So I'm alive...

So in response to Zach query, I will update you on what I've been doing. The short answer is working too much and (probably in all honesty) drinking too much. The longer answer is probably not much more interesting than that, but I'll give it a go.

So things here are good, but it's finally getting cold. I haven't bought a winter coat, although I was cornered by a salesman at the market last Saturday and told me I needed to buy a coat. I told him I didn't, but he didn't believe me and gave me a long, quizzical look before letting me, the stupid foreigner, go. I'm on the edge between buying a normal (relatively speaking) looking coat and just going extreme and buying a ridiculous leather coat with fur trimming like one of my friends did. The ridiculous-ness that is Russia has been wearing off on me. I also bought a Russia football (soccer) scarf that says "We are from Russia." I'm hoping that the militsiya (police) or muggers will be fooled into thinking I'm Russian and leave me alone. We'll see. I've got a good group of friends - other teachers - here but I really need to start hanging out with Russians; particularly the absurdly attractive girl (she's my age so its not anything inappropriate, just to clarify) in one of my classes, which leads me to...

my classes. Teaching has been good, but challenging. In particular, the company I work for is fairly disorganized and I've had new classes dumped in my lap the day before they start; their preferred method is to mention something about "your new classes" offhandedly and walk away. It has been somewhat frustrating, but since there's not much I can do about it, I've decided just to grin and bear it. Again, I think it's symptomatic of the country in general and not just the company. The actual teaching has been good though, although hard. I have a lot kids classes, which are difficult just because they generally come after school and don't want to sit through another hour or hour and a half of class. The adult classes are easier I think, but challenging in ways the kids classes aren't; adults are generally a little more demanding on the teacher than kids, who don't really care if they learn anything or not.

Living in Russia has been interesting, but not as different from living at home as I thought it would be. I think that's because Moscow is sort of like New York City - if you only visit/see New York, you've not really experienced what the rest of America is like. Still, it is different. People in public are definitely more abrupt, you see a lot more drunks, the police (for me) are scarier (in the sense they can give you a lot of problems if they ask you for your documents and decide they need to "fine" you) than in the U.S., and the drivers are insane (crossing the street is a bit stressful). Still, most everyday things, like food and public transport, are cheaper than in the U.S., although its incredibly easy to spend a lot of money in almost no time. I haven't gone out to any real clubs yet - I'd go but a lot of my friends here aren't really into that thing and they're really expensive anyways - and I was supposed to go to a soccer game today, but my friend who I was supposed to go with was too hungover and took a rain check. I'm debating whether to go to the CSKA-Spartak match next week (thus risking getting the hell beaten out of me regardless of which team - its Russia's biggest rivalry and they play in the same stadium - I support) or the Lokomotiv-Dinamo match (marginally less chance of getting beat up, but they're both Moscow teams so it'll still be crazy) but I'm excited about that.

Phew, that's whats been going on with me. I've been trying to update my other blog http://rossiyablog.blogspot.com/ so if you're dying to know what's going on with me, thats prolly a better bet. I also have some pictures up at picasa http://picasaweb.google.com/TEWonder. Anyways, hope all is well with you guys

пока,

Tom