Weekend adventures

I survived another weekend in Saint Petersburg despite heavy partying :-)

When I got home on Friday evening, my dear flat mate was on his way to whatever AIESEC alumni party in an Irish Pub and did a good job convincing me to join him... He complained that I hadn't posted any photo of him in my blog. This is due to the fact that I hadn't taken any pics of him... Below you can see the result of the photo session which followed that complaint!

Zhenya Charikov

Anyway, I had a good time speaking a lovely mixture of English and Russian and once more experienced the advantages (or disadvantages...) of AIESEC: I got to know to some gossip about AIESEC NSU... Yay!
As a result of the exhausting week I slept till 12pm on Saturday :-) Thanks to the sleeping mask and ear-plugs! I dedicated the afternoon to sightseeing in the city: Alexander Nevskij Laura, where I found some nature :-)
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Saturday evening/night... Hm, first I went to a music cafe which really reminded me of the "Nautilus" in Goettingen... I guess the reason were the rather European "messy" haircuts and the music :-)
I don't know what drove me to agree to this, but I ended up going to a night club on an island. This means that you can't go home after midnight by metro and not at all after 2am, because they open the bridges till 5am... and metro starts working at 5:30am again... And as we all know, it is one thing to stay in a club till 5:30am if you may leave any time you want or if you are bound to stay there, because there is no way out!!! I really liked the music and had a good time dancing, but I was half dead by the time I got home... 7am!!! The good thing is that I got the chance to take great pictures at 5:30 in the morning :-))) White Nights in Saint Petersburg!

Yesterday I had a look at my future appartment and will move either today or tomorrow and enjoy a single-flat ;-)


Alexander Nevskij Square


At Alexander Nevskij Laura


Trees!!! Yay!


Trinity Cathedral (I hope this is correct...)


Saturday night in a night club: Zhenya (not my flat mate; the name is really popular in Russia:-)


Anna enjoying Efes


Vitja at 5am...


Going home at 5:30am


Going home at 5:30am

Russian dinner and a cool cat

Ignoring the fact that I am really tired, because I never get home before 11pm, I m having a great time in Piter. Yesterday for example, I was invited to my buddy's home for dinner... People who have seen me lately know that I love Russian food - you can tell by the weight I gained :-( I enjoyed myself immensely though and I am proud to say that I managed to speak Russian only :-)
And Masha has a really cool cat!

Masha'a cat

I am - despite such statements - in no danger of becoming an alcoholic!!! On Wednesday I went to a park (probably the only one) and had a beer with friends. Yesterday I went for a walk with my flat mate AND a bottle of beer in my hand :-) And guess what my plans are for tonight! ;-)

Work is also cool ;-)

Welcome Party and getaway from the city

The weather is fabulous in Piter and I managed to get a little sunburn when hanging out all day long at some really cool lake yesterday! Half of an aspirin plus getting completely drunk did the miracle of curing my cold :-) A new week has started and with it came a huge pile of work...

Anyway, on Saturday my buddy Masha and I bought loads of different sorts of beer for my welcome party, which was taking place in my flat mate's room (who had not been asked for permission, but didn't care when he arrived at home pretty drunk around midnight). We were a rather small group of people, but that doesn't mean we didn't have a great time. Since I have spent 6 Siberian winter months in Russia, I am familiar with all sorts of drinking games. Unfortunately I got a little out of practice during the 2,5 months in Germany (clap your hands in two different ways and keep saying stuff like "fuck me, fuck me" "deeper, deeper" "lick me, lick me" without getting confused!!!). And hm, yeah, I was happly being my very self. Please don't call my mom, dear spicy springroll! ;-)
Germany was last in the Eurovision song contest :-(((
I also shuffled in some pelmeni! Yay! Honestly, I have no idea how I have managed to spend a week in Russia without having pelmeni!!!! Btw, some gossip about me made it from Siberia to St. Petersburg and I have a pretty good idea who the source of this is. One disadvantage of AIESEC!!!

Sunday morning I had a friendly hangover and took the second half of the aspirin :-)
I had to get up at 9.30 am... AIESECers do not belong to the working population and don't appreciate the value of a long Sunday morning sleep in. However, it was worth the show of strength! Simona (the cool girl from the Czech Republic) Katja, Vitja, Tyoma (all AIESECers) and I went to a lake a bit outside of the city. I never thought I would say this some day, but I REALLY MISS THE TREES IN AKADEMGORODOK!!! Saint Petersburg is by no means a green city and the traffic is an everlasting annoying background noise.
We had "Shashliki" and enjoyed ourselves in a rubber dinghy on the lake:-)))

All right, I have to work for a while now! Hope you are all doing well!!! :-)

Anna and her favorite toy: fire :-)
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Simona and Katya trying to set up the boat


Tyoma and Vitja


Anna and the "shashlikiy"


Simona and Tyoma on their boat trip


Caught a crab! Or did the crab get me?


A day at a lake


My buddy Masha

Russian Girls

I got a walk after work with my AIESEC buddy Masha yesterday. She is a cool girl: she patiently explains me all the sights in St. Petersburg (and trust me, there are a lot!) and watches me shuffling in McDonald's food :-))) Unfortunately, I am still fighting my watery eyes and my runny nose. I have the suspicion that it is not a cold but an allergy... to whatever??? How I am ever gonna find out in this big city? I will watch it a few more days and maybe consult a doctor :-(

Anyway, even with only half of my vision available, Piter is a beautiful town!!!
As Masha and I were walking down the streets, we passed a shop where some girls were doing a fashion show! See the pics and you know why I was so keen to buy my "Tussi shoes"!

