11 deg C, sunny with one or six clouds

Just like coming here, my looming departure has come as a bit of a surprise! Tomorrow morning I’ll be on a bus to Tallinn, the capital of Estonia. It feels like I have only been here for 2 weeks, not 4!

So I’ll take a step back a few days, as it’s been a little while since I last posted (with good reason!). Yuzha was certainly an experience! I spent time with friends of my relatives, down at a house near a lake and river. The weather was “a bit ordinary” the entire time, but we had a blast anyway. There was football, getting bogged near the lake, drying shoes practically in the fire, dancing, vodka, and many good times. Despite my decided lack of Russian skills, we managed to communicate everything just fine, with the help of the EN-RU dictionary and many many hand gestures

When the time came to return to Ivanovo, it was Sunday – and the buses don’t run on Sunday! So my relatives organised a ride in a car (a common thing here in Russia – stop a car, arrange a price and get taken to your destination!). The driver offered to take me to the train station for an extra 100 roubles (around AUD$5), but I declined and got off at the bus station in Ivanovo. Now, remember I’ve spent 2 days in this city, exploring it with locals. So I used this knowledge – combined with my ability to read the Russian alphabet and make out street names and some things – to catch the right bus into the City and even managed to find the voksal, or station. I had half an hour to spare, and the total cost: 8 roubles! Less than 37 cents!

The return train trip was not as pleasant as the way there. My compartment was next to a compartment being used by some Army guys – and it appears the train staff don’t tell the Army what to do. They were smoking, drinking and all sorts of things throughout the night, and of course I had next to no sleep. What sleep I did get was terrible due to a shocking pillow and sizeable headache from the weird sleeping positions I’d been forced to adopt! But I got to SPB, tried to sleep but couldn’t – so I spent the day relaxing and enjoying the sunshine.

Since I’ve been back in Saint Petersburg, I haven’t really done much. I went to the shops yesterday to stock up on fruit & snacks for my travels, and I’ve just been wandering around enjoying the fine weather and my remaining time here.