Going to the Dacha

I'm going to the dacha this weekend with Tanya and Seryosha. It's located in Demyansk (about an hour south of Novgorod). I'll be back early monday morning. Something for which I am very glad as according to our coordinators they best way to describe tomorrow's celebration is "a city-wide mash-pit." I don't think that sounds like fun. I'm all up for grilling shashlik and having a relaxing weekend away from the city.

In other news, Medvedev' is now president of Russia. We watched the inauguration on the news lat night. It was interesting to watch, though I kept being distracted with the thought of "wow that's a cool crane shot... I wonder how they got a camera up there?" and other videography perspective issues.

The inauguration is significantly smaller - in terms of number of people invited- than a U.S. presidential inauguration. Putin spent most of his speech reflecting over his term as president - according to Tanya it was a very sentimental speech and she found it moving. Medvedev then gave a short speech regarding his plans for his presidency - he then summed it up with a long thank you to "his dear friend Vladimir Vladimivitch Putin." I don't think Putin's role in Russian politics is at all going to lessen with his new role as "former-president."