I'll Give Myself a "D" for Effort

Because I'm barely trying here. I just don't feel like writing today. And because this pic is actually a couple weeks old. But it's new to you! This is the neighborhood near my Friday morning class, near Marksistskaya station. And it's just a great, colourful shot. No sarcasm, witticisms, or deep thoughts today, folks. Just something pretty to look at.

Happy Friday, all.

I'm Sure You've Heard People Bitch About This Before

Ever have one of those days?

Like say you wake up one morning to find that your possibly-retarded baby cat has pooped on your quilt but it's, like, five in the morning and you just can't deal with this before you have caffeine in your system so you go to the kitchen to light the stove, only to find that the light is burnt out and so you stub your toe on your ridiculously sharp-edged table leg on your way out to the washroom where, when you open the door to the toilet, water cascades over your feet sending your kittens into a flurry of panic?
And then, after you realise you own only three towels and use a big red blanket to clean it up running pink water over your entire apartment, and despite the fact that it is maybe five-thirty in the morning, your totally batshit downstairs neighbor rings your bell about fifty times until you let him into your apartment with two plumbers one of whom lets your seriously doorbell-and-water-tormented kitten run out (but at least he chases her down for you) and then no one can speak English to tell you what they are doing but they all still crowd around your toilet, which seems insanely innappropriate, somehow, while downstairs neighbor alternates between complaining about how your pipes have flooded his washroom and yelling at you for the fact that you are not wearing socks and thus will almost certainly "get the flu and die", and you have to go to work but can't even speak enough Russian to kick everyone out?

For sure, something like this has happened to you before?

But don't worry--it wasn't so bad.

I still had to slip on a patch of ice and smack my head into a railing, causing swelling and a faint bruise above my eye.

Same old, here in Moscow.

Okay: Two Canadians, an American and a Russian Walk into StPetersburg (pt.2)

( Part 1 is here)

We looked through our StPetersburg tourist guide and stumble across a restaurant called “The Idiot.” We consider it a sign; Cybelle is reading Dostoyevsky’s The Idiot. Also, I am reading The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Learning Russian. Not to mention the fact that Cybelle is a vegetarian, and this restaurant boasts a wide vegetarian menu (hard to come by in Russia) So to complete our perfect triad, we insist upon The Idiot for dinner. Slava tries to convince us that we should go to a restaurant he can find easily (he’s been to StP several times before) but he is out-voted three to one and we shuttle off aboard the St Petersburg metro to the city centre.

***

We exit the train to sleet and high winds. The restaurant is situated at the halfway point between two metro stops. I don’t know how far we have to walk, but it’s only an inch or two on the map, so I think it seems fine (look how much I didn‘t learn in Girl Guides!). Unfortunately, though the curving canals and bays make for a stunning cityscape, they don’t make navigation very easy. We set out on foot and walk for twenty excruciating minutes. And I mean excruciating. I know I’m from Canada--Winnipeg at that--but it feels like fire ants are nesting in my bone marrow.

Despite my aching fingers, windburnt cheeks and running nose, I am still gasping over the canals we walk along, and the graceful scrollwork wrought iron railing that is literally everywhere.

“Oh wow,” I exclaim, thinking of her promise to take photographs; “Kira! You need to take a picture of this!”
“Larissa. I am not taking my hands out of my pockets.”
Fair enough.

In the distance, I see a blue neon M growing closer.
“How is that possible? How could we have walked all the way to the next metro stop?!” I ask, employing my irritating Supleve habit of speaking to no one in particular. “Do we have to turn back?” I continue with dismay.
Looking around, we all make a solid inspection of the metro station. We have so been here before. About twenty-five minutes ago.
We’ve been walking in a circle.

As we reorient ourselves under a futile umbrella, Slava tries to convince us again to go somewhere else. But fuelled by our belief in fate (and the fact that we refuse to have walked 25 minutes just to eat at someplace random) we refuse. Did Peter the Great give up when people told him St Petersburg--a Venice for th North-- couldn’t be built? No. Like, when his people told him that building on an icy, desolate, dark, wind-and-storm-ravaged swamp was the stupid, toe-numbing, soul-draining fool’s dream of an obvious lunatic, did he listen sensibly? Of course not. So neither do we. We forge onward.

