From Moscow to Morocco

So another term has flown by.  Absolutely no memory of what happened in it..my long term memory appears to be diminishing at an alarming rate!  Both my TA's have caught be talking to myself at work quite animatedly and I can only assume that this along with memory loss means I am slowly turning into my mum...oh dear!! (Love you mum!)

But it ended with my brother and two of his mates coming out to Moscow for a long weekend...a worrying amount of vodka was consumed unsuprisingly and I have hideous memories of being dragged around the cosmonaught museum with a nasty hangover on a very hot day.  I do think space is amazing but after the 50th model of a satellite with a hangover you just want to end it all.  Luckily they had these lovely big red armchairs through the museum so all i had to do was walk extra fast until the next one then have a wee sit until Giles was ready.

So yes the sun has finally come to Moscow and it is amazing amazing. I really love this city in the sun.  I love it in the snow too, it's just the grey bits in between that are not so nice!   i have even planted my own window box although the soil in it has been there with no plants growing in it for at least 3 years so i'm not 100% sure anything will grow..not sure if soil has a sell by date!!  There is a gnome too though so if notihng grows I will just buy some more gnomes! 

Anyhoo holidays finally came and Hannah my TA and I jetted off ( well as much as you can jet when you are on BMI..( pizza wraps for a meal.. the cheek of it!) to Morocco to visit my friend Sophia who is working at a guesthouse right on the beach down from Agadir.  (With a quick nights stopover in The London to say hello to the little Lovegroves and the ancient Matriarch Lovegrove ( love you mum! ))

We were met at the airport by our pre arranged 'grand taxi' as they call them in Morocco. Obviously grand in morocco has a total different meaning as half the bumper was falling off, Hannah's side of the seat was full of mud and when we got in the driver handed us our window handles to attach!  Anyway  2 and a half hours later after some scary scary overtaking on dogdy 1 track road type scenarios (plus forced listening to the driver's chris de burg CD)  we arrived at lovely Mirleft a tiny seaside town.  

4 nights spent on the Beach at the wonderful Aftas Beach house with a gorgeous sandy beach right on our doorstep was just what i needed and we passed the time sunbathing, swimming, reading, sightseeing and eating lobster, lattes and tagines!   Oh and we also went to the local hamman ( only tourists there) and got scrubbed to within an inch of our lives and then covered in mud in a giant steam room whilst only wearing our pants by an equally naked little moroccan woman.   It was alarming but very nice and I think the local women had a right old laugh watching us! 

 We then got same grand taxi ( as he was a scary but safe driver for morocco apparently) 4 hours to Marrakech.   He was kind enough to play the same CD mix for us  although to my delight it also had cat Stevens on (I'm not being sarcastic now) who to my horror Hannah had never heard of  and alarmingly on listening to did not like.  Poor girl... i think the driver appreciated my rendition of 'Ooh baby it's a wild world!'  although by the 4th time the CD played even I had felt perhaps it was not such a wild world!

We then spent two nights in a bit of a luxury Riyad type resort  with not just a pool but a 'slate'pool.... ooh it was so fancy.  Due to it being change over week or something we were virtually the only guests there and had the sole attention of one crazy waiter who kept smuggling us extra chocolate croissants and fresh orange juice at brekkie whilst the slightly power hungry French manager was around the corner.   We spent an afternoon in Marrakech in the medina..did a nice bit of batering and made it out with only one slightly alarming incident when a shop keeper under the pretence of tying some blue scarf around my head in a long winded and lengthy fashion used this as an opportunity to rub himself up against my back with his little friend!!  It took a little while for me to realise exactly what was happening , as well you really don't expect that in a shop do you!  Anyway you can be sure I did not buy his scarf and promptly ran away, whilst he grinned away! Honestly!!

So back in Russia now ...7 more weeks then 1 year In Moscow will be done!  I am coming back next year for 1 more...eeek!  Hopefully see you all in the summer as I will be home at start of July and then in August!

 (Tash i know you are probably hyperventilating about the typos and lack of commas but i have been at school for 11 hours and just cannot do it!!!  feel free to fix it i know it makes you happy! :)  

x

Let it thaw, let i thaw, let it thaw!

