A Thousand Doobers Each!

so let me see the last time we spoke I had taken a
long walk?? sounds about right. well not a lot has
really been going on. at least as far as sight seeing
but as far as cultural experiences it has been rather
intense (I love this place so much, you can't get used
to it, every moment is shocking).
firstly there have been 2 house warming parties this
week as many of the foreign students are moving into
actual apartments. I luckily only attended one, where
the most serious incident was being Babushka’ed at
about 1 am (nightgown Babushka’ed is really quite an
experience, this one was flailing around quite
angrily). However when we arrived at IMOP we did have
another incident with the guard. you see the deal at
IMOP is that you have a curfew of 12pm you're not
supposed to return any later, however if you do the
guard has to let you in, obviously this leads to some
interesting incidents, this time in particular the
guard wouldn't allow us in and we had to call someone
already in the building. He came down and tried to
reason with the guard, apparently he wanted a 1000
rubles (things are never simple here) and he finally
let us in saying "I just like to watch them dance in
the cold". again this was the tame party.
The other party I didn't attend however not only did
it get out of hand (the other could be called more of
a soiree), people got stuck in the elevators for
several hours (never trust a Russian elevator, i
realized that day one when we were told that the
elevator in our dorm wouldn't stop on our floor, still
doesn't, never will). Then the cops came, now unlike
in America when the police get involved, they don't
just pour out the beer and disperse the party, they
want cash, lots of cash. They started by rummaging
through all the drawers and everyone's coats taking as
they wished (Chad only realized this morning that he'd
been quasi-mugged, some marine he is!) then they
demanded a 1000 rubles from everyone, at which point a
girl nearly fluent in Russian (thankfully) said this
is outrageous and slapped the cop and said "we're
calling the American embassy" (nothing scares Russians
quite like the American embassy) yep, they ran with
their tales between their legs.
On a slightly tamer note everyone has moved into
their home stays now, and the dorm is nearly empty
(finally some reading time!). Jarrod (who has
apparently developed something of a cult following
among those of you reading these emails) has moved
into his home stay where again he was subjected to a
nearly inedible chicken dish, but on the bright side
he was told "This is your last free meal, after this
it will be 7 dollars a meal" so Jarrod is off the
hook, he can just look cheap instead of nauseous. Now
you might think this sounds absurd: 7 dollars a meal
(you could go to a restaurant for that), but it turns
out most of these babushka's are just in it for the
money, each week you see a line at the ATM in the
lobby of babushka's eagerly forcing their exchange
student to pay up in American dollars, Babushka
robbery if you ask me. They all demand their money
immediately and in American dollars. I myself now have
a room to myself (although generally when there is an
empty room the digiorna or hall attendant manages to
bring a new German kid in while you're sleeping, for
some reason she refuses to give you notice either)
Although my motivationally challenged roommate Patrick
has left most of his wardrobe and shoes in my room
because he was to lazy to really pack.
And now to my favorite part of the week, my
experience changing our return tickets at the Moscow
station. So we're told that "it's not going to be easy
to figure out the ticket system": bad sign. Well we go
to the station and after about 30 minutes figure out
where we need to return the tickets(you can't just
change the dates you must return them for less money
and buy them for more). We return them with almost no
hassle, then we find quite easily the line to buy new
tickets, no prob. After getting babushka'ed once or
twice (they simply cut you, no one else does just
babushkas, I’ve even seen them break into someone’s
conversation with the attendant to get what they want)
we finally get up to the window, now as you know I
know 0 Russian, and wisely I went with 3 people who
have studied at least 2 years of Russian, thinking
this would be a piece of cake. Turns out 2 years is
simply not enough Russian to order a train ticket from
Moscow to St. Petersburg on the 19th of march, the
lady is screaming at us, we're writing on scraps of
paper she's writing in some sort of indecipherable
Russian cursive. it's bad, there are some rather large
Russian getting quite impatient with us(I’ve never
seen so many 7 foot tall people as I’ve seen here).
all Chad can shout is vecherom or evening. finally we
manage to get our tickets and are walking away when
Kendra says "hey guys we said 19th right?? Cause these
are for the 12th" #$@@^%$%$%$%^%^&%&^^!!!!!!!!!!! now
we're angry, which as everyone knows gets you nowhere
fast. Kendra goes storming back to the lady (in a
reversal of fortune a babushka made way for us, I
would have too, nothing better than laughing at the
Americans) of course the woman starts screaming again
saying that we said the 12th not the 19th (they are
extremely close in Russian) and being angry and fed up
Kendra doesn't take the fall (always a mistake) and
yep she tells us we must return them at the other
counter. so all in all we lost about 300 doobers or 10
dollars and about 1.5 hours of our lives.
One final bit for all you Ahkmatovites out there... I
went to the house today, seeing not only her house and
works (including several first drafts that look
astonishingly like the scribbling of another poet in
my life) but also Joseph Brodsky's study in the
adjoining house. And there is hope for the poets
because there were about 50 people in the place,
packed by poetry standards I’d say.
a little post script for the jarrod fans: Both of the
kids in his home stay have run away in the night
(possibly to escape the meals) and as of yet haven't
returned, I have no idea what that means but i thought
you'd get a kick out of it. ell