from St. Petersburg to Paris

A shorter post for you today. Much of my time is devoted to travel and our last days of the trip are moving ahead too quickly for a lengthy contemplation here.

A last morning in St. Petersburg. A breakfast that has settled into a routine...






... then a troubling packing hour (fitting largish and fragile items into a carry-on? What was I thinking!) and a sigh of relief as the suitcase manages to zip shut. I even have time for an hour-long walk before the cab picks us up for the airport.

Where to go? I'm feeling somewhat wistful -- there is so much I still hadn't seen! Should I fit in a museum? There are two completely empty ones around the corner -- one dedicated to the history of the Siege of Leningrad, the other to modern design. Or should I go back to the food halls and get a marzipan pickle for Ed?

No, I wont rush my last walk. I'll just take myself through the neighborhood...



(I passed her fruit stand every day)


... along the embankment that is now so familiar that I know every tilt and crack in the sidewalk (and there are many).



(you know the bridge, the cathedral, the Neva River...)


I veer into the Summer Garden. This is where Diane and I started our exploration of the city last Saturday. It's fitting that I should end with it now.

Oh, but how empty it feels on a weekday morning!






Only the regulars make it here now, enjoying the unusually beautiful weather. Regulars -- what do I know about regulars?! All I see are the patterns and I make guesses based on them. Well, let's end with those patterns and I'll let you do the guesses. Familiar themes now to all of us.
























One last look at the beautiful domes -- with the trolley lines to remind us that the city is home to many.






We leave this beautiful place and catch our flight for a three night stopover in Paris.

Paris. Dreamy, hazy Paris. It takes real Waldo talent to identify the Eiffel Tower as we fly over it (hint: look for the Montparnasse Tower to the left and work your eyes due right from it).






It's early evening by the time we're on the ground. I have a race with my friends who want to take a cab to town: I'll take the commuter train, you take your cab, we'll see who gets to the hotel first.

My train ride into the city feels summery. It's a warm set of days here -- I see that even now the thermometer is registering 31 degrees C (that's close to 90F). Moreover, even though it's Friday eve, there are no rush hour crowds. The city always feels less frenzied in August. So many people are away on vacation!

I alight at the Luxembourg Gardens.  I have my suitcase, I'm racing my friends, but it all doesn't matter -- I want my few minutes in this glorious park!






My travels here in the cold months make me long for that moment when the park is awash with flowers and chestnuts and all the trimmings of a summer evening.






So you could say I started my day in a park and ended it in one too. How fitting for me!






Now onto my familiar hotel and a familiar tiny room (and yes, I got to it first!)...






And now all we have left for the day is our evening meal. I opt for a neighborhood place that's a twelve minute walk from us -- L'Antre d'Eux (how would you translate that -- "our lair?" Something like that).






It's a tiny eatery, run energetically by a young couple -- the kind of place that you remember for the proprietors as much as for the food (both make you feel really good!).






My dining companions aren't hungry (silly them: who eats a bad tray of airplane food when you know you'll have a dinner in Paris!), but I make up for their weak appetites. We all have the eggs with chanterelles, then I go on to a chard gratin, finishing off with a strawberry verrine.












It is a beautiful evening in Paris -- perfect for outdoor dining. There is a hush in the air now -- partly because it's August, but, too, because we are in a quiet neighborhood.






Perhaps because I want that Parisian balance, I leave my friends after dinner and go on to walk through the Bucci neighborhood -- just a few blocks away. This is a place that reminds you that Paris really does not close down any time of the year. There are a number of restaurants and cafes packed into a couple of blocks (including this newbie!)...






... and they are always spilling out with people, especially in the evenings, whether it's winter (with heating lamps warming the patrons outside) or summer (no lamps needed! Air Conditioning? Eh! An American habit!).

When you travel to contrasting places, you have to make peace with yourself as you make abrupt changes from one to the other. In this familiar, crowded neighborhood I find my own peace.

I'm ready for Paris now.

The moon shines brightly...


 

Thursday in St. Petersburg

My friend and I had set aside this morning for shopping. Neither of us would have been disappointed if no buying resulted, but we have similar interests in things we might take home (small plates or items for the kitchen for us or for our daughters) and so our shopping compatibility levels are very high.

But first, there is the morning meal -- I'm looking at her as I come down in the glassed elevator.






Oatmeal!






Next, we go around the corner to the post office to buy stamps. Here's the sign -- it says "Russian Post." We go in. Nope. Not here. A few doors down. Okay. We try again a few doors down.





