Fun in Finland!

Can't believe we're already at the airport on our way back to Moscow- this part of the trip (the one where Ashley is with me making sure I don't go too crazy) is almost over! When we were leaving St. Petersburg, everyone we met was saying we were giving Helsinki too much time and would be so bored for five days, but we managed to encounter enough absurdity to make the time fly!

We arrived on a very early train (sorry Ashley) on Monday morning and with the help of some girls we found on the street got on the right bus to take us to the hostel. We ended up staying in the eastern part of the city in Katajanokka - neighborhood that is one of Helsinki's numerous islands/peninsulas, connected to the mainland only by a narrow street/bridge. After dropping off our bags, we headed to a couple major sights in the city. We saw the two major cathedrals, which were both very pretty (especially outside) but a little underwhelming (especially inside) after he incredible churches we saw in Russia. Nothing will ever compare. Then we wandered around Market Square- a sprawling market with dozens of tents selling fresh veggies (food that is green!) and fruit, as well as salmon dishes, fresh fish, and souvenirs. Not sure yet what the kitchen situation was, we agreed to return later for grocery shopping and wandered a little through the city. We found the Helsinki City Museum, which was just full of silly things like old beer cans and films of portraits that blinked at you creepily. Then we headed to the hostel where we officially checked in. We were in a private room, and immediately unpacked like we haven't the whole trip- just threw everything out of our backpacks and took over the space. Back at the market we bought fresh veggies and fruit and had a great dinner that night!

We spent the days in Helsinki mostly exploring the islands and the city in general. It's pretty compact so we did a lot of walking. Some highlights:

Seurassari

An island in the west of the city that houses an open air museum of buildings from all over finland, and incredible views of the city across the water. A few of the buildings are enterable, with some information to be found inside. One has become a children's museum, where we played this game:

Couldn't tell which items used to belong to a gnome though.

 We spent a few hours touring the buildings and then sat on a bench by the sea reading and soaking up that Nordic sun. While we were sitting there, though, we were ambushed by geese, who came close enough to nibble at the strap of my backpack and basically terrify us.

Suomenlinna

We spent our last day in Helsinki at Suomenlinna, a sea fortress just offshore, accessible by public ferry that runs as part of the tram/bus system in the city. Probably the most beautiful part of Helsinki, in my opinion, and definitely worth a visit, if you find yourself in Finland. In addition to cool fortress walls and cannons, somewhat decent beaches and great picnic spots up above the water, the fortress houses an "open prison" (but apparently this means open for prisoners, not for tourists) and 1000 residents who may or may not be displeased to find two lost American girls wandering through their backyard because they thought it was a museum. There is a visitor's center with the single greatest informational video I've ever seen, complete with intense, suspenseful battle music and a somewhat chilling (and seemingly irrelevant) warning that my country could do just fine without me. Not sure what was meant by that.

Turku

Wanting to see a little more of finland than just Helsinki, we spent a day in Turku, another city on the sea but a little west of the capital, about 2 hours by train. Our first stop was the castle, which we found tucked behind a lovely construction area and industrial shipyard. It's location made me a little wary of what we would find there, but it turned out to be worth the walk. The building itself was cool - after all the palaces and cathedrals a medieval castle was a nice change - but the museum was also really well laid out, with a great self-guided tour through the entire structure. It was also the silliest place I've ever been. Amongst the serious castle information were some fun surprises, like a stuffed rat near the latrine and dummies thrown into the dungeon pit, as well as an entire section devoted to the gnome that lives in this castle (please note: this is the second gnome reference in Finland). We tried on gnome hats: 

and saw the gnome'a treasure room: fake jewels and gold, guarded by a fake wolf.

After the castle, we headed east along the riverbank (armed with awesome dark Finnish rye bread that was so moist the outside was sticky and so delicious we couldn't help but eat half the loaf) toward the city's cathedral, which was cool but again nothing like Russia. From there we wandered along the paths that run along the river, enjoying the sun until it was time to hit the train station to head back to Helsinki.

