First Few Days

Hi all!! After hours of traveling in cramped seats and angry, with old German men who aren’t afraid to elbow you to push you out of their way, and driving six hours to finally get to my host mom’s apartment - I’m here!! This is going to be my first day officially in St. Petersburg. As soon as we got here, they took us to orientation in Repino, a seaside resort town on the Gulf of Finland (which I’ve been to twice – very cool!!) where the nineteenth century painter Ilya Repin was from. It was a lot of fun there. We did all the typical orientation things, such as learning how to deal with the police if they stop you on the street and ask you for your documents. Ok, maybe not so typical, but we did learn a lot of very useful information. There are about 50 kids here in total, and 11 of us are staying for the entire year (because we’re hard core like that). Everyone here seems pretty awesome. Anyway, we spent two nights in Repino learning how to survive in Russia and then they packed us onto buses and away we went to our host families. It took us six hours to get everyone dropped off, and guess who was last? If you guessed me, you’d be right! But I was actually alright with that because I got to see a lot of the city and how/where people live. Towards the end, I must admit, I was very cold and kinda tired and hungry, but other than that, it was pretty cool. After seeing where everyone else is going to be living, I must admit, the apartment I’m staying in kicks the most ass. It’s soooooo sweet. I’m in the downtown of St. Petersburg, on 3-я линия, a few blocks and a bridge from the soccer stadium. As soon as you turn off the main street, I walk through a short ally for cars and enter into a court yard and my building is the second on the right. I live all the way at the top of the five story building where there is no elevator. So not only will I have awesome Russian skills by the end of this program, but also legs of steel! Anyway, the apartment is amazing. The woman I am living with is an older, Russian version of me, except for the fact that she smokes like a chimney. Her name is Marina Markevna, which isn’t a very Russian name, but I think that she is partially British. She has traveled all over the place, and her apartment reflects that. She has trinkets from all over the world lying around. She speaks a little English, which I’m trying to get her to stop doing, and she also speaks French. She actually lived in Paris for two years. When I get settled and my Russian gets stronger, she said that we can practice some French, which is really exciting. She is not your typically Russian babushka. She does, however, live by herself, but she has a full-grown son and a very cute granddaughter. During my first dinner there, her neighbor came up and I got to talk to her too. The group went on a bus tour yesterday of the city, and it was very cool. Last night, a little boy Marina babysits came over the apartment, which was cool and then later two girls about my age came over. I was really tired though, so my Russian speaking skills were not up to par. And today, we walked all over the city and currently, I am sitting at the Sabarro two blocks from my apartment b/c it is the only place with free Wi-Fi. Anyway, my battery is going to die, so I need to wrap this up. Later!!

Check it out - I'm blogging!

So here's my travel blog! I hope to be updating it at least once a week, but I can't make any promises. Be sure to keep checking it throughout the year so you can keep tabs on me.