An exploration of Russia in St. Petersburg
Third year report 2015-2016
By Li Xiang
Introduction
Since the start of my second year at Sciences Po, people got quite excited about the
third year exchange, where do you want to go and which university do you like to
choose became two hot topics for the random chat among friends. For me, the third
year exchange program is a very well designed part of our undergraduate program, as
it offers us the opportunity to explore and experience the life in a different country,
along with the chance to study in a good university of that country. Therefore, how to
make a logical and well-considered choice for the third year exchange would be of
great value for me. Harboring this idea in my mind, I decided to think carefully about
my possible destination. As I am member of the Euro-Asia campus, countries
available for my third year exchange are mainly European countries. Many of my
Asian friends and colleagues chose Britain, Sweden, Netherlands and Germany. I was
pretty interested at Britain at first, for I would have the opportunity to study in a top
university such as UCL, also the daily life would be much easier since there would be
no language barrier for me. However, just before I had made up my mind, I met with
my third year exchange consultant, Cecile Marin, who is the International Affairs
Manager for Russia, Northern Europe and the UK. As her title has indicated, from our
talk, I realized I have the chance to study in Russia for my exchange, which came as a
surprise. Being a Chinese student who takes his prior academic goal as how to
evaluate and well-serve the national interests of China, I have been carefully
following the evolution of Chinese politics and international relations these years.
From this perspective, Russia has a considerable value to China. How to enhance our
strategic cooperation while reducing political distrust and misunderstandings will no
doubt be a long-term goal for Chinese politicians. Thus if I could have an opportunity
to experience Russia and learn about the features of its politics and society and other
spheres, I will no doubt gain insights for my future studies. Except for this concern,
what also interested me is Russia’s position as a civilization. For Chinese people or
people from other Asian countries, Russia is a periphery member of the western
civilization, but it seems true that Russia is never accepted by the west owe to its
historical and cultural elements of the east, Huntington even referred to Russia as a
separate orthodox civilization! If I can experience Russia culture and make
comparison with the western culture, it will be helpful for me to evaluate the possible
future relation between Russia and the west, which is one of the most important
international relations in the world today. Holding this two purposes, I thought Russia
would be a more interesting and valuable destination for me than Britain, also since it
is certain for me that I will not go to Russia for my master studies, it would be wise to
utilize the third year exchange to fully explore Russia. However, I do not speak
Russian and do not take it as my goal to learn Russian language, this confined my
choice for universities in Russia. When the result turned out, I was informed that I
will go to RANEPA, a university which is unknown to me as well as to the people
around me. What I knew then, was that I would for sure to study in Russia, and the
school locates in St. Petersburg. I was quite a bit disappointed at first that it is not
Moscow.
Description of the studying program
The program provided by RANEPA is called ‘Global Studies in Russia’, it is an
international program taught in English. We do not have freedom to choose our
lessons but need to follow the program. The program consists of eight courses, four in
each semester, with a total credit of 60 ECTS, half for each semester. As in Sciences
Po, each course( except for Russian language and urban studies) is made up by a
lecture and a seminar, but because only a few students attend, they are like two
seminars.
Courses on the first semester
Comparative politics(72h)
This course seems to be a repetition of the political institutions and constitutional
design course which I took on the first semester in Sciences Po. During this course,
prof. Vitaly introduced to us the political systems of certain countries of each
Continent, these countries were usually the ones which we were interested in and
were chosen through a vote. Despite I have learned related knowledge, the study of
Iran, North Korea were still interesting. Also prof, Vitaly was very interested in
democratization, we had several discussion on this topic. However, generally
speaking, the contents of the course were quite shallow, few knowledge was in-depth.
It feels like the professor did not really take it importantly.