***

(fifteen minutes later)

KIRA: Larissa, I can’t feel my feet.
Me: I know! This is awesome! I totally can’t feel that cat bite anymore!

***

(ten minutes after later)

KIRA: A Heinekken sign. We need to go to that Heinekken sign.
LARISSA: You know it’s weird, but I have a feeling you’re right. It`s probably right there.
KIRA: Even if that‘s not the place, that’s where we’re stopping. They’ve got beer and heat inside.

Turns out we had found it. And I know this is a long shot but if any of you ever find yourself in St Petersburg, I highly recommend The Idiot; menus with English, great foot, very cozy and ecclectic and artsy. The only thing that really threw us was the party in the private room, when a drunken WWII-style soldier stumbled out with a saloon girl. And no, despite the fact that this was the weekend following Halloween, that had nothing to do with anything. It was apparently the “soldier’s” birthday. Don’t know what was going on there, but I guess I’ve seen weirder in Russia.
Over dinner, we discuss the cat, and it turns out that I am the only one who hates it.
“He’s just nervous!” Kira defends the evil black monstrosity. “And territorial.”
“Yeah, well, Hitler was nervous and territorial when he invaded Poland, too,” I counter. “Doesn’t mean we should all get over Hitler.”
After a great meal, amazing mulled wine, and gorgeous bottle of white courtesy of Cybelle, we decide to head back to our rented flat for the night.

***

On the St P’s metro Slava takes a minute to point out the gates to the track--they are like elevator doors and you cannot even get near the train until it is in a stopped position. Even then, you can`t walk alongside it-- all you can do is board. Slava tells us that this is to prevent suicides.
“In this city,” he says, “there are a lot of people who commit suicides.” Not surprising. Despite it’s obvious beauty, St P has an average frost-free period of just 135 days per year, and is overcast 165 days of the year. They daylight can las as little as 6 hours per day. Never mind the bone-soaking cold that I already know all-too-well.

We have to change trains to get back to the flat and the cat who we have all by now begun to refer to as “Hitler” (I’m am slowly winning my anti-cat PR campaign). As we descend the escalator, I notice a drunk-looking man staring at us. I am transfixed out of simple shock that people in Russia do not stare--they are generally unfazed and more than happy to ignore each other. He says something to his friends that I’m not sure seems good, and does not back down in his stare. I lower my gaze and follow my friends to the metro platform. As we stand discussing tomorrow’s breakfast, the man approaches.

“Excuse me,” he begins “where are you from?”

Without thinking, and like a moron, I answer “Moscow.” Obviously, he is unsatisfied with this answer, and persists. “Where are you from? What language are you speaking?” I find this an odd question since--hello--you are speaking to us in English. Slava breaks in and tells them we are Canadian (sorry, Cybelle). Immediately, the man`s face changes from tense to very relaxed, his hands gesticulating as he talks with Slava. Then, unceremoniously, he bids us goodnight and goes back to his friends.

“What the Hell was that?” we ask Slava.

“Oh, he thinks we were German, and he say he hates Germans, and so he wanted to fight. But he was glad to hear you were not Germans.”

Um, okay, so let me get this straight--we almost got out asses kicked on a train platform for being German?
Slava says that he’s sure no one would beat up a woman, but that the guy was angry about some outcome of a football (soccer) game, and wanted to tell us how much he hated Germany.
Good to know. I have never in my life felt so defensive of the nation that started two World Wars, but there you go. And this still does not answer my most vexing question--If he thought we were German, why did he speak English to us?

Now back to the flat, and to little Hitler, for whom I feel refreshed resentment over this anti-German mix-up. But of course this cannot be it for our first night in St Petersburg, because we board the train and--lucky us--German-hater and his drunken friends get in the same car as we do. This is so not over….

To Be Continued…

So What that it Was Seven Degrees Today?

