Banking - the continuing story, part 2

So, yesterday I made the guy from school go back to the bank with me after lunch. Not one of the 4 ATMs was working, according to the bank manager. And remember, this is the “experimental” branch  of the bank which will not deal with any cash over the counter. The guy finally saw my point. He even passed on my blistering text message to the boss, who came into class to talk to me about it. He wanted to know why I just couldn’t tell the manager in Russian that I wanted to deposit money. BECAUSE THEY DONT DEAL WITH CASH OVER THE COUNTER, NUMB NUTS! And why don’t I just go to another branch? BECAUSE NOBODY SPEAKS ENGLISH AND MY RUSSIAN ISN’T GOOD ENOUGH TO ANSWER ALL THE QUESTIONS!

But I think we are now at the point that he will be getting the new Spanish teacher and me accounts at at another “foreigner-friendly” bank recommended by the British head of the international department at school.

On two happier notes, teachers from all over Russia will be visiting my class on Friday to see me do a science lesson in English with the kids. Our unit now is farm animals, so we have been singing”Old MacDonald” and learning what the animals say. (Interestingly enough, animals make “different” sounds in Russian than they do in English.) So what I’ve decided to do is fill a rubber glove with liquid and teach them how to milk a cow. These kids have as little idea where milk comes from as an American kid. That’s why we also built that neat barn, which the kids painted today, out of two cardboard boxes. We will be “farming” for the next two weeks.

Actually, I’ll only be farming for one week. I get a week’s vacation next week. I at first was going to go to Sochi on the Black Sea, but the flight was longer than I wanted to deal with. So I found a great package deal for Moscow. It will definitely be colder, but I’m sure I will keep warm running around the city. The good news is that I got my multi-entry visa today. I can stay here until Sept. 4, 2018 and can enter and leave the country as often as I like.

I might look into a week in Rome over the winter vacation. I’m still interesting in going to Spain, but I don’t want to deal with a terribly long flight again for awhile. I’m sure I’ll find something.