Jeppson's World Tour: January 2015

Our new place

I found it curious that instead of one big blanket, there were two little ones. Even on the twin beds, there was just one little blanket that you would unfold and use. It did not tuck in at all and there was no flat sheet. Also, the pillows here are big and square.

Since the wife of the guy who works with Chris is German, a lot of the stuff in their house was German. I That this was super funny. I'm guessing it is German/Russian... It's Chamomile baby bath. For bad babies???

St. Pete Metro

Mosaic of Peter the Great.

Another cool mosaic.

The escalators going in and out of the metro are super deep. Standing at one end, you cannot see the other.

Each of the light poles are numbered. This is so that you can tell how deep you are going down. Each pole is appox 14 feet apart. The deepest one we saw was 29 light poles, Chris said he has seen one that is 35 poles... 14 feet times 29 light poles is 406 feet. That is 135 yards. That makes it deeper than a football field...

While we were in St. Pete, the price of the metro token was going to go up on January 1st, from 28r to 31r. People were stock piling them. They would come in and buy hundreds at a time. It got to the point that they were running out of tokens and didn't have any for people who were riding that day. So, they rationed them. You could only buy one at a time. This was a big huge pain since we would have to wait in this pushy shovy line each time we wanted to ride the metro. I tried to buy 4, one for me and each of the boys. The lady refused to sale them to me until I had each of the boys come to the window so she knew they weren't all for me. The price hike was $.06.

This is a monument of Anna Akhmatova, a modernist poet. She is well known for her controversial works, most notable her tragic masterpiece about the Stalinist terror. Akhmatova's first husband was executed by the Soviet secret police, and her son and her common-law husband spent many years in the Gulag. This monument is placed directly across the Neve River from the Kresty Holding Prison where her common-law husband and son were held.

I am standing where at the statue looking across the river. In the middle of the picture you can see another monument that looks like a seal. It is actually a sphinx. On one side it is normal and on the side facing the prison it is a skeleton. There is a plaque there with quotes about the evils of political repression and like this Sphinx, it may look good on the outside but inside it is evil and terrible.

Face of a sphinx, part of the Monument to Victims of Political Repression in St Petersburg, Russia

Face of a sphinx, part of the Monument to Victims of Political Repression in St Petersburg, Russia

Misc shots of the city

A beautiful walk home

If this window could talk, I would love to hear about all that it has seen.

One morning I looked out our window and saw these two cars pull in, men in suits got out and came into the building. I got a super scary feeling thinking about what it must have been like to see cars pull up like this and wonder if your neighbors had turned you for something. The panic that people must have felt, hiding the forbidden items... Maybe I watch too many movies.

Gateway to Moscow. This is the road that leads to Moscow.

This is how they hang Christmas lights on their trees. It looks like it would be much easier to put up and take down.

Dec 29

Chris had to go to St. Petersburg for 12 days over the New Year holiday so, they offered to put up the whole family so that we wouldn't have to be separated. So, of course we jumped on that. Dalton and Seth had never been there before. True to our cheap nature, we took the metro to the train station with all of our luggage, rather than take a taxi. It was a bit awkward but, so much more affordable. Hee hee.

This is the train we took. It is called Sapsan which is Russian for peregrine falcon, the fastest of all the falcons. It gets you from Moscow to St. Petersburg in approximately 4 hours. It is around 800 kilometers (500 miles) in distance and the train travels at a maximum speed of 250 kph (155mph). This is the much preferred form of travel. There is a night train that you can board at night, sleep, and then wake up in the morning and you are there. It goes much slower and makes more stops along the way. Of course the Sapsan is more money but, we felt we could afford it since we took the metro instead of a taxi. (Hahaha) Actually we took it cause I have a hard time sleeping on gross Russian train mattresses...

With 5 of us, only 4 of us fit around a table so, Chris got to sit with some other people. He loved it, at least he acted like he did.

After about 3 1/2 hours, the troops started to get restless.

St. Petersburg train station.

Our first night we stayed in the Consulate General's residence. (For each country we get an embassy (usually in the capitol city). An embassy is there to serve their citizens who are living abroad. It is also there to form good relations with the host country, it issues visas to those wishing to travel to the US and such. If an American citizen in Russia gets in trouble, they contact the embassy. So, Russia is a pretty big country. It is very inconvenient for those trying to get visas and for our citizens to get to Moscow. Thus, we have mini embassies or consulates throughout the country. We have 3 consulates in Russia, St. Petersburg, Vladivostok, and Ekaterinburg. Russia has 5 in the US, Seattle, San Francisco, Houston, and New York.) So, at each consulate, there is a Consulate General (the "ambassador" of the consulate). The Consulate Generals all answer to the Ambassador who is stationed at the embassy. St. Pete is in between Consulate Generals right now and so the residence is vacant. They put us there for 5 nights, we stayed 1. It was big and empty. There were also guards etc that were in and out of the place which was a bit unsettling for all of us. So, we moved to one of the consulates apartments. The guy who Chris was there covering for let us stay in their apartment while they were in Germany. We liked it much better.

The yellow building on the right is the Consulate General's residence.

Main entry

Biggest book we have ever seen!

This was early on in the game, you can tell cause they are both still smiling.

Amazing detail throughout the entire place.

BEAUTIFUL grand piano

John Adams room. Back in the day when John Adams was the president, St. Petersburg was the capitol and the embassy was located here. This is the room he would stay in when he would come to visit. They have tried to keep it as it was when he stayed there. I was tempted to sleep in it just to say that I did but, I'm pretty sure the guards would have not allowed it. And let's be honest, any time I am somewhere where there are guards, I am usually on my best behavior.

The window pictured below is the window in the middle of this picture, by the corner of the wall.

Original window from when John Adams stayed here.

All the detail on this is inlay. Crazy amazing detail!

Dec 30th
Chris had to spend the morning at work so the boys and I ventured out and saw some things on our own before Chris met up with us.

St. Isaac's Cathedral.
This is the largest orthodox basilica and the 4th largest cathedral in the world. It is dedicated to St. Isaac of Dalmatia, a patron saint of Peter the Great. It took 40 years to construct. During WWII the dome was painted grey to help hide it from enemy fire. During the Soviet Union, the church was turned into a museum. It presently only holds religious services in a small portion of the church. The rest is still a museum.