Wow so time has been flying by and my blog has been on my to do list for ooh 3 months... procrastination was always one of my best skills! 

St Patricks day, Moscow

So as you can see i survived the Russian winter even though it's still snowing! The Russians celebrated the arrival of spring about a month and a half ago with Maslenitza ( Pancake week...a whole week of eating pancakes.. great idea) which was a Pagan Sun festival initially to celebrate the imminent end of winter!  Considering during the week of Maslenitza it was about -15 and was snowing and it still is now I wonder if the word imminet means something else in Russia!!  I think the coldest we got was down to -30 but i don't know it did not seem all that bad. But then my house is right next to my school as is my gym and the supermarket so my outside footfall was kind of pathetic compared to that of the hundreds of snow sweeper men and women who spend all day outside shovelling pathways through the city.  They are hardcore people and have my full respect especially the ones i saw without gloves!! I would be a terrible snow sweeper!  Even more worrying is the 100,00 homeless people who live in Moscow and how on earth they deal with such temperatures. I went with a friend who works for a charity to help out with a sandwich van last week that feeds the homeless and it made you realise how incredibly lucky you are to even have some gloves yet alone a warm house and food.

I've also been to visit an orphanage where another friend works.  A group of expats went out there to meet the children with the plan to go on regualr basis and play games and teach a little bit of English.  The children were all so polite and smiley and compared to what I was imagining it was a fairly nice building although i think this was a privatley run orphanage and many of the state run ones are perhaps not so nice.  It was a lovely day and we think the children really enjoyed it although it was sobering to know that i think the statistic I was told was something like 70 % of orphans in Russia will grow up to be alcoholics and drug addicts, criminals, prostitutes or commit suicide. Many of them are also social orphans which means that 1 or both of their parents may be alive but unable to care for them. 

School is going well and I have an amazing new shiny interactive smartboard which has cut my resource making time in half.... ohhhhh I love it!

COOKING LESSON!!

I have also very recently made the  decision to stay another year ahhhh!!   I did ALOT of thinking and went slighty barmy deciding to stay or go.  I never thought I would stay even a year but as it turns out Russia is not all that bad.  I did think of going somewhere a bait balmier with natural vitamin D and more opportunities to meet members of the opposite sex ...but i thought no I'd prefer another cold dark winter being a spinster!! Wonderful!! :) But my job is good and I am saving enough so hopefully I can have a nice 6 months off and write that book I'm always banging on about somewhere tropical with a studmuffin bringing me cocktails and fanning me with palm leaves!
Actually am looking forward to summer in Mosscow lots as when the sun does come out its so wonderful and the city despite it's smog towers and hideous dirt is kind of charming!

Pouteen N ight

What else..oooh i went skiing in France in the last holiday which was so wonderful and it was sunny everyday and I ate copious ( perhaps even life threatning amounts) of cheese in many different forms...raclette, fondue..off a spoon, off a fork, off a knife.. with my finger... ohhh it was fromage heaven! And my flatmates brother runs a bar there so there were copious amounts of free drinks..!

Miss Natahsa Newman came out for a visit too which was loverly and my brother and his mates are coming out in 4 weeks for my next holiday ....could be dangerous... 3 married men let loose from their families for the weekend ... I'm not responsible for any wodka induced antics Susannah!!!  Just buy him some insurance!

Ok it's been at least 40 mins since I last watched an episode of the Big Bang Theory so i better go before the shakes start!

mwa mwas miss you all !! xxx

Back to it!

