A letter home from study abroad
10, 11, 12 sept 96.
Well, I've been busy doing nothing in particular for the past several
days. on the 10th, shiloh and I went on an expedition to return the phone
she'd bought as it turned out to be broken. They gave her money back and
we went off to find a phone elsewhere. After an hour searching, we gave
up and went back to the kiosk we'd returned the phone to. For an
additional two dollars, we got a nicer phone that turned out to work.
Yesterday we went on an excursion to Novydevochy Monastary. It's a female
monastary in moscow that's got a lot of important historical associations.
The tour was in russian, most of which I probably could have understood if
I'd tried, but I can't even really pay attention to such things in
english.
After Novydevochy, Shiloh, George, Leslie and I decided to get
food. The only problem was that most of us were ruble-broke. Before we
were even able to get back to the street, we came upon a guy and his son
playing soccer. Les _needed_ to ask where to buy a soccer ball and
somehow, we got roped in to playing a game of soccer with them. It ended
being les and george vs the russians. The older russian guy was a _much_
better player than george....it was almost comical.
Later that day, I found out that I actually _can_ take money out
on russian ATMS.
Today, we had classes...nothing special...(can you tell I'm
tired?) Afterward, I headed off to meet Alyosha at the university. This
time, he showed up on time. I was amused to find out that he hadn't
gotten the message I'd left for him. I hung out with him and his friends
for a while. He was psyched because he'd just gotten a pager. He also
showed me how to make a payphone work for free. Apparently, all you have
to do is slam the receiver down on the top of the phone at just the right
moment. Right now, we're watching some silly sci-fi movie that nobody
really understands. But, I won't bore you.
At this point, I've pretty much decided to live in the dorm.
Shiloh, Katya and Jerry are living here too. The food's edible. It's
cold, but I'm going to go out and attempt to find myself a down blanket.
It'll be an adventure.
jesse