From Masha With Love..... 0 Preparation.... 27-NOV-2007 21:58:00 ONLY 3 DAYS TO GO! I'm pretty excited right now, except for the fact that I still haven't finished packing and I'm not sure I can actually FIT everything I need in my backpack....Oh, well! This is where I'll be posting photos and information about my trip, so please drop me a line and hopefully I'll keep the journal updated. Thanks guys! Da svedanya, Meg 0 South Korea's Got Seoul! 02-DEC-2007 10:52:00 Hi, everyone! Well, Zoe and I have made it this far - hooray! We stayed overnight at the Hyatt in Seoul, and it is AMAZING! Very, very nice...last night we had an amazing meal which included the local delicay, kimchi. Mmmm, delicious cabbage in fish sauce and chilli! We leave for Russia tonight, so as you can imagine, we are very excited! The next entry may well be from Moscow airport, where we will be staying overnight, and trying not to get mugged. We'll keep you posted! Love, Meg 0 Well, we're here..... 04-DEC-2007 17:05:00 We made it! I'm in an internet cafe on Nevsky Prospect as we speak, inhaling the sweet cigarette smoke of a 10-year-old boy......so yes, I am definitely in Russia! It was a fairly crazy couple of days, and the crazy times started at the airport, catching our flight from Seoul. We were waiting in line to check in, and this little old Russian lady - a true babyshka - came up to us as asked us in Russian if we were on her flight. We said yes, and then she went off in this torrent of Russian, trying to get us to take on one of her bags. It was crazy. Turned out that she had already checked in 30kg, and she had two bags of hand luggage weighing about 20kg - and she was travelling with two friends who had the exact same problem! No-one was letting them through with so much stuff, so they were going around asking everyone if they were going to Moscow, but no-one else seemed to speak any Russia. We only had a little more weight ourselves, but the babushki thrust these bags of stuff upon us....they had been shopping in Korea, buying cheap materials to sell back home in Russia. Eventually they all got through, which was pretty exciting.... Then, when we got on the plane, these Russian guys were sitting behind us and drinking heavily from a bottle of cognac.....which they eventually passed over to us! They were trying to speak to us in English, and they were really nice, but we kept getting in trouble from the flight attendants for being too loud. It was a really fun flight though, and we arrived in Moscow in a great mood.....which changed very quickly as soon as we got to immigration, or 'passport control'. Now I really understand why everyone talks about the queues here.....we were waiting for two hours to get through, and there were so many people, it was crazy. Then when we went to get our bags, this man started yelling at us - all I could understand from what he was saying was 'faster, faster'......so we got out of there so fast that we completely missed customs. I really hope that doesn't have serious consequences when we leave! The next hurdle was our domestic flight. We had already booked the tickets online, we just needed to get them from an Aeroflot office, which was ok. Then we managed to find the free shuttle bus to the domestic airport, then we settled in for a LONG night of waiting around - we arrived at Terminal 1 at about 11:30pm, and our flight didn't leave until 8:15am the next day. We slept in shifts for a couple of hours, then we met this nice guy, Sergei, who came and chatted to us, and showed us pictures of his family. He was really nice, even though he said we definitely didn't look Russian because of the way we sat and dressed - eg. badly. Ouch! There was meant to be someone waiting for us at the airport from the university, but they had forgotten when we were coming or something, so we took a taxi to the dormitory we were meant to be staying in. No sooner had we arrived, then we were unceremoniously kicked out to a different dorm - it's pretty nice there, although we do get locked in of a night, and we can't stay out later than 1am. Although, I'm sure we can find a way.......Our room is pretty nice, we have our own bathroom and TV, and it's just the two of us. We have a kitchen too, except it takes about half an hour to boil enough water for two cups of tea, and we don't have any kitchen implements. We wandered around for ages yesterday afternoon, and finally found a pan.....Hooray! So now we can toast bread in the pan, boil water in the pan, and make many other exciting creations! Today, we had to go to the university and take the test to find out which classes we were in. There was a free bus running from outside our dorm, but we didn't know where it left, so we missed it. Then we tried asking some people, and got hopelessly lost - we took 2 buses, both of which were wrong. Then it started snowing! We were getting pretty distressed, so we went back to the dorm to ask for more directions....as a consequence, I think that the lady who works there thinks we are the stupidest girls to ever come to Russia (a sentiment which may hold some truth, but still.....) The upside is, now I can truly tell people that I used to have to walk to school, for 10 miles, in the snow...... We made it to uni, sat the test - we're in the 5th class, whatever that means - and attended a class. It was SO HARD! It was a news and current events class, and I found it so difficult.....the teacher was really nice though, so hopefully it