My coat arrived yesterday! My mother shipped my very expensive, very warm winter coat from Canada, and it finally arrived! I have been looking forward this for weeks. Not because I really need it (it’s above zero everyday right now, suckers) but because I have wanted the package itself. This signal from abroad, this concrete evidence of people and places that all too often seem like a dream. Proof. Proof that I am from somewhere. Proof that have roots. It is a strange feeling when you need corroboration that you are who you are, but it was all starting to seem unreal...

As I run to my apartment with the box I cannot stop smiling. The elevator ride to the twelfth floor feels like an eternity. I have never been so excited to see the contents of a package of my own belongings.

I open the box, and extract the full-length coat from it’s month-long confinement. Immediately, I know what I want to do, and I bury my face in the lining and inhale. It smells of all things clean, and calm and comforting. Like that world a thousand of miles away that sometimes I have believing is real. But here it is--verification. A thousand memories flood over my mind and settle in to tranquillize my nerve endings--I picture my mother’s front hall, where the coats are stored. I can picture my mother, my brother and sisters, the comfort of family. I can half-believe that if I lift my head and open my eyes, I’ll smell the cooking from the kitchen, hear the noise of my siblings teasing, see the busy energy that always settles in when my big family gets together. I believe it, and for a very gratifying, nourishing moment, it is true.

It feels like I’ve been in a sauna, like I’ve had three drinks, like I’m lying, once again, in my mothers bed with a cup of tea and my favourite company. I am sedated. And in a city where I am finally starting to feel at home, I remember my first, my favourite home.

That's not to say I've been unhappy here--not at all. In fact, for the first time in a long time I’ve been feeling some peace. Looks like I just needed 15million pushy people smoking, and drinking, and bustling around everyday to calm me down.

But nothing, nothing has felt so great, lately, as this sign of life from accross the ocean.

Yesterday was a very good day.

PS: Mashka and Koshka say thanks for the fantastic box.

So a Good Part of Northern Moscow Thinks I'm a Slut

I don't have much time today--gotta go home and wait for a coat (long story), but I'll tell you something I learned just now:

Usually, rather than the bus, I take a Marshrutka, which is a van that follows the bus route-weaves in and out of traffic better, really comfy seats, and only costs a buck. But the money collection on these things is a little haphazard, with people just randomly passing their fare up toward the driver.

Every once in awhile, someone will turn to me to collect fare I have already paid. So I say to them "Ya dala," "I gave."

Well Slava just informed me that I have to say "Ya otdala," or "I gave it." Otherwise, the sentence has a similar connotation to "I put out."

So yeah. I've told at least half a dozen people over the last two months that I don't have to pay my cab fare, because I banged the driver. Nice.

You can take the girl out of Transcona...

When Translation Problems...er...Rise

All names and identifying details in this story have been changed at the request of the individual who provided this story to the Expatella.

No Mum, this story is not about me.

So an English-speaking friend of mine, Mary, is dating a Russian man John, who speaks English well enough that they can converse fairly normally. A missing word here, a brief hesitation there, but by and large, they have managed to get past most major communication issues.

Recently, Mary and John began the physical phase of their relationship. One night, after a little too much champagne, it starts getting really hot. Thinking that she is not quite ready for this, Mary tries to slow things down a touch.

"Okay John," she tells him mid-makeout, "That's enough. You need to put on pants."

"Okay," John says, and begins to walk across the room, away from his pants on the floor. Just as Mary is about to ask what the Hell he is doing, he returns to the side of the bed, a box of condoms in hand.

"Here--I have some pants."

"Pants" is a pretty basic, low-level word. Just goes to show you that men the world round are never thinking of slowing things down. He heard "You need to put on..." and his brain shut down completely.

I am certain that the ensuing laughter out of Mary was more than enough to cool things down.

Random Weird Russian Thing

Every once in awhile, I come across things in Russia that inspire me to wonder "WTF were they thinking?"

This is one of those things:

It is some kind of...er...statue. On the lawns of a very expensive apartment complex. If you think you can figure out a reason, please, leave it in the comments section.

It Has Nothing to do With Russia

But I am posting it because it is one of the most awesome things I have heard all week.

