So as to not bore you all I've decided to cut out all the details of teaching and just share memorable moments.
28.10.07: On Friday I happened by a church (All Saints I believe) in the East of Moscow and found an icon of Blessed Augustine which contained a relic of his, so of course it was wonderful to venerate such an icon. The church itself appeared to have fairly recently been redone-the icons were traditional and one section contained icons of the new martyrs of Russia. In the evening I went to a concert of Nikolaj Emelin who sings songs about Orthodoxy and Russia and war. Afterwards with some friends that were there I danced some traditional Russian dances in the parking lot... On Saturday I was blessed to visit the graves of Elder Sampson, Archimandrite Sergei and Archimandrite Zechariah. Elder Sampson was an Englishman who came to Russia
I also stopped by the monastery where St. Matrona of Moscow’s relics are but there was a line that would take several hours to pass through; I was planning on going to confession that afternoon so I didn’t have the time. One of the priests at St. Tatiana’s speaks English so I spoke with him a little in the afternoon and then at the vigil was able to confess so I was blessed to receive communion today. At Novo-spassky monastery there was a moleben in the afternoon after which there was a gathering of MP where I met even more people and did some more dancing.
Various thoughts: So at one point at MP I was talking someone and said a word in English to clarify or for some odd reason. A girl standing near by turned around and said something like it seemed like a foreigner was around...not realizing that I was actually a foreigner... Once again most people I met asked if I am any part Russian because they all think I look Russian; so of course this is always a compliment. Thank God I have also not yet been stopped by the militsia and maybe that’s the reason (although I’m not sure how much they really look out for foreigners-I think it’s mainly terrorists).
I’ve been wondering lately that since everyone thinks I’m Russian what they think when I speak... Some people also think I don’t speak that terribly (one even said that I speak without an accent) so I wonder if they think I’m maybe some sort of fool...
In teaching news Wednesday was my last class with the children; thankfully the problem child didn’t show up the last two classes so everything went fine. However, now I will be getting another sort of class about which I now know nothing.
There’s just something nice about being in liturgy and seeing through the window the towers of the Kremlin...
30 October, 2007
23 October, 2007
And another week...
16.10.07: I spent a good deal of time trying to figure out how I was going to stretch out my high school class in discussing The Godfather. I compiled questions for the reading sections and also for the movie sections; as the fill the the blanks dialogues didn’t go over so well I skipped those. I was very worried about not having enough stuff to do but in the end it worked out ok. I had them write as usual in the beginning and then we discussed some, watched some, discussed some, watched some and read another chapter. Now I hope I can just stretch it out over the next four classes... Evening class went pretty well - I had two trial students and one regular was missing. I feel kind of bad for anyone who has tried to join this class because the people in the class are pretty strong for their level and everyone so far who has sat in has been somewhat behind. The two girls that were there tonight had actually covered the chapter we were doing before but thankfully it had been a while and they didn’t remember that much. I had planned on calling my boss to talk about the elementary class but in the end decided to give it one more chance...
17.10.07: Once again I wasted an hour or more preparing a pointless lesson plan as the observer simply didn’t show up for class...and I was that close to telling her after she didn’t show up before that I refuse to waste more of my time. So that is it - no more lesson plans, ever. And once again the elementary class was “hell on wheels” (from the belt buckle of my new upper intermediate student) Although I had them somewhat under control for small portions of the class (I had them doing a lot of writing) it was a disaster. So I am from this point refusing to teach the class as long as said child is present. In my next class I yet again had a new student; now it is my biggest class - 5. And in my evening class the same two people were missing - so again we got through a lot of material but class just dragged on and on...
18.10.07: So my would be observer messages me saying that she wasn’t able to make it because she “got lost” and her “phone died” which was no consolation. I also was sent a message by the boss of my branch saying that she was coming to observe my advanced high schooler class. So considering that I modified my lesson plan - I found a few other things to do before continuing with the Godfather. I didn’t know what she would say about watching 20 or 30 minutes of a movie... But I am just going along with what other people have told me to teach... She only stayed for about 45 minutes or so (the first 20 were a writing exercise). She also informed me that her and the other boss want to meet with me next week for some odd reason. I also informed her that I don’t have the ability to control the elementary class; that I’ve tried everything I can do and it’s useless. She told me that they were thinking of stopping the class (which I highly doubt as they’re making at least something for paying me a pittance to babysit these children for 2 hours). For my evening class only one girl showed up so I started with going over the homework then something from the last lesson after which we ended up simply talking for the rest of the class. It turns out that she is Orthodox (before when we talked about it I didn’t realize that they probably wouldn’t know that word...). So we talked about various topics concerning marriage and saints. She doesn’t seem to attend services regularly but says that she believes...
19.10.07: My day when I try to push all thoughts of teaching out of my head. However, today I very much wanted to talk to someone about my past week and everything teaching so far. I was to meet someone that evening to go to a concert but she had the afternoon off so we met after lunch and walked around a bit downtown and spent several hours at a cafeteria talking. We went a little concert of traditional Russian peasant singing that evening after which we walked around a bit with a few singers from the show and other young people after which we ended up back at the cafeteria of that afternoon... I almost forgot to mention... When we were walking around in the afternoon my friend took me by the church where the relics of St. Alexei Mechev of Moscow who was a widowed priest who was blessed by St. John of Kronstadt to be an elder in the city. His son, St. Sergei, was also a priest who was martyred by the Bolsheviks.
20.10.07: Had my second lesson with my individual student. It was a little easier today as his parents didn’t sit in and I had an idea of what they wanted me to do with the boy. We looked through the book he uses at school and reviewed the stuff he just studied then reviewed the material I gave him the week before and then a little bit of a new lesson and that was it...fairly painless...and today they served me tea and cookies. Afterwards I saw a church so decided to go visit it...it turned out not to be a church but from that place I spotted another church...that turned out to have been a church but now was an iconography studio (could also still be a church but if it was it was not open-which would be a little strange as most churches are open everyday). So spent a few hours back at the flat before meeting a friend to go to a gathering of folklorists of the type we saw sing the night before (who were having a celebration for Pokrov). The place was rather hard to find and so my friend, wanting me to practice my Russian, had me ask every person that I was willing to for directions. So while speaking (especially using new phrases) I often forget what I’ve already said so about every time I would misspeak and end up using some other phrase that probably sounded quite abrupt (though I was trying to use polite phrases). The worst came with the last people I asked-two elderly women sitting outside their building. It started out poorly because I almost laughed when I went up to them as one of them looked like the other had recently punched her and given her a black eye. While I was trying to spit out the question the other who must not have heard started asking what we wanted and mumbling things. While the other was trying to explain she was beginning to understand where we were going and while we were leaving exclaimed “А дом творчества!” When we finally arrived we found out that there was also another folklorian happening that night so not so many people came. For a little while we sat around a table and they sang some songs and passed a common cup toasting to different people. Once more people arrived the balilaika was brought out and the dancing began. We danced some not too complicated dances so I picked up most of it. I think the dancing went on for about an hour maybe less and it was time to end. However they ended up singing until everyone was kicked out of the building then continued singing outside for a while...
21.10.07: Went this morning to St. Tatiana’s which I visited a few weeks ago. In the bookstore I bought another little book to try and read-this one is letters from the 50’s and 60’s from a priest to his spiritual children. Afterwards a friend and I went to Izmailovsky Park as there was another celebration for Pokrov. We spent some time in the kremlin (a reproduction) at the park and sat in for about an hour on a children’s concert during which we heard/saw Agni Partheni, Bless the Lord O My Soul, a few dances and a folk song. Next it was off to a church downtown where an akathist to Sts. Peter and Fevronia of Murom was being sung. Afterwards there was a regular gathering of young people with the priest during which they discuss various topics over tea and snacks. Tonight’s topic was freedom but before that the previous topic, problems in relationships, was rehashed.
17.10.07: Once again I wasted an hour or more preparing a pointless lesson plan as the observer simply didn’t show up for class...and I was that close to telling her after she didn’t show up before that I refuse to waste more of my time. So that is it - no more lesson plans, ever. And once again the elementary class was “hell on wheels” (from the belt buckle of my new upper intermediate student) Although I had them somewhat under control for small portions of the class (I had them doing a lot of writing) it was a disaster. So I am from this point refusing to teach the class as long as said child is present. In my next class I yet again had a new student; now it is my biggest class - 5. And in my evening class the same two people were missing - so again we got through a lot of material but class just dragged on and on...
18.10.07: So my would be observer messages me saying that she wasn’t able to make it because she “got lost” and her “phone died” which was no consolation. I also was sent a message by the boss of my branch saying that she was coming to observe my advanced high schooler class. So considering that I modified my lesson plan - I found a few other things to do before continuing with the Godfather. I didn’t know what she would say about watching 20 or 30 minutes of a movie... But I am just going along with what other people have told me to teach... She only stayed for about 45 minutes or so (the first 20 were a writing exercise). She also informed me that her and the other boss want to meet with me next week for some odd reason. I also informed her that I don’t have the ability to control the elementary class; that I’ve tried everything I can do and it’s useless. She told me that they were thinking of stopping the class (which I highly doubt as they’re making at least something for paying me a pittance to babysit these children for 2 hours). For my evening class only one girl showed up so I started with going over the homework then something from the last lesson after which we ended up simply talking for the rest of the class. It turns out that she is Orthodox (before when we talked about it I didn’t realize that they probably wouldn’t know that word...). So we talked about various topics concerning marriage and saints. She doesn’t seem to attend services regularly but says that she believes...
