Russia travelogue day 3: the furries

June 18 7:08 am
after walking in the streets of St. Petersburg I have come to a realization. Which is that if I really wanted to watch the world cup, I should have stayed home and followed the matches on TV. With everything else to do here, I just catch glimpses of the matches going on. So lesson number 4: if you really want to follow a tournament, make sure you schedule time to actually watch it.

First thing first, we didn't realize yesterday how tired we actually were. The plan today was to wake up at 9 am to go check out Hermitage museum and the winter palace. Well, sometime in the night, Shaks yelled " babe it's 1:00 pm" to which I groggily responded " ok" and closed my eyes again. She again said " it's 1 in morning! " and jumped out of the bed. Shamefully, it took me 10 more minutes to get my bearings and remember what was so important about 1'o clock. So we rushed and got out in just 1 hour 45 minutes! Hey we were going to see nobility and it wouldn't have befitted us to go there at a normal time. We had a responsibility to be late. I am glad to say that we succeeded at that endeavor. 

The museum is pretty ornate. There is a room full of Malachite called the malachite room. A gold room, full of so much glitter that you have to wear sunglasses, called ' the golden parlor'. A white room, with white walls and so forth. Every room was full of paintings and sculptures ranging from Italian artists to German ones. I think my favorite was 'lamentation of Christ' because it was so striking. And ' winter' was a great marble sculpture as well. Side note: outside of internet the most breasts you can see is in a middle age art museum. I wonder if I was not so desensitized by all the nudity so easily accessible, would I have found those patterns and paintings so much more evocative? I'm pretty sure I would have. It's kind of sad when 1000s of man hours loses because 1000s of people can press a button to upload nipples. It’s the price of modern life. Kind of ironic how privileged we are to see this art. Most of us would have died of dysentery in those times. Forget about having a chance to see a painting as big as a wall. For the art and the décor, the museums here are well worth the visit. 
We had a little photo session outside of the museum in the palace square. While Shaks was accosting strangers to take pictures of us, we were accosted by a man dressed as a furry animal. He forced Shaks to take bunch of pictures with him. It made me laugh to see her so uncomfortable. That laugh only lasted till the guy forced his head gear on my head and made Shaks pose with me. Hiding my face in some ones sweaty face mask is not an inviting idea at any level and for our troubles we were scammed out of 200 rubles. The kicker being that I have to agree with the scammer, the pics looked better with a giant mouse as my face. Lesson number 5 : it seems obvious but you really have to be forceful with tourist traps dressed as furry creatures. 
After this misadventure, we went right from middle age to as modern as it can get with a trip to CoCoCo, a restaurant featuring molecular gastronomic experience. Dishes featured sea weed foam, dessert shaped like knocked over flower pot, salmon ice cream and more. I wouldn't call it satisfying like a good meal is; I would call it an art that is enjoyed through your taste buds. Take that statement as you want. All in all, it cost us 150 bucks with two drinks which is cheap considering a similar 11 course meal in USA would have at least cost us twice excluding tips. 
Our night ended with a fun visit to Cuba libre, they had great drinks, and weekends they have a dj, who was playing international hits. Mostly, FIFA world cup songs which the international crowd was jamming to. Our chairs were taken away after a while to make space so we had to move on the dancefloor as well. Shaks can dance and I can do what is best described as that move from hitch interspersed with random jumps, so we managed couple hours between us. It was a great end to the day. 
Tomorrow, it's the cathedral of spilled blood. I leave you with a joke that I re-constructed because I'm sure I have heard it somewhere, I am not that funny to figure out a new pun joke all by myself. I knew the punchline so it only took me half an hour of walking before coming up with the set up to tell it to Shaks. So here goes:
what did the obituary of the herb seller read? 
"It was his thyme"