will get better as time goes on. There were only 6 poeple in our class, including us, so we'll certainly get plenty of practice. Tomorrow we have about 3 hours of grammar, and as nerdy as it sounds, I'm actually looking forward to it - I can't possibly make more of an idiot of myself than I have today! It's hard - it's really cold, and obviously the language is a factor in the difficulty. But even today is better than yesterday, so hopefully it's all uphill from here......maybe with a few trips or something on the way! Anyway, I've started writing down daily highlights and low points in my journal, here's what I have so far: 2/12 HIGHLIGHT: Seeing the babyshki as they finally got through the baggage check - they were so happy! To get through, they had been wearing the clothes and the material they had packed in their bags........they were each wearing about 6 layers of clothing, it was hilarious! But they were so happy :) LOW POINT Waiting for nearly an hour in one line at 'passport control', then watching them close down the booth that we were waiting for. We had to go to the end of a different line......It was pretty funny, Zoe and I were laughing a lot, but I think we were delirious from exhaustion at that point. 2/12 HIGHLIGHT Asking a shop assistant in a store for a pot, being taken to a child's potty.....I swear she didn't even crack a smile. Yeah, I think we may have used the wrong term there.... LOW POINT All the electricity stopping in our room straight after we got there - it's fixed now, though.......our room is so hot, it's like a tropical island. 4/12 HIGHLIGHT Seeing the beautiful Smolny Campus, where we will be studying.....it's really wonderful! LOW POINT Our first class......it really was very stressful. It can only get better, it can only get better, it can only get better...... Well, I think that's enough from me......Hope everyone is well, and I'll write again soon! Love, Meg and Zoe 0 We are gloopy.... 05-DEC-2007 16:54:00 Hello, again! It's such a short time since I last wrote, I know, but we needed some relaxation after a day filled with Russian grammar class.....it was pretty intense. After the first hour, Zoe and I were so traumatised that we snuck into one of the toilet cubicles and had a little cry.....it's just so hard! I feel like such an idiot. But the second hour was (slightly) better... But we are having heaps of fun. It's so incredible here, it's really beautiful. When we arrived, there was so much snow on the ground, it was so beautiful! All of our pants are filthy because we keep walking in the snow - it's just way too much fun! Today was warmer than it has been, so all the snow has melted now...hopefully, it might snow again tonight (but maybe as soon as we get home, not while we're still walking around.....) We had heaps of fun last night - we went to this crazy vegetarian restaurant in the centre of town, where they make these mad fusions of Indian food with fruit. We had spicy broccoli, potato and orange soup, and this stuffed capsicum dish with kiwi, grape and orange. It was delicious! Then we went and had tea and bliny (pancakes) with honey for dessert! YUM!!! After dinner, we took our first ride on the St Petersburg metro......it was pretty wild! And I know everyone talks about the giant escalators........but they were sooooo freaky long! It's really fun to watch all the people going in the opposite direction (and - if you're as poorly dressed as Zoe or I - watching them give you snooty, unimpressed looks) - what joy! Anyway, I have to get home and do my homework for tomorrow - speaking class! NOOOO.......... Stay well, and I'll write again soon! Love, Meg 0 Have a great weekend! 07-DEC-2007 15:56:00 We made it through a week of classes! HOORAY! Am at school still - thought I'd write one more message before the weekend. Zoe and I changed classes yesterday, and it's so much better now - the work is at a much similar level to what we study at home, and we're feeling much better about everything. To celebrate, we went for dinner at 'Dom Actera' last night - it's a dining hall connected to a theatre, which is apparently very popular with actors and assorted bohemian types. Well, we were there at 4pm (I think we're both slightly jet-lagged still, or just tired from trying to understand Russian all the time, because we're keeping the hours of a pair of pensioners. Dinner at 4pm, bed at 8:30pm.....IT MUST STOP!) so maybe we missed the more fashionable crowd, but the food was AWESOME! And we finally had borsh! Mmm....it was so yummy. The waiter thought we were hilarious as well - I think he was totally impressed with our fabulous Russian....or maybe not! Afterwards, we went for beer and bliny at a cafe, but on the way we stopped to look at the Church on Spilled Blood - it was AMAZING! Really incredible, I couldn't believe that I was actually seeing it. It was just what I needed! Tonight we're going out with a girl we met at school, to some Irish pub in the city, and we're going to try a local vegetarian haunt for dinner first. Exciting! I lost my beanie on a mashrutka today, so I'm feeling a little sad....I was really attached to that beanie! And I was wearing two at once, because it was cold, so now I have no beanie. I might have to buy one tonight, otherwise my ears will freeze and fall off....NOOO!!! If anyone from TAV is reading this, good luck for the Christmas concerts this weekend! Anyone NOT from TAV should go along, it will be fantastic! Have a great weekend guys, and we'll write again soon. Love, Meg 0 Hello, Friends! 