19.10.07: My day when I try to push all thoughts of teaching out of my head. However, today I very much wanted to talk to someone about my past week and everything teaching so far. I was to meet someone that evening to go to a concert but she had the afternoon off so we met after lunch and walked around a bit downtown and spent several hours at a cafeteria talking. We went a little concert of traditional Russian peasant singing that evening after which we walked around a bit with a few singers from the show and other young people after which we ended up back at the cafeteria of that afternoon... I almost forgot to mention... When we were walking around in the afternoon my friend took me by the church where the relics of St. Alexei Mechev of Moscow who was a widowed priest who was blessed by St. John of Kronstadt to be an elder in the city. His son, St. Sergei, was also a priest who was martyred by the Bolsheviks.
20.10.07: Had my second lesson with my individual student. It was a little easier today as his parents didn’t sit in and I had an idea of what they wanted me to do with the boy. We looked through the book he uses at school and reviewed the stuff he just studied then reviewed the material I gave him the week before and then a little bit of a new lesson and that was it...fairly painless...and today they served me tea and cookies. Afterwards I saw a church so decided to go visit it...it turned out not to be a church but from that place I spotted another church...that turned out to have been a church but now was an iconography studio (could also still be a church but if it was it was not open-which would be a little strange as most churches are open everyday). So spent a few hours back at the flat before meeting a friend to go to a gathering of folklorists of the type we saw sing the night before (who were having a celebration for Pokrov). The place was rather hard to find and so my friend, wanting me to practice my Russian, had me ask every person that I was willing to for directions. So while speaking (especially using new phrases) I often forget what I’ve already said so about every time I would misspeak and end up using some other phrase that probably sounded quite abrupt (though I was trying to use polite phrases). The worst came with the last people I asked-two elderly women sitting outside their building. It started out poorly because I almost laughed when I went up to them as one of them looked like the other had recently punched her and given her a black eye. While I was trying to spit out the question the other who must not have heard started asking what we wanted and mumbling things. While the other was trying to explain she was beginning to understand where we were going and while we were leaving exclaimed “А дом творчества!” When we finally arrived we found out that there was also another folklorian happening that night so not so many people came. For a little while we sat around a table and they sang some songs and passed a common cup toasting to different people. Once more people arrived the balilaika was brought out and the dancing began. We danced some not too complicated dances so I picked up most of it. I think the dancing went on for about an hour maybe less and it was time to end. However they ended up singing until everyone was kicked out of the building then continued singing outside for a while...
21.10.07: Went this morning to St. Tatiana’s which I visited a few weeks ago. In the bookstore I bought another little book to try and read-this one is letters from the 50’s and 60’s from a priest to his spiritual children. Afterwards a friend and I went to Izmailovsky Park as there was another celebration for Pokrov. We spent some time in the kremlin (a reproduction) at the park and sat in for about an hour on a children’s concert during which we heard/saw Agni Partheni, Bless the Lord O My Soul, a few dances and a folk song. Next it was off to a church downtown where an akathist to Sts. Peter and Fevronia of Murom was being sung. Afterwards there was a regular gathering of young people with the priest during which they discuss various topics over tea and snacks. Tonight’s topic was freedom but before that the previous topic, problems in relationships, was rehashed.
16 October, 2007
08-15.10.07 - Another week in Moscow...
Sorry for the lack of updates this past week. I've been going into the office as little as possible so therefore haven't had much access to this interweb. (Now I have even more pictures that will eventually be uploaded...)
08.10.07: After preparing the day before I didn’t have a lot to do today. I went in to the office in the morning though to work on preparation for my high school class. The teacher trainer I had talked to about this the other day turned out to have gone to St. Petersburg... So I talked to another one and she gave me some good advice and suggested that we watch The Godfather as it might go well with having them read a little ahead and then watch some. So I read ahead some in the book and worked on questions to ask. Hopefully this will keep their interest for the next 7 classes... When I arrived at my school the security guard (who finally recognizes me-I’m thinking it’s because of the wallet ordeal of last week) stopped me when I went in...at first I thought there was a problem but then he gave me some booties for my shoes to put on...(I assume because it was wet outside) So about everyone in the building was wearing blue booties and the place looked like a hospital. (I wonder if they’re going to be handing these out all winter as well...) My elementary class went well again today...the child who likes to act up was gone again. The atmosphere is much more relaxed when he isn’t there and an hour of class went by without me really realizing it. Next class went well also; one student was gone so I didn’t want to work to far ahead so I had the other two students talking for most of the time and we went at a relaxed pace (I’ve decided that it really doesn’t matter if we cover all I planned as long as they are talking and hopefully learning something). And the next class went well...
09.10.07: I was around the flat most of the morning preparing for classes and then went into the office to prepare some more; to talk to someone to get some ideas about how I was supposed to present the movie. I found a script online and selected several dialogues and took out some words for the students to put back in. All this preparation took a surprisingly long time so I again rushed off to class, not as early as planned but not late. The students were a little late as usual so I had time to get everything ready. I started out this class with another writing exercise; this one I had a picture of a dwarf that was in the Moscow Times today... We did a little discussion about The Godfather from the text they read and I tried to have them do a roleplay but it didn’t work the best...it wasn’t a total flop though. So we started watching and I had them try to fill in missing words but I hadn’t so much considered how difficult all the Italianesque accents are to understand. So after the first dialogue I realized that they needed to see the subtitles; at that point it was a little pointless to fill in the blanks as one of them pointed out. So we just watched another few scenes and then I had one dialogue in which I had left the list of words to fill in after they had seen the scene and that worked better... Now hopefully the next 7 classes will go as well. In my evening class one student didn’t show up so there were only two so I didn’t really want to do a full lesson. We did some reading and they ended up talking a lot and I decided not to stop them (the fact that they are dating helps the class to go pretty smoothly). So we discussed the topics in the book and then went off into other topics; by the end of the class we were talking about literature and movies...
10.10.07: I finally made myself get up at 7; it was the hardest thing I’ve had to do since I’ve been here... The problem was that it looked like it was still about 5 in the morning and I had just previously woken up and had looked outside and thought I had a few more hours to sleep... So with my extra time I simply prepared a little more for class and was going to go into the office to do a few things. When I got on the metro I decided to go ahead and drop my money off for the trip I am supposed to be taking on Sunday (to Kolomna a town outside of Moscow). So I had been to the church one other time (when I first arrived) but couldn’t remember exactly how to get there from the metro. I had looked at the location on a map a few times so generally knew which way to go so once I got coordinated from the metro station I figured it out. Thankfully when I went in I ran into a man who was patient enough to listen to me and direct me to the woman at the candle stand who took my money. So I had planned the day before to visit a friend’s English class again but ran by the office beforehand to check my email and make some copies. I had also “lost” my flash drive the day before (I thought for sure on the metro) but thankfully remembered to ask at the office and it was there. So I rushed off to St. Tikhon’s and my friend had procured for me a document that says I’m some sort of teacher and have permission to go into the building... So this time at the lesson my friend wanted to discuss the book where they were at at the time. The class was more talkative this time and I think they’re getting used to hearing an American talk... We discussed technology and at one point when Victoria said that she didn’t love technology I was tempted to bust a rhyme like Kip... So after class I had a little lunch with my friend and ran into my fellow American Thomas and talked a little bit about my teaching so far and other some such. So off to class... The woman who runs the franchise I work for, Maria, had told me the day previous that she was coming to my class to observe my discipline problem (which I informed her hadn’t been present but she came anyway) and sat in on class for about an hour. Class went pretty well as lately it has been. After class Maria talked to the students and asked them about the class and said some things about how they should act in class (such as not pulling the girls pony tale [which he hadn’t done before, I think he is starting to like her]) and told them not to speak in Russian, which I’d been trying to control unsuccessfully. Maria gave me some ideas of a few things to do and told me about the child that I will be teaching on Saturdays. Next class went well, however, after we finished the current chapter I turned the page and realized I hadn’t even looked at the next chapter... So I read the first thing and tried to have them talk a bit while I was trying to look ahead... I stumbled a bit but overall I don’t think it was bad. I think they’re used to my mess ups. Thankfully the vocabulary part took up the rest of the class after we had read a little story at the beginning of the chapter. In my next class I was giving a test so there wasn’t a whole lot to do. I did review the homework at the beginning so as to wait for one student, who never showed up. So the test and grading it took up the other hour and a half of class.
11.10.07: Spent a lot of the morning preparing questions and script excerpts for The Godfather. I went to the office around noon and spent some time copying exercises for next week and looking over materials especially for the new student I’m supposed to have on Saturday. I’m supposed to give a diagnostic test first and then give a sort of diagnostic lesson so we’ll see how it goes... I also was informed that next week I would have an observation of one of my classes. So it will be my upper-intermediate class on Monday. The teacher who will be observing me asked if I had a lesson plan and I was shocked...I haven’t made a lesson plan since about the 2 or 3 day of teaching... I found it pointless as even when I had one I forgot to go by it...or if I tried to I only got confused with having to refer to the lesson plan, the student book and the teacher’s book all at the same time. Basically I now just go by the student book in which I’ve made notes and refer to the teacher’s book if I hadn’t written all the answers in the student book. So now I’ll have to spend several hours writing up a pointless lesson plan... So my advanced group went pretty well today. We discussed the clip we had watched the previous class and also the reading which they had done. All four students showed up (one had missed basically the previous two classes-so all of The Godfather so far). However, this said student read over the text fairly quickly and I had the other students retell the story to her so she caught up pretty quickly. We watched about a 10 minute section and then I had them go over some of the script which I had prepared but after we had gone over it I realized that they were not very excited about doing this so I asked them if it was of any use and they said it wasn’t really... So I said we could just discuss the film which we did for the remainder of the class (about 40 minutes). I didn’t really have enough questions to ask so thankfully two of them argued for awhile about some things... The other two I kept trying to involve in the conversation but didn’t have much luck. My next class went well as usual. In the metro station at my school I was awaiting the train and watching it arrive when I spotted a friend whom I had met the first weekend I was here so I ran down to the car he was in and we rode together to my next stop. By another chance when we were transferring we ran into several other people from MP. While they were talking (I couldn’t make out half of what they were saying) we heard several small crashes from the hall behind us so we looked to see a man yelling at an older woman to “get out of here” and proceeded to kick her things (she was trying to sell two kittens). So my friends went over and I followed... There was already the man, the woman and two other men standing there arguing. I couldn’t make out anything but one of the men was between the yelling man and the other and the woman was standing there looking on; one of the girls we had met was between “ole yeller” and the woman. ...Evidently “ole yeller” was standing opposite the woman in the hall (many people sell things in the halls of the metro) but I didn’t understand why he decided to push around this woman. I asked my friend what happened and he just said something about like “such it is in Moscow”...