Other Scandinavian Mischief

In the hopes of experiencing nightlife like a Helsinkian, we consulted our map for a list of bars. Neither of us could turn down the offer of "part library part bar with over 100 kinds of beer" so we headed in that direction. It was the coolest, silliest place we have ever been (and re-read this post: we went to a lot of silly places in the last 5 days alone) with books (sadly, only in Finnish) lining the walls and lots of beer and Finns deep in what I can only assume was profound academic discussion.

and also this poster that I assume says "et tu brute?" in Finnish. The Latin nerd in me couldn't avoid photographing.

Still determined to have one local meal in every place I go to on this trip, we ate at the market on Thursday. Deciding that our vegetarian stomachs would unfortunately be unable to handle the reindeer meatballs, we each ordered a salmon plate, which was delicious but huge! with veggies, potatoes, and one mysterious fried ring on the side.

And I'll leave you with this anecdote. On one of our strolls along Helsinki, we were crossing a pier where a man was fishing. Having successfully caught a fish, he reeled it in, I guess with a little too much excitement, because the line flew backward and the fish on the end hit a woman who was walking by. The fisherman, Ashley and I all found this unbearably funny. The woman did not agree.

Have you seen my muff?

St. Petersburg is cold! At least in the shade- the sun actually warms the city up quite a bit. Ashley and I have gotten to see a lot of it, during the day and at night (although night is only about 30 minutes long, so mostly during the day). We got to go the ballet, the evening of the 22nd. We saw Swan Lake at the Alexandrisnky Theater, which, it turns out, is the oldest theater in Russia, so that was pretty cool. It was so beautiful, and we had great seats; they turned out to be in a box so that was really cool!

The following day, we took a ferry to Peterhof, Tsar Alexander I's summer getaway down the Baltic Sea a bit from the city. Beautiful, beautiful palace with a huge garden that we walked through and lots of fountains including a "trick fountain" that shoots water at unsuspecting passersby and their cameras (no harm done, don't worry!)

It was a gorgeous day and really sunny right on the sea, so after a while of wandering, we sat on the pier and read for a while. I didn't get to go to the beach at all this summer, so I'm glad I managed to find one in Russia! We headed home and dined like kings at a sushi bar/Uzbek restaurant that an Italian girl staying at out hostel recommended. Not really what I had in mind for a Russian meal, but all the Uzbek dishes were just like what I ate in Tajikistan, so it felt just like home 😊.

The next day, our last day in St. Petersburg, we went to the Peter and Paul Fortress across the river from the Hermitage and the hostel where we are staying. There was a beautiful cathedral there, and a few museums. The Museum of Medieval Torture Instruments cost extra, so we didn't go into that one, but we did do this:

because there's nothing wrong with being a 5 year old when you're a tourist. Also shortly after these were taken we watched a couple take their wedding photos with this guy, so no shame.

The coolest part of the fortress was the prison, which has been converted into a museum. Lots of prisoners of the civil war and Bolshevik revolution were held here, and a few of their cells were on display (some names I recognized from my Soviet Union history class), and there was a lot of information about the political prison (in English) so we actually (re)learned a lot!

Excuse me, I'm afraid I'm becoming ridiculous.

Forgive the absurdity, but everything that happens to us here is crazy.

We are now in St. Petersburg, the second stop of the trip! Can't believe how fast Moscow went; even though the days seemed long because we did so much, I wasn't quite ready to go. Luckily we'll be back there for the night after Helsinki, so we'll have a little bit more time.

