Afterwards went with Greg and Marisa and Laura to McDonald's for milkshakes and then to the internet cafe, where I sit now. And that is the story of Parsival. Really, it's kind of ironic. My quest to see Parsival and his quest for the grail. Anyway. Enough.

It's good to be back in Peter.

1. Babushka in the train compartment from Petersburg to Pskov':
She was really intrigued by our card playing and especially Kait's shuffling skills! Because no one in Russia actually knows how to properly shuffle cards. Can you believe that? She was really nice, though. And lived in a town called Velikie Luki (trans. = "Great Onions"). Everyone should live in a place called Great Onions, I think. She told us that we needed to eat lots of fruit to keep up our strength for our "strenuous" day in Pskov' (to come, at that point) and that Pechory Monastery would be like "a fairytale".

2. Igor' and Gera (short for Georgii) in the train compartment from Pskov' to Moscow:
Igor' was a soldier from Volgograd who was on leave and going home to see his wife and kid. Gera was a businessman from Moscow. We taught them how to play rummy. They gave us lots of vodka. It was an enjoyable evening. They were impressed that we could speak Russian and when I pulled out my Pelevin book to read, Gera said that it was a "bright example of my command of the Russian language" which was gratifying, because, apparently, most Russians can't even read Pelevin. Silly grad school.

3. Red-headed Russian guy in McDonald's in Oxotny Ryad, Moscow:
He sat at our table and could obviously understand what we were saying, so we started saying more and more ridiculous things to get him to squirt tea out his nose (yes, we are mature young ladies). He almost almost did. But then pulled on his Russian pout and left. Ah well.

4. Random British man in the Moscow metro:
He said he'd never "heard English in Moscow before". Not sure where he was living. Under a rock maybe? Good grief. He told us all about how he wanted to go to Petersburg in the summer and check out the Petergof fountains because he is obsessed with fountains. Frightening. But he had a lovely London accent like Hugh Grant and was very polite and kind of cute.

5. Two guys from Tazhikistan, one of whom was named Seryozha, in the train station waiting room:
They asked us if we could get married and get them green cards. We said no. Our Russian was better than theirs. Oddly enough. They were traveling without luggage and asked us lots of uncomfortable questions about Bush and Afghanistan and Iraq and bin Laden. We were glad when they left.

6. Random guy on train from Moscow to St. Petersburg:
He was 75 years old and spoke some English, was very amused by American ladies traveling alone. Not entirely sure what he wanted from us, except to practice his English. But he had friends in Atlantic City and Las Vegas. My call- a mafia man. Most likely.

7. Seryozha from Petersburg on the train from Moscow to St. Petersburg:
He was really excited to talk to Americans. He bought us chocolate with ballet dancers on them. He speaks almost no English. At night he took off all his clothes except a pair of purple tidy whities and sprang like a gymnast onto his top bunk. Bizarre.

And that's about the gist of it.

So yes, today Kait and I went to the market and were very accomplished indeed. Going back to St. Pete on the night train tonight so tomorrow we can rest, do homework, and go to the opera. I have tickets to "Parsival" -- Mmm. Hope you're all having a good day. I have no other news, really.

But in the meantime we have decided to do some serious slacking off, since we've already done most of the Moscow touristy stuff. So, as I said, yesterday we ate lots of pizza and went to an art museum. Last night we had a lot of vodka. That is to say, Amanda and Kait and I bought 0,75 L of the stuff and then drank it but they made me do triple shots to their single ones. But we finished the bottle! And were pleasantly tipsy.

Today we have, so far, wandered around and had a nap. Also pelmeni and cheese. And coffee! We were outside the bus station and these two guys hawking NesCafe Classic with big backpacks of it on jumped at us. There was a guy also taking pictures and we stopped for a minute to stare, which was just long enough for the one guy to come over to us, get out a cup, spray some NesCafe Classic into a cup with a hose, hand me a coffee stirrer, two packets of sugar and the coffee and dart away, all as the camera guy said "Smile". I will probably be in some NesCafe Classic ad now. It was kind of scary, but at the same time, highly enjoyable. We decided, since we think we're getting colds (probably from each other) that obviously some higher power intended us not to go to Suzdal' and sent us coffee from heaven instead. Obviously.

Our big plan now is to wander. We went to Red Square and there were some guys dressed as Nicholas II, Lenin and Karl Marx standing next to each other. I took a covert photograph and Lenin shouted something rude at me and followed us! Probably because he thinks it is ridiculous to have to dress up like Lenin on Red Square for money. I certainly didn't pay him anything. The Nicholas II one is kind of funny, though, because although you often see Ivan the Terrible or Peter the Great and Catherine I or Catherine the Great or Lenin dressed up, I've never seen Nicholas II anywhere but Moscow. But you never see Paul I or Alexander II anywhere but St Pete, so I guess it's okay.

Anyway, enough waxing poetic about people dressed like Lenin. We are wandering the malls today and also eating more Sbarro's because you just can't get that in St Pete and we crave real pizza, not just Pizza Hat. Kait today found Dr. Pepper, which we also were amazed by. I had a sip and realized I'd forgotten what Dr Pepper tastes like. The truth is I am an American Culture Freak (ACF for short). Sigh. How depressing.

Tonight, though, tonight we are going to stroll on Arbat Street and then go up to Sparrow Hills to see the city. It should be pretty, I think. And tomorrow the market! The big one at Izmailovsky Park :-) And maybe another Pushkin Museum (there are a zillion here). And then back to St. Petersburg to the opera, because I have tickets on Sunday night. Mmm yeah.

The truth is, I am just babbling a lot and I'll stop now. Hope you're all having a lovely holiday. We are having a lovely one, because, even though our plans all mostly failed (at least as far as daytrips are concerned), we are feeling relaxed and happy and it's nice just to have some "chill time" in Moscow, because Moscow is a hipster town. Al-right. Tata :-)

Pskov'... pshaw!

On Tuesday Kait and I took the evening train to Pskov'. Although we had some problems with Nevsky Prospekt (or, rather, I did), everything went smoothly and we caught the train in good time. We spent six hours playing Rummy. Right now we are having a tournament, we decided, and have played past 2000... we're just going to keep adding til the bitter end, I think. IE the Dulles Airport on Dec 18. Riight. We shared our compartment with a nice little lady who laughed at us and refused our offer of fruit. Sadly. Because we had a lot of fruit. We arrived in Pskov' at 10:30 pm and walked through the mud and slush and muck to the hotel Oktyabrskaya which had no shower facilities, but which had beds, and so we were happy. And all for $5 a night! The next morning we were up late-ish, realized that we couldn't go to Pechory Monastery and that the Pushkin estate, Mikhailovskoe was closed for the month of November and set off to explore Pskov.

We went to the Kremlin, which was 1100 years old, impressively and had a beautiful church. In fact, Pskov is full of beautiful churches. But the day we were there it was foggy. And all the churches are white, so we couldn't see too much. We walked around town. We tried to find the Pogankin Museum, which was closed, and on the way found not one, but TWO abandoned amusement parks. No really. Then we decided to go to the monastery in town and took the bus, but couldn't see it. The monastery, I mean, because of the fog, so skipped it. Ridiculous! Have some lovely foggy pictures, though. Then we went to the train station to take our night train to Moscow.