So after a gorgeous Cornish Christmas ( with lots of loafing, cheese eating and port drinking) and a New Year in London it was back to Russia.  It was so lovely seeing everyone.  It was also a novelty to chat to people at tills, be able to catch a bus and know where the hell i was going and not get chased by packs of wild dogs!  (ok that has not actually happened yet but according to my perhaps slightly ominous guidebook it's only a matter of time and coming back from the cinemas the other day i swear these two stray dogs were eyeing me up with intention to chase. Obviously i used my degree in Animal Behaviour to communicate with them through mere eye movements that this would be a mistake on their part!)
Anyway so after such a lovely time it was actually quite hard coming back to reality and I was a little bit sad to leave dear old Blighty!  One good thing is that is has properly snowed now and Moscow does look a lot more beautiful under a blanket of white.  It's still only -2 which really does not feel all that cold, however, i see it's going to be -8 on Thurs so perhaps the real winter is on it's way as it's supposed to be much, much colder than this right now according to the Russians.
I am religiously taking my vitamin D tablets as due to the fact it does not get light till about 9.50am and is dark early we only see the sun for 45 mins a day when we take the kids out ( that's if the sun is even out).
On Saturday i woke up at 10.20 and was so excited as the sun was streaming in the window so i rushed to open my balcony door and stood there in my rather little  dressing gown trying to soak up as many rays as possible despite the fact it was -2!  It's very icy and have seen a number of hilarious and some not so hilarious falls.  One poor lady had fallen and her ankle was at a very scary 45 degree angle.  I have had a few near slips ( apparently skechers' tone your butt as you walk' snow boots have no grip!) but not fallen yet fingers crossed!

Saturday was also my Birthday celebrations.  6 years ago someone leant me a book to take travelling in Sri Lanka called The Master and The Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov.  I remember it being one of those books that I was addicted to and could not put down until it was finished.  It starts with someone falling under a tram at a place in Moscow called Patriarch's Pond and being decapitated.. ( nice!).  I can honestly say i never imagined then I would ever be celebrating my 31st birthday in a tiny little restaurant next to Patriarch's Pond called cafe Margarita!  It was such a lovely night with the restaurant being the size of someone's living room and a piano player and 2 violinists playing through the meal. And my present from everyone at school was my favourite.... yes a massage!!:)   And then it was onto a club where things got a bit less sophisticated and er well can't remember much apart from dancing lots and perhaps some vodka!Oh and perhaps trying to leave without paying our bar tab because we could not see the waitress and figured they  might just have forgotton about a large table of people! We all made it downstairs apart from Darren who got stopped by the bouncers so we had to go back and rescue him and pay our dues! ooops   I tried really hard to go ice skating the next day as planned and even paid for my ticket but my body at the last minute decided it might be a wee bit dangerous to attempt this.

Hmm ooh and in another attempt to fight the darkness I joined a gym!! Yes me!!  I know i have joined gyms before but i only ever used the pool or sauna and never ventured into the alarming terrain of the actual machine room.  And there was that one step aerobic lesson with Tash which ended with me leaving early with an old woman due to lack of coordination!  But Collette my flat mate ( and a proficient gym user!) is showing me the ropes and tonight i went on a  cross trainer and a running machine!  Now i thought i was quite fit and due to the fact i generally only ever feel about 20  i was quite alarmed when Colette ( who is 23) seemed to have a bit more stamina!  That will change Kearny..watch out! :(  31 i tell you it's depressing!  Our gym is brand new and really nice but it is also a fight club and the main clientel appear to be male gym bunnies. You would think this sounds good but they are like extreme body builders ( body builders TV is the only thing on in there.. so gross!  I think the men might think perhaps these two English girls are in there admiring them but actually our conversations go a little along the lines of ' Ew look at him... that is totally gross why would you want muscles that big.. imagine when he's old and stops working out!' Hoping none of them speak English.  Anyway soon we will have an induction with Alex who is one of said gym bunnies and despite his scarily disgusting huge muscles is a very nice man!

Anyway time for bed i think school again tomorrow... 7 weeks and counting!!  Oh and if anyone is on skype call me anytime I love to see your gorgeous faces!  boediddley is my user name!

From Russia with love Boe Boe x

let it snow let it snow let it snow!

So it's started snowing more and we hit -4 yesterday although still the snow has not settled properly.  Getting the kids ready to go outside takes a while as they all have to put their little snowsuits and boots on which can drive you a bit insane but they are pretty good at it to be fair.  I do not have a little snowsuit i'm thinking it would not look quite so cute on a fully grown adult!  So I am surviving with primarni leggings and gloves which i think may have to be replaced with something a bit hardier soon like a polar bear!  ( totally joking obviously i have not lost my animal loving ways even in Russia.)  Mind you one of my friends is a governess for a hugely rich family and she says they have a polar bear rug in their full sized bowling alley. Horrid!  I am encouraging her to drop something unfixable on it like marmite ( if  only you could get marmite here that is).

