I've Just Seen a Face

Greetings world! Life is splendid here in Mother Russia. My group is still awesome, the weather is still cold, the food is still delicious, and the pigeons are still conniving little demons. They are up to no good, I can just sense it! And the kids are still crazy. Crazy awesome!

Before I begin my incohesive, attention deficient, egotistical rant I like to call a blog, I have an announcement to make. Are you all listening. It's ground breaking. Drum roll please...............

Magic. Exists. I've known it all along. I've been the laughing stock for years, but who's laughing now, huh? Who's. Laughing. Now??? MUHUWAHAHAHAH!! I was outside playing with our students and I picked up a stick that looked like it would make a fine wand. This kid Maxime, who is a bit of a terror (to put it lightly) was running around on the other side of the play ground. I pointed my wand at him and shouted "AVADA KEDVARA" and he immediately fell over, ergo, magic exists. Of course it works on the time I use the killing curse...woops. Next time I will try something a little less fatal. A patronus charm perhaps. Okay I will be amazed if any one is still reading this after that display of nerdom. Moving on!

One thing I have noticed here is that there are a lot of celebrity look a likes with the kids. It's quite bazaar, thus I have decided to make an entire blog post about it. The first one is unmistakable. 

I have already talked about Sieva (if you don't know who that is read my previous posts! eh? eh?). Technically this one isn't a celebrity look alike, but he looks EXACTLY like my niece Rheannon. I shall show you....

Here we have Sonya. Can you tell? She is identical to the Mary Kate and Ashley twins in Full House... 

Next up we have Dasha, or should I say Boo (from Monsters Inc.)

This next one you have to use your imagination just a little bit. Picture a much skinnier, much younger Jonah Hill.

Mr. Bean. Straight up. 

This one could be my favorite look alike. Vanya/worm from Labyrinth 

Aaaaaaaaand....last but not least. Sasha. I think you will find this once incredibly uncanny 

There you have it. Our little group of celebrities. I'll get you guys some autographs. Except from Gollum. I'm afraid that one is too risky. I could get my fingers eaten off. 

Hopefully you enjoyed my stab at trying to be entertaining. It's 2 AM so of course I find it hilarious. I have to write all my blog posts in the wee hours of the night so that I can laugh at myself and boost my self esteem. I live a sad sad life. I suggest you start reading my future posts in the middle of the night when you are not fully conscious. They might make more sense in your state of delirium. 

Hope all is well on the other side of the world! Always remember...peace and love :)

Yellow Submarine

Today I bring stories from my adventure in the city of...MOSCOW. We had a long weekend so we took a little vacation. Our train left Thursday night around 10:00. The metros can be somewhat hectic at times. Because we were going to be sleeping on a train all night I figured I would bring Reginald, my penguin pillow pet (yes we already discussed that I am 4 year old). I attached him to my backpack so he would be out of the way. Mistake. Although he was out of MY way, it wasn't the case for every person walking by me on the metro. It became apparent by the fourth or fifth shove that maybe I should have thought this through a little better. One guy literally punched the poor guy. Note to self: Russians don't like pillow pets.

The train ride there wasn't terrible, actually. It could be because I am used to traveling through the night. I don't have to remind you guys of my night rides in Asia. I had some doosies. This one was pretty standard. We arrived in Moscow around 6 AM. So the butt crack of dawn. Fun fact about Moscow...their metro system is Tom-Cruise-Crazy. St. Petersburg's system is very efficient and organized. Here's what Moscow's looks like:

It just don't make no sense. But I am proud to say we did a pretty good job of getting around. We stayed at a hostel, as per usual. I love hostels. They just have such a chill vibe about them. They may be dingy, but it's a comforting dingy. You just have to laugh at all the...questionable things that go on at hostels, even the blood stain on my pillow. That was a real nice touch. There was one thing that was peculiar about this hostel. All the tenants were old. Like...60's, 70's old. Kudos for them for traveling at their age. But it wasn't just like a few couples here and there. We were in the lobby waiting to check in and I was witnessing the equivalent to a clown car. The old train just kept a comin. I thought it would never end. One lady after another coming out of the room. You can only imagine what kind of wild parties went on there....it was hoppin way into the night, at least 7:00 PM! I don't know how they do it! The best part of our hostel were the bunk beds. It reminded me of good times. Shout out to Kaitlen Jensen. I hope you are reading this. You are my Bunk Mate Forever. It was weird not having you drop your lap top cord and scaring me out of my wits. You were missed. But I guess Syd made a pretty good bunk mate too ;)

Moscow had some pretty sweet stuff to see. I wanted to open my eyes wider so I could soak more in. 