Night Train to Moscow

In our compartment on the night train was a soldier from Volgograd named Igor' and a businessman from Moscow named Georgii. They were fairly lowkey and we taught them (impressively, in Russian), how to play Rummy and played Rummy with them for about five hours. Also they were making fun of Americans' low tolerance, but when we were able to match them for shots with no noticeable side effects, they were impressed. At one point the train woman came by asking if we wanted tea or coffee and when she saw the vodka bottle (illegal on trains), she laughed and said, "I can see, neither." And Igor' pointed out, "Maybe afterwards...". All in all, it was an enjoyable train ride. And we woke up in Moscow!

Happy Thanksgiving!

When we arrived in Moscow, they had mixed up our reservation, but eventually we got our room. Will was sleeping, but we met up with Amanda and we all left to go to the train station to get a train to Yasnaya Polyana, but the train there only runs on weekends. Silliness! So we decided not to go. Since there was no train. We went to the bus station, though, and bought bus tickets to Suzdal' for tomorrow, which should be nice. Then we went to the Pushkin Fine Arts Museum, where they have a lovely collection of French impressionist art, including some Monets and Renoirs, which I am a big fan of. Wandered around, then went looking for Thanksgiving dinner...

We wanted TGI Friday's, but were, sadly, unable to find one where we thought one was, so went to Sbarro instead. Had three lovely slices of REAL pizza and split a bottle of wine for Thanksgiving toasts. And that was Thanksgiving dinner. Kind of sad, but what can you do? Besides, I can have pumpkin pie when I get home :-) Hurrah! Anyway.

Happy Thanksgiving to all, that's all my news. Hope you're all having a good one and that you all eat some pie and stuffing and turkey and gravy and potatoes and whatnot for poor me in Russian exile. Sigh. Have a happy one! Cheers!

It is nice here in the snow, though. And funny to watch the Russians jump around the slush puddles, which, Kait and I discovered today, are often between six and eight inches deep and quite slushy indeed. We're talking soupy 7-11 here. Good grief. I took a picture of one of the street rivers and some Russian ladies walking by said that it was ridiculous that the streets were so flooded and even said that it was "natural" for me to take a picture. That never happens. Ridiculous!

Afterwards we went to a tea cafe where I had a beautiful champagne tea! It tasted like flowers. We played Russian checkers, which is unique... When you get a king (or "damka" = little queen) in Russian checkers, you can move it like a queen in chess! And jump anything in your way! It's crazy. I totally beat Mariana a lot, though.

Met Kait and Greg and Laura for a concert at the Philharmonic. We saw "Night on Bald Mountain" by Mussorgsky, Rachmaninoff's 3rd Piano Concerto, and "The Bells" (also by Rachmaninoff), which was all excellent. Kait fell in love with a baritone. But his voice was admittedly lovely. And the guy who played Lensky was in the chorus! And my favorite cellist, the really bored looking 8th chair, was playing. Hehe. He's so bored looking all the time... I totally sympathize.

Afterwards went to get a Russian girl hat with balls on top, but was informed that those were only "children's hats"... I will persevere, though, and get one eventually. Then went to get pyshki. Mmm. Then the internet cafe and home, because it was really really cold. At home had some piping hot borsch and some cutlets and noodles and it was yummy. And Marina and I washed all my sweaters in the bathtub and had to stir it like witches' brew! Then tea and reading and bed. And that was my Sunday.

The floor, where we had tickets, was scary. Lots of Russians. Some were waving a huge DDT flag. Some were waving a huge USSR flag. Some were waving big flares. And I've never seen so many lighters at a concert in my life. It looked like stars in the sky, there were so many. Everyone was jumping and crowd surfing and screaming and pushing.

**Note that I've been in Russia too long because I just tried to spell "pushing" "pushking"... riight.

So Kait and random guy Andrew and I sat up in the seats with random Russian teenagers. The concert was beautiful. They played most of my favorite songs and, surprisingly, Kait and I were able to sing along with most. Much to the surprise of the random Russian teenagers who heard us speaking American English inbetween songs. Hmm. When they played Leningrad, we all danced together. And when they played Rodina, we were screaming along with all the Russians. And it was All Good. Mmm happy concert.

Afterwards on the metro, I may have met my soul mate. Because I got on and he got on and we stared at each other and then it was m. Chernyshevskaya. Which is weird, because it means I missed my stop, pl. Vosstaniya, right before. We both got off. He looked like he would follow me, realized I was crossing the hall to get the train going the other direction, shrugged, and got on the train going the same direction as before. We were like two ships, passing in the night. Oh God, says Kait. She is right.

Yesterday we went to the Chesma church which looks like candy canes (really!) and was beautiful. And really random because it was by a huge statue of Lenin and the Chesma palace, which is falling to bits. Well, except the plumbing that was put in during the 19th century is actually the bit that works. Frighteningly enough. Fine 19th century craftsmanship that wasn't touched by the Soviets. Good grief.

After that we went to the Narva Gates and wanted to go into Ekateringof to see the last Stalin statue in the city. Sadly it was under construction. Of course. But we did take a picture of the Narva Gates which have been painted, bizarrely, bright green. And look like the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin. Ridiculous.

Then we went to Nevsky and went in our last wax museum. They claimed they would show us the secret of Lenin's embalming. What we heard instead was an hour long tour by a mumbly guide who was obviously a Stalinist. He would make bad cracks about Americans, said that Nicholas II got what he deserved (although it was a pity about his daughters, they were sweethearts and would have helped build a communist motherland, given the chance), Lenin was a two bit hack, but Stalin, God with him, (he actually said Bog s nim (God with him) every time he said Stalin's name) was what this country really needed. Stalin laid the foundation for the Glorious Soviet Union. Which crumbled under Gorbachev. But that was really Yeltsin's fault, because Gorbachev was the Last Hero of the USSR. And now politics is just like pornography. Oh dear, it was bad. We literally ran once the tour was over. We couldn't escape before because he would stand right in front of the doors.

And that's how we nearly finished our list. Left on it now:
- the bread museum
- the museum of the arctic and the antarctic, which we've heard so much about
- the blockade museum
- Pushkin (again, so I can see the lycee and Kait can see the palace)
- the geology museum
- the Pushkin house literature museum
We are making excellent progress. Oh yes, and the Hermitage. Pshaw.

Today is a rare sunny winter day in St. Petersburg. Things are looking up:
- it is sunny!
- Kait and I are going to (nearly) finish our to-do list of museums today
- I got a new student ID!
- I got my wallet cards back (not the bank cards of course, but my insurance cards and driver's license!)
- going to see DDT in concert tonight
Yes, all in all, things are happy. Can you see I like making lists? Soon Kait and I are going to begin the Christmas shopping process again. We had nearly finished in Moscow and then thought of more people and more "positively perfect" Christmas presents. So anyway... yes, we need to start anew. But it's all good.

I will be at home home from Dec 18 to mid January (before I have to go back to Mr. J's), it looks like. I'm not sure exactly if I am going traveling at all between Christmas and New Year since our conference plan fell through. As it turns out, flying to California is more expensive than Anton thought it would be. Riight. I told him. So we might go somewhere or we might do something exciting that isn't in California instead. We'll see. And that's really all the news.

- went to the photo place, got my picture taken
- gave the pictures to Erin to get a new student ID
- went to Western Union
- went to the post office
- talked to my professor
- got a hotel reservation in Pskov'
- bought our last train ticket, from Moscow to Petersburg on Saturday night

And then ate a cheeseburger! Hurrah!

From there we went to the opera to see "Eugene Onegin" again, which was even more lovely this time, although I liked the first cast better. The set was really cool... the curtains were all designed like manuscript pages with Pushkin's writing and sketches on them, so it was like you were looking into an actual book. Very cool. Also when they aged 10 years, the fashions changed accurately. And Lensky was way cute. All in all, it was good. Mmm the opera.

