Out & About

Today I got to see a good chunk of the city. Some on purpose, some not. But exciting all around.

The day started out slowly- sleeping in late (since I still wake up at 4:00 AM, argh), watched some AFN, played viola for a while. Then “Helen” called and asked if I would be interested in going to a concert tonight. A coworker from the office, “Ray,” had a spare ticket to a recital. Since Jonathan had to work late, I thought it sounded like a great idea. She said to just meet Ray there by 7:00.

Jonathan called and I told him about the concert. He said that he got a break before his evening shift and wondered if I’d like to have dinner with him before I met Ray. I said that sounded marvelous. We decided to meet at the office at 5:30.

I left home at 5:00, and made my first mistake- wearing the dreaded blister-causing shoes again. I brought reinforcements this time, though. Extra band-aids. Ha! Take that, shoes!

About a block later, the band-aids started coming off. Crap. I stopped briefly to change them.

After going through this routine twice, and trying to rush in between, I suddenly found myself off my usual route to work. Oops. And then I realized I didn’t have a map. Or a cell phone. Hmm.

I thought about turning and going back home, but then I saw a park several blocks ahead of me. I thought it was the park, “Anderson Park,” let’s say, that adjoins the street I was going to, ummm, “Smith Street,” yeah, that’s it. Anyway, I saw this park and I said, oh, I’ll just keep going. I’ll take the long way around.

Eight blocks and no band-aids later, I discovered it was the wrong park. Uh-oh. It was now 5:30. There was no way I was making it either back home or to the office in time to stop Jonathan from worrying. Oddly enough, however, I wasn’t worried. If nothing else, I knew I could find my way home. So I decided to press on.

I began using what little Russian I have to ask directions. Most people weren’t familiar with Smith Street, but some knew where Anderson Park was. But I wasn’t understanding their directions too well. Basically, I know how to say “go straight,” “turn left” and “turn right.” People were telling me things like “Go through this park, then south, look for the big horse statue…” Essentially, I had no idea. They’d rattle off a whole series of what sounded like gibberish to me, and I’d look at them with desperation and say, “Umm, naleva? (left?)” Eventually I was able to make out one person’s directions- “Go straight to that restaurant, then turn left,” and I found Anderson park. Yay! At the very least, I figured I’d just circle the park until I found Smith Street. I decided to ask one last person, just for clarification, and they turned out to know English. Double yay! They assured me I was (finally) going in the right direction.

I still had about 20 minutes to walk, but at least I wasn’t lost anymore. I had, however, begun bleeding in my shoe.

I finally approached the office, and no Jonathan. Apparently he’d started to panic (I was about 45 minutes late, after all) and had gone out looking for me. I bumped into Helen and she called him. He was immensely relieved to hear that I was found and alive. I was immensely relieved to go in the office and get some band-aids and a glass of water. All in all, it was fun, though. I got to try out some Russian, no one laughed at me, I saw some beautiful parks along the way.

In the end, Jonathan and I didn’t have time to get dinner together, but when I met Ray, we stopped for a pastry on the way to the concert.

The concert was fabulous. There’s a series of concerts going on right now that take place in palaces around the city. So you get the double experience of seeing beautiful architecture and hearing beautiful music. The recital we attended was of an Armenian bass, at Menchikov Palace. Menchikov Palace was originally built by a Russian ruler who feared being assassinated. In his paranoia, he carefully chose a spot for his palace between two rivers, and blocked off the other sides with a moat. Ironically, once it was built, he lived there for about a month before being killed by one of his own guards.

The palace is now owned by the Hermitage, and thus displays some incredible artwork, as well as being an incredible work of art on its own.

The palace…



Inside the courtyard...



The room where the recital was performed...



Another room inside...



One of the rivers around the palace.



The recital itself was great, the singer had a big, fat, properly Slavic voice, and did some dark Schubert and Rachmaninov pieces that suited him well. Then at the end he did a spiritual in “Old Man River” style, followed by something sort of Broadway-esque. Hearing him sing in English was so weird, I kept thinking, this must be what it’s like for a French person to hear me sing in French. He finished with an encore that had some evil laughing in it, and I wondered briefly if he was part vampire.

