Week 6 - Yulia (photoblog)

Week 6 exploration of SL began with visiting Moscow Island again, but this time together with other classmates and the lecturer. For me, it was an interesting experience for a few reasons. The first one is that it was a great opportunity to show my country to others. Although I’m not an owner of that site, but it felt like I was the host and it was sort of my duty to ensure everyone was happy and comfortable as if I invited people to my house. Another reason is that I had a chance to see whether I would enjoy working as a tour guide. Having visited this site before definitely helped me direct people to various places of interest, as well as the experience of visiting Moscow on multiple occasions in the real life. Potentially, this could be one of the tasks that I would be giving my students, and expect that it might cause similar degree of pride and enthusiasm among them, which will naturally motivate students to communicate and practice a TL (be it English or Russian).

We talked about how SL gives its users opportunities are not always available in the real life, and this was a good example. No one visited Russia before and the chances of visiting it in the real life are very low – quite expensive, too far and maybe language barrier, because Russian is known to be very difficult to learn and not everybody speaks English over there.

Visiting St Basil Cathedral with other students and the lecturer

While I was showing the Red Square, I saw someone by the name of Kolya (diminutive of the Russian male name Nikolai). The guy turned out to be an American born Russian who lives in California and plans to visit his grandmother who still lives in Russia. His L1 is English, and based on the conversations we had, I would assess his level of Russian as late beginner–lower intermediate. He visits Moscow Island to find people with whom he can practice his Russian. I gave him the link to our site – Kowhai – hoping that he would come by and I could talk to him about why he chose to practice Russian in SL, whether his teacher recommended him, and if SL meets his expectations.

A few days later I decided to visit another site called Lesbian Paradise, which I had actually visited before, sometime in week 1. Since I was new to SL, I didn’t feel confident to explore that site then and left it. However, I thought it would be good to come back and give it another chance J

On the dance floor… Trying to see who is who and with whom.

Being familiar and knowing quite a few members of the LGBT (stands for Lesbian, Gay, Bi-sexual and Transgender) community in person, I know how most of them dress and how to identify who is who, especially in the Lesbian community. Although this identification is often contested, there is no other alternative to ‘butch’, ‘dyke’ and ‘femme’ denotations. The name of the island suggests that it was created mainly for the Lesbian community.  When I teleported there, I saw a bunch of people on the dance floor. The way people looked was the same as in that Romantic Garden Island – a bunch of women wearing what one would usually see on straight people. And also there were a bunch of guys there. In one of my previous posts, I mentioned that the way we appear on SL is usually dictated by what is available and acceptable. Perhaps, those people (if they were indeed lesbians) could not find other hairstyles, manicure, clothes and even bodies. It is easier for femmes, quite challenging to find stuff. In my 1^st week, I visited a bunch of shops and didn’t really see anything that would be suitable for that group of lesbians. Again, I don’t want to sound too categorizing, but I guess for the sake of making it a bit easier, it’s ok.

This time I decided to explore other parts of the island, and as you can see, it was empty.

Another dance floor – at the DJ station

I tried to do some spinning, but these objects didn’t have that option, which is a shame really.

 Dancing in my lonesome

Sitting at their bar 

Flying around 

Saw this slide and decided to give it go

Sliding on my belly

That was fun as!!!

Enjoying spa

Saw some butterflies 

I think those who built this site were quite creative and quite liked nature. As you see, there are plenty of trees, flowers and little garden patches.

By the grand piano

I love this instrument! I wish someone were there so we could play it together.

Playing the grand piano

There was something with the sound, so I couldn’t hear what my avatar was playing and I couldn’t see the notes either. Anyway, it was cool to see my avatar doing things I would be doing in my RL. My place isn’t big enough to have a grand piano, but one day I’ll buy a big house and make sure there is enough space for it.

Dance floor #3, still no one

I thought this was a cool dance floor. It was made as if you’re in the space surrounded by the skies and stars. The creators of this place could’ve made it all look like it was a space or galaxy instead of having only one such element. 

Lying on a hammock

If you can see my pose, it’s like I’m lying next to someone and trying to hug that person/avatar. It’s pretty cool how they thought of such movements. I’ve seen quite a few options around this island, for example, you could stand by a tree and kiss someone, etc. 

Pole dancing

I’ve never done pole dancing in my RL and probably won’t do it. But it’s I guess it’s fine to be doing things like that in SL and at least imagine how it would look to someone else.

Not an empty dance floor J 

My exploration of Lesbian Island has come to an end. So now that I’ve seen all the corners of it, I decided to mingle on this dance floor. It took me a while to figure out how to dance here and what to press on. In Romantic Garden there were hearts hanging all over and in other dance floors on this island, the objects were obvious. I tried to ask a female avatar for help, but she didn’t appear to be online and active. A few minutes later, I decided to ask for help someone else and got it from some friendly chap. So as you can see, my avatar was doing well on this dance floor. The music was a bit weird, for the first 30-40 mins it was all rock stuff and no ‘traditional’ P!NK, Lady Gaga (she's known to be gay friendly), Kylie Minogue (I was told that she's one of gays all favourite) or happy gay stuff like Village People, etc. But then it changed to just normal dance pop.