But last night when I got home, Marina was acting all giggly and happy. So I asked what was up and she says, "I bought something for you..." and pulls a full LITER bottle of Bochkarev (tagline: Pravilnoe pivo = "The Right Beer") out of the cabinet. "We can drink tonight!" she says with a giggle and pours it in our glasses. Igor' K. comes in and sees the beer and gets excited. "You're drinking!" he exclaims. Marina asks if he wants any and he says, "No, I'm going to Zhenya's" (Zhenya being apparently one of his friends). He goes out and comes back five minutes later carrying a bottle of Stepan Razen (another beer) and singing the accompanying folksong while doing a kicky leg dance. Impressive for a 70 year old with a bad back!

He opens the bottle and Marina asks if he wants any... he says no and that he's going to watch sports. Marina turns to me and says that drinking is a woman's affair, and we toast to our friendship. Marina drinks her full glass like a shot. No kidding. Then giggles and says that beer always goes straight to her head and pours herself another. Hmm Russian women. We managed to drink the whole bottle of Bochkarev and are saving the Stepan Razen for another night. It was just really funny.

Marina says that they'll get a bottle of vodka my last night and "the whole family" will drink to me. Does this mean the grandchildren too, I wonder? Hmm.

Yesterday in the train office Kait and I saw the cutest Russian kids. There was one little girl, maybe 2 at the most, bundled up with a huge poof on her hat bigger almost than her head. She was wandering around staring at things and not blinking with the most adorable baby pouty Russian girl face. Her mother was nice too. She was in line in front of us and laughed when Kait and I argued about our hats (and we figured out the girl was a girl because she called her Tanya). Another baby came up, maybe two and a half, obviously a boy, also bundled up like a little eskimo. He tried to steal her stroller and then, when distracted by her, came up to her and made noises at her. Poor baby Tanya shrank down into the fetal position and looked scared. But he just made happy gurgly noises. And the truth is, Russian babies interact just like Russian teenagers. The jolly boys and the pouty Russian girls. Anyway. It was way cute.

Then, this morning, while waiting at the bus stop, I saw a man and his child (unclear whether it was a boy or girl because the kid was bundled like Nanook of the North). The kid said something and the man couldn't understand what it was so he had to readjust the hat so that the kid's face was showing. Then he laughed, kissed the kid, and readjusted the hat to hide his face again. It was way cute. Anyway.

Marina N. and her friend from Odessa
Marina N. has a friend from Odessa who, every morning during strawberry season, when her kids were little, would ride for an hour on the bus to the market to buy fresh strawberries and then back before work. So she had to leave at five or six am to get that accomplished. One time Marina was visiting and asked, "Why do you go on the bus so early? Why not just buy them all on Saturday or Sunday?" And the friend replied that a healthy child had to eat SEVEN KILOGRAMS of strawberries every day. Ridiculous.

Marina N.'s Friend from Odessa comes to visit
One time, Marina's friend from Odessa came to visit because her son, Slavik, was serving in the army in Pushkin, and the friend brought with her a ton of food from the Odessa market, including sour cream. And eight liters of milk. She cooked a huge dinner and Marina asked her what she was going to do with all that milk. And she said, "Slavik will drink it all." When Slavik came to dinner, he sat there and ate and whenever he got distracted, the friend would beat her fist on the table and say, "Slavik, eat!" (= "Slavik, esh'!"). Slavik would say, "I am eating, Mama" and then eat more. And in the course of the evening he drank all eight litres of milk! Apparently he was used to that sort of thing. Poor boy.

Marina N. and the glasses
Marina N. needs bifocals in a bad way and so, in order to do crossword puzzles, which she does nearly every evening, she puts on Igor' K.'s glasses over her own and makes her own bifocals. But it looks really really funny. Because her glasses are dark blue tinted old woman glasses from the 70s. And his are thick black military glasses. Hehehe. Last night I asked if I could take a picture and she exclaimed, "Oy! I forgot the glasses!" and laughed so hard that she nearly fell off her chair and had to leave the room to compose herself. Really.

Marina N. and the purse
Marina N. was pick pocketed on the street outside our house a few years ago. And afterwards she vowed to get a better purse. So she bought a really small purse to keep under her arm, but it was too small for all her things, so she got a new one roughly as long as a pair of skis. And now she can fit a whole umbrella in her purse! Which is about 4 inches in length, but about 2 feet in width, it seems. But she'll never be robbed again, she says.

The schedule for this week:
Wed night: Chopin piano concertos and Berlioz' "Symphonie Fantastique" at the Bol'shoi Zal
Fri night: Tchaikovsky's "Evgenii Onegin" for the 2nd time, this time at the Mussorgsky
Sat night: DDT concert! at something called the Petersburg Sport and Concert Complex
Sun afternoon: Rachmaninoff piano concertos and Mussorgsky's "Night on Bald Mountain"

Should be an excellent week. And next week - to Pskov' and Moscow and Suzdal for the travel weekend! And on Sunday night to see "Parsifal" (Wagner) at the Mariinsky! Hurrah!

Met up at the pelmeni place with Will and Amanda and Kait to play cards and had a nice game, followed by piping hot bowls of pelmeni in sour cream. Kait and I drank to our miseries' swift resolution with a couple of vodka shots. So hopefully things will be looking up soon. All part of the magic of the day, I think they will be, and then, afterwards Kait, Amanda, and I went to the ballet at the Conservatory, to see "The Sleeping Beauty", which was definitely beautiful. The music sounded like a snow globe would sound, since it was Tchaikovsky, and the dancing was lovely, as were the costumes. All in all, it was a very happy day.

I live it through my diary, and I read
That all my little problems, now are free
I want to live my feelings day by day
I like to give emotions, in my way
But I don't know if its the right day, for this word
Now I see things I didn't see before
I need an explanation, tell me more
Why I am in love now? I don't know

How can I live forever? I don't know
Where can I find Heaven? I don't know
What is going to happen? I don't know
Why I am in love now? I don't know

In my soul, In my soul...

From there we went to the Church on Spilled Blood and went inside. The mosaics were beautiful. We went to the Stray Dog Cafe, where Akhmatova and the other Silver Age poets used to hang out for lunch. Then went to see the eternal flame on the Field of Mars (just lit today after construction!!). We walked across the Trinity Bridge to the Peter Paul Fortress where I gave the tour quick, having memorized it when I was there last week or so, and then we went in the church there to see the tombs of the Romanovs. From there we took the metro up to Petrogradskaya to go to Kirov's apartment (already wrote about that, see the More Vignettes entry), which was excellent, even though Kirov's apartment wasn't actually open. Then went to the Aleksandr Nevsky Monastery again so Kait could actually see the inside. There was a service in the main church, which was beautiful to watch (our bad, going to an orthodox monastery on a Saturday evening!).

From there we went to McDonald's for some "American food" that was fast (and inexpensive) and ended up sitting with this Russian guy named Zhenya who is very cute and studying to be a minister of the interior (no really). He really liked us because he talked to us awhile and was not horrified that we were dirty foreigners, but, rather, intrigued. And he asked us to go to Kronshtadt with him next weekend maybe. Kait definitely picked a good table. Because we met an actual Russian that wasn't paid to hang out with us.

Now we are going to meet up with Marisa and Amanda and watch "How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days" in terrible Russian dub. I'm stoked ;-) Hurrah today! It turned out all well even though we couldn't get tickets to Novgorod and decided to go later.