10-DEC-2007 15:39:00 Hello again! Well, today has been a pretty good day - 3 hours of grammar class (but we were prepared today - and even got complimented on some of our work! At least, that was my understanding of the situation.....probably my Russian is so bad that I think they're commending me when actually they're laughing at my pitiful mistakes. Alas!) Then we had the craziest teacher for our last class - we've been dreading Listening Comprehension class sooo much, and when we finally went today, our teacher just talked about Pushkin and St Petersburg tourist attractions for an hour, then we watched these random vidoes. Hooray! We had a pretty fun weekend - we went out on Friday night with a girl we met at school, and her boyfriend and flatmate. Her boyfriend is Irish, so we went to this Irish bar in the city, right next to the Mariinsky theatre. It was pretty fun, and we got home pretty late (although our festivities were hampered slightly by the fact that, if we didn't get home before 1am, we'd get locked out and potentially freeze to death), so we slept pretty late on Saturday and had a bit of a lazy day. Then yesterday, we went to a museum about the Siege of Leningrad, which was really interesting, if a little intense for a Sunday afternoon. It really made me wish I had a better knowledge of Russian history, so we might try and search for some books while we're here. Then, as we were planning to catch a bus home, the sun came out! Seriously - the sky was actually blue! It was sooo exciting, all of a sudden people were outside, and looked happy, and were taking photos and stuff. So we decided that we simply couldn't go home and do our study in our room in such beautiful weather, so we celebrated by taking a wander around the centre of town, then going to a coffee shop we've been dying to try since we got here, 'Stolle'. It's written up in both our guide books as having the best pelmeni (pies) in the city, and it really was delicious. They had fantastic coffee as well, so we had a bit of a feast. Then, on the way home, we saw that a nearby shoe shop was having a sale on boots, and we both picked up a pair of fur-lined beauties for about AUS$60 each. They are so warm and comfy - which is great, because our feet are getting cold already, and the weather has actually been pretty warm - it's 4 degrees above today. So now we're prepared for when the winter really starts! It's so beautiful here, and it's so much fun to just watch people going past. All the children look SO CUTE in winter gear - they all wear these padded jumpsuits and bounce around the street like happy little elves. We were crossing the street the other day to get to school, and we saw a whole gaggle of cute little schoolkids crossing the road - they were in a long line, like little ducklings, and they were sooo cute! I want a padded jumpsuit! Well, I guess I better head home soon - we might cook up an exciting dinner of potatoes and garlic! Mmmm....actually, cooking in our room has been going ok. The other day we actually managed to poach some eggs in our tiny pan, and we toasted bread, grilled tomatoes, and had them with fetta cheese and avocado. The only problem is that we have no actual cutlery - we're using Zoe's Swiss Army knife to cut everything, and plastic spoons to eat our delicious concoctions. We only have plastic plates as well, although we did manage to find two proper cups. What luxury! Oh, well.....it still tastes just as good. I think I'll leave it at that today - I hope everyone is well. Zoe was reading the St Petersburg Times, and saw in the International section that the headlines from Australia were about someone stealing a bunch of ham and small goods from a supermarket in Sydney, so I hope everyone's coming to terms with that! Almost as exciting as our blog......almost! We'll write again soon - have fun in the sun! Lots of love, Meg and Zoe 0 Snow! Snow! Snow! 14-DEC-2007 16:08:00 Hello! Well, as you may have guessed from my exciting title, it snowed again! Hooray! I really, really love the snow. It makes everything look so beautiful, especially the snow on the trees! Every morning we've been hoping to wake up and find snow, so it was pretty exciting to see it again on Thursday morning. In other exciting news, we cooked a tasty meal last night! To fully appreciate this, I think you all need some background information about our room. We have a kitchen, with two hotplates, a sink and a fridge. But only one of the hotplates works, we only have one frying pan and it's kind of hard to find things that can be opened without a can opener.....which we haven't been able to find yet, so we have all these unopened cans sitting sadly on a shelf in out room. Nooo! So far we've just been toasting bread in the pan, maybe boiling some potatoes....the other day we were able to poach eggs, which was definitely a highlight! But last night was a true masterpiece - boiled potatoes, canned corn and kidney beans and these crazy tinned tomatoes with dill. It was pretty delicious, let me tell you...... Well, on a slightly less exciting note, we saw Swan Lake at the Mariinsky on Wednesday night! It was so wonderful....it was a bit of an adventure, because when we went to buy tickets, the lady at the ticket booth sold us 'Russian' priced tickets (they're significantly cheaper) and told us just not to talk when we got to the theatre. I think she felt sorry for us......but it was