Russian studies(64h)
This is one of the most valuable courses provided here. Prof. Ekaterina is very
dedicated and passionate in her teaching. Her lessons covered a wide range of topics
related to Russia, including Russian history, religious relations, ethnic relations and
Russian arts. For us to better grab the knowledge, she used a lot of pictures, videos
and we even had some of lessons in different museums! Needless to say, her lessons
were a enjoyment for us. Despite the flexibility in her teaching, prof. Ekaterina is also
strict, class participation was obliged and we need to write weekly reports based on
the readings, but these were never a burden!
Russian politics(72h)
I have to say, this course comes as a disappointment to me. Prof. Veronika’s
responsibility was to introduce us the Russian political evolution after the collapse of
Soviet Union. Yet her attitude was not quite serious and the preparation of the course
was at a minimum level. The whole of her lecture and our seminar discussion were
totally based on a single textbook, any reference to or discussion on other sources of
related topics were not welcomed. This made her lessons dull and less significant, as
we shall know everything through the readings. We were even more outrageous at the
fact that prof. Veronika had left for America since the second half of that semester, the
rest of lectures were all taken via skype!
Russian language(72h on each semester)
Our Russian professor has rich teaching experience and tremendous patience towards
her students. She opened a one to one class for me taking into account of my level.
She seldom blames her students, instead, she always tries to inspire her students and
cultivate their interests in the language study through her teaching skills.
Courses in the second semester
Post-soviet studies(72h)
This course repeats much of the contents of Russian politics which we took on the
first semester. Yet prof. Ilya tries his best to make his lecture interesting and flexible.
The contents are based on several different textbooks, some of them are of high
quality. Prof Ilya himself has a broad knowledge on this area, he likes to tell us many
stories and his personal experience related to Russian politics rather than only
referring to the textbooks. He also shows an amazing interests to participate in class
discussion or even debates on certain topics with his students, yet sometimes he lost
his manner as a professor when he became quite emotional.
Global governance(72h)
This is the only course which is carefully designed and well-prepared compared to
other courses I have taken here. In other words, only this course has a Sciences Po
quality of teaching. Prof. Ian is from Irish, hence his English skills is not to be
suspected(truly a problem for some of the other professors here). Except for his
adequate English skills, his methods of teaching and his attitudes should be praised as
well. Put aside the positive factors of the professor, global governance itself is
attractive, it is an area of study that is gaining increasing attention from scholars and
governments alike. Thinking about the fact that we are all living in a globalized world
today, this course provides an in-time knowledge for us to keep pace with the
changing world.
Urban studies(36h)
This is a course that seems coming out of nowhere, neither links to Russia nor to
global studies. Also as the course is short, only one seminar per week, both the
professor( also prof. Ilya) and students attach less importance to it. As a student, it is
always worth learning more, perhaps the knowledge will be useful in the future
studies!
To sum it up, this Global Studies in Russia is not a well designed program. We can see
problems of repetition of contents and irrelevance to the main theme of the program
that happened on some of the courses. Also we feel a clear drop in the quality of
teaching here compared with Sciences Po. Many professors are not quite serious
about their courses, for them, this program is like a part time job. Considering it is the
starting year of this program, perhaps we can expect a rise of quality in the future.
Experiencing Russian society
St.Petersburg is the second largest and perhaps the second richest city in Russia
second to Moscow. Russians like to say that the rest of Russia is completely another
world compared with Moscow and St.Petersburg. Yet unlike Moscow, which
represents the symbol of Russian Slavic traditions and its long-standing autocratic
political practices, St.Petersburg is somehow another face of Russia. The city and its
dwellers always bear in mind its own historical mission which was conferred to it by
its founder, Peter the Great, that St.Petersburg was established for the sake of
westernization. It serves as a card of identification that Russian people wish to show
to its European neighbors-----Russia looks like the west and Russia should be
accepted by the west. Reality is sometimes more cruel than the dream, this applies to
Russia very well. It is true that Russia successfully participated in European affairs
after St,Petersburg was established, throughout nineteenth century, Russia was
unquestionably a major player in the European chessboard. Yet for its European
neighbors, the reason to accept Russia in the game was quite out of its size and power
to serve as a suitable chess piece for the balance of power, Russia was never accepted
by the western Europe as a family member, culturally and ideologically speaking.
