for a month, because I know that everyone else will be bringing lots of stuff too. And you know what? I don’t care! I will need something spicy in the evenings after that bland stuff at school.

I hope you all have a happy Thanksgiving.

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday

Kamal Theater.

Shopped till I dropped.

Oh my. I didn’t start out to spend money today. I cleaned the apartment this morning in preparation for the landlady’s meter-reading inspection tomorrow. Then I had to get some supplies for projects this week , so Sonia and I went into town. We went to the craft supply shop at the big plaza. Sonia was impressed. I got the few things I needed and then we took the escalator down. And what did we spy one the next level? A Sportmaster store.
 Sonia had been looking for some crampons for her shoes. Being from Spain, she is not at all used to dealing with icy surfaces and is afraid she’s going to fall flat on her face and break something. We found some in this Sportmaster. As long as we were there, I figured I would look for a warmer winter coat. I’ve been told it’s not unusual to hit -22 degrees F. here in winter. I found a nice, long jacket that really keeps me warm. Sonia also found some snow pants. Then I ended up getting a couple of coffee cups at the grocery store in the mall because two of mine had broken. Plus, we ate fast food at Burger King. We’ve decided it’s not good when we go out together! All we do is spend money.

On the way home, we stopped in the little grocery store in our complex. A lady approached us and asked if we gave English lessons. Her family wants to move to Australia and they need to work on their English. I wouldn’t mind picking up another private student or two.

Then the international staff started texting back and forth. We had wanted to do a get-together and decided to do it this Thursday for Thanksgiving. I decided to do Sauerbraten. Now all I have to do is run out and find all the ingredients tomorrow and start marinating. I hope I can turn up all the spices. It will be a really eclectic meal; something Spanish, something British, something Russian, something Indian and something German. And not a turkey in sight.

Tuesday I’m going to the Tatar theater. They perform Tatar classics there. They speak in Tatar, then they translate it into Russian and after that they translate it into English. So the same joke gets three different laughs. I suspect it’s similar to what we know in Germany as Bauerntheater (farmers’theater or country theater).

OK. Enough for now. I’ve got to get up early tomorrow.

Spain and black spaghetti, part 2

I had a great start to the weekend. Yesterday when I got home from work, I figured I had finally better make plans for the winter break or I wouldn’t get anything. My break is from 27 Dec to 10 Jan. I was toying with bike trips in Spain or Greece, or just a trip to room. I googled Spain tours and Greece tours and they are all in spring. But Spain offered some bus tours of Andalusia, which is the particular area I am interested in. I didn’t know which one to choose, so I whatsapped my Spanish friend Sonia quickly to see if she was free and ran over to her apartment, which is in the building about 500 feet from mine. We found a great 9-day tour which gives me time for an extra day in Segovia and Madrid. We found a reasonable flight AND a good deal on a hotel near the airport. And Sonia lives right around the corner, so she is going to pick me up when I get into Madrid. The flights will be long because of time waiting for connecting flights, but I will finally get to  see this historic and culturally important part of Spain that has always interested me. Glad I got that taken care of.

 Today was also very, very pleasant. After cleaning up a little and Skyping to Germany, I met Anna downtown. We walked to the Hermitage Museum and looked at an exhibit of Imperial pottery, made in St. Petersburg. It was a lovely exhibit with a combination of old and modern. Then we walked all the way across town to the bookstore with the collection of English-language books. Two surprises: it was smaller than I had expected and it had a wonderful collection of English-language materials for young kids. Both Anna and I fond books we thought we might enjoy. The store owner happened to come in while we were there , heard us speaking English, thanked us for patronizing her store and offered us a cup of tea. We sat right down at the table in the store and drank tea and ate chocolate. We even started browsing through our books. I’ll guarantee we’ll be going back there.