St. Petersburg
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St. Petersburg (there are way too many sights in the city... Sorry, I don't know what this is... or better: I forgot)


Anna in front of university


My AIESEC buddy Masha (girls with that name tend be really good buddies!!! Greetings to Akademgorodok)


Girl 1


Girl 2


Girl 3


Girl 4


Girl 5


The couple


Girl 6


I got home at 10 pm... The block on the right is my current home :-)

Fotos

I still don't have my own computer, so I decided to make myself comfortable using this one and downloaded the necessary software to upload pics :-)))

These are most of my colleagues.

Telphin
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Goettingen meets St. Petersburg


St. Petersburg


St. Petersburg


Der Blick aus meinem Fenster

Back in Russia - Greetings from Saint Petersburg

This is my first day at work and since everbody is super busy, they left me alone with the internet :-)))
My colleagues are really nice and just presented their best German to me, "eins, zwei, Polizei... drei, vier...." I have also been asked if I smoke, just like every day in Akademgorodok!

So, I made it all right to St. Petersburg on Saturday. It took forever to get through immigration... I was the last one passing for I switched the lines at least 4 times and every time it turned out to be the slowliest one... But three nice Russians had been patiently waiting for me and helped to carry "la bomba" - as I call my heavy luggage - to my appartment. I am currently living with a Russian ex-AIESECer called Eugene in a really nice flat. The problem is that I have to take "marschrutka", then the metro and then another "marschrutka"/20 minute walk to work, which takes about 1,5 h. Therefore, I will have a look at another appartment in the center where I would live alone - very tempting thought! But my current appartment has a washing machine... tough decision!

Saturday after leaving my luggage in my new room, two Russian guys accompanied me on my first trip through St. Petersburg or "Piter" to meet Mel, this cool American girl I met in Akademgorodok. Mel and I exchanged the latest gossip;-) and the two Russians took it with dignity;-)
After this little chat Victor (the AIESECer), Shenya (a co-worker from Akadem, and actually spelled "Zhenya" as he kindly pointed out to me) and me went to have dinner in a neat bar. St. Petersburg is quite European and it feels like home - besides the Russian letters everywhere.

Yesterday I got a 6,5h sightseeing tour by foot with a cool Russian "alumni" (AIESEC) called Nadia. Then we went to some AIESEC meeting where I had been supposed to present myself, but ended up waiting until the meeting was over, because they didn't finish in time. Does that sound familiar, Robbie and Ania??? Same old story ;-)
I got a ride home though, which was really cool! All the AIESECers are extremely nice, but I will also have to find some foreigners...
I am surprised how good my Russian is :-) I understand most of the things and am actually capable of forming sentences! I still prefer English, but it is getting better! This time I will master the language!!! Yay!

All right, this is enough for now. I forgot the cable at home, so I can't upload pics. But: the city is BEAUTIFUL!!! And I do miss Goettingen a little bit ;-)

Ready to rock

I got my visa :-))) I guess "the more you pay, the faster they work" is true!
I will leave Göttingen tomorrow (unless I get my mother to run to the travel agency and pay for my ticket) and take the plane to St. Petersburg on Saturday!
I hope to see the "Göttinger" tonight!!!

Ready to rock

Tanz in den Mai - Dance into May

Hello everybody,
this was a long weekend with loads of activities and my camera was always with me. I am sorry, but I have to upload at least some of the pics... it is a rather long list of photos though :-)

I spent Friday as usually in the library, but "blogging" all the time. My friends and I have our "group blog" (Kaputtendorf), and most of us have permanent internet access. So, since we are not at the same place, we use the blog to communicate, and to tease each other. Have a look at Kaputtendorf to see what I mean, it is in German, but the pictures speak their own language...
Friday evening I went to the famous Kellnerweg-Party. It is a dormitory a bit outside of Göttingen, a really beautiful place. I did not drink much alcohol! YAY! (I have to give myself a break for the first vodka attack :-) )


Anna at Kellnerweg
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Anne and her seductive look...


Klausi and Chen...

After a good long sleep after the party on Friday we all met for lunch at university and then coffee at Max L - as always on Saturday's - and NO, we are not boring, but some of us are a bit older and need some kind of routine ;-)

Paul and Klaus (the big) at Max L


Krischan and Kerstin


Anna and Christian


Thomas proudly presenting his work! REALLY GREAT, ARGH!

Krischan, Kerstin, Thomas, Christian and I went to watch "Million Dollar Baby" Saturday evening. Absolutely recommendable movie! It deserves its 4 Oscars! After discussing the movie we went to pick up the second group who were watching a movie at Sven's (YES, your equipment is awesome, Sven! :-)) and went to Nautilus, a nice bar where I got to do what I usually do: I played with fire...

The pyromaniac Anna and...

ups! Help!

On Sunday we met for breakfast at Esprit (Meyer's was closed because of May 1st... the older ones did well with the change though! Wait a sec: who was young in the group? Aehm... ) and enjoyed the sun!

Klaus (the big) with Chen's hat from JLo


Paul with his Sunday afternoon smile


Thomas: isn't that a blue mark??? Good job, Anna!


The men/boys... :-) Klausi, Klaus (the big), Paul, Thomas and Sveenie


Anna


Thomas: Bon appetit!

Since summer arrived we all went to the Kiessee (a nice lake nearby) to get some suntan. Klausi, our picnic expert, brought a whole lot of food and vine, so we had a super cool picnic! Thanks, Klausi!

Klaus (the big) and Paul changing clothes... or whatever :-)


Klausi, our picnic expert, is enjoying the vine


Thomas taking a nap after, aeh... I guess, coffee break


Sveenie and Chen


Anna (note the HUGE blue mark on the knee) and Christian


Chen is... hm... what is this good for???


The beauty and the beasts :-) or is it the other way around?