Our last few days in Moscow we spent wandering around, seeing as many corners of the city. We went back to the area where the cosmonaut museum is, because we'd found a few more things to see up there, especially a Friendship of Nations fountain, dedicated to the close ties between the states of the Soviet Union. When we passed through the gates leading to the park, we were met by cartoon characters, and found that we were actually in a soviet amusement park. We strolled a while, looked at fountains, wandered through carnival games, bumper cars, a petting zoo tent, one tent that curiously said something mysterious about crocodiles, and lots of buildings competing to have the most hammer and sickles, and eventually came to the end of the park, where a path led off into a farm-looking area. Knowing that we had the whole day to explore, we followed it. We found some huge hedge animals. Unfortunately they were behind a gate, but they were incredible. We realized we were in an apple orchard and we were starving, so we picked a few, but the trees came to life and started attacking us. Not really, they were also fenced off. But we did find a little church that was singing to itself. When we got out of oz, we went back toward the park to see about riding the Ferris wheel. Got a pretty good view of the city, and spotted a few of the other sights we'd been looking for. Then we engaged in some pretty spectacular people watching (Russians love to pose for photos like no other group of people I have ever come across) by the fountain, and decided to head to the southern edge of the city where we could walk along the river and maybe get into a sculpture garden. We couldn't find a way to get to the road that runs by the river, so in the end we found another park (Gorky Park) and wandered there for a while before heading home. Later that night, we decided to try some Moscow street food, so we walked around the block near the hostel. We found a little shack called bistro, and successfully ordered shwarma and beers. The guys working at the counter thought we were incredibly amusing and fascinating, and watched us the whole time we were there. I guess American tourists don't frequent bistro at 10:30 at night. Our train on Monday didn't leave until 9 pm, so we had just about the whole day. We decided on tsaritsyno park, where there is a palace, a fountain, and a walking trail. We spent the day getting somewhat lost there, then took a sunny nap outside the palace. Around 4, we headed back to the hostel (we had checked out but left our bags for the day) where we sneakily used the kitchen, had dinner, and lurked in the hallway (there's a couch there) until it was time to head out. We had some trouble finding the train station- a sign we found pointed to every station nearby except the one we needed, and it was only when we went to the ticket office of a different train station and showed the woman our tickets with a sad "we are so lost" look that she pointed us back where we had come from. Turns out the sign didn't advertise leningradskaya because it was literally right outside of it. Luckily we were still about an hour early, but we found the train and our car and soon we were boarding! We were riding 3rd class to save money, but this meant there were no doors on the compartments. We were also on two top bunks next to each other, above two older Russian men, and across from two more. We must have looked helpless and lost, because one of them grabbed our backpacks and threw them up to the shelves. Then he immediately started speaking English to me (the whole time we were in Moscow, we had not met a single English speaker, and the guy I'm sitting next to on the train will not stop talking), telling me he's a sailor and has been to 65 countries. So when Ashley said she was going to have a cigarette before we left, I jumped at the chance to get off for 5 more minutes. When we came back, all 4 men surrounding us had taken off their shirts and made up their beds. So Ashley an I jumped up onto our own beds, where we stayed pretty much silent for the next ten hours:

I actually slept pretty well, and even though I woke up occasionally when we stopped, as soon as we started moving again I was rocked back to sleep. I woke up around 6:15, about a half hour before we were supposed to arrive. I peeked down below, saw that everyone was dressed and all the beds made up, so I figured the coast was clear to jump back down. I was instructed by the English speaker to wake up Ashley, so I did, and we pulled up to St. Petersburg! Everyone got off pretty quickly, and we took this picture:

Hint: if you are planning to take the night train from Moscow to St. Petersburg, pay for 2nd class.

We found the hostel via bus and a very helpful conductor. Did I say it was pouring? I have never seen so much rain. By the time we arrived, we were both soaking. It was only 7:00, but we figured we could at least drop off our bags for the day while we explored. The girl working here also let us shower, which was absolutely necessary, and then said we could stay for complimentary breakfast at 8. One shower, meal, and power outage (oh hello there Nairobi) later, we headed to the hermitage, which turns out to be right around the corner! 

We saw as much of the museum as we could (nearly all of the 3 floors of the winter palace) and then, when we could not possibly walk another step, went outside, where the sun had come out, and it had become a beautiful day. We picked up our swan lake tickets (for later tonight!) and some essential groceries, and then headed back to the hostel to plan the rest of the day. We decided to follow the river to the summer gardens and palace, and spent the afternoon there (and by afternoon I mean until 8:45, because the sun didn't set until 9:45), then walked across a bridge and followed the river back from the other side, where we had a great view of the sunset as reflected in the windows of the hermitage. I have never slept as long or as well as I did last night.

