My study abroad program this summer is hosted by St. Petersburg State University. Our study center is located at the university's Smolny campus. Smolny host three different departments, sociology, international relations and political science. CIEE's offices and classrooms are within the political science faculty. I take two classes throughout the summer. Each class meets for five 90-minute sessions every week -- talk about a lot of time in school! I am taking an Intermediate Russian Language class that is taught solely in Russian and boy has it showed me how out of touch I am with my language skills! Thankfully, I am quickly remembering a lot of the basics. I hope the moment arrives when all of my Russian language knowledge comes flooding back to me instantaneously, I won't hold my breath for it though! Huge shout out to my high school Russian teacher Mrs. Levina; yes I would cry in the hallway before your class started, and yes I would sweat bullets while you yelled Russian grammar rules at us, and yes I would try and frantically calculate who you were going to pick on next; but now I realize the reason for my suffering, so I can survive this class and life in St. Petersburg!!!! Seriously though I never realized how much she actually taught me in my various classes with her!
The second course I am taking here is called "Cultural Myths and Realities of St. Petersburg." The professor seems really great and not afraid to speak his mind on the current status of Russia and its complex political system. Our first class he even touched on some development issues, like education, sanitation, food security, and disaster relief, which was fascinating for me! I'm looking forward to his insights on other issues facing Russia, even though it is technically a literature class! Today we spent our class at the Summer Gardens. The grounds were beautiful and every few minutes we would stop and discuss the garden's symbolism, how it has affected the city over time, and one of our in class motif's which is water and flooding in St. Petersburg! Our class excursions always connect back to Russian literature or film media. Surprisingly, the majority of these cultural texts I have already been exposed to thanks to Mr. Callahan's College Russian class! Still in shock that week one of classes has come to a close -- crazy to think there are only five more weeks in Russia!