Afterwards, I had a pleasant walk home in which I did not get lost, and Jonathan and I shared a herring sandwich back home. All is right with the world.

white nights

Last night Jonathan and I decided to undo all our hard work getting over jet lag by staying up super late to experience the White Nights. After last week, the days are starting to get shorter (they’re already less than 20 hours, sheesh), so we figured we’d better jump at the chance.

The big event during the White Nights is the nightly raising of the bridges. As you may or may not know, St. Petersburg is set up on a series of rivers, hence its nickname of “The Venice of the North.” The biggest of these, which runs through the center of town, is the Neva. In the summer, at night, the bridges over the Neva are raised to allow large ships to come in. This happens around 2:00 AM and they close again around 5:00 AM. Since in June it’s bright enough at 2:00 AM to watch this happen, people come out and toast the bridges as they raise and generally frolic and have a good time. It’s THE place to be.

So last night, we decided to take part in the festivities. We left our home around midnight and set out to get downtown. We walked to the nearest Metro station- Metro being the subway system. Because of all the rivers and such, St. Petersburg has a high water table, so for subways to work successfully, they have to be very deep underground. Consequently, St. Petersburg has the deepest subways of any city in the world. The Metro escalators are crazy, you can’t even see the bottom of them from the top. They have lights inside that look like old-fashioned street lamps, and ads all over the place. I would’ve taken a picture, but there are signs up saying you’re not supposed to, and what with the festivities, there’s a lot of police around, so I figured I wouldn’t risk it. (Yet. I’ll attempt to get a picture in the future. )

The Metro is extraordinarily cheap- something like 50 cents to ride. We got our tokens and took the escalators to the bottom. The waiting area for the trains is very interesting- it’s just a big hallway with what look like elevator doors every few feet. No windows or anything- you can’t see the train coming. But eventually you hear it, and all the doors open, and they’re lined up with metro doors, and you hop on. It’s best to know the number of stops until you get off, rather than hoping to see signs- there won’t be any- and forget trying to understand what the conductor is saying.

We took the metro one stop, which was a fairly long ride, and got off on Nevsky Prospekt- Nevsky Street, that is. Nevsky is the main thoroughfare in town, with lots of shopping and 24-hour stores and monuments and all kinds of things. The Times Square of St. Petersburg, really. We got a little turned around getting off the subway, but figured out which way we were going and started toward the bridges.

Scattered among the local shops is the occasional bit of Americana, such as Subway, which is extremely hard to write in Cyrillic and ends up being like 8 letters- something like “CObBAEI,” which is a hoot. Also entertaining is KFC, which they call “Tsiplyonuk Kentakki,” literally, “Chicken Kentucky.” Mm-mm!



Anyway, we reached the end of Nevsky Prospekt, where museums and monuments and palaces begin.

Here’s an archway we walked under- note the clock, it’s almost 1:00 AM.



Here’s Jonathan with the General Staff building…



And me with the Hermitage.



Here’s a wide view of Dvortsovaya Ploshchad.



Eventually we reached the river’s edge, which was already starting to get crowded with sight-seers. We decided to try to go to the other side of the bridge- it was about 1:00 AM and it wasn’t supposed to go up until 2:00. Keep in mind- if you’re on the wrong side of the bridge when it raises at 2:00, you aren’t getting back until it goes down again at 5:00. You’re just stuck. But, we thought we’d take our chances. We got most of the way across and took some pictures- with film, so y’all will have to wait until I get them developed (and learn how to say “scan to CD” in Russian). As it neared 2:00, we figured we’d better high-tail it outta there. As we got back to our side, the police stepped out into the middle of traffic to put up barricades. The streets were packed with cars- I’m sure there’s a crazy traffic jam every night of people trying to get back. Well, we saw some people who missed out by mere seconds. Guess they were stuck for a while!

