Week One

Week one of the four-week training is complete, and I kind of feel like I'm in college again. I hope that feeling goes away soon. I liked college, but it's hard to feel like I'm at my job when I'm in classes (as a student) all day. Real teaching (teaching actual live students!) starts up this week, which I imagine will significantly change the tone of the program.

These weekends in Moscow, it's becoming clear, will be mash-ups of sleeping, gallivanting about with new friends, and staying home and surfing the internet like the hardcore introvert the I am.

First, a few introductory photos of the room in Svetlana's apartment in which I am staying, and the view from outside the window.

Also, the inside of Новослободская (Novoslobodskaya), the metro station by the Language Link Central School. If you stand around this station for more than about five minutes, you'll see a tour group pass through.

Saturday, I met up with some friends at ВДНХ (Vdnkh, the metro station with no vowels), to visit the nearby park, Всеросийский Выставочный Центр (ВВЦ) (the All-Russian Exhibition Centre). It's full of buildings and statues, more than trees and such, but it's still an enjoyable park.

This is the large building near the entrance, in front of which Lenin stands.

I'm not sure what this building is, but I had to take a picture of the rainbow.

"Welcome to the pavilion"!

Many republics have their own buildings. This is Ukraine's.

The Belarus building, I believe.

For a park that puts Soviet culture on display (and is guarded by a giant statue of Lenin), it's become quite accustomed to capitalism. There are kiosks selling kvas and beer and hot dogs, and tables full of souvenirs. You can tool around on a rented bike, or take small children to many attractions that remind me of the state fair.

They also have a ferris wheel!

Before leaving ВДНХ, we walked a bit to go see a large statue that wasn't inside the park. It's quite enormous, and quite well-known. Called 'Worker and Kolkhoz Woman', it was made for the 1937 World's Fair in Paris, and later moved to Moscow.

I don't know one goes about moving a beast like this.

I tried to be cool and take a not-too-Myspacey photo of myself in front of it. I ended up with a great shot of Ilya as an omnipotent deity, too.

Then we met up with a few more friends to find a Georgian restaurant. I have no photographic evidence of the delicious khinkali that we ate (if you don't believe me, it's okay, I'm open to eating them again). But these photos are from the little park near the metro. The curly-haired man in the green cape with his hand in his vest is Pushkin.