The last 6 weeks or so...

My last post was all about my mum & her boyfriend Rod's visit to Russia. They left on January 20th, so I thought I should write a quick update about what I've been up to since then. I'm also getting a little better at regularly updating my blog - it's only 10 days since my last post! The last few weeks have mainly been taken up with going to school, which I started back at on the January 31st. I must say it's been pretty boring, but that's not school's fault or anything, merely my reluctance to do any work! Though I can't really remember most of what I've done outside of school, I will try to recount a few of the major events.

Firstly, my good friend Marion arrived in Petersburg. She studies Russian with me in Manchester, and is spending the whole of her second semester here (Yay!), so we have plenty of plans for fun travels around Russia. She seems to be enjoying herself here so far, so all is good! As of yet we've mainly just been looking around the city (we did A LOT of walking when she first arrived) and shopping, though we did try to go to the Leningrad Blockade Museum, and only failed because it was closed for 'technical reasons'... Here is a picture of said museum, which looked very pretty in the sun. We're going to go back another day, when it will hopefully be open!

Within the last few weeks, we have also started a tradition of going bowling after school on Tuesdays. This is great fun, (sort of) exercise, and is much cheaper than it is in England! You get a lane for an hour for £6, which isn't bad when split between 3 or 4 people. I like the idea of doing it per hour rather than per game as well, so if you play quickly you can get 2 or 3 games in. The bowling place is also right near school so it's really handy for going straight after lessons. A funny thing is that all the computers are in English there, so the attendants have to type our English names in how they think they're spelt. This results in some odd nicknames, for example my friend Helen somehow became 'Alan'. Here is a picture of our score computer from one week, as you can see I was losing pretty badly!

I also went with my flatmate Mike to buy tickets for a gig in April. One of our favourite bands (along with our friend David) - Mogwai - are coming to Petersburg and playing at a club about 20 minutes' walk from our flat. We felt we had to take up the opportunity and got tickets. I'm rather excited!

Another thing that's happened in the last few weeks is that I got a sudden urge to read Russian, and finally finished my book of Russian stories. I swiftly started one of the many other books I've bought since I got here, a fairly simple kids' book about a mouse. I haven't quite finished it yet, but when I do, I intend to start on the first Harry Potter book, which I bought a couple of weeks ago. It would be great to finish it before I go home, but we'll see... Also, I'm not sure if I've mentioned this on here yet, but in Russia, Harry Potter is called 'Garry Potter'. It sounds like some sort of knock-off version, but really they just find it easier to say the name Harry as 'Garry'. This also means our ginger British prince is 'Prince Garry', and Hitler becomes 'Gitler', a rather entertaining fact for many non-Russians.

That's really all I can think to write right now, though if I recall any other recent happenings, I will add them to this post. A combination of laziness and forgetfulness means this is a relatively short post! It's been far too cold here to do a great deal, but now it's starting to warm up I will hopefully start doing more exciting things. This week is 'Pancake Week' in Russia - yes, they have a whole week rather than just a day! - and this weekend I'm planning to go to some of the celebrations for it. They take the whole thing pretty seriously here! I also currently have a provisional plan to visit the nearby city of Novgorod, so if I do end up going I'm sure I'll write about that. Over and out!

Naomi :)

Mother comes to the Motherland! (Long time no post, oops)

So, as you can see, my New Year's Resolution completely failed. My promise to blog more often has been completely and utterly broken, as I've yet again fallen back into my lazy ways. Hopefully that will be resolved soon though, as me and my friend Marion are planning to spur each other on with our blogs...

This epically long post is all about my mum and her boyfriend's trip to Petersburg to visit me. They came from the 16th to the 20th of January and stayed just around the corner from my flat, in the Fifth Corner (Пятый угол) hotel, which wasn't bad for the money, and apparently served a very large and tasty breakfast.

