One train later we're in Irkutsk, somewhere in Siberia next to Lake Baikal, the worlds deepest lake and fresh water reserve. Though groggy from very little sleep, arriving at the trainstation at 6am this morning was amazing. As we walked to our hostel we kept exclaiming things like : "There is no time limit to how much fresh air we can have!", "OMG! Can you believe we've walked for 5 min without having to open and slam closed a single door?!" "Clara Clara! No more noodles! We get to eat on plates today!", which got "I think being able to drink tap water is the best thing about Irkutsk!" as a reply.
So how was the train journey? Well, anyone who thought riding on a train for 3 days can go stuff it. Adapting to a new culture is definately an emotional rollercoaster, and especially when most of your energy is dedicating to find something (which might or might not be where it is supposed to be) and communicating. Despite all this the trip went fairly well. We shared a cabin with 40-something couple called Lena And Sergej and were Irkutsk locals. They spoke as much English as we spoke Russian and still they managed to teach us a card game (which we still don't quite understand the rules of but Clara in her never endig talent managed to win anyway) and we taught Lena how to make friendship bracelets in return. We shared food and laughs and they definately thought we were mental for volentarily exploring Siberia. Lena did start to get on our nerves trowards the end though as her motherly instincts got a bit to much. Enough said.
At the of the second day when Clara and I were just starting to feel a bit shit about this whole train thing we stumbled upon an Australian on the platform! oh the joy! Clara and I were starved for english speaking company and wanted nothing rather than to hug him then and there (thankfully we refrained.) So we spent an evening with Russ, Liam and Michael in true Russian style which we were severely punished for the next day. Surprisingly we're on the same train to Ulan Bator together so that will be fun.
Right. Of to the market to grab us some food. Clara's and my stomach haven't been at it's greatest of late so we figured we'd cook our own food tonight. Cheers!
Monday, September 29, 2008
Thursday, September 25, 2008
MOCKBA!
After much frustration and walking around in giant circles, we've finally found an internet cafe in Moscow. Hurrah! We're quite exhausted after spending all day yesterday being touristy and walking around, and so have wisely decided to chill out here and at Cafe Chai (which may be called something else entirely, but the Cyrillic characters look something like Chai, so that's what we've decided to name it) on our last day in Moscow.
Sitting down is awesome.
Other than that, we've been to Red Square, taken several jumping pictures in front of St. Basil's - as you do - and seen dead Lenin, which was sort of unreal and creepy, been to the Kremlin and got yelled at in Russian for a bit when we - I think - walked someplace we weren't allowed, and continued practicing our Russian. Every now and then Annika will exclaim "restaurant!" when we're walking along the street and see a sign that says PECTOPAH. Exciting!
We've also managed to eat at McD's twice in one day, which made us both very grumpy, and then blow one and a half day's budget on dinner and waterpipe at a lovely Lebanese restaurant. Well worth it.
We live with a lovely Russian lady named Galina who houses lots of Trans-Siberian travellers and makes a very tasty breakfast. Here we've met a crazy Italian by the name of Fabio who speaks very little English, but is travelling all over the world anyway, and a shy Brit who has something like thirteen padlocks on his backpack and has a hard time getting people to understand his northern accent.
Tonight the next leg of the adventure begins, as we board the three-day train to infinity and beyond! (Or to Irkutsk.) We're very excited about spending three days learning new card games and making a ton of friendship bracelets.
Sitting down is awesome.
Other than that, we've been to Red Square, taken several jumping pictures in front of St. Basil's - as you do - and seen dead Lenin, which was sort of unreal and creepy, been to the Kremlin and got yelled at in Russian for a bit when we - I think - walked someplace we weren't allowed, and continued practicing our Russian. Every now and then Annika will exclaim "restaurant!" when we're walking along the street and see a sign that says PECTOPAH. Exciting!
We've also managed to eat at McD's twice in one day, which made us both very grumpy, and then blow one and a half day's budget on dinner and waterpipe at a lovely Lebanese restaurant. Well worth it.
We live with a lovely Russian lady named Galina who houses lots of Trans-Siberian travellers and makes a very tasty breakfast. Here we've met a crazy Italian by the name of Fabio who speaks very little English, but is travelling all over the world anyway, and a shy Brit who has something like thirteen padlocks on his backpack and has a hard time getting people to understand his northern accent.
Tonight the next leg of the adventure begins, as we board the three-day train to infinity and beyond! (Or to Irkutsk.) We're very excited about spending three days learning new card games and making a ton of friendship bracelets.
Monday, September 22, 2008
Life so far.
Zdrastvuite!
We're in St Petersburg! Me and Clara today concluded that we would not die if we lived here. It's actually quite nice. And I like how we are starting to learn our way around and trying many new and Russian things.