The Gods are truly just.

If you hate right-wing pundits who don't know when to shut up, click here.

Oh the delicious irony.

Happy Friday indeed...

A Russian Point of View

“I think that Russians, we want all the options so that we can be proud that we bought the best thing,” says Maria, a woman about my age and one of my most advanced students. “When you see a Russian on the metro, maybe, we are always wearing the best of everything we have everyday, to prove to everyone that we are good enough for the best.”
What had started as a discussion of consumer demand in the workplace has evolved into her pondering the differences between materialism in the West versus materialism in her homeland. She lived in the United States for a year and has had the experience to reflect on the issue firsthand. Only having been her two months, I myself had never really considered that there could even be a difference. Consumer-obsessed society is consumer-obsessed society, right? Sure, there is a distinctly different feeling to Russian luxury and must-have items; they seem a little showier, a little more logo-intensive, a little more in the taste of visible wealth. But until now, I had naively chalked this difference up to a divergence in taste and style. But Maria insists that this is not the case--that the entire intention behind Russian consumerism is completely different.
I tell her that consumer pressure is a real social issue back home. I tell her a story about being 12, and begging my parents for a starter jacket (remember those?!) under the intense belief that it would automatically make me cool. It would obviously not have, and I did not get one, but I firmly held the belief all winter that if I could just get my hands on one, my life would be that much better. Even then, I was already succumbing to the power of the logo, and it’s happening even younger a decade and a half later. Style over substance, I assure her, is an issue in Canada.
“Ah, but you see why you did that?” She asks me. “To be like other kids. To fit in. Here, is not the same. We want to stand out. After the collapse of the Soviet regime, where everybody drove the same car, everybody had the same clothes, same apartments, same everything, we very much wanted things that were not all the same. Nobody could stand out before, nobody could feel special. Now we all can, and we buy many things because we can.
I agree that the rampant desire in Moscow for top-of-the-line everything is likely a backlash to the Soviet era, but is it really any different than the mood in the West, I ask sceptically.
“Okay,” she says, preparing an anecdote, “I have a friend from Portugal, and he says that everywhere else in the world, men acquire clothes, cars, these things to impress women, to make themselves seem important in this way. But Russian men, he says, they do it only to impress themselves. So they can look at it and feel that they are worth something.” She pauses, “maybe to prove as well to other men, sometimes. Even the women they date, they buy them expensive gifts of jewellery and clothes so that they will also seem more…important. This sounds horrible I know, but perhaps it is just hard for me to explain in English. Maybe it is not very good.”
But I suddenly understand the unselfconscious flaunting of furs, and diamonds, and iphones that cover the shoulders, and fingers and ears of Muscovites from all walks of life. They are, to the owner, like a pat on the back, a shout of congratulations, a hit of a drug. They provide the self-esteem needed to put on the thick armour in this tough world. They are a (false) form of self-validation. I insist to Maria that this is actually well-explained, and that it is really no better or worse than the validation we seek from others with these same items in the West. But it does explain the unselfconsciousness of Russian displays of wealth. They genuinely don’t seem to care if you notice their stuff.
Do you think this will settle down? I ask her. Maybe that it will stop once the Soviet era is merely a distant memory of the eldest generation.
“No,” she answers firmly. But perhaps it will…how to say…”
“Level off?” I offer.
“Yes, yes,” she says. “There cannot always be so many new products. We want always what is new, but this can’t last forever. Not with economic recession. Recession is like Darwinism, natural selection for products. Only the strong and the necessary will survive.”

And THAT, my friends is the greatest quote I have heard about the economic crisis so far. The most astute and unique observation of the effect on consumer spending habits that I have heard since the market went to Hell. Courtesy of a 25-year-old receptionist at a sports-facility construction company. Fantastic.

I Cannot Tell You How Much This Creeps Me Out

This is a promotional standee in the Mc Donald's at the Tverskaya stop. I had to sit across from it last night.

