I really did mean to post here more during the past month.
This morning I left Petrozavodsk, where I spent the last few weeks studying Russian and neglecting my homework. It’s been almost surreal. I’m still not good at Russian, but I’ve learned a lot. Not just about the language, but in general. About how to ride the busses and trolleys, about Russian food, about about Petrozavodsk’s founding by Peter the First in 1703 (the same year as Saint Petersburg!).
My host was wonderful, a fun grandma from Siberia who teaches high school English. She fed me breakfast and dinner, and for lunch I ate out almost every day with the other students at the language school, and sometimes volunteers fromlocal high schools. I wasn’t expecting that when I got here. I didn’t really know what to expect, but I met some great people that I already miss now that we’re scattering across the globe.
On the bright side, everything was so cheap that eating out every day was no problem, and I still have $150 left from the money I allotted myself for my stay here. That’s after going on two long excursions and buying too many Russian books (including the entire Chronicles of Narnia series in Russian), and shipping all those books back to Abu Dhabi.
We’ll see what’s left after my brief stay in Saint Petersburg. I have a hostel for tonight, and tomorrow night I’ll have to spend hours waiting at the airport for a 4am flight to Paris. I’ll spend three nights there, then fly to Cardiff, and after a night there I’m off by train to a farm in Wales where I’m going to be volunteering for three weeks. Then I fly from Cardiff to Baltimore to stay with some friends in Maryland while I wait for my family to see the Grand Canyon without me (a purposeful decision on my part, because they’re driving there in a minivan, and that’s just too many hours for seven people to be squished together.). My mom said a couple of weeks ago that she looked like a bad mom, because people kept asking her what my plans were and she didn’t know (neither did I, at the time). I said she should tell them to mind their business, but now you know.
Now that I’ve said goodbye to the last of my friends, the hard part of my journey begins. This trip is my first real attempt at solo international travel. I’ve flown from the UAE to Atlanta on my own, but that doesn’t really count. I’ve been really stressing myself out about it, probably needlessly. I’ve had to book my own hostels, handle most of my own transportation. I’m still a little bit terrified of Paris, even though it’s a much more touristy city than any place in Russia, and I’ve been doing okay so far. To be honest, there isn’t much I want to see in Paris. When I asked someone what I should do there, he said I should see the Eiffel Tower, which hadn’t even occurred to me. I want to see Leonardo da Vinci’s paintings, and I want to visit the graves of the Marquis and Marquise de Lafayette in Picpus Cemetery. Beyond that, I don’t really know. I could always just stay inside my hostel and keep practicing my Russian, but that seems like a waste.
Anyway. I might write something more detailed about Russia later. Right now I just want to sleep (my train left for Saint Petersburg at 6:20 AM). My mom and my brother are living it up in Germany without me for the weekend, so I have to try to have as much fun as I can. They don’t get to stay in a $10 hostel that’s right above a McDonald’s, though, so I think I already have them beat.
Daisy M. Hall 