Today we went back to the hermitage, with the intention of doing it all (we had bought a 2 day ticket). Unfortunately, we were defeated after the first floor of the small and large hermitage (the half of the property that is not the winter palace), finishing the part of the winter palace we skipped yesterday, and seeing the room of armor. Then we went to St. Isaac's Cathedral, which was indescribable - so much gold! - before heading back to the hostel to relax a bit and get ready for the ballet tonight! Very, very excited to be in St. Petersburg!! Oh, and because I just looked up and saw them, let me tell you about the stair in the hostel. First of all, the hostel itself is on the 5th floor of a building, and that staircase is huge and winding and never ending. But up to our bedroom is one more flight of stairs, in which every step is only half a step, so you have to use the right foot for the right step (does that make any sense?) and if you are not paying attention you have probably fallen back down to the first floor, and if you happen to be carrying a heavy backpack you might as well sleep in the living room.

Exploring Moscow

The last couple days have been pretty busy, as Ashley and I have tried to see as much of Moscow as possible in such a short time. I could spend weeks wandering the city, but we've had to pick and choose.

Saturday, the 17th was my birthday and our first full day here. We got up early and headed to the city center to see the Red Square, the Kremlin, and Lenin's Mausoleum. We could have taken the metro, but decided to walk the 20 minutes there to get a better sense of the city. We got turned around only a few times, and made it there with very little stress. Once we got to the square and got our delight under control, we were directed by a policeman toward the line for the mausoleum. It stretched just about he length of the square, but I've read that it moves pretty quickly, and besides, it's Lenin, so we were undaunted and joined the line. It took about a half hour to get up to the front, where we checked our bags and followed a path of former soviets' graves. With only a couple exceptions they were marked only in Cyrillic, but I recognized a few familiar names. Eventually the path led into the tomb itself, which was very dark and housed somber armed guards at every corner. There wasn't much time to stop when we reached Lenin, to keep the line moving, but it was very cool- absolutely worth the wait. Back out in the sunlight, we picked up our bags and headed to St. Basil's Cathedral at the other end of the square. I wasn't sure tickets were worth the 300 rubles, but Ashley convinced me, and I am so glad she did. I thought I got cathedral-ed out back in 11th grade when I was living in Switzerland and never fully recovered, but this was like nothing I had ever seen. The famous colorful dome roofs are some indication of what the inside looks like. The walls are painted floor to ceiling with colorful patterns and designs, and all the chapels are filled with frescoes and elaborate chandeliers and decorations. Can't wait to get some pictures up, but not sure I'll have a chance to get them off my camera until October. I have to remember to take a couple with my phone so I have something to share. Emerging from the maze of St. Basil's, we left the square for the Kremlin. It took us a while to figure out how and where to buy tickets, but once we were heading in the right direction, the line wasn't hard to miss. We waited a long time for those tickets- upwards of an hour in unexpectedly hot sun. When we finally got to the ticket booths, no one seemed to be following any kind of order anyway, and we lost a lot of time before I decided to be as aggressive as the Russians around me and pushed my way to the front, where I paid for two tickets and then got out of there as fast as I could. We checked our bags and cameras at the front like we were instructed to, but once inside found that everyone else had their cameras with them and were using them freely. I am a little disappointed that I won't have any pictures inside the kremlin walls, but it was so beautiful I'm sure I wouldn't have done it justice anyway. All the roofs of all the cathedrals are domed like St. Basil's, but gold instead of colorful and patterned so everywhere you look you are surrounded by beautiful gold and white churches. Five or six of the cathedrals inside the kremlin function as museums, so we wandered through them looking at the frescoes that cover every inch of wall and ceiling in each of them. Eventually, after attempting to sneak onto an English tour we passed (unsuccessful) and wandering around the grounds for a while, we decided to head back to the hostel to regroup and nap a bit (we were both still pretty jet lagged so hadn't slept much the night before).

