I've Only Been Here A Week?

 I swear I'm not meant to write a blog. But anyways...

I've recently been relocated. My babushka had to go to the hospital for something and I've been moved farther outside the city to a new lady named Svetlana. She's actually really nice and eats meals with me, which my previous host did not. It gets real awkward eating by yourself. She has her niece living with her who's my age, but I have yet to meet her. Svetlana is pretty chill, knows English, and is also a painter. She paints replicas of Picasso paintings and also paints other things. She's quite good. I'm excited to move farther outside of the city because it's less scary at night. I lived the closest to the center of the city, and I've seen some crazy shit. The only bad thing is that now I'm a lot farther from school. It's a 45 min metro ride in the morning, not to mention walking to the metro station. Blech. On the bright side, the weather in Russia is finally starting to turn for the best. Tomorrow is supposed to be 45 degrees, and then 55 the next! I got tickets to see Tchaikovsky's Cinderella and I'm super excited. One of my goals was to see Swan Lake, but it was way too expensive. As long as I see a Russian ballet by Tchaikovsky, I can live. We also got tickets to a hockey game final, and we are going to the Russian circus! I can't wait!

Since we've left off I've been to many places in Moscow. The Kremlin is actually a fortress, and the center of Moscow. We jokingly say that all roads lead to the Kremlin, because it seems no matter where we wander, we always find ourselves at the Kremlin. The Kremlin is actually genius in design. It's triangular in design, and back in the day two of the sides had rivers flowing by them. The walls are really thick, red and surround the entire thing. Next to it is Red Square where St. Basil's Cathedral and Lenin's Mausoleum reside. The Kremlin is home to government offices, churches (the Church of the Assumption, which is where all the tsars were coronated), the largest canon that never fired, and the largest bell that never rang.

The reason the bell (known as the Tsar bell) never rang was because there was a fire in Moscow, the metal got hot, and a chunk fell off. The bell was commission by Empress Anne, niece of Peter the Great. All tsars had their own ceremonial bells, and It was a tradition for tsars to have bigger bells than their predecessors. In my opinion Empress Anne was making up for something she lacked. If you look up Empress Anna's Wikipedia article you will learn some interesting things about her. She loved to ring the fire bells of St. Petersburg to watch people freak out. She forced a marriage between two dudes and made them sit in a nest outside her door and squawk on their "wedding night". She arranged a marriage between two nobles who didn't like each other, and made them spend their wedding night in an ice palace. Needless to say, Empress Anna is one of my favorite tsars.

I've also recently (as in today) been to the Novodevichy Convent. This is the convent where tsars, such as Peter the Great or Feodor I, would send their wives when they were tired of them. When Peter the Great was trolling throughout Europe examining Western European culture, there was a revolt by his sister Sofia and some soldiers. Peter went home straight away, crushed the rebellion, and sent his sister to live in the convent. This was the richest church in Russia, it had an accounting office it was so rich. It's recently has become a functioning convent for nuns again after being stripped during Soviet times. Right next to this convent is a famous cemetery (also Novodevichy Cemetery), where anybody who's anybody in Russia is buried there. Among them are Chekhov, Gogol, Yeltsin and Stalin's wife. Then, along the other side of the convent is a lake where Tchaikovsky supposedly wrote Swan Lake. Inside the convent is very peaceful and tranquil. I honestly wouldn't mine going back there just to bathe in the tranquility of it. Moscow is so busy, yet this place is so peaceful.

One thing I would like to comment on the Russians is their love of Icon paintings. I swear everywhere you go there's icons. Icons are religious paintings. When all of west Europe was going through the Renaissance, Russia had their icons. It's usually a square, with a painting of some sort of saint in the middle, and then gold surrounding. They can be painted or sewed (sewn?). Russia's art movements were just really slow, so they are extremely proud of their icons. On every excursion we've been on we've seen icons. I'm about to have icon overload. Yes, they're beautiful and intricate, but there's only so much I can take. 

My classes with Vera have been interesting. I have History of Russia and Russian Literature. In Lit we've been reading Blok and talking about the Symbolist movement. Symbolists are all about shadows and essences, much like Plato's philosophical theories. I'm eating this shit up. Besides that, Russian poetry is absolutely beautiful. Russian history has always been interesting to me, so I'm also loving it. I'm hating my intensive Russian courses more and more each day. The class has everyone involved in a situation in which we were all on an airplane to Moscow and had to be redirected to Tula. My name is Clara Steine. I hate it. Our teacher won't let us leave Tula, yet we have to leave it. I get really frustrated, and I'm not even sure why. 

I need to go to bed so I can actually wake up in the AM and go to school. Until next time, do svedanya bitches.