Tuesday night was catching up on sleep and homework.
Wednesday I met up with Olga, whom I have mentioned before. I met her where this Catherine the Great statue is.
I actually went to the archives/library the first time the week prior, but it takes time to get what you want not to mention gain access. The library system is insane. I needed to bring a letter of reference from the Nevsky Institute sponsoring my “studies” there and basically vouching for me, also lying that I was a 5th year student (since they don’t let just anybody in this library I guess). I also had to bring both my Russian and international student ID’s, not to mention my passport, oh and two 3 by 2 centimeter pictures of myself. Pretty crazy. Their system is ancient and not computerized (like most things in Russia), so you have to go in, get random pieces of paper stamped after you fill them out, walk around to different desks before they let you through. Having Olga there, who works there and is friends with people there, helped a lot. So eventually I got into the manuscript room where I had to look in a card catalog just for the index books to look up what I actually wanted to see. I wrote all the info down and submitted it (this is the first time I went). The second time I went (Wednesday) I could actually look at their real index books, not just the card catalogue, to pick what I wanted to see. I was then told to come back the next day to look at the manuscripts. This whole process took a couple of hours.
I then met Alisa for tea and studying. We met at this great little place down on Nevsky, more toward Vostaniya. You could order all these yummy loose teas and get a little platter of dried fruit, nuts, and cheese. We tried blue tea, which I’d never had before. It doesn’t seem that different from black tea, but it was served in this tiny little bowl/cup thing. Cute.
I went back to the archives Thursday after class and was able to get in and look through some manuscripts by, about, or related to Fokine (a choreographer). I mostly went through all this madness to get a better understanding of the system so that when or if I return or am doing research I know what’s there and what I’ll be getting into. The manuscripts, letters, librettos were pretty neat. It was kind of sad that I could read the French better than I could the Russian manuscripts (and I don’t even speak French). Ah well. It was pretty cool to be handling originals of Fokine or his stage designers, being able to touch his handwriting and the ideas that helped create some of his greatest works.
After that I went over to Gostiny Dvor to do some last minute shopping for friends and family, which took way longer than it should’ve. I then got completely lost in the metro station (I hate gostiny dvor) trying to get myself over to the right line to go to Sadovaya. Some of the signs aren’t labeled well, and I didn’t realize that I needed to go under another level (because nothing said that) to get there. Grr. So I accidentally exited the metro and then for some reason my metro card wasn’t working, so I had to wait in line to buy tokens, only to find that my card was working again. AH! So I finally made it to Sadovaya where I was meeting Alisa in a café to study for our exam, which was the next day. I was so late and hot and hungry and cranky when I finally got there that I had to go to McDonald’s and get ice cream. It was depressing though because for whatever reason the people at McDonald’s cannot understand my Russian. Not exactly the biggest confidence booster the day before an exam, and my second to last real day in Russia (I sure felt like I learned a lot…). Other people have had the same problem at McDonald’s though. It’s wicked annoying because half of the things on the menu are English words that I just need to say with a ridiculous Russian accent to be understood. Grr. I finally got my ice cream (2nd of the day, as usual) and all was better.
Pics from behind Gostiny Dvor (this is the "punk" section):
Alisa and I sort of studied, not really, since we didn’t really feel like it. We mostly sat around and chatted, drank some tea, and then went to buy some notebooks. She’s been doing school related things every summer since she was 11, so she wasn’t that motivated to study. I don’t know if it’s bad or good, but I feel like I’ve been treating this summer program in the way a lot of kids treat their college years—it’s about the experience more than the studying/classes. I mean, I’ve been going to every class, and doing my homework (even if it’s last minute sometimes), but not studying nearly as much as I normally would (or maybe ought to be). Nearly every time that there’s been a choice to go study at home or to do something, I’ve always chosen doing something. There is so much to experience here, that it just feels like a waste to coop myself up reviewing case endings or verbs of motion (although those are pretty helpful). I also feel like I’ve had to practice my Russian so much in order to simply get around that perhaps more has stuck than I realize and I didn’t need to study as much as I normally would (also the 1-2 hour dinner conversations-even if it’s mostly me listening-have helped enormously). Alisa has felt the same way, and I feel like if she’s “slacking” it’s more ok for me to, since she’s more studious about studying Russian than I was.
So I got home around 7:30, procrastinated for a while by packing, had dinner for a while, since it was probably my last at home for dinner with my host parents. It was a beautiful night, so I decided it was more important to go walk around the Smolniy instead of studying for my exam. Haha. It was worth it. The blue and white complex was really beautiful as the sun was just starting to go down around 9:30. I’ll just put up a bunch of pics from my Smolniy walk.
Here she is:
On my way:
way home:
I spent the rest of the night eating ice cream, drinking tea, snacking on a bowl of cherries, and sort of studying. I also did some packing so I knew whether I’d need to buy an extra little suitcase (since I only brought one).
I got to bed around 3 or something and woke up early to go over a few things for the oral exam.
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