Travel day: 4 hour trip in 13

In Novosibirsk, boarding the Aeroflot flight to Moscow at 6:20 PM on Sunday.


Airport sign at the very recently remodeled Tolmachevo airport in Novosibirsk


There's no direct flight from Novosibirsk to Seoul so our itinerary took us west to Moscow where we connected with a Korean Air Lines flight going east to Seoul.


We flew to Moscow in about 4 hours, arriving at Sheremetyevo Terminal #1 at 7:30 PM. (Moscow is three time zones from Novosibirsk.) The KAL flight left Moscow's International Sheremetyevo Terminal #2 at 10:40 PM. About 4 hours later, as we were finishing dinner on the plane, the inflight map showed us approaching Novosibirsk. Now let's see: We had left Novosibirsk at 2:30 on Sunday afternoon and after an hour van ride to the airport, and a 1/2 hour van ride between the Moscow terminals and 8 hours on two planes we were just about to fly over Novosibirsk. Oh, it's all part of the adventure!


The point of this long story is that we have arrived safely and uneventfully in Seoul, Korea. Our plane touched down at Seoul-Incheon International a few minutes early at 12:54 PM today, Monday. We checked into the hotel at 3 (this is the view from our room;) connected to the internet; got a video call from Chad in Akademgorodok (via our Skype connection) at 3:25; Bob's taking a nap and I'm on my way. Our friends from San Francisco, Nicola and Chris, arrive later this evening to officially kick-off the Pacific coast part of our journey.

Check the World Clock to figure out the time difference. It looks to us that when it is 4:30 PM on Monday in Seoul, it is 1:30 AM on Monday in Minnesota. Whew!

Packing

It's our last day in Akademgorodok. We leave Sunday afternoon with Seoul, North Korea, as the next destination.
We're not sure how much time we have left on our NSU broadband connection for the internet.
We've exceeded our Skype limit for the month so can't add more to our account until Nov 1.
Looks like it's time to move along. We'll be back in Minneapolis in the afternoon on Nov 13. Between now and then, we're not sure what our connections will be. When we get to Honolulu on Nov 8 we'll have cell phone service again.
So, all of this is to say that our communications may be a bit sketchy for the next 10 days. If we get connected, we'll post the news! We've had a great stay in Siberia. We'll be talking about this trip for a long time. As with all successful journeys we have learned so much. We have met some wonderful people and have some good new friends.

This is our friend Daniel Gehrman who is helping to pack Peggy!

Seasonal Changes

This weekly feature will report on the season’s color. On a day-to-day basis, we often lose track of just how the color is changing. This will help us remember the progress of the seasons during our stay in Akademgorodok.

First week, Sep 17, 2006 at 12:18 PM


























Second week, Sep 23, 2006 at 12:16 PM


























Third week, Sep 30, 2006 at 12:52 PM


























Fourth week, Oct 7, 2006 at 1:40 PM


























Fifth week, Oct 14, 2006 at 1:24 PM

























Sixth week, Oct 21, 2006 at 3:37 PM



























Seventh week, Oct 28, 2006 at 3:38 PM

To the dentist's office

Last Friday morning after breakfast, I noticed that a piece of one of my molars was gone. It's a tooth with a large filling and it was a small corner that seemed to be missing. I emailed Jim Cheever in Minneapolis who has been taking care of my teeth for 31 years. Jim was out of town but Judy relayed the message to him and returned his advice to me. On Tuesday evening, when we were out with Chad, Zhenya, and Daniel, I mentioned my tooth. Immediately, Chad was on the phone to his dentist. At 8 in the evening he made an appointment for this afternoon. So, my tooth is fixed, at least temporarily.

Akademgorodok dentist

This is what I reported to Jim:
"I'm sorry I can't tell you the name of my Siberian dentist. Chad Gehrman, our new friend (from Wayzata) who has lived here for 13 years accompanied me and did the translating. He explained the problem. She examined the tooth, said she'd do a temporary filling that would get me home if I was careful with it. It was very much like being at your Brookside office! Same stuff in my mouth; picking, sanding; putting some stuff in the tooth, putting the black-light gun to it; more stuff in the tooth, more light gun. Then some sanding(grinding?) Her only English words: "open" and "close." After this, a little more smoothing and then done. No Novocain--she said I wouldn't need it and I didn't. At the end of her work, she said I should have those other fillings replaced too! I said they were about 45-50 years old. She raised her eye brows at that. She and her assistant agreed to have their pictures taken though they thought I was a little strange. Probably am.



Her assistant




"When she was finished, Chad and I went out to the front desk. The bill was 150 rubles. We looked at each other and agreed the price should be checked. Yes, that was correct: $5.77!"

