The Road Sign Says:

The LITTLE BIG moment that had me shook

LITTLE BIG music videos are unique and interesting to Russians not only because of all this crazy stuff they always come up with, but also because these guys invite tons of Russian YouTubers to every music video. I might even write a list of people who have been invited so far, if Russian YouTube is interesting to you.

But my favorite cameo happened in their “I’M OK” music video. 

You see, the character on the left is Arseniy Popov. He’s one of the actors in Russian TV show “Improvisation” (pretty much the Russian version of “Whose line is it anyway?”). The thing is, there is an inside joke in the show about Arseniy being homosexual.

In the LITTLE BIG's music video Arseniy Popov not only appeared as the first TV celebrity, but the band kept the inside joke that they were clearly aware of. 

As a big fan of both “Improvisation” and LITTLE BIG, I was absolutely thrilled. 

ICONIC

Ivan Vasilievich Changes Professions // Иван Васильевич меняет профессию

Russian Idiom: как не знаю кто

Как не знаю кто often cannot be translated directly. It is an idiom meaning “to the extreme degree, too much”. “Я не знаю кто”, literally, I don’t know who, implies that any comparisons with other people or other events would be too weak, too pale. “I don’t know who could be as [something] as you are now”

Here are a few examples for you (thanks, Reverso Context) : 

Эти девушки смотрели на тебя как не знаю кто. These girls have been lookin’ at you like I don’t know what.

Нет, я еду домой, вымотался как не знаю кто. No, I’m going home. I’m completely soaked. 

Надевает наушники и радуется, как не знаю кто. He’s listening on his headsets, happy as a clam.

Ты пьяна как не знаю кто. You’re really drunk.

Воевали как я не знаю кто, чтобы сделать это. You have fought through hell to do so. 

Tik tok by: @afedoor

About the Russian invasion - how is everyone feeling there? What can we do to help?

Thank you so much for asking!

A little bit of history: it's actually been 8 years since russia first invaded our country. But for the last years it was getting more and more quiet. And now BOOM again

Many people evacuated from the destroyed by war cities in 2014 and some still live there even though they support Ukraine. It's hard to leave your home. So it's emotionally different for everyone. There was a joke that people from Kyiv worry more than people from Eastern Ukraine. Because they have experienced a similar thing in 2014 and now they're more prepared than ever before.

Personally, I'm panicking from time to time, because, yup, it's stressful. Most people don't really speak about the war and evacuation because it's scary. But I feel like everyone's trying to be prepared for the evacuation or fighting. Every night does feel like a last one, after all.

Since the beginning of the war, our people have been giving money to military charity. One of the most famous military charities is "Return alive" (Povernysya zhivim). Many Ukrainians donate here every month. Here is a link for Facebook page of the charity, let me know if it translates to English or if i should make a post with translation:

There is also a charity that helps military. Yana Zinkevych, a Ukrainian politician and a commander of the Hospitallers Medical Battalion, leads this charity. In 2015 she was paralyzed during a mission and since then she has been using a wheelchair. She has personally saved more than 200 soldiers and she's awesome.

https://www.facebook.com/100020149602229/posts/914756185872693/

In her post here she makes a list of needed ammunition and the needed money.

I tried to write about the charities that Ukrainians trust in. They are famous, they have been trusted by people all these years, so as far as I am concerned, they can be trusted.

Here is a post by @everlasting-burnout who provided more links. They seem trustworthy.

Thank you so much for reading and I encourage to reblog. Just to remind you, I'm trying to tell about Ukrainian situation as objectively and as truthfully as I can

THIS ONE. This is my favourite episode of Improvisation. Hands down. I strongly recommend to watch this one with sound on! * — wooden spoons are actually a Russian traditional musical instrument. Nope, not joking. Here's a cool video that shows what these spoons look like and what they sound like: Russian Wooden Spoon (Musical Instrument Sound).

This is my favorite TED talk by Mikhail Kazinik called “The school is dead, long live the school”. 

The point of his TED talk is that the school system is not teaching the right way anymore. The school used to teach to create the image of the world, but it now teaches the subjects without associative thinking.

“We shove information into our poor children like bags […] and where do we put the bags after that? To the junkyard. Because the school’s task is to ignite, and not to shove information.”

The poems Mikhail quoted in this bit: http://www.pushkins-poems.com/Yev704.htm https://ruverses.com/fyodor-tyutchev/we-can-not-divine/8632/

The original: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5gt6m7RwlYk&t=924s

So I was innocently watching a stand up about Russian language and found this comment. Even though it includes a lot of swear words, I thought it would be useful to people who have trouble remembering some Russian words. The stand up I was watching: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BtMd6PbscwE&t=14s

this post isn't about translation or Improvisation. it's just a couple of pictures I took in Moscow so far.

I'll be back home this Sunday. my next translation is half done already. thank you for your patience!

Here's a list of great VK public pages in Russian that I adore: pt 1

If you're learning the language, I think these might help you get more familiar with not only reading and spelling, but with how Russians actually communicate. And these pages are pretty cool too, so you can just check them out even if learning the language isn't the main goal.

1. покажи нам кусочек своей жизни/show us a piece of your life

A rather cool page where people share random pictures from their phones with a bit of info about themselves. Every post has its own aesthetic but more importantly, these posts feel very real and authentic. Here's what some of these posts look like.

"I'm majoring in geo in Moscow, sing in choir, and right now I'm writing my thesis a bit worried about my future. But I'll be fine. Kindness to all"

"the life of a physics teacher 💫"

2. пушистые морды/fluffy faces

Another page that accepts post suggestions. Here you can share your adorable pet (it's mostly cats).

"his name is Oleg"

3. мам ну не читай/mom don't read it

Did you have a diary when you were a kid? I cringe every time I read my old diaries. But this page collects all the weird diary entries and posts them. Not sure where they take them from, but they're all pretty hilarious.

"the door to the future"

"the page of positivity"

I'll be back with a part two!