We ran our way down the side of the river until we found a spot where we could see. The bridge started to rise and there were many “ooohs” and “aaahs.” Also, this whole time, there were fireworks going off. Different bridges raise at different times, so every few minutes there were fireworks in some part of town.

The bridge halfway up… can you feel the excitement?



Fireworks and fountains...



The fully raised bridge, with boats starting to come through.



Apparently another way to see the bridges raise is from a boat... you can rent out private boats (with a driver) to putter around on the river and watch from there. Which is why, ironically, when the bridges finally go up, most of the “ships” that initially go through are small enough to go under the closed bridge anyway.

So, once we’d admired the view sufficiently, we decided we needed a snack if we were going to make it home without falling asleep. We found a great place called “Kofe Haus,” or “Coffee House,” as it were. There are a lot of places around the city open 24 hours, even on our street, which is immensely handy. So at about 2:30 AM we went in and had some pastries and coffee. Earlier in the day I’d been explaining to Jonathan that I’m willing to make a fool of myself, linguistically, if I’m around total strangers, ‘cause who cares? But trying to speak Russian in front of him makes me nervous, because he’ll remember. He talked me into order and sure enough I made a complete fool of myself. I misunderstood what he was directing me to say, and rather than saying “I’d like a cherry danish,” I told the waitress that I AM a cherry danish. Which was awesome. At least she didn’t laugh at me. Also awesome was the Kofe Haus’s mascot of sorts, “Micter Dabl Kapuchin,” or, Mr. Double Cappuchino.



After a snack and some caffeine to perk us up, we headed back to the Metro, only to find it was closed. Oops. Apparently even during the White Nights, the Metro doesn’t run 24 hours. I can’t understand how all the thousands of people who were out by the river got home or to their hotels or whatever. But, we decided to hail a cab. Two things: First of all, if you just stand there with your arm up, anyone will stop to offer a (paid, of course) ride. Private cars will sell themselves as taxis for extra money, which isn’t always particularly safe. So, you have to make sure you actually see an official taxi coming before you wave. Then, once one stops, there is no set rate. What you do is, tell the driver where you’re going, and then bargain on a price before you even get in. Jonathan successfully negotiated a steal of a ride home, and in we crawled. I was very impressed that the taxi driver was able to keep his car running; every time we came to a stop, it sputtered and choked, but managed to go again. Leaving a trail of black smoke behind him, he got us home in one piece, even testing out his English now and then for fun.

We got inside and crawled into bed around 4:00 AM. Which is pretty ridiculous, but I did manage to sleep for 8 hour straight for the first time since we’ve been here. Yay!

food

Last night’s barbecue was almost a bust. (Rats.) As we were standing around drinking gazpacho out of martini glasses and the meat was put on to grill, some evil-looking clouds rolled in. Just in time for the meat to be done, it started to pour, so we took the party inside. What a huge relief the rain was, though. Cooled everything down dramatically. Guess the weather man was right. I left all the windows open overnight and now it’s a comfortable 70ish in here instead of the 80s it’s been.

Speaking of windows being open, even though we have screens, somehow, we’re being attacked in the night by mosquitoes. Back in Minnesota, people joke about the mosquito being the state bird, ‘cause those suckers are huge. But here, they’re sneaky and invisible. A few days ago I saw what I thought was a marauding speck of dust, but it must have been a mosquito, and it must have been breeding. Every morning I’ve been waking up with a few more bites. I have several on my legs, two almost on top of each other on my arm, causing a huge lump, and I have about 5 on my face, which is really attractive.

Anyway, back to the barbecue. We had a basic American meal- burgers, chips, beer. Looking around their apartment, I was stunned by the number of American foodstuffs. Where do they get them all? I mean, I know you can place orders online at sites like Net Grocer and have things delivered. But sheesh, shipping must cost a fortune on all that food. And they had American ice cream! Baskin Robins ice cream! Where did it come from??

