Why we're still here...

In honor of bid season, and shamelessly stealing the idea of an FS Blogger located in Brussels, here's my Top 10 Best and Worst of St Petersburg. Like this other blogger, I had a bit of trouble finding the "bads" as we are deliberately here for 2 consecutive tours. 4 years. A Foreign Service lifetime.

The good
1.  Ballet
The Mariinsky Ballet Company (previously the Kirov) is well known, but did you know Piter also boasts the Mikhailovsky Ballet? I have seen some Mikhailovsky performances that trump Mariinsky ones, and Mikhailovsky theatre is easily accessible by public transit unlike the Mariinsky. And the Alexandresky theatre hosts Eifman when he's in town. I have probably now seen more ballet in the last 3 years than I had in my lifetime before now!

2. Weather (hear me out!)
Here's my cred: I lived in Singapore with only a ceiling fan. I summered in Delhi when monsoon didn't come to cool things down. The words "only 40 today" have passed my lips. I can do hot.

But here's the thing. You can only take off so much, and A/C can only work so hard. With a hooded down coat and my fleece-lined Timberland boots, with my kids in Lands End snowsuits and Kamik boots, we can use every piece of equipment in the playground for an hour at -30F. I've done it two winters (last winter wasn't that cold). We have no malaria. Mosquito season is short. You can use sandbox toys in the snow. Almost nothing HAS to keep us inside, whereas heat can be dangerous.

3. Hockey
I hate spectator sports. I think a baseball game is a good place to drink beer outside. However ... the European style of hockey isn't as fight-y as the North American kind, and is more based in speed and finesse. It's actually pretty to watch. And the most expensive tickets outside the boxes is approx $25.00 No, I didn't mess up the decimal. Terry went to almost every home game this year and will again next year. Alex loves to go with her daddy (weekend games start around 5pm)

4. Chocolate, Honey, Vodka
Chocolate: I'm a dark chocolate girl, but always hate how American/European dark chocolates have that chalky texture. Somehow the Russians have found a way to keep the bitterness of the flavor but make the texture creamy. I have no idea what I am going to do when we leave here. When we go home on R and R or HL we bring chocolate with us. I am pretty sure this is a major culprit in my gaining weight AFTER losing the baby weight.

Honey: Ironically, our previous post was Malta, whose honey is famed and in all the souvenir stores. Never liked it much. Russians are very serious about their honey. At the fairs and markets you can find honey stalls each boasting a dozen different varieties and each one is different from anything any of the other vendors sell. Our favorite is the white - we still haven't figured out which vegetation is comes from - but it is the one specifically labelled полезно для здоровья детей (good for children's health).

Vodka: I never understood how Russians could just drink vodka without anything else to cut the taste or potency. Now I understand. A good vodka is smooth and has either no taste, or a pleasant taste. It doesn't feel like fire going down. I have a favorite brand I can happily sip.

5. Petersburgians aren't nice, but they are kind. Exactly like in NYC.
Example: I lost my diplomatic ID card during the 10 day New Year holiday. Turns out the woman who found it called the Consulate, after the holiday we connected arranged to meet up so she could return it to me. When my bad Russian made me hesitate at one point while she was telling me how to get to the nearest meto stop to her, she offered to come to my neighborhood.

6. 24-hour energy
In Malta, stores closed around 2pm or maybe 4pm Saturday and didn't reopen until Monday. This is when the weekly grocery list and shopping trip really became ingrained in my family. In Piter the stores and many restaurants open 24 hours and, especially in the White Nights season, the population is too. Just the other night I was going home at 11pm with the sun glinting off Spilled Blood (and me wishing for my camera!) I saw a babushka walking her couldn't-be-more-than-2-year-old grandson in his stroller. Wide awake, of course. Terry's hockey practices are at 9:45pm because that's when they get the ice - and I imagine when the dads can get away.

7. Beauty
This was originally entitled "Museums and Monuments" but then I realized it wasn't broad enough. Museums and palaces of course abound; a brief list includes the Hermitage; Russian Museum (which I prefer to the Hermitage); the palaces of Peterhof, Catherine's Palace, Gatchina, Pavlovsk; Peter and Paul Fortress that happens to house a cathedral and several museums plus a sandy beach right in the middle of the city; the Summer Garden that recently reopened; the Singer Building on Nevsky; the Bronze Horseman; the view from St Isaac's Catherdral or, if you feel a bit lazy, from Mansarda restaurant. Everywhere you look in Petersburg you can find something beautiful, whether it's streetlights glittering off ice in the winter, an old palace that was someone famous' home for a few years, or a park in full summertime bloom and greenery.

