Victoria Elizabeth Khachaturian is a US citizen. For several months she has been teaching at the faculty of foreign languages of our university. Belarusian dances and accordion playing are among Victoria's hobbies. Vita, and this is the way the colleagues and friends address to her, managed to like Mogilev students. “You are very friendly and easy to contact,” she confesses. In an interview with MSU NEWS, the girl shared her impressions of our country, and also compared Mogilev and her hometown of Los Angeles. “It is much warmer in our homeland than in Belarus, — Vita says. — Knowing that winter is quite cold here, by American standards, I decided to buy warm clothes. Some of the advice was given by my grandmother, who knows Belarus firsthand, as she was in Minsk. By the way, my grandmother, having learned that I'm flying to Belarus, baked draniki… I confess it's a very tasty dish.”
Vita's family speaks English and Russian, our interlocutor communicates only in Russian with her father and grandmother. This is the tradition… There is also Spanish in everyday life, as without it you simply can’t live in Los Angeles… English and Spanish are the languages of interethnic communication. She studied at the University of California. She studied linguistics. In the future, she plans to defend the master's thesis. “It's difficult to find the first job without a master's degree in my country. Everyone needs qualified specialists”, — the girl comments.
Returning to the topic of differences between Belarus and the United States, Vita stressed that there is much more in common between our countries. The difference is only in nuances… For example, in the US there is no such product as cottage cheese. Here, in Mogilev, Vita decided to try it — and was pleasantly surprised. There is no our famous marshmallow in America. The grandmother asked the granddaughter to bring her this delicacy as a New Year's gift. Vita admitted that the Belarusians smile rarely, they are shyer and… almost do not save water. “California is quite an arid region, so no one takes shower for 40 minutes,” she said, and added with a smile: “However, the Americans do not save much electricity…” At the moment Victoria is in the USA. The girl decided to celebrate the New Year with her family. However, she will return to continue teaching at the university pretty soon. A video interview with Vita will appear on our YouTube channel on Thursday.