Firstly, I went to meet them at the airport and we got a taxi back to the hotel, where my mum unpacked all of my amazing Christmas presents, which I swiftly opened. Amongst other things, I got lots of English chocolate (YUMMY!), a lovely Hello Kitty make up bag, a Hello Kitty mug, some Smirnoff vodka with a glass (a bit of a joke there), some nice socks, a sparkly belt, some very nice nail varnishes, and plenty more things I can't remember right now :) Quite a haul I think you'll agree! After all the unpacking and present-giving was over, we made our way to my flat so mum & Rod could meet Rosa, my landlady. Upon arrival, the traditional Russian aggressive hospitality was in full flow, and soon we had confectioneries coming out of our ears and were full of tea and champagne. I was chief translator, and was surprised that we managed to have a fairly in-depth conversation about all sorts of things together, and I think I only had to look in the dictionary once or twice the whole time! A lovely evening was had by all, and we got a fairly early night in preparation for the first proper touristy day...

On the first day, I decided to show my mum & Rod Nevsky Prospect, the main avenue in the centre of Saint Petersburg, which is very famous within Russian literature and culture as the hub of activity in the city. It was a bit cold and sleety, but nevertheless we marched on down Nevsky as I pointed out all of the places of interest. We went up to the Church on Spilled Blood (or whatever it's called - it has a longer, more complicated name I can never remember) and my mum asked what it was like inside. I replied saying I'd never actually been in, so my mum suggested we go inside. Inside it's absolutely stunning, perhaps even more so than on the outside... The walls were completely covered in paintings, the domes were all painted on the inside as well, and there was a lovely marble floor in the centre. There was also a small interesting exhibition about the restoration of the church, which was in a pretty bad state during most of the Soviet period. Here are some pictures of the church, inside and out:

(Top: Lots of paintings inside the Church on Spilled Blood; Bottom Left: The altar-y section in the church; Bottom Right: Me and my mum outside, looking a little chilly!)

After our trip to the church, we moved on to the Russian Museum. It's actually one of the less-frequented tourist places in Petersburg, as all of the art is Russian and foreigners don't generally know many Russian artists. This is a great shame, because it really is a lovely museum, featuring some truly underrated (at least internationally, anyway) Russian artists. It's also interesting as they have a section with a lot of Soviet art and portraits of Lenin and Stalin, which I find surprisingly eerie. My mum and Rod enjoyed the museum, even though they didn't recognise any of the paintings, and we also had a nice sit down in the museum cafe. Here are some pictures (stolen from my mum) of our museum trip:

 

(Top: Rod doing an impression of Pushkin, a popular photo pose with this statue; Bottom: The grand entrance inside the Russian Museum)

Despite already having walked several miles on the first day, we decided it was too early to call it a day and ventured to the massive city centre shopping centre, Galeria. Here we browsed all the shops and mum & Rod marvelled at the novelty of being able to smoke in Costa Coffee. After a couple of hours of shopping, our feet were too tired and Rod was too bored, so we made our way back to the hotel for dinner. The problem with eating out when mum & Rod were here was that I barely know any restaurants in the city. As a poor student, I always cook at home or eat in cheap and easy cafe-style places, so when asked where we should go for dinner, I didn't really have an answer! This meant we ate in the restaurant under the hotel a couple of times, but that was okay because it was a very nice restaurant with good food. Plus, we could wear normal shoes as you didn't need to go outside to reach it from the hotel. We ate there that evening and had a few drinks in the hotel room whilst my mum uploaded all of her photos on to Facebook (the wonder of technology!). I then walked home to get plenty of rest for our next touristy day.

We met up bright and early the next morning to walk through the sleet to the Hermitage. After my mum & Rod were so taken aback by the grand scale and decorativeness of the Russian Museum the day before, I don't think they were quite prepared for the Hermitage to just completely blow it out of the water... As we walked into Palace Square, there were several "Ooh"s and "Ahh"s at the sight of the Winter Palace, and we went inside. Despite the fact I studied Art History at university for a year, my mum knows a lot more about European art than I do, so I was sure she would love the Hermitage. I was not wrong, and she got rather excited upon seeing the sheer number of Picassos, Da Vincis, Mattisses and Monets on display. Since I forgot we should have bought a photo-taking pass at the beginning, we weren't really allowed to take photos inside the museum... This didn't stop my mum, though, who turned the situation into a good opportunity for some covert spy-style photo taking. We spent a good few hours exploring the museum, and I think we managed to see a good part of the full collection on show, though you never really know with the Hermitage as I always seem to discover new sections every time I visit! We had lunch inside the museum and browsed the gift shops, then went back out into the cold. Here are some pictures of our Hermitage visit:

 