Animal Bags
Another very popular style here is to see Russian girls carrying around bags shaped like animals. Like cats or teddy bears. Or sheep. But today, today we saw a Russian girl with a pink purse with a Chihuahua in it! A real one! In McDonald's ... so sketchy.

The little old ladies in Kirov's house
Today Kait and I went to Kirov's house, which turned out to be closed for repairs, but they did have an exhibit open about children's life in the 1920s and 30s in the USSR. It was a cool exhibit and we learned all about the Pioneers and the Scouts and how kids studied and whatnot. And there was a big bust of Stalin and a zeppilin in the stairwell! But best of all was the computer game, which we sat there and played for a good hour and a half. Afterwards, the little old ladies, exited that we had come to such an out-of-the-way museum and that we liked it so much we stayed for two hours, definitely sold us copies of the game. So now I have my very own Soviet children's life computer game. Rock on.

Ladies, I have been waiting for you
A really long time ago, like two months ago, we were walking in the market behind the Church on Spilled Blood. This guy saw us coming and burst out in heavily accented English, "Ladies! I have been waiting for you!" in a very melodramatic voice, while gesturing at his wares. It was great. We giggled a lot and walked on.

The dream bag
Yesterday, in a shop, I saw my dream bag. It is purple, with flowers on it. And patent leather. And fits everything. And is stylish and beautiful. But I could wear it with jeans. It is definitely more than my "just robbed in Russia and ATM card hasn't come yet" budget. But once I am once again on my, "on a stipend grad student with an ATM card" budget, I am going to go back and buy it. Because it is my destiny. And if it is gone, then it was fate, I tell you, and I won't complain. Well, maybe just a bit.

Cute Little Hats
The Russian men here all wear these cute little hats that look like what people in the US were wearing in the 1930s and 40s. Very cute. Makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

A sympathetic shop clerk
I've been searching for a copy of Nabokov's "Dar" for a few days now. I went into my favorite bookstore, the Snark on Pl. Vosstaniya, and there asked the clerk. He found me one but the second volume had the first 30 pages missing. I asked him if he didn't have another with the first 30 pages of the 2nd volume and he replied, "No, that's the last one. Alas." "Alas," I said, and left. His sympathy, though, made me also feel warm and fuzzy inside.

Life in a symbolist novel
If I was living in a symbolist novel, things would be very bad for me indeed, because all day today I walked around with a bag full of broken clocks. Really! Because my alarm clock broke and my watch band broke and my watch battery stopped. So I had to go to a repair shop. But if I was in a symbolist novel, it would be bad indeed.

And that's about all the vignettes I can think of now. So I'll leave you with that. Decided not to go to Novgorod tomorrow, but more on that tomorrow. Did buy a new transport card, a new watchband and battery, a new alarm clock battery, a new school bag, and some new CDs today, though, so am feeling like a whole new person. Almost. Night night ;-)

- Small children so bundled up they can't walk straight!
- If you have a student ID, you can get into all the best art museums for free!
- Homemade pelmeni with butter and sour cream and fresh dill. Mmm.
- Wonderful ballet and opera for cheap!
- Sunset on the Fontanka
- The metro works really efficiently and the employees are nice and helpful
- Lots of really nice walks you can do
- Bookstores teeming with books, all in Russian!
- cheap CDs
- badly dubbed Russian movies - highly enjoyable
- listening to an Orthodox service
- ice cream on the street
- Russian chocolate
- walking around the Hermitage
- finding little, out of the way museums

I might think of more later. So, see? Russia isn't all bad. It's just, sometimes, really frustrating. Mmm yes.

So, after discovering this, Kait and I went to the train station, to see about getting some tickets for Novgorod this weekend, because we wanted to go on Saturday, but there is only a morning train and no evening train. And we had to wait in line for a really long time to discover this. By a scary leering drunken man who kept putting his nose in my hair. I can tell you exactly what he'd been drinking, too, based on smell, which is worrisome.

Spurning the scary drunken man's offer to "take me someplace nice" and frustrated with the train woman, I went to Western Union to get some more money since my ATM card has been confiscated by the drug squad and all, and had to stand in line for an HOUR because Russians don't know how to fill out Western Union forms. Sigh. Lots of sighs.

So I remain cardless and have the sniffles. But, the good news is, that I do have some money now and also a ticket to see Tchaikovsky's "The Sleeping Beauty" at the Conservatory on Sunday night. Mmm the ballet. So maybe things aren't so bad after all...

First, Sofia and Kait and I met on the bridge where we always meet and went to the smaller museum in the big archy building across from the Winter Palace (which I think is called the General Staff Building). They had a random exhibit in there called "Japanese Blue" which was, basically, a lot of rooms full of blue cloth from Japan. Also in there they had some random French paintings, some random stuff from the reign of Alexander I including lots of ladies' dresses, court ceremonial clothing, and furniture, and lots of icons, to include Alexander I's "portable ikonostasis". Wacky old Alexander I. The true highlight of the museum were the two rooms of giant paintings by Maurice Denis called "The Story of Psyche" which showed seven scenes for that and were commissioned by some crazy guy for his apartment (!). Also there was a display about the Russian Foreign Ministry in the early 1900s. Fun stuff.

Afterwards we had hotdogs and pyshki and then went to meet our group at the Hermitage. Which is big.

We had a lengthy tour which took in the highlights (Catherine the Great's crazy clock, the Jordan Staircase, a big carriage, the throne rooms, a room for the generals who fought in the War against Napoleon, lots of Rembrandts and Titians, that famous picture of Danae that had acid dumped on it in 1985 by some lunatic, the really famous DaVinci that is here and not on tour in Italy (with the smiley Mary), and the GOLD ROOMS, which are a series of rooms with lots of gold stuff in them.

After surveying the premises, I conjecture that given three trips to the Hermitage, I will be able to see everything. Surely it won't take more than that. The Louvre only took two days and isn't that much bigger? Hmm.

But that isn't the BEST MUSEUM EVER that I promised to tell you all about. Oh no. The best museum ever is located on Solyarny Pereulok, parallel to the Fontanka, and is called the Museum of Decorative Art and Design, located in the old Baron Stieglitz mansion (originally called the Stieglitz Museum). It's in the back of this Institute of Arts and you have to ask the security people at the door and get special permission to go back there. My tutor and I decided to go there when the Engineer's Castle was randomly closed and I mentioned I'd been reading about it. She'd never been before.

The Exibition Rooms themselves are very dusty and badly lit, until the babushkas working there actually turn on the lights, that is. The place was completely deserted and it seems like it is usually completely deserted. And there was a collection of random pieces of china and furniture from the 12th to the 19th centuries, all beautifully restored. Apparently the students studying restoration at the institute practice on the museum pieces and the rooms themselves. The walls and ceilings and floors, all beautifully painted or done in inlaid wood or tile, were absolutely beautiful. Breathtaking even. Mariana and I walked around exclaiming and oohing and ahhing at how beautiful it all was.

The sad part is that it all fell into disrepair under the Soviets. Originally the museum, when old Baron Stieglitz started it, was meant to be an exhibition of different epochs of home decorating and was considered to be one of the best museums of St. Petersburg. During the Revolution it was seized and used to house people in, and then, after some destruction in WWII bombings, it was fixed up and opened in 1945 as an Institute of Art and Design. The actual institute part seems like it is falling apart and looks pretty scruffy from the outside, as does the museum administration, but the museum itself is lovely. Definitely worthwhile and, I think, maybe because of the random collection and style, one of my favorite museums here so far.

