Orientation

So I made it through my first day! Not sick anymore, but I'm extremely tired. We met with Tatiana (head of the USC Russian Dept) at 10am this morning. There's a Старбакс Кофе (Starbucks) on campus...so that was a miracle. She showed us where our classes take place and we met our professors. Mine seems very nice...her name is Elya.

There's this blue building across from campus. It's one of the "ghost" buildings. Basically it was funded by the government to be built as an addition to the campus, but when perestroika happened, the government couldn't afford to fund it so it is deserted now. It looks really cool/creepy. As soon as I get a camera I'll take a picture of it. It looks like its made entirely of glass and parts of the glass on the roof are broken and caved in. (Chaterra, reminds me of the first episode of American Horror Story...definitely a creepy building, who knows what lives in there hehe...) There is a guard outside to stop people from going in, but apparently you can pay him off to go in/live in there. The other students here are very intrigued by us. As soon as they realize we are speaking English they whisper and giggle to each other. One guy held up his fingers in the 'peace' sign and yelled peace at us. In the elevator one student asked where we were from and we said California. He said "Oohhh land of chickens!" Obviously no idea what he was talking about until he explained, and we realized he meant duck face pictures. (for those of you reading my blog who don't know what duck face pictures are, just look it up in google).

After orientation, we walked to a bank down the street to get rubles. Then we took the metro to go to a mall. Metro is really easy to take, although I don't know how anyone who can't read Russian would do it. The mall seemed very American, aside from all the Russian speakers. Johnny Rockets, Victoria's Secret, Calvin Klein, etc. There are a lot more McDonalds/fast food here than I would think. Bought a throwaway phone to contact professors/other students while here and some groceries. Helped the beginners order things in Russian and translated for them. Tatiana had to leave us at the mall to go home so I helped get us back through the Metro and what not.

As for the Russians. I don't know if they really don't speak English or if they just really don't want to. It's not in a rude way at all, they just like seeing us try to speak/encourage us to try. My roommate and I ran into a maid on the way down to the lobby this morning, and I explained (in Russian, because she doesn't speak English) that my roommate speaks absolutely no Russian at all, but she kept trying to talk to her anyway...amusing for me. I'll buy a camera soon!

More later...