Here's what you should do if you're ever in the same situation: order a cheeseburger. Because it's very hard to eat a salad when you can't look down at your plate because you know that the instant you take your eyes off that creepy-ass clown he's gonna run over and stab you in the eye with a hockey stick.

Just a little tip from me to you.

An apple pie would be okay too.

The Bible Omits a Few Technical Details About Raising from the Dead

So turns out that the camera is not exactly perfect.

In a glitch that I don't understand at all, it can only take pictures in the dark. Like if the room is completely dark and it has to rely on its own flash, it's good, but if there is light in the room... it looks like this:

Kind blurry, little lines on it... so it's not exactly "good as new."

But you know I bet when Jesus came back, even he probably came back with, like, a limp, or a stutter, or he wore socks with his sandals or whatever, and his friends didn't just go out and get a new Jesus. So, yeah. Think about it.

It's still cool that it's back. And hopefully, I can get it fixed. In the meantime, I'll just have to take photos in pitch black rooms. No problem.

This, by the way, it the Christmas tree in the marble lobby at one of my employers' offices...
*sigh* If they'd let me turn off all the lights in the lobby like I tried to, instead of holding me for three hours as a "security measure," I could've gotten the prettiest picture...

I Don't Know How to Feel About This

I'm not sure whether I'm more bothered by the situation itself or by my own (non-)reaction to it...

I get on the metro last night and head to the corner of a car to get a seat. As I sit down, I notice a shoebox sitting on the ground, apparently left behind by some long-gone passenger. No sooner do I see it before I calmly think to myself, "that could be a bomb." I initially chided myself for thinking this so instantly. I do tend to have a very vivid imagination. But the more I consider it, the more odd the old box looks. And it's not necessarily the craziest suspicion to have, considering this, among (too many) other things.
So I mentally weigh whether I am overthinking this shoebox or not. But I am calm. I mean CALM. I honestly put more angst into trying to decide between the McDonalds on Tverskaya or the other McDonalds on Tverskaya. I notice a couple more people eyeing it, but for whatever reason, they decide not to react in any major way beyond a sideways glance. Of course nobody touches it either...
As I am thinking about it an intellectual-looking gentleman in his sixties, across the aisle shifts his gaze from his newspaper to the box on the floor ever so slightly. He, too, appears to be pondering it, his eyes moving several times from his newspaper, to the box, and then back again. Finally he stands, and calmly asks everyone nearby whether this box belongs to them. We all answer negatively and, back straight, newspaper tucked under his arm, he strides calmly to the radio on the otherside of the car to report his find, presumably so the militsiya at the next station can take a look.
I decide to exit the train at this station, as does another couple sitting near us, while the older man waits on the train. As I stand in Mayakovskaya, waiting the two minute interval for the next set of cars, I realise that I still feel nothing but a little bit of hunger and sore feet.
I wonder, did I really believe that there could be a problem after all? I mean, I must have, because I got off the train, didn't I? At the same time, I never once debated mentioning it to someone. Okay, I didn't know about the radios, but even if I had... It seemed to much like panic. Like paranoia. Like the kind of fear you can't really afford to feel at every opportunity. Or to spring onto others unnecessarily.

I have no idea how to feel about this. But I still don't feel nervous.

Of course that in itself is what is unnerving.

Happy Birthday Katie!

Today I have to give a shout out to my little sister Katie, who turns 25 today.

In honour of the date, I'll share a little Katie story with you...

Growing up, Katherine and I shared a room. Of course, when it was time to go to bed, we'd often keep each other up most of the night, giggling. One night, when she was maybe nine, we were particularly giggly. My dad must've come in the room three times to tell us to keep it down. But Katherine--known in our family for her hyperactivity--just could not settle down. Even after all the warnings, she was still trying to talk to me. But my dad has had it, and from the hallway he yells:
"Katherine! That's enough! Go to sleep!"
"I AM asleep!" She yells back in a moment of particular brilliance. My father was so dumbfounded by this answer, I think he just gave up trying.

So today we celebrate this human being going twenty five years without accidentally drinking cleaning fluid or trying to bring a blowdryer into the shower.

Aw, I kid, Katie--you're very smart.