The best part is that everything is so beautifully and carefully restored that you can't tell the 12th century furniture from the 19th century furniture and also that all the pieces are so scattered and disorganized that it is like a treasure hunt... you never know what you'll find. We found some lovely cabinets with inlaid scenes from the middle ages, as well as bits from a church in Germany and some beautiful silk covered and embroidered chairs from some 18th century palace. All just lovely :-)

The other good news is that my UPS with bank cards and allergy medication has actually arrived in Russia. That's exciting :-) The bad news is that it is stuck in customs at the airport, so they have to go through the American Consulate here. And the lazy American Consulate bums don't work on either Russian holidays OR American holidays. Lucky ducks. So they all had a REALLY long weekend this weekend, for both the anniversary of the October Revolution on Friday and Veterans' Day today. Seems kind of incongruous... But still. I should get a job there.

The very bad news is that my Fed Ex from visa never came, so perhaps that was stolen too. Sigh. Have to call tonight and see. And that is all the good and bad news. In gradients :-)

The amazing thing was that the staff was actually helpful and pleasant in that office. And the Russians were standing in line like normal people and not cutting us off viciously. Craziness. It was like the twilight zone. I found out from the nice bureaucrat woman in the office that what had happened was the metro machine at Pl. Vosstaniya that morning had magnetized my card or something and also about 600 other peoples' cards. Hehe. Good one. So it wasn't my fault. Ah well.

But now my card is all returned and I have met kind and pleasant metro employees, which is madly impressive. And I suppose that all is well.

Now all I need is: insurance cards, a phone card, a bank card, a credit card, a new bag, and that CD I've been wanting that I can't buy in good conscience until I am able to access my money again. Hurrah. Sigh.

"The movie I was telling you about is called "Love Actually" Colin Firth, Hugh Grant, Liam Neesan. Colin Firth was on the Today Show this morning and he has married an Italian woman and has a baby boy, Mateo. He is cuter than ever. He is also working on the Bridget Jones II movie where he and Hugh Grant get to battle in a pond."

Sigh. Maybe by the time I get back to "civilization" where movies starring British actors with way cute voices are in English and not dubbed badly, it will be playing in the cheap theaters. Also I wonder if Bridget Jones II will be loosely based on "The Edge of Reason" or if it will be its own incarnation. Anyone know??

Sigh, Colin Firth.

The reason that the French revolutionary stuff is ridiculous is because it is an opera, by a German (Mozart), who was living in Prague at the time and writing for a Czech audience (well, Austrian, that whole Habsburg Empire thing) in Italian about stuff happening in Spain. The French people behind us remarked at one point, "C'est kitsch!" Hehe. Silly French people.

But, yes, it was a lovely production. The next opera I am going to see is, apparently, "Eugene Onegin" again (but school is paying for it!) and then I am going to see "Parsival" which should be some good stuff. Hurrah!

Anyway. Yesterday (Sunday) Sofia and Amanda and Will and I went on a Very Long Walk. We started at the university and walked to find the nose statue, which is a statue remembering Gogol's short story "The Nose" and is just a big nose attached to the side of a building. We found it, bizarrely, on the street with the good pelmeni place so, it turns out, we walk by it all the time. Craziness. From there we went walking down Canal Griboedeva to find the Lion Bridge, which we had seen before, but always forgotten our cameras or walked over at night. Then we went to the Nikolsky Sobor (Cathedral of St Nikolai) which has two floors. Downstairs I had been before, but never upstairs. They were having a service, with a full choir and all the candles lit, and it was positively beautiful. From there we went to the Troitsky Sobor (Trinity Cathedral) which is notable for being under construction and having large blue domes.

We crossed back over the Fontanka (which we had crossed to get to the Troitsky) and walked down to the Yusupov Palace because we wanted to see where Rasputin had had his last meal. Although the palace was clearly labeled as the Yusupov Palace and had large museum signs all over it, when we got in, we were dismayed to discover that it was, in fact, the Dept of Economics and Sociology for one of the universities. How depressing. There was, in fact, one guy who was paid to stand by the door and say that it was the department of economics and sociology and where the real Yusupov Palace was. Stupid Yusupovs, having way too many palaces.

From there we walked over to the Mariinsky to meet Will (who had overslept us and the beginning of the walk!) and then went down ul. Dekabristov (Decembrists' street) to the Mojka, passing by the place which inspired the Blok poem "Noch', ulitsa, fonar', apteka" (Night, street, streetlamp, drug store). Along the Mojka, we went to the Aleksandr Blok (he wrote "The Twelve") apartment museum, which was very interesting, and had cool things in it like a big frog vase, where you would put flowers in the frog's gaping mouth, as well as a library with a huge collection of Voltaire (in French!), a ceramic dog, a very pretty room (obviously his wife's), and another creepy death mask (think that's a Russian thing).

After the Aleksandr Blok museum, we went walking along the Mojka and looked at lots of crumbling palaces and mansions and luxury apartment buildings that used to be very grand indeed. Some were just sad because they would be beautiful if restored, some were enjoyable in a creepy, Gothic way, and some were not all that pleasant to look like before. One was creepily not creepy. And then we walked along the bank opposite the eastern side of the island of Novaya Gollandiya (New Holland) which is a "mysterious island closed to the public" where, apparently, at the beginning of the 20th century this crazy guy locked himself in the middle and tried to build a boat that couldn't be capsized (a pod??). The island itself, both because of mysterious aura and a huge gothic arch that allowed us to see beyond the crumbling red brick walls, definitely pleased our gothic sensibilities.

Afterwards we stopped for lunch at a Chinese restaurant out of curiosity. Although they had squirrel on the menu (!!!!!!!!), we opted (all of us except Amanda who got noodles) for something called "Chinese Pelmeni" which turned out to be really really good and a lot like wontons, but with this crazy sauce that was combined plum sauce and soy sauce. It was way tasty. And then we left.

From here we walked to the REAL Yusupov Palace where Rasputin really ate his last meal. We bought tickets and went through the museum, which showed the state rooms, the theater (they had a theater!), the ball rooms, and some of the family rooms. The museum was really cool but, only upon finishing the tour, did we realize that we would have had to have paid for another tour to see the Rasputin stuff. That would be the kitschy "Rasputin Murder Tour". Riiight. We opted not to feed any more money into the pockets of the scary looking last surviving Yusupov who is apparently living it up in France. She sends her regards to all visitors to the museum and her portrait as well... hmm.

Afterwards, since it was still early, we walked across Ploshad' Truda to the bank of the Neva, where, on nab. Angliiskaya is located the St. Petersburg City History Museum, which Katya had highly recommended to me months ago, but I'd never made it to. The museum was sadly under construction, so lots was closed, but the blockade and WWII exhibits were open, which made for some very interesting, although sad, reading. The staff of the museum was very friendly, though, and the coat check guy definitely asked us how we'd liked the museum, etc. before we left.

From here we went to meet Kate and Lyusya at the Chainaya Lozhka (Tea spoon = a fast food blini restaurant) on ul. Sadovaya (Garden street) before the opera. And that was the end of our Very Long Walk. It was very nice and refreshing, though.

On a similar note, yesterday I was at the Mariinsky Theater watching an opera (more on this later) and was reading through the program during intermission and there was a list of people who gave money and support to the Mariinsky after the tragic fire this summer that destroyed a lot of their historical sets and whatnot. And on the list was definitely one A. Chekhov. Now, I could have been mistaken, but I was pretty sure that A. Chekhov (of "The Seagull" and "The Cherry Orchard" fame) had died a long while ago, [note sarcasm] so was very amused at the ridiculousness of it all. But then noticed that the line above it read "The Moscow National Theater by name of". Silly Russians. In Russian, you see, it's all a lovely acronym and fits on one line. Not so in English. Anyway.

