Novgorod

St. George's Monastery in Novgorod

Millenium Monument and LEAVES!

This past Sunday three of my friends and I took advantage of the opportunity to go to Novgorod, a town outside of Petersburg. Novgorod technically means “new town,” but having been founded in 859 AD it is actually Russia’s oldest city. Just a three-hour bus ride away, it made for the perfect and much needed day trip.

St. George's Monastery 

As beautiful as Petersburg is, one cannot overlook the pure beauty of nature. After being in Petersburg for about five weeks surrounded by the smells of exhaust, cigarette smoke, trash, urine, dog poo, and body odor. I almost forgot what fresh air smells like. Yet as I walked off the bus and went out of my way to step on that crunchy looking leaf, it all came rushing back to me. In Petersburg I always feel like a fish out of water, gasping for air, but never satisfied. But in Novgorod my lungs felt INCREDIBLE. Every hour on the hour I couldn’t help exclaiming, “It smells like FALL!”  For those that live in the Northeast, you know that smell.

Museum of Wooden Architecture

Our first stop at Novgorod was a St. George’s Monastary located just outside the town and down the Volkhov River. The monastery was built in 1119…..a mere 650 years BEFORE the United States was even founded. Down the road is the Museum of Wooden Architecture, an open-air museum of peasant houses (or Russia’s Old Sturbridge Village as I like to call it). We treated ourselves to some Russian shish kabobs, bread, and honey beer (it rivals Harry Potter’s butterbeer). Our last stop was the Kremlin, built around the same time as the town’s founding, 860. This structure is incredible complete with Cathedral of St. Sophia and the beautiful Millennium Monument unveiled in 1862 commemorating Novgorod’s 1,000^th anniversary…making Novgorod 1,150 years old. America won’t be this old until 2910.

Volkov River

The Kremlin Square is beautiful located just on the river and the all trees are changing colors. Outside the Kremlin it is somewhat like a carnival, complete with popcorn, ice cream, cotton candy, and a strange petting zoo with snakes, a komodo dragon, and an anteater like animal. It gave me a small taste of what I am missing at Glastonbury’s yearly fall Apple Fest. We had an absolutely incredible day. The weather was perfect, the sites were beautiful, and it’s sometimes nice to get out of the Petersburg Bubble and enjoy some fresh air.

Friends Kristin and Stephanie in front of the Kremlin

Icing on the Cake.

At the beginning of the Add/Drop period for classes my academic advisor asked me, “What is your goal for your semester abroad? Is it to become fluent in Russian, is it to specialize in a certain area of Russian studies (some students actually come to Russia in hopes of translating medieval texts their entire stay.....), or is it to have the “study abroad experience?”’

After only being in Russia for about a week my friend and I had the ever so common “What am I doing here….in Russia?” crisis. It took coming here to realize I don’t think I want to do anything with Russian down the road. I don’t know if it’s because learning the language fluently would take years or if it’s because I don’t have enough love for the culture to live here indefinitely. But this doesn’t mean I don’t want to make the most of the experience while I’m here.

I was a bit hesitant to admit this to my advisor, but I told her, “It’s the latter, I want to have the study abroad experience-a different culture, gain some independence, try something new.” Her response? “That’s great because then everything else will just be icing on the cake.”

She asked me if I would be interested in a printmaking course taught in Russian. I immediately laughed it off. I have absolutely no artistic ability whatsoever. To give you an idea, when I showed my friend over Skype the self-portraits I had to make for homework she actually cried from laughter and demanded that I let her have one (thanks, Rach.) But my advisor said the teachers often like students with limited artistic talent. The printmaking course would round out my three Russian language courses and a history class on Russia and English in the context of international security- taught in English. So I said sure, I’ll give it a shot.

It was not until our second class when we were able to dive in and try it out. Unfortunately because the class is taught in Russian I’m not always sure of the actual terms in English but I’ll do my best. We have been doing linocut printmaking. We first draw our pictures onto a piece of linoleum. Then we cut out wherever we have drawn using a special knife or v-shaped tool. Afterwards you cover the entire sheet of linoleum with black ink using a roller, but wherever has been cut out will be left white because of the indentations or carved areas.

Knowing my artistic abilities (or more appropriately my inabilities), I decided to keep it simple for my first print. I was so nervous and my friend just kept telling me to calm down, everything would be fine, and it’s not that hard (yeah, cause you’re an art minor, Stephanie.) Not wanting to have to cut out too much white, I made a house in the moonlight with one window lit and a silhouette of a person looking out. 