12.10.07: I had planned on visiting Butovo Polygon (the place where many people were killed under the communist yoke; and where part of the reconciliation services between the two halves of the Russian Church were held) today so I headed to where I thought I would find it...I was wrong that I would find it. I went to the end of the line of the Butovo district and thought that I might spot it from the metro but no such luck. I did see another church so after looking around a bit and realizing it was a waste of time I decided to ask at the other church. There was a funeral ending when I arrived (and a sign not to enter) so I walked in the graveyard for a while before returning. I spent a few minutes in the church waiting for the attendant to have some spare time when I went up to wait an old woman had also come up so I waited until she was done. So I listened in on what she was asking... she was buying some icons and had first asked for one of St. Nicholas and looked at several. Then she asked about the Theotokos and about the different ones of those; at that point the attendant said asked if she had one of the Saviour and that it was necessary to have one of the Saviour as that’s where it all begins. So she spent some time looking at the different sizes and contemplating about a book; finally she purchased the lot... So the woman didn’t really know the exact way to the other church but told me which bus. So I found the bus stop but there was no where to buy a ticket (for such buses one needs a ticket before getting on). I walked a ways looking for a ticket book but the one I found wasn’t open... It was also very cold by this time (a few snowflakes had fallen when I was on the way to the first church). So I decided to give up the search for another day and headed back to the metro. I had wanted to go to Tsaritsyno next but decided I was not dressed appropriately so I went on a pointless trip to Izmailovsky park where I walked around the booths and bought a cup of tea. (I thought Izmailovsky park might have something different than 2 years ago but I was wrong...) So I loitered around awhile as I was supposed to meet a friend later to go to an art exhibition. So we went to a group of art galleries that are on the grounds of a former factory (appropriately named “factory”) and looked at 5 different galleries. So we didn’t actually go in the first one-it didn’t look that interesting from the outside. The second one had really big prints (probably 4’ x 6’) of people with down syndrome-they were mildly interesting because of the size and the backgrounds. The third one had an exhibit of photos from Australia which were also mildly interesting. And the fourth one had paintings that were in what I might call the “stream” effect (picture paint running down a canvas) with general shapes of objects. A few of these were mildly interesting for the texture. And finally (we actually almost missed it) what we had come for-an exhibit of movie posters from the 20s and 30s. These were the most interesting (it didn’t take much) as they were originals and one could see the pasted letters overlapping the hand drawn pictures. So after this I had time to make it to the MP meeting where a bard singer (Aleksei Kirillov) was going to be playing. So he played for about an hour-an hour and a half. Aleksei has played and organized a lot of festivals for Orthodox since he was baptized (if I remember right about 15 or 20 years ago).
13.10.07: So waking up with the thought of the new student I was to teach was not fun. I prepared a little before and tried to make my silly lesson plan for Monday’s class. I met someone from the office at a metro to be taken to the flat of the boy. The flat was about 10 minutes away (though it took a little longer as we had to find the way). I was prepared for an awkward situation but it turned a little more awkward when the parents (who spoke English, and very well, to my surprise) wanted to sit in on the lesson. I told them that I was going to give him a test and see where I think we should start. So at first they didn’t join but after a while they came in. We ended up doing the test together as he didn’t totally seem to understand it. I really don’t know why they’re having a private instructor as the parents are well capable of teaching him and he seemed pretty advanced for his age. I returned to my flat after this and prepared a little for the next week and went to the vigil for Pokrov at my local Church of The Annunciation. I had a pretty good spot to stand but when it came time for the annointing the church became like a rush hour metro (packed like a can of overcrowded sardines).
14.10.07: Today the awaited trip to Kalomna came; the first time outside of Moscow (and the farthest from Moscow so far). We left on a coach about 7 and made the approximately 100 kilometer trip to this town which is something like 30 years younger than Moscow. We arrived for the liturgy at the Pokrov Church at Novo-Golutvin Holy Trinity women’s monastery. The church was packed as to be expected but not overcrowded. The singing was by the nuns of which there were about 30-40. After liturgy we had a small tour of the other churches and a look at the monastery camel. They were kind enough to feed us a little lunch after which we listened to Abbess Ksenia give a talk and a question and answer session. A friend sat next to me and translated different parts of the talk so that I got the just of what was said. Next we walked to the local cathedral which is just outside the monastery and then a little bit around the old part of town. After this we got back on the bus and headed to the seminary/monastery where Fr. Iosaph (the spiritual director of Voskresene) attended and had a tour; this monastery was founded by a disciple of St. Sergius of Radonezh. We stopped at a local church near the monastery which was built in the Byzantine style and is currently being restored. Among other great things this church does is give rides on four wheelers to children after liturgy. We were then off to the other side of Kolomna to visit a men’s monastery opposite the river Oka from the women’s monastery. At this monastery we sang an akathist to the icon of the Theotokos Feodorovskaya. We had a short tour of the two churches and then made our way back to Moscow. My friend had mentioned earlier in the day that traditionally Pokrov is when there is the first snowfall which “covers” (pokrov). It turned out that the Covering is still over Moscow as when we were heading back we came across several centimeters of snow covering the ground.
08.10.07: After preparing the day before I didn’t have a lot to do today. I went in to the office in the morning though to work on preparation for my high school class. The teacher trainer I had talked to about this the other day turned out to have gone to St. Petersburg... So I talked to another one and she gave me some good advice and suggested that we watch The Godfather as it might go well with having them read a little ahead and then watch some. So I read ahead some in the book and worked on questions to ask. Hopefully this will keep their interest for the next 7 classes... When I arrived at my school the security guard (who finally recognizes me-I’m thinking it’s because of the wallet ordeal of last week) stopped me when I went in...at first I thought there was a problem but then he gave me some booties for my shoes to put on...(I assume because it was wet outside) So about everyone in the building was wearing blue booties and the place looked like a hospital. (I wonder if they’re going to be handing these out all winter as well...) My elementary class went well again today...the child who likes to act up was gone again. The atmosphere is much more relaxed when he isn’t there and an hour of class went by without me really realizing it. Next class went well also; one student was gone so I didn’t want to work to far ahead so I had the other two students talking for most of the time and we went at a relaxed pace (I’ve decided that it really doesn’t matter if we cover all I planned as long as they are talking and hopefully learning something). And the next class went well...
09.10.07: I was around the flat most of the morning preparing for classes and then went into the office to prepare some more; to talk to someone to get some ideas about how I was supposed to present the movie. I found a script online and selected several dialogues and took out some words for the students to put back in. All this preparation took a surprisingly long time so I again rushed off to class, not as early as planned but not late. The students were a little late as usual so I had time to get everything ready. I started out this class with another writing exercise; this one I had a picture of a dwarf that was in the Moscow Times today... We did a little discussion about The Godfather from the text they read and I tried to have them do a roleplay but it didn’t work the best...it wasn’t a total flop though. So we started watching and I had them try to fill in missing words but I hadn’t so much considered how difficult all the Italianesque accents are to understand. So after the first dialogue I realized that they needed to see the subtitles; at that point it was a little pointless to fill in the blanks as one of them pointed out. So we just watched another few scenes and then I had one dialogue in which I had left the list of words to fill in after they had seen the scene and that worked better... Now hopefully the next 7 classes will go as well. In my evening class one student didn’t show up so there were only two so I didn’t really want to do a full lesson. We did some reading and they ended up talking a lot and I decided not to stop them (the fact that they are dating helps the class to go pretty smoothly). So we discussed the topics in the book and then went off into other topics; by the end of the class we were talking about literature and movies...
10.10.07: I finally made myself get up at 7; it was the hardest thing I’ve had to do since I’ve been here... The problem was that it looked like it was still about 5 in the morning and I had just previously woken up and had looked outside and thought I had a few more hours to sleep... So with my extra time I simply prepared a little more for class and was going to go into the office to do a few things. When I got on the metro I decided to go ahead and drop my money off for the trip I am supposed to be taking on Sunday (to Kolomna a town outside of Moscow). So I had been to the church one other time (when I first arrived) but couldn’t remember exactly how to get there from the metro. I had looked at the location on a map a few times so generally knew which way to go so once I got coordinated from the metro station I figured it out. Thankfully when I went in I ran into a man who was patient enough to listen to me and direct me to the woman at the candle stand who took my money. So I had planned the day before to visit a friend’s English class again but ran by the office beforehand to check my email and make some copies. I had also “lost” my flash drive the day before (I thought for sure on the metro) but thankfully remembered to ask at the office and it was there. So I rushed off to St. Tikhon’s and my friend had procured for me a document that says I’m some sort of teacher and have permission to go into the building... So this time at the lesson my friend wanted to discuss the book where they were at at the time. The class was more talkative this time and I think they’re getting used to hearing an American talk... We discussed technology and at one point when Victoria said that she didn’t love technology I was tempted to bust a rhyme like Kip... So after class I had a little lunch with my friend and ran into my fellow American Thomas and talked a little bit about my teaching so far and other some such. So off to class... The woman who runs the franchise I work for, Maria, had told me the day previous that she was coming to my class to observe my discipline problem (which I informed her hadn’t been present but she came anyway) and sat in on class for about an hour. Class went pretty well as lately it has been. After class Maria talked to the students and asked them about the class and said some things about how they should act in class (such as not pulling the girls pony tale [which he hadn’t done before, I think he is starting to like her]) and told them not to speak in Russian, which I’d been trying to control unsuccessfully. Maria gave me some ideas of a few things to do and told me about the child that I will be teaching on Saturdays. Next class went well, however, after we finished the current chapter I turned the page and realized I hadn’t even looked at the next chapter... So I read the first thing and tried to have them talk a bit while I was trying to look ahead... I stumbled a bit but overall I don’t think it was bad. I think they’re used to my mess ups. Thankfully the vocabulary part took up the rest of the class after we had read a little story at the beginning of the chapter. In my next class I was giving a test so there wasn’t a whole lot to do. I did review the homework at the beginning so as to wait for one student, who never showed up. So the test and grading it took up the other hour and a half of class.