We saw...

St. Basil's. You may recognize this as the cathedral
"It's a Small World" was modeled after

Red Square

State Museum

This is just a glimpse of the gems that are in Moscow. The best way to describe is to imagine what Christmas Town would look like....and that is Moscow. 

Me, Syd, Court, and Ty thought it would be fun to go see a movie. We googled movie theaters that played English movies. We found one and got all excited. We went on the metro, walked quite a ways, just searching for this theater. We finally found it (keep in mind I LOVE movies. I was pretty stoked to finally sit in a theater). As we are buying our tickets we asked several times if the movie was in English. The lady kept saying yes. Excitement rising. We get our popcorn, get in our sits, wait for it to start.....aaaaandddddddd.....it was in Russiannnn!! Yaaayyyy.....should have seen that one coming. I actually understood a few words here and there. "Thank you" "Who's this?" "I'm Speaking" and "Godzilla." I guess it could have been the Russian word for "How are you...." but....I'm going to go with Godzilla. It made the plot much more interesting. But then it was a bummer because the whole time I was waiting for Godzilla to show up. Dis.A.Ppointed. 

One of the days we had the pleasure of going to the famous Kremlin (contrary to popular belief *cough cough Courtney,* it was not blown up). While waiting in line for tickets, we were just chatting away. We must be loud or something (pfff like I believe that. I am the quietest person I know) because a couple turned around and said "You speak English? Can you help us?" We were trying to figure out what part of the Kremlin was open that day. We gradually attracted more and more people. The next thing I know we are completely encompassed by English speakers. It was like I had done Liono's call in Thundercats. "Thundercats....HOOOOO!!" And they crawled out of the depths of the sewers and joined their master. I don't know why all of sudden all these English speakers turned into sewage trolls...they just did. 

To leave Moscow with a bang, I ate Thai food. It was my home away from home. And boy, was it goooo'ooood! Oh Thai food, how I have missed you. I don't think I broke eye contact with my meal. It was like a starring contest. I left planet Earth for a moment and went straight to Marci World for the duration of my meal (for those of you who know me well enough to know what Marci World is, congratulations. If you don't know what it is, you are truly missing out). Me eating that meal was comparable to Bill Murry in What About Bob. Only I didn't eat as annoying as him, because I grew up with manners...and a dad who would have drop kicked me out the window if I ate like that. Thanks dad! Back to Thai food....you should all know by now I have ADD. It was a fabulous way to end the vacation. And to top it all off to make it even more awesome....I saw this:

Bet you were wondering how I was going to tie in the song title. There you have it. A Yellow Submarine car. What more could you want in life? 

Our train from Moscow left at 9:30. This train wasn't terrible either...other than one tiny little thing. Our compartment smelt like I crawled inside of a butt hole. It was the kind of smell that literally burns your nostrils. My bunk mate....what a guy...next time dude, maybe not fart out a dead animal. Thanks. But after my sense of smell was melted away by that stench, I was able to fall asleep. We arrived back in St. Pete around 5:30 AM. Home sweet Home :) It is good to be back. St. Petersburg has been treating me well. And the people here are splendid. There isn't any where I would rather be right now (except maybe Hogwarts. I would leave everything for Hogwarts). So thanks to all for your love and support. I appreciate it every day! I haven't forgotten about any of you. And with that....Peace and Love :) 

Maxwell's Silver Hammer

News flash.....I fail at updating my blog!! My deepest apologies. I will blame it on the fact that I am too busy being awesome! So there. Man oh man oh man....Russia is the bomb. Part of the reason why I never update my blog is because I never know what to write about! There's too much! Like the time I saw a grown, sophisticated woman take a dump on the side of the road. I mean that's just rich. Or the time I growled at by a human. Or the time Batman came into our apartment! How could I possibly write about all of this stuff? (All of that really happened, INCLUDING the Batman thing. I swear. SWEAR TO ME! Oh geez, see Batman is here right now. Cool your jets Batman)

