Week 6 Day 1
This morning, unfortunately, did not start out all too well for me. First, I got out of bed about ten minutes later than I should have, which set me back by a lot and was just a little bit more stressful since there was more pressure on me to get to school on time. Next, my host mom gave me a HUGE breakfast: the remaining blinchki with jam, a plate full of boiled bean sprouts with vegetables, and a cup of tea. I also ate this a bit more quickly than I should have, which made me feel a little bit sick for the next hour.
I managed to get to school early, albeit fifteen minutes later than usually. Then, all throughout the first two classes, I had an odd sort of pain in my right leg (?), and although I never figured out what it was, it did go away after that, which was fortunate.
After class, we took a trolley bus to the restaurant, Пётр первый (Peter the 1st, a Russian king), which was accross from Stephan cel Mare park and just around the corner from the museum we would be visiting.
For lunch, we had a lot of Russian food: пельменный (chicken dumplings), potato pancakes, roasted chicken and vegetables, a lot of sour cream, and cvas (a drink that is pretty much beer but with so little alcohol that we are allowed to drink it). I didn’t manage to get pictures of all the food since it disappeared so quickly, but it was all very good (and filling).
We left the restaurant early and walked over to the National Museum of History of Moldova, where we learned that instead of taking a tour, we would be walking through it on our own and would just have to write a little paragraph in Russian about what we saw. I decided to pay to take pictures so I would be able to remember more of the things I saw, which I’m glad I did, since a lot of the rooms were really beautiful.
One of the more interesting things I saw was a miniature replica of Trajan’s column, which had a lot of detailed engravings all over it.
After looking around the second floor, we took a few minutes to step into a room which had a large diorama, supposedly of conditions during World War II.
There were also a few rooms on the ground floor that had old coins from Moldova and surrounding regions, and they had a lot of interesting depictions:
We spent about an hour inside the museum (it was not as big as it looked from the outside, and then about half of our group went into the park to finish a round of mafia that we had started at the restaurant.
Since it was a Monday, a lot of people had to leave to go volunteer with the FLEX participants. This left me, Cameron, Sara, Devin and Georgia alone in the park, and since it was hot out and we had homework to do, they suggested going to a cafe. We decided on Donuts & Coffee, where I had not been yet, so we walked up Pushkin street a few blocks to get there.
I ordered an orange and dark chocolate donut, and the employee recommended a cucumber lemonade, so I got that too. I had never had that before, but it actually ended up being better than I expected. They must have had at least a dozen different kinds of lemonade there—Sara got a lavender lemonade (that was very aesthetically pleasing), and I also heard them mention cherry, grapefruit, and several other kinds.
Cameron also showed us some Transnistrian money he had bought from Elliott, which he is absolutely obsessed with, but (I must admit), it was interesting to look at...all of us have had this strange curiosity regarding Transnistria, so we all get very excited whenever we learn (or see) something new about it.
We got all of homework done and discussed some very important things (i.e. Les Misérables) and left in stages. Some of the others wanted to go for ice cream, so I left them there and walked a few blocks to the closest bus stop and went home.
When I got home, Vera was out (running errands, I think), so I ate some of the dinner she had left on the stove, which was blini, Russian crepes, filled with cheese and apples. They were good, but I only had a few, since I had already had A LOT of food and the chances of me every feeling hungry again were probably less than zero.
Since then, I haven’t done much other than writing this post, so all I can say is that I hope to get to bed at a reasonable hour, and that I manage to sleep through the night (it’s been a struggle so far, but not debilitating).
I managed to get to school early, albeit fifteen minutes later than usually. Then, all throughout the first two classes, I had an odd sort of pain in my right leg (?), and although I never figured out what it was, it did go away after that, which was fortunate.
After class, we took a trolley bus to the restaurant, Пётр первый (Peter the 1st, a Russian king), which was accross from Stephan cel Mare park and just around the corner from the museum we would be visiting.
For lunch, we had a lot of Russian food: пельменный (chicken dumplings), potato pancakes, roasted chicken and vegetables, a lot of sour cream, and cvas (a drink that is pretty much beer but with so little alcohol that we are allowed to drink it). I didn’t manage to get pictures of all the food since it disappeared so quickly, but it was all very good (and filling).
The potato pancakes.
We left the restaurant early and walked over to the National Museum of History of Moldova, where we learned that instead of taking a tour, we would be walking through it on our own and would just have to write a little paragraph in Russian about what we saw. I decided to pay to take pictures so I would be able to remember more of the things I saw, which I’m glad I did, since a lot of the rooms were really beautiful.
The red room, which had a lot of ancient pottery and artifacts.
The yellow room, which had a lot of furniture, instruments, and old inventions.
The blue room, which had a lot of religious art and artifacts.
After looking around the second floor, we took a few minutes to step into a room which had a large diorama, supposedly of conditions during World War II.
We spent about an hour inside the museum (it was not as big as it looked from the outside, and then about half of our group went into the park to finish a round of mafia that we had started at the restaurant.
Since it was a Monday, a lot of people had to leave to go volunteer with the FLEX participants. This left me, Cameron, Sara, Devin and Georgia alone in the park, and since it was hot out and we had homework to do, they suggested going to a cafe. We decided on Donuts & Coffee, where I had not been yet, so we walked up Pushkin street a few blocks to get there.
I ordered an orange and dark chocolate donut, and the employee recommended a cucumber lemonade, so I got that too. I had never had that before, but it actually ended up being better than I expected. They must have had at least a dozen different kinds of lemonade there—Sara got a lavender lemonade (that was very aesthetically pleasing), and I also heard them mention cherry, grapefruit, and several other kinds.
My cucumber lemonade.
My orange and chocolate donut.
Cameron also showed us some Transnistrian money he had bought from Elliott, which he is absolutely obsessed with, but (I must admit), it was interesting to look at...all of us have had this strange curiosity regarding Transnistria, so we all get very excited whenever we learn (or see) something new about it.
When I got home, Vera was out (running errands, I think), so I ate some of the dinner she had left on the stove, which was blini, Russian crepes, filled with cheese and apples. They were good, but I only had a few, since I had already had A LOT of food and the chances of me every feeling hungry again were probably less than zero.
My dinner!
Since then, I haven’t done much other than writing this post, so all I can say is that I hope to get to bed at a reasonable hour, and that I manage to sleep through the night (it’s been a struggle so far, but not debilitating).
Comments
Post a Comment