Voting for president is a lot like sex—and not just because it takes place every four years in the solitude of a semi-private booth. Both are intensely personal activities that nonetheless can have profound public consequences. We might add that both often involve drug-and-alcohol-fueled delusions and morning-after feelings of guilt, shame, and recrimination.
Assuming this post works, this weblog has now been upgraded to MovableType version 3.12.
I'm home, and completely exhausted. Had one of the worst days of traveling in my life, and it was about 40 hours long. I'll write more about that later. I'm going to go take a hot shower now, and lapse into a coma.
Today was our last day in Russia, and I think we're ready to come home. I slept in late, but met Rimma and her friend Ksenya downstairs, along with Chuck. We set out in Ksenya's VW Golf for the village of Pushkin, where there are palaces that once belonged to the Czars. In fact, it was once called the Czars' Village, but has since been renamed. Sunday mornings are sleepy in St. Petersburg, so traffic was light and Ksenya was an excellent driver, we made our way out there in about half an hour, despite the rain showers. We parked the car and headed for the gates to the park that contains Catherine's Palace. We paid our entry fee and then strolled around the park for about an hour, the girls giggled about something (probably us) while Chuck and I merrily snapped photos of the surrounding lakes, trees, and paths. The fall colors were showing, and I hope my photos turned out, though I'd have been happier if we had some more sunlight.
Eventually, we made our way to Catherine's Palace, where we paid 500 rubles each (250 for the girls, since they're students) to get in. Once inside, we had to check our coats, then put on some dorky little booties over our shoes, so we didn't track any mud or dirt throughout the palace. We then found out that our tour included a guide, who was available only in Russian, so Ksenya and Rimma tried to discretely translate as we made our way throughout the palace.
Now, I appreciate everything we've been taken to see, but today was the day that I reached my limit of gilded cherubs, parquet floors, and fancy chairs. We've seen so many palaces and museums since we've been here, that my interest was rather waning, and my thoughts turned to the trip home. Eventually, we made our way to the Amber Room, which was rather interesting, though not really worth the cost of admission, in my book.
After the tour ended, we milled around the gift shops for a bit, then headed back to St. Petersburg. Traffic had picked up a bit more, so it took a little longer to get back to the hotel. We thanked Ksenya and Rimma, and said goodbye, then Chuck and I headed to the Quo Vadis? Internet Cafe to get online, as my dial-up has been nearly unusable for the last several days from my room.
We spent about two hours online, where I wrote up a bunch of weblog entries, and attempted to order some food via the cafe's intranet. Apparently, they didn't actually have any of the items I tried to order, and it took Chuck several tries to actually get his sandwich, so I gave up on that.
After logging off, we returned to the hotel in time to run into Dr. Vajpeyi, who was still looking to buy a Russian Hat. We walked with him to one of the stores we'd scouted yesterday with Rimma, and he bought a fine looking hat, of much better quality than the crap they sell tourists near the monuments and museums.
I stopped to buy some vodka that I'd been asked to bring to the U.S., and then we went back to our rooms and started packing. At 7:00, we met Alexey downstairs to go to dinner, which took us to a place called FX-017, which was, well, a bar/restaurant with a nautical theme. Chuck and I both ordered the steak with pepper, which turned out to be really good, we got it well done, but it was still tender. I take back what I said earlier about Russian beef, it's good in St. Petersburg, only the stuff I had in Moscow was bad.
After a couple hours of socializing, we returned to the hotel so we could do a bit more packing, and so that I could pawn off a bunch of stuff on Alexey and two of the Russian women from Herzen that joined us for dinner. I had some things, like UNI-branded highlighters and pens, that I'd been giving out as small gifts here and there, and I didn't want to haul them back to the U.S. with me. I also gave away two paperback books that I'd finished reading, an unused box of laundry detergent, one unused bar of soap, and a few other odds and ends that lightened my baggage considerably.
We then decided to cross the street to The Office, the fake British/Irish pub located there, and I had a pint of Heineken while I finished writing the few remaining postcards I had left. We talked with Alexey about his upcoming trip to UNI in January, and I got him to agree to mail my postcards for me tomorrow, as the post office is closed.
Around midnight, we bid everyone goodbye, and I returned to my room in time to catch a (thankfully!) hot shower, put on my last clean change of clothes and finish packing all my stuff. I was pleasantly greeted with my first useful dial-up session since Wednesday morning, so the Gods of Internet Access have smiled upon me long enough to write this.
I've got about an hour and a half until we're supposed to meet in the lobby to load up and head to the Airport, so I'm going to sign off now and finalize all my packing.
It's been an amazing trip that I'll never forget, and I've made a lot of new friends. Russia is different from the U.S. in more ways than I could imagine, but people are people no matter where you go. While I don't think I'd like living in Moscow (or any big U.S. city, for that matter), I could certainly handle living here in St. Petersburg. It's friendly to English speakers, has great restaurants, and is just a supremely beautiful city. I hope I get to come back during the White Nights some summer, especially after the ongoing restoration of the city has had a few more years to restore the glory to the old European buildings.