The post office turns out to be a quiet place. Just one woman behind the counter.  She regards us with some curiously and her Monalisa smile hovers, just at the surface. [It strikes me that I assume incorrectly that everyone knows we're American, because even when I ask a question in Russian, I get an answer in English whenever the person speaks our language. But of course, English is the universal "other" language here. When I'm asked -- where are you from, I see that the assumption simply is that I'm foreign.]



Errand accomplished. We head for Gostiny Dvor -- that "shopping mall" where I spied the countless shops of folk items -- arranged mostly by place of origin and type of item.

This time we pause at the ceramics from Uzbekistan. The vendor here is so shy, so unassuming! She speaks no English, but when we get stuck in our conversation, she calls for help from another vendor (who happens to be my very delightful seller of Matryoshka dolls). It is such an agreeable few minutes and I hope very much that she works on commission because both Diane and I buy little somethings and honestly, not many vendors have customers this morning.






And now we are back at the lacquered artifacts section. My preferred items are there, taunting me (I didn't buy them last time because of the demeanor of the sales clerk). And guess what? There is another seller by the cash register today and this one is quite delightful -- she reminds me of a strict teacher you're likely to have in school: the kind that you find out down the road has a stern facade and a heart of gold. We accomplish the purchases and leave quite pleased with the whole expedition.






I point us then to Kupetz Eliseevs (the food halls). The point is to just look at and admire, but after seeing the pastries, Diane suggests we sit down for a delectable break.






The cafe area is small -- it fans out in a circle -- but we find a spot...






And our attentive waiter hovers in a most helpful way. I try Russian again, but he wants to practice his English so I gladly switch. (His English is strong. He's a university student and his ambitions veer toward business.) He asks which states we're from and is visibly happy when Diane admits to being from Florida and I tell him I'm from Wisconsin. He's collecting states: so far he has served only customers from California and Washington. We enriched his coffer!

He does a splendid job, too, of pouring us glasses of Russian champagne.






I smile at that. When I was growing up in Poland, bubbly wine from the Soviet Union or Bulgaria was considered a lesser beverage, based not at all on the taste but on the country of origin. We admired the western stuff and though no one could afford it, we were convinced it had the taste of heaven. Our champagne now, at Eliseevs is quite inexpensive (you could not get a glass of anything in an American eatery for its price of $2) and quite good. Our pastries are impeccably decorated.

Diane and I are happy to sit back and talk (we are always quite happy to sit back and talk), but it is not to be. The seat to my right is suddenly occupied by a man our age (perhaps a tad older) and his (younger) guide. The man hears our English and boom! We're suddenly not a table of two, but a table of four.

He's a friendly, booming and not unpleasant American traveler and he hails from New York (I asked, but I didn't have to). Right away we learn what brings him to St Petersburg. His (young) wife is an Olympic figure skating coach -- she coached Sarah Hughes and I didn't have to ask to find this out, as he was very happy to share with us his (young) wife's accomplishments.  I do happen to follow Winter Olympics and I recall that Sarah Hughes won the gold in 2002. Our cafe companion and his wife come to St. Petersburg regularly to visit the counterpart (and now their friend here): the coach of the Russian skating women.
You know, the Russian coach was made an honorary citizen of St. Petersburg -- he tells us. Only thirty people have that honor. Putin is one of them! Well now, we are impressed, though come to think of it, I'm not sure how this honor trickles down to his wife or to him. Never mind. We find out about his accomplishments as well: he went to Law School with a future Supreme Court Justice. [To give him credit, he was quite pleasant to talk to and he listened attentively as we identified our own educational credentials which, to an extent, matched his. Minus the future Supreme Court classmate.]

Let's not leave by the wayside the equally affable tour guide that accompanied our guy (I suppose even accomplished Americans need help navigating Russia). He spoke perfect Polish! No, no, not from Poland. But his wife is from there and so he picked up her native language. He was delighted to learn that it is possible to travel from America to Russia because he thought it was perhaps too difficult for most. I have to think that the absence of Americans here is partly responsible for his views on this.

Diane and I leave and once again we follow different paths. She is joining her husband for their last bit of sightseeing and me, once again I want to walk. One last glance at Nevsky Prospect and the Anichkov Bridge, the one with the corner statues of men struggling with horses (think: people fighting the forces of nature)...






... and at a girl with braids, perhaps imagining herself in the photo opportunity created by some enterprising soul (you want to appear to be taming horses? Put your face here!)...






