A Radio Interview and a Brawl

Some weeks ago the other Holocaust Center volunteer and I were invited to speak in front of students at the Moscovian university of foreign languages. The lecture dealt with Antifacism in Germany and mostly students studying German attended this event. A couple of days later I recieved a message by a young Russian journalist who currently works at the Russian radio station Голос России (Russia’s Voice) and who also took part at the lecture, because she wanted to organise an interview with us for one of their German speaking programmes. As far as I know this weekly programme is called „Foreignern in Russia“. So, we went to the radio station last week and we recieved special cards to pass security and then we entered the recording studio. I had not imagined the studio to bet that modern and it was really interesting to see how radio station work and look from inside. Before it was our turn to have the interview they were about to finish the German news for this day. The interview was taking place in a tiny room and we sat behind two microphones together with the journalist who was interviewing us. Another lady was sitting behind a window behind a computer to record, cut, and edit what we were saying. I was really nervous, however, it was better than I had thought. You can listen to the final result when you click on this link: http://german.ruvr.ru/radio_broadcast/26178531/35307980/
My voice sounds awful and what I am saying is really not the most intellectual of all things. I also do not really look good on the picture. But it is nevertheless, or perhaps just because of that, kind of funny.

On Friday I was having dinner with a friend in a Japanese restaurant and it would have been a normal evening out if it was not for a brawl to start. We do not really know how it began but at some point there were two relatively young drunken men throwing chairs at a 40 year old man who was with his girlfriend. The older man was also really agressive. They were kicking and beating each other really brutally in that restaurant. They also threw down most of the furniture and at the end there was so much blood on the floor, because the older guy and one of the younger ones had open wounds. Overall, it was really frightening and it showed that some Russian men still try to impress women by being agressive, especially once they are drunk. The police came thirty minutes after the fight was over. Normally they are everywhere, but when you need them they are late.

Finally, I would like to say that last weekend it began to snow in Moscow, but today it is only raining. On the picture you can see my favourite place in Moscow: Patriarshi Prudi.

The Beautiful Sides of Moscow

In the last two weeks I was exploring Moscow a little bit more, because I felt that I haven’t seen a lot yet. I wasn’t really fond of Moscow until then. Only big buildings and everything seemed to be grey. Butit was obviously true that I hadn’t seen much up to this point. In the last two weeks I’ve seen so many beautiful and interesting places in Moscow that I much more enjoy living in this city. I’ve been to several museums, abbeys, churches and parks and I walked through beautiful streets with lovely historic buildings. I especially liked the Gorkij Museum, which is situated in the last house of this famous Russian writer before he died. This house and its interior were built in the East European Art Nouveau style and the stair case in the house is supposed to be the prime example of this style. My favourite place in Moscow, however, is a small lake in the center of Moscow. It’s called Patraiarshi Prudi, and this place is so beautiful, because this lake is surrounded by trees and then by tall and old buildings and it’s really quiet there. And this is really an exception in the center of Moscow, because normally it’s always noisy. So, definately my favourite place to relax. At this place Mihael Bulgakov also wrote his famous novel „The Master and Magarita“ or the novel starts at the Patriarshi Prudi. I can’t really remember anymore. I guess I should just read the book. On the picture you can see the Cosmonaut Museum, where the Russians proudly demonstrate that they had been the first people in space and not the Americans and not the Europeans (That's what a Russian mother told her 5-year old son, when she showed him the first man in space on a picture in the museum). Alyways very interesting to listen to such conversations.

Maybe some updates on my work. At the Holocaust Center I‘m rearranging the book compartment and I’m starting to look for interesting books on the internet, which might suit our library. My Babushka unfortunately has a member of her family staying over for the winter. Therefore, I have to wait until my organisation finds a new Babushka for me. Until then I’ll just work one day longer at the Holocaust Center. I hope that I can start working in the Refugee Center next week, because I miss doing some social work as variation for my office work.