pretty exciting, because we got a bit of a bargain! So, we dressed up (as much as we could, anyway), and set off in style to the Mariinsky. It was a beautiful night - the theatre itself is incredible, and the ballet was wonderful. We had such a nice night! Everything else is going pretty well. We made some Russian friends the other night, at a bar in the city - we happened to go on 'English Conversation Night', so everyone was pretty keen for a chat. A litre and a half of Baltika later, and we had a couple of new Russian friends, one of whom we're going to go to the Russian Museum with tomorrow. Actually, this guy we met - Igor - is really interesting. He's an artist, and he's learning English to travel to the States to do an exhibition there next year. He was telling us about how he participated in the riots against Putin in May, and he was beaten so badly that he has all this trouble with his shoulders now. It's pretty crazy.... it was good that he wanted to talk to us about politics though, we're trying to be pretty careful with our opinions about Putin and the government and everything, so when people are willing to discuss it with us it's really interesting to hear their opinions. Another guy we met that night, Sasha, was telling us that he supported Putin, so it was really good to hear the different points of view. So that was pretty exciting..... Speaking of opinions, we had a couple of interesting conversation classes at school this week, as well. We have a couple of English girls in our group, two girls from Japan, a German girl, and a guy and a girl from China. The topic of conversation this week was terrorism, and it continued onto whether or not there should be a death penalty for terrorists. The argument got fairly heated - as it was bound to, I'm sure - but the good thing was, because it's so hard to really express your opinion when you're not proficient in the language, I think it really helps you define your argument down to the bare essentials, and it's certainly good practice when everyone has a different opinion. I'm really glad that we're not in a class where everyone speaks English - it's really hard to try to express what you're trying to say, but I think we're both improving a lot in our understanding of Russian as well. Just from observing Zoe, I think the improvement of her Russian is amazing - she has already learnt heaps of stuff, and her speaking is improving every day. It's really exciting! Anyway, I should get going - off to dinner! Have a great weekend everyone, and we'll write again soon! Love, Meg and Zoe 0 Another Monday.... 17-DEC-2007 15:47:00 Hi, again! Well, this is the beginning of our last week at school before holidays begin next week....we're pretty excited about it! It's really strange - in heaps of ways it feels like we've been here much longer than two weeks, but it also feels like we've just arrived (if that makes any sense!). We're having so much fun, but I know at times I do feel really overwhelmed - mainly by the language, I think. And soon it's going to start getting really, really, REALLY cold - we've been pretty lucky with the weather so far, but I sense a cold change in the air. Bring on winter, I say! We had a fun weekend - on Friday night we tried a kind-of famous restaurant in the city, The Idiot, which is apparently popular with expats (I think it's due to the 2-for-1 beers at happy hour, or maybe the complimentary vodka shots on arrival......), and it was really delicious and fun. On Saturday we went to an exhibition at the Marble Palace, which is part of the Russian Museum. It was incredible - one whole floor of the museum was dedicated to sketches of costumes and sets, etc. for plays shown in St Petersburg. It was AMAZING! The detail of the propsed designs for the plays were so detailed, we thought it would have been impossible for the sets to be so intricate......but there were photographs of the actual performances as well, and they looked even more incredible than the designs! We were so excited, we decided that we were definitely going to a play sometime this week - and yesterday, we were able to get some tickets for tonight! So we're going to see Gogol's 'Marriage'......entirely in Russian, of course, so I'm reading an English synopsis right now so that I can try to understand at least part of the story! Then on Saturday night, we were invited to a party at the other student residence which hosts pupils from Smolny campus, which was pretty exciting. By the time we got there, the vodka was well and truly flowing, and you will all be pleased to know that both Zoe and I were able to drink it without being physically ill just from the smell. Hooray! Maybe we really are becoming Russian...... Apart from the play, we also have big plans for our free day on Wednesday - ice-skating, and then the Hermitage! How exciting! The whole city looks pretty exciting at the moment actually, all the New Year decorations have started to go up, and the whole city is covered with these incredibly tacky coloured lights. Even our school at Smolny has started to get into the New Year spirit, so we're really looking forward to the actual event. That's all from us right now - hope you're all well and happy! Love, Meg and Zoe 0 Where is the sneg of yesteryear?!? 