Had a few nights out which seemed to end up in starlite the diner of heavenly burgers. Hence two week starlite ban which incidentally is up on sunday .. phew was having the withdrawal shakes!

Saturday was fun as it was the 50th birthday party of the owner of our school.  So it was held in a huge fancy restaurant and consisted of all the teachers from the schools as well as our bosses doing lots of performances in between lots of eating and drinking.    We had been practising hard at our school with our dance... it was all going well until i remember standing there in front of like 100 people and thinking oh my god what the hell is the next move?  Anyway instead of doing the sensible thing of watching someone else i just freaked out a bit and stood there for what seemed like a very long time.  Anyway i got back into it and thought hmm maybe it was not that bad.  Then i was telling my flatmate Collette about it ( who was also dancing) and she said something along the lines of 'oh god ,i know i saw you Boe and i had to stop myself looking at you in case i messed up too!   Can't wait to see the video!!  It was also fancy dress with the theme 'back to the USSR' and it turns out fancy dress to Russians might mean more 'fancy' then what it means in the UK.  So most people went in 60,70,80's but a kind of glam and dressy.  I decided to go as a Russian rocket complete with Laika the first dog in space made mainly from resources from the classroom.  Our boss told me she loved my costume and then admitted she had absolutely no idea what it was!

We are now gearing up for Christmas which is a much bigger deal than in the UK.  No rummaging around in the school cupboard to see if the camel costumes still have a hump and if baby jesus has grown mould.  No no we have to perform songs, dances as well as a play and it's all filmed and a really big deal. Luckily the dance teachers do the dances and the music teachers do the songs. ( it would be extremely dangerous to leave that in my hands! So the play is just down to us.  The Littlest Christmas Tree it is and it's 3 weeks till d-day.  Oh god!   Still they are all very good at being in the spotlight as they we are constantly being filmed for this or that... i don't think a week goes by when i don't have the camera man stalking me around the classroom.

I felt a bit bad last week when at lunch one of the children ( the one who said i ate all the smetana! how rude!)
called me a 'silly billy' ( a phrase i fear i may have inadvertently taught them!) because i could not speak Russian.  I calmly explained that the reason i don't speak Russian ( aside from the fact it's ridiculously difficult) is that in English school we learnt French and Spanish normally.  This was my way of trying to convince her i was not a 'silly billy'.  Then one of the boys piped up and asked me what the names of all the vegetables were in Spanish.  Now i can order a beer and i can ask the way to the train station but i fear Mr Hunt skipped the vegetable module!  But not wanting to lose face i just made it up.  So now there are 5 russian children who think the spanish for carrot is caroto, cucumber is cucumbero and tomato is tomatoista!!  

Looking forward to coming home for Christmas immensely I cannot wait to see the sea and breathe a bit of fresh air!!

from Russia with snowy love xx

Happy Holidays in Sunless St Petersburg

So its 2.40am on sat night.. body clock out due to getting in at some silly hour yesterday morning after attending an ex-pat charity night linked to a friend's orphanage charity so my old friend insomnia keeps me awake. So thought i would use my time productively  Many mojitos were consumed.. laying off the wodka for a bit and was a fun night ended nicely at 4am with a starlite burger from the 24 hour american diner below my flat.  I have now put a 2 week ban on myself from any more starlite burgers as I appear to be consuming them at an alarming rate.  Might not be you playing santa claus this year Geffie Pa!!  Anyway we shall see if I make it 2 weeks... they put something in them that calls to me!! Ooh i could eat one now!!

Anyway Halloween at school was fun especially the cooked spagetti mixed with  cold porridge and red food dye!!  Then it was a much needed week off for half term.  Luke arrived on Sunday and after introducing him to the starlite burgers we caught the high speed train to St Petersburg the next day.   Lovely lovely hotel and unfortunately  when i booked they only had the deluxe doubles available instead of the regular so what can you do!  Breakfast in bed and double sinks ooh er fancy stuff!

