The Curonian Spit

The Curonian Spit (Lithuanian: Kuršių Nerija, Russian: Куршская коса, German: Kurische Nehrung, Latvian: Kuršu kāpas) is a 98 km long, thin, curved sand-dune spit that separates the Curonian Lagoon from the Baltic Sea.
It stretches from the Sambian Peninsula on the south to its northern tip next to a narrow strait, across which is the port city of Klaipėda on the mainland of Lithuania. The northern 52 km long stretch of the Curonian Spit peninsula belongs to Lithuania, while the rest is part of the Kaliningrad Region, Russia. The width of the spit varies from a minimum of 400m in Russia (near the village of Lesnoye) to a maximum of 3,800 m in Lithuania (just north of Nida).
The Curonian Spit is home to the highest moving (drifting) sand dunes in Europe. Their average height is 35 m, but some attain the height of 60 m.
The largest town on the spit is Nida in Lithuania, a popular holiday resort, mostly frequented by Lithuanian and German tourists. The northern shoreline of Curonian Spit is the site of beaches for tourists. Both Russian and Lithuanian parts of the spit are national parks.
The Russian side of the Curonian Spit belongs to Zelenogradsk district of the Kaliningrad Region, while the Lithuanian side is partitioned among Klaipėda city municipality and Neringa municipality.
There is a single road that traverses the whole length of the Curonian Spit. In the Russian side it goes to Zelenogradsk, while on the Lithuanian side it goes to Smiltynė. The spit is not connected to mainland Lithuania. Car ferries provide a transportation link between Smiltynė, located on the spit, and the port town of Klaipėda.
Since 2000, the Curonian Spit has been on the UNESCO's World Heritage List.

Faithless - BOMBS

We think we're heroes, we think we're kings
We plan all kinds of fabulous things
Oh look how great we have become

Key in the door, the moment I've been longing for
Before my bag hit the floor
My adorable children rush up screaming for a kiss
And a story they're a gift to this world
My only claim to glory
I surely never knew sweeter days
Blows my mind like munitions
I'm amazed

So much heaven, so much hell
So much love, so much pain
So much more than I thought this world could ever contain
So much war, so much soul
One mans loss, another mans gold
So much more than I thought this world can ever hold

We're just children, we're just dust
We are small and we are lost
And we're nothing, nothing at all

One bomb, the whole block gone
Can't find me children and dust covers the sun
Everywhere is noise, panic and confusion
But to some another fun day in Babylon
I'm gonna bury my wife and dig up my gun
My life is done so now I got to kill someone.

Should I give up? *antialcoholic advertisement*

I was trying to forget about English for couple of months because it made me sick!!!! And, finally, it had happened!
But I felt empty.
What do people do for not feeling empty...lonely?
I guess, they drink. Especially, the Russians. So, I'm not an exeption. I'm a Russian one to the very marrow of my bones.
Why do we do this? Why do I do this? Do we really need some dope? Why we can't live without it?
Too many questions and no fucking answer.
When I see drunk people I feel sorry about them, cause they seem weak for me. Am I right that we are the nation of dweebs???

People, be strong and take care of yourselves.

" I am the Passenger and I ride and I ride..."

After two weeks of every-year depression unconquerable desire to escape from the town ate me. To the village! To the village! Every single kilometr from the town I understood how wonderful can be life, I started to smile looking at quaint clouds. As far I drove from dust and noise of " glass and concrete" as better I felt. I realize that I can't breathe freely among fence. Could you imagine the volume of freedom when you are standing in the middle of the field of flowers, listening the buzzing of bees and dragonflies? Only you and nature.
Now I know how important to feel the unity between you and the other world. And I finally know what to do and how to cope with it.

Summer

The summer has come. Damn, I hate summer!!! I don't know, is there anybody in the whole world, who hates summer the same as me. May be, polar explorers?
Of course, "hate" is too strong word, but I really don't like summers. I don't take kindly to it. And I don't know why. I understand, that summer is so wonderful: rare warm rains, hot weather, beaches and sea, light clothes, short skirts, open-air parties, sunbathing, swimming, beach volleyball, vivid colours, flowers, KaZantip. And? I'm not surprised. Give me a snow woman, mittens and sledge!!! I can't bear with sand everywhere after a half-of-an-hour trip to the Baltic Sea, I don't like too hot weather and baking sun. But when I start thinking about Murmansk, for example, I thank Gog for a great opportunity of living in such place like Kaliningrad. I know, we always need more than we've got. But, people, lets appreciate these small life's gifts!!! I'm learning...

