New York, New York, It's a H*** of a Town (October 3)

I have fallen in love with American names,
The sharp names that never get fat,
The snakeskin-titles of mining-claims,
The plumed war-bonnet of Medicine Hat,
Tucson and Deadwood and Lost Mule Flat.

                                                                                 
                                                                               Stephen Vincent Benèt - American Names (1927)

 

...Because, as all South Africans know, the friends in the USA don't like it when we say h***. Other profanities are perfectly acceptable, but you can't say d*** either. Blasphemy is ok. This was on my mind on the long flight from Johannesburg to New York, not because I am the loose-tongued sort who's every other word is an expletive, but more out of fascination with a cultural detail that I don't understand. Why are two words that are so permissible in South Africa and the rest of the English-speaking world so stigmatized here, but others that we consider so much worse are not? I imagine parents scrambling to clamp their hands around their children's ears when I accidentally let slip the d-word while explaining to Sini what a levee is after she's been listening to 'When The Levee Breaks' by Led Zeppelin (on our playlist for this trip). Also, if it's so bad, how come they say those words on family television so often?

Of course television and reality differ, and before you say 'no really, you think?', I'll qualify that statement by saying that my impression of America up to this point is based almost entirely on the American television shows and movies that I've watched since I was a kid. And because of that, I tended to put off visiting the US because I felt like I knew it already.  No mystery, no culture shock, nothing to explore or be surprised by, none of the reasons why we like to travel.  In fact, were it not for the fact that my sister and brother-in-law now live in NYC permanently, we might not have done this trip at all in favour of China or India again.     

But that little detail has rapidly advanced the USA up the list and now, after years of saving, months of planning, weeks of getting really excited as the reality sinks in that we are actually going, and at least 6 days in packing, unpacking, and repacking (not because we had to but because it's fun!), we finally touch down at JFK airport on a warm late-Friday afternoon. We are met by Su-lin and Paul, which is a good thing because, contrary to the impression just about every New York based television show gives you, New York taxis are really, really expensive. We fight our way through the legendary traffic, all the while scanning our surroundings for some sign that this is the USA. I doubt that this is what Paul Simon was thinking of when he and Art Garfunkel sang about looking for America, but we don't see it yet. At ground level, all cities look the same - grey concrete, neon lights, endless streams of cars. An hour and a half of this, and Paul drops us at the reception of the Towers in Brooklyn, where we offload and carry our luggage to Paul and Su-lin's apartment. My head is starting to swim as the jet lag kicks in, but we only pause briefly to catch a breath before Su-lin whisks us to the roof level in time for the sunset...and a view that takes away the breath we just caught.

Oh...There it is.

On seeing the Manhattan Skyline, Sini and I feel like we can go home now. Of course it's just that we're exhausted and feeling more than a little high, so we decide to get some food and take time to land. Our first meal: an 18-inch New York pepperoni pizza. This one tastes better than it does on TV.
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It's tough to write about a city that so many have written about before without repeating what’s already been said. You can find better descriptions of the sites we saw in the days we spent in NY elsewhere. These included the mandatory - A walk across the Brooklyn Bridge, a picnic in Central Park, Ground Zero and the 9/11 memorial, a tour of the Metropolitan museum, Times Square, Phantom of the Opera on Broadway, the Empire State building, the Statue of Liberty. To be clear, we didn’t actually go inside either of the last two. The Empire State building placed itself outside of our modest budget and ideas of practicality (which are admittedly based on our modest budget) - from inside the building you can't see the building. You can see the rest of New York, true, but you can also see the rest of New York from other places that won't charge you $40 a pop. And those photos will have the Empire State building in them.

The Statue of Liberty was closed. While it can be argued that the tough immigration laws have rendered it symbolically closed for decades, this time it was literally closed to visitors. This was due to the Government Shutdown that took place when the US government couldn't agree on how to finance itself. None of the locals seemed to care much about this, and many seemed to be completely unaware that such a thing was even happening or why. The reason we knew about it was because it threatened to derail much of our trip, since all federal government-run parks and attractions were closed. Ultimately, it didn’t affect us at all since we had no plans to actually go inside the Statue of Liberty - we settled for sailing past it on the Staten Island ferry on a rainy, foggy afternoon - but it did provide a sharp reminder of the brittleness of the feet of iron and clay.  

