A Lovely Afternoon

It may seem strange, but I love quiet, peaceful, chilly afternoons in which I can read poetry and classics with a cup of hot coffee. Today was one such day. I did have a short essay to write, but I got it done by 2:00 PM. After I submitted the assignment, I went straight to the coffee maker to brew a fresh pot of liquid bliss. As the coffee was brewing, I worked on my Russian (I did lesson three for the THIRD time!). Then I poured my coffee and sat down for a two hour read in Natasha's Dance: A Cultural History of Russia. OK, so it's not exactly a classic, but it was very interesting. I love learning about the paradoxical nature of Russian culture in the 17Th and 18Th centuries. To many, this may seem like an extremely boring day, but I enjoyed it thoroughly!

Russian

I absolutely love the Russian language! I started to take Russian at the beginning of the summer and found that it was much harder a language than Arabic (the language I was dabbling in last year). I don't know why, but when I was studying Arabic, everything I learned seemed to stick to my mind a lot faster than French (the language I spent over a year studying and cant seem to remember at all!). In fact, I still remember all of the conversations that I learned in Arabic one year ago; strange, I know. The ease with which I can pick up on Arabic goes to show that I am not taking the easy way out with Russian; indeed, I find Russian to be harder than both Arabic and French put together! I'm serious! Some of the sounds that one has to make while speaking this beautiful language feel completely unnatural and alien. I have to do each lesson at least three times before I can fully grasp the content. But it is a labor of love, and all the mental blood, sweat and tears are worth it in the end.