But lets start at the beginning. We took a boat! A fancy smancy flashy things with glass elevators and a pool we never used! Our amazing friends Amy, Anna, Raz and Mirjam joined us on this part of the journey and we raised havock running around in the bollhav and geting turtle tattoos (fake). We stole a bunch of coasters and left funny messages to anyone who found them (sort of like a scavenger hunt) and of coarse jigged on the dansfloor keeping up with the old folks. All in all, very fun but as Clara and I concluded a one way boat trip was good enough for us.
Seeing as we were quite exhausted when reaching Helsinki we mostly ran erands at Stockman (we now own gafa-tape!) and ate Finish-Chinese hamburgers. Amy saw us off at the trainstation and so began our first leg of train journey; a nice, prepatory one of only 7 hours.
Arriving St Petersburg late at night was exciting. We refused to use our guide book and simply walked in one direktion to try to find a metro. It worked! However, although we did everything right and stood on all the right platforms ("it's the one with the name of that starts with a back to front euro sign") our train must have derailed or something cause we still ended up on the wrong line in the wrong place. Oh well we were soon back on track and finally ended up at the right station when new difficulties showed up. It was midnight and dark and we found the street the hostel was to be on but not if we were to walk right or left. We took left. Very stupid. We walked with heavy backpacks until we finally found a sign with a street number on it and then turned around and went all the way back. We did manage to get to the hostel before the reception closed though which we were very thankful for.
Our hostel is clean and nice but was quite intimidating at first. They have no lockers so we have been cuddling our bags all night. But the showers work and the water in the kitchen is drinkable. What more could you ask?!
In P-burg (as the locals call it) we've now eaten bortch (russian beetroot soup), seen a Russian kids ballet in two acts which was colorful and fantastic!, been on a boat tour, visited the Hermitage which has the largest collection of European art in the world, eated at the Idiot cafe which is inspired by Dostojevsky's masterpiece and walked miles in the neighborhood. P-burg is sunny and we've managed to score 2 out their total 35 sunny days a year! Awesome!
We miss home sometimes and I keep saying stupid things and Clara keeps complaining about a certain someone. Everythings grand.
Lots of love.
We're in St Petersburg! Me and Clara today concluded that we would not die if we lived here. It's actually quite nice. And I like how we are starting to learn our way around and trying many new and Russian things.
But lets start at the beginning. We took a boat! A fancy smancy flashy things with glass elevators and a pool we never used! Our amazing friends Amy, Anna, Raz and Mirjam joined us on this part of the journey and we raised havock running around in the bollhav and geting turtle tattoos (fake). We stole a bunch of coasters and left funny messages to anyone who found them (sort of like a scavenger hunt) and of coarse jigged on the dansfloor keeping up with the old folks. All in all, very fun but as Clara and I concluded a one way boat trip was good enough for us.
Seeing as we were quite exhausted when reaching Helsinki we mostly ran erands at Stockman (we now own gafa-tape!) and ate Finish-Chinese hamburgers. Amy saw us off at the trainstation and so began our first leg of train journey; a nice, prepatory one of only 7 hours.
Arriving St Petersburg late at night was exciting. We refused to use our guide book and simply walked in one direktion to try to find a metro. It worked! However, although we did everything right and stood on all the right platforms ("it's the one with the name of that starts with a back to front euro sign") our train must have derailed or something cause we still ended up on the wrong line in the wrong place. Oh well we were soon back on track and finally ended up at the right station when new difficulties showed up. It was midnight and dark and we found the street the hostel was to be on but not if we were to walk right or left. We took left. Very stupid. We walked with heavy backpacks until we finally found a sign with a street number on it and then turned around and went all the way back. We did manage to get to the hostel before the reception closed though which we were very thankful for.
Our hostel is clean and nice but was quite intimidating at first. They have no lockers so we have been cuddling our bags all night. But the showers work and the water in the kitchen is drinkable. What more could you ask?!
In P-burg (as the locals call it) we've now eaten bortch (russian beetroot soup), seen a Russian kids ballet in two acts which was colorful and fantastic!, been on a boat tour, visited the Hermitage which has the largest collection of European art in the world, eated at the Idiot cafe which is inspired by Dostojevsky's masterpiece and walked miles in the neighborhood. P-burg is sunny and we've managed to score 2 out their total 35 sunny days a year! Awesome!
We miss home sometimes and I keep saying stupid things and Clara keeps complaining about a certain someone. Everythings grand.
Lots of love.
Friday, September 19, 2008
Conversations in packy panic:
--"So I bought 6 packs of tissues but I accidentally bought menthol. You think that will hurt when used as toilet paper?"'
--"Do you have my bajsbyxor?"
"No, I hung them on Amy's closet."
"Oh. Ok. Phew!"
"Almost had a heart attack eh?"
"Yeah. Kinda."
--"How many pairs of underwear should we bring?"
"I say 7 or 10. Nice resonable numbers."
"Should we go wild and bring an unresonable number such as 8 or 9?"
"No, that just feels wrong."
