Of Holidays, Hectic Life, and Puppy Love (Ours, for Said Puppy)

First off, the puppy has a new home. I forgot to write about it, but the Thursday of the week we had him, an acquaintance of Galya and Alexei agreed to take the puppy. They apparently have a 12 year old son, so I'm sure that little Bashi has plenty of attention these days. While he was with us, we did our best to potty train him and educate him in the ways of the world. Here we have a picture of Eric doing a reading of Rudyard Kipling's "If."

"...Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it, And--which is more--you'll be a Man, my son!"

Otherwise, I haven't written much lately because we have been so busy. Wednesday last week was our "American Lunch" where we fixed dinner for the Russian staff and ourselves. We went with Italian food (spaghetti and meatballs) and had some fun with appropriate Valentine's Day poems.

We also found some appropriate Valentine's cards, with "I love you" and "Be mine," which was a bit surprising because Valentine's Day is a bit of a new phenomenon here.

Our students are also pretty awesome because they give us gifts at different opportunities, one of which was Valentine's Day. Molly got these flowers from a student...pretty sweet, huh!

Thursday was Joanna's birthday which was accomanied by blinni and a trip to our favorite Caucasus style restaurant. Friday was more Joanna's birthday celebration with a group trip to steam in the sauna. We passed the time relaxing, singing kereoke, and wondering why everyone in America hasn't figured out that this is an awesome tradition! Saturday was the American Home Mardi Gras Party for students, which turned out pretty well. We had food, games, music, contests, and a whole lot more.