... bad news : we've had a few rat sightings

Coincidence, it rules my existence here. For instance, today happens to be the 28th. The same day that I left in August three months ago to leave for Moscow. When you're in a culture that you're familiar with, it's easy to look at coincidences and find a plausible explanation for it. If you run into someone you know in the middle of Portland from a different city, you might guess that there's a concert going on that night and that anyone with a decent pair of taste buds and as an empty wallet as mine will end up on Stark St. for some grub.

However, when you're in a city whose culinary and cultural landscape you are not yet familiar with, it's much more amazing when you see walking down the street someone who weeks previous had pointed out that your shoelaces were untied in the metro.

Last week was the third and last week of finals. I was embarrassingly late to my last final after I spent too much time in the worst congested metro station in the world, barking up the wrong street, and backtracking my way to the correct street.

My flatmate, Katya, has already left for her new year's shindig in Finland. Monday I hand off my keys to Natasha who'll house sit for us while we're gone, and on Tuesday I meet up with Oksana to start our way to Kharkiv to join Kirill and from there we lazily make our way through Ukraine to celebrate the new year.

Happy new years and see you next year!

Good news is : we don't have cockroaches...

Last week I took my Russian final, as I finished each page, she took it from me (I was the only student in the class) and graded it on the spot. I took it as a good sign when she continually said "wonderful, splendid!" and even before she was done grading she said something about a "true A". My knot theory final went just as well. Out of six questions, I answered perfectly 5 1/2. I finished the exam in record time and left to go celebrate the new snow fall. I later found out from the other students that Prof. Sossinski started to grade my final right after I left and was laughing for most of the time... I was a little concerned about his reaction to my exam, until I learned that I had also earned a "true A" on it. Not everything that starts well ends well, however. Next week I have my most difficult finals, for which I'm frantically scrounging what notes I took, from when I happened to go to class, and I'm completing the homeworks that I didn't do during the semester (most of them). Wish me luck!

Errata, Sundry, and Voronezh Take 2

I would like to start with some errata from the blog. Clearly this is not an exhaustive list, but it contains some large corrections.

Vova and Kirill study Lithuanian, and not Estonian as published (ask Peter about the Dutch/Danish fiasco of 2005), and Kirill most definately has not graduated.

Speaking of publication, I feel like I have adequately forewarned and otherwise explained my parents my actions in Russia (this preface inspired by feedback from my post : "Nothing to see here"), such that I am free to post any and all my adventures here with the understanding that I am indeed being more safe than you think, but maybe not as safe as you'd like, and that some cultural differences make things not as dangerous as you'd believe. I wish I were talking about love, but that's always more dangerous than you can imagine. But then again it's Love. Love is everything : dangerous, scary, fun, an education,an addiction, thrilling,and beautiful.

Anywho, I'm actually talking mostly about hitchiking. Once a state sponsored institution (you give the driver a receipt, the driver gets money from the govn't), and now still an undying facet of Russian culture, hitchiking is a godsend for people who want to spend as little money as possible (like me!). Within the city, every car that passes by you is potentially a cab to those hard to reach pockets of moscow not near bus, trolley, tram, or metro. Drop a couple hundred rubles and you're there presto! Outside the city, it's a great way to make a long trip a little less boring with someone to talk to.

Sure enough it's just as easy as it looks. You stick your arm out, wave it about, (do the hokey pokey?) and sure as flies on shit, there's a car at the other end of your arm.

Thus starts my second journey to Voronezh. I spent 60 cents to get just outside of Moscow, a couple steps outside the MKAD, on the highway joining Moscow to Voronezh, M4. I get picked up just at the start of twilight by a delivery truck heading just a little ways south, but I'm excited, anxious even, to hop into my first catch of my life, and with a spring in my boot clad step, I swing my backpack and myself into the cab. We quickly cover the easy vocabulary : where he's from, why in the world would I want to come to Russia, what I think of Russia, what he thinks of the States. It's amazing what you can force yourself to come up with in a foreign language when you're deathly afraid of silence. Why so fearful of silence? Just the principle, I'm getting a free ride from someone, I feel like I should repay them with entertainment. I didn't let the conversation lapse once. Go me and my improving(?) Russian! Though perhaps I was being selfish, and was using this as an opportunity to practice my Russian at his expense of having to listen to my horrible accent. Oops it's 71km and this is his exit! Time for me to hop out. Nice to meet you, good luck! I walk down the road a bit, my lonley thumb getting chilly through my gloves, then turn around so potential drivers can see my irresistable smile. I turn around, and there's a semi-truck headed straight for me. I jump on the other side of the rail and the truck stops. I open the door and the driver is red in the face from laughing.

