Category: Russia

Coffee and Teaching in Russia…


I was drinking that morning cup of coffee after walking the dog. Boza was glad that him and I could tromp through the snow and check out our special places that we always go to. Sveta had been walking Boza since I was feeling rough…

So now Boza and I are walking again… 🙂

So what was I thinking about today while drinking coffee? Glad you asked…

I was thinking about a young student who I am teaching English to. He is a bright artistic young man (he is 9 years old) that is struggling with English because he missed a good portion of the last year of school due to illness and it was a very important year for basics of English…

In Russia from what I can tell everyone is taught English when they are young. Sveta said that she had English most of her life as she grew up. They also learn French and German but English seems to be the second language of necessity. This brings us to…

In Moscow, Russia someone can make a living teaching English. The demand is high and I am amazed at the price that I see these non certified English schools charging. Several schools near us are averaging over a 1000 rubles ($30) per individual of a 12 person group (yes $360 hour), per academic hour (45 minutes). Private lessons at schools are much much higher. The schools are over flowing with students of all ages. So someone with the ability, nerve and desire can make a lot of money tutoring in Russia…

But I am not teaching him for the money and I do not expect money for teaching him. I am teaching him English because he needs help. But the money issue is what brings me to this article. I grew up in a world of corporations that heaven forbid you better take care of the bottom line and make a profit. Even if you give it away, there better be profit in it. Since those days I have discovered a better bottom line and a better profit… 🙂

The grandmother is the person who found me. She heard Sveta and I talking in English one day this summer. Then she approached with her predicament that her grandson needed help before school started. I said that I would be happy to work with her grandson and his English. They are a typical Russian family and money is very hard to come by. The boys parents have no way to afford lessons and this was the grandmothers burden to bear…

So I said 300 rubles per real hour. I expected nothing but realized that they had to have a price because charity was not going to be accepted. So that started my entrance as a family member in a Russian family of strangers…

In Russia the teacher is someone very important. In the case of tutoring like I am doing. I go to their home and teach three times a week in their surroundings. They pay as they can and usually it is in the form of food. Such as tea leaves, baked cabbage pies, frozen fish and many other food items. Even coffee. In fact the food that Sveta and I get far exceeds any cash amount that I could ever demand for the services…

Treats are also very common and since I can not have treats, it has been hard to explain that issue. They just have to give treats to the teacher. It is tradition and if the teacher would refuse it would be an insult to them. So Sveta’s mom and uncle have benefited from the treats I get. Sveta refuses to eat them because I can not…

I usually go to their place and the boy is alone sometimes. We have our lesson and usually I spend two hours at the price of one. The family trusts me and wishes me in their household at all times. They always try to get you to eat a meal with them. Sveta has explained to me that I am their teacher. That I am a family member in their home and life…

It is strange to me and has been an adjustment for me to accept the fact that I am like family with them. Yet here I am, an America from a whole different world than what is common here and they treat me like one of the family…

By the way, when we first started with this boy he was not able to say his ABC’s and in less than 6 months we have got him reading from this years text books…

I am proud of him…

Windows to Russia!

South Korea is Provoking North Korea?


{Guest Post} A day after the November 23rd Yŏnpyŏngdo attack, Justin Raimondo rightly noted that “the South Koreans were conducting military ‘exercises’ near the disputed island, which North Korea claims as its territory, and South Korean ships had opened fire,” going on to suggest that “the military exercises, code-named ‘Hoguk,’ involving all four branches of the South Korean armed forces and some 70,000 troops, simulated an attack on North Korea, and were meant to provoke the North Koreans, who responded as might be expected” [Korean Conundrum: Is There a Way Out?]. He continued, “US troops were supposed to have participated in the exercises, but apparently the Americans thought better of it and pulled back at the last moment – perhaps because they knew a provocation was in the making”.