It's oddly nostalgic walking about the streets of New York. 'Oddly' because although I've never been here before, so many of the street and area names ring bells. A lot of songs I know refer to these streets, just as indigenous folk music usually describes its’ surroundings.

 

'Uptown got it's hustlers, the Bowery got it's bums, 42nd street got Big Jim Walker, he a bull-shootin son-of-gun'

                                       - Jim Croce, You Don't Mess Around With Jim

 

'...Countin the cars on the New Jersey Turnpike…'

                                       - Simon & Garfunkel, America

 

Getting around those streets is easy. The busses go everywhere the subways don't, and the subways go everywhere. It's reliable and affordable. Why is this such a problem back home? Even so, we walk a lot. Unlike Europe, no one seems to mind if we cross the street in violation of a pedestrian stop light. Doing this even provides me with an opportunity to do the Dustin Hoffman line from Midnight Cowboy when a taxi almost takes me out. I get to do this more than once. I never get tired of it!

 

 

 

South African Rite of Passage (August 4)

There's a brilliant movie with Steve Martin in it called 'LA Story' which features a scene in which Steve is in a queue to use the ATM. Except that this ATM has two queues - one for customers and one for muggers. After Steve draws his cash, a mugger from the second queue steps forward and says 'Hi, my name is Bob, I will be your robber for this evening,' To which Steve, barely pausing in the conversation he's having, replies 'Hi Bob, here's something for you',and hands over some cash. The robber thanks him and the two queues each move forward and repeat.  I always laugh at that scene.  But now I 'get' it.

Yesterday (Saturday) afternoon Sini and I, and another couple (from Korea) - were held up at gun point by 4 men and pretty much robbed blind - cars and contents, phones, wallets with ID and drivers license etc, Sini's wedding ring...

They were pros - the entire ordeal was accomplished in minutes, We'd arrived at the Kingdom Hall early after spending a day in service to try and have a nap before the meeting started at 4pm. Our friends pulled in behind us and closed the main gate with the remote, but one of the robbers got a hand to the gate just before it closed and forced it open. Within seconds there were guns in our faces, and after the dust settled  we were left standing in the Kingdom Hall parking lot feeling quite naked - fortunately not physically.

I don't know how shock works, or what it's supposed to feel like. We all felt a bit shaken, but we were laughing and joking about it shortly afterwards - 'They've stolen our car. How am I going to find out the cricket score now?'  Sini was lamenting the loss of her green coat and freaky bunny keyring. Still feel like that today.

Where does the blasé come from?  I think it's because, in South Africa, this is what happens. We have some friends that have experienced this. Almost every South African knows someone who has experienced this, if they haven't themselves. We've been very fortunate - there was no physical harm done. Some friends we know weren't so fortunate.

Lots of folks have said we should get counselling, or not refuse it if it's offered. I'm sceptical. Knowing the truth - why these things happen, who is behind it, that it has a finite time limit - makes we wonder what a counsellor could tell us.  We have hope already, and are surrounded by people who have the same hope. What else do we need?

Today we swore affidavits at the police station - which we need to replace our vital documents, then went home and ate triple-chocolate-mousse cake while we watched Le fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain (definitely one of the best feel-good movies ever). Tomorrow we'll start the process of replacing the immediate necessities. Hopefully, the 'shock' has passed and if it has, I'm grateful that we didn't notice it.

Finland - The Stealth Country (July 5 - July 22)

For a brief summary of Finland, listen to the song ‘Finland, Finland, Finland’ by Monty Python, in which the main points are covered.  I could never figure out what they were going for with this song. Are they trying to say Finland is boring? Dull? Unexciting? Because that’s all partially true.  Finland is not known for its’ diverse entertainment options. You will not find enormous amusement parks,  ancient historical monuments, or gastronomic extravaganzas (unless my sis-in-law Johanna is cooking).   What you will find is a beautiful, but quiet, understated country full of quiet (very), understating people.  Everything works: the busses and trains run on time - to the minute, the roads are maintained, the streets are clean enough to eat off, and every square kilometre of forest, field and lake – no matter how remote or uninhabited – looks as if someone is taking care of it.  It’s a country you can completely relax in. This is my fourth visit to Sini’s homeland, and I think I am finally getting the hang of it.

In fact, I love it. In Summer, anyway (Winter is a whole different bucket of ice).

