Floating down the Neva

(NB: Once again, there’s a week’s worth of entries here, so go back to the post about the wine bar and with the post following that day!)

The plan for Saturday was to go to the Hermitage again at noon, but that turned out to be a fatalistic idea. The line was long to get in, but we decided to stick it out and got our free student tickets after about 20 minutes. We spend this trip on the second floor looking at French, British, and German art from the 18^th and 19^th centuries. The art was beautiful, but I’m not really much of an art museum person. The real reason to go to the Hermitage, and what works well for us with our free tickets, is to look at the rooms of the building themselves. The Hermitage is housed in part of the Winter Palace, ergo the rooms were designed for royalty. The wing that houses Flemish art has the most beautiful painted ceilings, and it was our mission yesterday to find those in particular. After we found those rooms, we stumbled upon a sign directing us to a room with a display on knights. In that room where several full suits of armor, weapons from all different countries, and four suits of armors set up on fake horses to full scale, which was really cool. On our way out of the Hermitage we found ourselves in one of the old libraries of the winter palace. It was beautiful and everything I’ve dreamed of having one day! It was a two story library with a staircase and more bookcases on the balcony. Hannah took some illegal pictures and I was about to, but then the room attendant turned her evil eyes on us and we scurried away.

After the Hermitage, we met up with Corbin and Joe in the park outside Kazan Cathedral while we waited for the rest of the UA group to arrive. The excursion planned for that evening was a boat tour of St. Petersburg on the Neva.  The tour was 99% of things we have already seen, so everyone spent most of the time talking and relishing the chance to sail down the Neva on a boat. Unfortunately it was raining, so our time was spent below deck looking out the windows. We were all jittery because we planned a beach party following the boat tour and it started raining (following a completely sunny day) right when the tour started. But we got lucky! When the tour ended, we could see it clearing in the distance over the beach at Primorskaya!

me chilling in the park in front of Dom Knigi (on right)

Hannah and Joe hamming it up for the camera

arch we saw on the boat tour

Ergo, we staged our second party on the beach in Russia. We once again had delicious sashlyk and the boys got happy with the lighter fluid as usual. It was colder this time around, but it didn’t matter since we all had sweaters and a roaring fire to keep us warm. We used a door (yes, a door) that we found washed up on the beach to protect the fire from the wind coming in off the Gulf of Finland and all was well! The original plan for everyone else (I live a block from the beach) was to head out in time to catch the metro, but when the time rolled around, the majority of us decided to stay out on the beach. The boys found a stash of good wood, so we had a good fire going from 8pm to 5am. It was a lot of fun to just hang out with people, and since we’re 4 of 5 weeks through our time here in St. Pete’s, everyone is getting tired and just wants to chill. And I’m down with that. 

After getting home at 6am, after seeing everyone off, I passed out for about nine hours. And just before I typed this up I had the glorious experience of washing smaller pieces of clothing in the bathtub. Not as bad as I thought it would be, but definitely not an experience I care to repeat. I miss my washing machine! (Oh, first world problems!) But now I have internet for the next few hours since I’m at a café in Petrogradskaya with Kara, so all is right with the world!

Love and hugs to all! (Postcards going out sometime this week before I leave St. Petersburg!)

xoxo

It's Russia, baby!

It’s been a slower past couple of days, and thank god because I’m a little overwhelmed with the whirlwind of a week that I’ve had. We finally got our student IDs yesterday, yay! They’re super official looking, like serious WWII era documentation looking. And we get to keep them, so I’ll be sure to bring it home with me so I can show it off! Yesterday was very chill. I had an advising meeting then we walked around the Cherneshevskaya area where we checked out a small botanical garden. Everyone was exhausted so we headed home after that. On my way back, once I was in Primorskaya, I went to the 24 hour produkti (mini-grocery store) by my apartment for the first time. I was low on rubles at the time, so I grabbed a loaf of brown bread, some OJ, and three apples. Since we generally eat lunch and dinner out on the cheap ($3-$6 a meal) and breakfast is provided, these are serving well as midday and evening snacks! And orange juice has never tasted better in my life. Seriously. I need to make sure I eat something green every once and a while because nothing grows here.

