Rushing up and speaking Russian (tag Vlad). on Cascade Hall

Tatiana Vorontsova

October 26, 2017 10:05 PM

Rushing up and speaking Russian (tag Vlad). by Tatiana Vorontsova

Since arriving at Sonora, Tatiana had found herself dealing with an enemy. This enemy was totally unexpected, particularly as she had never encountered it before in her life, that she could recall, and therefore had no idea what, precisely, she had done to annoy it. Its name was ‘shyness.’

Shyness – her! She could not believe it. It was, after all, her deficient sense of modesty which had allowed her to learn English in the first place and which had encouraged Papa to think she would be well even among strangers. She had heard him tell Mama that they did not need to worry about Tatiana forgetting who she was ” – I do not think it occurs to Tatiana that there could be anything about herself to improve.” A double-edged compliment at best, but still – Tatiana was not shy. Nor did she feel any need to be like the Americans; obviously her way, the way they had at home, was better than the one the Americans used, so why would she want to adopt their ways? That she spoke English – the one concession to them she could not go among them without making – with a noticeable accent did not concern her, either, as standing out had never bothered her. The problem, now that she was in this situation, was her grammar, or lack thereof.

Tatiana took great pains not to remember when she had been prodded – and then, when she played deaf, outright ordered – into attending the special class, but sometimes the memory would sneak up on her and make her want to die right on the spot. It also made her, to her increasing horror, worry when she spoke to them – worry they were thinking she sounded stupid. Anton Petrovich had gotten her to reluctantly try to master the art of articles by sharply informing her that in English, she sounded like her brother Alyosha every time she opened her mouth – like a baby, not able to talk right. Did she still sound like a toddler? Did they think she was mentally deficient when it obviously took her a moment to process what they said and respond to it, or when she didn’t understand at all because there was too much noise or unfamiliar words went by too fast? Why was she so much worse at this than she had been at home with Anton Petrovich and Papa? It didn’t make sense to her that she could have true difficulty, the kind that was not overcome in a day, with something; it had never happened to her before, or at least not for this long.

Sometimes, it was the simplest things that could annoy her to distraction. Her classmates’ names, for instance. They did not sound much more like names to her now than they had when she had started here, most of them, and she could not always tell what was supposed to be a last name and what was supposed to be a first name. There was, however, one exception, and his name was Vladimir.

When she had first heard that, Tatiana’s head had whipped around in surprise, as she had not expected to hear another Russian name for months and months. She had been slightly disappointed when its owner’s surname had turned out to be English-sounding gibber-jabber, not something sensible, but still – perhaps he was from Russia, or not long removed from it. There were English and Germans and French, after all, who had moved there long ago, and while their names remained odd they were as Russian as anyone else now. Her newfound awkwardness, however, still made it some days before one day, all in a rush, she ran up to him after class.

“Vladimir – tebya zovut Vladimir, da? Privet,” she exclaimed, greeting him with the casual ‘hi’ after hastily asking that his name was actually Vladimir without waiting for an answer and then wondering if she should have. She had also called him ‘tebya’, assuming the liberty of two children not to use the formal form, but when she combined that with only just addressing a new acquaintance old enough to go to school as just ‘Vladimir’ and nothing else…. “Sorry,” she continued, still speaking Russian. “I don’t know your patronymic – my name Tatiana Andreyevna. My home – the Wizard’s Village, it in Alaska, but we Russian there. Where you from?”

All of this was uttered with a beaming smile that she had not used since arriving at Sonora, which she hoped he did not take the wrong way – she did not think he looked funny and did not mean to be overly delighted to see someone she assumed was the same as her, she just sort of…was. Of course, perhaps he was also delighted to see another person who didn’t use articles and would smile at her, too, and not be mocking her, as she somewhat suspected all the perpetually smiling Americans were sometimes. She looked at him expectantly, eyebrows slightly raised above her greenish-blue eyes as she waited for a response in her own language.

OOC: Better late than never, I suppose - we’ve waited too long for this one to not do it at all. Fuzzytiming back to an unspecified but early-ish part of the term, perhaps early October.

16 Tatiana Vorontsova Rushing up and speaking Russian (tag Vlad). 1396 Tatiana Vorontsova 1 5

Vladimir Brockert

November 22, 2017 6:05 PM

Yes you are definitely doing both of those things by Vladimir Brockert

Big, grey eyes stared back at the girl before him, wide with surprise and maybe a slight hint of terror. She was a bit taller than him and speaking wildly in Not English, which was of course always a bit jarring. Fortunately, he had been at Sonora long enough to recognize her and she wasn’t just some crazy stranger. Tatiana Vorotonsova - although he was somewhat sure she just called herself Tatiana something else in there - had a very Russian sounding name, and that was helpful because that was definitely the language she just rattled off at him.