11.10.07: Spent a lot of the morning preparing questions and script excerpts for The Godfather. I went to the office around noon and spent some time copying exercises for next week and looking over materials especially for the new student I’m supposed to have on Saturday. I’m supposed to give a diagnostic test first and then give a sort of diagnostic lesson so we’ll see how it goes... I also was informed that next week I would have an observation of one of my classes. So it will be my upper-intermediate class on Monday. The teacher who will be observing me asked if I had a lesson plan and I was shocked...I haven’t made a lesson plan since about the 2 or 3 day of teaching... I found it pointless as even when I had one I forgot to go by it...or if I tried to I only got confused with having to refer to the lesson plan, the student book and the teacher’s book all at the same time. Basically I now just go by the student book in which I’ve made notes and refer to the teacher’s book if I hadn’t written all the answers in the student book. So now I’ll have to spend several hours writing up a pointless lesson plan... So my advanced group went pretty well today. We discussed the clip we had watched the previous class and also the reading which they had done. All four students showed up (one had missed basically the previous two classes-so all of The Godfather so far). However, this said student read over the text fairly quickly and I had the other students retell the story to her so she caught up pretty quickly. We watched about a 10 minute section and then I had them go over some of the script which I had prepared but after we had gone over it I realized that they were not very excited about doing this so I asked them if it was of any use and they said it wasn’t really... So I said we could just discuss the film which we did for the remainder of the class (about 40 minutes). I didn’t really have enough questions to ask so thankfully two of them argued for awhile about some things... The other two I kept trying to involve in the conversation but didn’t have much luck. My next class went well as usual. In the metro station at my school I was awaiting the train and watching it arrive when I spotted a friend whom I had met the first weekend I was here so I ran down to the car he was in and we rode together to my next stop. By another chance when we were transferring we ran into several other people from MP. While they were talking (I couldn’t make out half of what they were saying) we heard several small crashes from the hall behind us so we looked to see a man yelling at an older woman to “get out of here” and proceeded to kick her things (she was trying to sell two kittens). So my friends went over and I followed... There was already the man, the woman and two other men standing there arguing. I couldn’t make out anything but one of the men was between the yelling man and the other and the woman was standing there looking on; one of the girls we had met was between “ole yeller” and the woman. ...Evidently “ole yeller” was standing opposite the woman in the hall (many people sell things in the halls of the metro) but I didn’t understand why he decided to push around this woman. I asked my friend what happened and he just said something about like “such it is in Moscow”...
12.10.07: I had planned on visiting Butovo Polygon (the place where many people were killed under the communist yoke; and where part of the reconciliation services between the two halves of the Russian Church were held) today so I headed to where I thought I would find it...I was wrong that I would find it. I went to the end of the line of the Butovo district and thought that I might spot it from the metro but no such luck. I did see another church so after looking around a bit and realizing it was a waste of time I decided to ask at the other church. There was a funeral ending when I arrived (and a sign not to enter) so I walked in the graveyard for a while before returning. I spent a few minutes in the church waiting for the attendant to have some spare time when I went up to wait an old woman had also come up so I waited until she was done. So I listened in on what she was asking... she was buying some icons and had first asked for one of St. Nicholas and looked at several. Then she asked about the Theotokos and about the different ones of those; at that point the attendant said asked if she had one of the Saviour and that it was necessary to have one of the Saviour as that’s where it all begins. So she spent some time looking at the different sizes and contemplating about a book; finally she purchased the lot... So the woman didn’t really know the exact way to the other church but told me which bus. So I found the bus stop but there was no where to buy a ticket (for such buses one needs a ticket before getting on). I walked a ways looking for a ticket book but the one I found wasn’t open... It was also very cold by this time (a few snowflakes had fallen when I was on the way to the first church). So I decided to give up the search for another day and headed back to the metro. I had wanted to go to Tsaritsyno next but decided I was not dressed appropriately so I went on a pointless trip to Izmailovsky park where I walked around the booths and bought a cup of tea. (I thought Izmailovsky park might have something different than 2 years ago but I was wrong...) So I loitered around awhile as I was supposed to meet a friend later to go to an art exhibition. So we went to a group of art galleries that are on the grounds of a former factory (appropriately named “factory”) and looked at 5 different galleries. So we didn’t actually go in the first one-it didn’t look that interesting from the outside. The second one had really big prints (probably 4’ x 6’) of people with down syndrome-they were mildly interesting because of the size and the backgrounds. The third one had an exhibit of photos from Australia which were also mildly interesting. And the fourth one had paintings that were in what I might call the “stream” effect (picture paint running down a canvas) with general shapes of objects. A few of these were mildly interesting for the texture. And finally (we actually almost missed it) what we had come for-an exhibit of movie posters from the 20s and 30s. These were the most interesting (it didn’t take much) as they were originals and one could see the pasted letters overlapping the hand drawn pictures. So after this I had time to make it to the MP meeting where a bard singer (Aleksei Kirillov) was going to be playing. So he played for about an hour-an hour and a half. Aleksei has played and organized a lot of festivals for Orthodox since he was baptized (if I remember right about 15 or 20 years ago).
13.10.07: So waking up with the thought of the new student I was to teach was not fun. I prepared a little before and tried to make my silly lesson plan for Monday’s class. I met someone from the office at a metro to be taken to the flat of the boy. The flat was about 10 minutes away (though it took a little longer as we had to find the way). I was prepared for an awkward situation but it turned a little more awkward when the parents (who spoke English, and very well, to my surprise) wanted to sit in on the lesson. I told them that I was going to give him a test and see where I think we should start. So at first they didn’t join but after a while they came in. We ended up doing the test together as he didn’t totally seem to understand it. I really don’t know why they’re having a private instructor as the parents are well capable of teaching him and he seemed pretty advanced for his age. I returned to my flat after this and prepared a little for the next week and went to the vigil for Pokrov at my local Church of The Annunciation. I had a pretty good spot to stand but when it came time for the annointing the church became like a rush hour metro (packed like a can of overcrowded sardines).
14.10.07: Today the awaited trip to Kalomna came; the first time outside of Moscow (and the farthest from Moscow so far). We left on a coach about 7 and made the approximately 100 kilometer trip to this town which is something like 30 years younger than Moscow. We arrived for the liturgy at the Pokrov Church at Novo-Golutvin Holy Trinity women’s monastery. The church was packed as to be expected but not overcrowded. The singing was by the nuns of which there were about 30-40. After liturgy we had a small tour of the other churches and a look at the monastery camel. They were kind enough to feed us a little lunch after which we listened to Abbess Ksenia give a talk and a question and answer session. A friend sat next to me and translated different parts of the talk so that I got the just of what was said. Next we walked to the local cathedral which is just outside the monastery and then a little bit around the old part of town. After this we got back on the bus and headed to the seminary/monastery where Fr. Iosaph (the spiritual director of Voskresene) attended and had a tour; this monastery was founded by a disciple of St. Sergius of Radonezh. We stopped at a local church near the monastery which was built in the Byzantine style and is currently being restored. Among other great things this church does is give rides on four wheelers to children after liturgy. We were then off to the other side of Kolomna to visit a men’s monastery opposite the river Oka from the women’s monastery. At this monastery we sang an akathist to the icon of the Theotokos Feodorovskaya. We had a short tour of the two churches and then made our way back to Moscow. My friend had mentioned earlier in the day that traditionally Pokrov is when there is the first snowfall which “covers” (pokrov). It turned out that the Covering is still over Moscow as when we were heading back we came across several centimeters of snow covering the ground.
08 October, 2007
04-06.10.07 - The weekend
04.10.07: I decided to get up early and go in to the office so as to find my materials for teaching next week so that I wouldn’t have to on Friday. I didn’t get there as early as hoped so other people were there coming in and out and in general distracting me from my task. I was also trying to figure what I needed to do to make my high-schoolers interested in the lessons. I talk to my teacher trainer and she gave me some good ideas such as watching a movie in parts and discussing it, reading “graded readers,” and showed me a book that has activities. I used one of these activities today and it went very well. Thankfully all 4 people were in attendance so I was able to have 2 groups. I also had them start doing a writing exercise at the beginning of the lesson which I think they all enjoyed. I read the most creative one to the class after their break. I had given them a picture of a middle aged man examining a high heeled shoe and told them to write about it whatever they wanted. Three of the four said such things as that the man was the owner of the store or of a shoe manufacturer but the fourth decided that the man was Lenin resurrected... After the break I realized I didn’t really have much to do so thankfully I had brought along an excerpt from a graded reader (The Godfather) so I started them on that and said that we would read some every class. I found out today that this class ends on November the 6th so I’m happy about that, however, unfortunately it may continue as an exam preparation class (before the end of the class the academic director came and talked to the students about the exam class and told them to talk to their parents about it and that she will call them on Monday...hopefully the parents won’t want to dish out the extra money...). The problem is that I will be done with the book next week so then I will have about 7 classes for which I will have to totally make up lessons. I was told the other day that I would be starting to teach an eleven year old boy in his home on Saturdays starting on the 12th. So now, even though I won’t for sure work on Friday, it will be the same as working 6 days a week as I will still probably have to go into the office on Fridays to prepare. I will be teaching said child for and hour and a half right in the middle of the day...and it will be at least an hour trip from my flat. To make matters worse the academic director at the school I taught at today asked me, “Do you like children?” I responded asking her what age children meant and was told eleven or twelve; so I assume from this that I will be given a new class of little brats. My evening class went well as usual other than a few hairy questions on quantifiers (if you remember the last time I “taught” quantifiers was the worst experience yet). We didn’t get through all the lesson, which I don’t mind, as we started a little late and got a little off topic some. I ended up asking the class about kefir (not totally unrelated as the chapter is on food) and they said that they like 1% better...