I guess I can start with the kids. Every day something out of the ordinary happens when you are working with kids. You just never know what they will say next. Take Sieva for example (my personal favorite). Keep in mind, Sieva is a psycho path. That child is straight up nuts. Love him though. So I was sitting in class with him when I noticed an idea flutter right into his brain. Its unfortunate that I didn't know what it was...because I could have prevented the next chain of events. I was just minding my own business, then the next thing I know, I was blind and suffocating. Sieva decided it would be a good idea to pull my sweater over my head and hold it as tight as humanly possible for a 7 year old, all the while yelling my nickname he has for me....Mr. Flesh. (Can we all take a second to think about how terrifying that image is. Mr. Flesh....I just picture of dude with skin sluffing off his face. Or dude wearing someone else's flesh) If that wasn't bad enough, this little fiasco escalated. From what I was experiencing from losing all senses of my, surroundings, I can only assume that what happened next was a fleet of River Dancers broke into the school, came into the class room and tap danced the crap out of me. It was one of the most brutal beatings I have ever received. I couldn't see, I couldn't breathe, my sweater wrapped around me like some kind of incubator the temperature of the sun, and I was getting bashed from every angle. I would much rather believe it was dancers than to admit I got my trash kicked by a class of kindergarteners. I love you too Sieva...love you too.  

Here's the little Devil. He's a keeper

Another incident that happened....there is this kid Zehar. Super cute. See. How could you just not love that face? That's where he gets you....he tricks you with that face of his so that you think he could never do anything wrong....and then he performs terrifying surgery on a doll, ripping out her hair with pliers, laughing and yelling in Russian with his arms in the air, while his "assistant" stabs the doll with a needle, which triggered the doll into having a seizure. It was a horrific display of behavior. I am now and always will be afraid of Zehar.

Zehar

See what I mean, never a dull moment. My group is....awesome. Especially the ones I live with. We have way too much fun. So much fun in fact that the people who live below us bang on the pipes in rage. Sorry neighbors. Don't murder us. We are just having a dance party. The craziest thing about our apartment (other than the fact we had spirits for about two weeks) is that we get surprise visits from famous people! It's the darndest thing. Unfortunately they always show up when I'm not there....

Batman came in through Syd and Court's window

This one needs an explanation....we have this guy whose job is to go in a huge pot of soup and stir it with dance moves. This is what he looks like

Soup stirrer 

Harry Caray....Syd and Court took their picture with him!

"Beaker" from the Muppets 

Aaaaaaaaannnnddddd......

Charley Chaplin!! Why....who were YOU thinking of??

Then it just got creepy....

Hopefully I will actually be there next time one of the celebs shows up!! As you can see....I have a great time here. Loving every second. The big city is so different from what I am used to. Like my town in Thailand....couldn't get any more opposite. I have to open my window at night because I get so blasted hot (this shouldn't be a surprise to anyone who has known me more that 5 seconds) and instead of hearing crickets and wind blowing through palm trees, I hear what I can only describe as a dub step song. "WAWAWAWAWA EE.EE.EE.EE.EE KRRRKRR.ZZZGRRRRRR." That...ladies and gentlemen, is dub step. Cars, buses, sirens, airplanes, crashes, that's what I hear every night. It just lulls me right to sleep ;)

Well folks...that is all for now. I promise to be better at documenting my stay here. I have been a slacker....from this day forth....I shall beeee.....PRODUCTIVE!! (who believes that?) And with that...say it with me.....PEACE. AND. LOVE! :)

Across the Universe

Salutations! What a week it has been on the other side of the planet. Here are some things you should know about Russia...

1. Don't upset a Russian. They may smack you (Courtney learned that the hard way)

2. There are an alarming amount of gingers here.

3. The food here is actually quite delicious. Once again, being vegetarian has its perks! You see, I DON'T get served the liver. If I come back looking like I ate a Russian, it's because of these dang blini. I am addicted, and now it's out of control! I can't stop. They're just....so....goooooood. If magic had a flavor, it would be blini.

