A midnight train

We left St. Petersburg last night. I felt like I could have stayed there much much longer. There's a really amazing vibe in the city. I loved it.

Amanda and I walked around the city for 5 hours on Wednesday, taking photos, taking it all in, getting lost in the side streets and alleys. The weather was finally gorgeous. We also took a boat tour that left at 12:30 a.m. That's right folks, it's White Nights here which means the sun "sets" around 2 a.m. and comes up again around 3:30 a.m., but, quite frankly, it never gets completely dark - it resembles a cool dawn. It was great wandering through the city's many canals heading to the Neva River. All of the bridges rise during the evening to let large cargo ships pass through the river, but this is a huge event here - hundreds of boats swarm the river, thousands of spectators line the sidewalks. Each boat blares music, some people dance, some people drink, some boats shoot off fireworks when each bridge opens up. It was really a beautiful last night in St. Petersburg.

Yesterday (Thursday) the three of us woke up and took long showers - knowing that we would not have access to showers again until... we're hoping late Sunday when we arrive in Siberia. Amanda and I wandered around until we found Dostoevsky's apartment and little museum. The museum wasn't great - mostly because it was just pictures on the walls, with little to no English explanations about the significance. There were, however, original copies of Crime and Punishment and the Brothers K. In fact, there were... sketches of each manuscript with little drawings of characters and settings. Very, very cool.

We accidently ran into an English tour of Dostoevsky's last apartment. It was really, really cool. I don't typically like those cheese-ball guided tours, but I learned so much about him, his relationship to his wife and kids, the significance of various sites in St. Petersburg which coorespond with his novels. It was really cool. It was also really inspiring to be in his study - to learn how he only wrote at night from 11 pm - 5 am, and he only wrote by candlelight. I'm sure that atmosphere contributed to how dark his novels were.

We met up with Ben for our last meal before jumping on an overnight train to Moscow. We assumed that the tickets we bought were all in the same compartment - not the case. So Ben shared a four-person sleeper car with a nice family from Tomsk (where we're headed). Amanda and had the top bunks with two older Russian guys who spoke no English, but offered us Whickey. We declined.

We did, however, inquire about the bar car. I was disappointed in the selection (beer, soda - neither of which I can drink) and vodka. Hmmmm. No mixers. Sounds interesting.

A young guy from Moscow helped us translate that we wanted some orange juice - but we soon found that wasn't available. We (well, I, Amanda said no way) decided could handle Vodka the traditional Russian way. Straight up. This quick jaunt to the bar car to connect with Ben turned into a four-hour crazy evening meeting lots of interesting people from Russia and the Ukraine. And oh my, it involved vodka. Now I have not drank much since January. I went shot for shot with Gleb - a guy who insisted on telling me and Amanda his life history, as well as many, many cultural differences between Russia and America. (You can get married at 14. Women choose at age 16 or 17 if they want to get married or "give into life of sex" and if a woman chooses to go to University, it's very unlikely that she will ever get married because "she will not be able to fix her face and be beautiful enough to attract a man...). Fascinating.

But the night included many, many toasts, some singing, more toasts and a really difficult time climbing up to my bunk bed at 3 a.m.

The train arrived in Moscow at 6 a.m. this morning. Needless to say, the three of us are dragging. We have to wait until 1:30 pm to get on our next train. I don't think there is enough coffee in the world to keep me awake until then. (That, of course, is the reason this blog is a little on the ranty side).

Anyway, we get on the this train (tickets that took Amanda and I 3 days at various train stations, several arguments with crazy Russian woman - I got elbowed in the ribs - Amanda got into a verbal argument with some zit-faced Britney Spears wanna be - and multiple translators - including a really tall Russian kid with a great mullet and a Superstar belt who told off a group of ladies who were yelling at us in Russian. We don't speak Russian, but Amanda and I are quite sure he told them to shut the hell up). But we're on our way to Siberia. Like I said, we leave at 1:30pm this afternoon (6/29) and we arrive in Novobrowick at 9 pm on July 1st. We're then planning on taking at 3 and 1/2 hour cab ride north to a little University city of Tomsk. I'm excited. Actually, I just want to get on the train so I can sleep for a few hours.

This internet cafe doesn't have any photo programs installed, so I'm just going to share some of my last days in St. Petersburg photos with you when I get to Tomsk.

What a saintly city...

We took an 8 hour train to St. Petersburg. We saw what I think will be the beginning of many great patches of trees, little shanty farms and tiny villages along the way.



So we left Moscow.







We got some great reading done (well I did. Ben read some smut) :)

Ben in the train:



And arrived in St. Petersburg. Amanda and I went out and explored the town and we certainly liked what we saw:







I love St. Petersburg. I mean, really I can't say enough good stuff about this city. It's is artsy, it is fartsy, it is beautiful and organic. AND it's been pretty cloudy and overcast since we arrived - so that's saying a lot. It's the White Nights festival here in town which means the lights don't go out in the city until wee hours of the morning. Although the bars are open until 6 am, that's not what I'm referring to. The sun doesn't set here... well, it gets a little dark around 2 am, but the sun rises about 3 am. So my clock is totally off.