St Petersburg is very different to Moscow as it is on a kind of grid system a bit like New York i think so just long long roads so very easy to navigate.  It had some very beautiful buildings compared to the more grey concrete boxes in Moscow although for some reason I like Moscow better I think because it's more like London and has lots of different kinds of areas and you can get a bit more lost in it.  St Petersburg def had more of a European feel though. So we spent two days doing the old cultury thing interspersed with eating lots of lovely food at some wonderful restaurants especially a Ukranian one with amazing borsch which had some very cool chappie on his casio keyboard banging out classic cheesy 80s rock songs!

The Hermitage was enormous and beautiful so could only saw a few bits and pieces of our choice and quite frankly my ability to walk long distances appears to be diminishing rapidly since i hit 30 .. give me a nice old coffee shop or bar any day!  Got ripped off by a cab driver whose meter read £20 after about 2 minutes literally in the car. Got out tutting and giving evil looks then read in the guide book to never get a taxi if you have not agreed a price before hand.  He saw us coming!

Weather was a bit iffy i don't think Luke saw the sun once in his 5 days which was a shame because Moscow in the sun I love love but without it its a bit dreary and grey.  It came out the day after he left though!

We had to go first class on the way back though on the train as no normal tickets left.  It did cost 3 times the price but was worth it was like being on a plane. Free drinks and they brought you a yummy dinner. Just before we boarded the train that evening we had tried to go for a massage that was advertised at the hotel.  However when we got there they only had room for a facial so while i went and had that Luke said he would go for a wander and be back in half an hour.  Half and hour later and he was not back and i had a text saying he had wandered into the jagermeister bar across the road and had accidentally ordered a liter of beer and would be there asap. So it turns out he did accidentally order it due to his total lack of russian but felt the need to drink the entire thing in half an hour just to save face!  Men are weird!
So he is obviously a bit merry as we board first class.  Then  this woman sitting on the other side of the aisle from us decides she is not happy about something and starts apparently having ago at the really nice stewardess who just stands there politely taking her torrent of abuse. No idea what her problem was think her bottled water might have been the wrong temperature!  So then Luke in his cheery state decides to give her the thumbs up!! This is when my eye defenders were put into use!

Last night in Moscow and we went to a club which was packed.  On returning from the toilet i found Luke sitting in our booth with two men.  He politely introduced me to Sergey and er forgot his name so lets say Vladimir.  Turns out Sergey may not have had all his faculties about him that night  for whatever reason and apparently took a shine to Luke and kept trying to stroke his leg interspersed with picking up our drinks and drinking them!    Sergey rapidly became very unpopular and we left him in his happy world soon after!
 Anyway so it was a fun week which went way too fast and i a have now been back at school a week.
We are on the countdown to the christmas concert which is a BIG deal at our school.  Obviously with my singing and dancing skills we have nothing to fear. chuckle chuckle! Hoping my more musically talented TA's will save me!  

I went to the cinema today for the first time after Hannah checked the film was in english.  Except when we got there it was not.  So i watched Straw dogs entirely in Russian with Hannah translating the main jist of the story  every now and then and actually it was pretty easy to understand due to it being a very visual ( and crap ) film! I have nearly learnt the russian alphabet and it had made a lot of difference in getting around.  Feel confident on metro now which when i arrived was a terrifying maze of weird words!

The first snow has fallen although not really settled yet and last week we got to -2.. but still wearing my heels and above the knee dresses!! Not sure that will last much longer!
Its funny the parents at my school don't like windows open in the classroom due to drafts but happy for children to go out in freezing temperatures!

from Russia with Love xx

Weird weddings and a bit more wodka...

So I have noticed a few times when out and about Brides walking around the city with their new husbands and friends.  Seemed like a weird thing to do just after your wedding to go for a ponder in around the city.  Yesterday on the bridge which approaches Christ the saviours cathedral ( which is just breath taking inside and out)  there were loads of brides.  What they do is come to the bridge and lock a padlock on it after they get married.  Very romantic i thought and a bit more civilised than getting off your face after the wedding like in the UK.. although i have a feeling they might just do that too what with all that Wodka about!

Hmmm so time is flying by again  and trying to remember all i have done.  School is great but long hours and so am pretty pooped in the week and also now do this thing called baby club once a week and also having to start extra lessons once a week for a child in my class.  All good as extra money but am looking forward to the half term next week so so much!  Luke is coming out to visit  for 5 days so am looking into taking a trip to St Petersburg as looks gorgeous but may stay here and just do some day trips.  I can't book anything until i get my passport back which is off somewhere having something done with visas etc... hopefully not being cloned!  I took great pleasure in telling Gilly  i sold it to a man on the street for lots of roubles!!  She was not amused!!