I finished watching a movie on Rossiya1 called Brigade, and I was pleasantly surprised. So I’m adding that to the list of movies I want to buy while I’m here (including East-West, Moscow Does Not Believe in Tears, and The Irony of Fate). The news is also a good way to wind down at night and also to practice my listening skills. I understand more and more every day; although my confidence in my speaking ability sometimes limits me. Like today when I ordered ice cream from a truck in perfect Russian and the lady didn’t understand me. FAIL. Ugh… But otherwise, St. Pete’s is great! The sun is staying up longer and longer. As I write this up, it’s 11:30pm and it’s just now twilightish. I’ve noticed that, as a result probably, the city starts the day later (around 10am) and stays open later (usually till midnight), with the exception of the 24 hour stores. I could get used to this. I like the later day idea. Unfortunately, I still have to get up at 7:30am to make it across town in time for my 10am class. Boo.

Today, after having lunch at the Smolny cafeteria, we ventured back down to Nevsky Prospekt, the west end this time. There along the beautiful rivers that run through St. Petersburg sits the Winter Palace and the Hermitage museum, which is actually part of the Winter Palace.  The Hermitage is a beautiful mint green colored building with wide accents and borders. It sits on a large square which has an obelisk thing in the middle and an arch on the opposite side. There were people everywhere, as well as horse-drawn carriages and rollerbladers. Apparently, skating is a big thing here in Russia. Anyways, with our student IDs, the Hermitage is FREEEEEE, which is awesome because a regular ticket costs 400 rubles (about $15). The Hermitage is three floors and each floor has two massive wings. So today we covered the eastern wing of the first floor, which is Ancient Egypt, Rome, and Greece. It doesn’t sound like a lot, but there was SO MUCH to see everywhere! They had statues from 300 BCE, jewelry, red-black Greek pottery, busts from Rome, Hellenic soldier helmets and weapons, various sarcophagi, Egyptian art, and even a mummy! So, of course, I was in heaven. And the rooms! Oh my god, the rooms themselves were absolutely beautiful!!!! The ceilings were so intricate and amazing, and each room had a different color scheme. The columns were mind boggling and the floors were stunning marble patterns, some in keeping with the Greco-Roman theme, others not. It was just amazing; there truly are no words to describe the beauty of the Hermitage. We wanted to hit up the west wing, where the Caucasus section was, but we ran out of time. I wish I had pictures of the inside, but they don’t allow cameras. 

The Hermitage

The reason I’m back so late tonight is because the university arranged for us to go see a performance of traditional Cossack dance and song. It was so cool! The academy that put on the performance was so talented and the costumes were gorgeous. I knew some of the songs too! The whole thing was just mind boggling and amazing to behold. I can’t even do it justice in this description! Just know it was wonderful and it was a good night! After the performance, I hopped the metro back to Primorskaya. Today was the latest I’ve ever been on the metro before (it was 10:15pm). After loads of people, including Kara, got off at Gostiniy Dvor, it was literally just me and about 40 Russian sailors/officers in my compartment. Primorskaya is on the Gulf of Finland and has a port super nearby, so I figured they must be up for duty. It’s probably the most hilarious metro ride ever, just the irony of it all! They were good guys, nice too, and they let me off the metro first before they poured off and took over the station. I’m sure this notion of me surrounded by Russian military men terrifies my mom (hi mom!) but I’m still alive and all is well!

And now I’m going to bed because it’s midnight here and tomorrow I have to be at Nevsky and Kazan at 10am because we’re going on an official bus tour of St. Petersburg as a group. I predict entertaining moments!

Love to you all! Xoxo

P.S. Wore a skirt today because we went to the theater. It was obscenely windy. You do the math.