HEAD, SHOULDERS, KNEES AND WHAT?

Okay. Pop quiz.

What's the name of the walky bit on the end of your leg?
And the name of the joint connecting the leg to that bit?
Your arm bends in the middle. What do you call that?
And where your fingers bend. What do we call those knobbly things?

I hope that you answered, in this order: foot, ankle, elbow, and knuckle.

I have been trying to teach my Russian students vocabulary for parts of the body, only to be hampered by the fact that Russians either don't have a word for a body part (foot!), have it but can't remember it because it's so obscure (ankle, elbow), or worse, don't know if they even have a word for it or not (knuckle).

It seems that, in Russian, everthing from the hips down is 'leg'. There's also little distinction between fingers, thumbs and toes (if you want to talk about toes, you have to say 'fingers on your feet', which is quite a scary mental image).

On the plus side, there is a word in Russian for the back of the head, which is something I'm pretty sure we don't have in English.

NEW COAT

I have bought a new coat. I actually look like a Russian now, rather than a downhill skiier who got a bit lost trying to find the Alps.

I knew the type of coat I wanted to buy. I asked a couple of acquaintances who had recently bought coats how much they had spent, giving me an idea of a reasonable price. I went to a clothes market that was recommended to me. I found a coat I liked. I tried it on. It fitted. I asked the price. It was, indeed, reasonable.

I agreed the price. But no! The market trader wasn't having that. He was so offended I didn't haggle that he started haggling with himself.

"3,300 Roubles."
"Okay. I'll take it."
"No! 3,200 Roubles. That's my final offer!"
"Okay, okay. I agree."
"No!"

I felt so bad for the bloke that I was tempted to start haggling the price up.

EAT YOUR HEART OUT JAMES EARL JONES

I have discovered a new and lucrative sideline to my teaching career, courtesy of the translation department of Language Link. One of the girls there, Jo, got me a contract recording the English language voice-over for a short film. So I spent one afternoon last week in a recording studio in North-East Moscow laying down my part.

I am sure you are dying to know what future blockbuster it is that I was working on. It is yet to be titled, but it concerns mineral deposits in a Siberian lake called Kuchuk. I am sure that it will take the box office by storm.

Actually, the text that I read was so full of scientific terminology that I doubt I understood much more than the Russian recording studio staff.

Me: What's this? 'Astrakhanite'? How do I pronounce it?
Russian: How do you think you should pronounce it?
Me: Er. Astra-KHAN-ite? AST-rakhanite?
Russian: Yes, one of those. In three, two, one...

Also, I'm not sure who translated the text from Russian in the first place but it wasn't exactly racy. I recall that it began: "Lake Kuchuk. A meridionally elongated body of water...." Plus I had to read it at an incredibly fast pace - four pages of typed A4 in nine minutes, including pauses. So I sound more like a horse-racing commentator than anything. "LakeKuchukameridionallyelongatedbodyofwater!"

The recording studio was a converted flat, and we had to keep stopping the recording while the neighbours flushed their toilet, slammed their doors, did the vaccuuming... Russian professionalism at its best.

Still, for some of us, fame beckons.

IDENTITY CRISIS

Hello. I'm still alive.

So, I went back to England for Christmas and New Year. I realised then that I am slowly turning into a Russian, doing things like: shaking the hands of everyone I meet, even friends old and new; taking my passport with me to change money.

Either that or I am turning into an American. People are 'guys', holidays are 'vacations', everything is 'sweet'. I think I know how is at least partly to blame for this (and no, it's not South Park). And did you know that Americans don't use the word 'fortnight'?


A SMALL BUT ILLUSTRATIVE ANECDOTE

This, er, vacation, I took the brand new high speed train link between Moscow city centre and the airport for the first time. I was impressed to see that the airport had two platforms, inbound and outbound, which they had cunningly numbered 1 and, er, 4. Some things never change.