Little Report on Today

The kids in my English Class
Don't let the serious little face in the middle of this group fool you. Kristina has got a major case of the giggles and they bubble out frequently. Natasha at the far right is no help. I thought about putting them at opposite corners of the table today, but alas, the table has no corners. :) So here we have, L to R, Vlad, Tonya, Kristina, Sasha, Natasha. (Pronounce Vlad with a flat 'O', as in clod or rod, NOT like the 'A' in dad. Tonya is pronounced with a long 'O' sound, like in Tony but it come out more like Tone-ya.)

These kids have all had 5 years of English at school. Let me tell you - their English is not too good. :( Kristina, however, is sharp as a tack, listens to my English and bits of Russian thrown in and often then translates it. She will probably make a very good translator some day in the future, if she keeps it up. The good news for me, is that when she translates what I'm saying, 99% of the time I know without a doubt whether she is translating it correctly or not! Now that is really progress on my part and makes me very happy.

Yesterday it was like an oven, going over to the home where we are meeting. Hot, hot, hot - with a good bit of muggy thrown in to make it just that much more exhausting. Fortunately, inside this room it is not too bad. The stone walls of this house, built in the 1960's, are very thick and insulate well, keeping the heat mostly out in the summer.

Today it was much cooler. Not cool, just cooler. After the classes today(Mel is teaching an Advanced English class to 3 or 4 adults and Julia is teaching a very beginning class to 2 or 3 kids and 1 adult), it really looked like it was going to rain. Mel and I rode a trolleybus home and about 45 minutes after coming in the door, the heavens opened up and the rain poured like buckets emptying from the sky. Here is a photo:If it was not so cloudy and dark, the sun would still be shining brightly this time of the afternoon. This photo is a little deceiving, though, because that is the drainspout from off the roof. Instead of all the water collecting and then pouring down inside the spout, the rain on the roof, two floors above us, collects at this point and then pours over the roof. A bit of it actually goes down the drain, but most of it falls all around the drain. Our balcony is soaked every time we have a hard rain. However, you can see how hard it is raining by looking into the distance. That's not fog - that is heavy rain.

Hopefully, tomorrow will be cooler and less muggy. Hopefully!