Fall has begun and everything is more or less in order. Sveta got her new passport -- she's now Svetlana Rasmussen. And I visited the Russian proctologist at long last. I was supposed to go in June, but I had more pressing things to attend to, like sleeping and running the cat around the sofa. The clinic was typical with peeling paint and tired-looking people crammed in the hallways. There’s never a reception desk. You wander until you find your department and then ask those crammed about, “who’s next.” It works, but I’ve found that the best way to get [View Full Entry]

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Misha is one of those guys who can always be found in the Perm State University weight room. “He was a champion,” fellow powerlifter Vladimir once told me. “Now he is old.” Misha’s not that old, but he bears the scars of long lived powerlifter: a bum knee and a big belly. For reasons that remain mysterious, Misha took a liking to me. He displayed his affection by accusing me of being an American Spy (“your students will be so happy when they capture an American spy!”) and helping me with me technique on a shoulder exercise (“you look like a [View Full Entry]

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Sveta and I spent my second fourth of July in Perm much like we spent the first: wandering around town. We found a side road that led to an unknown green valley. It was the usual Perm summer scene: industry and village. Ponies, razor wire, and pipes intermixed amid all that green. The overgrowth was the first thing that really struck on the ride home from the airport last year. Perm was covered in weeds, grasses and trees. The city was often hidden, and wooden houses and footpaths nestled in the valleys between apartment blocks. We eventually wandered down to the [View Full Entry]

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As I prepare for my annual AP “reading” trip, I’ve been reflect on that question that students in every class I’ve taught have asked me: “what do Americans think of Russians?” It’s kind of a dumb question, and I never know quite how to answer it even though it ALWAYS gets asked. But I certainly had some preconceptions before I came here. Some of them were right on, like, Russians require stamps, forms, and documents. But other’s were way off, and are probably shared by too many people. So this is, I guess, some of the surprises, the things I [View Full Entry]

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A couple weeks ago I revisited Kudimkar, the delightful and snowy capital of the formerly autonomous Perm-Komi region. Some of the Perm-Komi people still speak Komi, but I’d bet English is probably more widespread these days. Svetlana of Kudimkar (to differentiate her from Sveta my wife) invited me to address of conference of English teachers. The two-day trip required the usual 10,000 forms, and as they were all in Russian, completing them fell on Sveta (the wife). I prepared a couple of my lessons. Perhaps the most appealing part of this little escape was that it came in the middl [View Full Entry]

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Monday was “Men’s Day.” This is an important Russian holiday, so I didn’t work. Leading up to and following my day, women would approach me and say “I’d like to congratulate you on this Men’s Day." They had previously congratulated me on both Thanksgiving and Christmas, as if it had been me who had fed the Pilgrims or lay in the manger. Anyway, for my first Men’s day, my colleagues gave me a pack of vitamins. DYNAMISM brand. Then midway through my Tuesday night class, the students left. This wasn’t unexpected. We normally take a brea [View Full Entry]

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It was the night of Russian Christmas, January 7, and the bathhouse anteroom was freezing. As I disrobed I noticed that the black furry thing hanging on the wall was not a fur hat at all, but a severed cow head - perfectly preserved. I was too cold to feel surprised. I turned away, threw open the door and entered the bathhouse proper. Sveta and I celebrated Christmas in the village of Stashkova at her Aunt Vala’s farmhouse. Joining us were Aunt Vera and two of Vala’s five children plus their assorted friends, family, and hangers-on. The number of guests relative [View Full Entry]

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To close out 2008, I lost my wallet. This is the same one that survived a night on a Utah ski slope and an afternoon stranded at the corner of 11th and M streets. Four times I lost and recovered it on the UNL campus. One of those times a couple students of mine found it outside the Union and brought to my office giggling. "It was always running away," Sveta explained. This time, it appears to have made a successful escape. But even more than is usual, the lost wallet in Russia led to too much time being spent trying [View Full Entry]

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Perm Stage I: Jizzel and Thanksgiving My connections with the Perm stage began a month and a half ago, when Sveta and I accompanied an American attorney to the ballet Jizzel. Permians take great pride in their ballet house and company. I’ve been told by a number of English teachers, including Sveta, that the Perm ballet school is the second best in all of Russia. Only the academy in St. Petersburg is more renowned. That would be the academy for St. Petersburgers. I guess that’s how one calls a resident of St. Petersburg. This means that someone from Hamburg is called [View Full Entry]

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We returned from Moscow yesterday evening and fetched the cat. Rosie’s grown big; she ate well at the Vorontsov’s. They fed her milk and tried, unsuccessfully, to introduce her to pelmeni (a Russian-style ravioli) and sausage. I hope the experience has broadened the cat’s horizons. Maybe she’ll hiss at strangers less frequently. Before we dropped her off there was lots of running around "Have you seen her dinosaur?" I had not. The dinosaur was found and the cat deposited. I made my first trip to the capital to participate in Moscow State University’s Ame [View Full Entry]

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