04.10.07: As we would have a training session on Saturday I decided that I wasn’t going to do anything involving work on Friday. (I write this on Sunday and somewhat regret not doing anything...but only somewhat.) So I had picked out a few places that I wanted to go and was off... I went to the All Russian Exhibition Center (VVTs [that’s “tseh” not “t’s”]) first which is only a few stops from my flat. This facility was built to show off the cultural diversity of the CCCP and had different pavilions for the different regions. Now shops of all sorts, offices and eateries occupy these pavilions. The grounds are very nice to walk on as it has a park setting. I spent a few hours here including having a little lunch at a cafe (I had my second bowl of borshch). I next decided to search out a church that I had spotted the previous week from Kolomenskoe. It had taken me some time to find out anything about this church as I had only seen it in the distance and Katja didn’t know anything about it. However, with my trusty map of churches in Moscow and my book about the same I found it and how to get there. As I had a lot of time I ended up walking from the metro to the church which was probably 5 or 6 kilometers. When I got there it turned out that the churches weren’t open... I did go into the bookstore for about 5 minutes but that was it... So back to the metro... I next decided to go to Danilov monastery, the headquarters of the Patriarchate. On my way to the monastery there was a shop of theirs where various goods are sold - I decided to try some Kronstadt bread. The first thing I came across at the monastery, through an outside entrance into the fortifications, was a little church of St. Seraphim where there was a bookstore so I spent a few minutes inside. Then came the monastery proper; there weren’t a lot of people around so I sort of followed someone who looked like they knew where they were going... I came across a church in which there appeared to be a service so I went in. An Akathist was being prayed so I spent about 15 minutes there and decided to see if the other church was open. In the other church Vespers was finishing up so I spend another 15 or so minutes in that service. Before I left I got in the queue for venerating the relics of St. Daniel. I sat down for awhile on a bench in the courtyard, as I had been walking all day, and watched people come and go and especially the security guards who were dressed uniforms of the early 20th century (I think that’s what I want to do when I grow up). I was supposed to go to Tsaritsyno that night with a friend but they had to cancel so I ended up going to the meeting of MP where they were discussing various plans (I only understood about a quarter of what was said so I just followed the gist). Afterwards a few people went to eat at the nearby mall type facility where I had another bowl of borshch.
05.10.07: Had planned on getting up early and doing a few things before training but that didn’t happen... The training was a little more relevant but we didn’t talk that much about children so at the present wasn’t that helpful (plus it could have been compacted into about an hour instead of almost 2 hours). As I was to meet people from MP at 2.20 to go to a children’s home I loitered around the office for a little while after which I decided to change some money as there was a good rate. Well, when I gave my $40 she asked for 40 rubles (to give me a 1000 ruble bill). She obviously wasn’t calculating according to the advertised rate so I tried to explain but she wouldn’t have it. After I got my money back I figured I would try the other one nearby... Their “rate” was only 5 kopeks lower so it was negligible. It also turned out that their rate was actually about 15 kopeks lower than the previous place so I just went with it... In the end I lost about $2 which in the land of plenty isn’t much but when I can buy 4 loaves of wholesome bread for that much it hurts... So about 10 or so from MP went to the children’s home and played some games, did some activities, ate some snacks and watched part of a Bible movie with the children. One of the children, Ilia, took a liking to me and called me his dad and gave me some small models of various animals and a plane (see below). He also told me that he wants to be an icon painter when he grows up and showed us all, and later gave us, some of his drawings (see below). Later several others took an interest in me when they realized I was American and started asking me various questions. Overall it was a very rewarding experience (as some of my fellow teachers wished me) and I hope to be able to go back soon. Please pray for Ilia and his fellows that they will continue to stay close to the Church. We spent about 3.5 hours at the home and headed home... I stopped at Arbat street to go to Dom Knigi and ended up buying a map of Moscow (I was really looking for a small metro map but none were what I wanted) and a book on Russian verbs. On the way I stopped by a church (see here) which was still open after vigil and venerated the icons.
06.10.07: I went to liturgy at the Church of the Annunciation down the street today. (It was hard getting out of bed at 7 when it was still slightly dark but I made myself). I was able to position myself somewhere from where I didn’t really have to move about until the end of the service (plus there were slightly fewer people there than on the feast). Afterwards I did a little shopping at our local product center. As I hadn’t done any preparation on Friday or Saturday I decided that I really needed to so the rest of the afternoon I prepared this weeks classes (except for my advanced high schoolers for which I need consultation to start planning lessons). I drank about 10 cups of tea which I think gave me a headache...that or looking at those dang books for so long in poor light. As I prepared all that I felt necessary I started studying my verb book and finally looked at the Orthodox news papers I’ve had a few weeks... Saw some ads for iconography and restoration schools...maybe I’ll go be an iconographer...
Note: I have about 150 photos from this weekend so it's going to take some time to upload them all; hopefully over the course of the week they will all be posted, keep checking back.
Ps. The order of the pictures goes from bottom to top.
Happy shiny people
Another...(with great texture)
Another pavilion
The pavilion for Karelia (one of the few that has any wooden parts)
Detail so you can see their smiling faces
More happy proletariat
The Soviets did have a good taste in texture...
More detail
Detail
Another grandiose building.
"The Man" himself.
Forget about Roswell - here is the real deal.
The happy proletariat with their bountiful bough of wheat.
The grand entrance to the VVTs
04.10.07: As we would have a training session on Saturday I decided that I wasn’t going to do anything involving work on Friday. (I write this on Sunday and somewhat regret not doing anything...but only somewhat.) So I had picked out a few places that I wanted to go and was off... I went to the All Russian Exhibition Center (VVTs [that’s “tseh” not “t’s”]) first which is only a few stops from my flat. This facility was built to show off the cultural diversity of the CCCP and had different pavilions for the different regions. Now shops of all sorts, offices and eateries occupy these pavilions. The grounds are very nice to walk on as it has a park setting. I spent a few hours here including having a little lunch at a cafe (I had my second bowl of borshch). I next decided to search out a church that I had spotted the previous week from Kolomenskoe. It had taken me some time to find out anything about this church as I had only seen it in the distance and Katja didn’t know anything about it. However, with my trusty map of churches in Moscow and my book about the same I found it and how to get there. As I had a lot of time I ended up walking from the metro to the church which was probably 5 or 6 kilometers. When I got there it turned out that the churches weren’t open... I did go into the bookstore for about 5 minutes but that was it... So back to the metro... I next decided to go to Danilov monastery, the headquarters of the Patriarchate. On my way to the monastery there was a shop of theirs where various goods are sold - I decided to try some Kronstadt bread. The first thing I came across at the monastery, through an outside entrance into the fortifications, was a little church of St. Seraphim where there was a bookstore so I spent a few minutes inside. Then came the monastery proper; there weren’t a lot of people around so I sort of followed someone who looked like they knew where they were going... I came across a church in which there appeared to be a service so I went in. An Akathist was being prayed so I spent about 15 minutes there and decided to see if the other church was open. In the other church Vespers was finishing up so I spend another 15 or so minutes in that service. Before I left I got in the queue for venerating the relics of St. Daniel. I sat down for awhile on a bench in the courtyard, as I had been walking all day, and watched people come and go and especially the security guards who were dressed uniforms of the early 20th century (I think that’s what I want to do when I grow up). I was supposed to go to Tsaritsyno that night with a friend but they had to cancel so I ended up going to the meeting of MP where they were discussing various plans (I only understood about a quarter of what was said so I just followed the gist). Afterwards a few people went to eat at the nearby mall type facility where I had another bowl of borshch.
05.10.07: Had planned on getting up early and doing a few things before training but that didn’t happen... The training was a little more relevant but we didn’t talk that much about children so at the present wasn’t that helpful (plus it could have been compacted into about an hour instead of almost 2 hours). As I was to meet people from MP at 2.20 to go to a children’s home I loitered around the office for a little while after which I decided to change some money as there was a good rate. Well, when I gave my $40 she asked for 40 rubles (to give me a 1000 ruble bill). She obviously wasn’t calculating according to the advertised rate so I tried to explain but she wouldn’t have it. After I got my money back I figured I would try the other one nearby... Their “rate” was only 5 kopeks lower so it was negligible. It also turned out that their rate was actually about 15 kopeks lower than the previous place so I just went with it... In the end I lost about $2 which in the land of plenty isn’t much but when I can buy 4 loaves of wholesome bread for that much it hurts... So about 10 or so from MP went to the children’s home and played some games, did some activities, ate some snacks and watched part of a Bible movie with the children. One of the children, Ilia, took a liking to me and called me his dad and gave me some small models of various animals and a plane (see below). He also told me that he wants to be an icon painter when he grows up and showed us all, and later gave us, some of his drawings (see below). Later several others took an interest in me when they realized I was American and started asking me various questions. Overall it was a very rewarding experience (as some of my fellow teachers wished me) and I hope to be able to go back soon. Please pray for Ilia and his fellows that they will continue to stay close to the Church. We spent about 3.5 hours at the home and headed home... I stopped at Arbat street to go to Dom Knigi and ended up buying a map of Moscow (I was really looking for a small metro map but none were what I wanted) and a book on Russian verbs. On the way I stopped by a church (see here) which was still open after vigil and venerated the icons.
