Sorry that it has been such a horribly long time since I have written here. Things have been busy (in a good way, for the most part)! Of course, class has been nuts, we have tons and tons of homework every week. The worst is when I think I've gotten everything done over the weekend and think I'll have a few days break to relax, but then we always get our tremendous grammar work packet on Mondays, so my hopes are always in vain.
One of the reasons that I haven't written for a while is that I didn't have much to say, considering that we went to the Russian Museum like three times and, as beautiful as some of the art is, it's not really beauty that can be imparted over the internet. We saw exhibits on Russian Orthodox iconography and works of unknown artists throughout Russian history. Beyond that, given that much of the art is portraits of the Romanovs, the Russian Imperial family, a good portion of our tours were history lessons and in an effort to keep this blog post interesting, I won't share that here. If you want to know all about the Russian royal family, especially the tragic lives of all its women (our guide's favorite phrase: This [female relation to some Czar] also had an unhappy fate), let me know and I'll tell you all about it. Like many of the museums in St. Petersburg, the Russian museum is housed in several former palaces, one of which, the Mikhailovksy Palace, is rumored to be haunted, since the czar Pavel I was murdered there. The Mikhailovsky Palace was also converted into a school for military officers during the Soviet Union. Although a lot of the palace was changed to make room for classrooms, gyms, libraries, and dorms, some of the murals, especially the painted ceilings, were left intact. The photos from that time have so much cognitive dissonance - stark military trappings in this luxurious palace. The Russian Museum certainly has their hands full with the restoration. Most of the palace was still closed off, but we got to peek into one of the closed off areas and it was not pretty!
Inside the Mikhailovsky Palace. All the women on these portraits married horrible men who beat them, as far as I understood, except for Catherine the Great, who ruled Russia like a boss.
The ceiling murals that stayed in place while the palace was a military school.
So besides learning about the tragic fates of the Russian dynasty, this month I also went to an excellent concert put on by the group Серебряная Свадьба, Serebryanaya Svadba, which literally translates to Silver Wedding (could also mean Silver Anniversary, I suppose). They're a cabaret group, whose songs have plots and tell stories, which they acted out with props like puppets and costumes. Besides being incredibly fun to watch act out, their music is lovely, a combination of rock, jazz, Russian folk, and even klezmer. One of my favorite songs of the show was about the death of Alexander Pushkin, the great Russian poet. There's a Russian saying, "Pushkin is our everything" and if you want to ask someone who their favorite author is, then you have to specify "besides Pushkin," otherwise you will learn nothing. But the premise of the song is that Pushkin's relatives are trying to convince him not to go to Chornaya rechka, 'Black River', the name of the place in St. Petersburg where he died in a duel. On an unrelated note, what is it with Russian and German literature and duels?! It's like you can't participate in either literary tradition without having been injured or dying in a duel or making a duel a central plot point in some novel. Anyways, the group invited almost half the audience up on stage to act as Pushkin's relatives, begging him not to go to his death, "Black river, black pistol, please, Sasha, don't go, don't go to the Black river" (Sasha is the Russian nickname for Alexander). There's a metro stop named Chronaya rechka, so now whenever I'm riding the subway, I get the song stuck in my head :)
Serebryanaya svadba with...
...costumes and accordions...
...and puppets, too!
Pushkin's 'relatives' trying to convince him not to go to his duel and his death.
As part of the program, we also had an excursion to the Peter and Paul fortress, which was built in 1703 basically as the beginnings of the modern city. Key facts:
The fortress was never used in active military defense.
The fortress was a prison where many political revolutionaries, including the authors Dostoyevsky and Gorky, and many Octobrists, were imprisoned.
The members of the Russian Imperial family are buried in a cathedral on the grounds. Peter the First, who commanded the construction of St. Petersburg and led massive reforms to Europeanize Russia, gets special attention.
It is built in a very strange shape.
It is sort of a creepy place.
The layout of the Peter and Paul fortress
The placards above the entranceway to the Peter and Paul fortress are actually wood carvings.
There is also a museum dedicated to St. Petersburg on the grounds of the fortress which visited as well. That was a blast. I loved all the old artifacts - dresses, movie posters, old school coffee makers - and we learned that the most expensive office space in St. Petersburg is the office in the cupola of the central bookstore, Dom Knigi, which was originally built to be the headquarters of Singer sewing machines. The more you know...
The Dom Knigi bookstore on Nevsky Prospect. Disclaimer: I didn't take this picture, I found it on Google (but I really like it!)
