So here I am, in St. Petersburg. Our group is staying in the Hotel Regina, which (as I learned last night) is at the Petrogradskaya metro station on the blue line. The room I share with Demetria is smaller than any hotel or motel room I've been in, but it is nice, especially the bathroom. The floor in there is heated! And the toilet paper is pink.
Two days ago was my birthday, a fact which was announced to our group while we rode around tne city on an old red bus with blue curtains. They sang to me, and that was about the extent of my birthday celebrations, but being in Russia was excitement enough. Right? Of course.
By now, we've had two tours of the city of St. Petersburg -- bus and boat -- a tour of the Church of the Spilled Blood, eated at four different restaurants around the city, received cell phones and phone cards, and ridden the Metro. After our last dinner together, we had to get ourselves home. Anna insisted that I go out for my birthday, so we and two ther guys headed to the American Consulate. Yes, the Marines were having a party.
As we walked towars the bus stop, we saw our bus passing us. We gave chase and caught up with it at the остановка автобуса. Anna bought tickets from the conductor for us because we all had big bills, then we sat down and I anxiously/carefully traced the route of the автобус in my small city atlas. We managed to get off at the right stop, found the consulate, and experienced the Waiting which is so common in Russia. A guard collected our spravki (replacement documentation while we get our multipass visa) and Russian student IDs, went into a small, gray shack with tinted windows, came out, lit a cigarette, went back in.... We stood at a distance, as intstructed, and waited in the median along with three Russians. He eventually returned our документы to us, which was a relief. It's nervewracking to be without one's passport, справка, and ID!
We were let in two at a time, with plenty of waiting time in between entries. I suppose it felt longer than it actually was. When it was finally Anna and my time to go, we went up to the door and showed our справка и русские студенты биллеты again. The gaurds tried chatting with me in Russian about studying here, but I was distracted by the security process and we all switched to English. I got signed in, surrendered my camera, assured them that my cell phone couldn't take pictures, and plowed forward. Anna, who had gone before me, was waiting at the top of a short flight of stairs. We passed through a short hallway, which led us into a small courtyard. Um, where to now?
Well, we spotted another guard in the far right corner and approached him (подошли к ему). As we did so, I formulated a question to ask -- I decided on Где находится вечеринка? Before I could bust that out, he motioned us towards a staircase across from him.
The party was not very exciting. Already there were the three Russians, who had started a game of pool. That's it. More people came, in time. We stayed an hour, leaving before eleven because the Metro stops running at midnight and I'm skittish like that. Thanks to our navigation of the Metro earlier in the day, and Anna's public transportation smarts, we made it expediently to our stop (Петроградская). The boys were a different story. First, they didn't follow us up the escalator at our transfer. We went back down to get them and of course passed them as they ascended. Then, they got on the wrong train. We tried calling them, but I think they were more worried about us than we were abut them. I believe they got on yet another wrong train before making it home, but we all made it back in one piece to the hotel by midnight. You know, I don't think I even saw any Marines! None in uniform, at least.
And now I'm waiting to move in with my family. Nervous much?
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