BUT I LOVE IT HERE. I think I spend some serious time here and after Moscow, I was about to cross Russia off my list of places to return to someday. There are so many highlights from this city,

This church: The Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood:





This coffeeshop:






And this nutty, INSANE artist whom Amanda and I talked to for HOURS yesterday in the rain. He loves Led Zepplein, thinking about perspective, and cheap vodka. He was a beautiful soul and a trip highlight. So Valentine, our crazy artist friend:



>


Crazy.

We decided to cancel our flight to Perm and stick around St. Petersburg an extra day or two and then jump on the Tran Siberian in a couple days.

My time at this internet cafe is through.

Moscow's Mullets, Models and Materialism

Ok, I'm a writer. This is a word I've learned to use to describe myself. I'm also a traveler. This is a word I've used to describe myself. Although I have been a very good traveler over the past couple of weeks - I certainly have not been a very good writer. I think there is the pressure of having to write well. On my previous trips, I never worried about the writing process - I just told witty little anecdotes from the road about my adventures, and that was good. In addition, I meant to start a blog - both people I'm traveling with have blogs and they've been much better about keeping them updated. Excuse #3 - I usually travel alone, so I have a lot of time to be reflective and hide in an internet cafe for several hours every couple of days to keep in touch. However, I'm traveling with two great people and I certainly have not made it a priority to stop touring, traveling, exploring, etc. and hide myself in a cafe for awhile. Excuse #4 - internet access has not been quick or convenient thus far.



So I'm done with the excuses.


I had a different update with some photos of England, Germany and a couple of Moscow photos.

England was wonderful. It was so great being back in my little home - London was the first major destination I traveled to - it was also the first place I really learned what a strong and powerful woman I could be. I love London. I love how I feel in London.

I was also able to spend a few nights in Oxford and Ashford with some really great friends. I had not been to England in several years, and it was great how so many things just so natural, so comfortable after 2 and 1/2 years. But at the same tim, it was great how some things have grown up, changed, blossomed.

I found a cheap flight to Bremen, Germany and took a train to Hamburg. I love Germany, I always have. They people are friendly and fat. Hamburg was no exception. Hamburg is a lot like Amsterdam and other port cities, with some beuatiful areas and some really shaddy red-light district areas as well.

I met up with Ben and Amanda in Moscow about a week ago. Ben and i got suckered into this crap apartment and worked with this jerk people. Never, ever use Moscow Rick (recommended in Lonely Planet - don't do it. Just Don't.) Anyway, the weather in Moscow was perfect. Gorgeous blus skies with puffy, plastic clouds nearly all 5 days we were there. However, the rest of the city... I don't even know how to describe it - mullets, models and materialism seem to be the best adjectives at the moment. There is such a strange vibe about that city. I was afraid that that was the same vibe in all Russian cities, but it's not the case.

There is a weird 1980's - neon blinking lights - PACMAN script, leggings and mulets vomited all over the streets. I have no idea why. Amanda and I went on mullet patrol more than once. We have so many great shots of "I can't believe that's in style" sort of photos. So Moscow was a lot of people watching - which we really enjoyed. But it's unfortunate that communicating with other people wasn't even a possibility. It fascinated me over and over again that no one spoke English - everything was written in cyrillic. I am not arrogant and think that everyone on the planet needs to speak English, I was just really, really surprised, over and over again that Metro maps and menus were only written in cyrillic. I have traveled through India, Indonesia, Greece, Cambodia, etc. and I have never had a problem communicating with people. I'm good at the gestures, the sign language and the mucked up words and phrases and multiple languges in order to get by. But no one spoke anything close to English in Russia. So it took me almost 2 days to find where I could by a map (even when i pointed at someone else's map, the sales clerk just rolled her eyes at me and gave me the universal "I don't understand" twisting of the head.)

But what I think was even more fascinating about Moscow is the models and materialism that roamed the street. There was some kind of study that was released last week stating that Moscow is the most expensive city in the world. It was expensive, but I couldn't believe the greed everywhere. I have never seen so many nice cars, fancy shops, nd trendy cafes - all filled with "beautiful" plastic-looking people. There are so many model-types roaming th roads, I almost felt ugly for a couple of days. Almost. Then I really started looking. So many of those "beautiful women" were so done up and plasticy it was an eye sore. I wondered if it had much to do with this new found capitalism, and the people behaving like rebellous teenagers - most women dressed like hookers, and had mannerism similar to many drag queens I've known over the years. They didn't know how to be women. I wondered about the role models that these women had. It's obviously a very patriarchal society. Women need to use their bodies in order to attract a man. The difference between the under 30 and over 30 crowd was very obvious as well. most of the older women were... lets just say a fellow chunky sister.

Anyway, Moscow was not my favorite. I have lots to say about scary police, the AMAZING Red Square, the Kremlin, the circus I went to, and so so many theories and observations I picked up along the way, but I'm going to stop with this image and move on with the trip. This is a picture of me dancing in the field next to an old Russian church, which is next to a very soviet looking building. Oh how Moscow made me want to dance...

Oxford - London -Hamburg - Moscow