Our schedule is beginning to look a little bit more routine. Every weekday, we get up and meet downstairs at 10:00 AM. We then walk to the Faculty of Foreign Languages as a group and sit through a lecture. At 12:00 we stop the lecture to listen and discuss oral presentations from those in our group about the places that we went to the previous day. This is good, because it gives us a chance to think and reflect on all of the different things that we've been doing. At 12:30, we eat a hardy lunch in the faculty cafeteria (the lunch ladies get angry if we're late). Around 1:30 we go on some kind of excursion, either a museum or a tour of some kind. By 5:00 PM, we have time to rest and eat dinner. We may have a night trip at some point (like the opera) but this schedule is pretty regular.
Dr. Goeckel gave us a lecture on Soviet and Post-Soviet Economic Policy this morning. While I don't wish to give a general outline of the notes, I found it interesting that Putin became so popular in his first term because he helped Russia recover from the economic catastrophe during the Yeltsin years. Putin lowered and simplified taxes, reformed the land and labor code, balanced the budget, and challenged the oligarchs during his first eight years as president. Exports and oil prices increased under Putin, and Russians were able to become more confident about having a capitalist economy. Russians associated Putin with prosperity, which is why his approval rating was in the 70's. He was a capitalist who people could feel comfortable with.
That afternoon, we took a bus to the Museum of the Great Patriotic War, which is located in Victory Park. It was probably the largest museum we've been to, but also the most interesting to date. The bottom floor gave a general outline of the major battles between the Nazis and Soviets. Interesting fact that I learned today: Moscow was never renamed Stalingrad. Stalingrad was actually located eight hours southeast of Moscow in what is now called Volgograd (named after the Volga River which passes through the town). For some reason, I thought that because St. Petersburg was renamed Leningrad, that Stalin would be pompous enough to name the capital after himself. I guess I never gave Stalin's ego enough credit. Tangent over.
When we went up the stairs of the museum to the second floor, our group could hear several marching drums being played. As we walked up, we could see at least one hundred Russians all in uniform marching down the stairway. Jane, one of the Russian students, explained to us that the older men in the front were veterans who served in the Soviet navy. Behind them were about eighty children and young adults, who were apparently pupils in the naval academy. The students couldn't be over the age of fifteen (some as young as twelve), yet they had already chosen their career path. And here I am, a twenty year-old college student, still wondering what field I want to go into. Being the camera-happy young tourists that we are, we took a picture with the navy cadets.
There was a section dedicated to the German occupation of the Soviet Union on the third floor. I found it particularly interesting because the exhibit gave mention to Jewish members of the USSR that were exterminated during the occupation, despite anti-Semitic undertones in Russia. On display was a Hebrew prayer book, a torah handle, a star that marked people "Jude" ("Jewish") in the ghettos, Jewish-German ghetto currency, and, most gruesomely, teeth and toenails from Holocaust victims. The Holocaust imagery was more graphic than what I had seen in Hebrew school. A video, for example, showed the emaciated lifeless bodies of exterminated Jews stacked up on top of each other and being incinerated in a giant oven. Not the type of imagery that I would have liked to see, but something that I kind of had to see.
On May 9th, Russians celebrate Victory Day to commemorate the Soviet Victory over the Germans in 1945. It is usually a lot more popular and emotional than our Veterans' Day, especially since the fall of the Soviet Union, when International Workers' Day (May Day) was a day on the communist calendar, which occurred a week earlier. People usually wear orange and black ribbons (I guess the veterans are Syracuse basketball fans). Jane was able to get us ribbons for free. I tied mine on my backpack.
Dr. Goeckel gave us a lecture on Soviet and Post-Soviet Economic Policy this morning. While I don't wish to give a general outline of the notes, I found it interesting that Putin became so popular in his first term because he helped Russia recover from the economic catastrophe during the Yeltsin years. Putin lowered and simplified taxes, reformed the land and labor code, balanced the budget, and challenged the oligarchs during his first eight years as president. Exports and oil prices increased under Putin, and Russians were able to become more confident about having a capitalist economy. Russians associated Putin with prosperity, which is why his approval rating was in the 70's. He was a capitalist who people could feel comfortable with.
That afternoon, we took a bus to the Museum of the Great Patriotic War, which is located in Victory Park. It was probably the largest museum we've been to, but also the most interesting to date. The bottom floor gave a general outline of the major battles between the Nazis and Soviets. Interesting fact that I learned today: Moscow was never renamed Stalingrad. Stalingrad was actually located eight hours southeast of Moscow in what is now called Volgograd (named after the Volga River which passes through the town). For some reason, I thought that because St. Petersburg was renamed Leningrad, that Stalin would be pompous enough to name the capital after himself. I guess I never gave Stalin's ego enough credit. Tangent over.
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| Museum of the Great Patriotic War |
When we went up the stairs of the museum to the second floor, our group could hear several marching drums being played. As we walked up, we could see at least one hundred Russians all in uniform marching down the stairway. Jane, one of the Russian students, explained to us that the older men in the front were veterans who served in the Soviet navy. Behind them were about eighty children and young adults, who were apparently pupils in the naval academy. The students couldn't be over the age of fifteen (some as young as twelve), yet they had already chosen their career path. And here I am, a twenty year-old college student, still wondering what field I want to go into. Being the camera-happy young tourists that we are, we took a picture with the navy cadets.
There was a section dedicated to the German occupation of the Soviet Union on the third floor. I found it particularly interesting because the exhibit gave mention to Jewish members of the USSR that were exterminated during the occupation, despite anti-Semitic undertones in Russia. On display was a Hebrew prayer book, a torah handle, a star that marked people "Jude" ("Jewish") in the ghettos, Jewish-German ghetto currency, and, most gruesomely, teeth and toenails from Holocaust victims. The Holocaust imagery was more graphic than what I had seen in Hebrew school. A video, for example, showed the emaciated lifeless bodies of exterminated Jews stacked up on top of each other and being incinerated in a giant oven. Not the type of imagery that I would have liked to see, but something that I kind of had to see.
On May 9th, Russians celebrate Victory Day to commemorate the Soviet Victory over the Germans in 1945. It is usually a lot more popular and emotional than our Veterans' Day, especially since the fall of the Soviet Union, when International Workers' Day (May Day) was a day on the communist calendar, which occurred a week earlier. People usually wear orange and black ribbons (I guess the veterans are Syracuse basketball fans). Jane was able to get us ribbons for free. I tied mine on my backpack.
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