(Top: Mum & Rod in front of the Hermitage; Middle Left: General Staff Building on Palace Square; Middle Right: Alexander's Column in Palace Square; Middle: One of the main staircases in the Hermitage; Bottom: Plaque in the Hermitage commemorating the storming of the Winter Palace during the October Russian revolution in 1917)

It was quite late when we got out of the Hermitage, so instead of going somewhere else, I just took mum & Rod on a walk around a couple of the other nearby sights. We went and saw the statue of the Bronze Horseman and St Isaac's Cathedral, then walked back towards Nevsky. It was still a little early to go back to the hotel, so we went into Gostiny Dvor, a huge department store-style building, where my mum decided she had to buy a Russian doll, then proceeded to spend what felt like hours trying to find the perfect one... Eventually she found one which met her inexplicably high standards and bought it :P She also got a set of really cute Russian doll salt & pepper pots, which I hadn't ever seen before. We then decided it was time to call it a day and headed back to the hotel for the evening.

For their last full day in Petersburg, I decided to take mum & Rod to the Cruiser Aurora, a Russian naval Cruiser moored on the river which now serves as a museum. It is the longest serving Russian naval ship ever, and played a key part in the October revolution, so I had wanted to visit it for ages, but hadn't. Rod is very interested in ships so I thought it would make up for dragging him around all the shops a couple of days earlier... It did not disappoint, and it was interesting looking around the ship and all the memorabilia inside. I really want to go back again when it's warm and sunny, to get some non-cloudy pictures. Here are some pictures from the Aurora:

 

(Top Left: The Cruiser Aurora; Top Right: Mast on Aurora; Bottom: Life ring featuring the name of the ship)

We then continued the naval theme and walked from the Aurora to the Naval Museum, passing by the Peter and Paul fortress. I still am yet to visit the fortress, but I really want to. I think it would probably be better to go when it's a bit warmer and sunnier, though... We then went into the Naval Museum, which was housed inside the beautiful old Stock Exchange building. The museum itself was pretty interesting, although there were hardly any signs at all in English so it was hard to tell what a lot of the things were in detail. A lot of the stuff was fairly self explanatory though, and there were lots of cool Soviet flags and banners dotted around. I hope someone pumps some money into the museum at some point, because I think it has the potential to be really good... It just needs some English signs and a lick of paint, I think. 

After this we weren't sure what to do as it was too early to go back to the hotel. We decided to take a visit to Auchan, the supermarket, as me and my mum absolutely love browsing the supermarket at home (as sad as that sounds!) and foreign supermarkets are always interesting for tourists! Mum & Rod bought a surprising amount of stuff (they had plenty of room in the suitcase from where my Xmas presents had been!) and it was fun showing them all of the random products on offer here. We then popped back to my flat as it was on the way back to the hotel, and quickly had a cup of tea and a chat with Rosa. We ate in the hotel restaurant again on this night, which was yet again very tasty.

On the final day of their trip, we decided to stay fairly near the hotel as the taxi to the airport was booked for 2pm. We just had a little walk around the nearby area, including a shopping centre, and had a coffee, and then it was time to go already. I went with mum & Rod to the airport, where we had lunch in Costa Coffee before saying goodbye. It felt like their stay went so quickly, but it was really so lovely having them here and showing them the city I so love living in and I hope they enjoyed themselves as much as I did. I hope now it makes more sense to them why I find Russia so interesting! 

I'm wondering if this post could be a contender for my longest so far, so I think I'm going to stop here! I have quite a lot else to update on since my mum & Rod's visit, but I think I'll save that for another (not so distant!) day. Time to go and do some homework!

Christmas and everything that followed...

Firstly, in case you didn't notice, this is the second post today - yes, after being so lazy for a month I'm making two in one day! - therefore, if you really want to know everything I've been up to, I recommend you read the post below first. Oh and sorry for the sheer length of this post. That is all.

A lot of people found my decision to stay in Russia during the Christmas period surprising, but I'm really glad I did. Luckily a few of the people I've met here were also planning to stay, so we got to be all creative and make our own Christmas from scratch. As I said in the previous post, Russians don't celebrate anything at all on the 25th of December... It was quite a weird feeling to see people going about their daily business on Christmas Day! I actually really enjoyed preparing for Christmas, and I think we all did really well considering it was all of our first time doing it all ourselves, and not just sitting back as our parents/grandparents prepared it all for us...

