с днём знанием!

September 1, is the first day of school across the nation... and therefore, of course, a huge holiday? On campus all afternoon, downtown in the main city square, and all along the main streets of Vladivostok (as elsewhere, I'm sure) hordes of people congregated around heavily decorated stages where various singers and dancers performed, students and teachers delivered heartfelt speeches, and little kids ran off with numerous balloons and cotton candied faces: all in celebration of Денъ Знании (the Day of Knowledge), the beginning of the academic year. A little bizarre at first, but ultimately rather touching, I think.

As a teaching assistant, my first classes won't actually begin until Tuesday, by which time any semblance of joy at the prospect of a new academic year will been thoroughly forgotten, I'm sure. But I remain optimistic, if not a little terrified, about having my own classes. I'll be teaching seven groups of 10-15 fourth year English students once every two weeks in conjunction with their regular classes. Everything else about my time here remains a mystery, but at least I know I have students!

Until Tuesday, I'm on my own to do... I don't even know what. The other students in my dorm are all very nice-- and because I'm in the foreigners' dorm, I live down the hall from student groups from Japan, North Korea, South Korea, and China. Rumor has it that there is a lone Frenchman on the floor above. The Japanese girls and I have discovered that we have a common language comprised of broken Russian smoothed over by lots of giggling. (Who knew a discussion about pelmeni could be so uproarious?) But that said, it has been pretty overwhelming to realize how very... alone... I am here. The closest fellow Fulbright ETA is a good thousand+ miles away, and every oblique contact I have here either doesn't seem to exist or will not arrive for another month.

So I spent the afternoon гулятьing around the city on my own, walking down to the famous waterfront along the Sea of Japan. My first view was of some incredibly ugly industrial barges... but then, thankfully, I got lost! And thus I kept walking until I found, well, the *other* bay (gulf) complete with bobbing sailboats, a colorful ferris wheel and permanent amusement park, ice cream and shashlik stands as far as my admittedly near-sighted eye could see, and tons of ridiculously happy people running around on a nice little strip of rather ugly beach.

Vladivostok is often compared to San Francisco and, to some extent, justifiably so. It's a relatively compact, hilly city similarly positioned on a bay (Golden Horn). The biggest city in the region and located within hours of Japan, China, and Korea, it feels much more cosmopolitan that I thought it might (though I don't know if that says more about how cosmopolitan it is or how little I thought it would be after visiting a couple of other cities of comparable size in the West?). Basically, there's a lot more shopping, many more tourists, and a good deal of shopping tourists that I hadn't really anticipated seeing here. I don't know whether that's a good or bad thing, but it is what it is, I guess? I also keep hearing about a really great burgeoning arts scene in the city, but I haven't yet figured out where or how to find it. But I suppose it is only day two, and if my Lonely Planet guide is right about Vlad being a nice place to visit "for a few days," the next eleven months should provide ample time to get to know it a bit better.

*i

P.S. The image is from an article on RussiaToday.com about the holiday, if any of y'all are interested in learning a bit more about it.

P.P.S. On the subject of images: I have a handful posted online here (http://www.picasaweb.google.com/yoon.irene) and there are others from my month in Moscow on a collective photo site of the Fulbright ETAs here (http://www.flickr.com/photos/11183682@N07).