Russia travelogue- day 2 in st Petersburg: the quest

June 17 7:28 am
the sun sets in St. Petersburg at 1030 pm in summer. I knew it but still you have to see it to really understand it. It is liberation from the usual block of day we have been programmed to follow. The dinner doesn't have to be at 8. The offices can open at 10 in morning. Your night out starts at 12 am. The sun sets at 1030 and is up again at 330 in the morning. So we landed at 5:30, got out by 8 and have only just returned at 2 am. The dawn had already started peeking through as the sun will rise in another hour and half. Yes that's right.  I'm dead tired from all the walking and it's just first day. We might have got a bit excited there.
It was a lot of fun to see all the fans walking around, organizing chants for their teams. It finally feels like we are part of the world cup. I saw Egyptian fans the most although it's Russia they are facing soon. One random set of 10 or so Russian fans were trying to start a ru-ssi-aa chant. The other Russians just smiled and moved along. I think the real Russian fans are getting ready to March straight to the stadium tomorrow. On the other hand, the Egyptian fans were assembled in a square singing a song like they have experience with revolutions.
Shaks is a vacationing smoker. That is, she loves to smoke on vacations. We are walking the streets of Europe and in Europe smoking is a way of life. I saw people out in the party areas hanging out with the wine and smoke. So the thought slowly took root into shaks, and was at full force by 10 pm in the night that she needs to buy Russian cigarettes. So off we were on a quest to spot an open shop that sells cigarettes at that hour. That adventure made us step into every potential shop that looked like it might have some packs to sell.  It was miles of walking to and fro before a security in a souvenir shop pointed us to a place few blocks away which might have some. This was a spot behind the Nevsky prospect metro if you ever have to find it for yourself. It was a local pub area complete with coyote ugly bar and a strip club to boot. So you got your nice Russian women, your drunk Russians and also a group of Russian teenagers one of whom might have a stupid YouTube channel because he was using his camera and asking girls questions.  Shaks caught his attention while she was smoking. So his question first in Russian and then in broken English was "do you like cut or uncut dick?" We both rolled our eyes at that and Shaks said no comment. He didn't ask further and jogged back. For a moment I thought we had an ugly situation at our hands but it was just a teenager being an idiot.
Leaving that unpleasant experience aside, while we were walking we came across a street musician belting very familiar guitar licks. In fact, we kept hearing and walking to actually cross the street before the music made us stop and cross the road back to listen to him. His half burned, disfigured face oozing cool as his hands plucked the strings effortlessly. Shaks and I stood there for a minute, his version of comfortably numb washing over us. It felt a moment for just the two of us. The song is not romantic but there is something about Pink Floyd guitar that plucks the strings of our soul.
I will end this missive with the observation that Russian women are very well put together. They definitely take their appearance seriously, easy on the eyes. It also reminded me of my first visit to Milwaukee. I had a Russian driver who complained about the road construction, the weather and also Milwaukee’s women. His complaint about women? That they are out on streets wearing sweat pants and yoga pants. Imagine a rich Russian accent and the sentence " these women out in the morning in yoga pants. Come on... Try a bit more, this is not your living room. It's a restaurant." I think he might have been from St. Petersburg because I don't think I saw one yoga pant today.
This ended our first proper vacation day. Tomorrow is for museums and winter palace. Going to check out how the tsars lived and died.

Russia travelogue day 1: the rest of the plane ride

June 16th, 4:40 am:
I managed to catch some 4 hours of sleep before being served the breakfast. What i have wanted the most on this flight though is water. Unbeknownst to me,all the waiting in the airport and at home doesn't have to be exclusive, you can do other life saving things like drink water. So the first thing i asked is water at dinner time and the same now when we got breakfast. I saw the air hostess pick up a translucent small cup, gently pour the nectar of life into it. I even felt that it was magical, the bubbles floating up from the bottom, as if this water had a certain oomph to it. Like it was sparkling in the morning light peakng through the Windows. Gladly i brought the cup to my lips for a big cathartic sip. It was sparkling water. 
I felt like puking it back down into the cup. I hate sparkling water.  I have never had it unless by mistake. And after having a whole cup of it i have decided that sparkling water is what is wrong with humanity. We couldn't just have water? We had to jazz it up like it's a prostitute in the window of a red light district. What is the reasoning behind this whole invention? Here, water for people who hate the taste of water. Water for people who want soda but want to live at the same time. Water for those who like their water like their men/women, farting on the sly.  It's bastardization of the highest order.
I suffered silently since i am sitting in the middle and i could see another cart pushing in the other aisle. As politely as possible, i asked for water again. This time emphasizing “regular water please". The air host picked up a translucent cup, gently poured the nectar...cup to my lips for a big cathartic sip again. Immediately felt like needles poking my tongue as he continued to tell me that apparently all he has is the evil water. I hate evil water but I am thirsty and life goes on. We have other battles to fight. On to Lesson number 3, always have a bottle of water with you. It's too precious to leave it to others.

Anyway, time to land and rush to our connecting flight. We only have an hour after landing to the boarding of the next flight. Will we get to it in time? Find out after the break.