This is in large part due to our family, who spoil us rotten whenever we go there. On our first night in Turku with Saija & Michi, we feast on roast salmon (Oh boy! My favourite!), chilled weisbeer (Oh boy! My favourite!), apple cheesecake (oh boy…).  It doesn’t take much to make me very happy.  It doesn’t take much to make Sini happy either (which says a lot about her choice of husband) and a visit to Ikea the next day is like a visit to home accessories heaven - we will return with armloads of plastic goodies that will no doubt improve our lives but even if they don’t, well, they’re just so cheap…!

Prices at Ikea are in stark contrast to the cost of most of everything else in Finland, which by our standards is viciously expensive. A 340ml coke is around EUR3 (4x more expensive than SA),  the cheapest beer in a pub is EUR8, McDonalds doesn’t do anything under EUR2 and the trains…don’t get me started on the trains.  I can almost forgive trains being so expensive though because cars seem relatively cheap, but then again on the other hand fuel is typically not. The standard of living is very high – I don’t recall seeing a single beggar on the streets, which is a welcome change from the ubiquitous poverty of home. 

One of the things I love about travelling in a country where I don’t understand the language is that it grants me immunity to advertising. I don’t understand what the billboards are screaming. I don’t understand why I should eat the cereal that the television commercial wants me to, or even what word in the sentence is the brand name.  There is a tangible stress release that comes with being in this environment, and I have to wonder how much of our daily pressure can be attributed to being bombarded by requests for attention from all the various advertising mediums we have to deal with all the time. There are, of course, the more pervasive household brand names that can’t be ignored, but some of these are quite amusing to the English speaker. For example, Finns drink ‘Koff’ beer (ahem), buy their weekly groceries from the ‘KKK’ market, and deposit their savings at a bank called ‘Spankki’.  This last brand name is partly my own invention, and is correctly pronounced S-Pankki, but my way sounds cuter, and would also work better for a series of commercials – ‘No Hankki-Pankki at Spankki’ , or ‘Spankki – Because banking should not feel like corporal punishment’, and so on…

S-Pankki is also symptomatic of the common Finnish naming convention for businesses. The ‘S’ stands for something or other, and the word ‘Pankki’ means ‘bank’.  In addition to this there are ‘R-Kioski’, ‘K-Market’, ‘S-Market’ and many others.  This apparent lack of originality seems to be below par for a nation that has more than sixteen different ways of saying ‘snow’.

More spoiling is in store for us as we are wined and dined by the Kervinnen family and friends in Tampere, and after that with Johanna&Kimmo and Roni – Sini’s third sister, brother-in-law and nephew respectively. They have booked a summer cottage on a beautiful lake-shore near Jamsa where we will stay together while travelling to the District Convention in Tampere. I should say right here that Sini and her family are not stereo-typical Finns.  There is a running joke that goes something like: ‘How do you tell if a Finn is an extrovert?’ Answer: ‘He stares at your shoes instead of his own.’  The national character is (as I mentioned before) very quiet and reserved. Sini and her family are not. Not only do they stare at the shoes of others, they also point at them and laugh out loud. When the Juvani sisters come together the clown inside each of them bursts out and doesn’t get back inside the box until we go home. I don’t understand much of the hilarity owing to my aforementioned slim grasp of Finnish, but every time we get together with our Finnish family I feel the motivation to learn – not only to understand the language of my wife’s heart, or to satisfy the built-in South African paranoia that ‘they’re talking about me’, but to understand the other half of my family.  Although I suspect that learning Finnish won’t help in this respect. Families have their own language.

Johanna is a fantastic chef, a fact which - when combined with a special on fresh whole salmon at the local market - leads to feats of culinary amazingness.  This is the Finnish summer. The days are long and warm and bright, it doesn’t rain much, and everywhere the forests and fields are greener than the Emerald City.

