Russia Two

Television: We have a old and suffering black and white TV in our room here which is able to pick up only 7 channels total out of the hundreds available. Occassionally we have been watching Russian television to practice our listening skills and we have stumbled upon some interesting shows. Games shows (like Taxi- below), dramas like our soap operas (which are hard to understand because there is only speaking not really actions or settings from which we can understand through context, news, and even reality tv (a show called Dom 2 or House 2 which is kind of like our Big Brother or the Real World).

Taxi - Is an awesome game show that we have been watching which is on every weeknight at 7 o'clock (like Jeopardy or Wheel of Fortune at home). The show is somewhat similar to Who Wants to Be a Millionaire in that contestants are asked questions which are worth a certain amount of money, and the more questions they answer correctly the more money they accumulate. The show is set in St. Petersburg, and begins as a Taxi pulls up to two people, and instead of negotiating a fare, which is common practice here, the driver accepts the passenger's first offer and so they get in. As the door closes however, lights begin flashing on the ceiling of the van, and the driver/host turns around and introduces the show. As he drives them to their desintation he asks them questions (true false, multiple choice, general questions) and for every one they answer correctly he gives them 200 rubles. Sometimes he asks them to name the singer of a song he is playing, sometimes a screen pops down from the ceiling with a picture on it and he asks them to identify who/what/where the photo is of. The contestants are given three strikes so to speak before they are eliminated and they also get two "life-lines," one of which allows them to call a friend on their cellphone, the other allows them to pull over and ask a stranger on the street for help. Once they arrive at their destination there is generally a final bonus question which allows them to double their money. The show is very entertaining despite not being able to understand all of what is said because the people and the host are always very animated and excited. The host, is always cracking jokes, is very lively - reminds me of Howie Mandel (especially since he is bald).

Ikea: This weekend we and our flat mates (plus Jacob who lives downstairs) took a trip to IKEA which is on the outskirts of St. Petersburg at the end of one of the metro lines (there are actually two IKEAs,on opposite ends of the city in the middle of nowhere. On one side of the highway we could see small industrial buildings but on the other nothing, except for a power plant in the distance which was probably nuclear). We took two metro lines to get there, and then a bus (which is free, provided by IKEA) and finally arrived at the huge IKEA which is attached to a massive shopping mall (looks exactly like any mall in Canada, Sephora, Macdonalds, Esprit, and many more European stores). We all ate lunch at the IKEA cafeteria and then continued on through IKEA. Because the blankets in our apartments are made of wool, and since I am allergic to wool, the first thing on my list was a duvet or other blanket. Ross and I bought a duvet, its sheets, a set of knives (one of which we traded to Laura for two plastic bowls), a pair of cutting boards (one of which we traded to Laura for two of her plastic cups), a pot, etc . . . and it all ended up costing us about 80$ Canadian! I always knew that IKEA was reasonably priced, but IKEA in Russia is awesome! We learned today from one of our professors that the reason for this is because of where it is located. Apparently because it is situated so far from the centre of the city, it is not even within the St.Petersburg region. It is actually in the nearby Leningrad Oblast which has significantly lower taxes than St. Petersburg and therefore goods are more inexpensive.

Ross' Friend Xie Fei: On one of our first days here, Ross and I met a student from China who is also studying at Smolny (Ross astounded him, by speaking to him in Chinese instead of Russian or English). On Friday night, we were feeling lazy, and some what celebratory, so we decided that we wanted to go out to eat dinner so Natasha Ross and I went downstairs to ask Xie Fie if a nearby Chinese restaurant was any good. We ended up inviting him to join us, luckily too! because the menu was only in Chinese and Russian so it took our meager Russian and Xie Fie and Ross' Chinese to translate the menu. We ended up ordering dumplings, wonton soup, peppered mushroom squid, a chicken dish with tomatos, cucumbers, pineapple (not for Deanne at all) in a sweet sauce, and a beef dish with potato and peppers. All very excellent! But once we were finished, Xie Fei went up to get our bill and without us knowing paid for all of our meals! We insisted on paying him for our portions but he won out eventually saying that it was his treat to celebrate the Chinese New Year (Jan. 26th), we agreed but intend to take him out for dinner sometime soon.

Note: The photo at the top of this entry is a church in the centre of the city called "The Church-On-Spilled-Blood" or the Church of the Resurection, it is called the Church-on-spilled-blood because it was built as a monument to Alexander II who was assassinated on the spot where the church stands now. We have not gone into the church yet, but apparently somewhere inside there is an area of the floor where you can still see the stain of his blood.

Poka! (bye for now) Leah and Ross