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Tour de Peterburg

I went to Russia during winter break. That was a few months ago. I was in Russia a few months ago.

Yeah, I can’t believe it either.

Last time I talked about the trip, I was just about to go off with a couple of fellow CouchSurfers and explore St. Petersburg for the first time. So I’ll continue from there.

The other CouchSurfers, a European couple who were treating themselves to a whirlwind tour of Russia, led the way. We got out of the subway station and appeared near the river Neva, which was frozen except for a narrow channel where ships could presumably pass through if they really wanted to. Across the river we could see the cupola of St. Isaac’s Cathedral. It was only the early afternoon, but the sun was already low enough that it cast an orange tinge over half the sky.

We went to a nearby palace that had been converted to a museum. Apparently St. Petersburg is full of former palaces that are now museums. This one had been owned by a nobleman, and it was filled with period furniture and artwork. We had to put slippers over our shoes so as not to rough up the old wooden floors. It was very quiet in the museum; there were hardly any other guests besides us three. But in almost every room there was an attendant seated quietly, never speaking. More semi-useless (and probably miserable) jobs.

After the museum, we walked around some more. It had only been an hour or so, but the sun seemed like it was hanging just as low in the sky. We walked across a bridge that spanned the Neva, and from the other bank, we could see…

…ice fishers! Is that what they’re called when they’re ice fishing? It is now!

I started to get cold. I mean, really cold. I had brought my gloves, but I wasn’t wearing them. I was borrowing them from my dad, who said they were “Florida gloves,” not really made for people who are out in extremely cold temperatures for long periods of time. They were a little small for me, and they made it harder for me to take pictures. Eventually, I decided to wear them lest my hands freeze off.

Next, we entered the Peter and Paul Fortress, the oldest structure in St. Petersburg, built on an island in the Neva. It wasn’t incredibly late (or so I thought), but still, everything inside the fortress was pretty much closed. We did have a look at this beautiful church, though:

But we didn’t go inside. I think there was a service going on.

I was seriously getting pretty cold, but I managed to stick it out. It was slowly getting darker and darker. Now we were out of the fortress, and we were getting close to a ship that my travel companions for the day had wanted to see. It looked like a pretty modern battleship, and yes, I plead almost total ignorance of St. Petersburg’s tourist attractions because I didn’t and still don’t know what it was. All I knew was that it was closed by the time we got there, so we walked on.

The other CouchSurfers I was staying with (our host had overbooked his place) were out making their own travel arrangements, and they were hoping to see a performance of The Nutcracker that evening. Since it was getting to be that evening, the three of us decided to join them, so we made our way to where the theater was supposed to be. On the way, we passed the beautiful Church of the Savior on Blood, which (to the untrained Western eye) is strikingly similar to St. Basil’s Cathedral in Moscow:

We wanted to go inside, but it, too, had just closed. Are you noticing a pattern here?

It was getting to be showtime, and we still didn’t know exactly where the theater was. Well, we found the area where all the theaters were, so it was just a matter of finding the right one. Although, I have to say, some of the wrong ones looked intriguing: one of them, judging by the poster displayed outside, was staging a production of Oliver! In Russian. Fancy that!

My companions were able to ask passersby where the theater was, which was good because if I had been out by myself, I certainly would have gotten lost forever and I’d still be there looking for that theater. In my defense, I have now learned to say “Where is the theater?” in Russian, along with many other useful phrases such as “I don’t know where I am,” “Smoking is not allowed here,” and “Doctor, I think I have the flu” (none of which, I’m glad to say, I learned out of necessity).

We eventually found the theater and met up with the other CouchSurfers inside. The theater was very ornate and very old, and I could imagine the czar going there for a performance a hundred years ago (although he probably didn’t, I don’t really know). Anyway, it was Christmastime in Russia, so what better way to experience Russian culture than to watch a performance of The Nutcracker in its original language? Actually, I quickly remembered that The Nutcracker has no words, but still: the Russians are masters and mistresses (mostly mistresses, I guess) of ballet, so leave it to them to stage one of their countrymen’s most famous and beloved works.

I had seen The Nutcracker before, when I was in fourth grade or something like that, but I didn’t really remember the details. Act I was mostly unfamiliar, although it did have the rat king and all that stuff. Act II, though, was like watching a greatest-hits compilation of ballet. Almost every musical piece was instantly and intimately familiar. I guarantee you would probably be pretty familiar with the music in Act II of The Nutcracker.

And so, the show ended on a very good—I daresay splendid—note. After that, it was late and we were all hungry, so we went down to Nevsky Prospekt, the main drag, to find a restaurant. We ended up going to this place called Planet Sushi, which turned out to also be an Italian restaurant called Il Patio. As we enjoyed our Japanese and/or Italian food (I ordered a piece of lasagna), we chatted and laughed. We were five strangers in a strange land, each from a different country (if you count California is a separate country from the rest of the US), each with our own story and our own plans, all together trying to make sense of the cold, snowy world around us.

The Californian dude and the Welsh woman were a couple. The German guy and the Polish girl were a couple. And Jordon made five.

But I wasn’t meant to be alone. I had traveled thousands of miles to this frozen land so I, too, could experience true happiness. And now it was only a few days and a bus ride away.