Posted in Childbirth, Football, Pregnancy, Public Transport, Russia, tagged Euro 2008, European Cup 2008 on July 1, 2008 | 8 Comments »
So the contractions you were displaying proudly for the world here on the 20th, weren’t.
They were, according to the midwives, ’tightenings’ and, officially, did not hurt.
A comment which, by your third visit to the hospital for monitoring, after you had had a night of napping for five or ten minutes before being catapulted upright by a [...]
Posted in Football, Politics, Russia, tagged Champions League, Chelsea, Luzhniki, Manchester United on May 21, 2008 | 2 Comments »
People can sneer all they like about Russia’s managed democracy, but when a country is faced with the imminent invasion of the supporters of not one but two English football clubs, you have got to admire the government’s ability to declare a blanket ban not only on the consumption of alcohol in public but also on all [...]
Posted in Cinema, History, Patriotism, Pregnancy, Russia, War, tagged 9 Rota, 9th Company, Afghanistan, Fyodor Bondarchuk, Iraq, Vietnam on April 21, 2008 | No Comments »
A couple of weeks ago they showed a Russian film about the Russian Afghan war on TV called 9 Rota, or 9th Company.
You actually saw this when it first came out back in 2005 or thereabouts, but settled in to watch it anyway as you remembered it as being quite good, and in any case [...]
Posted in Advertising, Art, Communication, Culture Shock, Russia, tagged BT, Tracy Emin, Nescafe, Damien Hirst, Bistro, McDonald's, Nick Hornby on March 30, 2008 | No Comments »
Now you wouldn’t want to give anyone the impression that you are anti advertising.
Far from it, in fact. You find ads endlessly fascinating.
You take a secret delight in an industry that is blatantly all about manipulation. So much more honest than the pretence of making objective news reports.
It’s quite soothing just to be able to relax [...]
Posted in Alonso, Britain, F1, Fernando Alonso, Formula 1, Formula One, Hamilton, James Allen, Language, Lewis Hamilton, McLaren, Patriotism, Russia, Russian, The Rest of the World, War on August 5, 2007 | 6 Comments »
As a fan of formula one, your years in Russia were a bit frustrating.
It’s true that the races were generally available on one of the terrestrial channels, although it always seemed to take a few races for a deal for the TV rights to be struck. Missing the opening of the season every year and [...]
Posted in Britain, Children, Christmas, Detsky Mir, Hamley's, Marriage, New Year, Presents, Russia, Shopping, Ties, Wedding Anniversary on July 22, 2007 | 4 Comments »
Being the occasionally fond wife that you are, it occurred to you to start shopping for your husband’s present for your wedding anniversary (July 18th) bright and early this year.
Particularly because you wanted to buy him a (cuddly stuffed) camel. In the past, these have proved difficult to track down.
So you decided to go into the centre, [...]
Posted in Blogging, Communication, Culture Shock, Language, Russia, Russian on May 30, 2007 | 11 Comments »
The name ‘Solnushka’ isn’t one that any self respecting native Russian speaker would choose.
This is because it’s a term of endearment.
Loosely speaking, it means ’sun’.
But in actual fact, it’s closer to ‘cute little sunny wunny oochie coo’.
It is, essentially, the Russian equivalent of calling yourself ’sweet cheeks’. Or ‘honey bun’. Or ’sungglums’. Or something [...]
Posted in Aquarium, Boris Grebenshikov, Culture, Culture Shock, Music, Russia, Russian Underground Bands, the Royal Albert Hall on May 24, 2007 | 4 Comments »
So there you are at work, dubiously contemplating some hapless trainee’s latest assignment and grumbling wrathfully about the total inability of modern university trained youth to reference their sources in any manner which makes sense (”…what are they teaching them? Surely they can’t all have done travel and tourism for their degree?”), when a colleague comes in [...]
Posted in Britain, Communication, Culture, Culture Shock, ESC, Eurovision, Eurovision 2007, Eurovision Song Contest, Flags, Language, Lasha Tumbai, Morality, Music, Patriotism, Russia, TV, The Rest of the World, Ukraine on May 13, 2007 | 12 Comments »
You adore the Eurovision Song Contest and you say this totally without the kind of qualifiers that Brits usually add at this point. Such as ‘it’s so tragiclly kitsch’.
In fact, you are rather bemused by the fact that the British persist in regarding the thing as a monumental joke and yet follow programmes like Pop Idol with [...]
Posted in Architecture, Books, Britain, Culture Shock, Drink, Music, Public Transport, Russia, Sergei Lukyanenko, Sightseeing, The Rest of the World on April 23, 2007 | 7 Comments »
Having discovered that you had slightly misinterpreted the setting of the book by a Spanish author - with large chunks of it set in Spain simply because Spain is the centre of the universe, as opposed to somewhere suitably Continentally decedent for odd Art to take place - it got you thinking about the other series [...]
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