Russian people also realized this painful actuality, people were divided into slavophile
group and westernizer group, debating on the cultural identification of Russia
throughout the 19th century. When it comes to twentieths century, Russian people
decided to surpass its western neighbors by adopting Communism, which was
believed to be a more advanced political-economic system than the western capitalist
developmental model, and believed it could bring Russia to prosperity. They said:
Russia was different from and fundamentally opposed to the West because it was
more advanced than the West. The pursuit of communism did make Russia powerful,
yet its position as a military giant with compete dissenting ideology simply brought
more fear and hatred against Russia among the west. When Gorbachov denounced
communism and later when Yeltsin radically switched to capitalism and western
political models, Russia came back to its position in the eighteenth century when
St,Petersburg was about to be built, the idea of Peter the Great reappeared among the
Russian elites. However, the fact of economic collapse down and continuous fierce
geopolitical rivalry with the west since late 1990s push Russia to reconsider its
position in the world, as well as its relations with the west, today, Russia again falls
into the debates between slavophile and westernizer. During my stay in St,Petersburg,
with daily observation and exploration of the city, I gradually have the feeling that
St.Petersburg itself looks like a textbook of Russian history. On one side, there is the
beautiful downtown with old empire-style architecture resembling the architecture of
western European cities, on the other side, when you travel to the outskirt region, you
feel like you are in soviet union surrounded by soviet style communal apartments. On
one side, there are numerous super rich people driving in their Rolls Royes and
Bentley and going regularly to luxurious shops and restaurants, who perfectly show
the capitalist side of Russia since 1990s, on the other side, most ordinary people live
on pensions and can merely afford to consume in Soviet style shops and dinning
rooms, they missed the social safety net provided during Soviet time. On one side,
there are many rich and middle class people protest against Putin and wish a total
westernization, yet on the other side, most ordinary people like Putin and share a
hostile view against the west. St,Petersburg is such a strange mixture of different
values and beliefs, with history radically changing the connotation and contents.
Some impressions on Russian economy
The general impression I have about Russian economy is that many things are
backward, from another angle, Russia has huge potential for modernization. In the
downtown, many buildings regardless of their neo-classical architecture, have lost
their attractive appearance due to the dilapidated surfaces. Infrastructure is generally
in poor condition, for example the roads are not flat, the sidewalk has many pits.
Subways and tramways cars are pretty old. For me, the infrastructure of St.Petersburg
reminds me of the conditions of China in 1990s, despite St.Petersburg looks better
than many third or forth ranked cities in China, but for Russia, it is their second
largest city! The bad economic performance is also reflected by the increasing number
of part time jobs and very lowly paid jobs. It is very common to see people who have
to distribute leaflets on the street for a living, some of them are very old people, they
stand on the street the whole day regardless of the severe weather, which is
heartbreaking for me. On the metro, there are many salesmen with bags of their
products ranging from golden medals to pens and pencils, they worked very hard but
passengers do not pay attention to them. Economic sanctions really have a severe
impact on Russia.
Supermarket is a main source for citizens to buy their daily needs in St.Petersburg.
They provide the source of convenience for urban dwellers. However, because Russia
is a country generally in shortage of fruits and vegetables, as a large percent of them
have to be imported from other countries, Russian’s own fields can only cultivate
potato, carrots and several other vegetables with poor quality. Yet imported foods are
very expensive. Despite in St.Petersburg there are many rich people, most people are
in poverty, especially suffering from economic sanctions from the west these two
years. It is a common phenomenon to find that most imported luxurious imported
food, for example blueberries and asparagus are left unsold until they get rotten. For
most ordinary Russian people, they come to supermarkets barely to satisfy their basic
daily needs. Another interesting fact is the restrictions on the selling of alcohols.