21-DEC-2007 15:58:00 Well, I have a little bit of an issue with St Petersburg today.....where is the snow? It's nearly Christmas (well, Australian Christmas, anyway...) and it looks more and more likely that it won't be snowing! NOOOO!!!! So we're both keeping our fingers crossed that the weather will get drastically worse before Tuesday..... Apart from that, it has in general been a pretty eventful week! We had tickets to a play on Monday night, but - despite setting out 45 minutes early in order to find the venue - we couldn't find it, and ended up wandering the main street of St Petersburg for over 2 hours. We asked SEVERAL people if they knew where the theatre was, and in nearly all cases we received the extremely helpful answer of 'no'. Sigh. We still don't know where the theatre is actually, it's my personal belief that it doesn't exist. Maybe the play was supposed to be the existential drama of our souls in St Petersburg.......? But we made up for missing the play on Monday night by going to the opera last night. We saw 'Iolanta', a Tchaikovsky opera, at the Rimsky-Korsakov Conservatorium, where Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev and Shostakovich all studied. How exciting! It was a really nice theatre as well, and there were all these cool sculptues of composers who had studied there (all of whom, incidentally, looked very serious - not like the students of today, I can assure you!) The opera itself was really good as well, both of us are looking forward to more musical adventures! The famous 'Winter Festival' starts next week, so hopefully we can manage to see some interesting events..... AND - today is our last day of classes! Hooray! We're pretty excited, although the classes are really, really interesting. They do have their low points, however - yesterday, we were told by our 'Reading' teacher that, because we mispronounce our Russian 'o' sounds, we sound like Christian pilgrims from days of yore, and that people on the street probably laugh at the way we speak. Ouch! She's a delightful soul, really.....on a slightly more interesting note, we found out that there is a special verb in Russian which means 'to mispronounce one's 'o' sounds', which indicates to me that it might not be as uncommon as we were lead to believe.......the verb is окать , just in case anyone is interested! So, now we don't quite know what to do with ourselves! Lots of fun, hopefully......some of the English students we met in class are leaving this weekend, so we might go out and celebrate with them tonight. Then we have big plans to see some museums on Monday, and maybe go to some music concerts on Tuesday, for Christmas, which should be exciting! Well, if we don't have time to write again before Christmas, we wish you all a very merry, safe and happy Christmas! Best wishes for an enjoyable holiday, and we'll write again soon! Love, Meg and Zoe 0 Merry Christmas! 25-DEC-2007 22:09:00 Hello, everyone! I hope you all had a lovely Christmas, and that you have exciting plans for New Year! Zoe and I were able to whip up a little festive occasion in our room today - we went to the market and prepared a delicious feast of smoked salmon, cheese, fresh bread, fruit, nuts, vodka and exciting desserts! It was great! But we may have over-indulged just a little, so we're still feeling a bit sick now. Oh, well......we had a mini-celebration last night at well, and we tried Soviet Champagne, seeing as a few of our friends had told us that it was delicious. They were WRONG! It tasted like nail polish and soda water, a fairly average combination, to say the least. But we had fun, nonetheless....... Before trying the deadly champagne, we visited the apartment of a Russian family, friends of our Russian professors at uni. Sonya is a doctor, and she has three sons, all of whom are really lovely. We had some great conversations with the eldest son, Sergei, who is studying sociology at uni, so it was interesting to hear his perspective on some of the social issues in Russia today. And we had delicious mushroom soup, and a phenomenal amount of sweet and savoury pies! So it was really lovely - it was so interesting just to see inside a Russian apartment, and we tried out a little of our Russian (although we quickly switched to English, we must admit!). We also visited the Russian Museum yesterday, which was incredible. It's so massive, we didn't get through all of it, so we might go back later in the week. But there was a really interesting exhibition on the potrayal of women in Soviet art and propoganda, which was fantastic to see. They had old propaganda films and posters, as well as heaps of sculptures and paintings. It was really interesting - Zoe really liked the section on Russian icons as well, and we both enjoyed all the exhibits of traditional folk art. Everything was so detailed, it was amazing! So we're really looking forward to going back again..... We had our first, proper all-nighter on Saturday night - it was really, really fun. We went to a bar called 'Cynic', a grungy student pub in the centre of town, and we met a bunch of students who sat down next to us because it was so crowded. They were all so nice, and really interested in why we were learning Russian, and a couple of them spoke English but not everyone, so we were all just kind of speaking a mixture of both! How exciting......I definitely think our Russian improves greatly after a couple of beers (or maybe it just alters my perception of my own mistakes......) So we ended up coming home at 6am, just in time to get into our hostel. What fun! Well, I think that's it from us for now - enjoy the festive season, and we'll write again soon! Love, Meg and Zoe 0 С Новым Годом! 