06.10.07: I went to liturgy at the Church of the Annunciation down the street today. (It was hard getting out of bed at 7 when it was still slightly dark but I made myself). I was able to position myself somewhere from where I didn’t really have to move about until the end of the service (plus there were slightly fewer people there than on the feast). Afterwards I did a little shopping at our local product center. As I hadn’t done any preparation on Friday or Saturday I decided that I really needed to so the rest of the afternoon I prepared this weeks classes (except for my advanced high schoolers for which I need consultation to start planning lessons). I drank about 10 cups of tea which I think gave me a headache...that or looking at those dang books for so long in poor light. As I prepared all that I felt necessary I started studying my verb book and finally looked at the Orthodox news papers I’ve had a few weeks... Saw some ads for iconography and restoration schools...maybe I’ll go be an iconographer...
Note: I have about 150 photos from this weekend so it's going to take some time to upload them all; hopefully over the course of the week they will all be posted, keep checking back.
Ps. The order of the pictures goes from bottom to top.
Happy shiny people
Another...(with great texture)
Another pavilion
The pavilion for Karelia (one of the few that has any wooden parts)
Detail so you can see their smiling faces
More happy proletariat
The Soviets did have a good taste in texture...
More detail
Detail
Another grandiose building.
"The Man" himself.
Forget about Roswell - here is the real deal.
The happy proletariat with their bountiful bough of wheat.
The grand entrance to the VVTs
04 October, 2007
01-03.10.07 - The third week of teaching? (It seems like an eternity)
01.10.09: In several of my classes last week we didn’t get through all the material I had planned so for today’s classes I didn’t have to do a lot other than familiarize myself more with the material. While I was at the office the teacher trainer’s put a sign on their office door announcing that if anyone needed help and or advice they were there to give it. I had talked to both of them before about my elementary class and they had given me some pointers but I once again mentioned it and they decided to come out and observe a lesson. I was kind of nervous about this as I knew that my teaching methods would be criticized but what can you do... So at the beginning of the lesson the kids were pretty good, probably because she was there (as well as the Russian teacher whose room I use who had to fill out her class journal; she also didn’t want me to erase her German on the chalkboard so I was only able to use about half the board...). I think the children were a little nervous as at the beginning they made mistakes that they normally wouldn’t. After a while they were mostly back to their bratty selves. I was given the suggestion before class to institute a marks system whereby each student has four marks which will be erased as they misbehave. The only problem I have with this is that erasing these according to normal standards no one would be in the class after the first half an hour... The other problem was that as I was threatening to erase them and erasing them the children kept saying that nothing would happen when they were all erased. Towards the end of class the boys both had one left and both were acting up about the same amount so I was not quite sure what to do... But thankfully class was soon over... The teacher trainer went ahead and left after class and said we would talk the next day; I was surprised to hear that she thought I had a good lesson but there were just more suggestions on classroom control. My next lesson went pretty well; it was about fashion in a class with three high school/university girls but they weren’t quite as keen to talk about fashion as I thought they might be. In my evening class I had a trial student who I think will join the class so that should make the class work better as there will be pairs.
02.10.07: It’s getting harder and harder to get up in the morning as I know that once I do I have to start preparing for teaching that night... I looked over my lessons for today at my flat for most of the morning then went into the office to talk to the teacher I had observe my elementary class. She said my lesson was well planned (all I had done was follow the book) but that I didn’t move between the lessons points quick enough (because I have to remember what we’re supposed to be doing). She gave me more suggestions on discipline so hopefully they will work. I then prepared a little more for my other classes and listened once again to some people giving me suggestions on what to do with my teenage class that doesn’t like talking very much. The lesson today in that class was about the future and predictions that didn’t come true so I had found an outside discussion that I thought might be interesting. Class started out pretty well with a little game of taboo. When the one female student in the class shows up she’s usually about an hour late and today was not an exception. Now that she was there I could have them (in theory) discuss in pairs but they weren’t too keen on this; they would maybe say a few things and one group of them would start speaking Russian and the other one wouldn’t talk to each other... So I decided to crack down on Russian speaking as I had been pretty slack; the only problem is that there isn’t really any punishment...they don’t do their homework anyway so I can’t give them more homework. In the end when they didn’t want to talk to each other I resorted to asking them questions and trying to get everyone to say something which worked for a while... Once again I forgot that this group likes a break so they reminded me... After the break we had about 40 minutes in class but it was pretty obvious that no one wanted to be there anymore. The girl (who at that time had only been there about an hour and 15 or 20 minutes) thought the class ended at 6:45 so started complaining... I had them read an article that I thought was pretty interesting but they all seemed to think it was boring... I then tried to discuss a grammar section at which point I almost had anarchy so I let them go about ten minutes early... (Update: I realized that the class does end at 6:45...) My next class went pretty well as usual but I found out that one of the students isn’t going to be there for the next month - so now with only two people in the class I’m going to have to work a lot harder to prepare and find lots of outside material. Thankfully we got off topic and discussed various things, including our personal outlooks (we found out that we have one atheist, one christian and one orthodox...), so the lesson was stretched out a bit. The students in this class seem to be fit for a higher level class so I don’t feel like I’m really teaching them that much (and feel bad for the fact that I’m simply using the book which they could study on their own).
03.10.07: As I had all the materials I was going to use for class I stayed at the flat until it was time for work. I finally made it there with time left to stop in at the church which is right by the metro. I’m very glad I finally stopped in as it is a wonderful church. This is the one church I’ve seen so far where almost all the icons and mosaics match. True they were done in a 19th century style but not they are not the worst example of such iconography; there was one icon of St. Seraphim which I particularly liked. (Of course the the iconography is helped by the fact that many multitudes of faithful have prayed before them.) The girl in my elementary class was the first to show up today so I went over with her the homework. As she is a bit behind the others I hope this will help her. The next to show up was the boy who is the strongest student and to my surprise (and secret joy) the problem child did not appear today. So this was the best lesson we’ve had yet... They actually worked together and the boy explained things to the girl when she didn’t understand. My next class went pretty well but I had made a mistake when I had gone over the grammar point so that created several minutes of confusion. (I thought I had done really well explaining the point and then such a thing happened...) Once that was cleared up things went better (other than me feeling like a total fool and wondering what the students think of their “teacher” now). (Speaking of “quotation marks,” I explained the use thereof in a derogatory fashion; I don’t think they were amused). My next class went pretty well also. However, when I got to the metro with my fellow teacher the “fun” began... She realized that she had not her wallet (and was afraid that it had been stolen) so we went back to the school and tried to get in to no avail. She called our boss to see if we could get a hold of the security guard but was told that she would have to call in the morning. So back towards the metro when she got a call saying that the security guard would let us in; once inside the wallet was found in her classroom. So then it was back to the metro an hour later and more stressed on the part of my colleague. In other news a friend last weekend told me that I should try a higher percent kefir as it was better, sweeter. I told her that I had been told the opposite...so of course she was right; I bought some 3% and it is sweeter, however, I still like the 1% as well.
02.10.07: It’s getting harder and harder to get up in the morning as I know that once I do I have to start preparing for teaching that night... I looked over my lessons for today at my flat for most of the morning then went into the office to talk to the teacher I had observe my elementary class. She said my lesson was well planned (all I had done was follow the book) but that I didn’t move between the lessons points quick enough (because I have to remember what we’re supposed to be doing). She gave me more suggestions on discipline so hopefully they will work. I then prepared a little more for my other classes and listened once again to some people giving me suggestions on what to do with my teenage class that doesn’t like talking very much. The lesson today in that class was about the future and predictions that didn’t come true so I had found an outside discussion that I thought might be interesting. Class started out pretty well with a little game of taboo. When the one female student in the class shows up she’s usually about an hour late and today was not an exception. Now that she was there I could have them (in theory) discuss in pairs but they weren’t too keen on this; they would maybe say a few things and one group of them would start speaking Russian and the other one wouldn’t talk to each other... So I decided to crack down on Russian speaking as I had been pretty slack; the only problem is that there isn’t really any punishment...they don’t do their homework anyway so I can’t give them more homework. In the end when they didn’t want to talk to each other I resorted to asking them questions and trying to get everyone to say something which worked for a while... Once again I forgot that this group likes a break so they reminded me... After the break we had about 40 minutes in class but it was pretty obvious that no one wanted to be there anymore. The girl (who at that time had only been there about an hour and 15 or 20 minutes) thought the class ended at 6:45 so started complaining... I had them read an article that I thought was pretty interesting but they all seemed to think it was boring... I then tried to discuss a grammar section at which point I almost had anarchy so I let them go about ten minutes early... (Update: I realized that the class does end at 6:45...) My next class went pretty well as usual but I found out that one of the students isn’t going to be there for the next month - so now with only two people in the class I’m going to have to work a lot harder to prepare and find lots of outside material. Thankfully we got off topic and discussed various things, including our personal outlooks (we found out that we have one atheist, one christian and one orthodox...), so the lesson was stretched out a bit. The students in this class seem to be fit for a higher level class so I don’t feel like I’m really teaching them that much (and feel bad for the fact that I’m simply using the book which they could study on their own).