This guy is a riot. I have never seen such lewd window stickers, nor have I ever heard more foul language in any language in my whole life. It was always male-member this, female-parts that, and I've-had-intimate-knowledge-of-your-mother-go-buy-some-eyes-and-get-your-heap-of-iron-off-the-road that. He started his journey in Berlin carrying BMW's somewhere far south to the Black sea. You're going to Voronezh? I can take you all the way there! And so he did, my remaining 400km. I now know all the good and crappy cafes along M4. I also know about his pug (the one he picked up in Poland), the 20 years he spent as an officer in the army, his two degrees (law and economics), and his miserable pension (did I mention he's a semi driver?). Never has 400km passed that quickly in my life (250 miles have, however). This guy was all over the map with questions and stories. Moskovskaya oblast turns into Tulskaya into Lipetskaya into Voronezhskaya oblast. We're not far from Voronezh and we stop at a cafe to grab a bite to eat. 50 rubles for all you can eat borsch, pelmeni, and xleb. We strategize where best to drop me off, neither of us know the city, so we call it a "we'll know it when we see it" thing. On the bypass I spot a marshrutka and this would be a perfect spot to debark. We make our farewells, and I make my first step on the last part of my journey to Voronezh.

And I count my lucky blessings, route 90 is frequent service downtown! I hop on the swedish bus (you signal and the Stoppen light lights up), and we're blazing down Leninskiy prospekt, across the river and here I am! I've made it! I'm in Voronezh! At last, I've vindicated my last failed attempt to make it to this fair, 2 million city nestled in the hills divided by a river (Remind anyone of someplace? Portland maybe?).

Anyways, I think the hitchiking part is already enough for my parents to handle. I'll cut the rest of the story short (including serendipitous irony), and give general comments about the hospitability of Russians, the beauty of Voronezh, and how it awaits me for yet another visit. I'll leave you with one more story.

I got a haircut in Voronezh for 200 roubles. That was easily the most terrifying experience I've had in Russia. I walk into the salon and five women immediately stop what they're doing and all turn to look at me.

"What do you want?" One of them asks

I try to explain that I want a haircut, without knowing what the word for haircut is... They look horribly confused, "So... What color do you want?" "Color?" "Yes, Color. Blue, red, pink, silver..." "no no no, I don't want any color, I want" And I procede to pantomime a pair of scissors with my hands accompanied by snipping sounds. "Ah, all you need is just a haircut? Have a seat!"

Now, before I walked into the salon, I spotted the immenent problem of describing exactly how I wanted my hair cut. So I spent some time constructing a beautiful phrase from basic vocabulary and grammar. I had it perfect. These were all words I knew how to pronounce, I even know which sentence intonation patterns to use. And there's no way that the meanings could be mistaken for something else. So I sat down in the chair and let it rip, "Not as short as policemen. Longer on top than the sides." She looks at me and says flatly, "I didn't understand anything you said." I was flabbergasted. Doesn't she speak Russian? What a poor woman, going through life not speaking the language of her peers and friends. How can someone live thus? As soon as the surge of righteous pity left my system, I felt devastated that my Russian skills after working so well the day before would fail me now in my moment of greatest need. I shrugged it off. I said, "Do as you like". No sooner had those words escaped my lips than did I realize that I might be walk away from a haircut with a mullett for the first time in my life since 1st grade. She recognized the futility of further discussion, took her scissors and went to work. I wasn't joking when I took one look in the mirror and said to her it's never been better (Oh, *now* she can understand Russian... Sheesh).

Moscow

I've got about an hour until my next adventure. Let me tell you about a typical day in Moscow.

I walk from my flat down Mozhaiskiy street with the metro station waiting for me at the end, the bright red M shining like a beacon. Just beyond Studencheskaya station, on a clear day, you can see the Russian Acadamy of Sciences, and as you approach Studencheskaya you see track after track leading to the Kievskiy train station, the terminus and origin for many south-western bound trains (Such as ones to Kiev). The metro from this station pops up above ground again as it crosses the Moscow river, from which you catch sight of the Russian white house, the imposing main building of Moscow State University, and a second look at the Kievskiy station.

