sunday - groceries, church and the dvor

August 2

Today I had my first grocery shopping trip. I found out that the conversion rate was not 25 Rubles to the Euro as I had previously thought, but 44. So, it was still more expensive than I'm used to, but not as expensive as I feared. I bought spaghetti noodles, tuna, olives, cream, shampoo and toothpaste for 285 rubles.

I think I enjoyed the shopping experience – very different products than I'm used to. I happened to laugh at the sight of millet sitting next to the pasta, so Eunice got some and made it for me for breakfast. Not all that bad, although I did feel a bit [insert awful pun here] today.

After that Eunice took me to her Korean/Russian church with her. The songs were great since they mostly had the same melodies as American worship songs; the sermon was definitely a mental workout. I had the general idea of maybe the first quarter of it and then all I got were words. I understand the simple words, the filler words but I think I'm missing all the important middle words. I still have not entirely gotten over my fear of speaking Russian, but I had more practice today.

After my nap and a serious session of studying Russian, the neighbors, an American couple with three kids who's been living in Russia for the past 15 years training pastors, invited us out to the дворь (the giant courtyard) to enjoy some watermelon with them. It was really cool to chat with them about the advantages and disadvantages they saw to living in Russia. I also got to meet some Russian neighbors in the dvor who were just getting home from vacation in some undisclosed location in Russia with their 40,000 dollar suv and their miniature pinscher.

I also discovered that Russian kids pee out in the open, too.

(This picture is me at my window looking out toward the dvor. Notice the identical Russian apartment buildings lining up behind me.)