On the Дону

Greetings from the banks of the quietly flowing Don River, 120 km outside the city of Rostov-on-Don. For the past three weeks I've been teaching English to science students from all around Russia. Sara and Eric, my venerable colleagues from the American Home, are with me and we've been having a great time.

The place we're staying is pretty much a hotel, although they call it a "tourist complex". It's super hot here, but we have air conditioning in our rooms (not in the classrooms, unfortunately), and the Don River close by for swimming. Our teaching schedule was pretty relaxed - four classes a day, 50 minutes each. My class was scintillatingly titled "Storytelling through Poetry and Song". I was surprised at how well my students handled difficult poetry (even writing poems of their own), especially considering that they're studying science. When we weren't teaching we spent most of our time swimming or playing volleyball, cards, chess, and ping pong. Yes, I actually did play volleyball, which some of you who have known me for a long time might be surprised by. And I actually enjoyed it.

On the last two days of the camp the students did presentations on their scientific work. Most things I didn't understand, but they did a good job.

Tomorrow we're leaving for Chisinau, Moldova to do another camp like this, only shorter and with more experienced scientists. I'll try to keep up my diligent blogging there if we have internet access. Until next time...