Снег, Anniversaries, and Patriotism

well it's almost been 2 months since I left my home in the US and started my Russian journey. since the last time I have a lot to talk about. my school "Gimnazia number 1 of A.C Pyshkin" celebrated 20 years of the school. I could only help but laugh, as my school in the US is at least 50. but it was nice to skip out on some classes to watch the celebration. and the dances that the school had for students (which I didnt go to :p). it also started to snow in Russia, in late october, and last night. theres something about the Russian snow that makes you feel all excited and happy to be here in Russia. along with the school anniversary, the Rotary Club of Yuzhno Sakhalinsk is also celebrating its 13 year of service with a celebration (also with karcakob rotary club.. so LILIAN! :) )
When I came to Russia, my job was to improve relations between the 2 countries. well seeing as everyone here loves america, I feel my job is already done, yet I still find myself doing presentations for groups of people in school. 3 times I did a michael Jackson presentation for english class, where I sang half his songs and danced beat it and thriller in front of and audiance, after my dignity flew out the window. I was asked to do a series presentation about the USA for a serious english class. which is tomorrow. so my and the French Exchange student Roxane will both have to go to school during the holidays to talk about France and the US.
despite the english language presentations. my Russian is improving, its just hard to get people to sit and talk to me because it seems that a foreigner in Russia means nothing to my classmates. they compliment my language when I speak but nobody seems to mind the fact an american and a french girl are sitting right next to them, which is really great, but hard to be embraced. out of all the teachers, only 2 embrace Roxane and me. the mother/english teacher, and the Physics teacher (no idea why). but my grammer is improving and I know enough now that my host family lets me be alone in the city, actually ive been left alone in the city before since week 2. but the coolest thing happening right now is that im starting to forget english, although I know my writing is a grammer nightmare, I dont know how to correct it and I had to ask Roxane how to write the letter Q in english. so the first step is happening.. forgetting english D: although language is tough, the hardest thing I see for myself is not the language, but is explaining myself to people. nobody here in Russia seems to have that independent personality we see in the US. they seem to be all slides of the same tray. nothing really original with anybody I see. (thanks Communists). yet I still love the people here, they are a lot niсук than american people. with the exception of little kids, Russian kids are a lot nicer, theres no talking back to teachers or anything. yet american kids are much more well rounded and witty than Russian. just by seeing this change I can see how lucky I was to be born in the US. traveling abroad is the best way to see how lucky you are, or unlucky. and I think I can truely say now that I love the US. tears almost come everytime I hear my National Anthem or patriotic songs.
now a little about whats happening, every 4 days my host family has me cook the meals. and of course Im totally new to this so Ive always needed help on it. well now last time, where they requested american food. and I found cow meat.. and anybody who knows me knows exactly what I was thinking at the time. "hamburgers" soon I realized, to make hamburgers required different meat, and I instead made extremely toughmini steaks. i cant help but feel they only ate them because there was nothing else. but Russian here tend to eat a lot of stuff with Mayonase. and garlic, I asked them why the garlic and they said "to keep the vampires away". and I have to admit, ever since they had garlic in meals I have not seen one solitary vampire in Russia. and if we take the garlic away, we might make vampires again.. and on a totally different statement. my host father Casha, has joined the list of people who have out ate me. soon him and Mr. Hawk will duke-it-out. one day when we hat meat, he told me to try this Russian sauce. so i dip a bit of my meat in it and try it, next thing I know I'm crying and my mouth turns red and im needing water like crazy.. then i ask "WHAT WAS THAT?" "wasabe sauce" D: then my host dad takes his whole piece of meat, dips it in the sauce, puts it all in his mouth and eats it starting at me.. >.> its not often im beated.. but I will remember this..
America is the capitalo of mass media in the world, and after coming here I believe it. because people take seeing old american movies on TV here really greatly. and they have a lot of them. while here ive watched some old movies on TV and DVD. like "Back to the Future", "Iron Man" and the "Spider Man" series. good movies people here think are awesomer then they are. speaking of entertainment, Nothing gets inbetween me and football. i can find college games on ESPN AMERICA.. right here in Russia. and hopefully, in February, the superbowl.
as for school life, it is interesting, the only classes I can fully participate in are English and Sport. yet the interesting stuff is in English. we got our first english test results back. even though the teacher took the american variants.. i got (ready for this mom) an A!!!!!! minus. i point from a B. so i did beat my mom. yet on the second test, I got 1 point from an A. so i got a B+. i really am forgetting english, and this is proof. (took me 4 tries to spell that word right).
Russia does seem to fufill to winston Churchill's description. as Russia is a contradiction. the nation has 1/4 of the worlds fresh water and is the energy superpower of the world, yet gas here costs more than in the US 4 years ago and everyone is worried about saving power and taking 5 minute showers.
the only rule I wish i broke was the laptop rule, as internet can go down here with no word of return...... so great. by following the rule im limited :p. but it is holiday here. until monday. so I will have time to learn more Russian. and play with my pets.. half of which the dog ate.= and we gave away. i only have 1 dog and 2 cats now. the kitten thinks its a ninja also.
it also appears that if youre sick here. you stay out the week at school. so you dont get anybody sick at school. which I like because who wants to go to school anyway. the Russian system is not as great as the people here think. the American system in much better. in america "im gifted in science" "ok advanced science classes, follow your gift" in Russia "im gifted in Science" "ok, stay with these people, doing the same thing, no special classes to improve your gift".
internationally. the president Medvedev is in the Kuril islands now negotiating with Japan over issues. the japanese want some of the Kuril islands that Russia controls. mainly because fish trabel inbetween these islands a lot and you know the Japs and fish. but Medvedev holds strong and tells them no all the time. speaking of Japan, my Rotary club has asked me to write a paper about how I found myself in Russia which they will put on their website, once I get the link ill post it for you all to read. in Russia you dont drink the water out of the faucet, becasuse its not filtered and cleaned. although that doesnt stop me from drinking out of the faucet all the time... because my family has a filter :p. along with Russian disadvantages, Toliet Paper doesnt seem to exist anywhere outside my house >.>...
i also received my first package, my host family told me that everything sent they have here in Russia, but i still ate all the contents within a day. they also play a game called Russian lottery. with real money, its like Bingo only if you win depending on what row you filled. and if you fill the last one then you win the money in the pot. and people get sad when they lose rubles and when i see the amount i laugh and think to myself "id lose more money if I threw a dollar out the window".