Moving In

Sunday morning Katie Miller joined Jasmine and me as we ventured to the цветы stand at the metro near the hostel. After a few extremely awkward moments of trying to figure out what kind of flowers to get, and how many-knowing of course that Russians consider it bad luck to have even numbers of flowers, or anything really. I bought my host mom 3 gerber daisies. She has them now in a vase on the kitchn table. We were all so nervous to meet our families, but I feel like I had a little bit more reason to be worried because I have about the least Russian on the trip. I honestly feel like I have never before learned any Russian. Hopefully in the next few months things will get better and I will be able to understand what Tatyana and Dasha are saying to me.
The are very patient with me. Luckily, one of their favorite topics of conversation happens to be music. Tatyana plays piano and knows lots of famous musicians. Dasha plays the Didgeradoo, which is super cool. She is 22 years old as well and has lots of friends that have been over. I find them a bit intimidating. We live on the 6th floor of what I first believed to be a hotel. Above the door hangs a sign that says Hotel Anabel, but that is only part of the building.
We live up on the 6th flood, which is 112 stairs up, not that I counted... From my window I can see the Hermitage museum and some churches that are all lit up at night. I'd say I'm pretty lucky to live here with these nice people. Last night when I arrived home for the day, I finally met my host father, who had been missing the first few days. He had been in the forest picking mushrooms. The entire kitchen was filled with mushrooms. If you know me, you know that I do not eat mushrooms-ever! But I ate an entire bowl of Mushrooms and onions all cooked up together. I can't say it is my favorite food, but I ate it all. Today when I arrived home from school, Dasha and I had supper, and guess what it was---Mushroom soup! I am pretty sure we will be eating mushrooms for every meal for the next week at least! As long as I get to eat my blini for lunch I'll be ok. They are delicious creps filled with different things, my favorite is cabage and eggs with a little sour cream. ochen vkustvy! They are sold like fast food in many places near my school, but all made fresh! And inexpensive also.