Mr. Raimondo went on to argue, even more pointedly, “For the South Koreans to conduct military exercises in this explosive region, never mind firing off rounds, is nothing but a naked provocation of the sort the West routinely ascribes to Pyongyang. In the context of North Korea’s recent revelation that it is increasing its nuclear capacity, the South Korean military maneuvers were meant to elicit a violent response – and succeeded in doing so”.

A few days later, South Korean President Lee Myung-bak said of the incident, “Launching a military attack on civilians is a crime against humanity, even during wartime” [South Korean president takes responsibility for failing to protect country, signals hardened military stance toward North]. Of course, he is about right attacks on civilians being crimes against humanity, but he said nothing of the irresponsibility of holding war games so close to an inhabited and disputed island.

Read More of: Who’s Provoking Whom in the Koreas?

Copyright © 2010 by LewRockwell.com. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit is given.

Thanks!

Patty Lane

{Guest Post and Links plus picture request added by Admin}

Windows to Russia!

Will The START Treaty Be Passed in the American Senate?


The American Senate is going to try (attempt) to pass a proposed nuclear arms reduction treaty with Russia (START) as early as today, even though Republican’s say that there is too little time before Christmas breaks this year to properly study the disputed treaty. They express that they need time to explore the details of the treaty to make sure that it is in the best interest of the US needs…

Lets watch and see if this passes or not…

I can tell you that the Kremlin is watching closely because the Russian Duma has been ready for months and I really have my doubts that it will be passed this year…

Lets hope my doubts are wrong…

Windows to Russia!

Has America Taken the Soviet Path to Fail?


Now that we (USA) have officially extended our Afghanistan withdrawal to 2014 and or beyond.

Time article Read More Here >>>>>>

The only question left is how long will the longest war in American history be and will it take us into a grave like the Soviet version of the war back in 79 to 89? It has also been declared that we will never leave Afghanistan and that NATO was disavowing a 2014 leave date, that we would be out way before 2014. Looks like we were wrong!

AntiWar.com Read More >>>>>>

On Oct. 7, 2001 the US attacked Afghanistan. If we continue to the minimum that they call for of 2014. It will be around 13 years. We are very blessed that we do not have a Soviet empire and other countries that supports Afghanistan against us. Like we (USA) did with a number of other countries, including Saudi Arabia who offered the greatest financial support to go against the Soviet Empire. It looks to me like we would have been toast years ago if everyone had ganged up on us like we did to the Soviet Union.

Looks like Afghanistan is the graveyard of Empires!

Manfed Man

{Article by Guest Poster – Links below added by Admin}

Windows to Russia!

Coffee and Pondering in Russia…


This morning I did not get to walk the dog. Sveta took him for a walk before she took off for the day to the Gazprombank. As I said a few days ago that I am feeling rough and at that time had to take a nitro to get going for the day. I have had to take several more nitros since then during the evening times and in respect to that I have stayed calmer than usual. But in all honesty I am feeling a lot better than a few days ago. But Sveta still took the dog on his walk this morning and made me stay inside… 🙂

Now that brings me to my coffee and pondering…

I am pleasantly surprised with the uCan-Post program. I have woke up most mornings since starting the program and found one or two posts that are waiting to be looked over and posted. This is fantastic and so far 75% of the posts are worth posting. They are real posts and not a ranting spam. An example is that today I received three posts. Two of them are great but one was full of spitefulness and hate for Russia, with every other word a cuss word. Looks like to get the good out of the system, I will have to tolerate some trash…

Now I was also thinking about some advancements that Russia is making in the train travel department. One is the makings of a high speed rail between Kiev, Ukraine and Moscow, Russia seems to be in the works. Also the high speed rail that is working between Helsinki, Finland and St. Petersburg, Russia. These rails will travel at least 220km per hour and make the trip to adjoining countries a lot more fun. Sveta and I are talking about the rail to Helsinki and trying that out real soon…