After the District Convention we head on to Sini’s home town of Laukaa, about 30kms north of Jyvaskylla in central Finland. Here we spend the last few days of our vacation being pampered by Hannu&Lea, our Finnish parents. The summer market season has begun and Hannu has a fruit and vegetable stand in the local town square from which he sells fresh strawberries, cherries, potatoes, carrots, garlic chives etc. He runs this stand for three months of the year and has become very popular amongst the locals, who love fresh produce, especially if it is grown locally. The strawberries have come late this year due to a protracted winter, so Hannu has been forced to sell Swedish strawberries…the horror!  He is honest and labels the cartons as such so that locals know what they are buying and why it’s slightly cheaper.  He does manage to find a strawberry farm that has fresh strawberries – but it is almost 400kms away.  This does not present a problem and he drives through the night to return with the van loaded. When a local market radio station (yes – a radio station dedicated to the open market) announces that there are no Finnish strawberries in central Finland, he has the satisfaction of phoning in to the show to say ‘There are in Laukaa!’

Laukaa - Sini's hometown...

...where she is very well known.

Sini's home.

It’s too soon to go home.  But that’s usually a good sign. We’re well rested, somewhat bloated, have sworn off beer for the next few months, and have luggage full of carefully packed contraband, including a whole frozen salmon, and a few packages of Ruispalat – the delicious Finnish dark bread – which gives us a lingering taste of Finland for a few weeks after we get home. Ahead of us is a long journey, starting at the tiny (and deserted at 5am, the janitor had to let us in) Jyvaskyla airport, change plane in Tallinn, Estonia, onward to Saint Petersburg for a 7 hour wait at the airport to pick up our Jo’burg connection, via Dubai. What a marathon.  But the salmon survives.

Barcelona June 3 - June 11: Paella, Estrella, and Pata Negra

It's often repeated that the rain in Spain stays mainly on the plain. On touching down in Barcelona from an unseasonably freezing Finland, we found this statement to be an exaggeration. The rain was clearly not limited to the plain and was demonstrating it's freedom of movement around the entire Iberian peninsula by torrenting down in buckets here at the coast. This is a little bit disturbing for us, because this part of our trip is supposed to be purely holiday. We've been here before (in 2007) so we've seen most of the sites and are looking forward to spending most of our time doing as little as possible, preferably on the beach. This is in large part thanks to Tiina & Jari, Sini's sister and brother-in-law, who live here and have booked a house in Casteldefels, a pirates' spitting distance of the warm Mediterranean sea.

Fortunately, the rain needed only this day to make it's point, and promptly moved on to another parade somewhere else (probably on the 'plain'), giving us a beautiful week of mostly sunshine and great beach weather.  Which we will capitalise on.

Casteldefels is a 20 minute taxi ride from the airport (which is called El Prat - we guess because of all the British tourists that come through here), but takes us a bit longer because none of us have the correct address. We all have different parts of it, and unfortunately because our group (which includes Hannu & Lea and Saija & Michi) is split across two taxis, we wind up on opposite sides of the town. Also, we have no means of contacting each other due to cell network issues. We manage to contact Tiina, who fortunately speaks Catalan (more on that in a moment) well, and by means of an extended game of broken telephones is able to coordinate the taxi drivers well enough to get us to where we need to be, where she is waiting for us.  And the relaxing can now begin.

Another reason that the rain does not obey Spanish rain rules is possibly because Barcelona does not consider itself part of Spain. Here, they believe themselves to be independent Catalonia, and underscore this belief by having all of their signs printed in both Catalan and Spanish, but with the Spanish appearing *slightly* though noticeably smaller, and always beneath the Catalan. So, while many other countries deign to have English appear alongside the local language at least on important signs like 'Emergency Exit' or 'Danger: High Voltage' or 'Certain Death This Way', that is not the case here. The exception is a hand-painted message we saw on the roof of an anarchists' house visible from the Gaudi gardens, which appeared only in English: 'If it's called tourist season, how come we can't shoot them?'

Sitges has become a favourite place of mine. It's 15 minutes by train from Casteldefels - maybe 45 minutes from Barcelona central station - south along the coast. We spent a day here last time, but that was mid-winter and now it's June, and although the day has started misty and slightly overcast, the beach is packed in certain anticipation of the sun, which fortunately doesn't wait very long to show up. The streets are narrow and cobbled, the stone walls are aged -sometimes whitewashed - and the elderly Church of St Bartolomeu presides. It feels Mediterranean. While the rest of the family departs shortly after lunch, I decided to stay on for the rest of the afternoon to take photographs and wander aimlessly around.