8. Housing
We don't have too much to compare to, but the apartments here are surprisingly large and centrally located for such a big city. Yes it is all apartments but they are BIG and on the longest stretches of winter darkness the place never felt too small to contain 2 energetic preschoolers and it is certainly larger than the place we planned to raise children in when we lived in Philly.

9. Transportation
If we wait 3 minutes for a train in rush hour we start complaining - off hours we sometimes have to wait just over 4 minutes. Horrible, awful traffic means it took 45 minutes to go clear across the city. How on EARTH will we survive a DC tour next?

10. Cuisine
We've discovered Central Asian cuisine and Georgian food is a new favorite (although we haven't been to the recommended Uzbek place yet). Restaurants are at worst OK and at best exquisite. 

The bad
1. Apartment living
The lack of a garden is wearing on Terry 3 years into it. The inability to open my door and order the kids outside while I do the "they can't help me with this" part of dinner is also frustrating.

2. Ice (can be deadly!)
Russian attics aren't insulated. Heating is central and most people keep their homes at a comfortable temperature by opening their windows. What does this mean? All the snow on roofs melts and becomes ice. Icicles as large as people can hang off the eaves and threaten those passing by. 2 of the 3 years we've lived here there have been a dozen or more icicle deaths each year - this year was particularly dry.

3. Difficult language
If I gave Spanish the attention I have given Russian, I'd be a solid 3/3 by now. Instead I am optimistically calling myself 1+/1+ and continually frustrated by my own inability to find the word I want, or if finding it being perplexed as to which case or verb form to use. The only good news is I like a challenge and the triumph I feel from small progress is exhilarating.

4. Expense
Nanny post this is most certainly not. We are also improperly COLA'd so we aren't even being made whole. Things that cost $30 in the USA (crockpot, anyone?) are over $100 here. At least it keeps the shopping down.

5. Groceries
To keep a healthy diversity of produce you are either forking over $10 for a small bunch of asparagus (when it is in stock, which is about once a month) or doing a lot of preserving in the 2 summer months that things are in season. The reason I do my zucchini-bread-a-thon in the summer (so far about 120 muffins in the freezer!) is that there is no zucchini about 6 months a year - or anything other than carrots and cabbage - so it gets some different nutrients into my kids. There are some frozen veggies that, even though technically available locally, we still bought from the commissary when we still had commissary access because they tasted like someone bought them at the store, put them in the freezer, then put on a fancy plastic bag to make us think they are professionally processed.

6. Dirt
This isn't just about dirty streets or polluted air, it's ground and water pollution and the fact that we really don't know what harmful chemicals are in our food. Nothing's organically grown here and the water has heavy metals. We buy the imported carrots even though the local ones are the cheapest and, doing the "sustainable thing", we'd normally go for local over organic if given a choice.

7. Darkness
A lot of people have trouble with this one. I used to say that if you worked a 9-5 job in New England you went to work in the dark and came home in the dark so does it matter whether you missed 7h or 3h of light in between? As a partly SAHM, I feel the darkness more strongly. I'm not comfortable having the kids in the park in the morning when it's pitch black. It's also partly Medvedev's fault for cancelling standard time last year - we stayed on daylight savings so the sun came up at 11am. DAWN was 11am, not even full daylight.

8. Driving
OK this one isn't actually a problem for me but I put it in for fairness. Petersburgians drive like Philadelphians. Many Americans aren't happy about driving in Philly. My only issues with Philly involved the supernarrow streets in South Philly, and I haven't encountered those here. Driving the wrong way down a one-way, illegal u-turns, parking on the sidewalk? Par for the course.

9. Burocracy
Every month I have to pay Alex's detsky sad bill at the local bank. It means standing in a sort of line - Russians don't exactly line up, they call out "kto paslaydnie" (who's last?) and then focus on that person. It has to be in cash and I hand the teller the bill, the cash then wait for ... what? I have no idea. Terry lets the internet bills pile up for a few months before paying them because it's the same dealio. Alex is at a private detsky sad because a couple of native Russian speakers have told me the language issue isn't even half the problem with getting a child registered for a public school, it's the red tape.

10. Sushi
I love sushi. Terry stupidly lived in Japan and won't eat it anywhere else now. Every restaurant here serves sushi, whether the restaurant bills itself as, and the rest of the menu is comprised of, Italian, Georgian, French bistro, pub, you get the picture. And all of it is awful. What a tease!