Our first Christmassy get-together was on Christmas Eve, when we all went to my friend Luka's flat for food, drinks and Articulate (an awesome word game, which I must buy when I get home). It was a lovely evening, and highlights included the phrase "I can't believe it's Christmas already" being said numerous times, an absolutely DELICIOUS cake and several different people spilling several different drinks for no obvious reason. It was a lovely start to our Christmas celebrations, and I suppose it was when it finally hit me that I was going to be spending Christmas Day in Russia. Here are some pictures to document the EVEnt (see what I did there?):

(Top Left: Lovely people in Luka's kitchen; Top Right: Tipsily-taken photo of Christmas lights on the way home, included to keep the pattern of photos I like on here; Bottom: Destroyed cake - it was so delicious it sent us all into an animalistic rage)

I got back from the Christmas Eve party fairly early, luckily early enough to finish my personal preparations for Christmas Day - a chocolate log and crackers. I iced the log and added the final touches to my crackers and got an early night, knowing when I woke up it'd be CHRISTMAS! Eee!

Oh, and here are some pictures of the crackers I made since I can't think of another place to put them in this post:

(Everyone got a balloon, toy, sweets, hat and a joke - I tried to make them as authentic as possible!)

I woke up, and it was CHRISTMAS! Eee! I was greeted by a lovely unexpected present from my amazing Russian landlady Rosa, who had placed it under our miniature Christmas tree on the kitchen table. She got me a nice Nivea toiletry bag with yummy-smelling toiletries inside :) After this lovely start to the day, I proceeded to get ready and go to Pippa, Seb and George's flat for Christmassy fun times. Presents, crackers and chocolate log in hands, I trekked across the city, wondering if anyone even knew t was (our) Christmas Day here... The Band Aid song springs to mind ;)

All systems were go when I arrived at the flat - George and Pippa were being all Ready Steady Cook with military precision. I was impressed. Seb arrived shortly after and wowed everyone with his knowledge of carrot shapes - "So, you want them Julienned?" Luka also arrived, and our Christmas fivesome was complete. After a few drinks and a little cooking, we sat down for present-giving time. Pippa gave me an amazing nautical scarf she had knitted and a vintage Soviet sailor badge :D I also got a tasty chocolate Santa from Luka. Here are some pictures of the present-giving:

 

(Top Left: Russian Christmas tree!; Top Right: My awesome new scarf, hand-made by Pippa; Bottom: Pippa with her present from me - a Cheburashka (Soviet cartoon she likes) cushion)

The next notable event of the day was of course Christmas dinner! I don't really know what else to say about it other than the fact it was extremely tasty and we were all very full afterwards. Here are some pictures to visually describe the food timeline:

(I don't think I need to describe the pictures - I hope they speak for themselves, and show why we were all so full!)

So yes, that was my Christmas Day. It was really fun and I'm glad I stayed in Russia for it, because I suppose I'll remember it forever as my first Russian Christmas :)

Between Christmas and New Year I did precisely nothing. A few days were spent feeling very full and not really needing to eat anything, then a few days were spent sitting around watching films and playing computer games, and then it was New Year's Eve already. Russians go absolutely nuts for New Year's Eve - they have a tree, give presents, eat loads of food and have Дед Мороз (Grandfather Frost - their version of Father Christmas). It's very similar to English Christmas only on a different day.

We all celebrated New Year's Eve with a party at our friend Nick's house. I think at one point we'd intended to go out to a bar afterwards, but in the end we couldn't really be bothered. We had lots of drinks, tasty food (cooked by Nick's girlfriend, who is from Kyrgyzstan) and several games of Uno - a pleasant evening was had. Here are some pictures from NYE:

(Top Left: Remnants of home-made Russian salad; Top Right: Medvedev's televised New Year speech - kind of like the Queen's speech at home; Bottom: Me and Pippa shortly after Midnight)

Like the few days after Christmas, I didn't do a lot following New Year's Eve. I got invited into my landlady's flat several times to help eat all of the leftovers from their celebrations, including several salads which oddly all seemed to contain lethal amounts of garlic... I only ventured out of the house again on Tuesday, when me and Pippa went for a nice (albeit chilly) walk around the city. I'll end this HUGE post with a few pictures from said walk:

(Top Left: Church of Our Savior on Spilled Blood; Top Right: Frozen Neva; Bottom: View of the Hermitage across the frozen Neva)

I'd like to say congratulations to anyone who managed to reach the bottom of this post without falling asleep, I think it must be my record longest post... Oh well, I've got it all out of the way now! I'm going to try and update at least once a week now, to make my posts a bit shorter and more concise :P

Once again, Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to everyone!