There is nothing better for a man than to eat, drink, and see good for all his hard work...and then eat and drink some more. And then, dessert. Barcelona gets this. For me, food provides the strongest definition of a culture, and in Barcelona we have sampled seafood paella, paella negra (paella blackened with squid ink), varieties of jamón (smoked ham) and cuts of beef and herbed pork, spitted rabbit, gazpacho and...usually washed down with Estrella Damm - the local default beer (above average, rich taste, slightly darker than a standard lager - good), or a shared bottle of Pata Negra or sangria. During the week, most restaurants run a two plate special, which includes two plates of your choice, a dessert and a beer, for around an average of EUR10. For Europe, these are good prices.  I like very much the common practice here of buying an entire leg of smoked ham, then using a thin cheese slicer to 'shave' slices off every day. Every block in the city has a butchery and a bakery (or two), and there's something about nipping out to pick up a loaf of freshly baked bread every morning that appeals to me. 

The days spent on the beach are perfect.  The sun is not too strong, it’s not too warm, and not too crowded. The tourist season only hits next month and the Spaniards have not kicked themselves into holiday gear yet.  We also get to practice our Chinese. I never get tired of the look on a Chinese persons’ face when these lǎowài ( lit.‘always foreigner’, sometimes used pejoratively) greet them in their own language and start chatting. Usually there are a few seconds of puzzled silence as they try to work out what we’ve said in English (or in this case, Spanish). We then repeat ourselves slowly and the light dawns, and the verbal floodgates open, at which point we have to politely ask them to slow down.  On the beach in Casteldefels, Chinese ladies walk up and down offering massages for EUR5. We take them up on it a few times, and while they are very good, I wish they had gotten all the sand off their hands first. Or maybe the offer includes exfoliation.

In a break from the beach and blissful vegetativeness, Sini and I spend a day in the city centre, cruising La Rambla and the side-streets, the labyrinthine Barri Gòtic - the gothic quarter of the old city, absorbing the ancient stone facades and pretending it’s a thousand years ago. Barcelona has a strong retro thing going on, and there are lots of shops selling 70’s and 80’s clothing and memorabilia. Actually Barcelona seems decidedly and deliberately anti-fashion, or on the opposite end – trend-setting.  In either case, looking weird is celebrated.

My mission on this day is to try to find a particular kind of guitar – reminiscent of a trez guitar but more akin to a guitarlele. It has a smaller body than a classical guitar but a full size fretboard, and a distinctively crisp sound. I manage to find this obscure instrument in a shop on one of the many side-streets off La Rambla, but the price immediately cues the shattering sound of a breaking dream. Sometimes we forget this is Europe.  ‘Europe sucks’, we grumble.  I’m still sulking when we stumble upon a shop that stocks all the great Islay Scotch whiskies at the best prices I have seen anywhere in the world. This makes up for everything!  We forgive Europe and stock up on Laphraoig and Lagavulen.  If you’re a fan of the peaty and smokey, and you happen to be in Spain, try Lafuente. They appear to have shops in most of the major cities.  This place also puts the final nail in the duty-free coffin – I’ll be posting a rant here about what a con that is sometime soon.

We meet up with the rest of the family at Tiina and Jari’s apartment for drinks and a short nap, and then head out to Monjuic to observe the ‘Musical Fountains’.  Framed by a spectacular sunset, the view of the city from the top of the stairs of the Palau Nacional alone makes it worth being there, but the fountains are also fun.  They perform choreographed water-ballet and acrobatics in a rapidly changing kaleidoscope of colours. The only weak point in this display is the cheesy 80s music that accompanies it. To me, it seems like it needs something dramatic and powerful like Strauss’ ‘Also Sprach Zarathustra’ (theme from the movie 2001) or the 1812 overture. ‘Moonlight Shadow’ and ‘We Built This City’ just don’t cut it, and even the fountains agree and refuse to dance in time.  I know I wasn’t the only one to think this, as I overheard a woman with a broad southern accent complain, ‘Why don’t they do music by a Spanish guy, like George ‘Bee-zet’ or some guy?’

The rain returns from the plain just as we leave Barcelona. It will catch up with us in Finland. But we’re tanned, rested, have gained about 5kgs each, and don’t care.

