Happy happy new year!

It's time to stop being lazy and write about my year, for the friends and family who've asked me to! We'll brush aside the fact that this is the only thing I've bothered to write in 2017. I think I can manage to stop eating cake just long enough to get this all down...

January: The temperature went down to -33C/F (it's pretty much the same at that point).  Luckily we were all on vacation and didn't need to go outside.  Which we didn't.

(skipping months where nothing much happened and moving on)

March: Steve announced that he was ABANDONING ME to find his own place.  But then I found Masha, who is even more awesome.  Also I turned 27 surrounded by close friends (or as I like to say, celebrated the 2nd anniversary of my 25th birthday).

May: We had nice summer weather for the May holidays, followed by snow.  First attempt at a business trip to Tatarstan foiled by Moscow traffic.

June: There was more snow, but I dodged that bullet by going home! Attended my best friend's engagement party and said yes to the bridesmaid dress.  Visited Williams for my 5 year reunion, which was everything I expected and more. Had another mini reunion in NYC, and attended my first Pride parade thanks to Ben and Bill.  Was home for both my mom's birthday and Father's Day for the first time in 5 years. Spent a lot of time on the beach.

July: 24 hours after arriving in Moscow I was on my way back to the airport for Kazan, where I was a speaker at the FISU (International University Sports Federation) volunteer training academy. Then I went onward to Aktanysh, ie the middle of nowhere, to observe lessons at a summer camp and speak with some of the children (many of whom had never met a native speaker before). 

August: Our friends from Aktanysh came to Moscow for a week of training seminars that I got to help lead.  Then I fulfilled my long-time dream of travelling to Barcelona! More beach time, plus great food, amazing people, and all the Gaudi architecture my little heart desired.  We also managed to visit the highest point around at Tibidabo. 

October: The memory that sticks out most is Halloween, which I hosted at mine before heading to a club.  I did my Pinterest best and introduced the Russians to worms in the mud.  I was also responsible for the Halloween event one of our clients requested, where we discussed and then planned extreme pranks 💀

November: Thanksgiving! As usual, we celebrated twice.  This was the home stretch until Christmas.  But first...

December: ...I got really sick for a couple of weeks.  What's winter without being out of commission for a week or two? But thanks to the internet I was able to get all of my Christmas shopping done and watch loads of movies.  Speaking of which, STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDI. We celebrated Christmas with 2 feasts as well, and I lead a whole bevy of Christmas events for the companies we work with which was actually really fun.  I showed them how to decorate Christmas cookies American style, and then got shown up by them. My lovely students gave me tons of cake and tea and chocolate that I'm currently working my way through.  I've walked around plenty and seen Moscow in all its New Year's glory.  Now all that's left is to wait for the New Year and see what it has in store for all of us!

Black Fog

Yesterday, there was apparently a thick, black smoke in some parts of Moscow.  I say "apparently" because I luckily didn't encounter it, despite being in the center of Moscow for work and outside quite a bit.  It was also absent from where I live in the north-west of the city, so hopefully it's cleared up soon! Not before the State Department sent out an emergency email warning to all US citizens registered with the embassy saying we should stay indoors.

In other, lesser news, we celebrated Halloween last week with painted faces and good times; the holiday is becoming more popular in Moscow, at least among my age group.  My 12 year old student assured me that the day isn't observed in any of the state schools, so I decided it would be appropriate to spend a portion of our lesson watching Hocus Pocus.  

That's all I have for now, just a brief update. Also, in case you missed it, Putin being super suave in China. 

Kheppi Khelloween

...and now you know the Russian pronunciation for "Happy Halloween"! Some days, I completely forget I'm in Russia.  I speak English all day, and I go to/from work and meeting my friends without anything to remind me I live in Moscow.  On other days, however, I'm sharply reminded of where I am.  Halloween was one of these days, as were the several after leading up to today.

As I exited the metro at Mayakovskaya to walk to work on Halloween, I immediately noticed that I would need to take a different route.  The babushki (I taught you this word twice already. If you don't remember, you have no one to blame but yourself) selling gloves/socks/magazines/you-name-it had been replaced by metal barricades and more police than I have ever seen in one place.  Despite REALLY wanting to ask one of them what was going on, I reminded myself that they are not my friends. I had to keep reminding myself of this as I fought the urge to pet the police dogs, but it became easier when I noticed some of them wearing muzzles.  Yikes.  After figuring out how to get around the barricades, I saw that all of the Mercedeses, BMWs, Audis, Lexuses, and Range Rovers that normally line the street leading up to the EF building had disappeared as well and been replaced with big trucks and buses....probably explaining how every cop in Moscow got to Mayakovskaya.  There was a big traffic jam in front of our building, and as I wove through it, someone started blaring an instrumental version of a Cheburashka song (for those of you unfamiliar with this, Cheburashka is an old Soviet cartoon that is still popular.  I'll post a youtube video below to help you out here...don't say I never did anything for you!)  As I stood in front of EF with a face-splitting grin on, the usually grumpy security guard walked out, laughed saying "Great music, eh?", and then held the door open as I entered.  The only average thing about my morning was that it snowed, like every other day.  At work, we all dressed up (I was Sherlock Holmes. Chien drew a mustache on my face, Vanessa lent me a magnifying glass and bow tie, and Nicole lent me a checkered jacket. I'll try to post pictures soon) and had fun classes...again, a day out of the ordinary.

At this point, many of you are probably wondering what the whole police-and-barricades situation was all about. On the 31st day of each month, protesters gather in the square to support the right of peaceful assembly in Russia.  The Russian government is none too happy about this, and the result is a swarm of cops.

We also have a holiday this week: Day of Russia.  This means that I get Saturday and Monday off, in addition to my usual Sunday.  In short, a gift from Russia to workers (Edit: it has been pointed out by a friend that the holiday is actually Unity Day , click on that link to learn more. Still a gift thanks to the glorious days off).  This coincided with a teachers' party at work on Friday, where we ate too many cookies, drank cocktails, played Mafia, completed a team-building exercise, and were finally told (officially) where our new school location will be (answer:Starbucks where we play Mafia on Thursdays.  Hello daily coffee fix, goodbye salary).  I spent my Saturday off reading in bed, playing board games with Ulianna and Chien, and then going to English Social Club to meet friends at Hudson Bar (where they had special election day shots and cocktails...I didn't try any, but it was a cute idea) before going to a bar called Casa Agave, where we celebrated Day of the Dead by eating Mexican food and dancing salsa. Lyuba, Gleb and I literally ran to the metro to avoid being stranded, and I thought about how I never expected to sit in a Moscow bar listening to salsa and reggaeton, but there it was. Today (which is Sunday) I left the house only for groceries and plan on spending the rest of the day inside, but tomorrow should be another fun, relaxing day before getting back to work.  What did you guys do for Halloween?!

The little fuzzy thing is Cheburashka.  He is not a boy but also not an animal.  Hope that helps clear things up a little.