Speaking of travel and St Petersburg:  A high-speed motorway from Moscow to St. Petersburg will cross the Khimki Forest. This has been finalized and will become a fact after all the hoopla that has been going on about it. I find it interesting that this planned roadway is still on the original path even though this was one of the big issues used against the Old Moscow Mayor to fire him. He staunchly stood up for the path of the road to transverse the Khimki Forest. He had said that was the best rout and nothing else will do.  He was basically used as a scapegoat over the path of the new road. Guess what? They are still using the route that he said was the best…

Next lets touch on the subject of NATO and Russia. Wikileaks had let out a cable that contradicted what NATO was wining and dining Russia about. NATO was being so sweet to Russia that Russia had to have know that they were speaking with a forked tongue. Well after the cable leaked, Russia wanted an explanation is the cable true or not? Since at the NATO-Russia summit in Lisbon very recently. NATO talked all nice with Russia. During this nice talk behind Russia’s back, they signed agreements to defend Poland and the Baltic states against Russia while Russia was being courted in the same meeting. NATO took a few days and thought about the implications of the “Hand caught in the Cookie Jar” issue. They finally decided the best thing would be a semblance of the truth. “The Alliance intends to protect them from possible Russian attacks.” implies Director of the NATO Information Center in Moscow Robert Pszczel.

Last thought while sipping my coffee is about Ukraine getting into the tourist business over the Chernobyl accident area. I knew about some private groups doing tours of the nuclear plant site but it seems that Ukraine was not involved in the situation. Now Ukraine is making it an official tourist site with controlled tours of the area. “Ukraine officials will open up the sealed zone which extends for a 30-mile radius around the Chernobyl plant, and guides will offer tours which would avoid contaminated areas while taking in the main sights, including the abandoned town of Pripyat.”

Well that is it for the thinking’s. The coffee is gone and it is time to get to work…

Windows to Russia!

Billionaire Backs a Gas-Electric Hybrid Car to Be Built in Russia


MOSCOW — Mikhail D. Prokhorov, the Russian billionaire who owns the New Jersey Nets basketball team, rolled out another pet project on Monday: Russia’s first gas-electric hybrid car.

The designers of the Yo claim that at about 67 miles a gallon, or 3.5 liters per 100 kilometers, it will achieve better fuel economy than the Toyota Prius.

It is called the Yo, for the Russian letter “ë,” and it can use either gasoline or natural gas to generate its electric power.

Proponents say the Yo makes use of Russian engineering innovations but can be priced for mass consumption because of its bare-bones approach to hybrid automotive technology.

While two electric motors propel the Yo, a small petroleum engine that can burn either gasoline or natural gas will run nearly continuously to generate the electricity they consume. Instead of charging a battery, as in the hybrid Toyota Prius, the generator in the Yo either powers the motors directly or fills a bank of capacitors that can hold only a small charge.

The designers say that at about 67 miles per gallon, the Yo will achieve better fuel economy than the Toyota Prius (about 51 miles per gallon), in part because it is lighter. Like other gas-electric hybrids, it will also have a total range far beyond that of a pure plug-in electric car like the newly introduced Nissan Leaf.

The Yo, which is expected to go on sale in Russia in mid-2012 and cost about $14,500, will have a top speed of 80 miles per hour and a range of 680 miles — if both its natural gas and gasoline tanks are filled.

Mr. Prokhorov, who made his fortune in Siberian mining, promised that the car would defy Russia’s stereotype for dismal quality in the auto industry — a poor image he said was at odds with Russian achievements in other engineering realms.

“Don’t forget that in Russia we were the first to put man in space,” Mr. Prokhorov said at a media event to unveil three Yo prototypes: a coupe, a hatchback and a delivery truck. “Unfortunately, in the last 50 years, we are playing from behind a little bit.”

Mr. Prokhorov is the sole backer of the hybrid car effort. He intends to made an initial investment of about 150 million euros, or about $200 million, in a new Russian company called e-Auto, which will also manufacture the Yo. A team of about 40 engineers developed the car.

