Hello Post From New Intern Francesca

Hi everyone! My name is Francesca, I’m a Dutch/Italian freelance journalist based in St. Petersburg, and since June, a new intern at the Liden and Denz Language Center in St. Petersburg.

I ended up in Russia a bit by chance almost four years ago when I found a double Master’s degree in journalism between Berlin and St. Petersburg. Although my initial plan was to move to Germany after my graduation, the prospect of living a Russian life started fascinating me more and more during my last semester in St. Petersburg. After one year of unfruitful Russian classes at the university, I eventually decided to take a course at Liden & Denz, and after only one month, the until-then unintelligible grumbles of the babushkas at the dorms finally started to make some sense. As my language skills improved the temper of the babushkas also sweetened, motivating me to keep studying the language.

Once graduated, I decided to give St. Petersburg a try and I came back for a month to look for job opportunities and a place to live. St. Petersburg immediately proved to be an excellent choice and after two years I am still here with no intention to move anywhere else. In the past two years, I have been working as a freelance journalist for different international publications, mostly covering events and cultural life in St. Petersburg and I co-produced a documentary film on the clash of political ideologies in Russian theaters.

During my internship at Liden & Denz, I hope to share with you some of the reasons why I fell in love with the city and the Russian culture, my discoveries, and my ongoing struggles with the Russian language, hoping that my experience may be of use to other Russian learners.