My Friend Max

This is Max Levenko:

Max is a friend from last summer and he goes to university here in St. Petersburg. Praise God for Max, because he takes good care of me. The last few days he's come over in the early evening and we'll hang out and go run errands and he will translate. For example,  I got my cell phone (I'm using a phone a teacher from last year left, and I just need to buy a SIM card, which is a little memory card that allows me to pay as I go) and it didn't work right, so Max helped me straighten every thing out at the shop where I bought it. 

 Max came over today and we went for a little ride on the Metro so I could charge my metro card (40 rides, 300R, about $12) and we hopped on an Ikea bus. Well, it's not really operated by Ikea, but it is operated by a mall that has an Ikea, and the bus is yellow with Ikea all over it, so Russians call it the Ikea bus. This bus is free(!) and only goes from this one metro stop to the mall. Max is an Ikea fiend. He spends hours on the virtual home planner on their website. He's into anything Scandinavian and Ikea is probably apex of Scandinavian culture, so he recently applied for a job there. You'll notice in his picture he is wearing a Hatesphere t-shirt; he is a huge metal fan. You'll also notice in his picture a hot dog. We ate at Ikea and I got a hot dog and fountain soda for 60R ($2.40). Way to go Sweden!

Max's English is very good and he's actually German major at his university, so his German is pretty good too. His English is so good that he's able to joke very well in it. I've been told he is even funnier in Russian. So, basically Max is a great guy (music taste aside) and he is watching out for me and making sure that Russia doesn't eat me alive.