Being Girly Again

Forever young … Andrea and I just got tattoos on our hands and we are chewing “Hubba Bubba” chewing gum. The Skittles over here are also great. Everybody loves candy, especially women. The sweeter the better.

hubbabubba

kiwi

erdbeer

bubba

hubba

cola

mango-maracuja

“And girls just wanna have fun …” could be the title of our small night blogging session. Because simple is easier than complex.

(andrea+carina)

Passion for Pirogs

One of the highlights the Russian cuisine has to offer are definitely pirogs. Pirogs are pies made out of yeast dough or puff pastry. There’s s a wide range of different stuffing – so there is a great choice in both sweet and salty pirogs. We have been eating a lot of pirogs, especially in one of our favourite cafés, “Stolle”.

It’s great fun cooking together with friends, so I gratefully accepted the invitation to participate in the pirog experience. Julia and Maria invited us to their place. The advantage of living in an apartment is definitely the fact that they have even an oven!

Besides Julia and Maria, the two hosts of this “perfect dinner”, Sara, Marina, Varpu and I myself were passionaly and eagerly involved in the preparations. But do too many cooks spoil the broth?  Let me tell you – we didn’t!

Yummy!!!

Having a few glasses of sparkling wine during the preparations, some good conversation and laughs, we were all really curious whether our very first pirogs would be as good as we hoped. By that time, even more guests – Daniel, Hilmar and Iva – had arrived.

The smell that filled the apartment was promising and when the pirogs were finally ready, they just turned out to be absolutely delicious …

Yummy!

We then went to the city center to see a concert of Markscheider Kunst, which was great fun as well.

(anna)

Halloween, Houswarming, “Lying-In”, Sushi & Co

We haven’t postet a lot about going out lately but that doesn’t necessarily mean that we haven’t been going out. Actually it’s quiet the difference. During the last two weeks we were out quiet a lot and it was a WHOLE LOT of fun.

Friday – Halloween

Halloween: Fun in Karinas Flat

On Halloween we were at a really nice friend of ours – Karina – and then we went to the Club “Achtung Baby”. In order to get free entrance Anna “pretended” to be a ballet dancer and even gave a little show of her skills. Because pictures say more than doesn’t words, you should check out flickr for some impressions.

Saturday Night – “Lying-In”
While Anna was at a concert, I was at another great party on Saturday night (unfortunately I don’t have any pics). Our roommate Andrea and I went there and didn’t return until the next afternoon. Because of the metro’s and the bridge’s timetables, all the guest just stayed there. We had a big “Bettenlager” – “bed camp” would be the literal translation but I am afraid there isn’t such a word in English, maybe even something like “lying-in”.

Thursday Nigth – Housewarming Party & Sushi
Last Thursday we were invited to “Новоселье” (Housewarming Party) and it was really cool. We were invited to this very nice flat, in a new built apartement complex. Katja, a very dear friend, invited us. When we arrived a lot of nice Russians and a really good buffet awaited us. That night we even learned who to make “Sushi” ourselves.

Partying here is a lot of fun, especially with Russians. They really know how to party and how to enjoy one’s time.

(carina)

I am …

… curious about the U.S. election results!

… awaiting them desperately!

… commenting again!

For the last 30 minutes I have been wondering who would be the new president of the U.S.

either

… the attractive young man with the black skin, the nice smile and the nice wife, who is seamingly the better choice for America, at least from the Austrian point of view

or

… the elderly man with the wrinkly and scarved skin, the pretended smile and the wife with the dyed sheer-blonde hair, who is seamingly the better choice for America, at least from some Russians point of view.

This was just about appearance, stereotypes and fun. It’s not really fair to judge people by these things but isn’t it actually how THEY (the politicians) really want us to judge THEM. Aren’t they just acting all the time, because they want people to vote for them. I think yes! And I know, I am totally speaking AGAINGST my own business now. I think this hokeyness is the reason for so many people being sick of politics. I don’t think, no actually I know, that people are rumbling their acting.

But who really cares about my opinion? Is there actually any point in talking about it now? Time will bring the answer, I think, no actually I know.

(carina)

Running to Observe the Crises

few words in advance: I know that this following blog entry isnt’t at all perfect – especially not in a journalistic way. Still I want to post it. Take it as a motiviation to comment and to talk about the observations about the “financial crises” in your surroundings. I think it is a great opportunity since people from (many) different nationalities are reading this blog. It would be really interesting (for me) to hear/read about it!

Construction site in St. Petersburg's city centre, seen from top of Saint Isaac's Cathedral.

A few days ago I watched a newscast on ORF (on-demand) about the financial crises and how it hit(s) Russia. The next day I was jogging in my neighbourhood and since the Austrian newscast talked about “Russian construction sites having a break lately because of the financial crises”, I was really amazed that the construction sites in my neighbourhood were still lively. The following day, I passed this place again and workers were even working at night (or at least when it was already dark). Another day I was doing a little bit of sightseeing in the city center and see there, on top of the Saint Isaac’s Cathedral, you could see a lot of construction sites, where people were still working.

Another thing mentioned in the newscast: Some shops in Moskow were offering fewer products and some products were even already sold out. To be honest, I haven’t really noticed that in St. Petersburg yet (actually not even yet, about two weeks after the mentioned newscast).

People’s feeling
People I talked to about the crises don’t feel any impact on their daily life yet but they think that they will feel an impact in the upcoming months.

In one of our lectures called Russian Political System we also talked about the crisis and its impact on Russians. Our professor said that “normal” people hadn’t yet realized the consequences. But when he had been to Moskow about two weeks ago, he had had the feeling that “nice restaurants” hadn’t anymore been as crambed as they had used to be about two months ago. He said that this was already a sign that wealther people had already started changing their consumer behaviour.

