Introduction to Russia Michael and Alina Makin Cornerstone School, Dexter, 24 February 2004

What do you know about Russia? Size? Main language? Peoples? Capital? Other big cities When it is 2 pm in Dexter, what time is in Moscow? When it is 2 pm in Dexter, what time is it in Vladivostok?

Here are some answers Size? 6,592,800 sq. miles (about as big as the US and Canada combined). Eleven time zones. Main language? Russian (over one hundred others spoken) Peoples? Ethnic Russians; over one hundred other nationalities. Capital? Moscow Other big cities St Petersburg, Nizhnii Novgorod, Novosibirsk When it is 2 pm in Dexter, what time is in Moscow? 10 pm When it is 2 pm in Dexter, what time is it in Vladivostok? 6 am the next day (and it’s 8 am on Kamchatka!

The Russian Federation

Moscow, the capital of Russia

St Petersburg, Russia’s second city, and environs

Many Russians have cottages in the country – life at the dacha

Those who live in big cities usually live in apartments

The Russian Language The main language of Russia is Russian Русский язык – главный язык России The Russian alphabet is called Cyrillic а б в г д е…. Many words are similar in Russian and English

And it is easy to work out what they mean … Кот Especially if you know other languages Дом Hint – think domestic

Michael and Alina Makin teach University students about Russia and the Russian language Alina teaches students to speak Russian She also teaches courses on the history of Russian food and cooking Alina and I at work on board the cruise ship Sergei Kirov. I found the work very demanding.

Alina recently visited a Russian village, and made a film about traditional cooking

She is interested in all the favorite Russian dishes, and traditional table habits

Michael Makin writes books about Russian poets His latest book is about a poet called Nikolai Klyuev Klyuev grew up in a village in the north of Russia As an adult he lived in Petersburg, Moscow, and in Siberia, as well as in a little town near the village where he was born

Nikolai Klyuev, Nikolai Klyuev was was famous for collecting interesting and beautiful things from Russian villages, and for the way he read his poetry

Klyuev was born and grew up near the southern end of Lake Onega in northern Russia, in the area around the small town of Vytegra.

He was probably born in the village of Koshtugi, on the rivers Megra and Kimreka, and he was certainly baptized there in 1884.

Koshtugi in July, The village has a school with about twenty pupils, but most year-round inhabitants are elderly.

Here are two of the three last full-time residents of Zhelvachevo, the village where Klyuev grew up (the other houses are used as dachi in the summer).

This is the house where Klyuev grew up. Later it was used as a village school house. Now it is empty

Zhelvachevo Река Андома, Желвачево Rubtsovo – last village in the area where the poet lived. Vytegra in October 1994 Vytegra Cross at Makachevo Koshtugi in October 2002 Tudozero Klyuev country

In the 1970s a few people began collecting materials about Klyuev, trying to reconstruct his biography and recover his works Here is part of an interview with Nina Peruanskaya, who knew the poet when she was a very young woman, working in Vytegra..

In the villages near where Klyuev was born, children are interested in his life and work School children in the village school at Devyatiny, near Vytegra, read Klyuev’s works during a school jubilee, October, 2002

During the school’s jubilee, people who write about Klyuev were greeted by the school children and their teachers

The school has a museum Here children collect things that people used to use in their homes and at work, and try to re-create traditional life styles

The school has about 100 pupils, from 1 st to 12 th grade

In the summer, the school children work on traditional crafts

How do you think a school in rural Russia might differ from Cornerstone? Would there be more or fewer pupils? Would there be more or less homework? Would there be computers in the school? Would there be bath rooms in every class room? Would the teachers be stricter or less strict than Mrs Bullock?