Rainstorm

It was about 1/2 hour before bedtime, and we heard a rushing noise. "Is that ...?" Yep, huge downpour.  We got the kids in their raincoats and boots and rushed outside. They had a blast stomping in puddles and sticking their boots in the waterfall coming out of the drainpipes.

13 minutes later.

The thing is, we are not usually all that spontaneous and I can be fanatical about bedtime (always reinforced after the havoc that usually occurs when we deviate). But, in the end, they only got to bed 15 minutes late, and without the bath they were to have tonight.

Sometimes you just gotta carpe the diem.

Happy Russian Independence Day!

Today was a Russian holiday, but my Tuesday/Thursday nanny is happy to work holidays. So we took advantage of the fact that I had forgotten to tell her not to come until the week before and then thought it was too short notice.

The morning started great. I woke at 7am (habits die hard) and got in a workout before the family started getting up just before 8am.  The weather was awful, drizzly and gray, so I figured some of the plans I had for the day would have to be scuttled. The initial steps though were still solid so off we went ... to Kupetz Eliseevs. Here's a shot of the confectionery section.



We got some pastries and hot beverages and sat under the giant pineapple. I got a very yummy hot chocolate, tasting just like a melted chocolate bar but too milky and sweet, I still prefer Guell's the best. Although the meats, cheeses, fish etc are ridiculously expensive - the least expensive cheese cost 1000 rubles per kilogram, or roughly $15/lb - the alcohol was surprisingly close to what it would cost other places and the pastries were also on par.

From Eliseevs we headed over to ROSPHOTO where there were 2 exhibits I wanted to see and thought Terry would like.

The first was One Hundred Years by Danish photographer Keen Heick-Abildhauge - 100 photos of Russians, one from each year of life. Below is the 5 year old, who collects Transformers. In addition to the photographs, each photo included the age, name, and a dream or passion. We were struck by how the dreams were relatively consistent among age ranges, and how the changed over time ("I want to be a policeman/artist/actor" became "I want world peace" and eventually "I want to have family around me")




The other one was Crown on the Earth, a collection of Japanese photographers' works. Below is a set of photographs superimposed on top of each other to make one composite photo. A couple of these were so clear - so the faces involved had to be so similar - that the effect was quite eerie, especially when next to other images where the different individuals create a very fuzzy image.


After the art, it was time for lunch. Brasserie de Metropole was our destination as it had been recommended and we'd never gone there yet. And it was on the way home and close to the metro.  I hadn't realized it specialized in Belgian style home brews, so Terry was entirely unimpressed with their beers although I really liked his, mine was only OK. The food was pretty good too, we'd probably go back on a night he didn't feel like drinking.

After lunch was a weird time, not really time yet to go home (we'd specifically asked our nanny to stay certain hours then felt bad going home too early) so we did some errands first and came home only a bit early.

Last special treat of the day: buffalo wings. Terry found chicken wings at the store, a friend had sent us the Tabasco Buffalo sauce, and he whipped up blue cheese dressing yesterday (it is supposed to sit overnight).  YUMMY!

Zucchini bread muffin marathon 2012

Zucchini is back to 10 rubles/kilo at the rinok and that means it's time to bake a year's worth of muffins! Last year I got almost 120 into the freezer and they were gone by the new year so this year I'm aiming for 200. With what's already in and what's on the cooling rack, I expect 50 to be in the freezer by tomorrow and when I make more tomorrow night (I have enough shredded zucchini for one more batch) there should be 30 more.

Rather than one horrifyingly long night marathon of baking (and sweltering in the awful heat we had last year), this year I plan to do a few batches this night, one batch that night and extend the "marathon" experience over several weeks. The first two batches have been pleasant even, especially as the weather's been more appropriate for the far northern clime than it has been the last couple of years.

It also means there will be fresh zucchini bread muffins more often this summer. Yay!  I'll report back on the final result when all the baking is said and done.

My big boy

Tonight is Zoltan's inaugural night in the toddler bed. I can hardly believe how easily bedtime went, given that he spent the 1/2 hour before bedtime jumping in and out of the bed, grabbing his big teddy bear, tucking it in, then throwing it into the toy box, etc etc.

Another one of those "foreign service affects my normal life" moments. Did we move him tonight because he was climbing out of the crib, or we're expecting another baby and don't want 2 in cribs, or were we dealing with nighttime potty issues? No, no and Nope. He's happy in the crib, we're happy with him in the crib. BUT ... we'll be in the USA for 5 weeks between R&R and training, and we don't have a crib there for him to sleep in so we figured we needed to make the switch beforehand so it was natural when we disrupted him with 18 hours of travel, 8 time zone differences, and "nowhere" to sleep.

