|
Amerikanski Tavarischi,(American Comrades) I am here to report from glorious Mother Russia that things are well! The workers
paradise is going along wonderfully, and the 5-year goals from 1922 have been
reached! Today’s mission was to go to an icons birthday. I kid you not. They have birthdays, and this icons was today. No cake, no presents, lots of bending and kissing things, (the ground, the icon, assorted crosses, etc.) but not a piñata, pin-the-tail on the donkey, and you can bet nobody pushed its face into cake, spanked it 1200 times, or gave it a 'pinch to grow an inch.' It was kind of interesting though. The church was fairly modern, only about 150 years old. There was a cemetery outside where a few famous people were buried. The first person buried there was the architect of the church. After the story about Ivan blinding the architects of the other cathedral, now hearing this, I am thinking that Albert Speer got off lucky by having been sentenced to 20 years in Spandau prison for being Hitler’s architect. At least he could still see and breathe. (Not to mention write a best seller....) Another interesting grave is of a woman who died with no children, sisters, brothers, or other close family, save for her husband. She was very sad when she realized that nobody would ever come visit her grave. Once her husband was gone, that was it for her memories, and it distressed her. Her husband, (always count on a man to be sensitive, caring, and solve problems for women.) being the kind hearted soul you imagine Russian men to be, promised to put up a statue of Jesus that would attract people to her grave. It worked. He put up a very soulful statue of Jesus, and people come there, kiss the hands, kneel, pray, all sorts of things. It worked very well. There was a church Lena told me about where the patron saint is the healer of toothaches. (I kid you not.) When you go to this church, where dude is buried, you are supposed to walk around the church biting the walls and it will cure your toothaches. It is in Yaroslavl. I gotta get Daryl over here and see if it works. I don’t like dentists, but that may be a bit far for me. By the way, I was wrong about the age of the Armenian Church. They are celebrating their 1700th anniversary, and some of the relics are here in St. Petersburg. I am considering moving here. I want to hear from you people on odds. If I do, I won't own a car, and will have to continue this horrible exercise regime I have fallen into. I am walking my legs off right now. It is insane. You cannot imagine how much I have been trolling around. We take buses and subways, but you have to walk from one place to the other. Today, I was put on a death march by Olga, one of Lenas friends who somehow had the idea that I am in some kind of decent physical condition. She decided (apparently) that it was too nice a day to catch a bus, so we walked down this street, past subway stations, past bus stops, past tram stops, past all kinds of buildings. It was unbelievable. I thought we were crossing into Hungary before long. These people don’t walk slowly either. I keep looking back to see if someone is following or chasing us. It is unreal. I have to keep up. I will be damned if I am going to let a couple of Russian zhenshinas (women) walk an AMERICAN MAN into the ground! (HOO HOO HOO HOO!( fist circling above my head....)) I kept up, and have now collapsed into a pathetic heap at the edge of Lenas desk, and she is pretending not to notice how ragged I look. She really is a kind soul. At Olga’s, she fed us some soup. Cold soup, and the base, get this, is made with Russian soda. It is a brand called Kvass, and it is not real good, but it makes a decent soup. After the soup, we had something called 'Lazy Russians Stuffed Cabbage." Essentially, it is cabbage that they didn’t bother to stuff, but cut up and made into a hash with the stuffing. Pretty good meal. We did go through a park that was nice. They call it a park. It felt like a forest to me. We walked, and walked, and walked. There were a lot of statues, (Not a single one of Pushkin. Someone messed up!) mainly of war heroes. One was a lady who was a partisan, killing Nazis in THE GREAT PATRIOTIC WAR.(WWII) She was caught, and hung by the Nazis. There was one of Zhukov, and a walkway lined with busts of winners of the "Hero of the Soviet Union" medal. It was really pretty cool. Well, I have pirlmeni waiting for me. (Ravioli) I am going to go eat, then watch Scarface in Russian. (Jew leedl cockaroach....I goona keel jew meng.) I will write more later. Let me know if you think I should live here. If I do, I see myself taking lots of train trips around eastern Europe and trying to make sure that they all have their hatred of Americans justified..... From Russia with Love, Comrade Dave |