Mapping Out a Future, Part One

The past few weeks, I have definitely been bitten by the travel bug, in a big way. Most of the other teachers in my school--the Brits especially--have done quite a bit of travelling around in Europe. I find myself pressing them for information about every aspect of their travels: what it cost to take the train to Kiev, whether Paris affords any reasonably priced hostels, how one can get to Talinn, Latvia (where cheap flights can be had all over the continent) without going through Belarus (a country that seems to have designed its visa regime with no other end in mind than ripping off people who need to cross it).

It's hard to say when exactly all of this began. One answer is that's been going on, in a low-level way, for five years, ever since I graduated from college. At the time, I think that, despite my conscious desire to remain in the New York Jewish community I had grown to love, and to which I hope one day to return, part of me had real wanderlust, even then. It took chronic unemployment and financial ruin to give in to it, but looking back now, I realize it had been there for a long time. I just tried to repress it, because I didn't think traveling was a real possibility. I know better than that now.

But the more immediate answer is that the travel bug bit me in a big way a few weeks ago, when I had my last Russian lesson through my school. As part of that lesson, my teacher, a wonderful woman named Ludmilla, brought in a map of the Russian Federation, to help us practice the Russian words for north, south, east, and west. Somehow, looking at that map, it suddenly dawned on me what an enormous country Russia is. I had known this intellectually for some time--every office I've been in here seems to have a map of the country on a wall somewhere, and quite a few have clocks showing the time in various Russian and world cities--but I guess Ludmilla's spreading out that map really made me realize the vastness of Russia in a new way, especially when she pointed out for us the island near Vladivostok where she had been born and raised. Something sort of clicked inside of me, saying, "Stay here, see all of this!"

Then, of course, there was my foray to St. Petersburg. I have promised you more on that foray. The city, I found, can be summed up in one simple word: exquisite. There really is no other word that does Russia's northern capital justice. And in three days there, I know I barely scratched the surface of what there is to see and do there.

I arrived in St. Petersburg early on a cold, cloudy Thursday morning. My train pulled into Moscow Station (major train stations in Russia are generally named after the city at the far end of the line they serve, in this case Moscow on the Moscow-St. Petersburg line) a little before seven in the morning. At first, I did not fully understand we were there, and ended up having to dress rather hurriedly after a provodnitsa (train stewardess) started to scold me for not being off the train. But eventually I got my clothes on and scuttled off into the St. Petersburg dawn.

The first thing I needed to do was find a way to get to my hostel, which was situated under an archway leading into Palace Square. With this in mind, I looked for a taxi. Identifying a taxi, even at a train station, poses some difficulty in Russia, because taxis are not all painted yellow, as in New York, and because informal gypsy cabs abound everywhere. But my luck was good, and it turned out I had no need to identify a taxi at all, because several different drivers approached me as I started to walk off the station platform. Taxis seem not to be regulated in Russia (or if they are, the regulations are poorly enforced), and you end up paying for a taxi whatever you and the driver agree upon. Being unsure just how far the station was from my hostel, I was fully prepared to be overcharged.

What I was not prepared for was to be taken for an absolute fool. The first driver who approached me wanted 2000 rubles (around $80) to take me to my hostel. Having paid 4500 rubles for my tickets to and from St. Petersburg, I knew at once this was an outrageous price and flatly refused. I decided to set my maximum at 500 rubles (around $20); I reason that, as this was about enough to get me from LaGuardia into Manhattan, it could almost certainly get me from Moscow Station to the center of St. Petersburg. The driver tried to get me up to 1000 rubles, but I held firm, and in the end, he was forced to agree to the 500 ruble price.

Incidentally, when I left my hostel at the end of my stay and inquired as to the best way to get back to Moscow Station, I was told it was a short ride down St. Petersburg's main thoroughfare of Nevsky Prospekt and that almost any of the busses serving Nevsky could get me there for 20 rubles--a tiny fraction of what I had paid coming from the Station, and a mere one percent of what this cabby wanted. Ah well...at least I will know this if I ever make it to St. Petersburg again.

Once I had reached my hostel and dropped off my bag, I set off for the Hermitage. I had intended to reserve the Hermitage for the final day of my trip, but realizing it was so close to my hostel--through the aforementioned archway and across Palace Square--I thought this might be the ideal way to spend my first day there. The weather was chilly with occasional bouts of rain (in general, the weather in Russia has often made me wonder if I have not somehow ended up in England by mistake), and I thought an indoor activity nearby might be the best choice. And so, off to the Hermitage I set.

I had first to cross Palace Square. A sight more beautiful than Palace Square I believe I have yet to see. On one side, containing and framing the archway above mentioned, is the General Staff Building, a hauntingly lovely neoclassical building in a cool shade of yellow. I honestly believe I could have stood there all day admiring it, had I not been bound for the wonders of the Hermitage. And indeed, had I done so, I doubt I would have had to duck an oncoming car even once. Despite being a congregating place for tour busses going to and from St Petersburg, Palace Square has absolutely none of the hustle and bustle of Red Square--not a single seller of matrushka dolls was to be seen anywhere in or near it--and certainly none of the shameless gaudiness of Times Square. Its sheer quiet and serenity might have prompted me to stay there for hours, but I remembered quickly that 2000 years of Western Art awaited me in the Hermitage Museum, located in the Catherine Palace, which forms the other side of the Square. Remembering this, I snapped a few photos of it, and of the Alexander Column, and headed on.

More on St. Petersburg, and my affliction with the travel bug, tomorrow.