Easter is the time of springtime festivals, a time to welcome back the Tulips, the Crocuses and the Daffodils. It’s a time of new suits, new dresses and patent leather shoes; a time for Christians to celebrate the life and resurrection of Christ; a time of chocolate bunnies, marshmallow chicks, and colored eggs!

This year, in Russia, Easter was celebrated on Sunday April 08, 2007.

The tulips in the garden
Are wearing yellow hats;
The pussywillows by the brook
Have fur like any cats'.
The bee is honey hunting;
The robin's chirp is gay;
And all the world is singing,
"Oh, happy Easter Day!"

We, students of South Federal University, live in a lovely city in the south of Russia. Look at the photos: “Spring and Easter in Rostov-on-Don".

http://www.flickr.com/photos/7666138@N07/

There are many holidays that are celebrated in Russia every year.
One of them is the International Women’s Day on the eighth of March. This holiday is dedicated to all women and girls.
People do not work on this day and a lot of romantic, comedy and love films are shown on TV.
So on the eighth of March men and boys congratulate their wives, mothers, daughters, sisters, good friends and give them small presents.
According to the statistics the most popular presents on the International Women’s Day are:

1. flowers (roses, mimosas, tulips, lent lilies etc.)
2. cosmetics
3. jewelry
4. soft toys, sweets
5. tickets for a concert or to the theatre

The International Women’s Day is the first spring holiday after long, frosty winter. Russian people look forward to the coming of spring as they miss warm sunny days, the blue cloudless sky. On the eighth of March people like to go for a walk outside and sometimes festive mood brings to their mind poems like this one:

Spring Cleaning

March bustles in on windy feet
And sweeps my doorstep and my street.
She washes and cleans with pounding rain,
Scrubbing the earth of winter stains.
She shakes the grime from carpet green
Till naught but fresh new blades are seen.
Then, house in order, all neat as a pin,
She ushers gentle springtime in.

William Blake

Please, will you tell us whether there is a similar holiday in your country?

MOTHER
A mother has so many things to do,
From washing, ironing, cleaning to tying a shoe.
When they forget to wash their faces clean,
And their clothes are the muddiest you've ever seen,

Who repairs the clothes and scrubs them like new?
Of course, that is what a Mother will do.
Who becomes the doctor or the nurse when they
are ill, Applying a bandage or giving them a pill?

Who becomes a detective to find a toy or a book?
For missing things she must look and look.
Who becomes a listener to every broken heart,
To every accomplishment that a child makes?

Who seplds their children when they are naughty
Or reminds them of God when they are too haughty?
Who tenc& her family with love and patience, too?
Of course thai is what a Mother will do.
By Jeff Greener

On 8’th of March we are going to celebrate the Women’s day. This day is associated with spring and love. So, I want to recite this simple poem, my favorite one.

Coming through the rye.
Jennie is a pour wet body, Jennie’s seldom dry.
She dreight all her petty-coty
Coming through the rye.
Coming through the rye, poor body,
Coming through the rye,
She dreight all her petty-coty
Coming through the rye.
Jin a body meet a body,
Coming through the rye.
Jin a body kiss a body
Need the world cry.
Jin a body meet a body
Coming through the glen,
Jin a body kiss a body
Need the world ken.

by Robert Burns.

SONG
From thee, Eliza, I must go,
And from my native shore:
The cruel fates between us throw
A boundless ocean’s roar;
But boundless oceans roaring wide,
Between my love and me,
They never, never can divide
My heart and soul from thee.
Farewell, farewell, Eliza, dear,
The maid that I adore!
A boding voice is in mine ear,
We part to meet no more!
But the latest throb that leaves my heart,
While death stands victor by,
That throb, Eliza is thy part,
And thine that latest sigh!

In the middle of the February Russians celebrate Maslenitsa with baking pancakes (blini). Here is the process:

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Below you will find some recipes. Which one would you try?

Ingredients:
1 glass of flour
1, 5 glass of milk
2 table spoonfuls of oil
salt ,sugar to your taste

Stir eggs with salt , sugar and sieved flour in the bowl . Mix it thoroughly. Add some milk in this mixture and oil. Mix it and whip. Make the frypan redhot. Pour out some dough with a ladle on the frypan. Turn over a pancake and fry 1 min. This amount of flour is enough for 12-14 pancakes. Then serve with sour cream, honey, jam and everything you like.

Russians have many traditions & customs of which they can be proud.
A great number of customs & traditions date back to the early days of Russia & we can justly say that they are the reflection of our country’s history & the people’s psychology.

