Do Svidaniya, Mockby

It has been a week since we've left Moscow. We've hugged our families again, greeted old friends, and had the time to sleep off the jet lag. I've done a lot of reflecting on our trip in the past few days. I've thought about the ideas that have been challenged in me, and I've realized the things that have really changed in me. 

I think the most important thing that I've realized coming home is how different America's opinion of Russia is from what it is actually like. In the majority of American TV shows and movies, if there's a spy-- they're almost guaranteed to be Russian. We know more about what we think the KGB is than we do about what the people of Russia are actually like. America and Russia have always been competitive with each other, and for a long time, there was a lot of dissension. Americans hated their communist ideas; Russians didn't like the ideas of capitalism. A lot of Americans don't like Russia as a whole and assume that all Russians are still in support of the old Soviet Union. Russians see our nation and see the shooting sprees at school and wonder how unsafe our nation is right now. Through our separate media, we only get to see the worst pieces of the other country. This is so incredibly dangerous because we don't get to see the whole picture. We don't get to meet the people. 

During my time in Russia, I learned a lot about theatre. I grew so much as an artist. But I think some of the most important lessons I learned were simply about humanity, and how much ignorance there can be in blindly accepting facts about another place. Before we mistrust an entire nation, let's look at our sources. You have to get to know someone before you know whether or not to distrust them. There are good people in every nation. It's so important to get to understand the people in a place rather than just the politics of the people at the top of those nations. 

After living in Moscow for three months, a piece of my heart will always be in Russia. I will celebrate when they do, I will cry when they mourn. I will also always look at international relations differently and strive to look at humanity as a global entity and not through my western, American lense. I think that my perspective about what looking at things from a "global scale" means has changed completely, and I have become impassioned about how important it is to care about the WHOLE world instead of just your own side of it. I loved Russia, and I can't wait to see where my new passion for thinking globally will take me next. I might have said goodbye to this journey, but there is so much more for me to explore. 

Moscow, Moscow, Moscow!!

Today is the day. May 9^th. All of our bags are packed, and we’ve said our final goodbyes to the people and places that have made this place our home for the past three months. And what a three months it’s been. On our first morning here, we had a meeting with the director of the program. He told us that people that have set off on this journey forever see their lives and their acting split into two—pre-Moscow and post-Moscow. I can’t wait to see how this becomes a reality for each and every one of us.

I’m feeling very split in two as well—it feels so unreal to be leaving now. We dreamed and longed for this journey for so long. What now? The whole world is open to us. How will this journey impact what happens next? A big piece of my heart will always be left here in Moscow—in our acting studio, in the dorms, in the cafes, Gorki Park, everywhere in this place that changed me. But I will also be taking pieces of Moscow home with me.

Studying abroad can really turn your world upside down in some incredible ways. I’ve had everything that I believe about theatre and storytelling challenged, and a lot of personal views completely changed as well. We’ve learned about our fears and shortcomings and found our way through that. We’ve climbed a lot of mountains, and now we have to leave from the other side. My heart will be forever torn to be in this place, but I know that I learned what I needed to here and it’s time to move on to the next phases. And who knows where life could take me next?

7 Lessons in Studying Abroad

1. Even if you’re spending the majority of your time in classrooms, the most important lessons you learn are about yourself. Sometimes, you have to go 5,000 miles away from home to truly understand who you are. I learned so many things here about why I do what I do, what I want out of life, and what I expect of myself. No matter what happens in the rest of my life, these are lessons that I can hold onto forever.

2. No matter where you are from, all people have certain things in common. So many American TV shows paint Russians as the bad guys, the Soviet spies. Coming here, I’ve realized how America and Russia are truly cousins. They have so much in common, and if we focused on that instead of the differences, a lot could change in the world.

3. New experiences may be terrifying, but they are extremely good for you. I can’t stress this one enough. I never in my life thought I would end up spending a semester in Russia, of all places in the world. But this has truly been some of the best times in my life, and I will be forever grateful, no matter how intimidating a lot of this trip was.

4. It’s okay to make a study abroad trip what YOU want it to be. Everyone likes experiencing places in different ways. I ended up spending a lot of my time in this trip in coffee shops or in my window sill reading Russian plays and literature. That’s how I liked to explore this country. Everyone’s experience is extremely different, but that certainly doesn’t make yours wrong.

5. It’s very important to take care of yourself first. How are you going to enjoy your time in another place if you’re constantly exhausted and sick? Listen to your body first, and then go exploring. Winter is BRUTAL in Russia. We had to be careful not to get sick. Always make sure you’re giving your body what it needs.

6. Enjoy every moment while it lasts. The little things are probably going to be what I remember most about this trip. You never know what moments are going to be the most precious to you, so it’s super important to be present for all of them.

7. Don’t miss it until it’s over! We had a professor tell us this on one of our last few days with him. He said he never understands why people spend their last bit of time together crying about how they’re going to miss each other, because then they don’t really get to have that time together either. The last week of studying abroad is rough, because you start seeing a lot of “lasts” all around you. Don’t focus on those. Focus on still being there.

Have you heard, we're going to St. Petersburg!

Last weekend, we had a short vacation to St. Petersburg in Russia. It may not seem like a lot to have three days off in a row, but when you’re in class six days a week, it feels like forever. We took an overnight train Thursday night with beds so small I felt I was almost too tall to sleep in, and I’m only 5’2”! We got to go on an excursion to a town called Pushkin where Catherine’s palace resides, and we saw the Hermitage, and many other beautiful places St. Petersburg is known for. It’s known as the Venice of the North because there are about 300 bridges in St. Petersburg. The weather was a little cold and rainy, but it was still gorgeous. St. Petersburg is known for looking a little more European than Moscow. While Moscow was a city that grew into being, St. Petersburg was planned out inch by inch to be a very organized capital (when it was planned, Moscow is now again the capital city of Russia). It’s definitely a little more touristy than Moscow, and I feel like it’d be a lot harder to live there than Moscow. Being 400 miles north from Moscow really makes a difference in the weather.

It was really wonderful to have some time off from school in St. Petersburg, and to have the chance to explore a different piece of Russia. The sights were gorgeous, the food was amazing, and it was really wonderful and necessary to have a bit of downtime together before finals and the end of our trip. I think my favorite part of being in St. Petersburg was just walking through the city. A lot of the museums we wanted to go to were closed, so we spent a lot of time just walking down the streets together, laughing and enjoying traveling while being abroad. 

School here is amazing, but it can be brutal to work as often as we do, and I feel like we really got to spend some great time together in St. Petersburg. I also feel like three days was a perfect amount of time to be a tourist in St. Petersburg, and then come back to Moscow to finish our work here. It also made me appreciate how accustomed we’ve all become to Moscow. When we were leaving St. Petersburg to come back to Moscow, we called it home. And after all this time here in Russia, it really has become another home to me in my heart.