St Petersburg - May 25-30 - 2012 (White Nights and White Russians)

Arriving in Saint Petersburg on Saturday the 26th of May is not quite like arriving anywhere else in Russia.  Saint Petersburg has long been considered a kind of anti-Russia - the epicentre for each trend or revolution that goes on to sweep the rest of the country, only when it gets that far STP will have moved on. The Bolshevik revolution was seeded here, as was the anti-bolshevik movement, and so on until now when they don't quite like Putin.

On the other hand, arriving here is probably quite like arriving anywhere else in Russia for the reason that we almost crashed on final approach.  Coming in low about 2 minutes before landing the nose of our plane suddenly dipped down and the aircraft seemed almost vertical for a second. Everyone screamed for all of that second until the pilot opened the throttle and the aircraft screamed back as the stall was corrected. Scariest moment for me on a plane...!  On landing successfully everyone aboard clapped. We thought this was because of the near-death experience but apparently Russians do that all the time.  Maybe we would too if we had to fly Aeroflot...

We're not really here for touring, but that will definitely happen - this is one of the most beautiful cities in Europe with rich and deep history and amazing architecture - Russia's 'window on the west'.  We're 'officially' here to visit the branch and pick their brains on some of their technical expertise.  After queueing for what feels like an eternity but is really only 45 minutes to get through passport control, Ilya from Bethel computer dept meets us and looks nothing like his photo in real life.  I say this by way of excuse for the fact that I didnt recognize him and only asked his name 10 minutes into the drive, at which point he said 'Luke, it is me, Ilya!'.  To be fair, we have only ever communicated over IRC and I wasnt sure that he was fetching us at the airport.  Introductions aside, we hit it off thereafter and he took us back to Bethel via the scenic route, which included driving down Nevsky Prospekt - the main road through the center of the city, past the Seige of Leningrad monument - in typical soviet grey-stone-square-jaw-rifle-and-plough style - as well as some of the many cathedrals that characterize the city, the Church of the Spilled Blood, St Isaac's Cathedral, The Peter and Paul Fortress, etc, all breathtaking and reminiscent of Peter the Greats' desire for this to be the greatest city in Russia. The sun is shining today.

Bethel is as Bethel's are - clean, beautiful, and smiling faces all round. I will spend my two days of work here in a classroom with Ilya, Sergey Polyakov (who translates for me), another bro named Yuri and three brothers from outside of Bethel who are in video conference with us from Moscow, Odessa and Ukraine branch. Sini will work with Yulia doing guest rooms.  So, me with Sergey, Sini with Yulia. Last names are very important here. For example, on one occasion I needed to get hold of Sini during the day since we were to be given a brief tour of the branch.  I went down to home reception to see if they would know where Sini was working. The exchange I had with the brother at the front desk (who, incidentally, looks EXACTLY like Kenneth from '30 Rock') went something like this:

Me: I need to find my wife, Sini. Do you know where she might be?
Reception Br: Who she is working with?
Me: She's working with Yulia
Reception Br: Yulia who?
Me: I'm not sure. How many Yulias are there?
Reception Br: 14.
Me: Ok then.  Oh well, if she calls here looking for me, please put her through to me. I'll be with Sergey.
Reception Br: Sergey who?
Me: Ah.

Turns out, if you need to find someone but don't know their name, you have a good chance of finding them if you guess either Yulia or Sergey.

Before we get down to working though, we spend Sunday visiting Peterhof Palace at Petergof.  Getting there is fun in itself - it's orientation day, folks! We don't understand the writing and we know virtually no Russian. However, we manage to catch the train in to the city, and the subway to Nevsky Prospekt where we will walk to the Hermitage Museum and take the Hydrofoil to Petergof.  The St Petersburg Subway is the most beautiful subway I have ever been in. The opulence begins with the longest escalator that runs deep down under the city to the station with its marbeled floors, sculpted columns and nouveau light fittings.

Peterhof is an incredible piece of work, built by Peter the Great and used extensively by him to show off. The massive palace grounds are beautifully maintained and lush with manicured gardens and forests.  The main palace is also breathtaking. From the gold center-piece fountains depicting Peter's victory in battle over Sweden to the palace facade it is absolutely stunning: ornate, opulent, no expense spared, and, unfortunately, almost a complete reconstruction.  This is because of World War 2. Hitler had planned have the victory bash for conquering Russia held here, and had lavish invitations drawn up and sent to his friends, however prematurely.  One of these invitations made it's way to Stalin, who wasnt having any of that and promptly blew up the Peterhof himself - the ultimate party-pooper.   So much of what is here was put back together in the last 40 years.  Nevertheless, it was well worth the visit.