“...Okay,” he said after taking a moment to try to process the series of noises that had just happened to him. “You said my name twice, then you said hello, then some stuff I don’t know, then your name, and then maybe the word for Russian? But that’s all I got.” It was an impressive amount, Vlad thought, and actually, he was kinda proud of himself. He was by no means fluent. His mom, having grown up in Moscow, taught the kids some stuff here and there. Mostly, his maternal family members only spoke in Russian when they didn’t want him to know what they were talking about. He still caught names though, and he was pretty sure the language was mostly used to talk about Aunt Jamie’s late ex-husband. He definitely knew that his grandmother was using words she would never use in English; he could tell from his mom’s facial expressions.

“Are you from Russia?” he asked curiously. “My mom grew up there. That’s why I got a Russian name. My sisters don’t have Russian names, though. My big sister is Ivy - she’s a second year - and my little sister is Lavender - she’s too little for school. My grandmother is a Tupolova,” he added helpfully. Tatiana had to be a pureblood, because why would a Russian muggleborn go to school internationally? And the Tupolovs were a pretty big deal over there, so maybe that information would help Tatiana place things.

12 Vladimir Brockert Yes you are definitely doing both of those things 1400 Vladimir Brockert 0 5

Tatiana

November 22, 2017 8:14 PM

Now I'm trying to speak Russian and English simultaneously. by Tatiana

Big blue-green eyes, only a little darker than the aquamarines in their owner’s ears, stared back at Vladimir with surprise and maybe a little dismay as he said a whole paragraph in English. Tatiana’s smile dropped from her face, and her bottom lip trembled for a moment before she bit it, hard, to keep herself from crying before a stranger.

The burning sensation in her chest reminded her most of humiliation, though she didn’t think that was the right name for it now. It had been difficult, knowing she couldn’t speak easily or fluently to anyone, ever since she had realized that native speakers didn't sound anything like Papa and rather different even from Anton Petrovich when they spoke English with her – but compared to this, it had been a sunny afternoon in June. She didn’t realize how much she had missed hearing voices other than her own speak Russian until now, when she had so expected to hear just that and had been disappointed.

“I know this name,” said Tatiana dully when he attempted to explain why he had a normal name. His jabber about his sisters washed over her without making much of an impression; she thought lavender was a flower, but did not know ivee, and her main thought was a slightly vicious reflection that his mama and papa ought to have named him Tree or Cloud or something, to match his inanimate-object sisters. “I do not know them. I from Alaska, but Mama from Rossiya – Dedushka Papy from Rossiya. Sistery go to school there.” She was so depressed she didn’t notice she had begun combining English words with Russian grammar and pluralization. “I sorry – your name confuses,” she concluded.

16 Tatiana Now I'm trying to speak Russian and English simultaneously. 1396 Tatiana 0 5

Vlad

November 24, 2017 10:17 AM

That seems like a lot by Vlad

Oh.

Oh no.

His friend was sad! She tried to hide it, but Vlad could tell. His response hadn’t been what she wanted to hear, and now she was sad. He didn’t like it when people were sad. That made him sad, too, and he didn’t like being sad.

He listened to what she had to say, and he did think it was cool that they were from Alaska with some immediate Russian heritage, like her mom and her dad’s grandpa - family words, he had down pretty well - but he felt his little heart break when she said she was sorry. “Oh, no! Don’t apologize!” he insisted, gently placing his hands on her shoulders in the hopes of offering some comfort.

“I’m sorry I got your hopes up,” he said with a weak smile. “But, uh, I can learn more Russian, if that would make you feel better? I can have my mom teach me more over our letters or when I go home for break. Or you can teach me, if you feel up to it,” Vlad added optimistically. His smile grew a little, proud of his own suggestion and how it might make her feel better. “It’ll be okay.”

12 Vlad That seems like a lot 1400 Vlad 0 5

Tatiana

November 26, 2017 1:35 PM

Tell me about it. by Tatiana

At home, Tatiana was used to having physical contact with others. This was an inevitable consequence of sharing a bedroom with one of her sisters and her sitting and dressing rooms with all three – when she had first arrived, she had been momentarily confused about how on earth she was supposed to wash her hair or her back, as she and Katya had performed those functions for each other since they were old enough and Nadezhda had performed them for them before that. Since arriving at Sonora, though, she didn’t think she’d had more than momentary, incidental brushes with other people, so she stiffened with surprise when the Amerikanets Vladimir put his hands on her shoulders.

In her current mood, his offer to learn Russian did not go over nearly as well as Dorya’s had with her. “You learn Russian in – home time?” she asked skeptically, forgetting the English word for ‘holidays.’ “You know how long I learn English? Since I have six years. Now Anton Petrovich says I sound like a baby with three years when I talk English. You learn Russian in home time? Na.”

She deflated as the realization that he didn’t really deserve her temper punctured the balloon of her momentary irritation and allowed less focused misery take its place again. “Do not remember this,” she encouraged him, glumly again. “My fault – I come here, who expects you to talk Russian? Your familiya – po-Angliiski.” She shrugged philosophically. “You – with Dorian Montoir you live, yes? He – my friend,” she said, trying to change the subject to something more agreeable, as it seemed he was going to be one of those people who wouldn’t just leave someone alone to enjoy a wallow in her unhappiness with a situation.

16 Tatiana Tell me about it. 1396 Tatiana 0 5