...and I turn in toward my neighborhood again. I'm aiming for the Hope Shop -- the place where I had first spotted the frocks, some of them sewn by aspiring designers right here in St. Petersburg. Might there be a Christmas present on the racks? I spend a while browsing and contemplating the possibilities and the very friendly clerks treat me to lots of lemonade and sweets, which I think is delightfully kind, though not very helpful to customers who may want to fit into their dresses' waistlines.






On the street again, I think how easily you can form themes in your head and how quickly images and street scenes begin to fit in with what you've identified early on. My themes are simple: dads caring for young children...






Girls with braids...






And I don't look for examples: they throw themselves at me! But again I think back to a time when friends of mine visited Poland. This was some thirty years back and unquestionably, a walk through Warsaw would have revealed a less than adequate commercial scene. My friends (well, they are no longer my friends, though I suppose for other reasons) showed pictures from their Warsaw visit upon their return tot he States. The photos included many from their theme: a broken down infrastructure. Benches with peeling paint. Leaning lamp posts. That kind of thing.  After they left, I burst out crying. Was it true that my country presented itself this way to others? That there was no joy to be had in visiting it?

Well, I've seen no jarring or sad themes in St. Petersburg. The city smiles her gentle smile and I respond in kind -- smiling at the fathers, smiling at the prettiness of braids.







Alright. I leave my various packages in the hotel (see photo above) and I turn again toward the islands. I had cut off Vasilyevski Island the other day. I have a handful of hours now. Let me return to it now.

I walk along the Neva embankment. Now here's a family that exudes joie de vivre! I think how utterly sweet the girls' caps are -- all decked with cherries -- but I refrain from asking where they purchased them. I am not that bold.






Another bridal party, in front of the typical wedding car here. Are they aiming for a shot with the Church on the Spilled Blood in the background?






If I had to make one generalization from this walk it would be that people like to hold hands. Lovers, friends, mothers and daughters -- all touching the heart of the other through this very simple gesture.






Meanwhile, on the Neva River, the boats are out full force.






Here's a grandma with her grandson watching the boats, telling him perhaps that someday he, too, can go out on a boat. And it strikes me how remarkably common this bond is between the helpful grandparent and the little one. These grandmas, they're all as thrilled with theirs as I am with my little Snowdrop. They hold their grandchild just as tightly, they show them cheepers or boats. The love, the dedication to this young life is just as powerful -- I do nothing that a grandma here doesn't do for her grandchild.






And now I am on Vasilyevsky Island. Had I time, I might have checked out various museums here, but I'm really more interested today in the street scene. The island has a very nice pedestrian street with a few cafes and restaurants and this is what pulls me in. On this warm day, people tend to linger outdoors and I come away thinking that the island is both young in attitude and simple in demeanor.












Oh, another grandma... Is she worried? Pensive? Tired? Content? I cannot tell.






The island is crisscrossed by trams. Polish cities are crisscrossed by trams as well. This tram car seems just that much older. I have a nostalgic moment as I recall the older ones of Warsaw. Ours now are plastered with ads and they seem sleek and efficient, though of course, they do the same thing: zip through the middle of the street and spit out people at the stops. (For all the warnings I've picked up about ruthless drivers in this city, I felt 100% confident crossing on white stripes. Without exception, cars stopped. Just like here, they stop behind the tram car, to let the people walk safely to the curb.)






Ah, but it's late again. I make my way to the metro -- it's the fastest way to get home. It's rush hour and I mostly ignore my camera. Mostly.  Tired me, tired moms, tired children. But the trains come promptly, the mass of humanity moves in an orderly fashion. I get to my destination efficiently and without issues.






I join my friends for dinner at the hotel. We have free drinks (offered to those who book directly at the hotel's website) and this would be the perfect time to have that shot of vodka. It goes well with Baltic herring and potatoes!






But at the last minute I change my mind. Russian bubbly seems more fitting. We're toasting our travels together, not slugging potent shots with the locals.

After, I offer to do a run to the Bize Bakery. A few marons in the room would be so heavenly.






As I walk back along the busy Liteyny Street, I really have to smile. The sun has set. People are walking home. (Honestly, I did not look for this. And yet, the last (or next to last) photo taken by me in the course of my stay here always happened to have a watermelon in it.)






I go to the top (just seventh) floor of the hotel to deliver the macarons to my friends. There is a window in the hallway, looking out toward the historic heart of the city.

The moon shines brightly over St. Petersburg tonight.

