Let go of the marshmallow

It's been quite a while since I've written now. Some things have changed, but I've still got a bunch of homework, and I have just visited two more museums. But first; I have moved from the appartment with fleas to a new place. I live with a lady, she's 57, and she's very nice. I talk to here once in a while, when I eat breakfast, and come home from school. But I have to get used to listen to here, because at this moment I very little understand, mainly because she uses lots of words I've never heard before. And I think she thinks that I do too much homework:)
I have a big room for my selve, and nobody else from my class lives there. It's a nice feeling to walk to school alone, and just listen to music or podcasts. And it's a perfect distance from where I live to the university center; about 1/2 hour to walk.

This is the lamp in my room.



And this is the view from my window.

I have seen the place were Pushkin lived his last years, and died. It was very interesting, and our guide looked like a person from the middle age; he was quite skinny, he acted like an eurytmiteacher and I think he was secretly in love with Pushkins wife. He told us several times have she was considered the most beautiful woman in St. Petersburg and even in hole Russia.

Then, last friday, I went to a small kind of palace, but still in the middle of the city, where there had lived a very rich and well educated family. (what happened with the font?) Sounds like I'm dreaming now... what? alright. Well, I love this palace. It's called Jussupov Palace. I've been there once before, (then I even got to see the basement where they (tried to) kill Rasputin) and the interior is so beautiful. I simply loose my breath, if you can say it like that in english. I was so stupid to not bring my camera (mobilephone), so it's all gonna just stay in my head.


This is from one of me and Inger Johanne's translation sessions. It's become a tradition that we finish the translation, while we eat m&m's, then we go to our regular pirog-place, eat pirogs, and then right out our translation. Sometimes we have to do the last one over again, because the teacher wasn't complietely satisfied. Yeasterday, we even ate cake afterwards which we dipped in hot chocolate:). I think it became a tradition.


What is up with it?

And last friday almost everyone from my class went to Marinskij theater, and we saw the ballet "Sleeping beauty". It was really beautiful.

Tonight I had a dream. My mother was chasing me and wanted to kill me. She ran after me and throwed things at me. Larger and larger things. When she began to throw trees at me, I thought that it's better to be small, so she can't see me. But out soon found out that when I was that small, people woudn't see me, and since I was the size of a flea (which I do have some ambivalent feelings for, since they're in my bed) it was both disgusting and dangerous. (Now they wanted to kill me..) {Why do I so often dream about people chasing me?} Then I went back to normal size, and I went home to Tønsberg. But there, on Slottsfjellet, instead of the little tower, the stupid government had disided to build a castle in russian style, like the blue one on one of my first pictures. But they had of course made it norwegian-no sence of style-ugly, so parts of the castle was giant glasswindows, which, unfortunately, seems to be a must in newer architecture, and the walls was made of plastic, instead of stone. Nightmare.

This is from our enterence. Theres obviously no point in sending me anything.


This is our door.

I came over this church on my way to the excursion, and I remembered
that I went to a wedding here.

Mhm
Pushkin lived here from.. Oh, read it yourself, will ya.

This is the enterence of the same house.

Newly painted! Typical architecture from the time that the house was buildt..

Same enterence.

A woman who joined our excursion for a while.

Still in Pushkin's enterence hall.



This is the backside of the building where Pushkin lived, but
no one is sure on which floor.


Just a really messed up house. Looks like somebody occupied it, but then
for some reason regretted they're choice of occupation.

An old factory or prison?

Isak-katedralen. Men jeg får aldri gått inn..

So. I have now been here for three weeks, and I'm finally getting more used to Russia. And I've found out on which street I live. I haven't managed to do a lot of sightseeing yet, and I'm not sure if I ever gonna find the time. But I really want to go to Marinskij Theater to see The Brothers Karamasov, which I'm reading at the moment. But I only brought with me the first book, because I usually read very slow, and I thougt that the first book would last three months. But I'm done with it soon.. Maybe I should by them in russian.(?) So I have to use a year on each one of them..
This last weekend I went on a short excursion with the group which also study literature. I dont have the slightest idea what the teacher was talking about. We stood on the street, (which was of course noisy, and she talked almost to here self) and she showed us were Pushkin had lived when he was young. Later that day I went to see the Isaac Cathedral, and I also looked for a café that are called Art Café, but I didn't find it. I think its gone, and maybe replased with mcdonalds or something. I feel that it happens often, and it's anoying. I didn't do very much the rest of the weekend, I just tried to relax because I was sick last week. Oh, I did go to a bar on saturday evening. It's always nice to eat chocolate icecream in a bar, that late:) I think I'm gonna do it too often..

Novgorod

We went to Novgorod on Sunday. This is the Kremlin.


This church is very old. Almost 1000 years old. I think it is the oldest building in Russia,
but I dind't allways pay attention to the guide. Anyway, inside it was a
very sweet church.


This is the leaves inside the Kremlin.




A church..


A church.. ...


A church? No! A monastry!


Some trolls


A church or a monastry.


There are hundres of these houses along the road outside the big cities.
Some of them are terrebly old, and about fall apart. Some have allready fallen apart,
but people still live there. I didn't manage to take a picture of the more psychedelic houses
who are painted in sharp pink, voilet, turquoise and so on, and often with wooden "laces".





On the way home we ended up in a traffic jam, and we used an hour to move maybe 250 meters.
As you can see, there are four lines of cars in our direction, but there are originally just to lines in
each direction, so half of the cars were driving on the headshoulder and even outside it.

"час я покажу вам.."

The last days has been very nice. The weather has been brilliant, and it has changed the city completely, so that it's not so scary. And the sunsets (blue, orange, pink, purple and gold, almost) really suits the city. Me and Renate went for a walk on the canals around the main street Nevskij Prospekt, and it was very beatiful. And then we ate piroger on a pirogcafé, and you could taste that they were good in making them. Me and Camilla has made lots of bortsj at home. First Camilla tried to by some meat for the soup, without any bones, but the lady in the shop wouldn't let her, because -she knew how to make borsj, she had done it for 20 years.- So we had to buy more meat, and we bought 1 kg, so now we have to much meat and have to fill up with vegetables. It's going to be an evil circle..
What more is there to tell? We have lots of homework. And pancakes here are so good.


This is our homemade bortsj:)

This is Храм Спаса на Крови (The Cathedral of the Resurrection)

Fine farger. Og snart blir alle trærne gule.


Dette er en av kanalene. Det var fryktelig fint.

Dette er på vei til Oslo dagen før jeg dro.












Vi møttes på teatercafeen for en slags farvelmiddag.



















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