Because alcohol addiction is a long-standing social problem in Russia, alcohol selling
is banned in all Russian markets after 22:00. But the effect of this policy is doubted,
people can buy alcohols in groceries and consume in bars. Except for supermarkets,
there are some large scale markets outside the metro, with a variety of goods but at
higher prices. Often along the street there are small marketing booths usually selling
home-made food, or vegetables. It is obvious that these people are very poor, usually
very old or from central Asian countries, yet because supermarket chains are very well
built in St.Petersburg with their food prices usually lower, I see very few people buy
on street booths.
Russian society and cultural elements
On the metro
The order in the metro station is very good, most people obey the rules with very few
ticket evaders. In the metro compartment, people care for the old and woman, we can
see young people give their seats to people who need it. Russians like to read books,
on the metro many people read books or newspapers. Generally it leaves me with
good impressions.
Ethnic relations
Russians do not like foreigners, some of them are even ultra nationalists,
exemplifying xenophobic attitudes publicly and actively. For example, once when I
attempted to rent an apartment, I was astonished by the fact that most house owners
clearly indicate that they refuse to rent to non-Russians! Another case is that Russians
like to call people from Caucasus black people, and African people negro. I can feel
they prefer to show more respect to white people than to colored people. But my
roommate explains that they are just racist in the way they call these people, they feel
indifferent about them in daily life. It is true that I have not seen real racial conflicts in
St.Petersburg, people of different ethnic groups and religious beliefs usually can
coexist . But it is also true that most immigrants from Post Soviet regions are in lower
social status, they do very lowly paid jobs and live in the poor communities. People
from central Asia live and interact mainly with their own ethnic groups, so do the
Caucasus people. Yet there is no racial segregation in the form of USA style, generally
Russian people do not refuse to live with immigrants. Russian people do not like
people who do not speak their language, they are not tolerant towards non-Russian
speakers. Once I was in the restaurant ordering food with my poor Russian, the seller
sarcastically pointed out that I speak very bad Russian, why am I here if I cannot
speak good Russian. A more serious challenge is religious tensions. Even through
many Russian young people( ethnic Russians) are not faithful believers of orthodoxy,
with many who I talked to, they were quite anxious about the Muslim expansion in
Russia. In their eyes, Muslim culture is not a part of their own culture, its growing
influence poses a menace to the mainstream Slavic culture. More practically, it is very
widespread among ethnic Russians to associate Muslims to terrorists, Muslims from
Chechen and Dagestan suffer strong prejudice from white Russians. Once when I took
a taxi, the taxi driver told me his nationality is Dagestan, not Russian.
Russian young people and religions
Russian young people share more and more commonalities with young people in the
western countries, this is the outcome of western cultural influence on Russian society.
Compared with soviet time when young people are subject to moral principles and
usually behaved in a very self-disciplined and implicit manner, with traditional
collectivist thinking as driving ideology, today’s Russian youth are much more
liberalized and individualized in both their mentality and behavior. Young Russians,
just like my European friends, like watch American movies, TV dramas, listening to
American music and eating American fast food. Traditional Russian cultural practices
are more or less on a marginal position today. The most outstanding Russian cultural
symbol, orthodoxy, has lost its followers among young Russian people today. When I
visited Orthodox churches, they are usually quite empty, the only remaining believers
are old people. In the Russian studies class, it is taught that even through there are
certain number of believers today, most of them are not authentic believers, they
claim themselves to be believers but they do not often visit the church, participate in
church activities, the only occasion for them to demonstrate their religious identity is
perhaps during orthodoxy festivals such as 1st of May. In Russian, rural areas usually
have more religious believers than cities, but it can be explained by the fact that in
rural areas, there are more old people than in urban areas, old people tend to have a
religious faith than young people, but it is also undeniable that Russian rural areas are
much poorer than cities. As we have mentioned above, today many young people in
cities claim they have a orthodox faith, the reason for them to choice orthodox faith is
to ease the pressure they suffer in their urban lives, simply to have a spiritual pillar in
their life. Hence they do not really inherit real orthodox ideas, It is interesting that
many young people who decide to have a religious belief do not necessarily turn to
orthodoxy, many convert to other religions such as Islam.
