Monique Smith
This summer, with the generous support of CREEES, I was able to attend Columbia University for an intensive Russian language immersion program. Living and studying in the heart of New York City was certainly a change of pace from being at Stanford, but I quickly adapted and can put this in the book as one of my most memorable summers. At Columbia, my class consisted of six advanced speakers and was taught by Professor Alla Smyslova. In under two months we had already tackled some of the more challenging aspects of the Russian language. Where our feet feared to tread, whether it be the use of participles or verbs of motion, Alla Aleksandrovna pushed us to go further and get to the roots of our grammatical misunderstandings.
Every Friday we also had the pleasure of viewing a selection of the most notable Russian films such as Cranes over Moscow and Moscow Does Not Believe in Tears. During the semester, I also visited Brighton Beach with a friend from the program and we had a great day buying Russian novels, black bread and halva. As we sat on the beach and listened to the murmurs of the Russian voices around us, I knew this was the closest I could get to Moscow. To end our term on an informal and congratulatory note, all of the Russian summer classes met at a local restaurant, Uncle Vanya's, for some blini, pel'meni, and piroshki. I consider myself very lucky to have had the opportunity to participate in this program and it perfectly complemented my CREEES coursework. As I now reside in New York City and look forward to working and living here, I can only be grateful for the very easy transition to big city living that the summer practicum provided.