(carina)

Waiting for …

… better times!

No not really, just for the first results of U.S. elections.

You wouldn’t think that it is that hard to wait some more 30 minutes for some stupid results of some stupid elections. Some information that we get from the www. Some information that we rely on, even though it is transmitted electronically – maybe we even rely on it more because of the FACT that it was spread electronically and NOT personally.

Alright … I will keep posting now till I hear some first results. Write to you soon … (carina)

P.S. I nearly forgot to tell: That’s the first time I think the time difference is stupid because in Austria it’s still two hours earlier.

Feeling touristy

Mama and Papa, if you are reading this, and I do hope so, I hope you enjoyed your stay in Piter as much as I did. It was great showing you “my” city and my home for the moment.

Yes, my parents stayed in Piter for five days and I was trying my best to offer them a diverse programme. I was killing two birds with one stone: I hadn’t done much sight-seeing myself, so I finally had a good reason to get started with discovering more of the touristy aspects of St. Petersburg I had missed out on so far. Last week, I was not only passing by Hermitage, but finally went inside. The same applies to the Peter-and-Paul-Fortress.

However, I also tried to show my parents a St. Petersburg off the beaten track and less touristy, like a big real Russian market, various rides on “Marschrutkas” and a nice coffee-break in our dorm room. You don’t get these impressions from a package holiday.

I came to realise that I had already gotten used to distances. We did a lot of walking and on the second day, my parents already knew that it would ONLY be another 15 minutes of walking, when I told them, “Oh, it’s just around the corner.”

We were quite lucky as far as the weather was concerned. It was clouded and windy, it rained a bit, but it was still not too bad and we could do some walking, some more walking and even more walking.

Now I am getting back to daily life here in St. Petersburg, but I am already looking forward to feeling touristy again in about two weeks when we are going to Moscow.

(anna)

Contacts, Contacts, Contacts

So many things have been going on lately, that I don’t really know where to start, but I have to share some thoughts, experiences or rather ongoings with you.

1st Work Experience: Lesson – Russians and Their Networking
Today we have talked to Vadim, the head of the English departement and also one of our two coordinators, about a PR-internship. Quickly he hooked us up with a very nice “девушка” (translated as girl or better to say young lady but actually Russians use the word “девушка” for speaking about any female, whether she is five or 99 years old, selling fruits in a shop or still playing with her dolls). Enesch, thats her name, again instantly hooked us up with another guy (Actually I think it is her boss).

Half an hour later she already called to tell us that she had talked to her director and that we just need to call him to negotiate with him ourselves. Well, tomorrow we are gonna do that. I am excited and also a little “scared” because of talking Russian on the phone with this guy. But it will work out just fine, I’m sure (That’s how I keep motiviating myself). I will keep you updated on that one. By the way this internship would be at an PR-agency called Agency Information Resources.

2nd Work: More Prospective Work
We have another internship option. A lady from the PR-departement of our Faculty would help us with. We have an appointment with her tomorrow.

3rd Interview: PR in Russia
I am excited because tomorrow I am gonna “interview” one of my teachers about PR in general and PR in Russia. The result you will find on this blog soon.

4th Language: Happy Just Because of Simple Russian Language Skills
I have the feeling that my Russian is improving any day. I am soooooo very excited. The downfall: It seems that my Italian and Spanish is just disappearing as quickly.

(carina)

Туфли or better boots?

There is this cliché that women think of shoes a lot. With us this is definitely the case at the moment. We are now sharing our observations with you – can you find some answers to our questions?

Mirror, mirror on the wall, who has the highest heels of all?
No matter how old they are, no matter in which shape they are, no matter where they are, no matter which weather, what Russian women have in common are their shoes. Sometimes it seems as though they were competing for the “highest high heel in the country”. Sometimes we really admire how ALL of them can walk in these shoes.

Do you fancy my funky shoes?
The choice of shoes is really huge, some pairs are really super-funky. We have already found a lot of shops with funky shoes, but everyday that there is even more funk around.

How do high-heels affect architecture?
For weeks we have been wondering why the stairs in our faculty and also in other buildings are so flat – with sneakers you can easily take three at a time. As Carina was wearing high-heeled shoes today, she suddenly understood that they must be high-heel friendly stairs.

Umbrella or high-heels?
Today it is raining cats and dogs. One reason for wearing high-heels could simply be the rain and the pot-holes full of water. High-heels serve as stilts and women can walk over the water.

Any more questions?
We still have plenty and have already planned the next shoe project.

(carianna)

One month … and we are following the current

We are celebrating our jubilee. We have been to St. Petersburg for a month now. Time seems to be flying and maybe it’s because of the distances and the time you are spending in public transport that days seem to be over so much more quickly than at home.

We are expecting our first guests next week. That’s really crazy. We are looking forward to it, though.

We had a really interesting lecture yesterday. We watched some well-known Russian cartoons and discussed the picture of the Russian character and mentality that was drawn in them. One of the cartoons was about a hegdehog that fell into a river and decided to just follow the current.

Somehow we are “following the current” here. To some extent that is probably what you have to do. If you want to go by metro during rush-hour and you are already queuing at the entrance, you are kind of stuck. You are following the current.

We are following the current as we are trying to adapt to Russian lifestyle. There are times that we don’t have hot water. For a day or maybe two. That’s just what it’s like and we are fine with that. We might have been overwhelmed by bureaucracy during the first days, but when we got our train-tickets for Moscow (yeah, we are going to Moscow), we expected to be queuing at the train-station for some time. If this is the way things are done over here, we do them that way. We are growing and learning. Intercultural communication and understanding at its best – and we are happy about this experience.

(anna)