I always say I'm going to do a short post but that never seems to happen. Ah well. I probably won't post anything until Monday, so maybe all the more reason to post now. Photo time:
This is laundry detergent (стиральный порошок) for hand-washing. It's called Meef. In English, Myth. This stuff will get your clothes mythically clean! For legendary comfort!Last night:
http://www.gogolfest.org.uАmazing! It included lasers, Ukrainian chanting, accordions, performance art, huge balloons, a dude chain-smoking and playing 6-string bass at the same time, masked figures, and finally running around dancing around the room holding hands in a long line of people. Somehow that last bit was very Slavic. I dunno what the Ukrainian band had to do with Gogol, but they were awesome. Here's their website. And here's their Last.fm page. Are you on Last.fm (<- my page)? I use it to track what I've been listening to and to get more information from artists and bands, as well as to find new music. I highly recommend it, except for the fact that their online-radio service seems to have a fee now.
Also, I wrote a bit earlier about some of the discomfort I've felt around alcohol. I think it's a very individual thing. Part of it was that in more formative years, I never really felt like I had the chance to develop my own ideas on my own terms about it. Last night at the concert, I enjoyed a beer while watching the opening band, and it was great! It's nice to not be so worried about it. Also, I still have an Israeli beer in my suitcase that shouldn't be there when I leave Russia.
Scenes from last night. Crazy laser show technical performance art awesomeness. The first picture, where you can see ГОГОЛЬFEST, is the band before the Ukrainians (check out this page!). It's this guy Yevgeny Fyodorov from the now-popular Russian band Tequilajazz (I ripped one of their live albums yesterday, and it's pretty good stuff). And apparently one of the dudes from Akvarium!
And this guy. Chain-smoking and playing 6-string bass at the same time. Круто.
I also had a moment with the man himself. I ought to read some Gogol now, hm?Also, a brief word about the Russian slang word круто (sounds like KRUta). It's basically synonymous to the English "cool" but more like "far out" or "awesome." The best part? Literally, it means "steep." In conclusion, I've decided to incorporate "steep" into my English conversation as well:
"Dude, that show was so steep."
"Yeah man, it was like 89.9º!"
"Dude, that show was so steep."
"Yeah man, it was like 89.9º!"
Test #2 tomorrow. I'm getting As but I feel I should study more. Seeing Transformers with people after class. Then early Saturday, we all get on the bus to Pskov. I still find it somewhat hard to believe where I am, even when I'm walking up the street at 11:30pm and it's light out and the signs aren't lucid to me. Many of the people on the streets look like anyone you might find in America, except they probably don't speak English and they live in an entirely different culture.
On an unrelated note, I really want to learn Spanish. In a couple of years. I'm sitting in the computer lab / classroom at Smolny and there are some other students in here either online or doing homework. There are two new big white cruise ships parked on the river outside. This morning there were military fighters flying formations over the city, and I don't know why but it was cool to see. Didn't get any pictures of it. All the computers in here are Sun Microsystems "Sun Ray 2" mini-computers, and they seem to work pretty well, though most people brought laptops. On that note, I'm glad my computer is still holding up! When I get back to LA in August, I'll reformat it, do some cleaning, and hope that solves the problem. Which brings me to the topic of going back home.
I'm leaving Russia on August 9, and flying directly to Tel Aviv. However, I've already paid the fee to stay in Israel for an extra 9 days, flying back to New York very very early on the 18th. The plan was that I was invited to stay with one of my new Israeli friends in Eilat for an extended weekend, but the 10th of August is a Monday. So, I thought, I'll fly round-trip to Sofia (Bulgaria) for 5 days and hang out with my mate George! But that trip would be $600. So what am I going to do in Israel for 8 whole days? I won't have any summer money left by then. I'll know a few people from Birthright but I just don't feel confident that I'll feel up to bumming around Israel (WITH my two large suitcases) for so long without much to do. In retrospect, I might feel better if I had elected to come back even two days earlier (on Sunday the 16th, perhaps). I don't know. I can probably find stuff to do and places to stay with people I met, but that might be more awkward than I had thought. Most likely, to change it BACK the way it was, or to any other date, would require yet another $100. Curse indecision. To make matters more difficult, I had originally thought that I might use this time to spend in Washington DC (on my way back to California) with family I don't see often, or at least with friends in California, most of whom will be returning to school sometime around the 25th. It's not that I don't want to go back to Israel. On the contrary--I was so enamored with Israel that I planned this while there and laid down $100 on the spot to extend the trip with no specific plan in mind. Yes, in retrospect, I should have waited on that decision. What's more, I don't actually have a ticket back to California from New York yet, because I wasn't sure when I'd be coming back or whether I might be in Washington. I had also thought that I could theoretically work for a couple of weeks in Boston sometime between August and September, making back some money I'm spending this summer and seeing Tufts friends, but I concluded that it probably wouldn't be the best of ideas. I don't know.
As it is, I'll be heading to Japan at the end of September, sometime around the 28th I suppose. My only plan to return to the US before the following August is to spend my accumulated air-miles to take a nonstop roundtrip from Tokyo to New York to spend five or so days seeing my brother graduate and then returning for classes. I'll get two months off for spring break there, but I wasn't planning on coming home during that time. But then again, I don't know how I'll feel. Ideally, I thought, I'd travel around Japan and maybe visit Taiwan or Korea or something. I really don't know what's going to happen. I'll need to find a house to live in for my senior year at Tufts following that, and I really have no idea what that's going to be like either.
I've been thinking a lot, wondering a lot, and dreaming a lot. Then again, I always do, but the White Nights give me more dreams than I'm used to. Yesterday morning I was awakened a few minutes early by what might have been a nightmare, a literally paralyzing physical force that held me down because the force didn't understand me and I didn't know how to communicate with it, but when I finally was able to move I felt the renewed vital importance of that real effort at communication with it. The force had been around since I was a boy, but I didn't understand it until much later. As I get older and experience more, I realize what's important to me. Often, things that remain can be even more profound than singular moments. Some things will always be there, some things you hope will always be there, and everything seems to change somehow.
Even now, when I witness great talent or dedication, a part of me feels so terribly small and sad, and all my life I've wanted to turn that feeling into motivation. I still haven't quite figured out how.
I have a lot of exciting plans, and I owe it to myself to make the most of them. I'm adjusting to life here, and sooner or later I'll figure out what to do about my travel plans. Everyone tells me how great it is that I'm taking time for myself to explore and do the things I've always wanted, but I suppose I should have known that I wouldn't be able to take my whole heart across the sea with me.
Somehow, things always work out in the end, even though it can be very hard at times along the way.
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