The trip back to Bethel was educational for the nuances of the Russian language that we learned.  Bethel is in a small town outside of Saint Petersburg called Solnichnoye.  To get there from Petergof was simple enough - we took a Mashrutka (mini-bus) from Petergof to Avtovo subway station, subway to Ploschad Lenina, then a short walk from there to the train station to buy two train tickets to Solnichnoye. This is where the wheels briefly fell off.  At the ticket desk, my conversation with the ticket sales-lady went something like this:

Me: Sol-nich-noy-ye, Spa-see-ba (thank you), (holds up two fingers in the universal sign for two).
Ticket Baboushka:  Eh?
Me: (brief pause). Sol-nich-noy-ye. (two fingers again - slower this time).
Ticket Baboushka:  (Blank stare, trying to read my lips).
Me: (slower and louder, in the universal method for asking 'what part of Sol-nich-noy-ye did you not understand?') Sol - nich - noy - ye.
Drunk behind me: Zyol-nyeech-nai-ye!
Ticket Baboushka: Aaaah! Zyolnyeech!
Me: Da! Iz-ve-nyeeda! Ya pluhka govariyo pa Ruskiya (Yes! Sorry! I can't speak Russian).
Ticket Baboushka: Eh?
Me: Nevermind.

We got the tickets, but still had to spend a couple of minutes deciphering the cyrillic on them to figure out what train to take.

Visiting Bethel is always a wonderful experience. We spent some days with the brothers, and especially with Ilya and Natascha, and Sergey and Anastasia.  It's always amazing how distance, language and culture is no obstacle in instantly making friends.  The few days we spent with them were not enough and we will have to plan another trip here, and a longer stay.

We leave the branch on Wednesday 30 May, and it's raining.  Sergey (not to be confused with Sergey) drives us into Leningrad centre. We call it Leningrad now because it seems to fit better in the gloomy grey. Saint Petersburg is a sunny city.  We will spend this day touring the Hermitage Museum - formerly the Winter Palace of (guess who?) Peter the Great, and home to hundreds of priceless works of art by everyone from the ancient Egyptians to Raphael and Michealangelo to Matisse and Picasso.

Picasso - The Absinthe Drinker

We don't have enough time for this - it would take days to see it in it's entirety, but we have a plane to catch to Helsinki and still have to make our way to the airport - and it's bitterly cold outside. This is supposed to be summer, for crying out loud.  If this is the summer, it's easy to understand how every invader has gotten fed-up with the Russian winter. We were informed by various locals that the Russian summer is very short. Last year it was on a Wednesday.  So, in the driving rain and icy wind we make our way through the narrow streets, past St Isaacs Cathedral of the Sacred Blood of Peter and Pauls Immaculate Conception of Our Lord, or something like that, manage to find our way by subway and bus to the airport, and get there in time to be an hour early for the flight check-in time, and be told 'Nyet! No check-in now. Must wait one hour!'.

So we spend one hour experiencing a Russian (or maybe European) decadence: Hot Chocolate. In Saint Petersburg, it is what it says. It's chocolate, but hot.  No milk, water or anything to adulterate it. It is literally thick, pure, dark, creamy delicious chocolate, melted into a mug.  I feel sick afterwards.


But not sick enough to not want to come back here. 


On to Finland and Spain. 

The First Post (or 'Why Now?')

The simple answer is that 'Social Networking' of the Facebook kind is just too much. Too impersonal, too time-consuming, too in-your-face. TMI. Also, the reminders to look at the TMI are also annoying. I know these can be turned off, but I'd rather they were turned off by default, rather than saddling me with the task of forcing Facebook to stop annoying me.

Also, I like to think our lives are interesting - not just to ourselves - and sometimes it's good to write the interesting things down, maybe only to preserve them but surely also to share them, and contribute in this tiny way.

I suppose I'm saying that I doubt many will read this, but ultimately, even if only we read it, it serves it's purpose.

So things will happen, and we'll write them here. They won't all be interesting, insightful, funny, or remotely entertaining. In fact, the majority probably won't attract any of those adjectives, but they will be here. And if you read them, it's because you really wanted to (that, or you really do fit the description in the blogs' title...!).