May Day

The countdown has begun, Russia is coming to an end,
and it is sad (or was sad until I tried to write my
dad a b-day card and found that that website crashed
my computer every time I used it and once again I have
a shitty keyboard). this week we went to the private
banya, which was really probably the nicest interior
of any building I’ve ever been in in Russia, complete
with big screen TV, although it's great downfall was
it's tile floors, which added with water have left my
body quite bruised and battered (took about 3
diggers). then the next day we went to the Baltika
brewery, which obviously with 14 college students and
a free beer taste test was really quite fun (although,
strangely enough we'd already tried most of them).
Besides this most of our time has been spent picture
taking and seeing the last few sights around town. we
went to the largest black market in St. Petersburg,
filled with all sorts of counterfeit goods like DVD’s,
CD’s, car parts, guns and knives. and of course like
any good Russian market it was filled at the front
with babushka's selling absolutely any worthless scrap
you can imagine, what’s that? you tore a piece of your
shirt?? save the piece, it might fetch a rouble, oh
don't throw that freely distributed magazine away or
that broken pair of sunglasses, their gold in some
babushka's eyes. Good times. We also went to Alexander
Nevsky monastery where they were letting everyone in
free, no questions asked, but the second their heard
English they charged us 30 roubles each, unfortunate,
but typical.
then today we saw the May Day celebratory parade,
which essentially means every political party there is
marches down Nevsky prospect chanting and singing,
needless to say security is tight and the political
parties varied. they actually had an armed guard
separating the mainstream pro-capitalism groups with
the communists and anarchists (I fear the communists
might really diminish by next year, as most of them
weren't walking but using wheelchairs, times are a
changin...then it'll just be the Stalinists and the
anarchists)
I went out in shorts the other day, it was cold but
still I decided to go for it, the sun has been shining
for about 12 days straight (and almost 24 hours a day,
it's light till 1030 or so followed by a 2 hour dusk,
trust me that'll really mess u up) so basically it is
pure bliss, Russia is saluting is for making it
through what napoleon couldn't. still no flowers or
foliage, indeed there are still piles of snow in
places, but much better (and with about 20 hours of
daylight each day I imagine the foliage comes
quickly). For you poet enthusiasts I got a photo of
the stray dog, which is still open (perhaps under new
management) and serving poets of St. Petersburg. Happy
birthday dad, hope all is well ellski