--"So I have 2 tubes of resorb. How many do you have?"
"None!"
"Oh dear. We need to go shopping."
--"How do you pack a razor?"
"I know! I mean the heads are fine but how do you pack the actual used razor?"
"Well how about one us brings the actual razor plastic thing and we bring our own heads?"
"Yes, that's good. Let's be in charge of our own heads."
--"How am I going to fit all my stuff in my bag?"
"I dunno. I can fit all kinds of stuff in my bag."
"Do you have a magical bag or something?!"
"No. Maybe you're a bad packer?"
(Yelling) "I'M AN AWESOME PACKER!"
--"Do you have my bajsbyxor?"
"No, I hung them on Amy's closet."
"Oh. Ok. Phew!"
"Almost had a heart attack eh?"
"Yeah. Kinda."
--"How many pairs of underwear should we bring?"
"I say 7 or 10. Nice resonable numbers."
"Should we go wild and bring an unresonable number such as 8 or 9?"
"No, that just feels wrong."
--"So I have 2 tubes of resorb. How many do you have?"
"None!"
"Oh dear. We need to go shopping."
--"How do you pack a razor?"
"I know! I mean the heads are fine but how do you pack the actual used razor?"
"Well how about one us brings the actual razor plastic thing and we bring our own heads?"
"Yes, that's good. Let's be in charge of our own heads."
--"How am I going to fit all my stuff in my bag?"
"I dunno. I can fit all kinds of stuff in my bag."
"Do you have a magical bag or something?!"
"No. Maybe you're a bad packer?"
(Yelling) "I'M AN AWESOME PACKER!"
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
In case we fight...
Clara and I would never fight. NEVER! But in case we do fight there are a number of possibilities of how we can act. We could:
- yell a little bit. Let of some steam after being cautionary quiet while stumbling in at late hours in our dorm rooms never really hurt anyone.
- use the Time Out card. Why fight over dinner eh? Especially if the fight is over whether the candy wrapper is pink or a light red.
- grumble and be silent on the inside over whatever annoys us. Then when asked about it we could yell "NOOO!" and slam the closest door. (Clara)
- be overly straight forward but express ourselves clumsily and make everything so much worse by unintentionally offending someone. (Annika)
- find our individual ipod and sit in our own sphere for a awhile until the worst is over. Then when the need for a hug becomes overbearing make the brave move and go in for the makeup cuddle.
- yell a little bit. Let of some steam after being cautionary quiet while stumbling in at late hours in our dorm rooms never really hurt anyone.
- use the Time Out card. Why fight over dinner eh? Especially if the fight is over whether the candy wrapper is pink or a light red.
- grumble and be silent on the inside over whatever annoys us. Then when asked about it we could yell "NOOO!" and slam the closest door. (Clara)
- be overly straight forward but express ourselves clumsily and make everything so much worse by unintentionally offending someone. (Annika)
- find our individual ipod and sit in our own sphere for a awhile until the worst is over. Then when the need for a hug becomes overbearing make the brave move and go in for the makeup cuddle.
Monday, September 15, 2008
Happy Birthday Song.
Todays my birthday. And in honour of our travels my mum wrote us a song. It's awesome!
Goggle days!
Annika has recently posted some well-chosen words here about my reluctance to blogify our soon-to-be-adventure. Well. I can take a hint.
There isn't all that much to update on, now that we're down to the final days before take-off, except to note that the panic and packlists are growing exponentially, so instead I thought I'd leave you all with a picture that I feel captures the awesomeness that is us and this trip:
How will Greg ever manage to resist our wily charms?
There isn't all that much to update on, now that we're down to the final days before take-off, except to note that the panic and packlists are growing exponentially, so instead I thought I'd leave you all with a picture that I feel captures the awesomeness that is us and this trip:
How will Greg ever manage to resist our wily charms?
Sunday, September 14, 2008
The Day of the Chinese Visa
Our day was awesome. After having to struggle so horrendously with the Russian visa (Clara actually having the most trouble with it which you will have to ask her about since she refuses to record it here) the Chinese Embassy in Stockholm was a breath of fresh air. Cause that's literally the time it took me to get my visa. One breath and woosh! All done! Well....then there was the 15 min we spent empying Clara's bag trying to find her passport foto but that's not the communists fault.
So we had all this splendid time on our hands! And what better to do than to visit Kaknästornet. So we did and we let my mobile camera accompany us:
OMG! There's a view up here!
The Chinese Embassy from above (it's the square in orange).
Looking hot at the top.
Running away to make the bus. So stressful we ended up 5 min early.
So we had all this splendid time on our hands! And what better to do than to visit Kaknästornet. So we did and we let my mobile camera accompany us:
On the elevator on the way upp the tower...
OMG! There's a view up here!
The Chinese Embassy from above (it's the square in orange).
Looking hot at the top.
Running away to make the bus. So stressful we ended up 5 min early.
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