1:22 pm 
just made it. We had to run to the security gates. Where there were lines waiting to even form the lines the security lines. Shrishti ever resourceful, went to ask a security person who pointed to a board further ahead. Well that was all the excuse we needed to cut through the crowd to check if our flight was one of the lucky ones in the fast lane, unfortunately not. But at least we were in the front if the crowd just about to get into the lines. So it is 12:05 and we're in the line. 1:10 our flight departs.  Soon we find other poor souls taking the same route as us; one of the ladies had flight 15 minutes before us.  All of us next to the fast lane, wistfully eyeing the board while shuffling toward the long winding line. But no luck! Soon we were lost in the crowd. Another few nameless travelers added to the masses awaiting salvation. It was a long wait. We made it 30 steps in half an hour. The poor lady who came behind us and was in even worse situation as us went back to the polite but strict German attendant to ask if she could cross to fast lane. She could and that gave us the courage to ask him too and he relented seeing that it was already 1240. Now, when I call it fast lane, I'm being very generous because even with just around 50 folks ahead of us, it took us 20 more minutes to get to the security gates. The reason became obvious once we got there. 
There was a bouncer (security agent) who was doing a pre check before the x ray.  He had a look of mild inconvenience when shaks took out her big bag of toiletries. it soon turned into a look of considerable annoyance when he opened her bag and out popped three little bags. Each categorized and put together functionally. A bag for bath, a bag for make-up and a bag for contact solutions. To put it mildly he was not pleased and informed that only one 1l bag is allowed. We were running late and there was this new hitch on the road. So, I took her bag for myself and she was let pass but only after her face wash which had less than 3 ounces of stuff but the bottle itself was 12 ounce size was thrown away.  Now came my turn and when I put out one my bag and the other one I had taken from shaks, the agent sternly repeated himself. At this point I would have settled for anything to get to our flight so I decided to bite the bullet and ask him to throw all the creams I had away. At this point, he also had enough so he just waved my by.
Anxious for our bags to emerge from the maws of the X-Ray machine, I kept glancing at the clock which now read 1:05. I saw with dread when one of shaks bag was pulled for further check. I saw with further dread when the agent put a hand on my bag deciding whether it should be checked separately as well. Thankfully he decided against it. So while shaks stood there to get her bag picked apart, I took my stuff and rest of her stuff and bolted to the boarding gate. 
And I sit here now, plane has just taken off. I wave a silent good bye to Shaks who must have reached the gates after it closed. I'm sorry love; you can make it to Russia tomorrow. I will meanwhile seek consolation from the Egyptian beauty next to me. Just kidding, there is no Egyptian Beauty; there is a bald middle aged gentleman, who works as a bank manager. Also the plane boarded till 1:30, so shaks made it in time as well. Like a good fiance I waited for her to reach the gates before I boarded. Slightly anti-climactic that, there was no rushing to the gate and pleading to let us in. Just a queue to get into.

But as they say, you do it to feel the stress and anxiety of journey not the bliss of reaching the destination.
Time to nap some more. Next stop Russia!

Russia travelogue - day 0: the plane ride

June 15 10:34 pm
We have a take off. After 2 hour delay, we are up in the air. Shaks and me in our matching Argentina jacket, settling down in our seats. For last 3 hours i have been frantically downloading music, graphic novels, tv shows like it's water and i have been dying of thirst. I would have continued as well if it wasn't for the fact that i can't get any signal anymore. Some day I'm going to be comfortable with silence but today is not that day. Alright enough psuedo philosophy, I intend to record my daily travels so let's get back to that.
The day was sort of crazy as working days just before a big vacation tend to be.Shaks was out for 5 hours getting her hair colored! She just made it back in time to finish packing before we absolutely had to start for the airport. Lesson number 1on this trip: do not get a hair appointment on the day of travel. Her hair looks sweet though with light green shades mixing with browns and cascading down in curls from half way through. Every stand caressed by a meticulous stylist who kidnaps her clients for hours before they can resurface into the world reborn from a catalogue. Lesson number 2 then, do get a hair appointment before a trip if you're into that.
Now we are aloft in the middle of sky, and all i can think of is to get dinner and then catch some sleep. so tidbits that to throw at you, listening to blond by Frank ocean. reading saga comic series. Lugging my better half's heavier duffel, looking forward to the colored minarets of st Petersburg.
Dusvidaniya maybe?