Westernizers and slavophile
In big Russian cities especially St.Petersburg and Moscow, many middle class people
and intellectuals(who can also be middle class) have strong faith in western universal
values. They strongly believe in liberalism, hence most of them dislike Putin as they
see Putin’s regime as autocratic and not liberal. This belief is very widely held among
the professors and students in my department. For them, all the Russian economic and
social problems are the results of the drawbacks of Russian political system. However,
it seems to me that these people do not have a critical thinking capability on western
political systems, they blindly hold the belief that a democratic government can solve
all problems for Russia. While attitudes towards Putin among ordinary people and
poor people in smaller cities and villages are generally positive, these people have
very strong faith in Putin. They are very grateful of the social order and better
material comforts brought by Putin since he took office, which sharply contrasts to
Yeltsin’s reign. Except for this aspect, these people are also the most patriotic, even
nationalist among all the Russians.
Legacy of the USSR
On 8 of May the victory day for Russia in WWII, many people holding Russian flags,
some even hold Soviet flags. Many times we see on the street of cars painted with
Soviet flag or symbols. There was a building I saw with a huge soviet symbol on its
side. Even a can food named CCCP. I have met many old people and some young
people who miss or like the idea of Soviet Union, as they see it as powerful and proud.
One person I know in the dormitory even has a Soviet flag on his wall. But many
young people and some old people dislike USSR as it is associated with poor living
standards and shortage of food, for young people, many think USSR is totalitarian and
not liberal.
University life in St.Petersburg
Unlike universities in America or Britain, RANEPA does not have a school campus. It
is similar as Sciences Po Le Havre( despite there is a small square in front of the
building) . The department of comparative politics where I study in is a single
building located along the street near metro Obvodny Kanel , while our dormitory
locates several metro stations away on Vasilyevsky island, in the city center.
Vasilyevsky island itself is a charming place with many old neo-classical style
buildings along the street. What makes it even more comfortable to live here is the
so-called geographic advantage. The island itself is so close to Neva river that it only
takes around fifteen minutes to arrive at the river bank. The river bank is well built
with wide sidewalk along the river, which looks in some ways similar to the Bund in
Shanghai. On the left side(towards Vasilyevsky island side) of the sidewalk beautiful
flowers and grass are carefully planted, while on the right river Neva flows smoothly
and calmly. Standing on the sidewalk and looking to the south, what jumps in your
view is the golden top of Isaakievskaya church shining under the bright sun, not far
away there are the fascinating architectures of Admiralty building and Bronze
Horseman sculpture. All of them are among the other old and captivating
neo-classical architectures sitting quietly along the river. Walking down the street you
arrive at the Kunstkamamera museum where you can see all the strange collections by
the Tsar. yet it is always a more attractive choice to cross the river to the other side of
the bank, there you come to the heart of St.Petersburg: Winter Place, State Hermitage
Museum, Palace Square are located just a few minutes walk away. Going further
down to the south there is the Nevsky Prospect, the central commercial street of this
city, with so many delicious restaurants. The well-known Spilled Blood church and
Kazan Cathedral facing each other on the northern and southern sides of the Nevsky
prospect respectively. If the night is still young, spend several hours in shopping mall
Galeria provides you with the feeling as if you are in Galeries Lafayette in Paris. No
one can deny the fact that our dormitory on the Vasilyevsky island gives us the best
opportunity to explore the history and culture of this city. However, St.Peterburg is a
big city, the school is pretty far away from the dormitory, it usually takes us one hour
on the journey by subway. While in Le Havre, the city is smaller, but CROUS
dormitory is also closer to our school department. We only spent 15 minutes to school
on foot, which save a lot of time. Sometimes due to the severe weather of Russia, we
become quite hesitated to decide if we should go to school or not. The school
dormitory here is very cheap, but at the cost of no choices of rooms available for us.
