We were like two sets of musketiers, eight of us. We met on Friday at 8.30 am in room 308 at FAV of ZČU, an oasis of Russian culture in the middle of the desert. In the while before the action started, we had a chance to browse Russian books in the shelves on the back wall. We could see Chechov, Tolstoi, but you could search for Solzenicin´s Gulag without result. There were a lot of us but we eventually fit the room somehow. Two Russian ladies for their Embassy paní Екатерина Зубковская a paní Вероника Новоселова were introduced to us.
We could see two presentations about beautiful and interesting places in Russia, and about the possibilities to study there. Unfortunately the talks were in the Czech language. However, it was thrilling anyway. And what was interesting for me? I find very interesting the information, that there are cats employed by one of the most famous exhibition halls – Ermitáž in St. Peterburg. They have their wage, their holiday and time to retire. Unfortunately, nobody explained to us, what their job is.
Some of the infor was a bit over the top – such as propaganda of Cold war and some made us very happy (such as Bajkal lake is becoming a fresh water sea) – google it if you don´t believe.
Then we had a lesson. Mrs. Wanted to prove, that it is possible to learn Russian in 60 minutes. We were given task sheets. We started to read Cyrillic, which was a piece of cake for us, polyglots. She started with “hocus” which was followed by “pokus” and those unlucky having come last and therefore sitting in the front desks started to look very desperate. The teacher provided a lot of phrases and we could hear even some Slovak accent from those students of unknown school. Everybody had to participate and we learnt a lot from the teacher´s private life. We were given small book present for our cooperation and Mrs. Krausová, the leader of the centre, threatened us that we basically couldn´t leave without eating her home-made cookies.
Then full of experience and hope for Russian language and possibility to study at some Russian universities we left.
Přemek Kaucký, sexta A (volně přeloženo a zkráceno)