In spite of my Russian being bad, though, I am feeling a bit more like an authentic Petersburger since last night I had a dream about how the man I worked for was possessed by the spirit of Peter the Great and kept dressing up like him, except like scary Peter the Great in his statues (like in Moscow Trainstation) that don't blink. Sofia and I had to attack him with rolling pins to make him leave. Anyway.

Met Mariana and Yuliya at one and we went to see the Menshikov Palace. The Menshikov Palace is the first palace built in the city and has been restored to look a lot like it did in the 1720s. It's kind of scary, though, because it overwhelmingly reminds one of Colonial Williamsburg. Except that the tour guides are cranky Russian babushkas and not dressed in period dress. Also there are Dutch tiles on all the walls. It was a pretty palace and the tour was interesting, but kind of dull, although the tour guide did her best, declaiming all the information as though she was reciting Pushkin or someone.

Afterwards we climbed up to the top of St. Isaac's Cathedral to see the panorama of the city, because the weather was so fine. Yuliya, who aspires to be a tour guide, gave us both a good synopsis of what everything was. It was beautiful up there, with the sun glancing off the sculptures on top of the building, the river, other domes in the city, and the ship foundry on the Gulf of Finland. You could see, today, all the way to the park on the other side of the river from Smol'ny and to the Gulf of Finland. Very nice.

Wandering back down Nevsky Prospekt by myself, after they'd left me to go shoe shopping in the Stockmanns (think it is better to ignore the Stockmanns until I have a credit card again), I went walking down Nevsky because the weather was so fine. Was hungry so had a pirozhka with potatoes which was very tasty. Bizarrely the woman who sold it to me asked me to watch her stand for her for a few minutes. I declined, but thought it strange that she was willing to leave her stand with a filthy foreigner like yours truly.

Farther down Nevsky got an ice cream craving and bought a cone. Which I had to take off my gloves and scarf to eat properly. Who says I haven't acclimitized to Russia? Eating ice cream on the street in this weather, indeed. For all that it was sunny today, it was still below freezing. The nice thing is that your ice cream doesn't melt. Hehe.

Now time to scoot back to the apartment for some good reading time and dinner. Mmm dinner.

Marina N. and Erol Flynn
When she was a teenager, Marina had a crush on Erol Flynn. A really big crush on Erol Flynn. And she used to not eat lunch so she could go out and buy pictures of him taken in movie theaters with her lunch money. She apparently still has a good collection of these and showed me. They're sort of like the pirate movies they do now, except just photographs. Craziness.

Marina N. and Pirozhki
Pirozhki, for those not in the know, are little pies with things baked in them.
Marina N. says that her aunt made the best pirozhki in the whole world. And, although during the war, they didn't have anything to eat, her aunt still managed to make good pirozhki, somehow, and they would stuff them with grass and things in the summer. After the war, one time, Marina N. went on a geology expedition to the arctic circle and there she caught a huge huge fish sort of like a salmon, nearly two feet long, she showed me. She, enterprising young lady that she was, salted the fish, and brought him home to her aunt, and her aunt made pirozhki out of that fish and rice and they were so good that sometimes Marina N. still dreams about them.

Marina N. and a Trip to Moldavia
Marina N. had a friend she worked with who had heard from another friend that Moldavia was a beautiful place to be. So Marina N. and her friend decided to travel to Moldavia to hang out for a few weeks one summer. They took a bus there and stayed with a woman in the woman's house. And they became so sick with indigestion that nothing helped. Not eating in restaurants, not cooking for themselves, not medication, nothing. They decided to catch the train to Odessa and stay there instead, because the friend had family there, but they couldn't leave at first because of having to take turns on the toilet so often. Finally they collected themselves and made the driver promise to stop if necessary, even though all of Moldavia is vineyards so anyone on the bus could watch them do their business. But they didn't have to stop at all until they got to Odessa and they were cured once they got there. Marina N. says it was an excellent weight loss method and that she is allergic to Moldavia like I am allergic to St. Petersburg.

Marina N. and Books
After the end of communism in Russia, Marina N. went out and bought a high school reader because she wanted to see how things changed under the new openness and whatnot. She was shocked to see lots of formerly "enemy" authors printed in there. And started reading some of them and realized that they were way less boring than socialist realism and that's when she started enjoying reading. But she still likes crosswords better.

Marina N. and the Pyshki
Marina N. loves pyshki (like funnel cake but shaped like donuts). Once she was out with her grandchildren and they decided to get pyshki. So she stopped them (it was winter, they were being pulled on a sled) and went into a pyshki store and ordered a "Large". The pyshki place was having a special and gave them two kilograms of pyshki, which is a lot, because they are full of air!! Marina N. ended up eating nearly all of them herself because the grandchildren were so small they couldn't eat more than two or three each. And she was terribly sick afterwards. But she still loves pyshki.

More Marina N. stories maybe later, if I can think of some more...
That's all for now :-)

Otherwise today we tried to have Church Day. Church Day is an idea that I conceived to go to all the churches in the city in one day. We were doing well at the beginning. We went in Kazansky Sobor, the Armenian Church of St. Catherine, the Catholic church on Nevsky, a small red church by the Engineer's Castle, the Preobrazhensky Sobor, the Aleksandr Nevsky monastery, cemeteries and churches, and Our Lady of Vladimir church. Not a bad job. It was pravoslavtastic, as Will says. We ate lunch at the good pelmeni place.

No other news, really. Just thought I'd share my Day of Revolutions (now called day of world peace or something similar) story with you all.

More baseball caps
Today I saw a woman wearing a fur baseball cap. No comment. No comment.

Cologne
Igor' K. definitely wears Victor Hugo Cologne. Pour homme. Totally.

Think that's about the sum of it. Time to venture out into the cold and go home for dinner. Mmm dinner. I'm stoked :-)

Woodpeckers
The other night I went into the kitchen and Igor' K. comes in wearing a wifebeater and trying to make a phone call. He'd apparently been trying for a good four hours to call his ex-wife, whose birthday it was that day. Marina N. calls him a woodpecker, grabs the phone away from him, calls, and gets through the first time. "Woodpecker yourself" says Igor' K. after he's done. Marina N. proceeds to tap him on the head and call him a woodpecker again. "Woodpecker?" I ask, bewildered. Apparently "woodpecker" is what Russians call eachother when their heads are so thick that they can't think. Hmm.

A happy Russian
Usually Russians frown. A lot. Although, if you ask anyone, they are a friendly and warm people. But on public transportation, on the streets, etc. they frown. In fact, if you see someone smiling, you can tell that he is either a) insane or b) a tourist. If he isn't dressed like a tourist, chalk his grin up to insanity and Russians will literally cross to the other side of the street to get away from him. Really. So the other day on the bus, I see this businessman, obviously Russian, very well-mannered. He's totally smiling at small children and really excited about the landmarks on Nevsky Prospekt. And, although in theory, I guess he could have been crazy, he looked so pleased, that it made me happy too. Hmm.

Stockings
Last night, on the way home, I bought some stockings. Thick Russian girl stockings for winter! Which I am wearing today. And it is weird, because my legs aren't really cold at all, although I can feel the wind going around my stockings... it's sort of like thermal wear, I guess you could say. They are kind of itchy and I can see how Laura Ingalls Wilder was really angry about having to wear wool stockings all the time. But all the same, my legs aren't cold and it is fantastic (in the magical sense) that the wind just whistles around them!! Anyway. Fine Russian engineering.

