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Tuesday, November 25, 2003
Brr! Nuclear winter!
I was really looking forward to snow, because I thought it would make my neighborhood look less like a nuclear fallout zone. Before, when there were leaves on the trees and the grass was green(ish), the place wasn't so ugly, but now that all the eye can see for miles are electrical cables and crumbling Khruchev-era housing projects, it's a little homely. Okay, a lot homely. But then the snow finally fell, and now...yeah, it's no better. The sky is pretty, though!

- declared by Liusia @ 1:39 PM



Bits of wisdom from tag-board.com
This is what my tagboard now says, instead of displaying my messages:

Warning: Host 'coconut.tag-board.com' is blocked because of many connection errors. Unblock with 'mysqladmin flush-hosts' in /home/httpd/vhosts/tag-board.com/httpdocs/tagboard.msq on line 23

Warning: MySQL Connection Failed: Host 'coconut.tag-board.com' is blocked because of many connection errors. Unblock with 'mysqladmin flush-hosts' in /home/httpd/vhosts/tag-board.com/httpdocs/tagboard.msq on line 23
Error 4002: We are experiencing temporary technical difficulties. Please try again later

I'm actually pretty amused by that. Hee. "Unblock with flush-hosts." We need some e-drano up in here. I wish the tagboard people would get on with the plunging, though.
- declared by Liusia @ 8:37 AM


Sunday, November 23, 2003
In which I am reminded, once again, why I am mad at Russia, but Russia comes through and redeems itself in the end
Saturday did not begin auspiciously. I woke up at 9:30 am, to the sounds of someone who was neither Tolio nor Sonya talking outside my bedroom door, in the kitchen. Now, here's the scoop: Sonya, with the kind of exquisite paranoia only someone who lived through Stalin's time can perfect, has decided that it should be a secret that an American lives in her house, because "you never know." Fine. So when someone who is not a close friend stops by, I have to sit in my bedroom and pretend I don't exist. And I'm not allowed to answer the phone. And when I come home, I'm supposed to be real subtle about what floor I'm going to, and not let people see me unlocking the door to the apartment with my very own key and suchlike. Fine. It's kind of amusing. I can pretend to be a spy. Or Anne Frank. But today it was not amusing, because I was supposed to go meet Sofia and Amanda downtown, and I couldn't leave my room. And I couldn't call them and tell them I was going to be late, because there's no phone in my room. So basically, it sucked.

But eventually the woman left, and I got to leave, and I was only about 20 minutes late, which was okay because Amanda was even later. We went to Pushkin's house, which I have already visited, but Amanda and Sofia hadn't yet seen. It was cool, because we had a different tour guide this time than I had last time, and she gave a lot of really interesting details. Also, I noticed a display of Pushkin's sketches that I hadn't seen before. Pushkin was so goofy. He actually drew pretty skillfully - some of his pen and ink drawings show some sophisticated technique and general coolness - but most of them were just silly little doodles. My favorite was one he drew of himself in profile, with a crown of laurel leaves in his hair, labelled in Italian, "The great father, A.P." I don't know if he meant literal father (Pushkin did have 4 kids) or, like, Roman forefather. But it was cute.

one of Pushkin's self portrait sketches


Amanda's drunken attempt to re-create Pushkin's genius


After the tour of Pushkin's house, we went to the train station to buy tickets to Pskov and Moscow. We have a 5-day weekend next week, and Amanda, Sofia and I were planning on going to Pskov, Novgorod and Moscow. Sofia's sister will be in Petersburg then, so she's coming too. But now Amanda can't go, because her passport was stolen, and so it's not safe for her to leave the area she's registered in - Petersburg. So that bites.

We tried a few days ago to buy tickets, but found that you need a passport to buy train tickets in Russia, and as we didn't have Sofia's sister's, we couldn't do it then. Since then, Sofia's sister had faxed a copy of her main passport page, so we went to try again. I got stuck conducting the transaction, since Sofia and Amanda claim I have the best Russian.