I love you! Happy birthday Peanut!

For you, A Russian Birthday Song.

Ironically, I Have No Picture to Go With This Post

My camera is actually working.

You see, I dropped it two weeks ago, and then the lens wouldn't retract, no matter what I tried, and I figured that that was the end of the camera. I laid it to rest in a drawer, resigned to the fact that I would have to shell out for a new one, which I had planned to do today.

This morning, as I was leaving my house, I was going through that drawer looking for a memory stick, and decided to turn it on for no reason at all. And the lens retracted. It is back to new. Actually, it is better than new, because this camera has the ability to heal itself.

It's like that time that bible guy was all "Aw, man, I'm totally dead," and his friends were all "Oh, no way! This sucks!," but then three or four days later he was all "Oh dudes, I totally punk'd you guys! I am so not dead!" and everyone was totes happy and stuff.

This is just like that. I am so happy, and plan to commemerate this day yearly with eggs and rabbits.
And fireworks. I like fireworks.

Five Minutes in Moscow

Like so many children in Moscow, this boy is carrying a balloon. He guides it into the metro, the airy yellow mass bobbing above the heads of serious commuters, and takes a seat with his mother next to the door. Wave after wave of stony-faced Muscovites enters the car. There must be at least seventy five people in here. The train starts up again, rocking along to the deafening roar of the tracks, lulling its human cargo into an efficient daze in which we all stare at nothing and think our own private thoughts. Alone in the crowd, silent in the noise, virtually comatose for the duration of our transit.

*BANG!*

With a start, seventy-five previously over-composed adults jerk upright, attention snapping toward any sound capable of rising above the mechanical roar of the train.

The noise is followed by a startled silence, unexpectedly broken by a small giggle. The boy by the door is staring at the faces, amused that his now-broken balloon has caused such a mass reaction. His giggle intensifies as we all identify him as the origin of the commotion. His mother tries to admonish him for scaring people, but she’s having a hard time--his laughter is infectious. We, too, smile conspiratorially at the boy, sharing his joke, relieved that the noise was nothing more than a silly accident. At first, the smiles catch on to just the few of us around him. But then it spreads, as we each silently succumb to the complete silliness of this moment in the most banal and routine of settings. As the giggles spread outward like ripples in a pond, and a genuine laugh begins in the centre as the little boy can no longer contain himself. Neither can we. It is full fledged laughter now, and this too spreads enough that by the next stop, two thirds of the car is in stitches.
We exit at our stops, refreshed by our encounter but not entirely surprised to have found such lightheartedness behind the hard exteriors of other Muscovites. If we were all really that thick-skinned, no one would live here. There would be no reason.

Okay: Two Canadians, an American and a Russian Walk into StPetersburg (pt.1)

We board the train for St Petersburg departing Moscow at 9:30 am. I have never taken a train before and have no idea what to expect. The ride is nine hours, and I’d gotten only five hours of sleep the night before so all I am hoping for is a bed. Kira, Cybelle (from Kansas City), Slava (from the office), and I board the train and find out compartments. Four pull down beds--jackpot. We open them, lay down the mattresses and sheets, and survey our handiwork--feels like we’re spending the next nine hours at summer camp. But it’s comfy enough, and we take off our shoes and settle in.
The train has not even pulled out of the station when Slava begins to spread a rather impressive selection of groceries on the table between the bunks: yogurt, cheese, bread, ham, apples, chocolates, tea bags, and instant coffee.
“Eat, eat. Everyone should eat something.” He tells us gesturing at the food.
It’s a little early for us, and Slava seems frustrated by our lack of appetite. I have flashbacks of car trips of my childhood, my mother insisting that everyone eat the fruit she brought “Do you want an apple A pear? A plum?” She’d ask approximately every twenty minutes, “We have to eat it, before we get over the border! Have some fruit!” She’s insist, and there would be four kids trying to choke down their ration of two pieces of produce before arrival in Grand Forks, which was less than two hours away from the house. To this day, I don’t understand why we even brought it; I suspect that it may have just been her trick to get us to eat fruit because as a child I was positive that something horrible would happen at the border if we were caught smuggling the banana I did not eat. Well played, Mum.

