Random thoughts from the last 2.5 weeks.

Things I miss about Vietnam:

• The food. I had Solyanka yesterday, a traditional Russian soup, and it was wonderful. However, it seems difficult to get vegetarian options here
• The prices. I'm bringing in about the same amount of money as in Vietnam, but the prices I've seen so far are similar to those in France, a bit higher than America.
• My bathroom. But I doubt that will ever be beat (although there were a few times when I wouldn't have minded it being heated).

I'd say that the only disappointment I've had so far is the state of my flat. Although there wasn't anything on the floor, it was otherwise rather filthy. The previous owner clearly had a culinary bent for all the utensils and dishware he owned, but didn't have the sanitary concerns to properly clean them. Also, there were plenty of things left in the refrigerator, like onions and pork and half eaten tomato sauce. There was even a full bag of foul-smelling potatoes under the stove top. I've dispensed with most of the perishable items and stuffed almost all the personal items (DVDs, cologne, coin collection, etc) into the top shelf of my large closet. I still have to do a thorough cleaning of the kitchen, dinnerware, and refrigerator, but then I think I'll feel pretty good about being here.

The only permanent disappointment is the shower. It really only sprays straight down because of the way it is put on the wall, so I have to squeeze into the upper right corner of the tub if I don't want to hold the shower head myself. Even so, it's preferable to my situation in France because it's private and much cleaner (though still a bit dirty).

I would say that Russia is certainly quite similar to Prague, although everything seems more run-down. One of the things I disliked about Prague was that the cashiers never failed to give me dirty looks when I couldn't give them correct change. Out of the four purchases I've made here, only in one of them did the cashier ask me for different change, and she seemed pretty nice about it.

I grabbed some sparkling water by mistake—won't do that again. There's only a shelf between regular and sparkling water, and I had just gotten some water by the same brand so when I grabbed it I didn't notice the tiny letters saying “sparkling” in Russian. I'm really thirsty, but it's almost painful to drink.

I've figured out a way to make the shower much more comfortable. There are three blue cords that stretch over the shower which I assume are used for drying clothes. One is directly over the shower head, but even so I can twist the shower head holder 180 degrees so that the showerhead is almost aiming horizontally instead of almost vertically. The blue cord interferes and causes the showerhead to point more to the left, toward the wall, but it's still quite tolerable.

I've more or less hit the ground running—apparently the only difference between this week and the ones following will be a single 90 minute class. And I had plenty of other things to do, such as clean my house, take papers to and get books from Moscow, and purchase supplies for my flat. Jet lag has consumed some of my time, and I believe that I just got over it today, a week from when I arrived. So between planning for classes, teaching them, commuting, gathering supplies, and cooking, I barely have any time to study Russian.

My cooking has involved some experimentation. So far I've cooked two different meals—one a vegetable and sausage stir fry with a soy sauce/ketchup based sauce, and the other is chickpeas with mushrooms, potatoes, and onions mostly in the mushroom juice and with dill added. They were both very good, although the mushrooms I used in the latter were sometimes practically mush, in which case I had to force myself to swallow them. That's what I get for using frozen, I suppose.

Today I had the best apple I've ever encountered. My boss gave it to me and I almost didn't eat it because it had a couple holes, but it was wonderful—extremely sweet and juicy.

And this catches us up to the present.