“Russian scientists are good in ideas,” Mr. Prokhorov said. “This idea is really great.”

The Russian designers said the electrical generator approach of the Yo was sometimes used in city buses but not in cars. The advantage, they say, is in the small petroleum engine’s operating at its most efficient rate at all times, while the electrical capacitors absorb or discharge energy to accommodate start-and-stop city driving.

The designers say that the Yo’s fuel economy will be better than that of the Prius partly because the vehicle is lighter than the Prius and it has a lower top speed and only modest horsepower.

The fuel economy, the designers say, also owes to its unusual engine, a Soviet-legacy design where the pistons move in a circular motion. This approach to internal combustion, called a rotary vane engine, had some use in Germany in the 1930s but was largely abandoned later except in the Soviet Union, according to Andrei G. Ginzberg, chief engineer for the Yo.

Scientists honed it at a secretive laboratory in the Siberian city of Novosibirsk, he said, but never commercialized the design.

The Yo is intended for domestic sale in Russia, where it will compete in an automotive market bouncing back after the recession. Because financing is costly, most families buy cars with at least half the money down, confining the middle-class car market to vehicles priced close to $10,000. Few foreign hybrids are sold here now.

And while the car is snug, Mr. Prokhorov gleefully demonstrated that even his 6-foot-8 frame could be folded into both the front and the rear seats — a demonstration that also highlighted Mr. Prokhrov’s litheness as a lifelong basketball player.

Mr. Prokhorov is considered one of Russia’s richest men, with a fortune made through his ownership of the Norilsk Nickel mine in Siberia, which produces about 20 percent of the world’s nickel, along with precious metals like platinum and palladium.

Because he sold shares in Norilsk just before their value collapsed in the financial crisis, earning at least $4.5 billion along with a stake in another mining company, Mr. Prokhorov entered the global recession awash in cash.

In May, he completed a deal that made him the principal owner of the New Jersey Nets and the first foreign proprietor of a National Basketball Association team. He is also 45 percent owner of Barclays Center, the team’s new arena, which is being built near downtown Brooklyn.

Back in Russia, the country’s leaders have been pressuring Mr. Prokhorov and other wealthy businessmen to help Russia diversify its economy away from oil, by investing in high technology, a priority of President Dmitri A. Medvedev that Mr. Prokhorov has said he shares.

“For the time being, Russia lacks value-added goods,” Mr. Prokhorov said. “That is why cars are very important. This project for us is very important, to give the world a value-added product made in Russia.”

He noted, though, that he would steer clear of existing Russian carmakers like Lada.

“To invest from scratch is very important,” Mr. Prokhorov said. “It’s a totally new concept. All the old-fashioned car producers, they are linked with old technology.”

Mikhail V. Ganelin, an industrial analyst at Troika investment bank in Moscow, hailed the project as a worthy bet on Russian engineering in a prospective field. But he said he did not expect the Yo to make much headway in turning around the glum fortunes of Russia’s automotive industry.

In Russia, Mr. Prokhorov is known as the bachelor billionaire for his penchant for parties stocked with models from Moscow agencies, an image he has embraced with self-deprecating humor.

On Monday, he said he wanted to break two stereotypes. Russia, he said, could make a modern car. And new cars, he said, need not always be presented with smiling models nearby. And indeed none were to be seen.

Guest Post!

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A Bulgarian Christmas…


I was drinking my morning cup of coffee & was looking over comments made earlier. We had asked Ludmila, one of our readers to explain about Christmas in Bulgaria! This is what she wrote…..

Hi, Svetlana and Kyle!

