FARMINGTON – While a local joke describes a true Mainer as one who wears shorts and a parka at the same time, students in Russia joke that their weather comes in two seasons: a white season and a green season.

The humor exchange between students at the University of Maine at Farmington and a class of high school students from a small community in the Komai Republic shortens the distance between the two countries while addressing an issue felt by many: stress, said Kathleen Welch, assistant professor of Community Education at UMF. Humor between the students, she said, tends to focus on a lot of pet and weather jokes, and some sound quite similar.

Students from both countries wore silly hats Friday for a video conference class for the course, stress management through humor. Whether it was a crab-hat, jester or paper mache hat, or just a cap with the school’s logo, students on both sides could see and talk about what they were wearing and why. Comments that started questions were basically about school life and weather.

While here it was chilly Friday, Russians were enjoying a warmer March with temperatures around 32 degrees, the visitors said in English.

One of the goals of the course is to help students in Russia and Maine learn how to manage stress and promote social well-being. Welch, who has worked on the use of humor with HIV patients and has studied and worked in Russia, said students today complain most about having “no time.” Students tend to multi-task, she said, as they text message, talk, write a paper … all at the same time.

Her course is designed as a holistic approach of body, mind, spirit and emotions. She brings in local people to speak on techniques for dealing with stress such as yoga and meditation, and Welch also urges her students to stay focused on today and to use their inner resources to deal with stress since it can’t be eliminated.

Stress is a factor for the students in this small Russian high school also. Located near the Institute at Syktyvkar, an educational college involved in an exchange program with UMF, the rural Russian community of about 1,000 people is in the north with a similar latitude to Fairbanks, Alaska. There, a professor would earn about $100 a month and other employment is found in making pallets or textiles, working in a local prison or making reindeer boots.

While calling them resourceful and fun-oriented, Tiffany Maiuri, assistant director of information technology at UMF, who recently returned from Russia, said the students there are very fashion conscious. While prices are similar to those in the United States, wages aren’t, and for a student to pay $50 for a new pair of boots, she said, would mean using half of the parent’s monthly wage.

While they may not have as many “things” or “toys” as Americans, they are resourceful, as she explained how men might take a pile of rags and wind it into a ball, build their own goal posts and spend the day playing a variety of games.

Four years ago, Maiuri explained, a UMF e-mail that couldn’t reach the Komai Republic for lack of Internet access there started a process that set up high speed Internet for $1,000. Now, students can have a better cultural perspective and an opportunity to participate in an exchange discussion board where they can share similar issues. She explained how one local student talked about having problems with a stepmother only to have a Russian student with the same issue request a response on how she handled it. Students are still corresponding three and four years later, she said.