Day Eleven

It’s hard to believe our trip is winding down, we have learned so much and have seen some amazing sights.

Today was another beautiful day. We started off at Church of Christ the Savior on Spilled Blood—a stunning Orthodox Church with the interior comprised entirely of mosaics. It received its name from an assassination attempt of Alexander II in 1881. A bomb was thrown at his carriage as it traveled along the river—The bomb reached its destination, killing the assassin and fatally wounding Tsar Alexander.

In honor of his father Alexander II, Alexander III began construction of the Church in 1883 on the sight of the attack. The structure is simply beautiful and very closely resembles St. Basil’s Cathedral in Moscow.

After our tour we said a sad goodbye to our tour guide Svetlana and ventured off for the afternoon, exploring St. Petersburg and enjoying each others’ company.

The 12 of us met for dinner at “Café St. Petersburg”—a local, traditional restaurant near Church of Our Savior. This dinner was a special one, as it was our last dinner together. We took advantage of the time together and practiced an honored Russian tradition of toasting. In Russian culture, a group or individual will toast someone in place of giving a gift or present. We took the opportunity to toast Jane, without whom this trip would not have been possible. The toasts expanded to appreciation of our chaperones and recognition of the camaraderie of the group. It has been a phenomenal experience, every personality has contributed and made the trip what its been.

After dinner, we walked to “Ceber” (The Russian word for ‘North’), the most famous bakery as recommended by locals in St. Petersburg. After enjoying dessert there, we understood why!

Thank you again to all our family and friends who have kept up with the blog! We have tremendously appreciated the comments and thoughts—See you all soon!

Gretchen S

Day Ten

Today was another stupendous day here in St. Petersburg!  We had our second day of touring summer palaces, so we journeyed to the countryside by bus and arrived at Peterhoff, the beautiful seaside residence and favorite palace of Peter the Great (the first Romanoff to reign and the founder of the city of St. Petersburg).  The palace was a gorgeous yellow color in the French style because the entire grounds was meant to be modeled after France and is called “the Russian Versailles.”  We arrived just before 11 am—in time to see the ceremonial turning on of the fountains which is set music and is quite lovely.  As we looked over the balcony, we saw a cascade of fountains and a canal leading out to the Baltic Sea.  After witnessing this, we toured the palace and saw beautiful rooms, restored after they were completely destroyed by Nazi occupation during WWII.  Some of my favorites were the bedrooms of Peter the Great and Catherine the Great—we actually got to see their beds, which was really cool.  Then we walked around the gardens and saw many unique fountains, such as one that spurts up at random times so that children can run through it and one that is a waterfall that looks like a chess board.  We also got to stand right on the shore of the sea and take pictures.  We planned to swim in the water, and even brought our bathrobes (J), but we ran out of time and it was a bit cold anyways.  We also were short on time due to a very large tour in front of us in the museum that would not let us pass.  Apparently, local guides do not want international tours to pass them because they are somewhat jealous of the guides of international tours and think they have the right to be first if they are leading Russian people.  It was unfortunate for us, but interesting to learn this cultural difference.  After walking through the gardens and grabbing a bite to eat, we had to catch the bus.  However, we could have stayed in those gardens all day due to their beauty and numerous fountains.

When we returned to the hotel, we had a conference with 3 business people in the hotel to learn about their lives and their businesses.  I won’t go in to great detail on our conversation, but it was very interesting and we all had many questions for them!  One of the most interesting points in the conversation was when we asked why they are proud to be Russian and they turned the question back around to us as Americans.  It was very difficult to answer and made for a good conversation.  Please ask your daughters/sisters/friends who came on this trip to tell you more about our conference because it was a very unique experience!