Wish us luck that the easy bedtime translates to easy nights. He often wakes if he doesn't have water with him and tonight he doesn't. The question is will he call for us or go wandering through the apartment?

Elagin 2012

Our inaugural trip to Elagin for the summer finally occurred last weekend. Terry got a small fishing pole for Alex, got some help in purchasing worms, and we decided to take advantage of the absence of rain Sunday to revisit one of our most favorite places in Piter. We had an unfortunately slow start to the morning, so by the time we got there we didn't have as much time as usual to explore the place.

Note #1: Not a lot of fish movement. Alex bored quickly. Zoltan needed constant grabbing to avoid a Trakai repeat, especially as it was chilly today and he hadn't appreciated his dunking when it was sweltering hot outside.

Note #2: One thing I have been noticing lately is that all the enticements for kids - so sucker mom and dad have to pay for X treat or experience - are not break-the-bank expensive. We've developed the rule they each get one treat and it can be pretty much anything. Zoltan was begging for a ride in one of those electric cars and it was only 100 rubles for 5 minutes. When we get our new video card so Terry can edit videos you'll get a shot of him riding around on top of the world. He even gave his sis a ride, and she kindly returned the favor by sharing the ice cream that was her treat with him.

Note #3:  If you've never had сладкий фундук (sweet roasted hazelnuts) go NOW and find some. We got a little cone of almonds and one of hazelnuts, mostly to avoid having to make change, and wow what fabulous serendipity that was.

Goodbye season

Summertime is a time of transition for kids or anyone with kids, and for some of us there lingers the feel that the new year really begins in September (see, we Jews got that one right!). For State Department folks, it is a time to say goodbye, sometimes forever, to people you've come to know over the course of one year, two, or if you're really lucky in timing, three. For people still friends with their elementary school buddies, this seems like a dalliance rather than true friendships. It can't be farther from the truth. We all know our time is short and we often dive into friendships with both feet from the first Hail and Farewell.

Last Friday night our Consul General hosted a farewell party for this season's group of departees. Two of these people parent some of my children's best friends - before this post Alex was 16 months old so the sadness of saying goodbye was solely for myself. Now I get to dread an impending departure date on their behalf as well. Later in the weekend more farewells were said as even those who will continue to live here leave during summertime's "visiting family around the world time". I hate having to get teary over someone who isn't actually leaving for a month!

My mother made me hand write my Bat Mitzvah thank you notes in the week I had before starting summer camp. I think there were 150 or so. In that excruciating exercise, I became a thank you note connoisseur.  Similarly, I am hoping our lifestyle eventually gives us the skill of saying goodbye gracefully.

The cast is off

4 weeks from the date that the cast was put on, we were authorized to remove it. I thought Alex would be thrilled and want to jump in the bouncy castle or hang from some jungle gym.

Shows what I know about kids.

From the moment it was off she started crying it hurt. She asked for a sling (which she had refused to wear since the moment it had been put on the day the cast went on). She carefully held her arm close to her body when she didn't have the sling on.  I mean, except when she was busy with something else, like fishing or playing on the playground. The funniest part was watching her use both arms to walk up the "half-rainbow" at the playground, then pull her arm back into invalid position through the rest of that play structure.

FSO update - no pressure

There's a change to the language bonus points policy and it's not for the better (in terms of me becoming an FSO). The good news? I'm grandfathered under the old system: assuming I pass the Russian phone test, I will gain an additional 0.4 bonus points (moving my never-getting-hired 5.3 to a which-A-100-class-do-you-want 5.7).  My first impulse was panic. My second more rational thought was "If I don't pass the test during either of 2 shots at it, when I will be studying Russian pretty full time and am already close to or at the 1+ mark now, then I probably don't have the capability to learn languages to the capacity I need to and this isn't the career for me anyway."

More on the new policy here. Wish me luck in December and, if necessary, June 2013. And let's hope for no newer new changes.

Novgorod Day 2: Yuriev Monastery & the Wooden Architecture Museum

Sunday morning we were up, packed, breakfasted and ready to go at 10am.  First stop: Yuriev Monastery.
Natasha showed us an original surviving building from 1119 that was an architectural and acoustical fantasy that modern-day experts couldn't deconstruct, feared it would fall down around them, so reinforced supports with so much brick as to destroy what made it so amazing. Sigh.