30-DEC-2007 18:01:00 Hello, again! Just a quick note to say Happy New Year to everyone......we've had a bit of a mad party week, I'm afraid! And it looks as if the festivities will continue tomorrow night.....we've been invited to a couple of New Year parties, one of which is a student party organised by the English students at Smolny, and the other a random party of these nice Russian boys we met last week in a pub. Hooray! So hopefully we'll have fun..... The thing I'm loving the most about St Petersburg at the moment is the tacky New Year lights.......and yes, Mum and Dad, they ARE actually as good as the Rockhampton Christmas lights tour, if you can believe it! They're EVERYWHERE! It's really exciting. And last night, our new Russian friends Dmitri and Anton took us to this incredibly gaudy laser light show in the centre of the city - they actually project these crazy lights onto the Russian Museum, which is a really beautiful building, and the show goes for about half an hour, EVERY hour from about 6 until 10 at night. Madness! The music is really nice though..... Speaking of music, we saw an awesome live band at this art club called 'Fish Fabrique' the other night, and we've got a few exciting outings planned over the next week as well. The opera 'Evgeny Onegin' is playing on Wednesday night, so we might try to get tickets to that. We've already bought tickets to one night of the Winter Festival as well, which I'm REALLY excited about - it's a very Russian program of Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff and Prokofiev, so I'm really looking forward to it! Have a wonderful New Year everyone! We'll write again soon..... Love, Meg and Zoe 0 Наш Рай! 08-JAN-2008 20:12:00 Hi, everyone! I hope you all enjoyed the New Year! As anticipated, we did have a bit of a crazy night.....we attended the two parties, ate PLENTY of food and had PLENTY of vodka! It was really, really fun....we also walked into the centre of town for a very short while, just to get to the second party, and it was so crazy! So many people, and all these mad laser light-shows going on! It was pretty exciting to see it for a little while, but we were both glad to be celebrating in a slightly more low-key style.....even so, we didn't make it back to our house until 4pm the next afternoon! A pretty good effort, if we do say so ourselves.... Since then, we've been having a really great time. We met up with our Russian friends again, a couple of nights after New Year, and at some point during the night we decided it would be fun to go to Novgorod first thing the next morning! How exciting! So we got up early, made the trek into town to get tickets.....and it was all sold out! So our friend Alexei took us to a museum instead, the Artillery Museum, which was really insane. There were so many tanks, guns, grenades, and even nuclear rockets! It was really interesting, but we both found it really, really confronting, and we spent the rest of the day walking around, and talking about the ideas that we have of war. It's probably far too boring to go into here, but it's so hard for us to understand so much about war, and warfare..... Since then, we've been having some conversations with other Russians about the same thing, and it's really interesting to hear their point of view, particularly as if they weren't students, they would have to be in the army themselves! Anyway, the museum WAS interesting, but I would reccomend that you go prepared (and maybe after more than 3 hours sleep....) We also visited the Political History Museum, which was great! I think we'll have to go back, there was just so much so see there, and we didn't give ourselves enough time, really. But we really enjoyed it, and a lot of the exhibits had explanations in English, which greatly aided our understanding, of course! The actual building itself is really beautiful, it was built for a ballerina who was having an affair with Nicholas II, who later became Tsar. It was later taken over by the Bolsheviks, and you can see Lenin's office, and the balcony where he gave his address when he returned to Russia! We had a 'church day' last week as well - we visited the Cathedral of our Lady of Kazan, St Nicholas' Cathedral, and (finally!) went inside the Church on Spilled Blood. They were all really beautiful, and so different - inside the Church on Spilled Blood is INCREDIBLE! It's pretty much all covered in these detailed, colourful mosaics, depicting Russian icons and Alexander II. It's really overwhelming, but beautiful, in a very different way. Kazansky Cathedral is really beautiful, but MASSIVE! I found it really imposing as well, although amazingly beautiful. St Nicholas' was really pretty, but we could only explore a small part of it, as the rest was sectioned off with a sign saying 'No Tourists!'. What we saw was lovely, though.... Well, back to school on Thursday - and tomorrow, Zoe's parents will arrive! We're pretty excited, and we have a couple of plans up our sleeve......we'll let you know more later! The weather finally became cold, and the last couple of days ranged from -6 to -15 degrees! So we're now painfully aware of the inadequacies of our winter attire, and on the hunt for silly padded jackets! Hooray! AND it snowed last night.....really, who could ask for more? We were out for a drink with friends, and we ended up walking around in the snow for a couple of hours, which was really nice. I know we've said it before (possibly more than once.....) but the snow makes everything SO beautiful! I hope it continues.... Well, that's about it from us for now! We'll write again soon... Love, Meg and Zoe 0 Back to School..... 