Or maybe it’s just something in her Slavic blood, because here is Slava, insisting on the same nutritious intake before we’ve even left the city.
I opt instead for a little Anna Karenina and a nap before my lunch. And for the hour of day to be at least in the double digits.

***

I wake up with difficulty. The gentle rocking of the train, and the rhythmic sound of the tracks beneath us is amazingly soothing, and it‘s already 2pm. Slava and Cybelle are on the lower bunks chatting and eating sandwiches. I lower myself with a great difficulty, but finally, finally have found a moment when all my yoga has come to my aid. We spend the next several hours drinking tea, eating, and trading Slava English lessons for Russian lessons. We also spend a great deal of time exercising our bladder control, since the swaying, grungy squat-toilet is not a place we want to spend much time in. Hours and kilometres of Russian countryside roll by--forest after forest, town after town. It is so soothing, and despite the close quarters, a nice reprieve from Moscow’s packed streets and chaos.

Slava, at our request, tells us some stories about Baba Yaga, and I think to myself that if we put a flashlight under his chin, our little summer-camp scenario would finally be complete.
One more little nap in the rocking womb of the train car, and it’s tine to wake--we’re in St Pete’s!

***

I step off the train and am immediately hit by one thought--cold. It is so much colder in St Petersburg than it is in Moscow. I quick look at the digital read on the platform tells me that it’s actually hovering around zero, but it feels much worse than that. It is a city built on rivers, so the dampness and the wind make for a completely different feeling. A bad one. This is not helped at all by the fact that it is raining.
We head for the subway station and wait to buy tickets. Stuck in the long line (presumably because the train emptied) Slava leans over and tells us to watch out purses. “People will steal your money here,” he warns us. “Be careful.” I wonder if anyone had ever pointed out to him that he lives in Moscow, and that there are, indeed, pickpockets in the worlds fifteenth largest city. But he insists that pickpockets are rampant here. As I secure my purse for his sake, I realise that I cannot find my passport. Frantic that I lost it on the train, Kira and I squat in the middle of the St Pete’s metro station, and methodically go through my purse and luggage compartments one by one. It is found after way too much panic.
We board the metro and go off in search of the private flat we rented for the weekend.

***
After a 25 minute walk in the rain, wind, and pitch black night, we arrive at the apartment building. “Please, at least say zdrasvutye, to the woman” Slava pleads, “You might not be Russian, but she should not think that you are rude.“ We debate saying it in unison so that she thinks we’re crazy, but a reproachful look from Slava reminds us that St Petersburg is totally booked for the long weekend and we can’t afford to unnerve anybody. A young woman of about five feet lets us into the building at to the elevator. Two months ago, I’d have called the place “dodgy,” but now I’d say it’s “Russian.” Or as the Russians call it, “sovietsky” (Soviet era). We enter a tiny elevator, all five of us and our luggage, and emerge in a barely larger hallway. There are four flats on this floor, and if one door is totally open, the neighbour’s door cannot open at all. Even by sovietsky standards, this gets a giggle out of me.

Turns out that the woman lives in the flat with her two very young sons who are extremely cute. They are going to Paris for the weekend, they tell us, and will be back on Monday at noon to collect the key. Please feed the cat.

Umm--cat?

We begin to unpack in the small, neat, if kinda funky-smelling apartment. As I go through my luggage, I notice that my camera battery charger is rolled in a neat bundle right where I left it last--on the bed back in Moscow. Kira promises to take pictures of whatever I want with her camera. I go to change my clothes for dinner slightly appeased as Kira and Cybelle go in search of the elusive cat. From the bedroom, I am griping about the lost opportunities to take pictures of whatever I want in one of the most picturesque cities in the world.
“I mean, really,” I grumble as I open the door, “Nothing else could have effed up sightseeing in St Petes more.” And with these poorly chosen words, a lightening quick, massive black cat attacks my foot and does not let go. I manage to kick it off, but he has already drawn blood, and earned my hate for the rest of the trip. An infected foot may indeed be worse for sightseeing than a dead camera battery. Before dinner, I quickly look up the Russian word for “tetnus.” I will summarily spend the rest of the weekend missing my hand-sized kittens and standing on the bed and on chairs in this flat, brandishing a stick that dear Kira found to ease my mind and ensure my safety.
But we are not here to spend the weekend in an apartment with a giant (evil, mean-spirited, violent) cat. We have St Petersburg to see…