Finally, in honor of Thanksgiving, I figured that I would share my favorite Russian food with you! Priyaniki!! These are essentially gingerbread cookies, but even better. First of all, they are fluffier than gingerbread cookies, almost like bread or muffins in some cases. Second, they come in lots of different flavors - chocolate, honey, mint - so you never get bored of them. Priyanij is actually the Russian word meaning 'spicy' or 'spiced.' but not 'hot' spicy. I think of this word as describing the flavor of Christmas perfectly. It means everything full of ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg. Yummy!
I didn't take this picture either, it came from some Russian cooking website. Usually priyaniki don't have quite so much frosting.
Well, this ended up being quite a long post! I hope that makes up for not writing anything for so long. If you have any questions, feel free to email me! I love hearing from everybody and knowing that people are actually reading this would give me much more motivation to write more often! Also, in case you didn't know, I will be heading home to Buffalo for three weeks around Christmas. While I'm sad that I won't be spending New Years in Russia, I'm looking forward to going home and if you'll be in Western New York around that time, please get in touch so that we can catch up! I'll leave you with some of my favorite pictures from around the city.
The Aleksandrinskij Theater
Statue of Pushkin (you know, the guy who died in the duel) in front of the main building of the Russian Museum
Inside the cathedral at the St. Peter and Paul fortress
Wow! I can't believe that I've been in St. Petersburg for a month already. We're already starting to get a taste of the (in)famous chilly St. Petersburg weather and strong wind. Most of my time is taken up with class and homework, but I've settled in nicely and am trying to find the time to get out and meet people. Besides our daily Russian language classes, I'm taking a course on language change and dialects of Russian at St. Petersburg State University. Every Wednesday before class, I meet with two Russian students whom I met the first day of the class, Olya and Sonya. We chat for half the time in English and the other half in Russian, so we both have a chance to practice. Mostly we've talked about humor and politics, so it's a great way to relax, joke around, and ask questions that don't usually come up in class. Being with my host family is like that too. They always explain jokes and figures of speech to me, which is a great way to learn. Besides that, I'm looking into finding clubs to join in St. Petersburg. I checked out an ultimate frisbee club and the rock climbing classes at the university, so hopefully one of those can fit into my schedule. A few other Flagship students and I have decided to make a tradition of going to the Hermitage, the largest museum in St. Pete, on the first Thursday of every month, when it is free for everyone. While the weather is still nice enough to do so, I've been running in the parks near our house too, which is a sure-fire way to get chased by dogs that are never leashed (and get a lot of weird looks, even though my host family assures me that it is totally normal to go jogging in the park)! In short, I'm keeping busy!
A few weeks ago we went on a group 'excursion' to Pskov, a small city near to border with Estonia. Despite the fact that I can't say the name 'Pskov' with a straight face (it sounds like a sneeze), the city is completely enchanting. It is stuffed to the brim with churches and there is a 'kremlin', a fortress, with a recently renovated cathedral in the center of the city. We had an excellent guide who showed us around both the city and the nearby Pechory Monastery. I don't remember exactly how many churches were in the city, I think about 35 something, most of which were built in the 16th and 17th centuries. Incredibly, the churches in Pskov and the monastery all survived communism relatively well, although some did fall into disrepair and the central cathedral was re purposed as a museum of science (with an atheist bent) under the Soviet Union. The cathedral is a church again and we managed to crash a wedding there on our visit. Whoops!
The view from our hotel room window of the cathedral.
Taken from the bridge crossing the river, the cathedral peeking out from the kremlin.
Oh hi everybody, nice wedding, nice church - I'm just gonna take some pictures, don't mind me...
The path in the fortress leading up to the cathedral.
View of the locks on the bridge across from the kremlin. It's a Russian tradition for a couple to put a lock on a bridge, then throw away the key when they get married.
The city is struggling to keep the churches in good condition, mostly because the population is simply to small to support that such a large number of churches, so the congregations are very small. On the other hand, the churches and the monastery do draw a lot of tourism, including pilgrims, to the region.
Where is Pskov? Do not be deceived by how close together St. Pete and Pskov appear to be - that's actually a 4 hour bus ride!
As far as the monastery goes, I am positive whatever the guide said was totally fascinating, because she was excellent, but I was feeling really sick and didn't retain any information from the trip. The place was very pretty though - a walled fortress built into a ravine, with, I believe, 11 churches, some dating back to the 15th and 16th centuries, built into the caves of the ravine. Not only were the buildings gorgeous, but the gardens and grounds were obviously carefully tended, since the monastery is supposed to look as close to heaven as possible.