Nothing in this world could change your place in my heart

Two years had gone, but I still remember your touches,your voice, your look, your hands,your kisses in my ankles,your ears and how I lied to you that I had swallowed your tonnel, your lips, yor eyes, your faded hairs, our sex on the kitchen floor, on the bathroom floor, on the table, in the balcon, almost everywhere... It's like in one song of your favoutite group "I still remember..." You know, I've tried to forget. I was guilty: I wanted to forget about you first, but SOMETHING didn't let me do this. Then you. We've made so much mistakes. If I could return all the time, I would go out that bus, I wouldn't let you fly away...Did you wait for it? We were...And we are still the soulmates, we are the closest friends, but I'm still afraid of asking you: "Did you want me to stop you then?"

I will love you forever.

Laziness

What can I write about laziness? How can I show it? Transmit my feelings about it to let you understand?
Am I lazy? Are we lazy? Sure. And to prove it, I just stop writing, because I feel too lazy to go on. =P

Why do we need to be loved?

Do we?


To answer this question I have to think what love is actually. Happiness? Soulmates? Freedom? One lady, who is considered to be cleverer than me, says, that love is sacrifice. Previously I guessed it was understanding. Today I think it's sincerity.
We are all selfish, that's why we need somebody loves us. We don't want "to give", we have a strong desire "to take", we need lots of attention to our perishable bodies. I'm against of it. I want to stop lying to myself. I'm looking at sea.

Do we really need to be loved?

I guess not.

Sacred Writing.

Press or Bless.

During the whole year we were writing small articles on different themes and publishing them on our blogs. When we've heard about it at first time, everybody was confused, because it was quite a new task, someting that we had never done before. But as the time went on, we started to like it and come to classes with pleasure. We knew, that today we were going to do someting interesting.
Every topic for our writing was amazing. The teacher gave our minds a chance to fly away and think about very seriuos themes. Sometimes we were having fun writing about the thougts which came up first in our minds, sometimes we were sharing our secrets.
This opportunity gave me a lot. It made me think about such life questins which I have never been thinking about previously. And moreover, I had to do it in English. That was awesome. To my mind, Irina Alexandrovna shared a great idea with us. I hope, that it will be very useful to practice it in future with our pupils or students.

Masks we wear in our life.

These words resemble me the movie “Mask” with brilliant actor Jim Carrey. There was a crazy-looking professor, who wrote the book with this title “Masks we wear”. Of course, this sentence has a metaphorical meaning. It means that all the people in the world play different roles as the situation requires.
Even Shakespeare told, that life was a theatre and peoples were all actors in it. There is vast number of situations when we have to hide our emotions, put on “a mask” for not being identified. When we came to the university, we play in students and teachers, at home we are parents, children, wives and husbands, at work we can be employees or employers, in the company of friends we act absolutely different way. This is one kind of masks. There is also another side of the coin. We put masks when we lie, dissemble, exaggerate or minimize. When we don’t want somebody penetrates in our souls. When we want to create an impression on anybody…
But why do we do this? It is much easier to stay who you are and not hide your face under a “mask”. The answer is rather complicated and lies down somewhere very deep in our minds. May be, we don’t know who we are in reality? I prefer to stay myself everytime, because for me wearing a mask is a deception of your own. If you are honest with youself, you are honest with the rest of the world.

Sacred Writing

Imagine that you have an opportunity to change your sex. Will you choose your sex or male?

It's not the first time I'm thinking about this question. Everybody was watching so many movies about this theme. When I was in New Your I had seen so many people who weren't satisfied with their sex, and changed it with the help of clothes or even having plastic sergery. What concerns me, I'm absolutely happy with the sex which was given to me by my parents and God. However, I wonder, how does it feel for being man? To be honest, I would like to be a man for a week propbably, but not to change my sex forever. I think that there is nor advantages or diadvantages of each sex. I think, that to be a woman is wonderful the same is to be the man. And we all must be happy and thankful for what we've got. Do not try to change your nature, enjoy what you have.

Is Platonic Love the Same Kind of Feelings and Relations as Frienship?

The term amor platonicus was coined as early as the 15th century by the Florentine scholar Marsilio Ficino as a synonym for amor socraticus. Platonic love in this original sense of the term is examined in Plato's dialogue Symposium, which has as its topic the subject of love or Eros generally.
Now Wikipedia gives this definition:"Platonic love (Latin: amor platonicus) is a deep and spiritual connection between two individuals: within such a relationship there does not exist any form of sexual connection or sexual elements."
What concerns me, I didn't suppose that platonic love has a meaning of friendship, because it contains a word "love". I'm sure that both words have something in common, but they are different anyway. I can't understand why should somebody invent such term for the definition of "strong frienship". For me, platonic love is more than frienship, it's highly close relationship, when people feel and understand each other without words, they don't need any explanations, they don't have any negotiations...and they also don't need any sexual relations. I'm absolutely happy to tell, that I have such "platonic lover" and enjoy him very much and hope, that I will never lose him. We call each other "mother" and "father". Sometimes this relationship brings happyness, sometimes - relief, they can make us better, they can lessen our selfishness and start thinking about anybody exept you.

