Здравствуйте, руссофили и говорящие по-русски!

Меня зовут Лука, и я американец от Пенсильвании. Меня очень нравится говорить и учить по-русски!

I am very pleased to find a forum of fine folks like you! I was at first drawn to Russian for the rich sonority of the language — sounds upon sounds upon sounds overlapping yet distinct each one, full and powerful and expressive. I loved it immediatеly!

Last year, I intended to learn Russian. And my only chance to do that was to take summer classes before my final year in college. I had learned Latin, Italian, German, some Greek, Spanish, French, and others, and it felt like it was time for the richness of the русский язык. I also knew that Russian and Latin (up to this point my favorite language by far) shared a case system and other grammatically similar features, these features being some of my favorite of the Latin language.

For the first half of the summer, 2007, I went with my University's Geology Department (my major) out west to Wyoming and Idaho for Geology Field Camp. It was a truly great experience, but one I'll not expound upon here. This kept me from taking Russian 1 the first half of the summer, and I had already signed up for Russian 2 — I figured I could learn the first semester of Russian on my own, as I had for other languages, before the second summer session. I planned to do this during Geology Field Camp.

Well, surprise surprise, I didn't have much time to study Russian out there! So when I got back in the middle of the summer, I bought the textbooks, for both Russian 1 and 2, and had about four days to consume the textbook for Russian 1. Heh, I didn't sleep much. I prepared myself well enough before Russian 2, and although I did well in the class, I feel like I didn't have nearly enough time with the language — just a month and a half in the summer.

So now I've graduated, I'm teaching Latin and Spanish to middle schoolers, and in my free time I've elected to learn some more Russian.

I have quite a few interests in learning Russian. More than anything, I am attracted to the sound of the language itself. I have sought to immerse myself in Russian music, but I haven't found very much yet that meets my tastes (except for some of Валерий Меладзе). I'm especially interested in finding some Russian hard rock, or even heavy metal, as well as folk music; I also am deeply passionate about classical music and opera, and would greatly love to learn some bass-baritone arias in Russian. I'll probably start another thread about that later.

The way I learned Latin was the best experience I had in learning a language, even superior to the year I spent in Florence, Italy. The text I used (and use now with my own Latin students) is called LINGVA LATINA. This miraculous book is written every word по-латински — not a word of English, Spanish, Russian, you name it — just Latin.

Have a look at some of the sample pages:

The very first page is this map of the Roman Empire.
Then, almost anyone who reads the Roman alphabet can understand complete Latin sentences without the need for translation: page 2. It's like a children's book!

Rōma in Italiā est. Italia in Eurōpā est. And so on, with marginal notes and lots of illustrations, the reader learns Latin entirely in Latin, from the simplest sentences all the way through poetry.

Since having become fluent in the language courtesy of LINGVA LATINA, I have eagerly sought the chance to do the same with other languages — particularly with Russian.

Does such a textbook exsist for Russian? A reader that teaches mostly or entirely in the Russian language? Москва в России. Россия в Европе. Россия тоже в Азии. Россия в Европе и Азии. It would be a wonderful thing! I'd love to hear about any such possibilities from you folks.

Many thanks in advance! especially for reading this lengthy and verbose introduction! Пока и спасибо!