This is how Bulgarians celebrate Christmas and New Year:

Although Bulgaria has Orthodox Church, the people celebrate Christmas on 25 of December as it was in Russia before the Great October Revolution. The Bulgarians celebrated this holiday on 7th of January in the period from 1945 to 1989 as it is in Russia now, but after 1989 it was decided to change the date to the end of December. In fact, Christmas in Bulgaria is called Koleda. Koleduvane is a tradition which still remains in villages and not in big cities. Koledari (young men dressed in national costumes) spread Christmas cheer around village and sing folk songs. A special dinner consisting of at least twelve dishes is prepared and all of them are without meat. This is a family holiday and all members of a family gather together round the table and celebrate it. A traditional Banitsa with fortune slips is put on the table. It’s very delicious meal. It’s made from puff paste with some white cheese rolled in it and baked in an oven.

Santa Claus in Bulgaria is called Dyado Koleda (Grandfather Koleda) and he brings the children gifts as Santa Claus and Ded Moroz do.

New Year Eve is joyful holiday when people gather together, eat a lot and go to the center of town or city at 12 o’clock or earlier. Five minutes before the New Year comes Bulgarian President gives a speech, which is transmitted on all state and private TV channels and in the midnight people cheers with “Na zdrave” with wishes for good health.

My regards,

Ludmila

It seems that the world all has a Santa Claus! If anyone else has a story about their countries: Christmas Traditions please leave a comment. I will be happy to include the Holiday Traditions on “Windows To Russia!”

Kyle & Svet

Stories of Traditions Welcome Here!!! It would be nice to know about your Christmas in the country where you live…
Thank You very much Ludmila…

Windows to Russia!

Wal-Mart Closing Moscow Office…


What a wonderful little news item for this Monday…

Wal-Mart Stores Closing Its Moscow Office

It seems that Wal-Mart has pulled out of the attempt to enter the Russian market after Wal-Mart which been in acquisition talks with discount chain Kopeika failed. Kopeika was bought earlier this month by X5 Retail Group, Russia’s largest supermarket operator… 🙂

Past readings about Wal-Mart from Windows to Russia…

http://windowstorussia.com/french-auchan-is-russias-king-retailer.html

http://windowstorussia.com/russia-and-wal-mart-have-started-dance_12.html

http://windowstorussia.com/russia-wal-mart-next_20.html

Windows to Russia!

Coffee and a Putin Quote…


Sveta found a great quote for me today…

“Тот, кто не жалеет о разрушении СОВЕТСКОГО СОЮЗА, у того нет сердца, а тот, кто хочет его воссоздания в прежнем виде, у того нет головы”

Владимир ПУТИН

Translated:

“Anyone who does not regret the destruction of the Soviet Union, has no heart, and whoever wants to recreate it in its previous form, has no brain.”

Vladimir Putin

Windows to Russia!

Corruption, not nationalism behind latest Moscow riots…


Russia Today: (Link)

Mass riots that started in the center of Moscow on Saturday must be blamed on corrupt police rather than nationalist sentiment in society, Russian observers and experts agreed.

A gathering of thousands of football fans to mourn their comrade killed in a street fight with men from the Northern Caucasus, ended in riots and racist attacks on Saturday. However, police, politicians and observers alike say the riots showed society’s anger over police corruption rather then general xenophobia.

Read More and Watch Video >>>

Windows to Russia!
  • Those behind violence in Moscow will be dealt with – Medvedev (rt.com)
  • Football fans rally over supporter shooting (rt.com)
  • Russian fans in clash with police (bbc.co.uk)
  • Russian Protests Erupt Over Soccer Fan’s Killing (nytimes.com)
  • You: Injuries, arrests as fans clash with police in Moscow (earthtimes.org)
  • Russian football fans clash with police over death of supporter (rt.com)
  • Protests Tinged With Ethnic Tensions Erupt in Moscow Over Soccer Fan’s Killing (nytimes.com)
  • You: Russian football fans run riot (nation.com.pk)
  • Football fans, troops clash in Moscow (reuters.com)
  • Fans disrupt Moscow over killing (bbc.co.uk)