The opera, Eugene Onegin

Opera and Ballet Theater










Eugene Onegin sign










Ilya and Bob












Olga and other teachers












Helpful students from Gymnasium #12 with Peggy







Curtain call for singers
Back to the Opera and Ballet Theater

The ballet, Giselle

Professor Almira Yusupova is the curriculum coordinator for Bob's visit here. When we first met with Almira at the beginning of our visit, she asked us if there was anything in particular that we wanted to do or see while we were here. We told her that we’d like to see a performance at the Opera and Ballet Theater. Last week she told us she had tickets for the ballet, Giselle, and invited us to join her family for the performance.

This afternoon we met Sophia, Almira’s daughter, and traveled with her to the theater. Since we had arrived in plenty of time, we were able to enjoy a photo exhibition of the renovation of this enormous hall. With its renovation completed, it reopened in December 2005. We still had time to have a snack in the café. The theater has cafes which serve finger foods, desserts and beverages.

We met Almira, and Sophia’s dad, Rais, before the performance began. This theater is the largest in Russia, larger than Moscow’s Bolshoi (which means “big” by the way.) Rais observed that much of the interior wood had been salvaged and refinished, some of the work being done in St Petersburg. These chairs were redone in St. Petersburg.




The ballet was beautiful.
As we were departing the theater, Rais ran into a school mate from years ago. She asked him what he thought about the performance. After he gave her a good report, she told him that her daughter had danced the part of Giselle!

When we emerged from the building, Rais told us about some prominent buildings in the Ploschad Lenina where the theater is located: the former trade building which was built at the turn of the century and now houses the Regional Studies Museum; the mayor’s office; the geographic center of Russia (really of the former Soviet Union) is about a block away. From her childhood days, Almira remembered the square without the massive statues of Lenin and his comrades. She said they are impossible to remove because of their enormous size.

After the concert, Rais drove all of us back to Akademgorodok. He pointed out sights along the way, while Sophia translated for us. A very nice evening with this charming family.

The Cyrillic Alphabet

We love it when your email and comments ask us questions. This reminds us of things we want to tell you. Kathie C asked, "Can you speak Russian now?"

Da! That means "yes" and the true answer is "no" which looks like "he" in Cyrillic and sounds like "knee-ette" in English. Peggy can manage about 30 words of vocabulary. Bob is much better. It would take a lot of study to get the hang of this language. We are pleased that we can do transliterations of the alphabet: 31 letters including hard and soft marks that change the sounds. Not to mention the change of intonation depending on which of the 10 vowels follow which consonants. Eeekkk!


These are some signs in Novosibirsk and Akademgorodok.
First: Novosibirsk logo
Second: House address
Third: Memorial path sign
Fourth: Zoo entrance


This web-site, signs in Russian, shows 100 signs in Russian with hints as to translations. They are fun to see.

Bob's new shirt

Tonight we returned to the Chinese restaurant. After dinner, Olga, Sasha, and Paulina presented Bob with a Novosibirsk State University t-shirt. You can see how pleased he is. You will see a lot of it when we get home!

Election day in Siberia

Our absentee ballots arrived this morning via FedEx. We cast our secret ballots and they are going back FedEx in the morning. Though our ballots are secret, it is no secret that we voted for Peter Hutchinson, Mark Ritchie, and Amy Klobuchar! We are in the International Studies Office at NSU in this photo.

Bob is handing our completed ballots to Ian Reznitchenko so that he can deliver them to the FedEx driver in the morning. Ian has been our university contact for our stay here. He has answered a myriad of questions and smoothed the way for our stay. We could not have done this visit without all of his guidance and assistance. You can tell from his photo what a pleasant fellow he is!

Later in the afternoon we ran into Ian and his son Grigory at the Trade Center in Akademgorodok.

8th graders and the zoo, too

Today we met with Olga’s 8th graders—an enthusiastic group. We had a lively conversation and were pleased to see some familiar faces among them. At the end of the class they surprised us by asking for our autographs.
















The next class was the “optional” English group. We would call this an elective class. We had met with them before and they suggested that we come back for an excursion to the zoo. We walked to the zoo with Anya, Anya, Nick, Helen, and Olga. Nikita and Andrew joined us a little later.



The zoo was a great place to exchange vocabulary words. We saw several different kinds of bears. This huge Russian bear was impressive when he stretched up the side of this cage.










An interesting animal turned out to be a yellow-throated marten. The Novosibirsk zoo is one of only four zoos where this species breeds.








This is a better photo from the internet.








There are white tigers who have been at the zoo only a few years.














A unique animal is the liger whose father was an African lion and whose mother was a Bengal tiger.






We really enjoyed our time at the zoo with these students. They found our feeble attempts at Russian humorous but were patient in helping us with pronunciations. They are great teachers.






























Bob, Anya, Helen, Nick, Olga, Nikita, and Andy.




When we left the zoo, the students went their different ways and we returned to school with Olga. She pulled out the hot water pot and choco pies and tea for a warmer-up. What a pleasant way to end our visit.