The Day Michael Died

I'm the best kind of drunk right now. In fact, only one person that I know knows what kind of drunk I am right now....that person is Scott Lawrence Siepker. I managed to find this German restaurant (ala Hessen Haus) and they served Augustiner, a beer that Scott and I had in Munich. Man, this beer is amazing. I didn't think they served it outside of Munich, so I was EXTATIC when I found this place that had it!

The restuarant itself is really cool...felt very much like Hessen. I ate there alone, but it was probably best because I had time to just be by myself and enjoy the atmostphere. The meal itself was only OK, but the beer and my surroundings made it a very enjoyable meal.

The big news of the day is that Michael Jackson has died. I really don't know how to react. Michael Jackson is my childhood. My mom and dad would blast that while us kids would dance to it. It's so surreal....I almost don't believe he's dead. I haven't thought about him much in the last 10 to 15 years, but when I heard it just hit so close to hom.e. As my brother pointed out, it's a lot like Heath Ledger...you feel like you lost someone that's closer to you than he actually is.

A Russian student at the MAT came up to me, Christina and JT while we were eating lunch at said he was so sorry to hear about Michael's death. I thought that was such an incredible gesture....a Russian guy telling giving his condolences to us simply because MJ was our countryman. I don't know how to react, but either way Michael was an amazing performer that I will miss very much.

This now brings the total of celebrities that have died while we've been over here to four: David Carradine, Ed McMahon, Farrah Fawcett, and now Michael. I'm afraid to ever even think about coming back to Russia for fear of losing other people. It's been a very weird month.

So I missed a day of blogging...big whoop. Not much happened. We went to see Cherry Orchard at the MAT. 22 of us went, 6 of us stayed until the end. It wasn't the most amazing show we've seen here, but it was nice to see something a bit closer to home. The acting was much more text driven and subtle, a lot like it is in the states. The coolest part of the show is that they used the actual MAT curtain as the set...the reason being that this was the only place left in the world that was still around when the play was born in the late 1800's. A very original concept.

I did my "given circumstances" etude, which is where you are yourself in any sort of circumstances, real or fake. I chose a Chiefs playoff game that they lost on a controversial call...not too far from home.

Today was a pretty good day though. We had our singing final which I am so glad is over. Working with Marina is pretty stressful, but I survived and it wasn't too bad...always worse beforehand. But now it's over and I feel like it's smooth sailing until we leave.

Truth be told I'm pretty excited to be coming home for a variety of reasons. I miss people and can't wait to get back to American food and culture. Sometimes it takes being away from home to realize that.