Personally, I’m loving our sparse fridge. Every morning brings a grin when I open it and see the 9 products, all in Russian. I love how things are the same, but not somehow. Milk and orange juice- pretty standard- but they’re in paper cartons that you have to actually cut open with a scissor. Neat. Pre-sliced white bread… but round, more baguette-ish than loaf-ish, and more solid, it doesn’t break apart when you try to spread something on it. Individual cups of yogurt, but with interesting flavors. I especially love the green apple. Green apple yogurt! Whoda thunk? It’s delish. Also, I love the fact that portions are so much smaller. Milk cartons, pastries, everything is just smaller.

Our simple fridge…


This milk is “clever.” And smaller than a Pepsi.



Mmm, green apple yogurt.



Tonight when Jonathan gets home we plan to have dinner at a nearby bistro. He ate there the other night and says they have a good selection of salads. Mmm-mmm!

ugh, weather

One word defines the past week: HOT.

It’s been like 90 here, and humid, with constant sunshine, and no air conditioning. So gross.

Interestingly, every summer, the city shuts off hot water for a few weeks. Since we’re special peeps, we’re provided with our own hot water heater. But a cold shower would feel soooo good right now anyway. I’m having to shower like 4 times a day as it is.

Yesterday I went in for my first look around the office. It, too, was un-air conditioned. Nothing exciting so far, just meeting people. I was still so incredibly tired that I had problems paying attention. After a few hour of non-stop info my brain was ready to pop. And it being like 100 degrees inside didn’t help. I decided it was nap time.

I managed to walk home All By Myself. Okay, so I got a wee bit lost. But I found home again and only had to check out the map a couple times. Yay!

Home is probably a 20 minute walk. A few casinos and sex shops on the way. Also, a lot of shoe repair shops. Everyone walks everywhere here, so shoes get beat up. Or feet, as happened in my case. All the sweat made my feet stick to the leather, and consequently, skin got pretty much completely removed. Ow. Okay, I know wearing tennis shoes everywhere will immediately identify me as an American, but until it cools down, I’m not going to have much choice.

I hear the weather will improve this weekend. I believe today is the longest day of the year, so it could only get better from here, right? We’re planning to go out and see some sites- I have yet to see the city proper- so I really really really hope so.

Jet lag is still giving me problems. Right now it isn’t so much that I’m tired at the wrong times, it’s that I’m hungry at the wrong times. So I’ll be tired in the middle of the night, but I can’t sleep ‘cause my stomach’s growling. I woke up last night at like 2:00 AM. I rolled around for a while, but eventually gave up and got up to get a sandwich. 2:00 AM is the darkest part of the night, and it was still bright enough that while I had my sandwich, I was able to read a book without a light.

Yesterday a shipment of our stuff arrived, so today I’m unpacking it. It’s like Christmas, it’s been so long I forgot what we’d put in there. Also exciting- I figured out how to use our AFN satellite receiver. It gets about 10 English channels, which is pretty exciting. Until now, I was having to watch “Sabrina the Teenaged Witch” dubbed in Russian. But at the moment, “Star Trek: Wrath of Khan” is on. I’m not sure which is weirder: Sabrina in Russian, or Kirstie Allie with pointy ears.

Tonight we have to go to a barbecue being thrown by Americans in our building. The kind of Americans who’ve lived here for a year and haven’t even tried to experience local culture. Yay. Guess I’d better go take another shower to get ready…