After our nap, we were discussing potential birthday celebrations when a guy staying across the hall came over and introduced himself, saying that he was traveling alone and basically looking for company. We invited him out and left around 9, thinking we'd find a bar or restaurant and just have a quick drink... Our naps hadn't really rejuvenated us. We wandered for a while as it was still light and pretty warm out, then found a restaurant. The seats were all couches and armchairs with comfy pillows and curtains around the booths. We had a little vodka (it is Russia, after all, and it was my birthday) and stayed until around midnight, then Matt suggested that we check out a karaoke bar that is across the street from the hostel. Unfortunately, we underestimated how long we had been walking earlier and thought we had gotten lost (when really if we had just continued a few more blocks we would have made it home easily) so got a little turned around. Somehow we made it all the way to the city center. We decided to just take the metro back, but were told it was not possible to get home from where we were. That was just not true, but we believed the Russian who told us that, and decided we'd walk back. We got a little further down and realized we'd been pointed the wrong way by the people we'd met on the street. Luckily, we were able to get on the metro from there and made it back without further ado. We spent a while chatting with the girl working at the desk, who was working her first night shift and was (I hope) happy to have some company, and she even had a pizza delivered to the hostel for us. Yes, you can have pizza delivered to your hostel in Moscow.

The next day (yesterday) on even less sleep because we went to bed late but more because a new roommate snores louder than anyone I have ever heard (literally the room vibrates every time she breathes), Ashley and I headed to Kitai Gorod, an old Moscow neighborhood close to the city center where we saw two small museums- one, the chambers of the old Romanov palace, and the other the original British embassy that is 500 years old, with a lot of information on 16th century trade relations between Britain and Russia. They were both very interesting and cool buildings to look at, at the very least. On our way out of the second museum, we were literally attacked by pigeons. A whole flock of them was just sitting in the field and all of a sudden they all flew at us. There was a split second when I knew what was happening and had time to cover my head and cower behind Ashley. Otherwise, who knows what might have happened. Then we headed up to the northeast of the city, where there is a cosmonaut museum. After getting briefly stuck in the middle of a highway because there was a crosswalk to the median but not from it, we walked over to the museum, which was pretty cool, although most of the signs were only in Russian. From what I deduced, though, it really focuses on the politics of space travel, and not the science of the US air and space museums which I have never pretended to enjoy. Among my favorite parts of the museum: a tiny soviet flag that apparently Nixon presented to the USSR after sending it to the moon on Apollo 11 (I didn't know he did that, but I think it's great); the first two dogs the USSR sent to space, taxidermied and preserved in glass cases, posing next to a model of a space shuttle; and the English signs pointing you to the next exhibit, urging you to "inspect further". As we left the museum, we followed our ears to find a group of (potentially) Mongolian street performers dancing and singing. I thought it was pretty cool, but I was also exhausted and didn't think my legs would stand up for much longer, so after they finished their first song we hopped on a monorail that would take us to the right metro line and went home. I napped while Ashley got some bank issues settled (apparently Bank of America hates the ATM in the hostel and doesn't recognize the transaction) and then we decided to check out Arbatskaya, a street in the west of the city where, from what I can tell, Russian hipsters go to watch street performers and painters, drink beer, casually carry monkeys dressed as children on their shoulders, and eat Cinnabon and Dunkin Donuts. We wandered there for a while, until it seemed like all the performers were heading home, and then we did the same. Today's our last full day here; we hop on a train to St. Petersburg tomorrow night!

First day

Well we were finally given seat assignments- after boarding started, so you can be sure I was calm and collected and not panicking at all. It worked out in the end though, because Ashley and I were upgraded to economy plus, which apparently means comfy seats, extra leg room, and complimentary bottles of water. Our flight to Copenhagen was then uneventful, and we actually arrived a half hour early because of wind. We got there just as I had finally drifted off to sleep, and as we groggily stumbled around the Copenhagen airport at 7 am but 1 am out time, we were directed toward gate b, although our gate hadn't been posted yet. While this meant going through passport control, we were assured we could get to any gate we wanted once we got to gate b. unfortunately I think the Danish man who told us that was a little confused, because when we got to the other side and saw that our gate was a c gate, we followed signs back through passport control, where the bewildered border control officer looked at the stamp in our passports and said "you just got here". And that's the story of how I accidentally went to Denmark for 10 minutes.