We left the store and walked through the passage connecting the mall to the hotel and took the elevator up to the 25th-floor restaurant. It was already totally dark in Kazan and the view of the city all lit up was breath-taking. It was a very noble establishment but everyone was casually dressed. It seems pretty obvious that a lot of well-off foreigners use this hotel when they come to Kazan. The wait staff all spoke English.

We shared a bruschetta appetizer, each of the four pieces of bread having a different topping. We shared two pots of tea. I had the black spaghetti with shrimp and Béchamel sauce and Anna had a salad with roast beef slices.it was finally a meal that wasn’t too bland. In fact, it was excellent. My whole bill with tax and tip was $15. The view alone was worth that.

I caught a bus home and am in for the night. My stomach is still full!

Tomorrow is clean-up and shopping day. The landlady come Monday to read the meters. The place had better look good. And I get to skype to Germany tomorrow night. That will be fun.

Spain and black spaghetti

Just ate this delectable plate of black spaghetti in a restaurant with a spectacular view if Kazan on the 25th floor of a hotel. With an appetizer and enough tea to float me home, it was only $15 with tax and tip.

Let’s get physical!

I forgot to mention that my movie ticket only cost $2.58. Eat your heart out, Regal Cinema!

Fun fact: when you go to a restaurant here with other people, it doesn’t matter how many people are in the party, the waiter serves the first dish that comes out of the kitchen. They never wait until the food for the entire party is ready, so someone always ends up watching another person eating for 10 minutes until his food arrives. Weird system. In general, the food’s not spicy enought for me.

Fun fact: The kids love croutons in their soup at lunchtime. It’s just the old, stale bread that hasn’t been finished up from the previous week that’s cut up in small chunks. But the kids will ask for it by the handful.

It’s snowing like crazy at the moment. I think I’m about to experience a Russian winter. I just did my homework and checked the latitude of Rochester and Kazan. Kazan is 12 degrees of latitude further north than Rochester. Holy crap. I just went out and bought a warmer hat. Now I’ve got my eye on a long winter coat. I will be walking to school soon. I don’t want to ride if the roads aren’t cleared and my impression so far is that that will never be the case in Kazan. Although I shouldn’t rush to judgement. I’ve seen street sweepers out there. They don’t seem to be very effective, however. Every car in Kazan is covered in mud. It’s also illegal to wash your car in your apartment parking lot. Only if you own a place out in the country, can you wash it yourself.

I learned something else interesting. The Russian Duma (legislative body) just declared that it’s no longer mandatory to teach the Tatar language in schools in Tatarstan. If a kid wants to voluntarily take Tatar lessons, he can sign up for a class after hours. This has some people worried. They see it as an attack on the culture and are afraid the language and their heritage will be lost. It sounds like it might be the first step to insert more Russian influence into Tatarstan. This only applies to public schools. Private schools can teach it if they want.

So, now on to the physical. Every school teacher in Russia has to get a physical once a year. It includes a chest x-ray for TB and for the women, a pelvic exam. Yup, you heard me right. What the hell do they expect teachers to be doing in school?! And they expect you to bring a passport picture. In any case, our school contracts with the cheapest clinic it can find and the clinic only does the exams on Wednesdays. So, according to our nurses at school, they had sent all of the paperwork for us foreigners on ahead to the clinic so that we could be processed in a reasonable amount of time and not have to translate everything there.

We show up at the clinic, with Valeriya, Matthew’s Russian wife as a translator. This clinic looked like something an American woman would go to to get an illegal abortion. We got there shortly after 8 and there were already about 20 people milling around. Then we find out that the guy at the clinic who supposedly processed our paperwork in advance had quit his job. So, Valeriya’s standing there filling out all the paperwork in Russian for us and about 30 more people come into the clinic. You don’t take a number, you don’t wait in line, you push and shove. Finally we get to go to the back and stand by the first doctor’s door where they draw blood. What the hell for? As we are waiting, about 8 people just simply push ahead and jump the line. Some of them were even from the other branch of our school! Damn.

