Editor’s Note:  The Minkey is compelled to jump ahead a few countries and share her time in Russia….  don’t worry, we are preparing posts on the other Nordic stops, I promise.

I grew up in cold war central – all the bad guys in every movie were Russian, remember?  Films like War Games, The Falcon and the Snowman, Rocky IV, No Way Out (big twist in that one, huh!), Red Dawn, and many more.  Yeah…. Red Dawn.  That was a rough one, right?  When the tanks roll in and shoot up the school, because obviously that is how the Soviets would start an invasion, for sure.  And Patrick Swayze and the other kids are holed up in the mountains, like guerrilla freedom fighters?  Oh the drama!  We were inculcated with the fear of communism and the USSR and global thermo nuclear war… so it is kind of surreal to actually BE on Russian soil.  It is mind-boggling how much has changed in the past forty years, though some would probably argue that it hasn’t changed that much, only the window dressing, but let’s not talk politics.

Anyway – I’m on this interminable train journey to St. Petersburg with a Russian couple in my cabin.  You know the type, it has four bunks and a fold-out table at the base of the window.  The woman-half of the Russian couple speaks English – though it’s unclear how well she speaks English.  She has been helpful in explaining what various train employees have told us or asked me personally.  Otherwise she and her guy have sat across from me canoodling and whispering in Russian.  I am not sure WHY they are whispering since I can’t understand a damn thing they are saying —  and it is starting to annoy the living crap out of me.  And we still have three hours before landing at St. Petersburg.

The border shenanigans have been entertaining.  First stopping at the Estonian border – leaving the EU behind and getting my passport examined and stamped by their border police.  I actually thought that was the Russian border crossing… HA.  The Russians stopped us minutes after the Estonian border police and we went through much the same rigamarole, although they had soldiers, a german shepherd and a Nurse Ratched type of gal who took my passport and barked at me about the migration card.  Welcome to Russian bureaucracy.  They make you fill out this little card with your vitals and they hold on to one half and you hold on to the other.  It must be presented when you leave Russia.  And at this point I’m thinking, like you don’t already have me tagged on a few different systems just by running my passport through the handheld computer!

Back in Estonia I saw first-hand some of the devices the Soviets used for surveillance at the Museum of Occupation… which was depressing as hell.  It required a chocolate gelato fix after the fact.  But I digress.  I’d been freaking out about this moment because I don’t have the address of my ‘sponsor’…  because when traveling to Russia you must have an invitation letter from someone there who basically vouches for the fact that you are not coming to stay forever, in Russia (after being here for some time, I don’t know why you’d want to do that anyway).  Soooo, I left that part of the form blank and Nurse Ratched snatched it and disappeared.  The Russian lovebirds across from me took all of this in and the woman-half curved her lips slightly upwards, barely a smile – I think she was attempting to be reassuring.  I was ready for some type of interrogation when Nurse Ratched appeared, tossed my passport at me and that was that.  I was in!

Several hours later we reached St. Petersburg at midnight.  Apparently about eight other trains arrived then as well – because it was wall-to-wall people.  Not only that, there was a train getting ready to leave playing martial-themed music over the loudspeakers – I believe this is the Moscow Express train that leaves every night (approximately at midnight) …  Craziness.  I’ve been in many train stations around the world and never have I seen a train with it’s own theme music!

I needed to boogie over to my Airbnb rental and my plan was to take Uber.  The metro in Cyrillic frightened me, so Uber it was.  Before that though, I had to get some cash, because my wonderful Airbnb people wanted 1,000 rubles since I was outside of regular check-in times.  This was a hoot.  And one of those times when I needed my own camera crew to follow me around as I attempted to figure out which machines were actually ATMs.  It was so ridiculous – after spending time at one machine that was supposed to take your dollars and convert them into rubles – where I would feed it 20 dollar bills and it would click and whir and then open the magic door and give me back the same 20 dollar bills … (I’m laughing even now as I write this – it was so damn funny)…  I just stood in front of this machine laughing hysterically.  And hoped I did not draw any attention from the police, who are everywhere at the station.  I wandered down another hallway and found a green machine that turned out to be an ATM.  Hallelujah!

