Back in the States

So I made it back safely and after a night in London and a VERY long flight, I am in my room in California. I am slightly jet lagged, but happy to not have to lug a suitcase around anymore. But I miss Russia terribly. I had such an amazing time there and I cant wait to go back to see the city and my friends again. Many thanks to AIFS for keeping us safe and happy while we were there and to the Benjamin A. Gilman Scholarship for making this trip possible. I hope many more people can benefit from this amazing scholarship so that students can continue to experience new cultures as I did. 

Last week in Russia :(

I cant believe how quickly this semester went. I really am not ready to leave, and tomorrow is going to be a sad day. This week, however, has been wonderful. We had Monday off because of Victory day. There was a parade downtown, but I missed it because I was studying for finals. Tuesday I had two finals and then I had to study for my last final on Wednesday. Right after my last final, I went downtown and enjoyed the beautiful day. I met some Australian tourists, who were very nice and then I sat in a park for a bit. Then I volunteered in the Archaeology department at the Hermitage again. This time I got to work with bones, which was really cool! The women who worked there were showing me different specimens and explaining their significance. They also offered me coffee and tea during our break and we talked about politics (mainly the upcoming elections in both countries), economics, Russia vs. America, and lots of other interesting topics IN RUSSIAN! I was very proud of being able to say all of this in Russian. I am now very grateful to my conversation teacher, who taught us all this vocab. After they kicked me out  because we were done for the day, Esther and I went to our favorite Cafe and then walked around the city until we met up with our friend who took us around the city to a few places we hadnt been. It was very pretty.

It is truly amazing how long the days are here. It doesnt get dark until about 10 or 11. Seriously, I took this next picture close to 10 pm:

Still light outside! Also, the streets are still decorated from Victory Day.

 And I took this one a little after 10, and it is STILL very light! Its actually quite nice because you can get a lot more done.

 The next day Esther and I went to the Hermitage for the last time and saw the rest of the exhibits so we have officially seen every single room of one of the largest museums in the world! We were quite proud, then we went to St. Isaacs, and I climbed to the top and saw a panoramic view of the city!

Then we went for a lovely walk and ended up at the Naval museum and then I went to Peter and Paul fortress, which is one of the first places we went to when we got here, so it seemed right to go back.
    After that was the boat trip that AIFS took us on, followed by our goodbye dinner. It was really fun and a great way to end out our semester.
    Today we received our certificates of graduation as well as our transcripts. We said bye to the professors who were there and then Stephanie and I went on a lovely walk and said our goodbyes to downtown St. Petersburg. There were a few festivals/concerts downtown. I imagine there are even more in the summer, which makes me wish even more that we could stay! Tomorrow we leave, and I cant believe how wonderful this semester has been.
     

Peterhof

Ok I'll try to keep this short, since the pictures will do most of the explaining. Today AIFS took us to Peterhof, which was absolutely stunning. We had a private bus, which took 1.5 hours. The entire time, we thought it was going to rain and we lamented the bad weather, because we knew the fountains would be so much more beautiful in the sun. When we got there, we saw the palace, which was gorgeous, and waited for the main fountain to be turned on. As they turn on the amazing fountains, music plays. And the whole ordeal is magical. First of all, everything is GOLD

 Once the water turns on, it gets even more spectacular.

They gave us a few tours of the area, including the bath houses, which were super elaborate and looked very relaxing (I want one). Then we had free time, so I took a walk by the Gulf, where I saw a man standing in the wind in nothing but his underwear. Apparently this is common, and it is considered sunbathing, which is odd because it was still cloudy and at that point. Speaking of weather, though, the day ended up being beautiful, despite the yucky morning and reports that predicted heavy rain. By the time I was on my way back along the beach to return to the park, the sun was out and I was warm in my raincoat.
       I then walked around the park and was stunned by how amazing it was. I wish I could go back. There were fountains and trees everywhere. Everything was so clean, elaborate, and overwhelming to the senses. The nature at the park was also beautiful!

In summary, EVERYONE SHOULD SEE THIS PLACE! I had never heard of it before this program, and it is now near (if not at) the top of my list of most amazing places I have ever seen. It made me realize how lucky I am to be studying abroad with AIFS, which takes us on such amazing excursions and I am grateful for the Gilman scholarship, which allowed me to go on this amazing trip. So really, if you are even remotely near here, go see the fountains, but make sure they are on (aka dont come in winter). Also, bring me, because I definitely want to go back someday. 

Volunteering at the Hermitage!

As I mentioned before, I've been volunteering at the Hermitage, which is the main museum here. Whereas last time I greeted people at the entrance, which means I definitely have “hello” and “please take your coat to the cloak room. It is required” down. Although that was fun, and I got a lot of language practice, this past Tuesday was even better because they let us go to the Archaeology department. Even getting there is an amazing experience. You enter the museum feeling special with your volunteer access badge, which lets you (among other things) cut in line, enter where no one else can, and give off the impression that you know what you are doing.  They take you through some exhibits, past these tapestries through a door that says in big scary Russian letters DO NOT ENTER. You then go up a small sketchy spiral staircase with pipes randomly about, through a door that requires an access key (someone had to let us in…we weren’t THAT special).

