Not of the World

Now as anyone who knows me AT ALL knows, I am not the kind of religious fanatic that believes in removing oneself from the sinful world completely; I watch tv shows some people wouldn't, I read books some people wouldn't want to finish because I see academic value in them. I even like songs with profanity and inuendos in them sometimes (see other blogs). I've been thinking a lot about material posessions though and have come to the conclusion that people have far too many of them and they occupy too much of our time. (Please note that I include myself.) I better not give specific details because those who read it could misconstrue it to be accusatory, but suffice it to say that I feel there is more to life than material goods and that someone who lacks the finer things in life should not feel obligated to be unhappy without them. At the risk of sounding like a loser, I will give an example from Harry Potter (book 5): Harry is very upset about something (which I will not say specifically because that would spoil the upcoming movie if I did so) and he is in Dumbledore's office. Harry begins smashing several very nice objects. Dumbledore tells Harry he may continue smashing his posessions; "I dare say I have far too many of them". I like this simplistic attitude. Or what about Wordsworth? "The world is too much with us; late and soon,Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;Little we see in Nature that is ours;We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!..." or Sir Phillip Sidney: "...Desire, desire ! I have too dearly bought, With price of mangled mind, thy worthless ware ;...But yet in vain thou hast my ruin sought ; In vain thou madest me to vain things aspire ; In vain thou kindlest all thy smoky fire ; For virtue hath this better lesson taught,—Within myself to seek my only hire, Desiring nought but how to kill desire. " Or my personal favorite analogy which is from the Bible, which says that it is harder for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven than for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle. His heart is set so much on the things of this world. I think it's because a rich man is focusing on himself and his posessions and how to get more posessions rather than worrying about the important things like God and family and friends. While I'm ranting like a madman, I'd like to say that people who do the "right thing" expect people to make exceptions for them because they're doing the "right thing". I had a philosophy professor in college who told us that he wasn't going to make exceptions for people who do the "right thing". He wasn't going to excuse a tardy because someone was helping another person and was consequently late for class, he wasn't going to excuse someone from a week of classes because they were getting married. He said that doing the right thing can be hard and that people should be prepared to accept the consequences for their choice, regardless of whether it's a good choice or a bad choice. I agree with my philosophy professor on this point and have tried to adopt this mentality into my own life. I hope others will follow suit, although it seems I would be blindly optimistic to believe it will happen. Ah well...another grumpy blog. I hope you enjoyed it!

Microwaves are Outlawed in Russia

This statement answers a long-time question that I pondered while in Russia: why does my host mom re-heat everything in oil and a frying pan?? They seemed to be an average middle-class family (as far as income is concerned) and I couldn't understand why they didn't have a microwave, which would save them a lot of time. Well, now I know. Apparently there have been all kinds of tests run on microwaves. In one test, the scientists took 2 plants of equal health and controlled every aspect of their growth, except one of the plants was given regular water at room temperature and one was given water that had been microwaved for 5 minutes and then cooled to room temperature. The one given the microwaved water did much worse than the one given regular water. At first this made me not want to use a microwave, but then I figured that I may very well live longer by not using a microwave, but all that extra time would be spent using the stove.

Slava

So around this time of the year, I always get to thinking about Russia. It's been 2 years now since I arrived. May 6th (conveniently one day after May 5th, which celebrated winning WWII and the blockade of Leningrad (ok, not the actual blockade which was a nightmare, but the triumph of it all)). I remember being sick with worry and sorrow (I was leaving Dennis behind). I packed until 5:00 in the morning, trying to cram my life into one small suitcase for carry-on and 2 big suitcases for checked luggage. I left at 9:00 to go to Billings, where my flight left. A lady from my church, Ruth Reed had to take me to the airport because everybody else had work/school. My mom's last word of advice was don't take a wooden nickel from anybody. Odd last advice. Ruth didn't let me sleep during the 3-hour car ride because she was tired too and needed somebody to keep her awake. She took me to lunch at Johnny Carino's Italian restaurant. I was still feeling sick so I ate 1/2 of my soup and a salad. Then a 1 1/2 hour plane ride to Denver. I still didn't sleep, though not for lack of trying. Then a 2 hour wait and one last hamburger from McDonalds (or so I thought) and a 9 1/2 hour ride to Hamburg, Germany. That flight was awful. For one thing it lasted all night, I couldn't see the movie screen enough to enjoy the movie, and I was in the middle of the row. Also, I'd never tried to sleep on an airplane before, and was shocked at how uncomfortable it could be given the fact that one can recline and that one also gets a free pillow and blanket to use. Finally after about 1 hour of sleep in the past day, I met up with some more people of our group. We weren't pretty, but we were there and on the last leg of our journey. We flew 3 more hours and made it to St. Petersburg. It was sunny in Germany and drizzling in St. Petes. I remember on the bus we got our first glimse of Russia. The sidewalks were muddy with the rain, and there was a lady wearing a scarf pushing her gypsy bag along the muddy, pothole-filled sidewalk. After a quick bus ride we were taken to our host family. I was told in an earlier e-mail that I would have a roommate,also named Ruth coincidentally, and would be staying with Lyuba and her son Grisha. Grisha is only a few years older than me. They live along the canal Griboyedova, just around the corner from Hay Square, or Cyennaya Ploshod, for our Russian-speaking friends. This is one of the main settings for Dostoyevski's Crime and Punishment. It used to be smelly because animals were sold there. Now it's quite nice. There are 2 Metro stops very near each other. It was in walking distance of St. Isaacs, The Hermitage, Nevsky Prospect, and a McDonalds. That first night we were so tired but didn't want to sleep. I wanted to stay awake until I could take it all in. We were fed a meal of soup, boiled potatos, and hamburger patties. We drank hot tea (herbal!). We unpacked and lay in bed waiting for sleep to come. The next day Grisha took us on a walking tour of St. Petersburg. He showed us the Metro, we found a pharmacy, a post office, a "Russian" grocery store, and an ATM. He also showed us how to walk to school. After that Ruth and I went for a stroll. I bought some flowers from a small shop by our apartment and gave them to Lyuba. The next day we started school. All that happened the first day was a language aptitude test, which landed me in the "advanced" class and a small lecture on what would be expected of us. Afterward, we were free to go. I went for a walk with some of the people from my group and we found a McDonalds that was 2 stories tall and looked like a Russian cathedral, with onion domes on top. Finally some real american food! Wow. With blogs like these I should just write a memoir. I'll write more another day when I have some free time. I assure you I enjoy writing it more than you enjoy reading it, but I love reliving a great summer full of memories.

Why d'you sing hallelujah if it means nothin' to ya?

At the risk of sounding like a complete loser, one of my favorite parts of church is the hymns. This is a problem when people are long-winded in their talks because that means the closing hymn gets "foregone" if that is indeed a word. It makes me sad. We were going to sing one of my favorite hymns this Sunday too. I went to a Damien Rice concert this weekend. He played my favorite song on the encore. It's called "The Blower's Daughter". I recommend it. His album "O" is one of my all-time favorite albums. His other album "9" has some explicit lyrics with references to sex and possibly "the f word". I didn't know this when I decided to go to his concert. All I know is that his cellist played a song she had written called "Never Leave You". Her name is Vyvienne Long. Her song definately had "the f word" in it, but I loved it. What a conflict of interest! I wonder if her album is sold "edited"...