S.

Short update on what's been up with me last weeks:

After spending 3 weeks at home, I was in Poland for almost a week; then spent a couple of days at home and left to Minsk, to spend a week with a friend of mine (she is waiting for a baby! :) and needed some support. From there I went to St.Petersburg for the week-end, to see another friend of mine and to refresh my memory of this nice city. Came home and in 2 days left to Lodz, for Mike's wedding.

And got today another invitation, another friend of mine, from my childhood, is getting married, in another part of the country, in 3 weeks. It seems roads are my destiny for those days :)

So I'm more or less stable at home for some time, probably for a couple of months more. Looking for an internship, but not yet. The problem is - I don't know what I want long-term. May be I just need to do at least something somewhere :)

Want to become a donor, while I'm here, already some use of me for someone. Will report on how it was, I promise! (remark on the side - it seems I'm not better with updating my blog than with answering email hehe)

Today is the day when my town - Svisloch - has a 750th anniversary.
Some facts about it:
We have 10.000 inhabitants and we are the district capital (районный центр)
Svisloch has 3 schools (and several more in villages around), music school, sports school
There are several major state shops, many small private kiosks/small shops, small daily market, 3 dodgy bars, one restaurant of soviet era and no cafes at all.
Hospital, good for a town of our size
Library, district cultural center, a bank, administrative buildings, railway station (however the connection for passengers is only to one city nearby, bigger center), one nice square, a park (well renovated recently), and good roads.
Several places of block houses, however 2/3 of Svisloch are private houses (as ours and more simple)


And today - the big day for Svisloch, when buildings were newly colored (cosmetic renovation, as we say, Potemkinskije derevni), flags put out, major speeches, stands from district farms, and some goods from around (I got a nice leather-stone bracelet for myself).

Concerts - quite good ones - were all the time one the stage. The story of the city form the beginning as a play, songs, comic groups, songs, modern, classic, children dances. It was very nice I should say, even if usually I'm quite ironic about our celebrations.
We had even the Paratroopers show, the managed to land on a small square, doing all cool figures in the sky. The crowd was definitely impressed, few people saw a parachute close at all in life. And of course my father, former military paratrooper, had to be around to observe and express his opinion :) Not once he told that he will kill me if I try to jump with a parachute, but now I'm even more determined :)

And a bit later today in the evening we are going to have a disco with radio DJs that come to our town, that will be lead by a known republic TV figure (by some miracle, or probably for a good money, she is coming to us)

Some snapshots:

My parents; me and my father




Me and Katya, we grew up together - two of us symbolize the beauty of Slavic girls hehe



Paratroopers landing



Traditional clothing and singing



And, look here: stands of district collective farms (soviet type kolhozy), 2 pm - people just eat and drink (alcohol!) on the display on the street! No room to break the stereoptype, what to do…



Every place has its own specialties, and this is the life of a small Belarussian town. My life for some time :)

Debate about Belarus economic and political development - the other time :)

And I promise-promise, more updates are coming soon about all my trips!