After that, we had only a couple hours to get ready for the ballet that we would be going to that night.  We ended up walking the whole way to the theater (15-20 blocks), and only arrived there 10 minutes before the show but were still the first to sit down in our section… that’s Russians for you!  The theater was recently-renovated and was simply stunning.  As for the performance, the dancers were spot on and Mary said it as the best performance of the Nutcracker she’s ever been to and she goes every year!  Simply amazing and so surreal.  Gretchen joked that she only goes to the ballet in Russia, which is funny to joke about, but amazing that it is actually true that we went there!
After this, it was 10 pm and we had planned to stay out for the White Nights celebration to see the draw bridges being lifted over the River Neva.  We got dinner and had to wait until 12:15 pm to get a boat.  Others of us decided to walk around a bit and go back to the hotel.  On the boat, the view of the bridges was amazing and it was awesome to see both the water packed with boats and the shore packed with onlookers all out at 1:30 in the morning to witness this amazing festival that only takes place in St. Petersburg for a few weeks until the Summer Solstice.  When we finally got off the boat and walked back to our hotel, it was passed 2 am and we basically all headed straight to our rooms and passed out from exhaustion.  What a wonderful, yet extremely busy day!  More from Gretchen tomorrow.

With love, from Russia,

Shaughnessy

Summery Summary of the Day

Priviet! (That's "hello" in Russian--I'm sure I spelled it wrong, but phonetically that is how it sounds at the very least!)

Today was another grand day for the Bennies as we traveled outside of St. Petersburg to nearby suburbs to visit a couple of summer palaces of the Russian royals. Our first stop was at Catherine the Great's summer palace. The place was huge! The palace spanned many meters and is one of the biggest palaces in the country. While we're well versed in tours at this point in our trip, today was different because all guest had to wear fun little booties while touring each of the palaces (check out the picture below to see what we sauntered around in--very stylish!) This was done to preserve the originality of the royals' homes. Catherine's summer home was stunning--done completely in gilded Baroque style with lots of details in each of the rooms of the palace. It was very lavish and ornate; it almost looked unreal. I felt like I was in an actual fairy tale and I kept hoping at any minute my fairy godmother would show up to spin my outfit into a grand ballgown so I could waltz the day away. The place was incredibly gorgeous, but the thing that will stick with me from the tour is that Catherine's palace had to be rebuilt after World War II. During the war it was occupied by soldiers and completely stripped--75% of the treasures and belongings in the place were lost during the war. Only the outer walls and parts of the ceiling were left by the end of the war. In the 1960s the Russian government decided to rebuild and restore the summer palace to it's former glory and a thirty year labor of love began. It was inspiring to see the pictures of it during the war and then to walk through it completely redone, dazzling crowds on a daily basis. To me, this lesson of hard work, rebirth and revitalization will stay with me for a long time.

The second palace we visited was the summer home to Peter the Great. Compared with Catherine's summer palace, Peter's seasonal home was not nearly as grand, but many of the students said they preferred it more because it was smaller and felt more homey. It was still quite large, but not nearly as lavish. The fun thing about this palace was that the royals built a bedroom complete with a massive gilded canopy bed just for show! They never used it! The bed was really lovely and it's a shame to think that it was never used, only looked at when guests visited. Silly royals and their money.

I want to talk for a moment about Russia and some of the things we're experiencing as we're abroad. Everyone's done a fabulous job of capturing the day-to-day events, but so much happens that we could blog for hours and still not tell about everything! For me, Russian culture has been really interesting to experience. The biggest difference that I have noticed is that Russians rarely smile. This is a bit of a challenge for me to comprehend because I'm always smiling and laughing--and because of that I've definitely gotten some odd looks from people on the subways and sidewalks! The cultural norm is just different--people are much more reserved here whereas Americans are more likely to express and emote.

The other thing I've noticed is that Russian women dress a lot differently than American women. On a daily basis I wear jeans and cardigans. Here, it's like a fashion show as the women wear beautiful dresses and heels every day. I am inspired on a moment-to-moment basis because many of the young women here look like they are dressed to go to a party or the theater. They look stunning! We've asked some of the young women we've encountered about this and they've said that it's just the norm here. Women want to look good; they want to give the impression that they're put together and come from a good background--even if that isn't necessarily the case.