Our university sits in a triangle formed by three metro stations, and we have a choice of two to debark. The first one leads to a ho-hum walk past another of the seven sisters : the ministry of foreign affairs, and down Arbat street, a 1km long pedestrian street once home to Pushkin and one of the oldest streets in Moscow. The second station (my favorite) leads you down Gogolskiy boulevard, a street split down the middle by a wide park. From a statue of Gogol to a sculpture of Mikhail Sholokov you walk down a cobblestone path arched by trees. Turning down Sivtsev vrazhek, you pass by a sculpture park and you're at our university in the heart of Moscow.

Class usually starts 15 minutes ago, so you excuse yourself and quickly and quietly sit down. We have a wonderful lunch lady, have a delicious lunch, and an hour later we sit for our second class. Do some chores, wanna come over to my place for some tea?, make some dinner, chat with my chatty flatmate (she's a girl... she constantly talks), do some homework, rinse and repeat.

Now I'm off to pick up a power cable from the last tennants of my flat who now live by the Patriarschiy ponds, see some friends at the dorm, and pack for my second attempt to get to Voronezh. This time I have valid documents, not just in theory, but in hand.

See you Sunday!

Learning about Russian culture is difficult. Especially when your friends tell you that they grew up on American culture. They read American comics, read American literature, grew up watching movies from Mike Nichols and Jimmy Jarmusch. Aside from being inundated with Soviet cartoons, I've been getting an excellent education in Ameican culture. Does it seem strange to anyone but me that all of my friends were born in the Soviet Union?

I went to Liza's English class this afternoon where we discussed stereotypes for different regions in the States. They were very interested in the differences between southern belles, valley girls, and jersey girls. As well as how hicks, hillbillys, and rednecks are different. Did you know that people from Arkansas are made from corn?

Aside from being filled to the gills with math here, I spend alot of my time learning alot about English (question of the night last night: what are the prepositions doing in "I've been out/up/down there"), Russian (who knew it would be so hard to ask for the piece of cheese on the left, no not your left, my left), and French (it's me and two frenchmen in my Russian class).

What else... The highlight of my new in the apartment was finding out that I can open the paint enrusted windows, and I am now able to open one bottle of beer with another. Oh man, if only my scholarship advisor could read what I'm learning to do in Russia. Oh wait she does.

Speaking of research, I found a professor here that does work related to what I'm currently doing with Holly. The only tricky part is staying out of his spit zone, otherwise I think we're going to hit it off real well.

Aside from falling голова over heels in love, I think that's it in the news department for now.

Nothing to see here

Remember how I mentioned that wedlock is slightly more unlikely than spending time in prison? It turns out that I was right.

But let's not get ahead of ourselves. There's so much to tell and now that I have your attention, we should start from the beginning.

An autumn celebration, a night of horror : Halloween came to Moscow. After selfish prompting, my adopted mother in Russia, Peggy, graciously offered the use of her apartment for this night. We cooked, ate, and drank non-stop. Some of the food was good, like baked apples smothered in honey, raisins, nuts, and whatever else we could find. The pumpkin soup was a miracle, and the mulled wine divine. But the eggnog turned out less noggy and more like a bottle of Jameson with some raw eggs mixed in (but it was almost redeemed the next morning as it made a reappearance for French toast).

The most important part of the evening, however, was that this was the first time that I introduced the different groups of friends to each other. Up until this point, I felt like I was living separate lives. One with the other foreigners in the Math in Moscow program, one with the Russians at the dorm in which I used to live, another all together with the friends I've made outside of the dorm and Math in Moscow. It's emotionally exhausting at times to be constantly meeting new people. I was dropped in this city knowing no one, and it takes a lot of effort to get to know people, to let them get to know you.

Anywho, all in all, this night was a success.

You might have noticed that I mentioned the dorm in which I used to live. Where am I know? Deported? Not yet, you'll read about that in a few paragraphs. Under a bridge? Sometimes I find myself under bridges, but I have a real place to sleep. In a real bed. In a room, next to a real shower, which is right next to the kitchen with a very real stoven (stove/oven).

