Monday, May 4, 2009

Siege Tour

Today we did the Siege Tour with one of our tour guides. As we left the hostel for the tour, we noticed that the city has begun its preparation for Victory Day, which celebrates the victory in the Siege of Leningrad. On the Siege Tour, we learned about the siege. It was an interesting tour through the Rumyantsev Palace. The building was given to the city of St. Petersburg after Rumyantsev died and the building was converted into a museum commemorating the victory over the Germans in the siege of Leningrad (now St. Petersburg). The siege was a 900 day blockade between Nazi Germany and the Soviets, beginning in 1941. We learned about how the citizens of Leningrad thought the fighting would only last a few weeks and did not evacuate the people. Eventually, the city was surrounded to the north and south, and water towards the east and west. The supply lines were overtaken by the Germans, so the Russians had to create a supply line across the lake to the northeast of the city.



After going throughout the entire history of the Siege of Leningrad, we had a few hours of free time. Some of my friends and I, went to a souvenir store near the Hermitage. There were the traditional Russian souvenirs including the Matryoshka dolls and Faberge eggs. After some made their purchases, we were off to find lunch.



A group of us went to Subway to get a sandwich. I find myself using and understanding Russian more and more each day. I was able to successfully order a meatball grinder with no cheese. The people working did not understand why I didn’t want cheese on my sandwich. Regardless, it was a pretty good meal.



After lunch, we found the “China town” of St. Petersburg. It was huge and dirty, but it is where most of the locals shop. There were several blocks of shopping and stores, all completely filled with clothing, bags, and shoes. There were so many rows of stores that we did not have the time to look everywhere. We definitely need an entire day to explore this shopping wonder.



After quickly changing at the hostel and grabbing some dinner, we all took the bus to the Mariinskiy Theatre to see Aida. Aida is a four hour opera Italian opera, set in Egypt, with Russian subtitles. If there were English, it would have been more interesting because I feel like I would have understood the story more easily.

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