16-JAN-2008 17:51:00 Привет! Well, as the title of this entry suggests, we're now officially back at school! As much as we hate getting up so early in the mornings, it is really good to be back again, and we both feel that we are far more comfortable with the work than before the holidays (despite doing remarkably little study over the New Year period! Hooray!). I think our understanding and comprehension is definitely improving, which is really exciting, and we're at least more confident - if not successful - with speaking as well. We're really enjoying classes now....and with only 2 and a half weeks in St Petersburg to go, we're getting quite sad at the thought of leaving! Last week, Zoe's parents came for a whirlwind visit to Russia - only two days! - on their way to London. It was really, really great to see them! We did our best to run around and show them the sights.... first, a Russian feast at one of our favourite restaurants on Nevsky Prospect, Дом Астёра - or, the Actor's House. It's connected to a theatre, and we think it used to be a drama school..... in any case, it's quite difficult to find, and rather imposing (with a scary bust of Stanislavsky on the wall as you ascend a massive staircase) but the food is great! So we ate up a storm, and then escorted Jim and Di back to their hotel on Vasilevsky Island. Te next day, they visited the Church on Spilled Blood while we were at school, then we met up for some fine Russian pies, then a walk to Palace Square along the bank of the Neva River. After that, the Hermitage - where Jim was able to see his favourite painting, 'Lot with his Daughters' - and then we got tickets to a concert at the small hall of the Philharmonic, which was lovely..... although, in retrospect, a string quartet may have been slightly too sleep inducing for those who had travelled about 30 hours the previous couple of days! The following day, Zoe took her parents to the markets near our place, where they were able to sample some of the delights of Russian cuisine - kvas, bliny, and more pies! They also got to see our room (which was a highlight, I'm sure!) and take a mashrutka! It was really great to see them, and talk with them about our travels so far - we hope the rest of their journey is going well! I've been reading through some past entries, and I realised that I haven't mentioned any of our cultural escapades! We've been attending quite a few concerts - as well as the string concert, we also attended a concert at the Winter Festival, which was AMAZING! The grand hall of the Philharmonia is so beautiful as well, it's really lovely to hear music there. We saw another concert there last week, and we've got tickets to a concert in St Isaacs church this weekend. It's so incredible here - we could literally see a different play, opera, ballet or concert every night of the week! And it's not very expensive...... we even forked out 120 roubles (about AUS$6) to see a Russian play, which was really fun (if incomprehensible). We saw The Master and Margarita, which I haven't read, and Zoe had only read a third of it. So, naturally, we were pretty confused.....the set was really cool though, and they had all these crazy giant, plastic heads of Lenin and Stalin lying around the stage, which at one point they all put on, and ran about the stage screaming. ??? Apparently the theatre company that we saw performing is also quite controversial, as the director of the company only hires men, and all the female roles are played by men. So it was a fun experience - definitely worth six bucks, in my opinion! In other news, Sam arrived yesterday! It's great to have him here with us, and he's even staying our floor of the student house! Hooray! So far, we've made him taste Soviet Champagne, and treated him to a couple of 'Zoe and Meg Feasts' - incidently, last night's 'feast' was truly spectacular, involving nearly a whole cabbage, onion, potato, beans, and a lot of pepper. It was actually pretty good.... We also took a trip to Novgorod last weekend! For more information on our fabulous adventure, see the entry entitled 'Novgorod'! That's all for now - we'll write again soon! Love, Meg and Zoe 0 Novgorod 16-JAN-2008 18:22:00 Last week, we (finally!) were able to get tickets to Novgorod! We were so excited about our travels, we brought a packed lunch of homemade soup and sandwiches, and all our thermals, and set off on the bus! Unfortunately, the one thing we didn't remember to pack was our guide book (which is really amusing, because we take it with us EVERYWERE in St Petersburg!) so we were a little confused when we arrived. But a (somewhat) friendly local pointed out the tourist information office, so we bought a map, found a hotel, and were on our way! It was already afternoon by the time we arrived, so we headed straight away for the Museum of Wooden Architecture, an open air museum about 10 minutes away from the centre of town, with examples of early wooden architecture, churches, houses, and even a windmill! It was so beautiful - it was the end of the day, so there were practically no other visitors, and lots of snow. It was really lovely. Then we headed for the St George monastery, which was even more spectacular. Unfortunately, we were too late to enter the church, but we walked around for a while in