You realize, there is essentially not a word of English or even a word in the Roman alphabet at the train station (or really anywhere else).  There are a few signs with pictures (like a suitcase) and some of those had one word, like ‘luggage’.  But it is damn tough to figure out ANYTHING.  And, nobody speaks English …especially in St. Petersburg (I’m finding Moscow to be a bit different).

I requested an Uber and wondered how in the world the driver would find me.  The train station is situated on a huge traffic circle with obligatory monument in the middle (in this case, Hero City Obelisk WWII commemoration).  But it was night and I had no clue about names of the surrounding boulevards and figured this Uber driver spoke no English anyway.  He arrived at some other spot – and I texted him that I was in front of the station.  And then I laughed out loud – wondering if he could figure out the English.  Somehow – he found me.  And yes, he had really no English skills whatsoever.  Then he dropped me off at the wrong place – the numbering of Russian buildings is odd.  I was at 13 Nevsky Prospect, and he dropped me at something called 13/9 Nevsky Prospect.  I could not even find a door with only the number 13.  Luckily, the Airbnb gal found me and took me in through a red door (with no numbering) and into what might be a building that has seen no renovations since it was built, maybe 1901.  Maybe even earlier.  Obviously no elevator.

I have now come to realize that it is a Russian thing to allow the internal common areas of the building to completely fall apart and slowly decay; but the apartments in the building all appear to be updated.  At least some of them are updated.  Another characteristic of these buildings is to have a big iron door that opens into a vestibule area where there are one or more individual apartments with their own front doors.  Some of these apartment enclaves are updated and have very modern looking doors.  Others are not.  Like the place I walked into.  Old iron door, vestibule smelling of tobacco (who am I kidding, most of Russia smells like tobacco) and we walk towards the ancient wood slat door.  Oh yeah, my internal alarm bells were already ringing.

Upon walking into the apartment I first noticed the smell – which was a strong musty odor and unpleasant.  Really unpleasant (after several days in the place, I decided that the drains were part of the unpleasant odor problem … eeew).  It’s dark and dingy with a very eclectic decorating style that consists of fancy patterned wall-paper with vinyl brick-like wainscoting.  The floor must be as old as the building and I believe they put down linoleum on top of the original wood flooring which is now uneven, slanted, and extraordinarily creaky.  The doors sound like the moo-can toys little kids have (remember, you turn them upside down and they have a kind of sick sounding moo?).  There are odd nooks and crannies in a few of the rooms and I did not look closely to see what might be stored (or living) there.  The kitchen stove was missing a few knobs and parts of the burners – it had seen better days.  The lighting was haphazard, at least in the bedroom, main living room and bathrooms it was really quite bright (which was unfortunate in the bathrooms) – but the hall and kitchen was basically dark, complete with broken fixtures hanging out of the walls and ceilings.  Bah.

Things were not quite laid out as you would expect, with the microwave on the kitchen table, all the plastic folding chairs for the kitchen table were set up around a square coffee table in the living room area and they had all kinds of sheets and towels on a drying rack in the space that was supposed to have a desk – which did have the desk – but unclear what I was supposed to do with the laundry …   The refrigerator was in the hall way and sounded like an airplane engine taking off.  I have been in many Airbnb places now and have NEVER encountered a dump like this one.

Let’s just say that I did not sleep so well – especially with pillows that were stuffed with an unknown material that seemed to harden into curvy cement walls – argh.  In the bedroom there is nothing but sheer curtains which meant I was bathed in the brilliant building lights from the courtyard all night long, and then broad daylight invaded the room.  It was not ideal.  But it was cheap!  AND pretty much the only thing it had going for it was the location.  A five-minute walk to Palace Square and the Hermitage complex, metro around the corner, St. Isaacs Cathedral down the street, Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood down the street – I mean most monuments and museums that you want to visit – you were within walking distance.  That was fabulous.  AND – it was next door to the most amazing restaurant that makes some kind of Russian meat pies.  These are square and rectangle shaped (sometimes fish shaped) buttery pastry dough complete with decorative dough leaves and flowers across the top, stuffed with spiced ground meat, salmon and dill with cream sauce, chicken and mushrooms with rice, and the list goes on.  They had fruit pies too, but you already know I did not try those!  This place is called Stolle and if you are in St. Petersburg – you gotta check it out.

 

Not an auspicious beginning to my trek through Russia —   promise to share more about how to get around as a tourist when pretty much nothing is in English!