It may be interesting to know about Russian food. The wide range of Russian food is really worth exploring. There are many tasty dishes to try, such as stuffed cabbage leaves, soups, such as borsch, lovely salads, blini, pelmeni, kissel and many others. When Russians invite guests for a meal the table usually groans with food.

Maslenitsa (Shrove(-)tide, Pancake week, Mardi gras)- is a cheerful festival of seeing winter off welcoming spring in. It came from our ancestors which were pagans. To celebrate the occasion they baked blini – special flats.

Ingredients for Blini:
400 pound of flavor
3 eggs
2,5 glasses of clabber
3 spoonful of sugar
salt
citric acid
baking soda

You have to break eggs, drop them into a bowl, and beat them. Add salt, sugar, pour clabber, put flour, slake with baking soda and mix the ingredients slowly. Oil the pan and heat it up. Pour the batter into the pan, cook it a half of a minute then turn over the pancake and cook it until it’s quite ready. Put it on the plate and butter.
Blini can be served with sour cream, curd, jam, vegetable, meat, caviar and so on.

Pancakes is one of the most ancient dishes of Russian cuisine. It appeared in IX century and dates back to pagan times. The main dish at Maslenitsa was pancakes. But they are so popular in Russia even nowadays that people make them all year around.
There is a great deal of recipes of pancakes in the cookery book. I’d like to present you one of them, my family like most of all.

Ingredients:
5 table spoons of flour
2 ½ glasses of milk
2 eggs
1 table spoon of sugar
1/3 spoon of salt
1 table spoon of vegetable oil

Beat up salt and sugar with eggs. Pour milk into this mass and put in flour. Stir the mixture and add vegetable oil. Mix the mass once more. Put the pan on a heating element of stove. Then oil the pan. Bake thin pancakes. Don’t allow them to stick to the pan.
Pay attention! You should pour vegetable oil into the dough only after adding flour, or your pancakes won’t be air.

I hope you’ll enjoy your meal!

Maslenitsa (Pancake week) is the only purely Russian Holiday that dates back to the pagan times. Celebrating Maslenitsa, people are letting the long-annoying winter out and the long-awaited spring in.
The essential element, of course, are pancakes (blini). Pancake is a symbol of sun. It is as round, gold and warm as the sun. Pancakes are served hot with either butter, or sour cream, or caviar, or mushrooms.

My favorite are simple pancakes. Here is the recipe:

Flour - 2,5 glasses
Eggs - 4 to 5
Sugar - 100 g
Dairy Butter - 200 g
Milk - 3 to 4 glasses

For the simple thin pancakes the dough is prepared of flour, milk, eggs and salt. First thing you should do is separate the yolks from whites. Then stir up the yolks with sugar, slowly add milk whilst stirring. Then add the salt and the melted hot butter. Then start adding the flour (very slowly), stirring the mixture and smoothing the dough nubbles. As the last step, add the stirred whites. Now everything is ready for baking pancakes on the hot frying pans.

Ingredients: 400 g. of flour, a half glass of milk, a half tablespoon of salt, a half tablespoon of sugar, 15 g. of yeast, oil.
Heat 250 ml. of milk and mix it with yeast. Add some flour to mixed milk. Make dough and put it in a warm place. Add the rest milk with yolks, oil, sugar, salt to dough. Mix it up. Let it rise.
Pancakes are fried in a well heated pan smeared with oil.
Curds for filling.
Ingredients: 300 g. of curds, 2 tablespoons of sugar, 2 tablespoons of sour, 2 yolks, raisin.
Mix curds with sugar, sour and yolks, salt it a little. Add some raisin.
Pack pancakes like ENVELOPES.
Serve pancakes while they are hot.

150 g of milk
100 g of cheese
3 spoonful of flour
1 spoonful of oil
1 spoonful of cream
1 spoonful of sugar
3 eggs

Make a dough for pancakes, using milk, flour, egg and sugar. Bake pancakes on a warmed-up pan. After that grate cheese, add eggs and cream, mix it up, and add this mixture to every pancake. Roll it. Then put pancakes on the baking tray and sprinkle with cheese. Bake it in oven for 10 min.

250 g of flour
250 ml of milk
250ml of orange juice
2 spoonful of oil
2 eggs
50g of butter
1 orange
50g sugar powder
oil and sugar

Mix flour, eggs, oil, milk and juice. Add some salt and leave it
for 2 hours. Whip butter with sugar powder, spoonful of orange peel
and juice of a half orange – it will be ``sauce`` to pancakes.
Bake pancakes on a warmed-up pan, serve hot with cool sauce !!!