the snow, looking at how incredible it was. It was so dark by this time, we couldn't even really take pictures - I also slipped on the ice and dropped my camera in the snow, and when Zoe went to help me, she fell over too...so my camera was fairly unhappy after that, and refused to take any more photos for the rest of the day. It was wonderful to see it though, I'm so glad we took the trip out there! We had a feast at a local cafe, got a good night's sleep, and the next morning headed over to what was once the local marketplace, where there some truly beautiful churches. After that, we visited the Kremlin, and entered the Cathedral of St Sophia to see the amazing decorative icons inside. All the churches in Novgorod were so beautiful, it was a really lovely day! The journey to and from Novgorod was really interesting, as well. Everything changes so much as soon as you leave the city, it's crazy. Along the way, there were lots of little villages which seemed to consist of just a row of houses, many of which were really delapidated and sometimes completely falling apart. We spoke about it in our conversation class yesterday, and our teacher told us that usually people have to come and live in the city during winter, because it's simply too harsh to live out there. But we still saw people walking around and everything...... The journey made us both really want to explore more traditional towns! So, that was our journey to Novgorod! We really enjoyed ourselves..... Love, Meg and Zoe 0 Another week has passed...... 20-JAN-2008 17:34:00 Hi there! Another fun week has passed..... this will be a short one, as Sam and I are about to go and see 'Anna Karenina' at the Conservatorium tonight! But I thought I should drop you all a quick line.... Everything continues to go well over here - I'm so sad that the time is passing so quickly! It's so wonderful here, and there's always so much to do.... Zoe and I have been talking heaps about just how much we love it, and how we really, really want to stay! I think we've been really lucky, we've had such a fantastic time and relatively few dramas - although it's not over yet! I'm sure there's still plenty of time for us to get into trouble of some sort.... Well, what have we been up to? We finally visited the Peter and Paul Fortress last week, although we managed to visit on the one day a week that the cathedral is closed! So we may have to go back..... it was pretty incredible, though. There's a massive bell tower in the cathedral, and as we walked into the fortress (it's on this kind of island on the Neva) the bells were all chiming - it was a really gloomy, overcast day, so it was pretty creepy. The buildings are really beautiful, though. Then we went searching for a Russian bathhouse, but all the ones we could find were either closed on Wednesdays, or not in operation anymore. How sad! So we're planning on going sometime this week...... Last night, we went to a beautiful choir concert in St Isaac's church - it was all choral music by Rachmaninoff, and all of it was amazing! It was great to see the inside of St Isaac's as well - it's pretty intense. Our conversation teacher was talking about it the other day, and she said that heaps of people died while they were building it! It's really beautiful, but while the concert was on all the lights were dimmed, so it was really gloomy..... possibly the perfect place to listen to sacred music! Afterwards, Sam decided to call it a night, but Zoe and I felt like a bit of a dance, so we trekked out to a dance club called 'Metro', a 4-story monstrosity playing an exciting mixture of techno and crazy Russian pop! I swear we were the oldest people inside, it was pretty amusing. So we went wild on the dance floor.... it was really, really fun. I have to say, I'm pretty impressed with how badly a lot of Russians dance, it's great! So, needless to say, Zoe and I fit right in..... We've visited some crazy museums over the last couple of days as well. After school one day, we popped in to see the Museum of Erotica, a fine establishment housing Rasputin's penis in a glass gar. Yeah, it was pretty gross.... and the museum was so random, it was actually in the middle of a proctology clinic! We had assumed that it may have been just a money-making enterprise for the clinic itself, but admission was free! Very random..... And today we went to the Sigmund Freud Museum of Dreams, which is a conceptual museum displaying all these images that are apparently the most common in dreams. It was pretty cool, and there was also information about Freud's life and work. A couple of days ago, we visited Stroganoff Palace and saw a really interesting photo exhibition, called 'Leningrad Underground'. All the photos weren't allowed to be exhibited in public during the years of the USSR, because all the Soviet art had to depict certain ideas, etc. It was incredible! Anyway, that's all for now! Hope you all enjoyed your weekend! Love, Meg and Zoe 0 Very quickly.... 05-FEB-2008 00:14:00 Hey everyone! Sorry, this is just a quick message to let everyone know we are fine - we have arrived in Moscow, and are having a blast! But our Russian phone doesn't work anymore (we think we bought a sim-card just for St Petes) and we don't have very regular internet access, so I'm sorry for being so slack with the blog! But I will see you all soon! Hope you are all well, and having fun! We'll see you soon! Love, Meg and Zoe 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0