After about an hour of this crap, we just said screw it, got our documents back and went back to school. Matthew was smart enough to take a video of the entire scene to show the boss how impossible is was. So now we will have to find another solution. We actually already have but I’m not going to put it in print. I’ll let you know when I get the official documents.

Boy, I thought getting Medicaid for my dad was a pain in the ass, but this bureaucracy tops them all.

On a calmer topic,  Mothers’ Day here is in November. We will have to prepare a present for the moms and they come in on one afternoon and put on a program for the kids. Can’t wait to see what this will be like.

We’re headed for the mexican restaurant again tomorrow. Saturday I want to finally get to the big bookstore and Sunday is going to be cleaning and Skyping day. The landlady comes Monday to read the meters so I’ve got to be ready for her.

Mozart and Mathilda

I forgot to mention yesterday that the Basket-hall has squat toilets in the ladies’ room. It’s a porcelain hole with places to put your feet on either side. I’ve seen the, in other countries, but it was the first time I’ve seen them in Russia.

So, Skyping didn’t work last night, but we made a WhatsApp call. At least I got to talk to everyone. The next time I’ll remember to push the camera button however, so we can all see each other too. We didn’t make contact until about 4 and then we talked for half an hour.  That means I slept in until 10.

After I got up and got going, I took my 5-liter water bottle out to the water Automat and filled it up. Then I walked down to my old bank, took out more money and deposited it in my new bank. It’s right near the subway station and my bread bakery. So I stopped and got bread and took the subway into town.  I’ve got to take a picture of the bakery for you next week. It’s a little, nondescript gray building with no entrance. If you want bread, you wait in front of a little window tha5 the guy opens when he sees you and you tell him what you want. Sometimes the line is 10 people long. And when you’re standing at the window, you can see all the bakers patting the dough and putting it in the oven.  You end up with piping hot flat bread. It’s phenomenal.

I had wanted to go to to the big bookstore that the guy told us about yesterday, but since I started out so late and had tickets for the 2 p.m. showing of Mathilda, I decided to push the bookstore off until next week and get tickets to The Magic Flute instead. So when I got off the subway I walked up The Hill to the opera house. I go to the counter and ask for tickets for Dec. 20 and the only thing they have left is standing room only.  I tell her I’ll take two tickets and she tells me the price. I didn’t hear her correctly through her inch-thick plexiglass and and screechy microphone so I asked her to repeat. You would have thought I had asked her to sacrifice her first-born child. Finally, the lady behind me in line told me the price (less than a dollar a ticket. Take note, RPO, they sell out weeks in advance.)

It’s interesting that 99.9% of cashiers go out of their way to help you. The small number who don’t are usually older women. Maybe they are just pissed at the raw deal they’ve gotten in life and now have someone they can take it out on. Who the hell knows. But I got my tickets.

Then I walked down to the place where I saw the neat Tatar hats and, of course, they were all too big and I didn’t like any of them anyway. So I walked back to the mall with the  movie theater and ate two slices of pieces at the food court. It’s important to know that it was two slices, because when you order two, you get a free cup of tea with it.

I went into the movie theater and took my seat. They have as many trailers and commercials as in the States. It was good that the movie didn’t have an awful lot of complicated dialogue and that I remembered some of my Russian history. I got the gist of it and enjoyed it. It didn’t feel like 2 hours and 10 minutes.

After the movie I caught the subway back towards home and stopped at the grocery story. I got what I needed and walked home. Then I had a nice long FaceTime chat with Mary Ellen. I was so glad she could watch me make my penguin project for school and critique it for me.

And now, since I’m still tired from the late chat with America, it’s about time to turn in. The only other thing of note today was that I noticed a Stockmann department store in town. It’s a very prominent department store chain in Finland.

Tomorrow I’m making binoculars out of toilet paper rolls with the kids and were going on a lion hunt. In the evening, I have tutoring. So enough for now.