The fortitude of my tutor
Today I met my tutor and we walked a long way, all up Canal Griboedeva to the Mikhailovsky Garden, around the Engineer's Castle and into the courtyard, across the Field of Mars, across the Neva, to the Peter Paul Fortress. My tutor was wearing stiletto high heeled elf shoes. But, in spite of them, when we got lost in the Mikhailovsky Garden because all the entrance/exits but one were closed for "repairs", she was very gung ho and conceived the idea of jumping over a fence, going across a muddy canal embankment, and climbing up the side of a bridge to get out. Even though the entrance was only a bit away. Even though we were both wearing skirts. Even though she was in stiletto heels. Impressed, I followed. And that's how my tutor and I went climbing over a fence, an embankment, and a bridge wall today. Really. Later, on the cobblestones of the fortress, she did an admirable job and even suggested that we walk around the fortress, on the stony and sandy beach and then the muddy canal embankments. Russians are hardcore. Also, did I mention that my tutor was an extra in a miniseries based on the Tolstoy novel "Resurrection"? She totally was. Hardcore.

Taxidermy penguins
Today in class, Adam was talking about how great the Museum of the Arctic and Antarctic is. About how it is the absolute best and most worthwhile museum in Petersburg, etc. Sofia and Lyusya, however, have been to this museum and told us all about how at it they have only a lot of ratty stuffed penguins and lots of Soviet paraphenalia relating to arctic/antarctic expeditions. So my conversation professor got really excited. Turns out that there are pictures of her grandfather and her father in the museum since they were part of a Soviet medical team that went. And at their dacha (dacha = Russian country vacation house) they have taxidermy penguins. As my conversation professor says, "They're so cute! A mommy and a baby. But stuffed, of course." Of course.

The Government Inspector
Today Kate and Sofia and Will and Amanda and Marissa and I went to see the Gogol' play, "The Government Inspector." It was an excellent production. Very avant garde. But there was singing! By a group that sounded kind of like the King's Singers! And also lots of dancing. Including dancing in formation of a group of 19th century bureaucrats. It was excellent.
The only sad thing was that we came a bit late (because of adventures with dinner -- Kate and Sofia were late, the German place was too expensive, we tried for Italian food, but the service was going to be too slow, and then the blini place took too long, sigh) and had to first put our things in the garderobe and then climb up to the tip top of the theater to stand for the entire first half. The ticket woman let us into the central box, because we were polite, and the nasty Russians who were quite rude to her had to stand way over in the corner box. Haha. You could tell that the husband was embarrassed that a bunch of Americans were more polite than his wife and daughter to the ticket woman. The ticket woman only had two teeth. Really! Standing up there was hot and nasty. And the box next to us, somehow, had no door, but had people sitting in it! Mysterious. When we went down to the ground floor, we saw some fine Russians in "theater clothing". One boy was wearing a football jersey and a suit coat. Brilliant. But the play itself was excellent. Mmm Gogol'.

The Mystery of Garderobe 8
We left our things in Garderobe 8, and when we went back to find it, we got lost and found Garderobes 7 and 9, but couldn't find 8. We had to ask four or five people, who led us in circles, until finally this woman let us follow her and set us straight. Several of the people we met looked as if they had been wandering in the labyrinthine theater for years, including a very dusty old man. Eventually we did find the garderobe and got our coats, which were the last ones there. Crafty Russians. On the way down, we understood why we had been so confused. In one stairwell, there were two EXIT signs pointing in opposite directions. Sigh.

The End.

Today met Kate and Sofia early and we went down Nevsky Prospekt to buy me a new wallet (haha, sigh) and look at some of the statues of little cats and a dog that looks like it is made out of tinker toys and the horses on the Anichkov most up close, because we hadn't done that before. Apparently if you go up to the dog and put a piece of paper in its mouth with a wish on it, your wish will come true. We decided this was an excellent method of contracting tetanus and declined. We also went in the scarily sumptuous Yeliseevsky grocery store (which is done in Modern Style and has a glass chandelier, even!) and ate at McDonald's.

McDonald's in Russia is scary because it is always ridiculously crowded and Russians, although famous for standing in lines, don't know how to stand in lines in McDonald's, so you have to fight a big crowd to get to the register. Kate and Sofia managed to get our food only by working as a team, with Sofia blocking the Russians while Kate stepped up to the cash register. While they were busy with that, I went to find a table, which was a long process, because not only were all the tables full, but people were actually waiting in line for them too, around the tables where people looked like they were finishing. Same old chicken mcnuggets, or "maknoogets" as they are called here. Yay Russia.

We went from there to the metro, where we were supposed to meet our group, and went to see Peter the Great's little house, which he built with his own hands. Really! It's sort of like a shrine. We also saw a boat he made, an iron cast of his hand, and his suit. Way cool. And it wasn't closed this time! "Technical difficulties" indeed... It was funny, though, because Peter's wooden cabin is definitely intact, just completely enclosed by a brich building which was, apparently, built by Catherine the Great to make the place a kind of shrine. Peter's daughter, Elizabeth, made it into a church, even, with Peter's favorite ikon as the centerpiece, but it was "restored" under Catherine. Anyway.

From there we went to the Museum of Political History, which was our group excursion for the day. It was a long and kind of repetitive tour, but we got to see some cool stuff. Like, for example, Lenin's office and the Bely Zal where lots of famous people danced and some of Mathilde Kshenskaya's costumes. And we saw lots of Lenin paraphenalia, as well as the balcony where he addressed the crowds after he arrived from the Finland StationAnd they'd left some of the Soviet exhibition rooms the same. And we saw a chess set made out of masticated bread in a prison camp! Okay, so that's nasty. But it was a cool museum, nonetheless.

Afterwards we set off for the Kirov Museum, but then realized it was Wednesday, which means it is closed, so went back to the metro where we discovered ... a fair! Really! With rides! But they looked scary, so we didn't go on them. One, though, was a kiddie train with one car of Goofy, one of Mickey, and one of ... the Pikachu. Kind of random. Then, there was a Cradle-esque ride called "Viking" which had a large picture of a pirate on it. Also random. We decided to go on to the internet cafe. And here I sit, as usual. Ah well.

The last couple days have seen lots of random people around town and thought I'd comment a bit. First, on Sunday, I saw this guy dressed in a military uniform asking about an Armenian grocery store. I thought he was saying "army store" since he was wearing a military uniform. But no, it was an Armenian grocery store. There isn't one by my street, by the way. Yess. This morning on the bus I sat next to this woman who was reading a paper about TaTU. It was funny that I got a seat at all. The first bus that pulled up was so full that people actually had their faces pressed up against the glass and whatnot like in a movie (or a Russian bus), but right behind it, two other buses pulled up, which were nearly empty, so I rode to school in style. Then today on the bus from the Mariinsky to Nevsky, I wanted to get off but it was a crazy European bus with regular seats, so it was hard to get by in the aisles. The Russian women I was squeezing against, rather than being their usual cranky selves, were actually pleasant and blamed the uncomfortableness of our situation not on the fact that I am a dirty foreigner, but on the fact that the bus was made by filthy Germans. Haha! Some even smiled. Shockingly.

When I get home, the first thing I want is a bubble bath. Mmm. By home, I mean home home. Where there are things like: sunshine, cars to get me places, books in English, decent Italian food, cheeseburgers, microwaves, dryers, decongestants, and checkbooks. Mmm yes.

Alternatively, when I get my credit card in the mail, I am going to get a new bag and new wallet. Hurrah new bag and new wallet. The duct tape holding my old bag together is slowly but surely breaking. I blame my professor who keeps having me read whole novels, which she lends me in hardback.

