{"id":2214,"date":"2018-07-08T05:32:18","date_gmt":"2018-07-08T09:32:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/sla2018\/?p=2214"},"modified":"2018-07-08T10:00:55","modified_gmt":"2018-07-08T14:00:55","slug":"frustration-and-joy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/sla2018\/2018\/07\/08\/frustration-and-joy\/","title":{"rendered":"Frustration and Joy"},"content":{"rendered":"

It’s now been almost a month since I arrived here, and as I predicted in my last post, I haven’t had the easiest time here. To be honest, as far as language progress goes, I’m a little disappointed in myself. My vocabulary is very poor, and I’ve spent a lot of time wasting time, rather than sitting down and working on my vocabulary like I should. That isn’t necessarily true, because I do have a job now that takes a few hours out of my day, but there is a lot of time that I spend not doing anything at all, even seeing the city, and I’m starting to get a little frustrated. In class it’s showing, when day after day I’m the only one in the room who doesn’t know a word, and it’s tiring. Furthermore, in class there is one student who has very little respect for the rest of us and it shows, he’s dismissive, and sometimes outright rude, and takes up a lot of valuable time talking when the rest of us could be working our conversation skills and learning something. The frustration I feel, with myself mostly, is very real and sometimes a little difficult to handle. It gets very emotionally exhausting, especially when I feel like I have very few friends here. I have people I can talk to, and the students on the program with me, Russian and American, are all very kind, but there isn’t anyone here I feel like I can confide in, and the atmosphere in my host home is always a little awkward. I didn’t realize this could happen, but there is a very real stress that comes with not having a place in which you feel comfortable or a person with whom you feel comfortable. Nothing is terrible, I have people I’m friendly with and my host family is very sweet, but the emotional load just feels heavy sometimes, especially coupled with my disappointment in myself.<\/p>\n

On a lighter note, I have created some very wonderful connections in my first month here. My second week in, I went to the little playground in the courtyard of my apartment building to work on some words for myself. Out of the building came a \u0411\u0430\u0432\u0443\u0448\u043a\u0430 (grandmother) and her grandchildren, two boys. They started playing and eventually I worked up to talking to them, and then playing tag with the boys. The youngest (two, \u0410\u0440\u0445\u0438\u043f\u043a\u0430, Arkhipka) was at first a little suspicious and adorably protective of his older brother (\u0417\u0430\u0445\u0430\u0440\u043a\u0430, Zakharka), and they’re both very active. I proceeded to spend the next two hours running around with them, and learning the Russian rules to a familiar game from my childhood. If you care to find out: the person who is “it” is (\u0432\u043e\u0434\u0438\u0442) (leading) and you’re safe if you’re \u0432 \u0434\u043e\u043c\u0438\u043a\u0435 (in the little house). That day was the happiest I’d been in the country so far. The kids and they’re wonderful \u0411\u0430\u0431\u0430 \u041d\u0430\u0442\u0430\u0448\u0430 (Baba Natasha) were so welcoming and inclusive, despite the fact that I was a stranger and foreigner. Since then, they’ve taken me into their routine. I’ve met their mother, who loves talking to me and learning about english and helping me figure out how to say things in Russian, some other children: \u0424\u0435\u0434\u044f, \u0421\u043e\u043d\u044f, \u0421\u0442\u0451\u0440\u0430, \u041c\u0430\u0448\u0430) (Fyedya, Styopa, Sonia, Masha), and yesterday a wonderful old man with whom I talked about the music I play. They’ve shared ice cream with me, and Sonia even gave me a picture she drew!<\/p>\n

\"\"
It says \u0420\u0438\u0442\u0435! Which means, to Rita, which is what Im called because I introduced myself by my Russian name, which is Margarita<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Baba Natasha has really brought me in to her home, the family talks about me, and the kids wait for me to come outside and play with them. I feel really blessed to have met these amazing people, and to have been accepted into their little playground world, my terrible Russian and all. To be honest, I learn much more from them and from practicing with them than they ever could from me, and playing with them is my favorite part of the day.<\/p>\n

I’m also lucky, because I got to overhear a student in my program asking about volunteer opportunities with kids, and shamelessly asked if I could tag along. I’m glad I did. Five days a week, from five to seven pm, I am an English teacher at a learning center on the edge of the city. The kids range from 4 to 7 years old, and it’s absolutely an energetic bunch. I get the songs they learn stuck in my head mercilessly, but it’s so worth it. I even learn Russian during the moments when the kids refuse to speak English! I love working with them, and on friday, I even stayed after and talked with the other teachers, who are Russians, and got to do even more language practice!<\/p>\n

If I’m proud of one thing on this trip so far, it’s the connections I’ve made with kids. I’m so lucky to have this world of interaction and play and joy open to me while I’m here. It lightens the load of everything else, and is probably my saving grace on this trip.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It’s now been almost a month since I arrived here, and as I predicted in my last post, I haven’t had the easiest time here. To be honest, as far as language progress goes, I’m a little disappointed in myself. My vocabulary is very poor, and I’ve spent a lot of time wasting time, rather … Continue reading Frustration and Joy<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2990,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[115873,290963],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2214","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-russia","category-sla-blog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/sla2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2214","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/sla2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/sla2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/sla2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2990"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/sla2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2214"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/sla2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2214\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2220,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/sla2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2214\/revisions\/2220"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/sla2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2214"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/sla2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2214"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/sla2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2214"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}