Heaven :)

4. The kids here are CRAZY! I mean, don't get me wrong, they are adorable but man....it must be something in the water. One boy, named Maxime, was "misbehaving" (that is the biggest under statement of the century) so I was trying to control him. As I was trying to take him to a Russian teacher he latched onto Ty's leg, grabbed my arm, contorted his head around, and sunk his little fangs into my hand. It left a bruise (which isn't saying much considering my skin could be bruised if it was too windy out). Needless to say, Maxime is on my list....Another boy at a different school, whose name escapes me, looked at me, pointed, and started making some kind of demonic growl. I was terrified. I thought for sure the next step would be him pouncing at me and eating my face off. Instead he just cried. Guess there's just something about me that Russian kids don't like. Maybe the blue hair...which brings me to my next point.

5. Russians don't like blue hair. They are always laughing at it, saying I am crazy. Yup, tell me something I don't know.

6. My neighbors upstairs are CONSTANTLY rearranging their furniture. At all hours of the day or night. At least that's what I think they are doing. Hopefully they aren't practicing some kind of seance that involves sacrificial rituals. Best case scenario, I actually have wizards living above me and they are practicing the levitation spell. That's what I tell myself so I can sleep at night.

7. Russians don't like it when you pay in big bills. They will yell at you.

8. Sveta (our parent coordinator) is the best thing that has ever happened to Russia. Words can't describe how awesome she is. She takes us our on excursions each week. These are always a good time. Examples:
  
We have mini flash mobs where we break out in song on the streets, along with not-so-choreographed dance moves.

Sveta grabbed my arms and flapped them like a bird. Then we ran whilst flapping my wings, making bird noises (well the noises were mostly from me, but still)

Me and Sveta were made for each other.

And here she is :)

9. I have learned to love the metro. Yes, you get a lot stares (the price of being American...on second thought, I think I get a lot of stares in America as well. So let me rephrase that, the price of being psychotic...) Yes, they usually smell like BO. Yes, they are extremely crowded. If you are lucky enough to get a seat, you also have the pleasure of staring the crotch of the person standing in front of you. But I love it. Yesterday on the metro, a mini band performed. Out of no where I hear drums and then a saxophone joined in. It was a joyous moment for all! Except the old woman sitting next to me. She plugged her ears. Hilarious. Her eyes were screaming, "These blasted hooligans and their loud noise machines!" Always an adventure on the metro.

And finally....
10. One day a flock a pigeons is going to swoop down and carry me off to their kingdom in the clouds. Pigeons are everywhere....bum bum BUMMMMMMMMM (dramatic music)

It goes without saying, I LOVE IT HERE! I love my group (don't know if they can say the same about me). I am pretty sure they are all telling their parents that if they had known their head teacher was so insane, they would have never come. My apologies to my group. But if me walking out in a Batman onesie didn't scare them away, I don't know what will. They passed the test. Twill be a magnificent semester! Until my next post.....you know the drill.....Peace and Love :)

Back in the USSR

Yup...I am still goin with the Beatles' titles. Anyways....GREETINGS FROM THE MOTHER LAND! What a trip. So far everything has been sublime. But let's back up to the very beginning. First of all, I suggest that no one ever books a flight for 6:30 AM. Ever. Especially when you have 20 hours of travel ahead of you. Bad. News. Bears. So my flights. Shall we start with Salt Lake to Chicago? Everything was totally normal and ordinary. Oh except for the guy next to me mumbling to himself the whole time. About who knows what. He would throw in the occasional outburst of laughter whilst shaking his head. I don't know, maybe he told himself a hilarious joke (because we all know we've done that before). OR he saw apparitions of animals wearing human clothes. Ya....that was probably the case. Then he kept taking pictures of the clouds with his phone. He would say under his breath "Oh yaaa....that's a keeper. Real nice. Mmhmm." thks happened at least 6 times. Kudos to this guy for making his flight more enjoyable than the rest of us drones.