We can just live in rooms at least for two people, mostly three or four. This poses a
sharp contrast to the CROUS housing where I usually live in a single apartment.
Living in such a dormitory brings an experience of love-hate relationship, in the sense
that you can better communicate with Russian students while lose your privacy,
overall it is not even a problem if you get along well with them. What really comes as
a disappointment is the fact that only one desk is provided in the room, hence all
roommates have to share one desk, which makes study very inconvenient in the
room( because you need to care about others, hence you cannot occupy the desk by
yourself, yet sharing the desk makes your own study inconvenient). However, if we
are in Le Havre, Sciences Po provides a library in the department building with
adequate equipment. This is not the case here. The department building does not have
a library nor even a reading room for students. It is impossible for us to study in the
school building before or after classes. This school does have a library, which is
located in another part of the city, the condition is not really good and takes us quite
sometime to go there. In the end many of us Sciences Po exchanges have no choice
but to go to cafe on the streets to study. There is no doubt that all these inconvenience
have reduced our study efficiency to some extent. All these frustrations make me envy
about my friends who exchange to British or American universities which provide
much better studying and living conditions to their students, especially the fact that
they can study in the library with so much flexibility at their discretion ( just recently,
the school eventually opened a small library in the dormitory building, with only four
computers. I am now able to sit in this small room with wifi and write this report to
you by the fact that very seldom does any Russian student come here, so that even
these mere four computers are always empty here).
What we learn in the school is called ‘Global studies in Russia’ program, it is an
international program. We take our courses in English, but the campus itself is not a
English speaking campus. The rest of Russian students all take their courses in
Russian. Hence we are like a small group of isolated students. Most Russian students
have difficulty in their English, perhaps because of this, only a few Russian students
join us in the courses, for example, in first semester, in all three courses we took in
English, Russian students who joined us never exceeded three, hence our classes were
always merely a handful of students. It is even worse that these Russian
students
acted very passively in the class, very few of them participated in class discussion. In
the second semester, the situation improved, now more Russian students participate in
our English courses and they are more active in the class. Despite the fact only one
course has more than five Russian students this semester. Another problem links to the
lack of English capacity is the fact that Russian students would prefer to speak
Russian to you than to speak English. Very few of them show any interest in practice
their English with you. In other words, if one only speaks English, he can only have a
talk with a few students on the campus who are able and willing to speak English. The
reluctance to use English also takes place in the study. For example, once we had a
class debate, my teammates were two Russians. What astonished me was that
throughout the whole preparation, they only spoke Russian, even during the debate,
they discussed in Russian, despite the fact it was an English debate. Looking from
another angle, it indicates if you do not speak Russian, it will be difficult for you to
integrate in the school, since most of your Russian colleagues have no desire to know
about a non-Russian speaker, despite you are in a so-called English program. For
exchange students whose goal is to learn Russian here, I think it is a very good
environment for them, but being an exchange student to Russia does not necessarily
imply that one’s aim is to learn the language, and one year is certainly too short to
handle the Russian language for many people, since our program is much more than a
language learning program. The problem I indicate here becomes more obvious if we
compare it to Sciences Po. Sciences Po Euro-Asian campus provides students with
English language programs, this ‘Global studies in Russia’ program, provided by
RANEPA, is also called an international program in English. For most of international
students including myself, the provision of English-teaching programs are an
important reason for us to choose Sciences Po Le Havre. For me, two years’
experience in Le Havre is very fruitful and meaningful. It is true that more than half
of my classmates in Sciences Po were French, but language has never become a
barrier for me to interact with them. The whole campus had a good environment of
English communication, even through I did not speak French smoothly, all the French
I met were very willing to speak English to me. It made me feel convenient to
participate in campus activities and events, clubs and parties and I have built up close
relations with many of my French colleagues. Frankly speaking, Sciences Po Le
Havre has successfully demonstrated the concept of internationality and inclusiveness,
that is also a reason that encourages many of us to continue our study in Sciences Po
for master degree. Therefore, I think the international program provided by RANEPA
still has much to be improved. The logic is simple: to make a successful international
program, only the provision of English-speaking professors is not enough, the campus
itself should be internationalized.
