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Resident Director Updates
Last month a group of students accompanied Alex Nemchonok to Pskov where he and his ultimate frisbee team from St. Pete went on to take 3rd place out of 12 teams in a regional tournament.
Meanwhile, Julianna Bores gave a presentation for UNESCO on a report she compiled from a published work on the state of education in Russia and several of the former Soviet Republics. Her thirty-minute presentation to a group of UNESCO and university representatives constituted the culmination of several months of preparation, including the compilation of the report from a general UNESCO report in English, the translation of the report into Russian, and the presentation. Her work may be published by the university and has already been noted online.
In other news, with the help of the assistant resident director, Alec Luhn, a journalism major, secured an internship at the St. Petersburg Times, for which he's now written several special reports on exhibits around the city, including one on representations of Lenin at the political history museum, frequent news briefs and restaurant reviews.
In the realm of studies, five students presented abstracts of their term papers to an audience of students and teachers as part of a university-wide student research conference. Some topics included insights on the LGBT community in Russia and the state of its civil liberties; shifting perspectives and significance of the parade of victory, a memorial to those who fought in WWII and a decidedly Soviet demonstration that perhaps has taken on more meaning since Putin came to power; the life and times of rock samizdat' in the seventies and eighties; and a comparative analysis of Chekhov's short story "Lady with a Dog" and Maupassant's "Mademoiselle Perle."
Finally, to the kids. Following Cecilia Leugers's initiative, many Spring 2009 students have attended a class of fifth graders who study English to give them opportunities to put theory to practice. While Bridgett Balliett and Andrew Remley have made themselves weekly available to children, ages 3 to 9, at an orphanage on Vasilievsky Island, where they play games with the kids, take them on walks, and excuse themselves at the end of the day for having to go and not being able to take the kids with them.
Nathan Cox, St. Petersburg
Alumni Ambassadors are ready to speak with you! - Russian Language and Area Studies 2010
American Councils has elected five Alumni Ambassadors for the Academic Year 2010-2011. Our Ambassadors are happy to answer any of your questions and to tell you about their experiences abroad. If you have a question you'd like to direct to any of the following ambassadors, please write to outbound@americancouncils.org. Please include in your subject "Alumni Ambassador Question." We will forward your question to our ambassadors.
Featured Student Notes
Moscow in winter is quite an interesting place to live. Russians have lived in Moscow for centuries, so one would think that Russians would love, or at least tolerate, the cold. From my experience, the reality is quite the opposite; Russians passionately hate the cold. Of course, this is a broad generalization. I think they often enjoy winter because of the many wintertime traditions. However, the Russians that I interact with have a deep fear of the cold.
More specifically, they fear becoming sick from exposure to the harsh winter. Therefore, departing the apartment is often a time-consuming process. You MUST have a hat and gloves. Failing to wear a hat in winter, especially if it is snowing or sleeting, will likely result in unpleasant conversations with babushki. I was the u...
I feel that I have really adjusted to living here. It no longer feels like I am a visitor, but a real inhabitant of the exciting city of Saint Petersburg. However, we have all of our midterms this week and next so it’s a bit hectic. Everything is going well though. We went to the banya not too long ago, which was a milestone. We sat in the steam (over 200 degrees) and hit each other with birch branches. It was great. I felt super relaxed and like a real Russian.
It hasn’t been too cold this week but we finally did get the first snow a couple of Wednesdays ago. It actually decided to completely blizzard on the only day we have had a fully outdoor excursion this whole semester. It sleeted, snowed, hailed, rained, the whole nine-yards. Since then it has seemed to calm down a bit. My ho...
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