A day in the life
**From my time living and studying in St. Petersburg, Russia in the summer of 2014. Written then but posted 6 years later.**
My alarm goes off at 8am and I open my eyes to sunlight. During the summer white nights the sun would never truly set. I get dressed and head into the kitchen for breakfast, where a pot of warm kasha (oatmeal made from buckwheat) awaits. Since the tap water is undrinkable here, my host family has to boil the water before drinking it, although some families use filters. After filling my water bottle, I take the copies of my documents in my bag (in case the police stop me and request them under suspicion, as is legal) and head out the door. When I enter onto the busy street, cars scream by me and swerve around each other, trying to make a yellow light, only to be stopped by traffic on the other side of the intersection. I shake my head and make my way towards the bus stop.
I watch as marshrutka after marshrutka stop along the road to pick up more people than you think could possibly fit in a van. Marshrutkas are privately owned busses that run a certain route but will stop anywhere along that route to let you off. You just have to do is tell the driver where to let you off and hand him the money – all while he is driving. Finally, my bus comes and I step on, take a seat, and wait for the person in the orange vest to come give me a ticket in exchange for 25 rubles (that’s about 67 cents).
As I’m riding past the elaborate, baroque, yet damaged and unkept buildings, I look at the people on the bus. Some men with briefcases seem to be going to work; a boy in jeans listens to his iPod as he gazes out the window; two young women in short skirts, tight tops, and high heels sit with their large bag on their laps and sunglasses on their heads, texting on their iPhones; a young woman with a stroller stands near the door and an older woman wearing jeans sits reading her novel, as many people on transport do here; an elderly man reads the paper and two elderly women sit near the front, wearing flat shoes, long skirts, light jackets, and a scarf covering their head. They, too, hold their bags on their lap and are eyeing up the other passengers on the bus. They are known as babushkas, or “grandmothers,” and nobody messes with the babushka.
We cross two bridges, pass the baroque, blue-and-white Hermitage (one of the world’s largest museums of art), and drive a little ways on Nevsky Prospekt (the popular, main street in St. Petersburg). The bus fills up and no seats are left so some passengers need to stand. At the next stop, an elderly woman, or babushka, comes slowly onto the bus and scans her card on the machine to pay. She walks over to the young boy listening to his iPod who, seeing the old woman, rises and gives her his seat. If he hadn’t, very strong, spiteful words would have been directed at him by all the babushkas on the bus.
Finally, we reach St. Isaac’s cathedral (a Russian Orthodox Cathedral, which is the fourth largest cathedral in the world). I remember visiting the Cathedral the first week I arrived in St. Petersburg – it’s large, stone pillars and golden dome are impressive from the outside, but the inside is even more impressive – the walls and ceiling of a large, open space is covered with hundreds of colorful mosaics.
It’s my stop and I get off the bus, walking the rest of the way to Smolny College. Along the way, two Russians ask me for directions, and I do my best to answer them. I’ve been asked for directions at least three times every week since I got here – and now I can actually answer them!
I continue the familiar route to school: past the men drinking in the park, past the many buildings under construction and covered with the green tarp, past the productkiys on every block, past the workers smoking on the street (since it is illegal to smoke inside, even in your home), past the people feeding pigeons by the handful, past the food stands on the corner selling blinis (russian crepes), corn, or hotdogs, and past the delightful surprises left by dogs earlier that day.
The smells I encounter could be better: dirty gasoline used by the cars, cigarette smoke, tar or asphalt from construction sites, the sewer, garbage, and other unpleasant smells that cannot be explained. Only every now and then I smell freshly bread or pirogis (Russian pastries) wafting out from a café or food store.
When I get to the one entrance of the building, I scan my ID card and pass through the turnstile. The college is one building with two courtyards. First I have Russian grammar class for one and a half hours along with other Americans on the program, and then I have History of Russian Autocracy for three hours and twenty minutes alongside other Russian students. All of my classes are taught in Russian.
After classes I usually walk around the city or go to a café with some friends I met on the program. In the summer St. Petersburg can be very hot and filled with tourists, but in the fall the temperature is perfect, there are fewer tourists, and all the families have arrived back from their dachas (summer homes in the country where families go to escape the city every summer). Now that families populate the city, many faces I encounter on the street have changed from serious and cold faces to smiling, laughing faces. The family is the center of Russian culture, and kids are the center of the family.
St. Petersburg was built to resemble Amsterdam so there are many beautiful bridges and canals to walk along. The city also has many great museums, and some that are pretty strange. The ones I have visited include: the Hermitage (of course), Erarta (contemporary art), the vodka museum, the cat museum (St. Petersburg has a thing for cats), the Museum of Strange Things, the Freud Museum, and more. It’s also great to visit the suburbs of the city, where you can find forests, summer palaces once used by the nobility, and beaches.
I’ve been to the Church on Spilled Blood, tanned in the Field of Mars, toured numerous baroque palaces, and had picnics in many parks and gardens. I’ve seen a ballet and an opera, and I plan on seeing the circus. I’ve been to a jazz concert in a park and went spelunking in the woods with my host brother. And almost every day since I got here, I’ve seen at least one wedding.
If I were to sum up my thoughts about St. Petersburg, Russia, I would say that I feel like I stepped back 30-40 years into the past. The city and the social customs are underdeveloped compared to places in the US. For example, there are still traditional gender roles, almost everyone smokes cigarettes, running outside is unusual (but also because the city is not that pedestrian-friendly), and there’s a lack of diversity. It’s a strange and unsettling feeling.
When I get home to my host-family, the three small girls are running around naked, chasing each other and screaming. Alla (the great-grandmother) is talking to her friend on the phone in her room, Tatyana the house-keeping is cooking food, the grandfather is working on his computer in his room, the mother is playing with the kids, and the father and grandmother are still at work. I live in an apartment with 10 other people, and although it has eight rooms and two bathrooms, there’s no open space. There’s no living room – only two long, narrow hallways with rooms coming off of them. The gathering space is in the kitchen, which has a table that seats only four people, and if people aren’t in the kitchen, then they are in their room with the door shut. But being in a small room with the door shut can be extremely stuffy and hot during the summer since there’s no air conditioning and sometimes no ventilation system in buildings.
For dinner Tatyana makes traditional Russian cuisine: borsch, herring under a fur coat, chicken, cucumber and tomato salad, etc. Some things I’ve noticed about the food: Russians love to soak their food in fat, whether it be butter, oil, or mayonnaise; Russians use dill frequently, even in the strangest foods, like with carrot salad; Russians eat a lot of chicken. Basically, if you can tolerate repetition and bland cuisine, the food here is fine.
Towards the end of the summer it wouldn’t get dark out until 1am, but now the sun is setting around 9pm. After doing my homework and browsing on the computer, I lay my head down and go to bed, exhausted from the day. On the wall next to my bed hangs a brown, flower-patterned carpet that covers the entire wall. Good insulation for the winter to come.
Living in Russia has been difficult, especially being used to such a westernized way of living. Things are much more traditional here, and being a woman, that can be tough. But being here has made me realize just how much we have back in the US, and has made me appreciate everything I’ve grown up with. St. Petersburg definitely has a lot to offer, and I’ve learned so much these past three months – not just about the language and culture, but about myself, as well. Here’s to the rest of the semester – на здоровье!