Hello from Russia!

Firstly I appologize for the delay in this post, but things are crazy and we don't have an internet connection in the Gostinitsa (hotel) yet.

As some of you may know by now, our arrival in Russia was horribly stressful! Our first flight from Calgary to Toronto was delayed because of numerous issues. Firstly one of its engines would not start (-24 degrees was apparently far too cold : P), and once that was fixed, the washrooms on board crapped out (sorry, no pun intended) so those had to be fixed as well before we were able to take off. As a result of these delays we arrived in Toronto only 1/2 hour before our flight to Frankfurt was supposed to take off. A steward on our plane informed me that we would still make it, so we rushed off the plane, raced through the terminal, up a level, down a long corridor through two passport checks, down a level, to the far end of a terminal and hurrah! our plane was still sitting at its gate . . . but the flight was closed we were informed and we were not allowed on! So we missed our plane, and yet could see it sitting out there waiting to taxi out, with our entire group (all of the Students and Dr. Pereira from the Dalhousie group) on it. Air Canada was able to get us on a flight later that night (5hrs or so behind the first) and were gracious enough to give us 24 whole dollars to buy dinner (astoundingly generous I know)! However because of this huge set back, we ended up missing our flight in Frankfurt as well, which meant that we had to travel into Russia alone, without the rest of the Canadian students and without our Coordinator. We asked Air Canada to send a message to him on the flight giving him our new flight information, so that when we finally did arrive, he could arrange for someone to be waiting for us at the air port. This, as we know now, never happened. They neglected to give him our message, so he had no idea when we would arrive, and so, no one was waiting for us! Luckily (thankgoodness!) we met another student, who is from Saskatchewan and also studying at the Smolny Institute of Russian language and culture, on the flight and a driver was waiting to pick him up. He was being housed in the same "gostinitsa" (hotel) as us and so we convinced the driver to take all of us, even though he was only expecting one student.

It took an hour or so for him to drive us to our residence, and once inside we had to communicate with the women who work in the front lobby and explain who we were. After nearly 26 hours of travel, and with out meager Russian we finally sorted everything out and one of them took us too our rooms! Ross and I are sharing a room together, which shares a bathroom and kitchen with two other bedrooms. Our roommates are Laura and Jessie (students from Ontario), and Erin (our classmate from Victoria) and Natasha (who is from Dalhousie). Poor Ross seems always to be stuck with only girls, but luckily our male classmates from Dalhousie and Ontario live just downstairs. He has also befriended (in a way) a student from China who is studying business at St.Petersburg State University's main campus (Smolny, our school, is affiliated with this), who we met while waiting for the elevator. They initially spoke to each other in english, which was a bit difficult for the Chinese student, so Ross switched over into Chinese, which at first astounded the Chinese Student!

Since arriving, we have visited the centre of the city, where all of the large stores and sites are, purchased cell phones (email me if you want our numbers, although it might be quite expensive for you to call; it is free for us to recieve calls), had photos taken for our student ids, bought groceries etc, taken our initial placement tests, and now have been placed in our classes.

So far (this is only our 2nd day of class) we have very much liked all of our teachers, who speak almost completely in Russian but occassionally explain a word in English. We have either two or three classes each day: "Razgovor" (conversation), Grammar, Literature, Film, a Mass Media Class in which we read and translate the newspaper, and Phonetics.

About the City: the buildings all look very old, some of them very dirty and falling appart, but some of them, in the city centre or if they are of importance are immaculate. But none of the buildings seem to be taller than 10 or so stories, especially in the centre of the city. There are people everywhere! We are told the population is around 5 million or so, but an exact figure is hard to determine. It has been very dark in the mornings when we get up, it doesn't seem to get very light until around 10 o'clock and even then it is not ever very bright and sunny. It has been very warm however, above zero nearly every day but feeling cooler because of the wind and damp. The streets are packed with cars, and I think the designated lanes are often ignored. Pedestrians do not have the right of way here, so crossing in places often takes a great deal of time, but in busy places there are walkways that go below the street. The metro here is fantastically convienent. In the morning we are taken to school by bus right from our residence, but in the afternoon, we walk the 20 or so minutes to the Chernishevskaya Metro Station, which we take a stop, then transfer to a different line and travel two more stops to Primorskaya Station which is about 15 mintues from our residence. Also near our residence are several grocery stores ( the signs say "supermarket," "paterson" etc. . . only written in cyrillic, many signs here are actually in english) which have everything under the sun in them! Really good, dense rye breads (the danish blood in me says yum!), nuttella!, many juices, pasta, rice, everything, and many products from north america or scandinavia (some very good looking pickled herring which I intend to buy when next go shopping and some of the same canned sardines which you buy mom). The only downside here is that the vegetables and fruit are not fresh and often have gone bad. So we have been drinking fruit juice, cooking frozen vegetables, and eating canned fruits too.

To sum up... (running out of minutes on school computer!) Things are fantastic! We are already starting to feel very comfortable here (perhaps largely because we have each other, I am sure some of the others with us are feeling a little more homesick and out of place), and are enjoying soaking up the city.

Hoping you are all well, Stay tuned for more:
Love Leah (and Ross too)

T-Minus 3 Days

Hello! Now that we have been thoroughly inoculated against various diseases (hepatitis, thyphoid, cholera :S) we are ready for Russia . . . We hope. All of our preparations have been made and now we are just getting excited (Leah more so than Ross who of course remains perfectly calm). We have even purchased EU train passes for Germany, France, Spain and the Czech Republic (yes that's right whether he likes it or not Ross is going there now, but only if Leah admits defeat and agrees to go to Belarus)! We hope this blog will keep you, both updated and entertained, on our adventures abroad. Stay tuned for St.Petersburg survival tips from our first few days :D

Luv Leah and Ross