Wednesday in St. Petersburg

to help or not to help

On my solo hike today, I plan to first walk along the embankment of the Neva River. As I cross the street, I notice that a young mom is struggling with her baby carriage. Many of the curbs here have ramps for strollers or wheelchairs, but this particular corner has nothing of the sort.





I ask -- can I help?
She demurs. No no, it's okay.
I do a quick assessment in my head and then silently pick up the front of the carriage and we carry it to the level surface. Thank you, she murmurs.

At the other end of the block, the same problem presents itself, only the stairs are going down. I turn around and eye her quizzically. She immediately says -- really, it's easier on this side. I smile and walk on.

This is the kind of stuff I struggle with all the time here. Because I surely know what's going on: pride does not allow for an admission of weakness.

It happened in Poland numerous times when I was growing up there: the (wealthy) visitor comes, he or she helps by handing out a largess -- a present, money, typically tangible things. And sometimes it was greatly appreciated, but at other times it's an insult. As if you're saying -- You obviously need my help. Here, let me do this for you (or give this to you), you lesser person. And this was in Poland, where Americans were and are adored. What must it be like here when an American gives help from her or his elevated position on the world platform?

Sometimes (but you have to think very carefully about when) the best thing you can do is not help. You're saying then: I know you are an equal. (Or perhaps even more than that.)

Perhaps you'll say I'm overthinking this. Just lift the stroller, throw down the money, offer your largess, God damn it! No, I don't think so. Sometimes the best thing you can offer is just one quiet Monalisa smile. Nothing more than that.


the islands


As the week in St. Petersburg draws to a close (we leave Friday), I want to walk. A lot.
St. Petersburg is, of course, a city of waterways and therefore it is a city of islands. Right across the Neva, there are three that I can reach by foot: Pietrograd and the connected to it Zayachy, and then Vasilyevsky.

And so right after breakfast (I have settled on oatmeal... what can I say...) --






I set out alone, heading, as I indicated above, toward the Neva River, then tracing its shore until the Trinity Bridge. There I cross to the first of the islands and after one more bridge, I am on Zayachy. This is where you'll find the fortress that started it all. The one that is so evident in this photo:






And inside the fortress you'll find the Peter and Paul Cathedral. With only one or two exceptions, all of the tsars are buried here. (I bought my ticket, went inside, saw the graves, went out.) The tower is the second largest in the city (the largest is the TV tower).






It's a relatively warm, sunny day and there are a number of people out for a stroll here. And sun bathers!






And lovers.






There is a river beach area and you can strip down to your bikini and stare at the Hermitage and the Church on the Spilled Blood across the river.






Or, just walk the island and admire the sights. (Including this odd statue of Peter the Great. If you rub his right forefinger, you'll have good luck. I already have good luck so I didn't bother.)






More weddings to admire...


 


.... more bridges to cross and then I realize that I am straying far from the hotel. If I am to be on time for my scheduled meeting with my friends, I best reconsider taking in another island.

And so I cross the Neva and do something else instead: I ride the metro.



the metro


Using a city's public transportation is as good a way to rub shoulders with the locals as going to the store to buy bread. In a bus, trolley bus or metro car, you can gaze unabashedly at those around you. In St Petersburg, the best place for this is unquestionably on the metro.



(in the eyes of some, there is sadness, or worry, or both)


The first line of the metro (the red line) was completed here in 1955. The remaining lines soon followed. The city now has a gloriously efficient system of moving people around and this afternoon I devoted one hour to just riding it -- from one stop to the next, getting off at the stations that seemed the most worthy of a closer inspection.

I have four comments (not in order of importance).

For a visitor from the west, the price of a ticket is embarrassingly cheap. At the same time, you wont find many foreigners using the metro. This is the odd thing about St. Petersburg: most visitors come by bus and leave by bus and explore by bus, sticking pretty close to the Hermitage. The metro remains relatively free of outsiders. (As opposed to, say, Paris, where the metro in August will have more tourists than French people. The Parisians are all out on the beaches of the Mediterranean. The visitors dominate.)






Secondly: the metro system is incredibly efficient. I worried that getting on and off and on again would take forever. Think D.C. metro and how long the wait can be for the next train to pull in, especially in non rush hour periods. Getting on and off would be tediously dull: all that time waiting at the station!

Not here. The trains come every two or three minutes.  For a person who wants to get on and off -- it's a dream.