It Happens to All the Greats

I am having, hands down, the worst case of writers’ block lately. I can’t write a thing these days. Emails, creative writing, this blog… someone asked me to sign a cheque the other day and I nearly had a nervous breakdown. This is hard, so I’m going to work my way up. Before I can get to the creative writing, I’ll work on some letters home. And before those, this blog. It took me several greeting cards and half a shopping list to get this far, so be patient with me.

I’ll put up the St Petersburg weekend recap in installments, and hopefully get over it soon.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to freak out about what kind of graffitti to write in the bathroom.” “Larissa was here”? No wait--should it be “wuz here?” Dammit--I think I know what drove Fitzgerald to the bottle…

Question: What is the Funniest Thing in the World?

Answer: A kitten having sneezing fits.

Particularly when said kitten is still small enough for her tiny sneezes to blow her backward.

Little Miss Mashka started sneezing yesterday, and it got to the point where she woke me up last night with a sneezing fit (she was sleeping next to my neck.) Then, when we woke up, her left eye was glued shut (ew). And while a sneezing and snotty kitten is surprisingly cute, I'm pretty worried. I know upper respiratory infections can be very bad for little cats, so I'll be taking her to the vet. Vets here are open 24hours and surprisingly inexpensive. We would know, because Koshka, as it turns out, had a parasite, a fact we discovered when she vomited all over Kira's laundry. Then the doormat. Then on the laundry again. Poor thing needs medicine about four times a day.

And now the other one.

It occurs to me that our kittens are like that annoying, sickly, snot-nosy little weenie kid from elementary school. You know the one I mean. He was always out first in dodgeball and peed himself on the fieldtrip to Lower Fort Garry? There was one in every class.

There are two in our apartment.

I'm actually afraid to take them out, for fear the other, cooler cats steal their Whiskas and do that "Why you hitting yourself?" thing. At which point Koshka will go hide in a cupboard, and Mashka will stand on top of my left foot and cry until I pick her up.

*sigh*

I'll keep you posted. In the meantime, feel soothed by the picture of me and Mashka pretending to be mad at each other for the camera. Haha! Aren't we hilarious?

Five Minutes in Moscow

5:30 pm--
I’m running through the station courtyard to catch the train to downtown. The middle-aged women from early this morning, along with their heaps of blouses and sweaters, are gone now. In their place stand magazine and newspaper racks boasting throwaway-publications on every imaginable topic.

As I pass through the entrance to the metro, I notice a woman who by my estimates must be a hundred years old. She is squeaky clean, bundled in quilted layers for the winter, despite the fact that it is an unseasonable fifteen degrees outside.

Reaching into a pocket filled with kopeks, I blindly drop some into her plastic cup. With the outdated currency system, this handful of coins is nearly worthless in all value except sentimental. What she could ever buy with them? They can provide little more than sympathy. Our worthless circles of metal do nothing but say “I understand. Poor you. Life is hard. I sympathise.” But in a country where life does seem harder, and compassion just a little rarer, these condolences are valuable. This is Russia: doleful and lamenting and tired of hardship. As necessary to getting though the rough days as food or water, these sentiments are something of a currency...

She straightens her scarf and rocks slightly. I’m through the turnstile before we even have a chance to look at one another.

I'll be Posting Again ASAP

I've had some concerned inquiries as to where I've been for the past week. The answer is:
St Petersburg for four days, recovering from absinthe for one day, working a new schedule for one day.
Thanks much for your concerns, all, but I am totally fine (minus that absinthe thing).

I'll be back to it as of tomorrow. In the meantime, why don't you just reread some of my old posts? My writing is just the gift that keeps on giving...