Naomi

Pre-Christmas epic post...

Hello! I've been so lazy recently, and I figured I may as well make the New Year's resolution to write in my blog more, so here goes. Firstly I plan to update you all on everything that happened in the run up to Christmas, in this post. Then I intend to write another epic post all about Christmas Day and everything that's followed it...

MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE! if I haven't already said it to you. It's a bit late now but hey, better late than never.

I feel I should mention now that Russians don't celebrate Christmas as we do. They do have a Christmas, but it's on January 6th/7th rather than December 25th. That said, nobody actually celebrates that Christmas apart from very religious people, so their main celebration is New Year. Because of this, we had to invent our own Christmas from scratch for the 25th :D

The run up to Christmas was mainly filled with school. Less and less people started coming in the nearer it got to the holidays, but it wasn't too bad. A few lessons were filled with the watching of lovely Russian films, so I was never particularly bored. One of the films we got to watch was Ирония Судьбы - Продолжение (The Irony of Fate 2) which was actually lovely, and sort of like the Russian version of Love Actually or something. A lot of Russians hate it because it pretty much bastardises the original from the 70s, which is a Russian New Year classic - they show it on several channels at once on New Year's Eve here. Anyway, I thoroughly recommend the sequel, though maybe watch the first one beforehand if you can, as it's great in its own way. A week before the end of term, we all had to take tests to check we'd actually learnt something. They weren't too bad, and I'm happy with how I did, though I've only got the marks back for 2/5 tests so far, so it could all go wrong still...

Also at school, we had a Christmas party. It was proper primary school-style, with each class having to dress up and give a performance. It was really fun, and my class performed a song we wrote to the tune of '12 Days of Christmas', only we changed it to '12 Days of Russia' and included lots of different things we've experienced in Russia. It was lovely to see what the other classes had done, which included a modern version of the Nativity, acting out the teachers getting drunk, and performing a cartoon all the classes had watched as a play. Everyone did amazingly well, and it was especially nice to get everyone together since some people aren't coming back next term :(

I didn't do a huge amount of sightseeing between my last post and Christmas. I'm mainly holding back on sightseeing because my mum and her boyfriend are arriving at the end of next week so I'll go to lots of places with them. One thing I did do though was go to an awesome exhibition of digital art (Yota Space Festival) at an abandoned department store, with my friend Flick. The department store was pretty much in the middle of nowhere, which we discovered when we tried to get lunch nearby beforehand... After 10 minutes or so of wandering aimlessly in very strong, very cold winds, we finally found a Чайная Ложка (Tea Spoon - a Russian pancake chain) and settled down for lunch. It was really SO cold that day, I think it must be the coldest I've felt since I got here! Despite this, we braved the outside once again and walked to the department store. What greeted us was a wondrous world of trippy art installations in pitch black rooms, accompanied with good music and (unfortunately) hordes of Russians. We had a nice time wandering round, and also watched a lecture by an English DJ cum artist called Matt Black (nope, we'd never heard of him either). The lecture was a little long and not particularly interesting, but it was fun and probably useful to listen to him speak in English followed by a direct Russian translation of what he said. The exhibition was only temporary, so I'm really glad I went, as it really was an awesome experience.

Here are some photos I took there - please bear in mind my camera seems to hate taking photos in the dark:

(Top: Mesmerising light sticks which changed colour, moved and made noises as you walked near them; Middle: Gorgeous red-lit staircase; Bottom: Lecture by Matt Black - there were several different lectures each day)

The only other really notable thing I can remember from before Christmas was the super Christmas Market on Nevsky. It was really cool wandering round the stalls and browsing Christmassy/New Yeary things, souvenirs, presents, hats and plenty more. Here are some pictures from the market, because I don't really know what else to say about it other than the fact it was totally cute and really got me in the mood for Christmas:

(Top Left: Christmas Market; Top Right: Cute teddy made of lights at the Christmas Market; Bottom: Me in my new hat I got at the Christmas Market - Not real fur!)

