Top 10 Things I Already Know I’ll Miss

I know I’ve only been here a month, but there are several things I know I will sorely miss when I get back home:

Teremok – a chain restaurant that serves amazing Russian food like bliny (blintzes), borsht and kvass. It’s cheap, it’s delicious and it’s possibly my favorite place to eat out, right now.

Pyshki – Russian donuts, basically like funnel cake only impossibly lighter, softer and approximately 30¢ each. (Actually, as I think of it, I’ll miss Russian food as a whole…)

Smolny – Vanderbilt is pretty and everything, but it isn’t a 19^th century monastery painted ice blue and featuring gold-capped cupolas. I think more than the aesthetics, though, I will miss the millions of wedding pictures taken in front of the building and the superior feeling I get when I walk past tourists in the morning and imagine them saying to each other, “Hey, look, Russian students!” (They provide me almost as much amusement as seeing tour groups go around Vanderbilt’s campus…)

Student discounts – Yes, students at Vandy get discounts at certain stores, restaurants and events, but here, Russian students get discounts everywhere, and some places are totally free, like the Hermitage museum. Train tickets, metro cards, ballets, operas, museums, boat rides…discount! Too bad supermarkets and clothing stores don’t jump on the discount wagon, too.

Beautiful historical architecture - it’s everywhere. There are cathedrals, palaces, statues, bridges, parks, monuments…even certain metro stations are works of art! Sure, the tsars ate off gold flatware while the peasants starved, but they sure left pretty houses for us history buffs to appreciate. Just look at Peterhof and the Hermitage.

Street performers – they are everywhere, too. Just this afternoon, I was walking back to the metro after class when I saw a guy playing pipes and guitar and manipulating a puppet simultaneously. He totally deserved the ten rubles in my pocket. Late at night, when the metro is practically empty, musicians will come out to make some money. (Some are okay, but others are spectacular. Case in point, there is a woman at Gostiniy Dvor who sings opera at night.) There were a couple of guys by the Hermitage with three pet monkeys…good times. lol

Endless diminutives of my name – Russian is a rather blunt and straightforward language that occasionally borders on rude in comparison to certain English constructions. (For example, when you order something at a restaurant, you say, “Give me X dish…” rather than “I’ll have X.” Also, to get a waitress’ attention – because they are almost always women – you say, “Girl!”) However, there are TONS of suffixes that turn the language into something totally sweet. Take my name, for example. Katya is already a shortened and sweet form of Ekaterina, but my host mother has not called me Katya since I stepped foot in her house. I’m Katiusha, Katenka, Kationka, Katyush, Katyushenka, “my sunshine,” “my child,” “my soul” (a very old term of endearment…the concept of the Russian soul is a big topic in my society class), “my bunny,” “my dear,” “my little girl,” “my sweetie”...

The metro – I don’t know why, but I adore the metro. It’s cheap, it’s easy, the trains come every three minutes, there are convenient stops everywhere, changing lines is a snap if you follow the very clear signs posted overhead…also, everyone is in a hurry, which is my natural state of existence, so I fit right in. And, since I’m small and travel-sized for your convenience, I have no trouble weaving in a out of people when there is a massive crowd in front of me. Plus, sitting on the metro sometimes feels like you’re on a rollercoaster ride, since the train moves so fast. I live on Vasilievsky Island, which only has two metro stations. The ride between Primorskaya (my stop) and Vasiliostrovskaya (if you can pronounce that on the first try, you’re my hero) is usually pretty fast, but from Vasiliostrovskaya to the first stop on the mainland, Gostiniy Dvor, the metro driver hauls around a curve! It’s awesome. As an added bonus, St. Petersburg has the deepest metro in the world…so, yeah.

Mullets – Russian men (and some women, unfortunately) seem to think that mullets are cool. My host mom’s grandson has one, I’m sorry to report. (But he’s 4.5 years old and doesn’t yet know how silly he looks.) There is nothing more hilarious than a guy walking down Nevsky Prospekt with a leather jacket and a mullet. My friend Marie is convinced that mullets are on the out, though, and I do admit that I’ve seen fewer ‘dos over the past month. She seems to think that the men are tired of getting laughed at by Americans…

My host family – they are indeed my family, because they have warmly accepted me as their surrogate daughter for four months. My host mom, Nina, is the sweetest thing in the world. She’s impossibly patient with my horrendous grammar and limited vocabulary, she hugs me, makes sure I have everything I need, cooks me delicious meals, chats a little with me and watches tv with me. She also likes to make fun of me for saying thank you all the time. I once asked for a glass of water and she (and her daughter, Lelya) was like, “No way, it’s too difficult to reach all the way over and grab the pitcher to pour you some water. Why are you making me work so hard?” And speaking of Lelya, she is a singer/pianist and has a gorgeous voice. (She’s appearing in some sort of production of Alice in Wonderland and has invited me to attend.) She’s around 30 and is a ton of fun, though she definitely likes to mess with me more than Nina does, which is okay. She’s the one who calls me “bunny” all the time. I have a harder time understanding her Russian, though, so our conversations are more lopsided since I can’t reply as easily. She speaks very quickly and very quietly, though as my comprehension improves, I catch more of what she says. Finally, there is Liusha, the grandson. (I have called him Alyosha on this blog, once, and I’m not entirely sure if Liusha/Aliusha is a diminutive of Alyosha/Aleksandr or not.) He is a very active little guy who always seems to have this playful, sneaky gleam in his eye. I like playing with him, but he has no clue about when enough is enough, so I have to be very careful about what I allow him to do. Also, I hardly ever understand what he says…toddlers/preschoolers are hard enough to understand when they’re speaking in your native language. Now imagine my problem. Most of the time, I stick to enthusiastic “yeahs” or pensive “I don’t knows” when talking to him. It has worked pretty well so far.

Lack of real homework – study abroad is pretty much a cakewalk, academically, as long as you understand what your professors are saying. My daily assignments in Russia are laughable compared to the work I did last semester. Let’s put it this way: last semester, I was taking four history classes and one language class. All I did was read in massive amounts and write papers. I was a stress basket in the beginning of the semester and after I literally scheduled free time for myself, I got a bit better. This semester, I have homework that takes me ten minutes to complete, I don’t have to read hundreds of pages a night, I don’t have to write essays longer than 15 sentences, and in two of my classes, no homework has been assigned for the past two weeks. I have about as much free time as I did freshman year. I have the capacity to get bored. It’s wonderful. CIEE’s policy is that less homework assigned means more time to immerse ourselves in the culture and language. I tend to agree, both philosophically and, well, lazily. (Coming back to Vandy is probably going to be a shock, though. “You mean two hundred pages…by tomorrow? A ten-page paper? Quizzes and tests before midterms and finals? What is this crap? I’m going back to Russia.”)

Everyone I’ve met here – There are some cool people who came on this program, with me. I’m very sad that I’ll probably never see them again. But, there is always Facebook stalking!