12 September 2007

12 September 2007
Mark Twain
United States of America

Dear Mark,

You will be happy to know that we have been expanding ourselves into the cultural life of St. Petersburg...with interesting results.

On Monday evening, I had my 'Russian debut'. I was invited by guitarist Alexei Pliousnine, the director of the Apositsia Festival in which I am participating at the end of the month, to join him and his colleagues for SHARE-St. Petersburg. This is a human and machine jam session, in which live players interact with laptops and film. Alexei is an incredible musician and the experience was fantastic. The show lasted for about two hours. It was presented at this very hip club called The Place which is outside of the downtown area, so getting there was a little difficult, but it was worth the trip. I will probably be doing this on a weekly basis, since it is a steady Monday evening event.

The next day we visited the famous Hermitage. I must say that my first impressions were less than uplifting. As we were to meet a colleague of Margaret's, we entered through the Staff Enterance, so I didn't experience the Grand Staircase in it's full glory; the colleague was also an hour late in meeting us, so we sat on a rather uncomfortable bench in front of a drab office and security guard. The museum itself is a bit confusing, and riddled with construction and closed passages, so the main exhibit that we were looking for was never found; none in the staff could point us in the right direction, nor seemed to know what we were talking about, and we ended up walking in circles around the less interesting corridors (although the Raphael Loggia was fantastic)-the beautiful Dutch Baroque and 19th/20th Century French exhibits were unexperienced-at least I assume that they are beautiful...I did never see them...we left tired and frustrated. I must add here that the building itself was beautiful, even though many of the pieces that we saw in the less interesting corriders were less than inspiring. It was said that Catherine the Great bought many paintings, but she didn't care what they were and never looked at them-maybe she should have looked a little more...Next time, we'll get a map from the proper entrance!

A note must be made here about cultured milk products. Like the canned fish, cultured milk products seem to have bottomless variety! In the US, we have yogurt, and more recently kafir. Here...here, not only are there different species, but endless varieties within each species-texture alone presents a daunting task in trying them all. I've decided at this point that my favorite type is Riazhenka, which is a creamy, yellowish drinkable 'yogurt'...delicious!

The language remains a daunting task...but getting better...at least I can now order Riazhenka and ssssshhii...

Yours always,
Demetrius