I've moved into an amazing apartment. As idle curiosity will be the punchline for the story about the police in Michurinsk, it is also the reason for this change. I have been on the lookout since I've gotten here for goodwill-esque stores. A place to buy clothes and gadgets cheaply. Of course, such a thing doesn't exist in Moscow. So I gave Craig's List a whirl. No one uses Craig's List. Well, almost no one. I looked through the housing section and saw a posting : 11500RUR Kutuzovsky 1 BR - Looking for a roommate. I emailed the gal, we meet up, see the place, the university sends someone out to look at the place and I move in shortly thereafter. My roommate is a manager for an art hall in Moscow that is the home of a contemporary dance troupe, that hosts cartoon festivals, film festivals, and much more. She's a riot, and the sweetest person I know. She can also read me like a book. Which is fine, but it gets unnverving when she decides it's story time and reads me aloud. She knows what I'm thinking, how I'm feeling... It's all very strange, but she's great. Катя is sort of like my Russian big sister.

So. About Michurinsk. Along the lines of wanting to find a cheap place for clothes, shoes, even haircuts, I was told that I should go to Voronezh. The home town to not a few of my friends here and even to a friend in the states. So I invite Bill and Наташа (also from Voronezh) to come with me. We start from Moscow at 730 in the morning and travel in a southerly direction. Much like a falling leaf we have no idea where we are sometimes, we backtrack, find our way, and continue on. One thing leads to another and we find ourselves on an electrichka (intercity, cheap, eletric train) to Michurinsk, already about 390km from Moscow. Voronezh is 460km, however Michurinsk to Voronezh is 150km. Anyways, we arrive after dark in Michurinsk at 8 in the evening. We check the timetables to find the next means of transport to Voronezh. The earliest is an elektrichka at 4 in the morning. We now have 8 hours to kill. We find the main drag, buy some supplies for the night and take on the city. We find a monument for wokers at Chernobyl, we pick up a stray dog along our walks, and we wander around until we find the other train station in the town. We sit down, relax, play cards, and eat.

It is the stroke of midnight (give or take a couple of hours) and in walks the militsiya. Here we are, a couple of Americans and a Russian with our feet on the chairs, our stuff scattered all across the floor, a bottle of wine, food and cards. One of them walks over and looks at each of us in turn.

"What are you doing here?"
"We're waiting for our 4 o'clock train."
"Oh, ok. Would you like some tea?"

We were completely floored. He brings out three cups of tea, sits down and starts chatting with us. His name is Viktor, he visits his mother in Chernobyl each year ("I'm telling you, it's completely safe there"), used to be in the military, and has a son my age. We ask him to tell us about the city (it used to be named Kozlov, and is now named after a Russian polymath, it's a fascinating town), and he has a great sense of humor (he had us going for a few minutes that he didn't believe we were foreigners). We were the first Americans he's met, and he was really interested in our opinions about things that we just didn't have the vocabulary to talk about. He got up to go back to his office in the train station and we continued to play cards.

He comes out again, and tells us he's sorry to disturb us, but he's just doing his job and may he please see our documents?

To make a long story short, we had the local and federal police along with the ФСБ (KGB with a new name), printing us, questioning us, and taking our statements all night and all morning. I slept in the cell (it was more comfortable), the other two in the lobby, and we walked out of the station after noon with 2000RUR fines each to pay and one infraction of statute 18.8 "Violation of a foreign national or stateless person, the rules of entry to Russia or the regime of stay (residence) in Russia" One more infraction and we're deported and can't return to Russia for 5 years.

вот. All is well, we're back in Moscow. Some details are clearly missing from the narrative, but if you are in the area, you've got a place to stay and we'll have to chat over tea.

Out of prison and straight to wedlock

Sorry for the post title, I thought I'd offer a viable explanation for the lack of posts. Actually, I haven't been to prison (yet), nor have I been married to the love of my life (a proposition slightly more unlikely than the first). I've just been having the time of my life.

Classes have started already. In fact, we're just now writing our midterms and it is is week eight already (of fifteen weeks). Classes are hard. Very hard. I'm taking four math classes (algebra, knot theory, topology, and ergodic theory) and a class on Russian language. Each class lasts for three hours, with some short breaks in the middle. Now, we all know I love math. And the math here is terribly interesting. No not just interesting, but amazing. However, it's impossible for me to digest that much math in three hours. It's lead to a lot of changes in the way I learn. I'm used to sitting in lecture three times a week for an hour, understanding the lecture more or less, and then getting on with my day. But the lectures here feel like a... well like a hammer. If I try to understand as we go along in the lecture (which is taught a fairly clip pace), I will be knocked out intellectually for the rest of the day. So my reaction has been to go polar opposite of my previous strategy, now I take notes (that's a first for those who are curious) much to the exclusion of immediate understanding. So that adds another time sink outside of class in addition to the grueling, but interesting homework problems.