Ticket bitch: Yes?
Me: Tell me please, how much are tickets from Novgorod to Moscow on the night train Nov. 28th?
Ticket bitch: What class?
Me: Platzkartny. [that's the cheap one.]
Ticket bitch: At what time?
Me: It's not important, the latest one.
Ticket bitch: I can't tell you if you don't tell me what time you want to go.
Me: There's no posted timetable in the station or on the internet, so I don't know what times the trains run! The latest time.
Ticket bitch: (dramatic sigh) I have one at 11 am, 14 pm, 20:45 pm and 23:05 pm.
Me: 23:05, then, since it's the latest one.
Ticket bitch: All the tickets for platzkartny class from Novgorod to Moscow are sold out at 23:05.
Me: What about 20:45?
Ticket bitch: All the tickets from Novgorod to Moscow are sold out at 20:45.
Me: What about in a different class?
Ticket bitch: All the classes are sold out at 20:45.
Me: Please tell me, when are the tickets not sold out?
Ticket bitch: All the tickets from Novgorod to Moscow are sold out in every class all day.
Me: (trying not to get angry) Fine. Then I still want to buy tickets from St. Petersburg to Pskov, Nov. 26, platzkartny class.
Ticket bitch: Where are you going?
Me: To Pskov.
Ticket bitch: To where?
Me: To PSKOV.
Ticket bitch: To where?
Helpful Russian woman behind me in line: Good God! She clearly said 'to Pskov!'
Ticket bitch: Oh, to Pskov.
Me: Yes.
Ticket bitch: What time?
Me: The earliest morning train.
Ticket bitch: You need to give me an exact time you want to depart.
Me: There's no posted schedule! I have no way of knowing! Just give me the earliest train!
Ticket bitch: What time do you hope to leave St. Petersburg?
Me: (confused) How about 10 am?
Ticket bitch: No.
Me: Um, 9 am?
Ticket bitch: No.
Me: I don't care what time! Sometime in the morning. Whatever!
Ticket bitch: There's only one train all day.
Me: When is it?
Ticket bitch: 10 o'clock.
Me: I just...okay. Fine. Three tickets. (I give her our passports and the photocopy of Sofia's sister's passport.)
Ticket bitch: What?
Me: Three tickets.
Ticket bitch: What?
Me: Three tickets!
Ticket bitch: I don't undertand.
Me: Three tickets!
Helpful Russian woman behind me in line: Three tickets! She obviously said 'three tickets!'
Me: Yes! Three tickets!
Ticket bitch: I know three tickets, I can hear. I mean I can't read this. (Holds up Sofia's sister's passport photocopy.)
Me: Is there a problem with using the photocopy? It's a very clear photocopy.
Ticket bitch: It's not in Russian. Why isn't it in Russian?
Me: None of our passports are in Russian, for obvious...oh, my God.
Sofia: I'll write her name and information down in Russian for you.
Ticket bitch: I mean, what the hell does this say?
Me: She's writing in down in Russian for you!
Ticket bitch: I don't read these American letters. [this is dumb. They're not 'American letters,' to begin with, they're the alphabet used by most of the rest of the world that is not Asia, and while I certainly don't expect people in foreign countries to speak English, since everyone needs passports to get train tickets, she must have to deal with foreign passports on a regular basis. It would behoove her to learn the Latin alphabet so that she can do her job. Plus, Sonya tells me that since everyone has to take a foreign language in high school, every Russian she knows knows the Latin alphabet, even if they learned nothing else.]
Me: She wrote it down IN RUSSIAN for YOU. (passes her Sofia's translation)
Ticket bitch: Ohhhhhh. That's what it says on her passport. Her name. Wait, why are two people's names the same?
Me: They're not the SAME. They have the same last name, they're sisters.
Ticket bitch: (smirks, like being sisters is some decadent American idiocy.) 450 rubles and 60 kopeks.
Me: Fine. (pays her)
Ticket bitch: Here are your tickets! Have a nice trip!

Upon actually examining the tickets, we discovered that the train did not, in fact, leave St. Petersburg at 10, but arrived in Pskov at 10. 10 pm, that is, 22:00. Which means it's ridiculous that she said 10, since Russia operates on a 24-hour clock, and besides, I clearly told her I wanted morning tickets. The whole thing was an idiotic fiasco. It was almost like Monty Python sketch. Russian service personnel can be astoundingly rude, even more so once they realize you're a foreigner.

So we reworked the trip idea: Since we're now missing the day on Wednesday, we'll just extend our time in Pskov a day, take the bus from Pskov to Novgorod, skip the day in Moscow all together, and come back to Petersburg on the bus from Novgorod Saturday night. Neither one of us is too broken up about that; we saw all the really big Moscow stuff (Lenin's tomb, the Kremlin, etc) when we were in Moscow earlier in the semester, and not going to Moscow is defnitely going to save us a lot of money.

The three of us decided it was definitely time to go get some good food and some liquor, so we headed for the metro, to take it to this nice little tavern we know. On the way into the metro, I had another fantastic adventure, although I'd have to say this one worked out in my favor.


Amanda's drunken illustration of the metro incident, which I have subtitled in English for you

There's the usual crowd outside the metro, so we're buffeted around a bit heading in. Sofia and Amanda are ahead of me, and they go through the door. Then, two guys cut in front of me. One of them kind of lingers in the metro doorway, blocking it subtly, while the other...well, I notice a tugging on my purse strap, and realize he's tried to sneak my wallet out my my purse, but been thwarted by the fact that the zipper is sticky and hard to unzip. And his hand is all they way in the pocket, but his glove is caught on the half-broken zipper pull, so he can't get it out. Huzzah for cheap zipper manufacture!