I think I'll end this post here, and start on the next epic - Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and everything since!

Naomi :)

Apologies...

I'd just like to apologise for my laziness with my blog lately. I am still alive and well, and intend to update it again as soon as I can be bothered. Argh!

Oops, I haven't updated this in yonks...

Oh god! I did it again... Weeks without updating. I do it every time I post, and every time I do it I say I'll update more often in future. Oops.

Firstly, I have exciting news - I have a job! Yes, a Russian job! How exciting. Well, not that exciting, it's only teaching English, but it should be fun. My first class is on Monday at the biggest beer brewery in the whole of Russia, Baltika. The brand is owned by Carlsberg and pretty much has a monopoly on beer sales here, so it's pretty cool - shame I don't like beer though! I wasn't planning on getting a job here, but then I thought about how much time I waste doing nothing, and it'd be nice to have some extra cash, so I thought I may as well use my time a bit more productively. It's good money as well... We'll see how it goes.

I also went to the Hermitage again since my last update. It was nice to see some of the things I didn't see the last time I visited, such as Mattisse's 'Danse', 'Madonna Litta' by Leonardo da Vinci, and the stunning moving peacock clock made out of gold. I'm sure it won't be my last trip there, as there is still so much to see (and it's free!)... I think this is the only cultural thing I've done in the last few weeks, which is a little embarrassing, though I do still have plenty of time for sightseeing, especially when my parents come and visit! My mum has actually booked her trip here, she arrives on the 16th of January with her boyfriend - I'm so excited! It'll be so cool to show my mum the city I absolutely adore, and I'm also looking forward to English treats brought from home :D

I'm racking my brains trying to think of all the stuff I've done since my last update... This is the main reason I need to update more - my memory is terrible. It feels like I've mainly been shopping, basically. An amazing new shopping centre has opened 15 minutes walk from my house. It took 3 years to build and opened a couple of weeks ago, so the locals seem fairly excited about it and I'm quite happy to get in on the fun too. It's absolutely massive and has tons of new shops, including a few more English ones - yay! I've been three times already, oops.

I've had a few nights out recently, as well, though none were particularly crazy... Which is probably for the best! I really do enjoy Russian bars and clubs, even if they are a little smoky. Today I tried my first glass of 'fruity beer', and it was rather delicious. I really dislike beer usually, but the fruit quite overpowers the taste of the beer. I tried the cherry and apple ones today, but intend to try the rest of the wide range of flavours available...

I suppose the only other notable thing I need to mention is that the weather has changed dramatically since my last post... Nowadays, -16 is a normal daytime temperature. Anything above this is a great bonus! So anyone in England moaning about the cold, please feel for me before you do so. The snow here is great fun, though I might not be saying that anymore if I slip over, something I'm really scared of doing. It's so dry and flaky, it feels fake! Then again, I've never really been out in proper snow - Plymouth always seems to miss out - maybe this is what it's always like!

This has actually proved to be a much shorter post than I was expecting it to be... Perhaps it's because I'm tired and want to go to bed, or perhaps it's because I have a terrible memory and can't actually think of anything else to talk about, I don't know! I'm sure I'll think of something I've missed - I really feel like I've done more than the above in the last few weeks... Anyway, I'll end with some pictures of the snow I've taken around the city :)

(Left: An avenue of trees in Park Pobedy; Right: A ferris wheel I thought looked cool at Park Pobedy)

(Me in Park Pobedy - that's a frozen lake behind me!)

 

(An example of the epically big icicles one can find here... People get killed by them every year apparently)

Okay, that's all! Naomi :) 

Только в России...

So... Time to update the blog! I have a fair amount to talk about since my last update, so I hope you're sitting comfortably :P Just so you - my loyal readers - know, the title means 'only in Russia', a phrase I'm finding myself saying with increasing frequency...

