Impressions and Cogitations: Petersburg. Living amongst and adjusting to delusions of grandeur.

Greetings fellow bloggers and viewers,

I am a student who lives in the Kultural Kapital of Russia, Saint Petersburg. However, after living in Moscow, which I truly loved (and love now), this city has yet to win me over. It may well not and that's okay because no matter where I have lived, I have discovered good things. Yet, in places that we don't like we often have to *enumerate* to ourselves what's great or do some concerted searching. And outside Petersburg's main tourist areas, which have lost their charm for me and are essentially monuments caught up in their own over-inflated pomp, this city is all too often ... ghetto, dingy and smelly!

All this ghetto-ness is nonetheless harder to deal with given that Petersburgers are generally rude, stuck up, and thoughtless people unable able to accept their city's severely dysfunctional state by continuing to breathe in the dirt-like flatulence of palaces and buildings not designed for them, but rather a now disappeared aristocracy. The city's a showcase and its natives are sufferers of an inferiority complex now that they're not the crown jewel of the Russian Empire.

Reeeoww!! Scratch, hiss, scratch, hiss. "That's more scathing than the acid rains of Chernobyl!" you may have thought. I will get in to the specifics of what I mean in later blogs so bear with me. I will say, however, that my opinion of Petersburg is not necessarily what I think of Russia and Moscow evokes a very different, positive one from me. I'll elaborate on that one too because if you've been a visitor or resident of Russia, you may think, "But I went to Saint Petersburg for the weekend and liked it more than Moscow and..." Understandable. In fact, I initially thought that and Petersburg's a great weekend city. Weekend being the operable word. In any case, later posts will sort out what I mean so stay tuned!

Back to the ghetto-ness. Yes, much of Petersburg is a ghetto, dilapidated dirt pile with colonies of excreta, mountains of trash, frescoes of graffiti, and troupes of pesky kids and teens I've told to f^ck off a time or two. I've even shoved though a trio of them who were messing around with me and the babushka next to me on the metro as we were was exiting. (Reeeow! Alright, I'll tone it down). Certainly, this contrasts with the beauty of the Hermitage and the images of the Russian nobility of yore. This can't be Petersburg. This crazy blogger is lying, high on crack, or a secret agent of modern day Muscovy to destroy the birthplace of Venerable Vladimir Putin. No. Say it ain't so about Petersburg! Well ... maybe I just lost my rose-colored lenses ...

*But* I have actually enjoyed trolling through the less desirable parts of town! Originally from a city with tough people and a whole lot of drama, I can handle myself pretty well. In fact, as product of my background, I'm essentially attitudinal and surly with hints of Woody Allen and Ice-T, though I like to think of myself as a Lewis Black type of character who carries a cheap Hong Kong-themed, Swiss Army knife. Anyhow, I truly enjoy musing about all the broken down cars, smashed glass, and egregiously pimped out Ladas (those are truly the purest forms of visual, non-human hilarity). The human element, despite its heretofore mentioned undesirability in my eyes, is also a riot. From an over-abundance of angry, aggressive women of all ages, due to Russia's demographic and social woes, to stumbling alcoholics who look at you in disbelief when refusing to give them a cigarette, I have to laugh and momentarily set aside the frustrations I have with this place. To make it better, I play Elvis' In the Ghetto or 2Pac's Brenda's Got a Baby in my head and wish I could laugh madder than Bedlam -- "And his momma cried (in the ghet-to)" or "Brenda's got a baby, d@mn shame, girl can hardly spell her name.." And with that, dear readers, I leave you with a few photos of r.e.a.l. Petersburg.

Decaying, but charming apartment buildings.

Petersburg -- a city with angry, aggressive women and not enough men for them.

Someone was angry at the driver for being late.

It needs way more than a tune-up

Balconies = storage spaces

What awaits you as you exit metro stations in the wrong part of town!

A walk in the park is not always a pleasant thing here.

Trash collection day is ... a quarter past *never*

Lada chic.

Word. Now if this city could produce a decent rapper, problem solved!

Only the cool cats have the code in.

A swear word in Pburg.

They're tough here.

At least they finished it off!

Again, someone just couldn't handle waiting for the bus.

Dilapidated charm.

Just put all the trash in a pile and hope it goes away!

A shovel appears as the snow melts.

Obvodny Canal -- the longest and ugliest canal of Petersburg. Traversing downwards through the ghetto, it was once an open air sewer in the 19th century. Not much has changed.