Going through a mini-russian fascination at the moment. Learnt to read the Cyrillic alphabet in June, that was useful. Now i can read Russian, yet not understand what i am reading. "Is this useful or not useful", a certain teacher would comment.
My first attempt at reading Tolstoy, (actually it was forced), was in 99, 'War and Peace' in Mandarin. Hmm, russian-mandarin translation worked out. Coincidentally, Channel 5 or was it Arts Central was showing the film adaptation, which was a stroke of luck. I can watch the movie, without reading the book and write a wretched book review for class. But the movie stretched for eternity, it went on and on... 'could you just hurry up', gave up at 3am, after 3 hours, and the movie was still playing. Now, that was in 99. I'm back at Tolstoy today with Anna Karenina.
Speaking of fascinations, there's always this unexplainable intrigue with all things Czech. I've been asked this for a long time, and i never could give a definitive answer. It probably started in 95 when i was in Turkey. Can't be more specific beyond that, which leads me to another thought... back to the original thread, so it was always a dream to visit Czech Rep. Bedrich Smetana's Ma Vlast is such a magnificent composition.
Here's a russian phrase 'Соединение советских социалистических республик'. Should strike a chord if you look at the first letter of each word, C.C.C.P - see it on T-shirts? A Soviet revival is underway in many ex-soviet states, e.g. Ukraine as reported by BBC news. C.C.C.P stands for the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (or U.S.S.R in the western media).