The lack of extracurricular activities is a second problem after English language
constrain. RANEPA provides very few extracurricular activities to exchange students,
same for their own Russian students. Only a few choices of student clubs are provided
on the whole school system of St.Petersburg(with consideration of the extracurricular
activities provided by all six departments of RANEPA in St. Petersburg). The
department where I study in is called comparative politics department. This
department is famous for the tensity of courses and workload. But it is certain that
there are very few extracurricular activities provided by either the school or the
students themselves( perhaps they spend too much time on school work and have no
mood or time for clubs). The whole department sounds like a academic training center
with little focus on social life and student life, it seems to me( but also true after
communicating with some of my Russian friends) that the Russian students on this
campus simply come to school to study and then go back home to do their homework
everyday. The only student club in this department is consisted of few girls and it is
inactive now. As far as I know, none of the four Sciences Po exchange students in
RANEPA has ever taken part in any school club or extracurricular except for a school
activity called educational training once a semester for two days on the weekend. For
us, extracurricular activity is about to explore the city or travel around with friends,
which are really private and outside school. While during my two years in Sciences
Po Le Havre, I enjoyed the variety of choices of clubs and activities provided by
Bureau of Arts( BDA). Through my talks with BDA members I can feel how
enthusiastic they were on the design and organization of activities for the campus. It is
no doubt that all these extracurricular made university life much more interesting and
they also serve as channels for us to integrate into the campus, they are as important
as the university courses in the sense that they together constitute a balanced student
life, don’t forget the saying: all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy. Therefore,
the lack of extracurricular here in RANEPA is quite a shame and has to be tackled
with.
Compared with Sciences Po, the contents of lessons are not fruitful, except for
Russian studies and global governance, it is principally based on the readings, and
discussions on the readings.
Benefits
During the year’s study in Russia, I have accomplished the goals I set for myself.
Through the courses I take, I have a more comprehensive knowledge and
understandings on Russian history, politics and economic system. Outside the school,
I have regular talks and discussions with my Russian friends on a wide variety of
topics on Russia. Trips in and out of the city help me possess a visual image on Russia.
With all these efforts, I have a much clear picture on Russia in my mind and form a
personal view on this country. These knowledge will be invaluable for me in the
future studies.
Conclusion
Russia is always a very mysterious yet fascinating country in the eyes of many. If you
are interested in this country, a short exchange is very suitable. But it is always crucial
to be well prepared, both mentally and physically, on the fact of relative low quality
of education, the very severe climate, a bureaucratic system with bad efficiency and a
society that is not very welcoming to foreigners, or more specifically, to non-Russian
speakers. I strongly recommend one to learn Russian and be able to handle this
language before he comes. Except for all above, the deteriorating economy these
years and the possible social problems in the future also possess a risk. Once you are
ready, there will be no obstacles to prevent you from enjoying the exotic culture,
amazing beauty of nature and delicious food in restaurants of post-soviet states.
Annex
Budget: budget here is a sort of comfort for you, with rubble continuing to depreciate,
you feel you are getting richer and richer here everyday! However, with so many
Russian people suffering from deteriorating living conditions, it dose not mean you
should live an extravagant life style. The overall expenses taking into account of food,
communication, traffic and entertainment would be around 150 euros per month. If
you stay in school accommodation, it would be another 100 euros per month.
However, if you want to rent a house in the city, it is no cheaper than 300 euros.
Travel：St.Petersburg is a world famous tourist destination, the whole tourism industry
is matured here. You can easily get information in English such as leaflets and maps
which help you to organize your trips in and near the city. Yet Russian people
generally do not speak English. Also many of the businesses have a habit of cheating
foreigners. It is a better choice to travel with your Russian speaking friends which
would reduce a lot more risks and inconvenience.