3 May 2009

The weather has been really beautiful this weekend. Yesterday I couldn’t think of what to do, so I decided to go for a walk. I went all the way from my apartment down Nevskii Prospekt (the half to the west of Ploschad Vostania) by side-streets the entire length of the street up to St. Isaac’s Cathedral, where I stopped and relaxed in the park behind the church. While I was wandering around, I went past an ice-cream/juice vendor who was arguing with three women. The vendor was trying to tell them to give her more money, and the three women were very confused and asking her questions in Spanish. As I was standing right there, the vendor looked at me and asked “do you speak Italian?” and all three women at once said “Español!” I don’t know why, but I thought I could help. I drew in everything I could remember from high school and working at Party Central Express, and asked in Spanish if they needed help. They told me they didn’t understand, and I asked the vendor how much they owed. She told me sixty rubles. I couldn’t remember how to say sixty, so I pointed at the ten ruble bill the woman was holding and said “six.” They gave her sixty rubles and thanked me. I tried to say ‘sorry, I only speak a little Spanish,’ but my mind was so mixed up that I ended up saying “lo siento, я только hablo un poco по-Español.” They looked as confused as I felt, but said thank you anyway and left with their ice-cream.
For old times’ sake, I went into the souvenir market to argue with merchants for fun like I did two years ago when I was in the city. I got to one booth, and while I was looking at the same junk sold at every booth in the city, I thought I would see if the flasks here had “Stainless Steel 5oz” as well. The first flask I picked up had the two-headed eagle (the Russian Crest) and the flag of the Russian Federation, and when I flipped it upside down I saw engraved “СССР”. I started laughing, and the vendor looked over and asked why. I showed her the flask, and she turned red, laughed and told me that she had other flasks for sale. The next one I picked up had “Stainless Steel 5oz” on the bottom, and I told her it wasn’t Russian made. She said there were others yet, and started picking up different flasks. It was written on every single flask she had, with the exception of the one that for whatever reason had representation of both the Soviet Union and the Russian Federation. I wasn’t planning on buying anything from the start anyway, but I laughed and told her that I’d come back when she had something real for sale.
After sitting for a bit on a bench in the sun, I continued on to the bronze horseman, up to the hermitage, across the bridge, past the university, and ended up at the metro stop Vasiliostrovskaya, where I went in and rode back to the apartment. I relaxed for a bit, and went down to Vera’s apartment. I was a little confused about what was going on, because she called me Friday night (after I told her I wasn’t coming) and asked me why I didn’t show up. I told her that I thought we had agreed that I wouldn’t be there until Saturday, and she laughed and apologized and said that with the holiday she forgot that it wasn’t a weekend. She then said she was going to her dacha (summer house) and wouldn’t be there, but rather I could go and meet with her daughter and her son-in-law. I said “so I’ll be eating with your daughter?” and she said no, there wouldn’t be any dinner because she wouldn’t be there. I didn’t quite understand why I was going, but I said fine. When I got to her apartment, she answered the door and said that she had decided she wouldn’t go until tomorrow (today, now). I went in and we had borscht, a salad made of tomatoes, cucumbers and sweet peppers, and tea. It was a nice time. I ended up being there until after eleven o’clock talking with Sergei, Vera’s son-in-law (to be honest, I have no idea what her daughter’s name is).
Today I slept in again, and was awakened around eleven by a call from Vera. She told me Sergei was on his way up with breakfast for me. She said she was getting ready to leave, and that he would bring me breakfast and I would come down for dinner later tonight. When he got here, he gave me a tomato, half a cucumber, some sweet pepper, a plastic container with boiled potatoes, fried fish cutlets, bread, cookies, and a bit of a chocolate tort. I couldn’t believe how much she sent me for breakfast. I ate the vegetables and spread out the rest of the food over the course of the day. After eating, I did my homework for tomorrow, cleaned my room a bit, and headed out.
I didn’t have any specific plans, so I went walking down Nevskii again. I thought I would explore some more, and tried some new side streets. I’m not sure quite how I got there (when I left I realized where I was) but I wandered into a marketplace that looked like a black-market scene from an old movie; a whole neighborhood of unpaved dirt roads with people hawking bootleg clothing, electronics, clothing accessories, food…everything. When I first walked in, I happened upon a man with a little table set up selling shoe-care products. I took a look at the brushes, and realized that along with shoe-polish, brushes and insoles he was also selling what were either little baggies of oregano or marijuana. Kind of a strange combination of products, if you ask me. I continued along, and found a little shop selling leather shoes. On my list of “personal souvenirs” (if you will) was a pair of Russian-made leather shoes. They weren’t particularly high on the list, but I noticed a couple days ago that the inside of my black leather shoes are starting to get torn up as they are three or four years old and whereas at home I wore them only formally, here I have been using them day-to-day and getting a lot of use out of them. The girl asked me what I was looking for, and I told her I had no idea, just something black, leather, and comfortable enough to wear day-to-day. This other man came in, and started asking me all kinds of questions. I tried on a few pairs, and they didn’t quite feel right. We found one that he wanted to try on me, but couldn’t find the second shoe. I asked him about the price, and he said we’d talk about it later. I said to at least give me some kind of idea, and he said “we’ll agree on something later” and then told me to follow him. He took me underground (here I started feeling a little nervous) into this series of tunnels which appeared to be used as stockrooms for all the shops above. He lead me along one of the tunnels to what I guess was his stockroom, and I sat down with who I am assuming were his family by the resemblance. He went off to find another pair of shoes, and the people there talked with me a little. They were friendly, but I was still really uncomfortable sitting with these people in a cave underneath a strange marketplace in an area of the city I didn’t know. Eventually he came back, and I tried on the next pair of shoes he had found. They were really comfortable and looked nice, but I still had no idea what he was going to try to charge me. I had set my limit at four thousand rubles, but I was only going to spend that much if I really liked the shoes because I really didn’t want to spend that much (but I know that they make shoes here that last a long time). They asked me if I wanted a bag or a box, and I told them that they still hadn’t given me a price. He offered me 1,500 rubles. I acted like I wasn’t sure, and the woman told me that in a store they could cost at least 3,500. I said I didn’t know, and the other man stood up, took my shoes (that I had walked in wearing) out of my hand, put them in the bag, and handed them to me. I figured there was really no haggling in this as he was already giving me a very reasonable price, so I gave it to him. After he gave me my change and I put the new shoes in my back-pack, the man asked if I needed anything else. I asked him to show me how to get out, and the older man who was sitting laughed and said “here, you might need one of these” reached under his coat, and offered me a pistol. I don’t know what kind of surprised expression I gave, but the man who had sold me the shoes laughed, said “I think he’s fine,” and took me out of the cave. After that I decided it was time to move on and went back to the main road.