evening, first day

Currently 9:00 PM, and still bright as day. Jonathan and I took a walk this evening to get a feel for the neighborhood. We stopped by a bistro for dinner. It was cafeteria-style ordering, with samples of some dishes on display, so it was fairly easy to order by pointing. Also ordered something off the menu, which turned out to be chicken kiev. We ended up with that, sautéed vegetables, cucumber and tomato salad, and french fries. All in all it was pretty tasty. Then we took a walk back to our apartment. It was steaming hot out, probably close to 90 degrees. 19 hours of sunlight a day and no air conditioning in most buildings adds up to a sticky mess. On the way home, we stopped by the small grocery store- the produkti- on our block to pick up a few essentials. It reminded me of the kind of grocery stores you find in extremely small towns- several aisles in one small room, with just enough space for one person to get down an aisle; one or maybe two versions of any product, such as pasta sauce or mustard (many choices for beer, however); everyone carrying baskets because there’s no way a cart could maneuver in there; one cash register with the employee tucked into a cubicle surrounded by candy bars and packs of gum. And while produkti means produce, and that seems to be the main selling point for most of these little stores, the produce selection was small and tired-looking. I guess we’re pretty far from any place where fresh fruit actually grows. There were, at least, about 20 different kinds of fruit juice.

Currently we’re trying to figure out how to access our money. Apparently our bank, despite their proclaiming their experience with customers overseas, has made it nearly impossible to get money from ATMs here. They claim they are too nervous about Russian fraud. But I don’t know what, exactly, they expect us to do about it. Very few places here take credit cards, so how can we access our cash? Jonathan is currently on the phone with them trying to figure this out. Hopefully our groceries will last for a while, since we’ve already exchanged our limited supply of cash and don’t have a ton left.

Some quick observations on local fashion- perhaps it’s because they’re trying to catch a man, perhaps it’s because it’s hot out, or perhaps it’s because that’s just how they roll- but most women here are not very subtle about their undergarments. I have never seen so much panti-line or so many see-through shirts in my life. Most women don’t bother wearing bras under t-shirts, and when they wear a blouse, it’s inevitably sheer and they’ll be wearing a black bra underneath. A phenomenon I truly don’t understand. I mean, even 40-something conservative women. Yikes. I even got a few dirty looks from some women- although I’m not sure if it’s because I was fully dressed, or if I’m obviously a foreigner. Perhaps those two things are one in the same.

Tomorrow more of our things arrive. I hope I packed a black mini-skirt in there somewhere so I can start to blend in more. I’ll wear it with granny panties and a swimsuit top; then I’ll fit right in.

first impressions

Zdrastvitye! Dobro Pozhalovat' v Sankt Peterburg!



Well, we've arrived, in one piece. Mostly. Jet lag is taking a serious toll.

First, the basic facts of our traveling. We left Washington, DC around 10:00 PM. The 8-hour flight was boring, but not too painful. Killed the time by napping, a little reading, and watching Something New, one of the in-flight movies. Well, tried to watch, anyway... during the first half, the sound kept skipping; during the second half, the visuals were garbled. Good ol' United. I think I managed the get the gist of the movie anyway.

We transferred flights in Frankfurt, which is the grossest airport ever. Relatively clean in the sense that there isn't trash lying around, but it just has a dingy feel. When our plane landed, it taxied to a seemingly random spot on the tarmac, and a large staircase rolled up; we exited the plane and boarded a very crowded bus, on which I nearly dislocated my shoulder by hanging on for dear life as it whipped across the tarmac. It dropped us off at a small room with 3 chairs and a screen indicating gates for flights. To get to our gate we had to go through a security checkpoint. Beyond security was a small lounge with a smoking area and no ventilation or bathrooms. This is where we sat for an hour until we boarded another cramped bus and then our plane. It seems that there is a worse airline than United out there; it's called Lufthansa.

Flying into Frankfurt...



Getting off the bus...



Getting onto our plane.



Our flight had a LOT of turbulence, to the point where I wondered momentarily whether we'd arrive at all. At least it had great food. You know you're out of the US when suddenly breads become whole-grain rather than chewy white, and chocolate is, by default, dark rather than milk.

Russian countryside...



After about two hours, we landed at St. Petersburgs international airport, Pulkovo-2. At least the plane actually pulled up to the terminal here. Inside was a little gross as well, considering that it was an unseasonably warm 85 degrees out, and there was no air conditioning. Here we were greeted by our host couple, "Joe" and "Helen," let's call them. It's a good thing they were there, since Russian airport workers almost immediately started harassing me about declaring my viola at customs. As if it's an antique or something... what? Joe kept yelling back (in Russian) something about "she's a diplomat, shes doesn't have to, it's not old anyway," and we made our way outside to the waiting SUV.

