Waiting in St. Petersburg airport

We take off in three and a half hours. The Internet here seems to be working, and some blog posts I tried to do a few days ago have magically appeared. Next stop: Frankfurt!
The last month has been an unforgettable experience for me. I made some new friends,  and learned so much about language and culture. I have much more empathy for my students, who often are overwhelmed, confused, and exhausted by immersion in English.  I can truly empathize with their feelings now.  The puzzles of Russian grammar are logical compared to English grammar.  My conversation skills have improved more than anything, and although I have a lot to learn, I feel that this trip was a well-rounded learning experience.  Thanks to everyone who made it possible.

Большое срасибо Many thanks!

Thank you to the Khokhlov family for a month of learning and good memories! Thank you to our teachers, and everyone who helped plan the trip and make it happen. Thank you to Paul, Josh, Audrey, Brianna, Rachel,and Jennifer for being so much fun and making life interesting. It was a great trip!

Ten kilograms of black currants

Blogger is not cooperating for the last few days. Anyway, Sasha brought home a huge pile of currants. Today, Lesya is making jam. First she sterilizes the jars by baking them in the oven. She boils the lids in the stove, then bakes them dry. She has a big pot filled with boiling currants and sugar. She uses a teacup to skim the foam off the top, I think that's the "bad stuff" (I'm not sure what bad stuff), then she takes the jars and lids out of the oven, fills them with jam, puts the lids on tight and turn each jar upside down on the counter. So far this evening, she's made two huge pots, and has one more to boil up. The jam is really tasty, not too sweet, and it's a beautiful dark magenta color.

Why Russians have dachas

These lilies were a gift from Rachel, and her host mom.  They grew these at their dacha, where they also grow vegetables. These were still blooming a week later, and had a total of ten blooms. 

The teapot is my friend

This is the чайник (teapot) that boils all the water we drink, and use in cooking. It makes the fresh hot cup of tea, morning, noon and night. It's water appears in all the tasty soups and borschts. It cooks the rice, noodles and pelmeniki. I like this teapot!

We are at about 58 degrees north latitude

This the map above Valye's desk. I know we're in the north because of the white nights, but it is really striking to look at a map and see it. Juneau, Alaska is about the same as here. I thought I was from the north (Wisconsin), but now I know different.

Guess when this was painted....

This icon of St. Nicholas is in the huge collection of the museum here. I'm not sure why, but he's a favorite saint, almost as popular as Holy Mary. Our teacher told us a joke about a peasant who thought St. Nicholas could probably replace Jesus in importance, at least in Russia. The oldest icons were from the 11th century, I think. They are painted on wooden panels that are covered in woven linen, and prepared with a mixture of gypsum, clay and animal glue. Sounds like an early version of gesso, maybe. This icon was painted in 1294. Those egg tempera paints held up pretty well.