#notable things

went ice-skating: i was not that good at it but i wasn’t the worst, so that’s something. i had lemon tea afterwards, and then we took a taxi to the bar and i had a “strawberry and basil tini” which was kinda ok, i really love basil, and my first vodka in russia. 

after one drink i wanted to go home, but everyone else was staying, so i ordered a taxi! by myself! in russian! and it got me where i wanted to go! i was nowhere near as nervous for this as i am usually for english phonecalls and i have no idea why... perhaps it was the alcohol? anyway. i’m proud of myself.

part of the problem (it's not really that much of an issue I suppose) is that there's a very similar routine for each day is very similar: lessons from 9:30-1:30, followed by lunch, usually at the main shopping centre, followed by maybe another shop and then home and homework. this makes it difficult to distinguish from day to day. I guess it's just like being back at school, in some ways, except that all our lessons are in the same classroom here. 

Some notable things that have happened, not necessarily in chronological order: 

rang pip, but thought it was a wrong number because he sounded v Russian

went to the 7D experience at the cinema, twice. it's scary. 

visited the library with our teacher 

bab was worried about me, so bought me some soya "meat" to boost my protein intake 

lost my passport, went to the police, found my passport in my cupboard 

went to work in the library. we went to work on the music floor. to work there, you have to have a card stamped, which I did after explaining that I was English and didn't really understand. Ana did the same (except she's Bulgarian), we both sat down to work. they played the Beatles and some Bulgarian music on vinyl to make us feel at home. Lorenzo entered a few minutes later, and they asked him what he was doing wandering round their department, to which he replied that he was looking for some books, a perfectly reasonable thing to do in a library, in my opinion. they quickly escorted him out, and after that we could not find him. 

ate at a Georgian restaurant. The food took a long time and was disappointing. we had been promised that the meal would be too big to have fries as a side, but the reality was a lukewarm tomato, pepper, and an unidentifiable vegetable that was maybe meant to be an aubergine, each topped with a chunk of butter that hadn't even melted. definitely missed out on the fries. 

-Prime rib steak for the DJ, awww yeah~~ -Over an hour's worth of speeches throughout the night, half of which were the fault of the groom's mother, who clearly thought the evening was all about her. -"Let It Go" singalong on the packed dance floor. -Bride exited the party quite early after taking several shots and subsequently needing to be escorted to her hotel room and poured into bed. -Guest brought a beer bottle onto the dance floor and dropped it, forcing me to stop the dance and clear the floor because there were glass shards everywhere and several female guests in bare or stocking feet. -Drunk bridesmaid ran out and slipped and fell on her butt literally two seconds after I warned everyone to be careful because the floor was still wet. -Hotel concierge flirted with me when I went to get my parking validated.