As one of the teaching assistants came around to help us he sort of stopped at my workspace and gave me a puzzled look and made many suggestions as to how to make it better. Mind you, this was before and after he looked at the work on either side of me and all he had to say was “good job!” So he told me maybe I could fix this, fix that, and maybe even write a word to help identify the story I was trying to tell. My picture was actually the simplest story ever…if I need a word to describe it then I am doomed. I was already so out of my comfort zone with the art that the directions in Russian weren’t helping any. Finally he came over to correct how I was holding the tool. The minute I changed how I was holding it I cut my hand. I felt myself get really flustered and I could feel the tears coming, but I knew once I started crying I would never stop. I also didn’t really need to be known as the girl who cried during art class. So I quickly got up, drank some tea, ate some cookies, and relaxed for a while. 

Finally once I felt collected I went back and finished prepping my print. I was the first one to finish because I had the simplest design so I just decided to give it a shot. As I pulled off the paper from my print I was actually pleasantly surprised with the results. I even got an English “Super!” from the teacher! I was so relieved that I treated myself to another cookie. I’ve realized that I won’t ever be at the top of the class. Art just isn’t my thing. But it’s important every once in awhile to try something new, step outside of your comfort box, maybe even set yourself up for failure once or twice. We don’t always have to be great at everything. It can often be much more rewarding to be passable at something that is difficult, than succeed at something that is easy.

Unfortunately, I don’t have any pictures right now of my prints, but I hope to maybe make a post at the end of the semester of some of the work I’ve done (don’t get too excited.) For now, I’ll just post some really pretty places around the city……

Nevsky Prospect at Night 

Kazansky Cathedral 

St. Isaac's Cathedral 

St. Isaac's at night. 

Neva River 

There must be something in the water

As I walk along the streets of Petersburg in my sneakers and backpack that scream nothing but “tourist”, it’s hard not to notice the countless gorgeous women in heels and other non-weather appropriate clothing. It sort of makes you understand the whole “mail-order bride” concept. But what our group wants to know is how on Earth are so many women in Russia so beautiful. We decided that there must be something in the water.

Well there is something in the water….it’s called giardia. For those of you that don’t know, giardia causes a diarrheal infection of the small intestine. Thanks, but no thanks.  Living in the United States I have been privileged to always have water available anytime, anywhere. I never believed in buying water in the States- it always seemed like a waste of money and a waste of plastic bottles. But it is very different in Russia. There is no option for “tap” at a restaurant and if you want water at home you either have to buy it, purify it, or boil it. My host family boils their water, but this also means you have to wait for it to cool before drinking (it’s no wonder they drink so much tea here…who has the patience to wait for cold water?)

Some of my friends and I have just joined a gym here in Petersburg and one of the things we were immediately excited about was a never-ending supply of water. “Drinking water” is actually listed on the gym’s list of “Basic Services”- this is the equivalent of an American gym listing a “water fountain” as one of their selling points….

When I first mentioned to my mother that I wanted to join a gym she asked, “Can’t you just find a Soviet gym where you can pick up rocks?” Sorry to disappoint, but the gym is actually very similar to any gym in America. It is probably the place I most easily forget that I’m in a different country.  I’ve been trying to get in workouts everyday. While, yes, I’ve been walking a lot here, I’ve also been eating a lot. Russian is probably not known for being the most health conscious country and it is often hard to find food that is not covered in butter, sour cream, or mayonnaise (a blog post on food coming soon, I promise).

Today I tried my first Russian Pilates class. I’ve done a bit of Pilates back home so it wasn’t too hard, but sometimes you just have absolutely no idea what she is saying. At one point the instructor came over to correct my technique and said something about an apple. I thought I just misheard her, but then realized she wanted me to pretend that I had an apple between my chin and my chest so I wouldn’t lift my head up too high. Luckily I was able to figure out what she wanted me to do without having to admit that I really had no idea what she wanted me to do. I’ve decided my goal is for her never to realize that I don’t actually understand what she’s saying. This basically means I must do every single move correctly or else next time she comes over to correct me I’ll be forced to confess.  

As I left the gym (not before filling up my water bottle of course) I realized that I went through an hour long class where no one guessed I was a foreigner….small feats.