Archive for April, 2008
Yeltsin gets a street, Dostoevsky gets married & Russian soldiers commit suicide Posted by josefina on Apr 24, 2008
Politics, huh? Russian politics are great, very entertaining and at times rather frightening – just not my shot of vodka, if you get my drift. When I started out as a ‘watcher & commentator on Russian life’ [particularly from a Siberian point of view] back in 2005 at the tender age of 20, I was…
Only in Russian: Хлопотать! Posted by josefina on Apr 21, 2008
Once in a while you come across a new word in a foreign language that just grabs a hold of you hard and refuses to let go for a long period of time. This word can be as plain as vanilla ice-cream, but it is more often than not an exotic word, and frequently also…
Random Russian Reports Posted by josefina on Apr 17, 2008
For some reason whenever I’m searching for some interesting piece of news from the Великая Родина [Great Motherland] to comment on here, there’s nothing even remotely interesting to be found on any of the many abundant Russian news sites. I’m not just trying to find a news story to comment on in a purely ‘journalistic’…
20th Century Russian Lit Reading Tip: «Зависть» Posted by josefina on Apr 14, 2008
Sometimes the lists of books assigned for you to read during the course of a semester for a class at an institution of higher (or middle) education can make you feel anything but excited or even a tiny bit thrilled. Usuallly the student asks himself (or herself) the following question (given that the class being…
Who Is Mikola Gogol? Posted by josefina on Apr 12, 2008
This morning, while browsing through the main page of www.izvestia.ru for some appropriate piece of Russian news to comment on here, I came across this fascinating headline: «Микола Гоголь – нарезка в семи томах: украинские переводчики отредактировали и подправили “пророссийскую” повесть Гоголя “Тарас Бульба”» [Mikola Gogol – a slicing in seven volumes: Ukrainian translators edited…
Omniglot: An Invaluable Reference for Language Enthusiasts Posted by josefina on Apr 9, 2008
Simon Ager, otherwise known as Omniglot, is well known in the language learning community. His online language resources are unparalleled, and provide perhaps the best, most accessible alphabetic reference available. For those of you who are starting out with Russian and are still frustrated by the Cyrillic alphabet, be sure to check out his…
Russian Phraseology: Nose Posted by josefina on Apr 9, 2008
Even long before the main hero of Nikolaj Gogol’s [Николай Гоголь] short story «Нос» [“The Nose”] met his own nose on Nevsky Prospect dressed as a general, the nose had a special place in Russian culture and language. A couple of days ago I was reading my favorite Russian weekly newspaper and came across an…