Feel i have well not exactly mastered the tube but am no longer having to mentally prepare myself before i get on it as kind of figured out the system it's just like london underground really but with weird words and way more people and less smiles!! I know hard to believe!  Oooh and way longer escalators.. they are super long!

Had a great night out last weekend at a karaoke bar with people from work... obviously with my rather fine voice i was not keen to sing in public ( sing star and a private booth in soho is perfectly acceptable but this was a restaurant!!)  However with a few wodkas and the promise of The scorpions.. winds of change ( my new favourite song!)   i suddenly felt my voice should be shared!!  And yes Tash i sang Gold too in memory of us!  I think the Russians really appreciated that one!

My kids are all lovely still and we are gearing up for halloween celebrations on friday.. we had a halloween party last night and i went as my usual black cat.  Ironically had a massive allergic reaction to the real cat that lived in the flat and spent most on the night thinking my lungs had shut down and freaking out i might have to go to  Russian casualty!  Maybe a slight overreaction. (moi??) All good now the fumes of all the cars have sorted me out!

As I walked home today along the big main road  either the president or the prime minister went by.  Way bigger fuss than when our lovely Queen drives past.  First there was about 15 police cars all with sirens going followed by these wicked old black sidecars, then about 20 blacked out beamers  and his car followed by a load more sirened police cars.  All going so crazily fast!

Right i need sleep and food.. still addicted to smetana and made the dangerous discovery of something called smetana cake in costa coffee.... there is no hope now!!

Bye bye xx

A place not to visit!

So after a lovely visa run to sunny England i made it back to Moscow.  On my flight back to the UK i sat next to a 50 odd something English guy who despite not looking keen on talking to me found the best course of action was acceptance. So i inundated him with questions about why he had been in Russia and if the place he had been was worth visiting ( a resounding NO!) Turns out he was a scientist working with the Americans measuring radioactivity levels and cancer rates in a place called Mayak near the Ural mountains.  He told me in the 50's they built a nuclear power station in about half the time it should take and due to cutting corners managed to contaminate the whole place.  Following a number of nuclear accidents the place is now classed as one of the most contaminated in the world.  So feeling a bit Erin Brockivichy I did some research and it made fascinating yet depressing reading http://thescreamonline.com/strange/strange08-01/chelyabinsk40.html.
Anyway i have halted my Brockivichy feelings at just reading as not to mention not having the cleavage i think the Russians are not too keen on snoopers!

MAYAK

I got back to Moscow airport last  night this time flying BA rather than Aeroflop.  Can't say it was much better.. in fact Aeroflot food was was nicer.  The Curry gods would be weeping if they had sampled BA's version of a chicken korma!  Still we did have an awfully polite northern pilot who welcomed us all on board about 15 times gushing at how he was here to serve us.. bless.  And everyone clapped when we landed again.  I have perfected cutting out all thoughts of crash landings as we land!
Erlan picked me up again in his amazing ancient Lada.. i was even more amazed when he went to open it and i realised it had central locking..surely not an original feature.  Again he drove us at alarming speeds towards Moscow with manouveres which would probably be found in training videos for what not to do on motorways!  I was even more happy when he explained to me in broken English that 'Miss Jenny told me drive Miss Rebecca fast fast so she can come to bar!'  Miss Jenny is not in my good books!
Slept of my jet lag till 1 pm..ahh nice.. went for a walk to find a new supermarket.. got lost..but was nice to look around.  Returned to familiar supermarket where on lining up to pay noticed a frail old woman behind me with one item.  Being the respectable member of society i am i gestured for her to go before me. Well frail my arse!!.. she lost the plot and started shouting at me in Russian complete with angry arm gesticulations and evil looks.  As i had no idea what she was saying i just smiled!  Not sure they have Help the Aged over here! Won't be doing that again!

Right bedtime..ready for the little angels tomorrow and a bit more smetana..i have been having withdrawal symptons!

Oooh and it's getting bloody chilly now!!!