03.10.07: As I had all the materials I was going to use for class I stayed at the flat until it was time for work. I finally made it there with time left to stop in at the church which is right by the metro. I’m very glad I finally stopped in as it is a wonderful church. This is the one church I’ve seen so far where almost all the icons and mosaics match. True they were done in a 19th century style but not they are not the worst example of such iconography; there was one icon of St. Seraphim which I particularly liked. (Of course the the iconography is helped by the fact that many multitudes of faithful have prayed before them.) The girl in my elementary class was the first to show up today so I went over with her the homework. As she is a bit behind the others I hope this will help her. The next to show up was the boy who is the strongest student and to my surprise (and secret joy) the problem child did not appear today. So this was the best lesson we’ve had yet... They actually worked together and the boy explained things to the girl when she didn’t understand. My next class went pretty well but I had made a mistake when I had gone over the grammar point so that created several minutes of confusion. (I thought I had done really well explaining the point and then such a thing happened...) Once that was cleared up things went better (other than me feeling like a total fool and wondering what the students think of their “teacher” now). (Speaking of “quotation marks,” I explained the use thereof in a derogatory fashion; I don’t think they were amused). My next class went pretty well also. However, when I got to the metro with my fellow teacher the “fun” began... She realized that she had not her wallet (and was afraid that it had been stolen) so we went back to the school and tried to get in to no avail. She called our boss to see if we could get a hold of the security guard but was told that she would have to call in the morning. So back towards the metro when she got a call saying that the security guard would let us in; once inside the wallet was found in her classroom. So then it was back to the metro an hour later and more stressed on the part of my colleague. In other news a friend last weekend told me that I should try a higher percent kefir as it was better, sweeter. I told her that I had been told the opposite...so of course she was right; I bought some 3% and it is sweeter, however, I still like the 1% as well.
01 October, 2007
26-30.09.07
26.09.07: I got up as early as I could make myself which turned out to be 7:30 and started planning my lessons. I had to make myself get up a little early as I promised a friend that I would come to their English class to converse with the students. Thankfully I had planned enough the days before that I didn’t have a lot to do during the day. I still went in to the office and found a few activities. One of the teacher trainers was there so I talked to her a little bit about my teenage class. Like the other teachers, she said that I should work more with discussion topics and not so much strictly out of the book. She gave me a few books that have some pre-made discussions in them so I am going to try them out next class. I met my friend around noon and went to where they teache, St. Tikhon’s Institute, and spent about an hour and a half with their students. The building where the school is, as with most buildings, has a security guard. When we were entering my friend explained that I was a guess for class but he didn’t want to let me through. So my friend started pleading with him and eventually asked me if I had any sort of identification about my work so I pulled out my same pass that I would use to get into the building where Language Link is and he was pleased... At my friend’s class I mostly talked about my conversion to Orthodoxy and such history and my schooling. They asked me various questions about my impressions of Russia and what American’s think of Russia and I as well asked them what they think about Russia (particularly the position of the Orthodox Church therein). I enjoyed talking to and hearing from them so hopefully I will have time to visit again soon (it would especially be good for them as my friend said that they have never spoken with a native speaker before). I was escorted back to the metro by the class so on the way they asked more questions and told me about various things. I had planned on leaving for work by 145 to be a little early and get set up for class but didn’t leave until 2 so I was very worried about being late, however, I made it to school about 2 minutes before class was to start and found none of the students there. They showed up about 10 minutes late and the “fun” began... So I decided to start out with an activity today hoping that it might get the energy out of them and calm them down. We played “action charades” where they had to act out simple activities like brushing teeth. Some of them didn’t turn out to be so simple as they didn’t know such phrases as “comb hair”. Things went pretty well for about 10 minutes but then they decided to start writing on the board when they got up so I decided to cut it short. I had them complete a little revision test in the book which they actually worked pretty diligently on (except for the one who always acts up); but he was at least pretty quiet. I really wanted to let them go on forever working but they did finish so I had to check in... They did pretty well overall so maybe I have taught them a little bit... The rest of the class was pretty calm considering past classes. After the usual 30 minutes my next class started and thankfully we had a third person show up. Everything went pretty well and it seems I even managed to spark a slight interest in history for the girl who said she always hated history. We had a chapter which included some readings about Henry the VIII and his wives so that kept them fairly interested. And 15 minutes after that class... (actually it turned out to be about 25 as I waited a few minutes for the last person and checked someone’s homework) Everything went well in this class other than getting a slight headache...
27.09.07: I got up early today (not as early as I had planned, however) to go to the liturgy for the feast of the Exaltation of the Cross at the church by my house. I was about 15 minutes late by the schedule for the start of the liturgy but they were still doing the 3rd hour so all was ok. As on Saturday and Sunday the church was packed and I had to squeeze through people to get to a spot (I still, however, often had to shift as people are most of the time shuffling by). I hadn’t particularly planned on staying for the whole service as I thought that I should do some more planning for my lessons. However I got sort of stuck towards the front of the church and didn’t feel like squeezing back through everyone; besides, I thought that it was only about 10 o’clock...it turned out to be almost 11. This wasn’t a problem in the end as I realized I didn’t need to go to the office today and could just make copies (which was all that ended up needing to be done) at school. So I got something to eat at my favorite little shop in our local food/anything market and spent a little leisure time at the flat. I left early for work as I though I would walk around the neighbourhood near the school and I had looked up to see if there were any churches nearby. I had forgotten to write down the address but ended up on the right street (turned out that the church is on the same street as the school). When I went in the church I noticed a few people up towards the front on the side and thought there might have been a service recently and it turned out there had been...a funeral. There was a +recently reposed babushka surrounded by what must have been her family. So I bought a few candles and lit one especially for her. I headed back to school thinking that I had plenty of time as my class didn’t start until 4:45...well I got there, made a few copies, talked a bit to the secretary, headed to class and found two of my three students. I told them that they were rather early, as it was only 430, and proceeded to prepare for class...I started class about 4:50 when the last student arrived and only then when I took my register did I realize that that class starts at 4:30... My Mon. Wed. classes are the ones that start at 45 minutes past... Class went fairly well over all but I’m pretty sure it’s painful for the students as they’re probably very bored. I tried one of the discussion topics I was given but it didn’t arouse much interest. My evening class went very well other than again having a very difficult grammar question.
28.09.07: We had a training session today on methods of teaching a class which is preparing to take an English proficiency test so my day was interrupted by this pointless activity... I went into the office but hadn’t gotten up as early as planned so I only had about an hour to look for materials for next week. I described this training as pointless as 2 weeks ago we had almost 4 hours of training on the makeup of this proficiency test; at this days session we simply were told of some books to use and more activities. Before this session I saw one of our other teacher trainers and asked about my passport which I hadn’t seen for a month... She said that they should call me when it was ready but that she would check into it. She sent me a message a short time later that said it was at the main office...who knows how long it had been sitting there...other people that arrived when I did had received there’s about a week and a half earlier. When I returned to the office after our training I found the rest of my materials but was not able to do completely everything I wanted as everyone else decided to come in and just hang around... Afterwards I checked out a little cd shop by the metro to look for Alisa cds but didn’t find any. I ended up buying the first set of cds from a band called DDT as a fellow intern had said they were good and at the first birthday party I was at they sang one of their songs and I liked it. I shouldn’t have believed the intern or gone by what was sung...out of 7 disks I have only liked one so far... I next went on a search for Fr. Arseny (the book) so I went to one of the Orthodox shops in Moscow - Pravoslavnaya Slova. They however didn’t have the book either so I bought a book by Fr. John (Krestjankin) to try and read. I walked around the neighbourhood some and came upon another church so I stepped in to see if they had the book. They’re in the process of re-painting the interiour so it was interesting to see them at work. I asked the woman at the bookstand if they had what I was looking for and told her that it was about a 300 page book but she looked through her whole stock of tiny booklets looking for it... I felt bad for having her do this so I decided to buy something; I bought a book that has short histories of all the churches in Moscow and a small calendar for next year. I met a friend later at Vorobyovi Gori and we walked around the park there and along the Moscow river.
29.09.07: I had planned on preparing more for teaching the following week but again didn’t get up as early as I had hoped. After half heartedly looking over the books I decided that as it was Saturday I didn’t need to be working since I would be preparing all my weekday hours anyway... I received today while I was home a telemarketing call; I didn’t know that they would exist in Russia... So I had decided to make a trip to the South of Moscow to the Optina Pustyn Podvore. This was the one other place where I thought I might find Fr. Arseny and I was correct - although I almost overlooked the book as it was shelved with Literature and not saint’s lives. I visited the three separate shops they have in the Podvore and also the church. Last time I was at the church the relics of the Optina startsi were out but this time they were in a part of the church that was roped off. On my way out of the grounds I was harassed by what appeared to be a gypsy child of 6 or 7 begging with his mother; I gave him my pocket change (about 15 rubles) and he started following me saying something I couldn’t understand; he must have realized that was all I was going to give so he ran off to follow after his next victim... I walked around the neighbourhood and a little into Bitstevsky Les and then picked up a few pirozhki and a yoghurt for a late lunch. I later met a friend downtown to go to their church, St. Tatiana, for the vigil. This church is on the old campus of Moscow State University (right across from the Kreml), which I had seen before but didn’t realize that it was a church (it looks like a university building other than having on the front “The Light of Christ Illumines All,” which I thought strange...). After vigil we went to McDonald’s where we waited in line for about 20 minutes...more because we were talking and not forcing our way up front...and ate outside the Kreml in Aleksandrovsky Sad. We spent some time eating and talking on various and sundry topics. At one point a woman approached (she looked German) and asked in English how to get to Red Square. I was thrown by the fact that she just decided to talk to some stranger in English so it took me a second to respond.
30.09.07: I met the same friend again this morning to go to St. Tatiana’s for liturgy. After the liturgy my friend introduced me to a few of their friends (2 of whom were also Aleksanders...). I was also introduced to several of the priests and the deacon, all of whom speak English so now I have someone to whom I can go for confession. We then walked over to Christ the Saviour as I hadn’t been there yet. This being the main cathedral in Moscow, and all of Russia, of course is beautiful but a lot of the iconography in the lower church I like better than what is normally seen by people and associated with the church. I met another friend, whose birthday party I had been at a few weeks previous, at Kolomenskoe, one of the summer homes of the tsars, in the afternoon and we walked around a few hours. We visited the church of the Kazan Mother of God where there had just been a wedding, was another one going as well as a baptism... After walking around for a while we returned to the church and stayed for a bit of Vespers and an Akathist. When we were leaving we coincidentally ran into a few people from MP who were going for a walk.
