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July 24, 2008 / Thursday
Summer Garden, And That Ship I'm Not Going To Get To Visit
This morning, I decided to pay a visit to the Summer Garden. I threw on my comfy red shoes, strapped my backpack on nice and snug around my waist (hooray for a thick waist band; with the laptop and all my pack here is heavier than the one I carried up Whitney) and headed out.
I'm learning to take side streets here now. They're still pretty busy, but much more pleasant than the main drag.
I got to the Summer Garden and walked down the center path toward the statues. When I reached the statues, I found that the entire area had been taped off. What is up, St. Petersburg? Why do you like to close tourist attractions in the middle of tourist season?
I headed for a parallel path, which, fortunately, was also lined with statues. I took pictures as I made up silly captions for the various figures and poses. I hope I remember them when I post the pictures next week.
[ Update: I remembered them. :-) ]
When I reached the other end, I swung by the Summer Palace, in the corner of the garden (it's more like a park) along the Fontanka River. Unlike all the other palaces we've seen, which have been giant, the Summer Palace is the size of a house.
In all the Summer Garden was quite pleasant. The tree cover was very nice, as it's warm and sunny out today.
Back into the sun I went, for my second try at seeing the Cruiser Aurora. I noticed as I crossed the Neva that there were a lot of large Russian navy vessels in the river, four in all. As I got closer to the Aurora I saw groups of sailors everywhere, in various types of uniforms. I wonder what's going on here right now? I held out hope that perhaps they'd be busy with the other ships and not the Aurora, but when I arrived at the ship I found it was not to be. The Aurora was closed yet again. I guess I'm not going to get to see it on this trip.
Headed for the office and stopped for lunch at the outdoor Teremok stand (it's a round thing you walk up to) near the Metro station. I managed to order without too much trouble, except that I knew only how to say juice, and was handed an apple juice even though I wanted orange juice. A "please" (пожалуйста) and a bit of pointing fixed that. "Orange" (or probably some juicy adjective derived from orange) is a difficult word in Russian; I can sound out the letters but it's so long that until I learn to say it naturally, it's hard to read and pronounce to a server. Here, you try: апельсиновый.
Okay, I just made myself learn it: a-pel-sin-o-veey. Short 'o' not long 'o', I think.
The gentleman in line behind me tried to talk to me while we were at the stand-as-you-eat table by the stand. (The table has little hooks underneath for hanging your bag. Neat.) I pretty naturally managed to say, "I'm sorry, I don't understand Russian. Do you speak English?" He didn't, but he tried to ask me something along the lines of whether I liked my blin. (I heard some word in what he said that I've heard before, and from context I'm starting to gather that it means something along the lines of liking something.) I gave a nod, a smile, and a thumbs up. My mushroom and cheese blin was quite tasty. I'm still not going to try it with fish roe, but at least now I've tried a savory blin here in Russia.
When I left, the gentleman mustered a very well enunciated "goodbye". I reciprocated with what I hope was a well enunciated "dasvidanya" (до свидания).
July 24, 2008 02:32 AM | Food:St. Petersburg
Comments
I got Google to translate the menus (mostly because that third page had weird brown stuff and I wanted to know if it was lentils--it was kashi, of course).
Your blin was an "e-mail" blin! Did you know that? Pretty funny.
I have fond memories of ricotta-cheese blini with jam on Sunday mornings. (I think we bought them frozen... but still yummy.)
Sorry you won't get to go on the navy ships. Me, I'd be walking right up to them and asking. :)
(Oh, and does the word for "apple" start with "apel" too? Hence the confusion?)
Posted by: Jennie at July 25, 2008 01:58 PM
Yeah, I couldn't figure out why they called it an e-mail blin. It didn't look electronic, and it didn't look like mail.
People were asking, and getting denied. I doubt that asking in a language they probably wouldn't understand would have helped!
The word for apple is яблоко, which is pronounced "yabloka" (approximately, since it has 'o's and those behave strangely). Nothing like "apple"!
Posted by: Viv at July 25, 2008 09:53 PM