Our flight to Moscow was easy and crisis free, and customs and border control felt a little like a bunch of people went home early today- desks where they might have checked our immigration cards and items to declare, but no people doing any checking. So, having collected our bags (the baggage claim gods were smiling on us and they were some of the first we saw), we consulted our detailed hostel directions. Once we determined that we were at sheremetyevo airport and not domodedovo like I thought (for whatever reason, I guess I thought that double checking the airport we were flying to was overkill...) we found that we needed to get on the aeroexpress train and after many minutes of turning in circles and shrugging, we enlisted the help of a security guard who guided us up an elevator and down a hallway. We bought tickets without (much) trouble and hopped on board toward the city! Then we found the metro and used my negligible understanding of Cyrillic to figure out where to go. Ashley was a rockstar reading the metro map and somehow we managed to make it to our stop (we even had to change trains!). The directions from the metro stop were a bit unclear- "take the path, it goes on a ways" - but only a handful of wrong turns later, we arrived at the front door, checked in, were given a tour, and were left to our own devices. We decided to find coffee and then maybe real food. Coffee turned out to be 5-7 dollars so we probably won't be doing that again in a hurry. The map we got at the hostel had a minimart nearby, but also a grocery store a little farther away, so we decided to be adventurous and find the grocery store. We didn't find it, but managed to navigate in a circle and never get lost! In the end, since it was 8:00 pm and we were exhausted and wanting to get back before sunset, at least our first night, we decided to check out the minimart. It turned out to be more than enough of a store, and we stocked up on some apples, bread, yogurt, and cheese, so maybe we won't starve to death or go broke in this city. Now we are all tucked up in bed- ready for Lenin, the Red Square, and the Kremlin tomorrow!! Can't wait!

(Forever roommates, taking on a third continent 😃)

We're off!

Here we are... Waiting at the airport. So far, so good, except that we weren't able to get our seat assignments online. When I called the airline, the Danish guy told me that "the seats are reserved for the passengers". Which frankly was not all the helpful. So when we checked in, I hoped we'd be able to get seats then. But the woman told us that we could get our seat assignments at the gate. So after an easy and hassle-free trip through security (for us; the guy ahead of us tried to bring a fake sword, which TSA deemed too realistic for the flight), we arrived at the gate. Unfortunately the woman at the gate took our boarding passes, told us she'd page us at 4:30 (which is what time we are supposed to be boarding) and sent us on our way. So now, one free coffee later, here we sit, at the gate, with no seat assignment, no boarding passes, and 16 minutes to boarding time. Sounds like a good start to a trip to Russia to me!

Testing

Hello again! This post is a test to see how terrible it is to blog via iPhone before I decide whether to bring my computer on my next adventure.

For those who don't know, as a post-graduation present to ourselves, my roommate Ashley and I had planned a Russia trip. It transformed from a transsiberian railway trip from Moscow to Beijing into a 2 week tour of Moscow, St. Petersburg and Helsinki. Then, after some prompting from my aunt, I decided to continue extend it as a backpacking trip down to Istanbul, a city I've been itching to see ever since I looked out at it from the plane on my way to Tajikistan (2 years ago, how crazy is that?). I'll be traveling trough the Baltics, down through Poland to the Czech Republic to Vienna, Bratislava, Budapest, a few towns in Romania on the way to Bucharest, to Sofia, finally to Istanbul, and I'll be flying home from there. I'm leaving in 11 days, and I'll be gone until October 21. I'm a little nervous about traveling alone, but mostly I am so excited! I'm just finishing up a couple last minute planning things, and then I'll be on my way!