Pushkin Station


Third point: there is no trash, no litter, no graffiti. It is clean down there. Remarkably tidy for a nation that doesn't have the reputation for being pristine. And no, I did not see a cleaning squad attending to human slovenliness. I saw an occasional (but rare) guard, that's all.






And I saw a populace that is proud. Too proud to deface what is regarded as uniquely grand, uniquely theirs.



Avtovo Station


Which brings me to the final point: the metro was built in the years just before and after the death of Stalin. The stations are a work of art. Soviet art. There isn't a better place to come face to face with it than at the metro stations.



Kirovsky Zavod station




...with Lenin keeping watch


Times have changed since the days of Lenin or Stalin. We're back to Russia now, as opposed to the Soviet Union. And Saint Petersburg, as opposed to Leningrad. But although the city name has changed and the commercial face of Russia has surely changed too, moving further and further from the post-revolution communist rhetoric of its leaders, here -- unlike in Poland -- the monuments to those leaders have, for the most part remained in place. Here's a relief of Stalin and Lenin at the Vosstaniya stop:






What does this young woman know about the two former leaders of the Soviet Union?


 



Perhaps this is true to some extent in most countries: we, too, have trouble letting go of glorified images of generals and leaders whose period of governance did not exactly embrace all the values we claim to hold dear. But in Poland, the erasure of a communist past has proceeded rapidly following the return to market capitalism. The changing of Warsaw street names is a prime example of this. Not so here.



Narvskaya Station



the Hermitage, part two

We eat an early meal. While Ernest rests, Diane and I grab a supper at the Bize bakery at 4:30. For me -- a beet salad, borstch with black bread and a macaron.
















And then we scoot along quickly...


 


... and shortly after five (today, the museum is open until nine), Diane and I are at the entrance of the General Staff Building of the Hermitage. A few years ago, the powers that be decided to create space here for the Impressionists and the post-Impressionists, to ease up on the congestion at the Winter Palace, where the rest of the art is displayed. The General Staff Building offers dozens of rooms around a courtyard, with great natural light and a beautifully constructed common areas linking it all together. 95% of the art has been moved by now and the whole project will be completed by the end of this year.





And here is a shocking thing and it is so shocking that I still cannot fully grasp nor understand it. Let me explain: the Hermitage has the single largest collection of Impressionist art in the world. It has two rooms full of Gaugins alone. It has a huge room of Monets, one of Renoirs -- I mean, it's enormously vast and grand. It would not be incorrect to say that I learned to love Impressionism right here, in St. Petersburg (then Leningrad) when I was a mere 15 year old. I saw in the paintings something dreamy and magical. Here is where I began the life-long struggle to look at something with Monet-like eyes.  A haystack, a river, a garden -- I understood their simple but exquisite beauty had to be painted in your soul. Honestly, my life changed after that.

In other words, the Impressionist collection is mind blowing!

Now to the shocking point. Brace yourselves:

The   museum   is   almost   completely   empty.

Here's how a room of Monets felt:






Or of Matisses:












Of Gaugins:






I have never been in a place with such great art with so few people in it.

There are two plausible explanations for it: since the vast majority of people see the Hermitage in a tour group, the tour companies have somehow not managed to make their way over here yet. 

Or, equally plausible: the buses and cruise ships simply cannot send groups out in the evening. They have to clear out of here and get the people back to wherever it is that they're spending the night.

Me, I am just awash with delight!

Here, let me immerse you in just a sampling of the art.

Enter the world of Van Gogh with me!






And of  Monet:






Renoir, Cezanne, Matisse:






Oh, it is a remarkable set of hours! And the layout is so easy to navigate that I can readily do a second briefer walk through, just to smile and enjoy the entirety of a now known presentation.






Downstairs, I purchase three very beautiful books.





I will bring the Hermitage to Snowdrop. I so look forward to that.


Outside, the light on the square is fading. A guitarist is playing Russian songs. Familiar ones to those who gather. Some people mouth the words with him. I hear "sertse" again and again. The heart. Love songs.


















At the other side of the Square, right by the General Staff Building, young men are playing a roller blade hockey game.






The square has been transformed from a place of great tourism to a place of local use. Of music, sports, friendship.

I linger. I am an outlier -- a tourist, but I linger nonetheless. The moment is too precious to let slip away just yet.

And then I walk along the river back toward my hotel. The sun is setting now over the Trinity Bridge.





Love blossoms in its golden tones.


Just before returning to my hotel, I stop at a grocery store to buy some evening snacks. Raisins, chocolate, something to drink. And then I go home. It's time to take your foods and bring them home.