The view of the monastery from outside its walls.
A number of churches on the monastery grounds, built sharing walls.
The spires of the church that were visible from outside the monastery.
To wrap up this post, I've got a great story about riding the streetcar from my apartment en-route to our group trip to the Russian museum. Of course, I've mentioned babushkas in some past posts from Ufa, but this is another babushka story. All the seats were full, so I was standing on the streetcar, minding my own business, and this older lady carrying a bunch of bags gets on. She heads straight to where I was standing next to an older couple and asks us in typical babushka fashion if we could let her set her bags down and lean against the window, "Dear, sweet, nice people, would you let me stand here...."So of course we let her by. She stands right next to me and just starts talking. At first I had no idea what to do - such a deer in headlights - I didn't know if she had asked me a question or what. So I just nodded and didn't say anything, figuring she would just go sit down when people got off at the next stop. No such luck. She talked to me for the full 40 minutes we were on the streetcar together. Between the noise of traffic and how quickly she was speaking, I didn't catch most of what she said. I think I said two words the whole trip, just replying when she asked me where I studied. Luckily, we had just passed the university, so I just said "Right here." I think she was talking about her son, but I couldn't figure it out, because the name kept changing, first Ivan, then Aleksiy. The whole exchange was hilarious and totally surreal, especially considering that people don't usually talk on the public transportation in Russia and certainly not with strangers- I've ridden on subway cars in total silence for more than 20 minutes here! I don't know what I would have done if she had actually started asking me questions... This is why I love travelling - you think you're finally getting used to the culture, figuring out how to navigate the public transportation, not smile in public, give exact change to cashiers in stores, etc., then something entirely unexpected happens, just to make sure your week isn't boring!
So I have safely and happily arrived in St. Petersburg. I've been here about a week, but our classes just started today, Saturday. Wait what? Yes, on Saturday. As per Russian tradition, the first of September is always the first day of school. Actually its considered a holiday - День знаний, literally "Day of Knowings," but "Day of Knowledge" sounds so much better. So we had our first day of class. Since my communication level is equal to that of a five year old, I felt like I fit right in with all the kids, accompanied by their parents, carrying flowers to their teachers on the first day of school. Class was pretty uneventful. We met our teachers and made up some silly skits, much like kindergarten. Unlike kindergarten, we already have homework.
"Best wishes for the holiday"
To get everybody up to date, I just started the Flagship program in St. Petersburg, Russia. A full academic year in a city where the average annual temperature is only 40 degrees F? Are you crazy? Yes. In all seriousness, I am really looking forward to the upcoming year. I really enjoy language learning and I'm thrilled to be traveling again. Also, St. Petersburg, "the Venice of the north", is a gorgeous city. I plan on staying warm and learning a lot.
I have a wonderful host family, who I'll be staying with for the whole year. My host mom, a former master gymnast, teaches physical therapy and calisthenics at a university and my host dad is an engineer from Moldova. They're lovely - very patient and ready to answer my many questions (what's this? what's that called? where is this? is it safe to eat this? can I go jogging in the park? is it possible to buy this?...).They also have two daughters (and a granddaughter) who live in St. Pete as well and come to visit a lot, so there are people closer to my own age around as well. Friends of my host mom have been visiting from Moscow this week, so the house has been busy, which is great. I've had lots of practice chatting. And eating, so much eating. This summer I was cooking mostly vegetarian dishes and eating a lot of Indian style foods - light, spicy dishes. Russian food is so different - heavy, usually fatty and more bland, with meat. And a lot of food at that! I had to explain to my host family the difference between what Americans consider healthy and what Russians consider healthy eating. They sort of laughed and told me that I would have to eat like a Russian in order to stay warm in the winter. However, they were very excited when I offered to cook Indian food. I brought spices with me, but I think I'm going to have to lay off the spicy for their sake. Since my host mom and her friends only get together a few times a year, I have also had a lot of practice drinking wine and champagne, practicing an essential skill in Russia, making toasts.
My new home
To be quite honest, the highlight of my first week here, besides just walking around the city, has been talking about food and eating with my host family. In general I love trying new foods and learning how to cook new things. Also, I know enough vocabulary to carry on an intelligent conversation about cooking, while still learning new words and phrases. The problem in Russia is that if you say you like something, the host usually produces seeming never ending amounts of said dish for you to eat.
Like I said, I spent a lot of time just strolling around the city as well. Here's some of what I saw:
