April 30, 2008

Lisa slept well but I didn't. Guess it took me an extra day for the jet lag to hit.

Got up with the plan to hit the Hermitage today. Everyone in the family except me dreads large museums so we our plan was that after 3 hours we had to leave no matter what. Well I lost at 1.5 hour mark!!! We got there right at 10:30AM when it opened and it took an 1/2 hour to get our ticket. Started out at the Jordan staircase then headed to a special exhibit on Arabian Art. Pretty cool tents they had set up. We then hit the older European art which bored everyone except me. Did a quick tour of the French impressionists and the headed out at 12:30PM.

We then walked across the bridge with the idea of having Blinni for lunch from one of the two fast food chains that Hannah likes and then hit the Mendeleev Museum. Well it turns out that the museum is just on the other side of the bridge. Hannah was able to pick the right building in the St Petersburg State University 'Campus' and after some help from a student / teacher we found the correct door. After ringing the bell, a nice older lady came out took our coats and turned on the lights. Turns out that Wednesdays is not the day for the English tour. Hannah helped us decipher some of the texts but we were able to spot the early artifacts of the Periodic Table. After 3 rooms of pictures and letters, another woman came out and turned on the lights in his office. This was our chance to ask questions. She pointed out his more than 100 diplomas, the vast array of art reproductions that he collected on his wanderings around the world, his 6 children, and some of his inventions. She pointed out that he was the first petroleum engineer and that his travels took him to Western PA hitting Oil City and Pittsburgh.

A short 20 minute walk with Hannah pointing us towards the Geological Museum (check out the symposium in June), she found a Blinni restaurant. We tried the cheese, chicken, mushroom, and plain one covered with sweeten evaporated milk. We all loved the last one. The 'Rock' museum is a great find that the Lonely Planet guide pointed out. It is a huge building where we had to wait for a nice old man to come down and escort us up to the 3rd floor climbing up a magnificent stone staircase. We get in there and he asks for a donation and points us to the areas. This place takes the whole 3rd floor and has case after case of rocks. Highlights are a 20 ft dinosaur skeleton, some cool geodes, and the advertised map of Russia made of precious and semi-precious rocks. We really like the 2 cases were they had polished various rocks and matched them with photographs of art or nature that looked remarkably similar.

After this Hannah finally agreed to give us our first taste of public transportation. We caught a tolley that would take us to her host apartment where her host mother was to entertain us for late afternoon tea. First we got off a mile before her apartment and we walked to see the Bay of Finland. Then off to her apartment which Lisa remarked looked very similar to the high rises in the Bronx. Her host mother was very excited and had bought a fancy cake, some Russian Easter Bread, 2 kinds of jelly, and brought out her fancy teacups. We had a nice time sitting in her 50 square foot kitchen, listening to her talk Russian and Hannah translating for us. She had bought us gift of a picture book of St Petersburg but didn't double check the language; it was in Italian!!!

We headed back to our hotel area to have dinner with one of Hannah's friends at an Indian restaurant that they liked. This time Hannah took us on a Mishipoo(sic), a private van that follows the bus routes. This was a rat trap van and it filled up about 1/3 of the way into town. Needless to say we made it...

The evening ended with Lisa and I having a drink in the Renaissance lobby with the intention of listening to the harp player. She wasn't that good but quit fairly soon after we got there. I got interested in the UEFA Chelsea vs Liverpool game and noticed this cute petite girls heading back to the restaurant with these huge burley guys. Turns out that all over St Petersburg we saw these posters for "The Pussycat Dolls". Lisa brought Sam down to verify that they were the real thing.