Saint Petersburg and Selenograd

One week ago I went to Saint Petersburg for the weekend with two other volunteers from Moscow to visit the volunteers in SaintPetersburg. I was really excited, because I had heard so many good things about Piter (Russians usually refer to Saint Petersburg as Piter). We went to Piter by night train, as this is the cheapest and most useful way to travel in Russia, because you usually save a lot of time. When we arrived in Petersburg we were picked up by our friend, who lives in the city centre of Petersburg right at the Nevskij Prospekt, Piters high street and also Putin’s favourite street as I was told. We then started a tour through Petersburg and this city is really really beautiful. A lot of old buldings in the historic center, various bridges, and the city is beautifully situated at the water which reminds me of Amsterdam and there are so many sights to visit. Among others we have seen the Mariinsky Palace and the Church of the Saviour on Blood. On Saturday night we also went to a party, but unfortunately we slept to long on the next day so we could’t go to the famous Hermitage museum, which is the biggest art museum in the world. Hopefully next time. On the way back to Moscow I only slept one hour, because it was unbearably hot inside the train. We arrived at 4 o’clock and had to wait until 6 o’clock at the station to take the first metro train.

Maybe as a contrary example to Saint Petersburg I’ve been to Selenograd, a suburban municipality of Moscow. After a 40 minute train ride one employee at the Holocaust Center, the other Holocaust Center volunteer and I arrived in Selenograd. The name does actually mean „Green City“, but I have to say that I’ve never seen an uglier and greyer city than this. Of course I haven’t seen everything of the city, but what I’ve seen was just pure uglyness. There were only huge skyscraper apartment building and big streets. Everything was grey and dismal. Our job in Selenograd was to visit a school and to present our organisation and teach pupils about the Holocaust. Surprisingly, it was a really great school, which organsises several events (much more than my school in Germany) and is very very active. Also the school children seemed to be very interested in the topic. Some school girls told us that they hate studying German, but they liked that volunteers from Germany and Austria came to their school.

Hugo Chavez, Zoo and a New Job

Last Thursday I went to a lecture on the situation in South America. Normally, I’m not really interested in South America, but the invitation proclaimed that Hugo Chavez, who came to Moscow to meet Mr Putin and Mr Medvedev, would also hold a speech. Therefore, my colleague and I sent the organisation an e-mail to register for the lecture. The lecture was supposed to start at 4:30, but the whole event was badly organised, so it took us an hour to get into the lecture hall, because the security guards started to check the passports and bags of all guests only when the lecture was already supposed to start. First, some Russian experts on South America talked about the situation in South America until it was the turn of Hugo Chavez. He has a really deep voice and is an excellent speaker. However, throughout the lecture I didn’t understand what he was saying because he spoke in Spanish and it was only translated into Russian. Therefore, I didn’t really know whether I should clap. Because sometimes he talked about North Korea and I didn’t want to clap when he was saying that it is the best country of the world. So I just didn’t clap. And he also criticised the United States several times and said how great Venezuela was. But at least I can say that I’ve seen Hugo Chavez. Yeah!

On Saturday I went to the zoo in Moscow. They only important thing to mention is that the living conditions for the animals are pretty upsetting. The cages are small, seldomly cleaned and the animals just sit around, look sad and are bored.

Yesterday I went to a refugee centre in Moscow. When I came to Moscow our country coordinator told me that I will also work in this refugee centre. I had thought that only the other volunteers would work there, but it sounded interesting so I was excited and happy to have the chance as well. We’re going to work in the centre one or two times a week after our regular work and help children with their homework or just teach them how to study. Every volunteer can choose what he wants to teach and he or she will get one child to take care for. I believe that next week I will get a call by the head of the centre to find out when I’m going to start my work.