We are celebrating St. Valentine's Day!

Please, listen to the poems and vote for the one that you like best .
Click the following link to vote:

St. Valentine's Contest

Thank you for your collaboration.

My Valentine

I have a little Valentine
That someone sent to me,
It’s pink and white
And red and blue,
And pretty as can be.

Forget-me-nots
Are round the edge and
Tiny roses too; and
Such a lovely piece of lace
The very palest blue.

And in the centre
There’s a heart
As red as red can be!
And on it’s written
All in gold “To you,
With love from me!”

Let me give you my hand;
May it ever be there for you.
Let me give you my shoulder;
May it always comfort you.
Let me give you my arms;
May they only hold you.
Let me give you my heart;
May it only love you.

- by Anon.

February the 14th day
It`s Valentine, they say,
I chose you from among the rest,
The reason is I love you best!

BECAUSE OF YOU, I RISE
by Oliver Mbamara

You are the ray of the rising sun,
Assuring me of a bright new day,
Filled with light and hope to have.
You are the cool breeze of my morning,
With soothing fresh air good for the heart,
Filling my being with lovingness.

You are the sweet bird of the morning,
Singing tunes of love and affection,
With cheers and courage for a happy day.
You are the bud of my blooming flower,
With scents and color so beautiful,
And the gifts of nectar so tasteful.

You bless the dawn of my new day,
And because of you, everyday I rise.

Sure as grape grows on the vine,
So sure you are my Valentine –
The rose is red, the violet is blue,
Sugar is sweet and so are you!

I love you more than applesauce
by Jack Prelutsky

I love you more than applesauce,
Than peaches and a plum,
Than chocolate hearts,
And cherry tarts,
And berry bubble-gum.
I love you more than lemonade,
And seven-layer cake.
Than lollipops.
And candy drops,
And thick vanilla shake.
I love you more than marzipan,
Than marmalade on toast;
For I love pies
Of any size,
But I love you the most.

Hug poem

It' s wondrous what a hug can do
A hug can cheer you when you're blue.
A hug can say, "I love you so"
Or, "Gee! I hate to see you go"
A hug is, "Welcome back again!"
And, "Great to see you!" Or
"Where have you been?"
A hug can soothe a small child's pain
And bring a rainbow after rain
The hug! There's just no doubt about it
We scarcely could live without it.
A hug delights and warms and charms
It must be why God gave us arms.
Hugs are great for fathers and mothers
Sweet for sisters, swell for brothers
And chances are some favourite aunts
Love them more than potted plants.
Kittens crave them. Puppies love them
Heads of State are not above them.
A hug can break the language barrier
And make the dullest day seem merrier
No need to fret you about the store of 'em
The more you give
The more there are of 'em
So stretch those arms without delay
And give someone a hug today.

Sonet 130
By William Shakespeare

My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun;
Coral is far more red than her lips' red:
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damask'd, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound.
I grant I never saw a goddess go:
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground.
And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare
As any she belied with false compare.

The Revelation
by Coventry Patmore

An idle poet, here and there,
Looks around him; but, for all the rest,
The world, unfathomably fair,
Is duller than a witling’s jest.
Love wakes men, once a lifetime each;
They lift their heavy lids, and look;
And, lo, what one sweet page can teach,
They read with joy, then shut the book.
And some give thanks, and some blaspheme
And most forget; but, either way,
That and the Child’s unheeded dream
Is all the light of all their day.

I Wish I Was There
By Jesse Shawano

I wish I was there,
To kiss you Goodnight.
I wish I was there,
To hold you so tight.
I wish I was there,
To gaze into your face.
And wonder why angels,
Have come to this place.

I wish I was there,
To talk all night long.
Or sit in the presence,
Of the one that I love.
I wish I was there,
To tell you I care.
I wish I was there,
To tell you,
"You captured my heart"
And "You'll always be there."

