Today was my first day of classes. I got about three hours of sleep last night, I woke up around 12 for no reason and couldn’t fall back to sleep. Around 7am I took a shower and ate breakfast with Владимир. We then took two buses to get to school, it took about 15-20 minutes, which I believe was very fast. While I was in the bus stop, I saw some buses that were completely packed with people, thankfully, the ones we took were fairly empty.
My first class was Russian language. I am in the intermediate level class and there is a total of two students including me. I think that is very good because we get to ask tons of questions and practice. We reviewed some of the basics and proceeded to learn some new things. The class lasted for three hours. After that, I ate the lunch my family gave me and went to the second class. This week we are taking a folk art class. In this class there are seven of us (the whole group) and we are taught how to paint in traditional Russian style, specifically Novgorodian (I think that’s how you say it.) Next week we will begin with Russian history classes. I have always thought I am not very good with art, today’s class proved it. Our teacher makes it look so easy and I can’t do any of the brush strokes correctly, or I mix the paint wrong, etc… The class was very interesting and fun, even though I am not good at it, it is fun to do. After class, Владимир came to pick me up and tell me which buses we were taking. I’m not sure exactly why, but we ended up taking 3 buses and a trolley (the electric one, is that what it’s called?) Once we got home, we had lunch. So far I have enjoyed all of the meals I have been given. Someone told me Russian food was not very good, they were clearly wrong.
After lunch I took a nap, I’m not sure exactly how long it was, but it was long. After that I was given a really good dessert which included milk, strawberries, and vanilla ice cream (not a milk shake though), it was very good. While we ate the ice cream/strawberry/milk Владимир showed me some of the paintings he has done, he is really good. I guess it is a hobby because he paints here at home.
I have only been here for around two and a half days and I think I am understanding words much better. I guess I’m getting used to the speed (unless everyone is slowing down, which is a possibility). Now I hear the words everyone says correctly, but I still don’t know what most of them mean.
It is 9pm as I am writing this, and the sun is still way up in the sky. From what I checked last week online, the sun sets around 12 and comes out around 4am or something like that. The only time it is dark out is when I wake up in the middle of the night, if I didn’t wake up, I would never see darkness. I think I could get used to this, I hate when it’s dark out, it makes me tired. Since I took a nap, I am not very tired, I wonder how long it will take me to fall asleep today…