I had not expected to have a Fall in Moscow but we're having a "Baba Leto" (when it get's cold and then warm again)
The road...
Random Russian child
What appeared to be a private house in the middle of the park...
The same
The implements
This isn't your backwoods outhouse...
The similar
Near the graveyard there is a big apple orchard (I was slightly weary of eating the apples so I didn't try one)
The orchard (notice the man in the tree)
Detail of the gate to the graveyard at Kolomenskoe
The graveyard at Kolomenskoe
The graveyard at Kolomenskoe
After trecking up a big hill to the other church Katja and I found it closed...
Detail of main church at Kolomenskoe
The bell tower and some other building at Kolomenskoe
A view of Moscow from Kolomenskoe
The main church at Kolomenskoe (still under repair)
Detail of door in gateway
One of the gateways to Kolomenskoe
Detail of one of the buildings at Kolomenskoe
The Church of the Kazan Mother of God
The Kazan Church
A chapel spotted on the way to Christ the Saviour
Dostoevky statue
Dostoevky ironically outside the library by the name of Lenin (a man who would be his arch nemesis)
Lomonosov, the founder of Moscow State University
A "structure" at Bitsevsky Park
Detail of the "structure"
More Beautification
More Beautification
Someone loves Yasenevo
The entrance to Bitsevky Forest
Bitsevsky Forest in Yasenevo
Yasenevo district (seems that the people are trying to, understandibly, liven up the atmosphere)
Optina Podvore
Optina Podvore
Optina Podvore
A fantastic building...
A fantastic building detail...
St. Mitrophan's
St. Mitrophan's
St. Mitrophan's
St. Mitrophan's
St. Mitrophan's
27.09.07: I got up early today (not as early as I had planned, however) to go to the liturgy for the feast of the Exaltation of the Cross at the church by my house. I was about 15 minutes late by the schedule for the start of the liturgy but they were still doing the 3rd hour so all was ok. As on Saturday and Sunday the church was packed and I had to squeeze through people to get to a spot (I still, however, often had to shift as people are most of the time shuffling by). I hadn’t particularly planned on staying for the whole service as I thought that I should do some more planning for my lessons. However I got sort of stuck towards the front of the church and didn’t feel like squeezing back through everyone; besides, I thought that it was only about 10 o’clock...it turned out to be almost 11. This wasn’t a problem in the end as I realized I didn’t need to go to the office today and could just make copies (which was all that ended up needing to be done) at school. So I got something to eat at my favorite little shop in our local food/anything market and spent a little leisure time at the flat. I left early for work as I though I would walk around the neighbourhood near the school and I had looked up to see if there were any churches nearby. I had forgotten to write down the address but ended up on the right street (turned out that the church is on the same street as the school). When I went in the church I noticed a few people up towards the front on the side and thought there might have been a service recently and it turned out there had been...a funeral. There was a +recently reposed babushka surrounded by what must have been her family. So I bought a few candles and lit one especially for her. I headed back to school thinking that I had plenty of time as my class didn’t start until 4:45...well I got there, made a few copies, talked a bit to the secretary, headed to class and found two of my three students. I told them that they were rather early, as it was only 430, and proceeded to prepare for class...I started class about 4:50 when the last student arrived and only then when I took my register did I realize that that class starts at 4:30... My Mon. Wed. classes are the ones that start at 45 minutes past... Class went fairly well over all but I’m pretty sure it’s painful for the students as they’re probably very bored. I tried one of the discussion topics I was given but it didn’t arouse much interest. My evening class went very well other than again having a very difficult grammar question.
28.09.07: We had a training session today on methods of teaching a class which is preparing to take an English proficiency test so my day was interrupted by this pointless activity... I went into the office but hadn’t gotten up as early as planned so I only had about an hour to look for materials for next week. I described this training as pointless as 2 weeks ago we had almost 4 hours of training on the makeup of this proficiency test; at this days session we simply were told of some books to use and more activities. Before this session I saw one of our other teacher trainers and asked about my passport which I hadn’t seen for a month... She said that they should call me when it was ready but that she would check into it. She sent me a message a short time later that said it was at the main office...who knows how long it had been sitting there...other people that arrived when I did had received there’s about a week and a half earlier. When I returned to the office after our training I found the rest of my materials but was not able to do completely everything I wanted as everyone else decided to come in and just hang around... Afterwards I checked out a little cd shop by the metro to look for Alisa cds but didn’t find any. I ended up buying the first set of cds from a band called DDT as a fellow intern had said they were good and at the first birthday party I was at they sang one of their songs and I liked it. I shouldn’t have believed the intern or gone by what was sung...out of 7 disks I have only liked one so far... I next went on a search for Fr. Arseny (the book) so I went to one of the Orthodox shops in Moscow - Pravoslavnaya Slova. They however didn’t have the book either so I bought a book by Fr. John (Krestjankin) to try and read. I walked around the neighbourhood some and came upon another church so I stepped in to see if they had the book. They’re in the process of re-painting the interiour so it was interesting to see them at work. I asked the woman at the bookstand if they had what I was looking for and told her that it was about a 300 page book but she looked through her whole stock of tiny booklets looking for it... I felt bad for having her do this so I decided to buy something; I bought a book that has short histories of all the churches in Moscow and a small calendar for next year. I met a friend later at Vorobyovi Gori and we walked around the park there and along the Moscow river.
29.09.07: I had planned on preparing more for teaching the following week but again didn’t get up as early as I had hoped. After half heartedly looking over the books I decided that as it was Saturday I didn’t need to be working since I would be preparing all my weekday hours anyway... I received today while I was home a telemarketing call; I didn’t know that they would exist in Russia... So I had decided to make a trip to the South of Moscow to the Optina Pustyn Podvore. This was the one other place where I thought I might find Fr. Arseny and I was correct - although I almost overlooked the book as it was shelved with Literature and not saint’s lives. I visited the three separate shops they have in the Podvore and also the church. Last time I was at the church the relics of the Optina startsi were out but this time they were in a part of the church that was roped off. On my way out of the grounds I was harassed by what appeared to be a gypsy child of 6 or 7 begging with his mother; I gave him my pocket change (about 15 rubles) and he started following me saying something I couldn’t understand; he must have realized that was all I was going to give so he ran off to follow after his next victim... I walked around the neighbourhood and a little into Bitstevsky Les and then picked up a few pirozhki and a yoghurt for a late lunch. I later met a friend downtown to go to their church, St. Tatiana, for the vigil. This church is on the old campus of Moscow State University (right across from the Kreml), which I had seen before but didn’t realize that it was a church (it looks like a university building other than having on the front “The Light of Christ Illumines All,” which I thought strange...). After vigil we went to McDonald’s where we waited in line for about 20 minutes...more because we were talking and not forcing our way up front...and ate outside the Kreml in Aleksandrovsky Sad. We spent some time eating and talking on various and sundry topics. At one point a woman approached (she looked German) and asked in English how to get to Red Square. I was thrown by the fact that she just decided to talk to some stranger in English so it took me a second to respond.
30.09.07: I met the same friend again this morning to go to St. Tatiana’s for liturgy. After the liturgy my friend introduced me to a few of their friends (2 of whom were also Aleksanders...). I was also introduced to several of the priests and the deacon, all of whom speak English so now I have someone to whom I can go for confession. We then walked over to Christ the Saviour as I hadn’t been there yet. This being the main cathedral in Moscow, and all of Russia, of course is beautiful but a lot of the iconography in the lower church I like better than what is normally seen by people and associated with the church. I met another friend, whose birthday party I had been at a few weeks previous, at Kolomenskoe, one of the summer homes of the tsars, in the afternoon and we walked around a few hours. We visited the church of the Kazan Mother of God where there had just been a wedding, was another one going as well as a baptism... After walking around for a while we returned to the church and stayed for a bit of Vespers and an Akathist. When we were leaving we coincidentally ran into a few people from MP who were going for a walk.
I had not expected to have a Fall in Moscow but we're having a "Baba Leto" (when it get's cold and then warm again)
The road...
Random Russian child
What appeared to be a private house in the middle of the park...
The same
The implements
This isn't your backwoods outhouse...
The similar
Near the graveyard there is a big apple orchard (I was slightly weary of eating the apples so I didn't try one)
The orchard (notice the man in the tree)
Detail of the gate to the graveyard at Kolomenskoe
The graveyard at Kolomenskoe
The graveyard at Kolomenskoe
After trecking up a big hill to the other church Katja and I found it closed...
Detail of main church at Kolomenskoe
The bell tower and some other building at Kolomenskoe
A view of Moscow from Kolomenskoe
The main church at Kolomenskoe (still under repair)
Detail of door in gateway
One of the gateways to Kolomenskoe
Detail of one of the buildings at Kolomenskoe
The Church of the Kazan Mother of God
The Kazan Church
A chapel spotted on the way to Christ the Saviour
Dostoevky statue
Dostoevky ironically outside the library by the name of Lenin (a man who would be his arch nemesis)
Lomonosov, the founder of Moscow State University
A "structure" at Bitsevsky Park
Detail of the "structure"
More Beautification
More Beautification
Someone loves Yasenevo
The entrance to Bitsevky Forest
Bitsevsky Forest in Yasenevo
Yasenevo district (seems that the people are trying to, understandibly, liven up the atmosphere)
Optina Podvore
Optina Podvore
Optina Podvore
A fantastic building...
A fantastic building detail...
St. Mitrophan's
St. Mitrophan's
St. Mitrophan's
St. Mitrophan's
St. Mitrophan's
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