I must close for now, as tomorrow we have another big day. We're going to the coast of the Baltic Sea--we're all so excited! We'll also chat with some Russian business women to hear about their journeys and then we'll get to experience a true Russian ballet, The Nutcracker! It'll be another wonderful day for us as we wrap up our adventure abroad. We all send our love! Dasvidanya! (That's Russian for "goodbye".)

~ Krissy P

Day Seven - Hermitage!

Today was another great day in St. Petersburg!  At 9:30 this morning we met up with Svetlana and rode the public bus to the Hermitage.  The bus was very user friendly—we were able to buy tickets in the bus itself. 

After making a few stops, the bus made it to the area of the Hermitage in time for our 10:15 entrance into the museum.  A large part of the Hermitage had been a residence of Russian tsars.  It was beautiful!  The entrance to the exhibits had a magnificent staircase.  Everyone imagined themselves as guests of the royal family as we climbed the stairs and entered several halls and throne rooms.  While in one of the first rooms, our group increased by one.  A woman apparently from the Ural Mountains tagged along with us for almost two hours!  We didn’t think she spoke English, but she seemed interested in Svetlana’s tour anyway.

Unfortunately, we could not see the entire collection at the Hermitage.  It contains so many masterpieces and artifacts that it would take three years to see the each piece for only one minute.  We enjoyed touring for two hours, but then we were ready to have lunch with Jane’s friend who was a curator there.  Jane’s friend told us about Hermitage and her experiences as a woman in Soviet and Post-Soviet times.  It was really interesting to hear her perspective.  She seemed like a brilliant person! 

After our two-hour lunch break, we toured the treasury at the Hermitage.  Our guide there told us about almost every broach, snuff box, necklace and crown on display. It was interesting to find out how jewelers disguised less expensive gems to look more luxurious.  For example, jewelers could dye one type of porous gem in hot water.  Jewelers also set clear diamonds on colored foil to look like a different, rarer type of diamond. 

After the tour, several of us rode the bus by ourselves while others enjoyed a second boat tour.  Now we have the evening off and are planning a game of Mafia.  I’m sure more will be posted tomorrow!

Sarah S.

PS: Keep commenting! We love hearing from all of you!

 

Day Six - More Russian Adventures!

Hi Russia trip followers!

Tuesday marked the half way point of our Russian adventure! It’s hard to believe that we started traveling one week ago. Time has been flying by, with each day filled with exciting new experiences.

Tuesday was no exception. We began the day with a trip to St. Isaacs Cathedral in St. Petersburg.  This gorgeous church is the 4^th largest cathedral in the world. It was perfect timing for us to go there, because the day before was St. Isaac’s Day and the day Peter the Great was born. After touring the inside, some of us ventured up to the roof of the cathedral that circled the main dome. The view was definitely worth the 250 steps up to it!

After some people sun bathed in a nearby park, we all decided to take a boat tour. Because of the many rivers and canals going through the city, there are boats everywhere giving tours. We boarded a boat and set off with our guide Max (Hi Max if you went to our site like we told you to!). This was the most perfect day we could have asked for! Not a cloud in the sky, a slight breeze, and 80 degree weather made for a great time to soak up the sun and take pictures as we floated through St. Petersburg.

Next we walked to a little market and got food for a picnic in the park. We relaxed and ate in the grass for a couple hours before walking back to the hotel. We took the metro to visit Jane’s friends Marina and Ura later that night. Marina was a ballerina and gymnast, then a gymnastics coach for many years. Ura has worked as a service engineer for the metro most of his life. They graciously shared their home with us and were open to any questions we had about Russia and their lives. Marina even sang for us before we left!

Overall, it was a fun, eventful, and relaxing day!

Stay tuned for what else we are up to in Russia J

Molly J.