I’m nineteen years old. I live in Rostov-on-Don and study in Rostov Pedagogical University. I’m fond of reading. Most of all I like stories by Adgar Alan Poe. I think his novels are very exiting. I also like to listen to the music. My favorite group is The Beatles.
I live in Rostov-on-Don. It’s a large city situated on the right and left banks of the river Don. Rostov stands on the border line between Europe and Asia.
Rostov was founded on December 15, 1749. Not far from the customhouse grew the fortress that got the name of a Russian metropolitan Dimitri Rostovsky. Later the name was changed to Rostov and later to Rostov-on-Don.
Rostov-on-Don is an administrative, cultural and industrial centre of the Rostov Region.
The city has rich cultural traditions.There are four theatres in the city: the Drama Theatre named after Maxim Gorky, the Musical theatre, the Theatre of Young Spectators and the Puppet theater. Besides there is the Philarmonic, the Jazz Centre named after Kim Nazaretov.The city’s museums display interesting exhibits and collections. The Museum of Fine Arts on Pushkin Street has oil paintings by the well known battle painter,Vereshchagin,and pictures by Aivazovsky, Shishkin, Levitan, Perov, Repin and others. The Museum of Local Lore offers tourists many interesting exhibits which reveal the history of the freedom-loving Cossacks.
More than 20 different nationalities live and work together in Rostov giving it the atmosphere of cultural tolerance and friendship

Hello!
Let me introduce myself. My name is Oksana. I am 19. This year I graduated from Don Teacher Training college and entered the Rostov State Pedagogical University – now I’m a fresh man. I’m eager to be a teacher. I think teaching is a noble profession.
I am a naturally calm, placid person, I long for harmony, security and love peace and quiet. I am romantic and believe in horoscopes. My sign of zodiac is Virgo. I am fond of reading and also I am “a mouse potato”.
They say that I’m a good friend because I’m open to communicate and so it’s easy to deal with me.

I’m 21 years old. I’m from Republic of Kalmikiya, it’s also a part of Russia. I’m proud of my country and I’m eager to learn more about other countries and people of our beautiful world!!!!!!!!

Hi, my name is Kate! I’m 20. I live in Rostov-on-Don and study at the Rostov Pedagogical University. I’m very sociable and out-going person. I’m fond of sport and interested in music.

I’m 20. I’m from Ust- Donetsk. I’m fond of sport, especially swimming. I’m a good mixer.

Hello! My name is Tatiana. I am 19. I live in Rostov-on-Don.
I am a first year student of Rostov State Pedagogical University where I study English.
So, I am a busy person. But when I have some free time in the evening I like to read a good English book or watch TV if there is a good film. I also like music, classical as well as modern. I have more free time during weekends. I like to spend this time with my friends. Sometimes we go to the cinema or just walk around the city.
I am interested in the culture of the Great Britain, the USA and other English-speaking countries.
I don`t know exactly what I will do after graduating from the university, but I am sure I will find a good job as a teacher or an interpreter or something like that, because the English language is very popular now and everybody needs it.

I m a 1st year student of Rostov State Pedagogical University, English department. I came in Rostov from a small but very beautiful and cozy village, where I spent a number of my green years. I m in love with languages, music, break dance, I also like to play tennis, football. Particularly, I' m going to make friends with anybody who has the same interests and occupations as I do, or who just wants to practice language. So, I hope, you'll answer me!

Hello, people!!! Let me introduce myself. My name is Marine, but my friends call me Djarul. I’m from Russia – the largest country in the world. I’m 20 and I’m a student of Pedagogical University. So, I like drawing and I adore creating fantasy. I think it is fun.

Rostov region is the land of the Don Cossacks. In the north of it among the steppes there is a beautiful place called Stanitsa Vershenskaya. This is my native town.
It is situated on the left bank of the river Don. Stanitsa Vershenskaya is a picturesque place which attracts many tourists. It is known all over the world because the great Russian writer M.A. Sholokhov lived and worked there. All the readers know his books “And Quite Flows the Don”, “Virgin Soil Upturned”, “They Fought for Their Country”, “The Fate of a Man”, “The Don Stories”, which display the history and hardships of the Don people. One of the most attractive places of the stanitsa is the embankment. Behind the church St. Mikhail there opens a fascinating view of the Don river. One can admire fresh green bushy and woody banks stretching along the mirror - like waters. Annually many tourists, visitors, rest – makers come here to get acquainted with this famous place and to have a good summer rest. This is a really fine place and a rich land – there are foliage and coniferous forests, lakes, sandy beach which is good for bathing, swimming in the river and sunbathing. I’d like you to visit this place!

Hello, I am Angel, I am twenty years old. I am an active girl, who is inerested in everything in youth life. I like parties, discoes and extreme kind of sport. Besides I am quite attractive affectionate girl. I was born in Rostov -on-Don and I live here.Rostov is an exciting city where you can find a lot of places to get fun.I am a student of Rostov State Pedagogical University.Here I am studying English and gaining teaching skills. I really consider that student life is the most exciting period of life. My life is full of different funny adventures.