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Wound my time in Poland down. My dad took me to see a beautiful ballet production put on by the National Polish Ballet – Romeo and Juliet. It was awesome – I can’t remember the last time I went to see a classical ballet performance. A few days later I flew out of Warsaw to St. Petersburg – via Riga, Latvia overnight. I arrived in St. Petersburg – sleep deprived from all night in Riga airport. I found my way to a hostel – this was sort of a logistical nightmare – between not being able to read or speak Russian – hordes of people – and my heavy backpack. I think a lady cussed me out on the metro for taking up too much space with my pack – at least other people around me gave her dirty looks for me – I humbly tried to apologize to her in English. I’ve also never been on a metro that feels like you’re really entering the bowels of the earth – pretty deep. After a rest, I wandered a bit – and realized the immensity of this city – massively huge buildings and streets – gorgeous though – just made me
feel a little insignificant. Poland didn’t seem as confusing to me for some reason though. Maybe St. Petersburg is a faster paced city – it’s definitely bigger. Not knowing the Cyrillic alphabet adds to the challenge as well. I am now staying at a home of someone who hosts for couchsurfing. I spent literally 5 1/2 hours today in the Hermitage museum (at least it was a rainy day, so good to be inside all day) – and didn’t remotely make a dent in that place. Again - massive and an amazing collection and palace. You would have to see it to understand what I mean. I spent probably the majority of my time inspecting and re-inspecting the European collection from 19th and 20th century – famous painters like Cezanne, Gaugain, Matisse, Picasso, Renoir, Monet, Van Gogh, etc. I really loved this collection. I felt like such a touron (is that really a word?) because I couldn’t stop taking pictures – but hey, I’m not trying to hide the fact that I’m a tourist – it would be kind of ridiculous if I tried to “blend in” as a Russian. After I wore myself out at the Hermitage, I collected
Summer Palace - Hermitage
this is so huge - hard for a picture to do it justice my backpack from the hostel and walked almost 2 hours to another side of the city (Petrograd) to meet the young woman of where I’m staying now – she is a couchsurfing host. I decided to walk because a combination of not wanting to deal with another lady cussing me out on the metro and also it gives me a better sense of a city. My bag was a little heavy and my shoulders were starting to hurt – but it really is a beautiful city and by then it wasn’t raining anymore – and I sort of understand where I am now. My host is really nice – she has lived in St. Petersburg 20 years, but grew up in Siberia – closer to Mongolia – so that is obviously interesting for me. She has been super helpful – helped me get a train ticket to Moscow. These kinds of tasks can take forever with such a huge language barrier. Many more young people speak English in Poland than in Russia – interesting. In both countries with folks from older generations – forget it. Julia (my host) also lives with her 90 year old grandmother here. I think someone
who must be a family friend of theirs – his name is Boris – an older gentleman joined us for dinner last night (more like I joined them) – he doesn’t speak any English, but was very kind and nice – and asked me “what about Barack Obama” and also asked if I really believe that Bin Laden is dead.
Today, I have spent the day in Petrograd – the side of the city where Julia lives – it’s away from the main downtown historic area. I found my way to the only Buddhist temple in the city, which has a small café in the basement that serves really inexpensive food. Nobody there spoke English, but the one guy who is the resident artist for the temple did – he was really nice and took me under his wing a bit and showed me around and invited me to come back at 3pm for a service – which I did – interesting. He was intrigued with how I found the place and said that he’s only met one other foreigner there. It’s a good sized temple with about 12 llamas based out of there. I told him my plans
wine cooler
i want this wine cooler in my house! to go to Mongolia, and he said that he is going to be painting a couple of temples this summer in Siberia – close to Mongolia and Kazakhstan - interesting – he seems like a true wanderer. It’s not the typical “scene” you would expect at such a temple in the States with a bunch of young hipsters. Rather, a wide range of folks – but many middle aged and older folks – to whom obviously Buddhism is their primary spiritual outlet – I guess there is that Asian connection across Siberia.
That’s it for right now – I have a couple days left in St. Petersburg – then will arrive in Moscow early Sunday morning via train. I’ve decided to stay in a hostel there, as to give myself a bit of privacy before I have probably no privacy on the train across Siberia. Will post some pictures later – but none from the Buddhist temple today – it’s pictured in my mind.
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Jeannette Hovey
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Hey Becky! We miss you!!
It sounds like you are having a great time so far! I am really glad you have this blog so we can keep in touch and live vicariously.. nothing too crazy to report from Flagstaff, except it is still snowing grrr! But we need the moisture!! Ladies 80's has gotten Emma and I twice this month! She has art again in Martan's :-) YAY! Mostly same same for us!! Love you honey, safe travels sister!!! Xoxoxo