Firstly, we went to our landlady (Roza)'s dacha. All Russians have some interesting obsession with living in the countryside, but also like the convenience of the city. This means almost every middle-aged person has both a city flat and a dacha, which they often build themselves from scratch or in kit form. I first discovered this strange country house phenomenon last year when I was in Russia and visited a dacha, which was extremely confusing since my knowledge of Russian was limited at best. I'm not sure if it's just a Russian tradition or what, perhaps other countries also partake in the two-houses-no-matter-how-poor-you-are craze. I dread to think how much petrol is used by Russians just going to their dachas (usually done several times a week, and they can be up to an hour or so from the city), but I expect it's a lot. This is Russia, though, and they seem to still believe their resources are limitless. Roza's dacha has been built from scratch by her husband, Vanya, who is a bit of a Jack of all trades... It has so far taken them ten years, and it seems likely at this rate that they'll still be adding to it in another ten years. It's definitely still a 'work in progress', and they actually live in a small wagon when they're there. I admire their determination in building their dream house, but it does seem a little excessive.

So we left for the dacha on Wednesday morning, after Roza had told us the traffic would be better during the week so skiving school was a good plan. A 40-minute-ish drive later and we arrived at their 'village'... The first thing that struck me (and Maddy, too) was how strange all the houses looked. They really looked like they'd popped straight out of the computer game 'The Sims' - all very strange designs, many covered in plastic fascias as though they were bought flat-pack in Ikea or something. I loved it, and decided I'd enjoy building the life-size plastic wendyhouse of my dreams if I had the chance. After stopping off at the local supermarket to buy some privisions, including a big yummy cake, Roza drove us to her house. It was in a great location, right near the coast with a nice view of the Gulf of Finland (though it was extremely misty on the day so we couldn't see very far), and I was impressed :) We sat and had tea and cake in the wagon, along with Roza's pet terrapin, who I inadvertently scared with my camera flash, before looking around the half-built dacha then going for a walk around the village. Roza is extremely similar to me in a couple of ways. The first way is our shared love of shopping (she calls me шопаголик 2 - shopaholic 2, her being number one), and the second is the fact we're both rather nosy. Wandering round the village examining everyone's houses was lovely, and Roza's commentary was entertaining - "This is a very old house - take a picture!", "A very rich old lady lives here, all on her own!", "Look at this stream, this is where the poo goes into the sea... The Finnish people don't like it," were some typical examples.

A good time was had by all, and we headed back to the city in the afternoon after a nice day of fresh air in the country. Here are some pictures to accompany my dacha story:

(Top Left: Roza's dacha; Top Right: The quality toilet facilities on offer at said dacha; Bottom: A very misty view out to the Gulf of Finland.)

The next notable event of recent days was going out on Friday night. Everyone decided to go on a huge school night out to Club Griboedov, which was handy as I can see it from my bedroom window, it's extraordinarily close, though before Friday I'd never actually been there. We started with drinks in Fidel, where I had a couple of 'cocktail Natasha's, my usual drink in Fidel. I'm not 100% sure what's in them, but they definitely contain a lot of vodka and some grenadine, and they're pretty tasty. We met a couple of German tourists in the bar and chatted to them, and they joined us for the evening. They were pretty fun guys, and had just arrived in Petersburg for the first time ever that day, so we were keen to show them a good time. We moved on to Barbara for one drink, then ran for the last metro to the club. We literally did run, by the way, which was hilarious and embarrassing, but we made it on to the last train of the night with 4 minutes to spare. The club wasn't bad, it's housed in a nuclear bomb shelter which is underground, but has an upstairs terrace and glass-walled bar. It was actually the coolest place I've been to since I got here, though it was a little pricey. I treated myself to a 'white Russian' cocktail even though it was a bit expensive, as it was the first time I'd actually seen one for sale in Russia, and it's my favourite cocktail back home... I had a good night all in all, and there were many drunken foreigners knocking about the club, so much so that I can't even remember overhearing any conversations in Russian - only English. I was yet again hungover on Saturday, even though I've quit the horrible pikey cocktails-in-cans, opting for the more traditional drink of vodka. My body couldn't even handle that! I am a rubbish drinker.

I didn't do a lot over the weekend, only a big shop in Auchan (still my favourite supermarket) and watched a few films. I watched 'Stalker', a Russian classic by Andrei Tarkovsky, though I think it needs another watch as it made little to no sense. Then again, I think that was supposed to be the point. Hmm. Yesterday I went to Mega (huge shopping mall) once again, with my friends Pippa and George, though managed to refrain from buying anything. I do need to go back later in the week to buy myself some new jeans, though, as my current pairs are getting very worn out. Bah. We found something extremely cool at Mega - a huge матрёшка (Russian doll) made of Lego, and here is a picture of me next to it:

Anyway, I apologise as always for the lengthy blog post... I don't even know who reads this anymore! It's sort of like a diary, though, it'll be nice to read over it again myself when I've forgotten bits of my year abroad! 