Maybe then they'll even have wi-fi...
I got up Saturday to find I had no hot water, though I'm sort of getting used to this. I managed to get the trickle of lukewarm water collected in a glass that I could slowly shampoo my hair clean, and used a washcloth to tidy up the rest of me as best I could. I then went downstairs to meet Chuck and Rimma for a shopping excursion. We walked through several stores that sold hats, scouting for Dr. Vajpeyi, as he told us earlier he wanted to buy a Russian Hat, but not the crappy kind that they sell to tourists by the major attractions. One of the Russians told me that many of those are made from dog fur. Yuck.
We also walked into a store called 505 that sells all sorts of multimedia, such as CDs, DVDs, and Computer Games. This store advertises on TV, and is located just off Nevsky Prospect, but it's completely filled with pirated goods. They're generally clever fakes, with all the DVD cover art and the discs are even pressed, not burned, but they're all pirated. You can get movies for 120 roubles ($4), and computer games cost roughly the same. Audio CDs were 75 roubles, or about $2.50, and they have a pretty good selection.
I don't know how the movie studios or music publishers can sell their wares when the pirated goods are so cheaply available. You can buy legitimate DVDs in Russia, but they're about $20, so you can see why most people don't do it.
After 505, we went to a shopping mall of sorts. It's a bit different from the average U.S. mall, or the big mall we saw in Moscow. It's all one giant building, but all the shops are sort of combined. Take a shopping mall, empty it into a Wal-Mart sized building, then make it so that you have to pay for each section at a different register, and you'll get the idea.
I purchased a few bottles of Vodka and some chocolates, as well as a couple more postcards. Chuck did some souvenir shopping as well, and we wound up waiting at one counter for about 15 minutes, as the keeper of that area had left someone else to watch her shop, but that person wasn't actually authorized to sell us anything. Ahh, that Russian Customer Service experience.
Shopping in Russia is unique, even in grocery stores, most of the goods are kept behind counters, so you have to get the attention of the clerk, and then point out every single item you want to buy, as they gather them all for you. While this certainly prevents theft, it is far from efficient, and results in long lines even when goods are plentiful. One morning I wanted to buy some more water in the grocery shop adjacent to the hotel, as the St. Petersburg water is not safe to drink. I had to wait about 10 minutes while the woman in front of me did her grocery shopping, one item at a time, and the clerk scurried about the store retrieving the things the woman called out.
Many shops also have "helpers" who follow you about the store spying on you to make sure that you're not stealing something. They can help answer questions too, but that seems to be a secondary function, as they're obviously watching you the whole time, craning their necks to look around columns to make sure you're not pocketing something. Theft must be a major problem, as even things costing relatively little are often tagged with the anti-theft devices that we normally only see on expensive items in the States. For instance, each of the little 250-ruble bottles of Vodka I bought had to have their tags removed before I could leave the store.
After some more shopping, the three of us clink-clanked our way to an Italian restaurant on Nevsky prospect. We supressed a giggle when a young guy named Alexander promptly came up and announced to us in English that he'd be our waitress during our meal.
Chuck ordered some spaghetti with shrimp and black noodles, and I ordered a pepporoni and bacon pizza, which was quite good, they bake them there in a brick oven. We bought Rimma lunch too, as she'd put up with us dragging her everywhere, and we knew that if she had to pay herself she probably wouldn't be able to afford much to eat in this place, though it was pretty reasonable by U.S. standards, costing less than $10 for each of our lunches indvidually.
After lunch, Chuck and Rimma did a little more shopping and I returned to hotel, as I was already hauling enough stuff around. I then caught a quick nap, and was woken up by a cell phone call from Chris. He said that he was going to meet Katherine and Chris at a place called Patio Pizza to eat dinner and asked if I'd like to join. I said that I had a late lunch, but that I'd go have a coke or two, and maybe an appetizer or something, so we met up near Kazaan Cathedral a few minutes later.
Much to my surprise, Patio Pizza turned out to be the same place I ate lunch, I just hadn't tried to translate the Cyrillic at the time, and it was more upscale than a place called "Patio Pizza" sounds in English. So, I ordered a Coke and some garlic bread, and chatted with the others while they ate. For dessert I ordered a vanilla mousse, which turned out to be a cake topped with various berries, and it was quite tasty.
After dinner, Katherine and Chris wanted to go to 505, as they'd heard of it, but didn't know where it was. I guessed wrong on the cross street a couple of times, but eventually managed to lead them to it, where they added a few titles to their personal movie and music collections too.
I then said goodbye to them, and returned to my hotel to watch a movie on my laptop, and fall asleep at a reasonable hour.