Without going into too much detail (gotta leave the boring narration for the slideshows that you'll be dying to see), I've been wasting my time around Moscow. I've made a bitching set of friends who against all reason put up with me and my Russian. Interestingly enough, the overwhelming majority of them are linguists. Go figure. We've been to dachas (think a cabin and you've got it) in the outskirts of Moscow, and a citywide scavenger hunt in the capital of an oblast a couple of oblasts away (oblast = state). With the other international students, we went to St. Petersburg shortly after we got here. In Moscow, I happily wander and get lost. Stumbling on a few of the innumerable state sponsored (read : free) museums, concerts, and galleries. While none of the muscovites I know play any instruments (yet! one's picking up the accordian, another the harmonica. Should I try my hand at the banjo?), but they all know plenty of musicians which makes it easy to find a small, out of the way concert to go to.

I've only begun to see the big, and the small of Moscow. The known and the unknown. I have my eyes set on getting to know this city, but also on the rest of Russia. With the renewal of my AMS scholarship, and my visa extended to July 31st, I have seven weeks of vacation in the winter (from a week before christmas to the second week of February), and ten weeks after the program ends (a week before my birthday). I'm like a kid in a candy shop. I have my eyes set on too much of europe and asia, and already I've fallen in love with what I've seen of the country, the culture, and the people.

The highs are higher, and the lows lower in Russia. Perhaps this is a mix of the emotional rollercoaster of living in another country, the cultural differences being a double edged sword (they both clarify and obfuscate ideas and people), and the beauty and difficulty of the language. In any case, I miss my friends and family (I wasn't homesick until part of home, Dad and Amy, visited last week), but love the people I've met here.

Week 1

This week I learned as much about North American culture as Russian. As infrequently as the canadians use "eh?" as a universal suffix, does the Californian from Bezerkeley use "dude" in every conceivable grammatical mode. I've seen only two black people during this week in Moscow, and when the conversation happened to turn to gay rights at Esther's dacha this weekend, none of the Russians knew any gays in Moscow (I later learned this was not true, but the line of questioning wasn't very tactful. Especially in a place where just holding hands with a bloke in the street could land you in a hospital). Aside from appearing to be thirty years behind in terms of civil rights (and fashion! mullets and plaid, everywhere!), these initial impressions hardly speak for Russian culture at large, and even less for individuals.

Some of the most important people for the weeks to come are Lisa, Anya, and Esther. They are three wonderful Russian students who work for the Math in Moscow program who showed us around our neighborhood the first day, and have been accompanying us on trips around Russia. Lisa, as you may remember, was the one that picked me up from the airport, but together with Anya, I didn't see much of either until Питер/St. Pete. and whose stories will be told in week 3 (stay tuned!). Esther's story and that of my first weekend in Moscow follows.

Esther, born in Moscow, raised in Israel, a five foot fewer-inches-than-feet tall, bundle of contagious laughter, and world traveler. During the week she mentioned that she was going out to her parents dacha in Pokrovka that weekend, so we invited ourselves along. Sleeping bags underarm we make our way out to the trainstation. We're no sooner than 10 minutes on our way out of Moscow than every sense becomes aware of the difference in air quality. You can see, feel, and taste the cleaner air.

The dacha is like a home away from home (and certainly a home away from the dorms), and there we pass on the beutiful tradition of smores. Most of the other students go off and play cards, and Daniel and I get to meet two of Esya's friends : Kirill and Vova. Both in the philology department, studying Estonian; though Kirill has graduated and Vova is writing his disertation. Vova heads to bed, and Daniel, Esya, Kirill and I hang out around the campfire in the backyard, under the stars, braving the biting cold. An amazing weekend in Russia. The following morning we spend a few hours picking apples from the trees, with them patiently telling me how to less awkwardly construct my thoughts in Russian.

We'll get to the apple pie making another post for it was done in another week. I'll end on a little saying that I picked up from a textbook last year : "Лучше поздно, чем никогда" This entry was typed up piecemeal, and I think it shows... I'll try to be better about timely writing these things up when they're fresh so I can be just as late in posting but have more time to edit. However, "Better late than never".

-M

(III)Moscow : Red Dawn

My wonderful Step-mother Amy is full of it. Full of good advice that is. Why lug around two suitcases when you can stick one in a locker at the airport? Always the right tool for the right job, she likes to say. Call a spade what it is, a shovel! But if she tries to tell you to check two bags on S7 airlines (who never having heard of my step-mum will repeat : "Sorry sir, you may only check one bag"), hold your ground!

Ten euros per kilo later, I make my way through security, but not before bumping into some poor woman on my way (my flight leaves in 10 minutes, go go go!). I realize that my breath is not going to do anyone any favors on the flight and quickly brush my teeth (my flight leaves in 6 minutes, run!). I make it to the gate with plenty of time to spare (5 minutes 'til lift off) and.... not only is there the woman into whom I bumped at security, but the rest of the passengers. They're taking their sweet time loading, or rather preparing to load us. I amble over to Shannon (oh she has a name, she must be an important part of the story!), and apologize for being so rude at security. She's been living in Moscow for the past year teaching english, and she introduces me to her friend and Orthodox nun for the past lifetime and a half!

She and the rest of the plane are leaving dublin after a tour of a bunch of old hills and half buried rocks. You wouldn't think that rocks could be that interesting to talk about, but coming from a nun with a bunch of Russians sitting around to hear the stories again, anything would have been interesting at that point. Alas, like the tower of Babel, we are divided into our seats on the plane unable to communicate.

I idly wonder which city it is that we are passing over right now. Is it Moscow yet? No, we still haven't left the runway. Are we there yet? No, we must be flying over the baltic sea. Wait a minute, we must be close. I know this song. Yes, the pilot said we would be on time and I had timed this song almost perfectly. We're descending, and in the grey squishy thing between my ears echo the words : "I am just a new boy, a stranger in this town. Where are all the good times? Who's gunna show this stranger around?"

I remember only three things before I passed out on my dorm bed. The first was the most anxious moment in my life : "What if she decides they have too many math majors in Russia? Is my visa valid? I don't look anything like my passport photo... Shit, I forgot my piano music!" The customs lady hardly took a second glance at me or my passport. Whatever welcome she might have uttered had she been inclined to be so welcoming would not compare to the immense feeling of joy I felt banging my knee into the metal turnstill on my way into Russia.

The second was after picking up my checked baggage. I walk through customs, and see from the crowd my face staring at me. I'm tripped out on a sleeping pill, in a foreign country, with customs officers trying to talk to me in Russian. The last thing i need is an existential crisis. From behind my face pops up Liza's face, she squints then turns the sign around to reveal my name. After satisfied that my face and my other face are a good enough match, she breaks into a grin and gives me a hug!

In the darkness of early morning we hop into a car, she falls asleep in the back seat, and I get to make small talk (very small, neither of us speak the other's language) with the driver. Domodedova appears to be in the middle of forest. Moscow happens slowly, sneaking up on you. Every now and then you are fooled by a cluster of buildings, maybe purporting to be the edge of Moscow. But you know to wait. I waited and then I saw the sun rise on the city and on my new life in Moscow.

(II)Dublin : The calm before the storm

I'm not sure which is more striking. The fact that there are more Australians than Irish in Dublin, or that the street signs are older than our constitution.

After nearly getting run over by not looking the right direction when crossing the street (the maniacs drive on the wrong side of the road!), I take a bus into Dublin and hop off at the Dublin Spire after realizing that I was hopelessly lost without the address for the hostel. After some grunting and hand gestures I established that the local language was not yet Russian, but English. I make it to my hostel after a while wandering around with wide eyes and a fly trap the size of a tea saucer. This city is beautiful!

I no sooner than step out of a long overdue shower than meet one of my roommates who promptly invites me to join him and our other roommates to a tour of the Jameson whiskey plant. As night turned to day, so did the whiskey turn into Guinness. Awesome night made short : well, I think I just did. Surely my impression of this night was biased by my debut into travelling in Europe and hanging out with other twenty-somethings coming and going on their own adventures, but it was just that : amazing.

The next morning, I crawled out of bed then woke up. Knowing that I had everything to see and no time to do it, I naturally gave up. I walked through a triathalon, past the zoo, found a museum (and my new favorite modern artist), and otherwise wandered aimlessly around Dublin. I'll take tours when I'm retired, I'm here to see the city.

Any impressions? I feel like I should say that the people were really nice. But I won't. I don't understand why this is such an oft used description of a city. Are there cities where people are supposed to be really mean? Is there some backwater city in the world were people go out of their way to be rude? We give too much credit to culture and its ability to fundamentally alter a person. So far in my limited travels, niceness seems to be prevalent among people. Even if they're not from Portland.

Dublin. Where the people party as if they bought sin at a two for one sale. My gateway to Moscow.

(I)Pre-game impressions : The party is always funnest right before the police arrive

This summer was a blast. My jobs didn't leave me a burnt out shell at the end of the day, and what's more : I got to choose my hours. This let me hang out with many awesome people : old friends and acquaintances from school, highschool friends freshly graduated from university, and new, fun people that crawled out of the corvallis woodwork during the summer. This summer was especially filled with energy. Everyone I knew was on their way to adventure. They were applying to grad schools and jobs, moving to the middle of nowhere and to highrise apartments in manhattan. With this in mind, you could see why I quickly became despondent as my trips increased in frequency near the end of summer, eventually landing me in Russia.

My first reaction to my changing circumstances was that I was putting my life on hold. I had spent time with all these awesome people over the summer, and they'll continue to be awesome and do awesome things while I'm gone. All of a sudden, the barbeques and inane discussions over which is the best microbrew of the collection were going to be a fifth of the world away. Almost as many miles as there are feet in a mile away. If I could hear people in Oregon shout my name, it would only be 7 hours and fifteen minutes after they shouted that the sound would reach my ears.

For a while this rain cloud hung over my head (they call me Joe Bfstplk). But then though I knew I would miss my friends (I do), I realized that this outlook would imply some sort of constancy that doesn't exist. My friends change, my home cities change, and (in an egotistic way) most importantly I change. I love how we're supposed to become less egocentric as we age, but really I'm becoming more so. It's not so important where I am, or what I'm doing. Any experiences I have is, by definition, my life. Just as there is no rewind button, there ain't no time to get up for more popcorn either.

So here I am fresh out of summer. I worked, I partied, I left. I got to see family wedded, wasted, wetted, and wizened. Here's to life and to whatever it brings!

Trip to Moscow, part 1 : Visa in San Francisco

The trip started out easily enough. Peter was going down to the Bay area to look for jobs, so I caught a ride down with him. The trip was going quickly, perhaps the easiest long distance drive I've done. We were about a half hour outside of Medford, OR when I heard in a very resigned voice, "Oh, shit..." It took me a couple of minutes to realize that the voice was my own.

Earlier that morning, I remembered that the consulate wanted a copy of the vital pages of the passport. I made the copy, but it and my passport sat in the copier while I rushed out of the door with my suitcase and backpack...

After a frantic phone call to my mother to arrange the delivery of my passport, we're back on the road and make it to Bezerkley in no time (both of our fathers had predicted a 12 hour trip, we made it in considerably less time).

I've always been a fan boy of Portland. It's been the center of food, music, and other culture for my adult life. To me, it is the greatest thing since or before sliced bread. I've visited other cities, but they were too large (LA), dirty (LA), uninspiring natural surroundings (LA, DC), or I just didn't have enough time to explore them (Seattle).

However, my trip to San Francisco (not long enough!) has me head over heels in love. Much larger than Portland, you find yourself easily drawn into an introspective mood : where do I belong? what is my place in society? who am I? But it is small enough to get an idea of what it's all about. Small enough to get lost, but know in the back of your mind that you can always find your way back to something familiar.

With that in mind, the days I spent waiting for my passport, I walked the breadth of the City from the ferry building to the pacific ocean. This feat need not be attempted more than once in one's life. There are far too many hills and they are far too steep. It did have the benefit of letting me scope out the route to the consulate for the following day, but unfortunately I didn't keep to the maxim : "Bring your camera everywhere". Determined to walk slightly shorter distances the following days, I found that hopping on a random bus for half an hour and then walking back was a viable way of seeing the city for cheap. This is how I stumbled up on a Russian neighborhood.

Unlike at the Russian consulate (I had barely uttered "Добрый день-Good day", than came the curt request "Please speak in English"), the neighborhood гастроном owners were more than happy to oblige attempt at Russian. In addition to the bureaucrat's reluctance impatience with foreigners butchering his language, I got my first taste of Russian.... adherence to rules.

I had arrived at the consulate half an hour before their visa desk closed with all of my documents. I checked my application in the lobby for the 50th time (you know, just in case I had accidentally said I had been issued a French passport or something silly). I walked up to the window, where I was promptly urged to speak English, and stuffed my documents through. He checked them over, nodded in an appreciative manner at what I assume was my neat handwriting, and then asked for the payment. I took from my wallet a fat stack of 20s and attempted to push them through the slot only to find it blocked by his hand. "I'm sorry, we only accept money orders", says he. The blood drained from my face, my heart slowed, and I started to panic. Where am I going to find a money order in the next 15 minutes? Will I get back before they close? Did I make a mistake on my application? Did I remember to send Robert a happy birthday facebook message?

He must have read the consternation on my face about having forgotten Robert's birthday and took a deep breath. "Wait a second," says he as he walks out of sight. He comes back with a receipt book and looks me sternly in the eye, and talking without moving his lips (a talent bestowed on Russian men), he says very seriously, "This is a big exception, you must understand. We would never do this, and you are very lucky that we are taking your cash because it makes so much sense for us not to accept paper currency of the country in which we work." Ok, the last part of the quote wasn't accurate, but it conveys my sense of amazement how out of the way they go to justify the rule they're circumventing while at the same time making it seem like they've never done and will never do this again. We do the same thing, but when an exception is made by an American beaurocrat, they tend to act as if nothing circumspect was done.

Anywho, I'll probably litter my future posts with a few photos here and there, but if you really have time to waste, you can see more photos here.

Wilkommen, Bienvenue, Welcome!

10 Months and 19 Days ago : Corvallis shrank a little more today. I estimate that this cowtown is now smaller than the Little Prince's asteroid. I also got an overdue notice for Theroux's "The great railway bazaar". As Pink said : "I've got a strong urge to fly. But nowhere to fly to"

8 Months and 22 Days ago : I attend a study abroad information session. I was hoping for a few drinks, a map, and a bucket of darts. We only got handouts instead. Apparently eastern Europe has the most scholarship money. Russia, here I come!

5 Months and 4 Days ago : I turn in my essays and application for the Boren scholarship. I hold my breath.

5 Months and 3 Days and 23 hours and 58 minutes ago : I start breathing again and cross my fingers instead.

1 Month and 26 Days ago : I am rejected as a Boren Scholar.

1 Month and 19 Days ago : Cha-Ching! I hit pay dirt with the American Mathematical Society. They're sending me off to Russia with seven and a half dimes (an odious, practical, abundant, and even number)

15 Days ago : Summer starts along with my three jobs at Oregon State. I'm continuing with my work at the Giovannoni Lab, working magic with math to pursue the ecological role of bacterioplankton in the ocean's surface. I landed a sweet research gig with Holly investigating the combinatorial significance of analytic functions which describe properties of integer partitions. And who knows what directions working with Bob will take us? (No, I'm serious. Does anyone know?)

1 Month 29 days 6 hours 45 minutes from now : I leave for Moscow and within a short time period, 20 other students will descend upon Moscow from the US and Canada to begin a program aptly named "Math in Moscow". There, at the birthplace of modern mathematics, the largest metropolitan area in Europe, a city of culture and also hedonistic debauchery, where hot water during the summer isn't to be taken for granted, the land of бабушки eating sunflower seeds, of chessmasters, of borsht, the land from which came the man who would crush the west with the heel of his shoe, and whence came the mad monk; in the culture of madness, beauty, bitter winters, and vodka we study math.

The itch that led Daniel Boone out of Kentucky, that drove Pytheas out of Marseille, that chased Jacques-Cousteau 500 meters below the ocean's surface; the very same itch which goaded Greg Mortensen up K2 has mobilized me from complacency in Cowtown to an adventure in Russia.

The itch is many things. It's foremost a desire to see the world, but it is also in a very appreciative way those who have made this trip possible. My advisors : Renee, Holly, Bob, Scott, Rachel, and Peggy. My donors : Parents, Grandma Jane & Grandpa Gerry, the AMS, my Step-uncle Alex. My tutors : Еvgenia, Dmitrii, and Аnаstаsia. My fans : friends, family, professors, and anyone else who puts up with my hare-brained schemes for adventure.