Russian Post, Reparing Windows and Sergiev Pasod

You need a lot of patience in Russia. Patience and a lot of time. I had to experience that last Thursday. And although I thought that I’m a patient person, the Russian Post definately did proof me wrong. Sometimes one of the volunteers at the Holocaust Center has to go to the post office to pick up a package or a letter. This time it had been my turn to pick up three letters. So I walked to the office and waited in the queue. There were only 5 people in front of me but I had to wait 50 minutes until the lady at the counter helped me. I still can’t believe how slow a person can be. The staff at the post offices are everything but consumer oriented. The whole post system is so circuitous. Although, some other employees were working at that time, they didn’t seem to think about opening another counter. This woman even helped one of her colleagues to fill out a form, instead of continuing to serve the customers. I became more and more annoyed. When it was finally my turn, the lady told me that they only hand out packages at this counter and that I had to go to another counter. So 50 minutes for nothing. I went to another building to reach the other counter. But this was apparently the immigration office. After waiting 10 minutes the lady at this counter, however, showed me the way to again another counter. Finally I was able to pick up my letters. Next time I will carefully look whether I have to get packages or letters so this doesn’t happen to me again.

On Friday I went to my Babushka as usual. This time I cleaned her windows and I did the caulking for her windows. I guess I haven’t done that much repair work for ages. After that she prepared lunch and we listened and talked about classical music.

On Sunday I went to Sergiev Pasod with a group of business students from Moscow. The volunteers from Moscow including me got to know these students, because the students meet every Tuesday to drink one or two beers. And we normally join them there. Some girls planned this day trip to Sergiev Pasod, a city 90 minutes outside from Moscow. It’s famous for it’s Lavra, which is something similar to an abbey, just a little bite more impressive (as you can see in the picture at the top). We met really nice people, ate great food, saw beautiful buildings and walked through the Lavra. The weather was amazing and I really enjoyed this trip.

A weekend celebrating German Unification Day

I spent the last weekend practically eating, drinking, and talking all the time. I also had the possibility to listen to a concert and of course celebrate German Unification Day. The best thing about it - everything was for free. My friends and I started our festivities at the German culture and education institute Goete, which invited all Germans and people who study German to their central office. After some introductiory words and quiz games, it was time to eat. I had hoped for a buffet, but it turned out that the institute had organised waitresses which walk around with food and drinks. This however, wasn’t really the best idea, because everybody was hungry and the waitresses were chased by the masses and the trays were already emptied after seconds. Therefore, I also had to punch myself through the masses to snatch at least bites from the different kinds of food and beverages. Later on the German band Anajo from Augsburg played a conert in a big festival tent outside in the garden. The concert was really good and we all had a lot of fun.
The next day was a little more formal, because all German citizens were invited to the German embassy. It took us ages to walk to the embassy, because it is located between two metro stations and we didn’t know that it would take us 45 minutes. But we arrived and we were allowed into the embassy after we had shown our passports and passed the security check. Luckily, I had worn my Action Reconiliation for Peace T-Shirt. This way some people approached us and talked about our projects. Overall, the evening in the embassy wasn’t as good as the one in the Goete Institute, but the food was slightly better which is of course very important.

How to Treat an Old Lady

Today I went to my Babushka for the first time on my own. I called her half an hour before I arrived at her place. Surprisingly, this phone call went better than I had expected, because I'm normally not the best when it comes to talking Russian on the phone.
I also took the right bus and stopped at the right station on the way to her place. I went up the stairs in the house to her flat. The doors were already open, because her bell isn't working at the moment. I stayed there for half an hour and we talked a bit about what needed to be done in the flat and what we had to buy. We then together took the bus some stations further to go to a supermarket and a kind of building supplies store. It was a special social supermarket where everything was way cheaper than in other supermarkets. One could really feel that she had to decide and calculate what she really needed, because she recieves such a low pension. Although, it wasn't that far it took us 3 and a half hours to go there and back, because, as I already mentioned previously, she can't really walk well. Especially the three floors in the house are troublesome. But also daily life such as crossing the street and taking the bus are difficult. However, I enjoyed helping her and talking to her while walking with her arm in arm, because I felt like I did something good and that it really helps her when I carry the bags. When we came home, she cooked for me and we talked again about her life and about my family. That's what interests her most. I had taken my laptop with me to show her pictures of Kiev, because she was born there. She really seemed to enjoy looking at the pictures and talking about her experiences there.

P.S. I have a new (or rather a used) mobile phone. So I can really call people now and they will understand me. Yeah!