Now I have reached intermediate level in Russian

...not really.

But that was one of the goals of MITIM for all students - to reach good level in another foreign language during the program.

And how many managed to do that? My guess from LUT students: 0.

I am still alive

...and can not speak any Russian. Today I tried to remember how to say "My name is Joona" in Russian but I just could not remember it. 2 semesters with Russian well spent.... :D

Busy busy week coming up

Monday: Russian exam
Tuesday: Consulting project final presentation + meeting (8 hours)
Wednesday: Supply and innovation management exam
Thursday: Economics of innovation classes + Spanish exam
Friday: Economics of innovation classes (7-8 hours) + deadline for QBR assignment


Will be so so shitty.

Done with Russian studies in Piter

At 12 o'clock today, after coming from the shower I saw an interesting message on my laptop. Shot had written that the exam starts at 12, not at 1 like we assumed. So, I knew that I will be late at least 35-40 minutes which was the case.

Luckily, the teacher is a friendly one and let me in the class so late. I wasn't the only one late, I think 4 out of 6 were not there on time. Again one of the situations where information did not flow freely to all relevant parties at GSOM...

The test itself was multiple choice (phew!), with 40 questions I think. Then there was 4 sentenced that needed to be translated from English to Russian. On top of that an oral exam! I got a bit lucky with the subject, which was food :) "Eta kapusta, pomidoor, luk..." The multiple choice wasn't that big of a success - I think I had something like 10 wrong (I saw my graded paper, the teacher was very quick with them). From the oral part I got 5- and from translation 4+. Overall not that bad I think.

Russian test in about 2 hours. Can be interesting with this preparation...

Language studies... очен плоха

I attended my first Russian class in more than one month, I believe it has been something like 5 weeks since the last time. Why has it been that long?

Well, there is an interesting answer. The way GSOM has organized the language studies is not optimal at all. We have 4 classes of language per week, 45 minutes each. For almost every group those are during the same day. This means that if you miss the class for whatever reason, it immediately results in quite a long break from your studies. And with this kind of rhythm you are doing your homework only once a week. So one class + one day of homework means you study the language twice a week. Which is way too little in my opinion.

It would be so much better to split the 4 lessons in 2 pieces, one class on Tuesday for example and another on Thursday. With this split, you would have to do homework also twice a week. Which equals to 4 times a week which is so much better than only twice.

Monday evening activity

After finding that we don't have anything to prepare for tomorrow, I used this opportunity to study some Russian. There was again something like 1.5 week break in language studies for me because of seminars and other obligatory stuff that needed to be done. Of course, we have been really busy otherwise also with the studies....

Also went to the gym, which was good. It always has a positive effect on my mood and energy levels, but since there is so much other things to do, sports have gotten lower priority too often. Trying to pick that up again. (Last time in the gym was on last Thursday, so not bad)

Sunday studying

After really fun few days it was time to get back to business today. At least on some level. So, today I was studying some Russian, writing report for Corporate social responsibility class and also finished my part on the first part of Knowledge management group work (midterm report). Not that big things but I am still quite pleased that I have been able to do some studying today. Tomorrow is going to be quite an intense day, school from 9 am to 6 pm. After that, the usual homework stuff and working on group projects.

I feel I have to study a lot for Russian class since I have not studied that much during the last few weeks. Other courses have gotten priority over Russian classes, but I will definitely put more effort on learning the language on next few weeks.

Actually, yesterday I tried to get my very first black taxi by myself. I managed to stop something like 10 cars and asked how much does it cost to go from Nevskiy to Marinskiy theater were I was supposed to meet some friends. Well, the attempts failed miserably in a way - I was prepared to pay 100 rubles for the trip because I knew it wasn't that far away. The cheapest price I heard was 200 rubles... Of course they noticed that I am not Russian so probably the drivers were just trying to get some easy money. Hah. As if I would pay them. Since I knew where I was heading, I just walked to meet my friends. The trip took only something like 15 minutes by foot. Quite a boring story actually :D But yeah, now I can say that I've tried getting a "taxi" also. Lets hope that soon I am actually able to ride in one to correct place :)

Russian language studies

I am starting to sound like Shot, but I don't like the way Russian language (and other language) studies are organized here in GSOM. I have no complaints about the level of teacher, who I think is good. My problem is with the fact that we have classes only once a week. 4 lessons in a row, which means 3 actual hours with a 15 minute break in the middle. Is there a person in this school that can cope with that? I don't think so.

It's not that hard to concentrate on learning stuff about economics or organizational behaviour for 4 lessons in a row, but languages are a different case in my opinion. Grammar, vocabulary, pronunciation, etc.. It takes time to ingest all that information. Like today, all of the students were already loaded with new information by the break and the second part of the class was quite painful for us. Luckily our teacher notices these things and won't push as that far during the second half.

Actually it is pretty cool how long we have come during one month from level 0. Now we can(?) describe our friends,family and surroundings, the weather, ask for directions etc. Maybe in a couple of months time we are actually able to have some discussions in Russian :) At the moment it's still pretty much impossible, aside asking typical 'how are you' and so on.