That's about all the news. I have tickets to "Marriage of Figaro" on Sunday night. Hurrah! And tickets to see "The Inspector General" on Thursday. Hurrah! I'm way excited about both :-)

How I've Spent Money Since My Wallet Was Stolen:
Total money: 500 rubles borrowed from M. and 200 from L. (the names of my benefactresses will be kept strictly secret so other people cannot mooch off of them, etc, if they happen to find themselves in St. Petersburg, randomly. Note that at the current exchange rate, 700 rubles = approx. $22, which is the amount of money I have had to live off of since Friday night until Western Union opens on Monday.
- 50 rubles for 45 min of internet yesterday
- 25 rubles to get into ethnographic museum
- 330 rubles on dinner and wine last night (it was expensive!)
- 180 rubles on 3 hrs of internet today to get affairs in order
If you have been carefully counting, dear reader, this leaves me with a brilliant 120 rubles which is exactly how much lunch should cost tomorrow. And I can run to Western Union right after class. Haha! Cross your fingers that my masterful accounting will work. Sad that I spent that much on internet but the truth is, I have to have my e-mail fix. Not to mention, I have to finish my grad school applications. Apparently when you are in Russia, they count you as a foreigner, even if you are American, and your dates magically become a whole month earlier! Bastards.

Things I've talked about with Marina N. since yesterday:
- transvestites and how exactly they look after their operations
- how they did that experiment and figured out that sheep are homosexual sometimes too
- how to tell drug addicts and drunks apart on the street
- plot of a Soviet movie about this girl who met a gigolo in Venice
- that guy at the Halloween party who was dressed like a vampire and asked me if he could "see that" by which he meant my leg. Did I tell you all this story? When I held out my leg, clad in stripey stockings, he sort of rubbed it a bit and walked away. Russians are crazy.
- how to properly sweeten grib (grib being that stuff in the jar in our kitchen, remember? there should be pictures of it in the September archive)
- the defense of the cities of Krakow and Stalingrad in WWII
- and, last but not least, what a good memory the granddaughter has, and how bad the grandson's is, and generally how women are superior to men.
My thought is that Marina has been watching some crazy TV programs lately and wanted to discuss them with me and not Igor' K. Anyway, all very interesting.

Things I can talk about with some authority in Russian:
This entry could also be called vocabulary building. Every new experience helps, as Erin, our fearless leader, says...
- the difference between a nasal sinus infection and a regular sinus infection
- swelled up adenoids and various methods of treating them
- at least six different ways to cook beets and how they are all called
- measuring one's legs and buying stockings
- money transfers
- things associated with being a pirate and why one would want to be a pirate for Halloween
- yurts (ie teepee-esque huts populated by people in central Asia)
I'm tired of writing this now. The list goes on and on. But anyway. More lists later. We'll see. Now to see if my e-mail is actually working. I would buy internet time while the CMS that handles my e-mail is having "downtime". Brilliance.

Yesterday I went to the ethnographic museum with my tutor, Mariana, which was way cool. My tutor and I get along much better than my other tutor and have lots in common. For one, we both study languages (although her studies are more directed towards business language), but it was still fun going through the museum and making fun of the bad English placards together. For two, she's not super trendy like every other pouty Russian girl here. Also she's not pouty. And she has the sniffles a lot too. If you can call what I've been having the "sniffles". For three, she goes traveling a lot and tells me all about her travels, for example, in Turkey and Hungary and Serbia and France and Finland and Estonia. Which is very interesting because I haven't been to most of the places she's been and she hasn't been to most of the places I've been and we can swap stories pretty well. So things are working out well on the tutor front. And, as I was saying, the museum was cool. They have a large collection of national costumes from all across Russia. You never really think about how many people are not Russian in Russia, but there are lots. Tatars and Buryats and lots of others. The museum was collected under the empire and continued under Soviet power, so the exhibits were quite diverse, but it was all being restored when we were there, so the really far out places like Kamchatka were under construction. But still. It was cool.

Afterwards I went to meet various people at Cafe Idiot, which is a place I've been meaning to go for ages. It is very trendy with expats, as I was saying yesterday, and the interior design looks like it was done by the same people that designed the Dostoevsky Museum, which, I suppose, is thematic, at least. The food was good, though, and they give you a shot of vodka with your meal, which makes you feel very urban hipster indeed, although I suppose I should be above such things. But came back to the apartment in a happy mood, full of potatoes, and Marina N. made me pelmeni, which made me even happier, and then I got to do all my phone calling since people at home were awake, and got everything sorted out. Which means that tomorrow I ought to have some money at least, that is my own and not borrowed from kind people, and which also means that I can get out of debt as it were, as I hate borrowing money. Also this week I should get a shipment of decongestants and allergy medication for after the current perscription is gone, as well as a new bank card and a new credit card. And life will, once again, become a series of happy nothings interspersed with the ridiculous amount of work I am doing.

When I say ridiculous, I mean ridiculous. But the good news is that I have definitely improved because last year I would never have been able to read the amount that I am reading in Russian and write logical essays on it in the small amount of time I have between classes. We are reading, now, about a short novel in three days. Which doesn't seem like a lot to all of you who don't study Russian, but is a lot. Really.

And, on that note, I think I ought to get down to the business that I came here to do. Namely, grad school applications (due in less than a month! ack!), replying to e-mails, and getting life straightened out. So don't worry, those who were worried after my last entry, because things here are fine and dandy and I am going to survive to the end of my study abroad.

The next day I went to do the doctor and Dr. Lovely-English-Speaking-Myasnikov said that I had allergies. Allergies to what, you ask? Well. Allergies to the air in St. Petersburg. And right when I ran out of American cold medication and returned from my trip was when it started getting really bad, because before I'd at least had decongestants, which is, apparently, something they don't sell in Russia. So he put me on an antibiotic to stop the infection that the stuffiness in my nose was causing, and sent me home with a decongestant spray, which didn't work.

Suffice to say, I had a nasty reaction to the antibiotic and the decongestant spray literally didn't work. It wouldn't spray because it was broken. So I was in a much worse situation. But, yesterday, being Halloween, decided to get dressed up anyway. I bought a toy sword and was about to go off, merrily, to our Halloween party, when I missed my wallet. Yes, my wallet had been stolen. Which left me, without money, but dressed like a pirate, wandering the streets of St. Petersburg asking people about my missing wallet, to see if I had left it somewhere. The funniest part about this is that Russians don't celebrate Halloween, so they just thought I was crazy. Sigh.

As it turns out, my wallet was in fact stolen (hey, wallet thieves out there!) and by some really professional pick pockets. Because I know it had to be stolen after 6 pm and by 7 pm there were already $1200 worth of charges (in shoe stores, ironically) on my credit card and ATM card. Luckily the fine people of visa knew what was what and realized that they were being fraudulently used and blocked my cards after the first charge, so at least I don't have to pay that much. But it is annoying to have no money and no cards or anything and no phone numbers. Sigh. But lucky my passport was in another packet.

So last night, I think, being sick and feeling miserable and having had my wallet stolen, was, I think, the low point of my study abroad thus far. But today already things are looking up. That is, the sun is shining, I went back to see an ENT specialist and he gave me some decongestants that seem to be working, I'm going to a cool museum this afternoon, and then eating dinner at Cafe Idiot (trendy with expats and Dostoevsky themed, apparently) with a bunch of friends, and so, life is a bit brighter. Sigh. Not sure how frequently I'll be blogging, though, until I have access to a bank account again. We'll see.