Chicago airport was nice. It's sad when the most exciting thing is your day is when you discover the toilets automatically change the seat cover. I don't know how many times I went to the bathroom just so I could wave my hand above the seat like a wizard. You think I'm kidding. And then I had to talk about it to everyone who walked in. "Have you seen those toilets? It will change your life forever! My mind is still blown!" I need to get out more often.....

Our next flight was Chicago to Germany. This flight actually was fairly normal. However, by this time I began to realize I was rapidly regressing to the age of 4. Let me just paint of picture of what the people around observed. A girl that is at least 20, wearing a pink unicorn sweater, taking pictures with a toy action figure (its Fin from Adventure Time, if you were wondering), clinging on to a penguin pillow pet, and playing with a Gameboy (and yes, I WAS playing Pokemon). I should probably re-evaluate my life when all of things are occurring at once. Except for the pillow pet. Bringing that was the smartest decision I have ever made. You wouldn't believe how much attention that gets. Especially with the Germans. They got a kick out of him. I should carrying that everywhere. Maybe get some dates with the fellas. "Did you guys happen to notice my pillow pet? Ya...its a pillow AND a pet." If that doesn't work than I don't know what will. Anywhoo...back to flying and my weird instincts to revert back to 1995. On my flight to St. Petersburg these girls actually got really excited when I pulled out my Gameboy. At least I think they were excited....they were speaking German. But I did hear the word Gameboy. And I am going to assume they something along the lines of "Hey that girl's got a Gameboy. She is SO cool. I wish I could be more like herrrrrrr. An inspiration to us all." Yup. That's definitely what they said. NOT "Does that girl seriously have a Gameboy? What is she, four years old? I think there's something wrong with her." They would never say such lies.

After about 20 hours we arrived in St. Petersburg. ITS SOOO GREEN! Holy moly. We are straight up in the forest. Flying in it looked like a autumn day in Narnia. Freakin awesome. Here we met our coordinator, Alla. She is the sweetest lady. Love her. Her English is good enough to understand each other. She has been taking very good care of us. I live in an apartment with three other girls, Meghan, Sydney, and Courtney. All passing my "Rad List." If you don't know what constitutes making the Rad List, you are not on it so don't even bother asking. We are getting along marvelously. It's very rainy here, ergo my hair is FABULOUS. Since when is poofy, frizzy locks, Kramer style, NOT the hottest thing you have ever seen? Even though the temperature is on the nippy side, I have been enjoying it. Autumn doesn't get a turn in Utah. So I like it here.

It's been a busy couple of days. Running around, trying to get things ready for teaching on Monday. I am pretty sure we stick out like sore thumbs. You can definitely tell we are loud obnoxious Americans. REPRESENT! Today we had the pleasure of going to the doctor to get all checked out. First of all, the doctors didn't speak any English. Mostly our conversations consisted of them asking me something in Russia and me replying with the nervous laugh you all know so well. Then they responded with shaking their heads. The first doctor checked out my throat and ears. And boy did he go to town of my ears! He stuck that ear checker thing way the crap into my ear canal. I know it's something you just tell kids to freak them out, but I am pretty sure he actually reached my brain. From what I gathered, I am in tip top shape for those things. Yahoo. The next doctor checked my breathing, organs, and skin. I got to lift up my shirt, spring break style, for that doctor. That's always a good time...I should clarify than none of these procedures were terrible. Just so you know. I am not a wuss. The next procedure was getting blood drawn....and the last one....I would rather not talk about. For discretion's sake, let's just saw I had to swab a place that I never imagined I would have to swab. (On second thought, if anyone has ever "imagined" swabbing that....they are really really sick). I had to go behind this curtain and just drop my drawers. Welcome to Russia. All in all I survived. I pretty much just laughed the whole time. When I left the exam room I said "Spaciba" the the doctor which means Thank you. She looked really confused as to why I would be thanking her for making me swab my hmmhmmhmm. I was just tryin to be polite haha.

I really am loving every second here. I haven't been GREAT at taking pictures. Tomorrow I promise I will start snappin those like no body's biz. So until then...no pictures for you! (Did you read that in the soup Nazi's voice? You better have). I miss and love you all! Hope this blog met your expectations of confusing, ADD, disturbing writing. Because that's all I really know how to do. SO GET USED TO IT. And with that....I must retire to my quarters. Peace and Love :)