Sacred Writing

Is sex for the sake of sex without any relationship commitment possible?

The questions are rather complicated. To tell the truth, I'm afraid of been wrong understood, but I think that sex without any relationship is possible. Because we are all people and sometimes we have such strong desire of intimacy that we can't stop it anyway. And there are such situations when we don't want to have any relationship, but just satisfy our physical needs. If you don't love person you have to explain to him or her that we are all free to do what we want. Thus, I guess that my point of view is obvious. Sex is always possible, of course, if it is safe and by consent.

Afternoon Pages.

Why does Emma regret about her wedding? Have you ever regretted about anything you have done?

I think, Emma wasn't such kind of woman who saw the sence of her life in a marriage. She was afraid of losting herself, she doubted whetether she made the right choice, her free life has stopped by that day and nothing could be turned back.
What concerns me, of course, like many people in the world, I had regreted about some of my actions. It sometimes happened. But now I can remember the most strange and contraversional regret. I was regretted about my first love. I wish I never did this. Sure, it was because of the pain I've got. And, moreover, it was just a moment of regret. After a while, the pain had lessened and I remembered only wonderful and happy moments of this love.... So, I think, it's no worth regretting about something good. Let's remember the people's wisdom: it's better to regret about what you have done than what you haven't done.

The book which has taught me a lot.

Since I was 3, I had learnt how to read and did it every free second of my life. I have read a lot of books, many of them were wonderful, others not so interesting, but I never gave up reading them, I always try to read them till the end. I can’t say, that I have only one favorite book, there are several of them: “Gone with the wind” by M. Mitchell, “Master and Margarita” by M. Bulgakhov, “Three comrades” by E.M. Remark. My favorite writers are Chuck Palahniuk and Irvine Welsh and I adore everything that they create, their books have taught me a lot, but there is one book, which impressed me so much that I will never forget it. It’s “The Thorn Birds” by Colleen McCullough.
When I was 14, my mother advised me to read this book, and I wouldn’t regret. This is the story about family, about people’s relationship and, of course, about great love. I’m not going to retell you the plot, I want to explain why it has impressed me so much. The main character Meghann "Meggie" Cleary was unhappy in her love, but strong-willed and intelligent woman. Through all her life she bore her burden: she was in love with a priest; she understood clearly that there was no chance for them to be together, but went on living regardless of what people were saying and thinking about it. She had lost 2 of her brothers, a father and a son whom she loved so much, had an unlucky marriage, but still had a strong desire for living. Nothing could make her despair, nothing could change her character, nothing could stop her either God or society, nothing could kill her. And when I start thinking about this woman’s fate, I just can’t believe that such kind of people exists. When something goes wrong in my life, I remember this character and smile, it turns over in my mind that whatever happens you must be strong…you can’t gave in!
Moreover, there is one more thought which appears in this book. This woman went on living waiting for only one and the most happy moment – the moment of intimacy with the man whom she loved very much. She was waiting for it for ages. And when the time had come, she forgot about everything and fell into this maelstrom. That’s why this book had this name - “The Thorn Birds”. It is about desperate people who are able to live till the moment of absolute happiness and beauty…
So do I. I exist till the moment of truth and will live inspite of wars, starvation and disaster. I will go through fire and water, go through thick and thin and nothing will stop me.
That was the main idea why this book has taught me a lot.

Afternoon pages.

What does the parental care mean for you? Are there any words which you desire to tell your parents but are unable to do for some reasons?

Actually, it's not that thing which I like to talk about or discuss. my family relationship used to be private. I don't want, but I must.
Thus parental care has been important for me the whole my life. I am one of those rebelious children who (to tell the truth) fed up with it. And I understand, that even when I get married and have children, my mother won't stop caring and looking after me, aand also teaching me, what I hate the most.
What concerns the words I want to tell my parents...I don't know, they are always "thanxes"...Thanks for giving me birth, for taking care of me, for teaching me how to live. But the most important "thanks" is for my mother for her strong-willing, for her strong character which was her present for me. And her wonderful words: "Sasha, you made me happy!"