Week 1

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I will update this journal weekly, I think doing it daily is close to impossible and I do not even wish to attempt. I will start off by talking about my first week in Russia. I arrived on the 9th and basically I slept for two days straight. I was not at all nervous about coming to a new country and living there. I do have to say that at the airport I was surprised. First encounter with a Russian was on the airplane, where this woman was just brutal and then once the plane landed and I attempted to ask a guard a question and very rudely he responded with "ШТО" which is basically saying "WHAT"
I almost went home with the wrong person, because he assured me that his program is the one that I am looking for, but thankfully I didn't believe him and I searched for another person that had my name on the sign. I found him and came to the dorms. At first it didn't look like Russia to me, all I saw were trees and snow and highway, and that was not what I expected. I unpacked and I just wanted to sleep, so I slept for basically the next two days.
School started on Tuesday, Jan 13th, and I really wanted to go and explore but we couldn't go anywhere until we got our school passes. The system here is really protective, and they require passes for EVERYTHING! But we did have a "field trip" to downtown on Monday and that was the first time that I saw Red Square. I was beyond excited and I couldn't wait to come back and actually walk around without the feeling of being rushed.
The next place I visited was Храм Христа Спаситея and it was so beautiful. I went there by myself and I was really proud of it! It was my first time on the metro by myself and it had a transfer. I couldn't believe how beautiful the храм was inside, I was just speechless. I bought candles for my grandmother: Danica - grandfather: Jovo Brothers: Nebojsa and Strajko and I believe I bought one for my other grandmother: Sema but now I am not completely sure, but I will go to church soon and buy one for her.
On the 15th of Jan, we decided to go downtown again. We saw Гум, Казан and St. Basil Cathedral and it was a cute little adventure. Oh during that time my camera completely died and I was really upset. Also, during that trip there was a random guy that came up to us and said his name was Tom, and how he wanted to be "our boy", it was really creepy and made me laugh for some time. The mall, GUM, was just beautiful I am afraid that I will never have enough money to shop there, those prices were ridiculous.
My birthday, Jan 16th, was spent walking around ВДНХ it was a really beautiful place, with a lot of Soviet buildings around. And we went inside one of them, and inside were just these shops and it looked like they didn't belong there because from the outside it just looked too beautiful to be turned into a market.
On the 17th I really wanted to go out and celebrate my 21st birthday, but no one really wanted to go out so I just used the day to relax. On the 18th, we did another excursion with GRINT and we saw the Pushkin Monument and also the store where it was basically covered in gold. During that same day I visited Vito, a distant cousin, that lives really close by.

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