Who uses the metric system, anyways?

Russia uses the metric system, apparently, and France I think. Fortunately, I studied physics at university and have used the metric system before (I don't think I've used it since). I can never remember the metric/English conversions, though. This has caused no small amount of confusion to my Russian friends when I tell them about America. "Yeah, a hot summer day in New England can get up to 200 degrees C, sometimes" or "The speed limit on the highway is usually 500 km/h, but most people drive faster." Good stuff.

Milk comes in bags?

Another aspect of Russian life that has proven to be a little tricky for the unprepared... milk often comes in plastic bags. This is fine, if you have a pitcher handy. If you don't, well, it can be awkward... Unless you're planning to use all .75 litres at once. Milk also comes in small box cartons, but not every store carries the box cartons. I'm learning that you need to learn which stores carry what products. The small magazines don't have a large selection and each one carries a different range of products. I have since bought a pitcher for the milk, but it took me a week and a half to find a store that sold pitchers. The second picture shows my temporary solution to my milk-in-a-bag problem

The Quest for Bumaga

This was my first purchase on my own here in Russia. When the American team left, I took a cab to the house and wanted nothing more than to crash by myself for a day or two. There was not a scrap of TP to be found in the whole house, however, so that got me out and about the neighbor hood real quick. Fortunately, there are small neighborhood stores ("magazines") that stock the basics all over the place. A word to the wise: it helps a great deal if you write down your shopping list in Russian ahead of time, instead of trying to use your pocket dictionary with the shop girl in real time. In this case, it would probably have greatly reduced the amount of giggling as I tried to find the word for toilet paper (which, remarkably, is not found in my pocket dictionary). Then again, the shop girl probably would have laughed at me, regardless. This type of bumaga is the sort you typically associate with Russia in your mind: the texture and consistancy of brown paper towel but not nearly the tensile strength. I have since found some stores that have better quality bumaga, but at the time it was all I could find and unprepared Americans can't be choosers.

Internet Access in Russia

I just got internet access here in Russia. It's been 2 1/2 weeks since the rest of the American team left and I've been (slowly) learning how to live here. Several days ago I got a crash course in Russian internet access technologies, while walking from store to store in Anapa with a Russian fellow named Igor. The land line phone infrastructure here isn't as developed as in the US, so most electronic communication is over the air. I was originally hoping to use a system called WiMax, which is a two-way receiver/transeiver that communicates line-of-sight with a tower on the hill. A little pricey, but WiMax supports up to 512 kb/s upload/download. Unfortunately, I live too close to the hill and a smaller hill blocks my view of the tower. Last Friday night I spent 2 hours walking from store to store with Igor shopping for modems. "Modem" seems to be a general term for any electronic device that accesses the internet in some way. A cell phone can be a modem, a USB device that accesses the GPRS network (at 5 kb/s) can be a modem, etc. I'm currently using my cell phone as a modem. Access speed isn't too bad, as long as other people in the neighborhood aren't making phone calls. The voice/data channel is shared between up to 20 people, locally, so the connection speed can be anywhere between 5kb/s and 100 kb/s (I think). I talked briefly with Pastor victor about setting up directed wifi antennas on our houses and sharing his WiMax connection, but decided to go with the Sputnik (satellite) option instead. So, I'm getting a satellite receiver installed today or tomorrow which will increase the download speed quite a bit (but not the upload speed). In a few more days I'm getting another "modem" (not sure exactly how this one works, but it requires a SIM card of it's own) which ought to increase my upload speed, if it works in my town. We'll see how that goes. In the meantime, I've got my cell phone modem at 5-100 kb/s. Later.