Well, I intended to just yank his hand out of my purse, shove him away from me and go through the door, but...well...the shove came out more like a punch. And it, um, landed in the general region of his kidney. And I have a mean right hook, so...he kind of staggered back, falling into the crowd, holding his side and looking shocked/in pain. And then his door-blocking cohort saw me coming toward the door, and tried to scurry away before I got there. "Why did you do that, young lady?" he cried in Russian, hurrying away.

"Because you're a fucker!" I yelled in English back at him. I regret that it wasn't in Russian, but I was a little steamed up. Plus, I don't even know how to say "fucker" in Russian.

I win!

So that makes twice that people have tried to pickpocket me in Russia, and both of them have gotten schooled. And then there was that horde of gypsies. I'm starting to feel like a bit of a superhero. Also, to get concerned about my temper.

The rest of the metro ride passed without incident, except us giggling, recalling the look on the pickpocket's face, and lamenting that I didn's notice Amanda being pickpocketed, because then I really could have brought some justice.

It turns out that we didn't know exactly where the little tavern was, because w got totally lost trying to find it, and wandered around for almost an hour. But when we finally decided to go back to the metro and get food somewhere else, we walked right past the tavern. Hee.

This place has, as far as I can tell, no name (If you look up "cafes" in the St. Petersburg Yellow Pages, there are several pages of cafes that are named "Cafe." Also, if you look up shoestores, there are pages of them named "Obuv' (shoes)." This is not very creative.) But the place has the best pelmeni ever. The softest pasta, filled with juicy ground meat and slathered in sour cream...mmm. And we bought a bottle of vodka, which makes anything better. The first shot we did was a monster shot - here's a picture showing the liquid level of the bottle after we did our first round. No more letting Sofia pour, that's for sure.


After pelmeni and some shots, I went to call Sonya to let her know that I wouldn't be coming home, since we were going to be out late, and I didn't want to risk missing the last bus to our apartment, which runs at paltry 11:30 pm. Amanda said I could crash at her place on Nevskii Prospekt, so I wouldn't have to worry about the bridges rising and the busses not running and the metro closing and all that.

While I was gone, Sofia and Amanda got to drawing all over my theater schedule. They made the clever illustrations you see above, as well as these works of art, which I have subtitled for your viewing pleasure:

this shows a boomslang snake eating a New Russian out of his fancy car while capturing another capitalist bad guy in his tail for later consumption.


this one is self-explanatory. Unfortunately, it is true of the gang of Gypsies that live on Nevskii Prospekt, except there's more stealing and less dancing. I wish they wouldn't do that, because they are just fueling people's fears about Gypsies.


Trogdor!


us as gangsters. Amanda is staking out the scene by pretending to take a siesta under a sombrero, but is really ready for action and gathering valuable reconnaisance. I am the "big pinecone," which Amanda says is the Russian equivalent of our "the Big Cheese." I wear a bitchin' fedora and high heels, because I am a femme fatale. Sofia is the muscle, and she smokes cigars and beats people up. Amanda wrote "the strength" since we couldn't remember the word for "muscle," and it probably doesn't translate the same way into Russian anyway.


At the table next to us, there was this group of young Russian guys, who seemed to think it was really funny that we were talking mostly in English, but randomly busting out Russian words all the time. If you listened to them, you could tell that they were trying to figure out what we were talking about - when we started saying "pinecone," they got really confused. It was good-natured, though, and really funny - one of them spoke some English, and he started doing the same thing we were doing but reversed, talking all in Russian, with random English words interspersed. Then, when we were talking about how we weren't really sad not to be going to Moscow, since Moscow is so exasperating and confusing, he said in English loudly enough for us to hear, "Yeah, Moscow is shit!" And we replied, "My soglasni! (we agree!)" And then they really started laughing, and one of the other guys was like, in Russian, "Don't talk about Moscow like that, you guys, it's my motherland!" but he was clearly being sarcastic. And the English speaking guy offered us cigarettes, but none of us smoke, so he looked sad, like he'd missed his big opportunity to hit on some girls, and didn't have any other pickup lines. This was all much more entertaining for the fact that we were all half drunk at this point.

After we'd finished the bottle, Amanda really wanted Mexican, so we headed over to a bar/restaurant with the worrisome name of "La Cucaracha." (That's "the cockroach" in Spanish, y'all.) The nachos were good and the froo-froo girly drinks were better. Then Amanda and I walked Sofia to the metro so she could go home, and we went back to her house, where her host mother made us hot tea and made up a bed for me. And all of a sudden, I wasn't mad at Russia anymore.
- declared by Liusia @ 7:13 AM


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