The airport is something like 30 km from the city center, so we had an adventurous ride into town. Russian drivers really are a breed of their own; lane markings and the concept of turning lanes mean very little. The outskirts of town all need a good scrubbing, but as you get in deeper, monuments, parks, and dramatic buildings start to appear. Our hosts were pointing out important landmarks as we went, but I was completely wrapped up in trying to decipher at least one sign somewhere. Reading Cyrillic is a full-time job.

After about a half hour, we arrived at our temporary quarters. Apartments are tight at the moment because of the upcoming G8; we'll move into our permanent quarters after that. Our current street is short, with buildings that are large and majestic but could use a coat of paint. The stairway to our floor is large, echoey, and very minimalist. Our apartment itself, however, is definitely nothing to complain about it. It is enormous compared to anything we've lived in before. It has a living room, a large kitchen with room in it for a table, an actual dining room, a guest room, and the main bedroom. Our entire last apartment (which we paid over $1500 a month for in San Francisco) would fit into the bedroom here. It has beautiful wood floors and ridiculously high ceilings. Most of the doorways are probably 8 feet tall, and there's another 4 feet above that to the ceiling. The provided furniture and welcome-kit dishes and towels and such are quite lovely. Joe and Helen got us a small supply of groceries, including a Russian box of Honey Nut Cheerios, which is just surreal.



After explaining which keys were which, they left us for a bit, during which time we unpacked, showered, and pinched ourselves. When we'd had time to relax somewhat, they came back to take us to dinner. They picked us up and drove us around the city, including past the building we'll move into in August, which is next to a large park on a pretty tree-lined street. Apparently the apartment itself is about the same size as our temporary one, but more modern in its design, and the building has a gym, a pool, and a sauna. Sweet.

Inside our place...



A street in our neighborhood.



For dinner we went to a middle-eastern type place, where I had shashlik, which is basically a shish-kabob. They had both Russian and English menus, which was helpful, although the English menu was occasionally amusing. For example, there was a definite moment of confusion when I was reading my choices: "Pork shashlik, lamb shashlik, beef shashlik, cheapen shashlik. Cheapen? Is that like a bargain kabob with multiple kinds of meat on it?" After comparing the Russian and English menus we finally determined that it was a brutal misspelling of Chicken.

After dinner we realized it was time for bed, which was something you had to really think about, considering that it was 11:00 PM and still complete daylight outside. I was extremely tired though. Joe and Helen dropped us off, we started up the air conditioning in the bedroom, and pulled down the black-out shades. I almost immediately passed out.

Today Jonathan had to start working, and I was going to come along to get a sense of what his office is like, but when the alarm went off today, I felt like I'd been drugged. I'm talking hard-core jet lag, people. Or just plain extreme tiredness. After all, aside from some mediocre naps on our flights, we'd essentially been awake for 32 hours by the time we went to bed last night. Jonathan managed to get up, but we decided it would be better for now if I tried to adjust slowly. My body has an extremely hard time adjusting to change, and this is a pretty hefty change. I went back to sleep for a good long time, then woke up and had a big bowl of Cheerios, skimmed some tourist brochures, and now here I am. I feel lame for not having even gone outside yet today, but I guess it's better to not push myself and then feel like crap for our first month here.

Tonight when Jonathan gets home, I imagine we'll take a walk together, so I will get outside eventually. On our block theres a Produkti store which I believe has groceries, so well go stock up.

So there you have it, an introduction to our new little world. I'm sure future updates will be shorter and probably more interesting. Anyone have anything in particular that they'd like to know about? Please ask! Ill try to answer as much as I can. Hopefully by tomorrow my body will be cooperating so Ill be able to experience more than the view from our dining room...

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