We then were introduced to the staff and got situated at our work bench. They then put a bunch of pottery fragments in front of us, gave us some instructions, and left us on our own. We couldn’t believe that they were giving student volunteers such liberties with such important archaeological specimens. We felt so professional and quite special to be able to work with pieces from the HERMITAGE! We stayed almost an hour after our shift had ended, and we enjoyed every second of it. They kept asking us if we wanted to go home, and we kept refusing. I would like to brag that Esther and I are beasts and got through so many specimens and they at least acted impressed! When we finally did rip ourselves away (it is finals week), we went to find the lady who worked there to tell her we were leaving. She was in a room full of tools made from stone, bone, and wood. We spent about half an hour drilling her with questions about all the tools, where they were found, how old they are (REALLY old!), what they were used for, etc. She was very nice and answered all our questions. She also let us hold/touch/inspect anything we wanted, which was amazing! I was so happy and felt so fortunate to have the opportunity to gain the kind of archaeological experience that some students dream of by just signing a piece of paper and bringing a copy of my passport. I mean, how cool is it to say that you handled/catalogued specimens from the HERMITAGE museum?! We are going back as soon as we can. I wish I had started earlier! 

Novgorod!

Last Saturday we went to Novgorod, which is 3.5 hours away by bus. We had a nice tour and learned a bit about the history of the city. It has been bombed and destroyed, but it is still there. There were a ton of churches, monuments, and even a beach: 

Ra-Ra-Rasputin, fajitas, and more

Starting off with an amazing interior of the Hermitage

So last Saturday (I am a little behind, sorry) we went to Yusopov's palace, where Rasputin was killed. About half the tour was concentrated on that fateful night, and they even had recreations of the events. Unfortunately, we could not take pictures, but the palace was beautiful. The second half of the tour was all palace interior and we even got an impromptu a capella performance from four very talented men. They sang to demonstrate the excellent acoustics of that particular room. They would have sounded wonderful in a cardboard box, but the acoustics were in fact wonderful. In the palace was a theater. A legit theater. How cool would it be to have a mini Mariinsky theater in your house. Well, technically palace, but still, I was impressed.
    On Tuesday, Austin, Ester, and I went back to the Hermitage to do part II of our attempt to conquer the entire museum! We made some progress, and saw some amazing art. They have two whole rooms of Picasso paintings and a room of Matisse, and a wall full of Kandinsky! This museum is amazing. More on that in a later post.

One of my favorites

      This week I started experimenting with food, because I am getting tired of what I have been eating, so I made fajitas. I know this sort of undermines my attempt to immerse myself into the Russian culture, but they tasted so good. I also made guacamole, which was inspired by my suitemate, who had made it earlier in the week. The habaneros here are actually pretty spicy, which was a pleasant surprise. 

       On Thursday I went to a special Russian Club event that teaches you about Kyrgyzstan and we got to eat some traditional food, which was delicious. A lot of people went, and I had a great time. Friday, we had a field trip for my St. Petersburg class to the musical instruments museum. It is one of the largest musical instruments museums in the world and has lots of cool exhibits like the largest flute in the world, old Russian horns, the precursor to the piano, and a cool instrument that is essentially a bunch of large wine glasses that turn and dip into water so you can run your fingers along the rims and make music out of 'that wine glass noise.' I hope you all know what I am talking about. Anyways they also have a station where you can hear what all of the instruments sound like. Ok Novgorod  and Hermitage volunteer work next time! 

Out a random window. I love this city.

Finland/Estonia

Ok sorry this took so long. Anyways if you want the short version, Finland and Estonia were amazing! There, now you don’t have read the rest of this post :). But really, I loved them both, for different reasons. Ok where to start? We took a BOAT to Finland. AIFS described it as a ferry, but this thing was a cruise ship! It was an overnight ferry (cruise) so we had 4 to a room and I was with my normal suitemates. The rooms were pretty nice and the beds were comfy. A bunch of us stood on the deck for HOURS watching the boat (cruise ship) crash into the ice floating on the Gulf of Finland and we saw a gorgeous sunset.

After the sunset, we realized we had lost sensation in most of our bodies, so we went inside. The boat had plenty of entertainment from casinos to restaurants, a club, a café, a sauna, a movie theater, a performance room, and probably lots of other things that I never saw. The next morning we got a complimentary breakfast and then we got off the boat and were in FINLAND! I was expecting very stern customs officers who would drill me on my reasons for being there, but instead my customs officer smiled at me and asked if I would be doing a lot of shopping in Finland. That pretty much sums up how awesome the people were in Finland. We got a quick tour of Helsinki by a very nice Finnish lady and had an amazing salmon lunch. Then went to our hostel, which was really nice and very close to the gulf of Finland. This is important because later that day two of my suitemates and I SWAM IN THE GULF OF FINLAND!!

It was amazing and SOO much fun! It was cold (duh) but I would do it again in a heartbeat. It wasn’t even that cold when we got out, even though we swam among floating pieces of ice. The rest of the day was spent walking around Helsinki and hanging out in a restaurant/bar called iguana. This place will be important later. We also went to an Ice bar, which was really interesting.

       

     The next day we got up at 5 to go to Tallinn. Tallinn is quite possibly one of the cutest places in the world. We went to the old city, which is straight out of a medieval movie. Mom, if you are reading this, it is pretty much what you wanted Solvang to be. Anyways all the streets were cute, all the buildings were beautiful, and all the people were nice. I cant comment on Estonian food, but the coffee was good. Oh and they had roasted almonds, kind of like what they have in NYC but WAY better and probably cheaper. Anyways we pretty much had the day to wander around the city and it is small enough that you can go around the entire city in about an hour so we just strolled in the sun. That night we went back to Helsinki. 

  The next morning was our last in Helsinki, к сожалению. We went to the modern art museum, which was amazing and they had a special African exhibit, which I very much enjoyed. Then we went back to Iguana, where Jake and I attempted to win an eating competition where you have to eat a very large, very spicy pizza by yourself and then you get your name on their wall of fame. I should say that I attempted, and Jake succeeded. He did a great job, whereas I only finished half. It was a very large pizza. After that, we went back the dock and got back on our cruise ship and sailed (not literally) back home. I slept the entire way back.