Naomi :)

"This is Russia, not Indonesia!"

So, not a huge amount has happened since my last post... Reading week went well, I had a nice week of rest and recuperation speckled with entertaining moments.

On Wednesday me and Pippa decided to go for a walk around the islands of Petersburg, covering two, Vasilevsky and Petrogradsky. Vasilevsky is where Pippa lives and is quite pretty, and Petrogradsky is where Zenit (one of Petersburg's main football teams) plays their matches. Petrogradsky was actually very posh and had some beautiful buildings and very expensive shops. Here are a couple of snaps from our jaunt:

(Top left: FC Zenit stadium; Top right: A pretty building on Petrograsky Island; Bottom: An entertaining sign in a fast food restaurant, listing mainly N. American cities in Cyrillic.)

On Friday, my friends George and Seb hosted a party, which was pleasant. We had two visiting guests, Tom (from Manchester) and Adam (from my uni but studying in Moscow), so it was nice catching up with them. The party moved on to our friend Nick's flat, which is 2 minutes from my flat, via a lovely Russian gypsy cab... This trip was eventful as at one point the poor driver, who appeared to speak no English, actually got out to check his tyres for punctures. Four drunken English students + one poor conked out Lada's back seat = recipe for disaster. Luckily, we all got to Nick's flat alive, though a few card games later I was starting to feel pretty tired and went home. It was a nice night, though I wasn't quite drunk enough to deserve the hellish hangover I received on Saturday :( I've resolved to quit drinking (yes, in Russia!) for the time being... Or maybe I should just quit the cheapy 9% 'cocktails' made up of unknown alcohols I insist on drinking, and stick to the more traditional beverages. We'll see.

On Sunday, me and Pippa decided to check out this flea market Pippa had read about on the internet. It was quite far from the centre in an area neither of us had previously visited, so we were a little worried about what we'd find there. The website Pippa had found directions from appeared to be from the age of dial up, so we were dubious as to whether the market even existed anymore... Luckily, it did, and our Удельная adventure began! It was basically one huge car boot sale, only with no cars, just tarpaulins laid on the ground... Cue a few hours of browsing amongst the market, which stretched as far as the eye could see in a field that made Glastonbury look well kept. Me and Pippa were pleasantly surprised at how friendly all the salesmen and women were, even when they realised we were foreign. It felt like we'd left the ever-xenophobic Russia far behind! We were brought back down to earth when we saw the sheer amount of scary 'military goods' on sale, such as knives, bullets, rusty army helmets - some with bullet holes - and grenades (no such thing as Health & Safety here!). All in all it was a great trip, even though all I bought was a pair of socks, and was a chance to speak to some lovely people... I intend to buy more next time, as we've decided to visit as often as possible, hopefully every weekend :)

I would have added some pictures of the flea market to this post, but I didn't actually take any. I was a bit scared that taking pictures of people's items might have seemed a little rude... I'll take some distance shots next time we go and upload them so you get more of an idea of what the market's like!

The aforementioned market seemed even better after we visited the tourist market near Nevsky Prospect later that same day... It was a stark contrast, as most people at the tourist market spoke English to us and were really on the hard sell. I didn't like it at all! Though it seems to be one of the better places to go to buy souvenirs, and I think if they'd realised we spoke some Russian the prices may have reduced quite drastically. Oh well, I don't need to buy any souvenirs for at least another 6 months, so I'll worry about it nearer to the time! Oh and the quote which forms the title of this post is some market stall owner's reponse when we questioned the extortionate prices of his watches...

Anyway, this is a rather long blog post considering I said I didn't have much to talk about, so I'll end it here! Also, I'm supposed to be going to my landlady's dacha (country house) on Wednesday, so hopefully I'll have lots of fun to report and nice pictures to share from there! Here are a couple more pictures from the last few days:

(Left: Amazingly named English pub near my house; Right: These snowflakes were big enough to be picked up by my camera! Winter's a-coming!)

Naomi :)