...at 10:30 pm-- fireworks or an incessant barking dog outside your window?
Even in a room 16 stories up, the fireworks (in celebration of yesterday's
holiday) shot off at 10:30 last night RIGHT NEXT to the hotel sounded like a
war zone (and sure were bright and colorful)! But for 15 minutes or so,
they silenced the barking puppy that hangs out near the front of the hotel.
The barking and yipping starts up at sunrise (3:30-ish) and just goes and
goes. We could have shut our windows to drown out the noise...but then we'd
have suffocated... Besides that, the guy with the accordian outside across
the street that starts up around 9 really lessens the dog's barking, anyway,
so...
We had to check out of the hotel at 9 am-- even though it's now 4:30 pm and
I'm writing this from the Internet cafe inside the hotel-- because we're
leaving for St. Petersburg on the night (sleeper) train at 1 am. For most
of the day today, we were at the Sergeiv Posad monastery (with a lunch break
at, dare I write this, McDonald's; a Russian McDonald's is in itself a
cultural experience). Now we're temporarily homeless (really only roomless)
until we get to St. Petersburg. We have dinner here at the hotel at 7 pm,
followed by 3 and half hours of hang time before the bus takes us to the
train station. The train will arrive in St. Pete at about 8 or 8:30, and
we'll take a bus to the hotel, then immediately go for a bus tour of the
city. Based on my last (and first and only, really) experience with the
Moscow-St. Pete sleeper train, I'll be up for a good 30+ hours before I can
truly crash in the hotel tomorrow night. The sleeper cars have cabins for 4
persons each with VERY little ventilation and submarine-sized bunks. On top
of the cramped quarters, we'll have to stow our honkin'-big suitcases in
there with us... But, as I told my students, it's another cultural thing
that they have to do while they're here to get the bragging rights. I'm
sure that, like everything else, it'll make for some good stories upon
return home!
So all is well for this small American group from Texas in Russia, marrooned
for the time as we may be...
Talk to you again from St. Petersburg! (Where DUSHNO will likely no longer
be the Word of the Day!)
Poka!
E.B.