Bell Tower at Yuriev Monastery

Alex running through the dandelions

Zoltan with his bouquet

The final stop was the Vitoslavistsky Museum of Folk Wooden Architecture. I loved the irony that the wealthy people who could afford chimneys (there was a tax) were pest-ridden because the poorer "black" houses, so encrusted with soot - inside - couldn't support insect life. Natasha told us we were lucky to come when we did, there is a big festival next week and they were preparing for it.  There were men dressed in some kind of period costumes with eagles and I think I saw a falcon, and plenty of snack and souvenir stalls.  We definitely didn't spend quite enough time there, but it was moving past lunchtime and we assumed dacha season Sunday afternoon traffic would be rough. At least we got the kids some fun things to remember Novgorod - wooden flute/pipes and colored pencils made out of what looks like a large segment of branch.

Wooden church - built without nails

Wooden house typical 200 years ago. Built without metal nails.

Novgorod Day 1: Kremlin and surrounds

Novgorod - "New City" - was new around 859 when it was first referenced in writing. It has a fascinating history unique in Russia as a prosperous republic founded by merchants rather than princes. You can read some snippets here (longer) and here (more abbreviated). A significant degree of its prosperity came from cleverly charging fees for anyone wanting to pass its waterways at a time when river travel was the exclusive way to get around - it is situated where 51 rivers flow into Lake Illman and one river - the Volkhov - flows out.

We drove out Saturday morning, not oppressively early as our tour guide, Natasha*, was meeting us at 2:00pm. A mere 130 miles from Petersburg, we took a solid 3.5 hours to arrive. Terry likes to blame the 3 stops but one of them was only long enough for me to exit the car, look at the busload of passengers waiting for the toilets, and get back in. Traffic and poor roads, I say.

We stayed at the Hotel Volkhov. The Spartan rooms were sufficient for our needs, my only complaint being the lack of room darkening shades in a city that has White Nights. The kids couldn't fall asleep until two hours after being put down to sleep. Otherwise, the place couldn't be more accommodating, having the baby cot in our room within 1/2 hour of our arrival and responding to all our requests promptly. It was a bonus that if not every member of staff spoke English, enough did that we could always find someone who could understand us.  Because of our later than expected arrival, we only had time to grab a quick meal at the hotel before embarking on our tour. The meals were tasty if unique but the garniri were barely edible. Even the kids wouldn't eat the French fries.

Our first day the tour guide took us through the Kremlin, St Sophia's Cathedral, and Yaroslavl's Court. Apparently, St Sophia was meant to be reminiscent of Hagia Sophia in that it was originally dedicated to Holy Wisdom and not some human/saint named Sophia.

Terry and I traded off managing the kids and actually paying attention to Natasha, and it worked pretty well. The Kremlin consists of lots of green space and several buildings, so the kids were able to pick dandelions and run races and there were even points where we were both able to turn our ears to Natasha even as our eyes followed the kids. You can see them above playing in front of the "Monument to the Millennium of Russian Statehood" with St Sophia in the background.

 One tidbit I particularly liked: when alternatives to wood appeared on the "building materials" front, the Church got first say and decided only churches and holy buildings could use stone or brick. Merchants eager to protect their goods from fire ended up adding chapels to their warehouses, there are 7 surviving such buildings on the other side of the river (by Yaroslavl's Court). The tour ended for the day right by Na Torgu souvenir shop, apparently a Novgorod institution and highly recommended to us. I admit I was first overwhelmed by all the unique stuff, after so many matroshkas, Faberge egg replicas and amber jewelry it was like a breath of fresh air. In the end Terry and I couldn't agree on anything so I only got a cheesy spoon rest for the kitchen as I have been whining for one since ours broke a few years ago.

That night we ate at Cafe Le Chocolat, conveniently one block from the hotel and also recommended to us.  Our friends from the Consulate, who were also on this expedition with us, came later and it seems all the good customer service karma got spent on us. They were prompt and informative (getting a bit busy, they didn't get the kids' food out right away but did keep us apprised). In fact, even considering getting the kids' food out first was an impressive move. When Alex spilled her full glass of milk on the table, they appeared and got a clean tablecloth even though we assured them it wasn't a problem for us. Terry's pork loin was tasty (he reports) and my fish, while bland on its own, was just right when topped with the seasoned tomato and cheese that came with it. The kids' chicken nuggets were trying to be too fancy and the kids wouldn't go near it. At least it came with fries.


* Natasha was recommended to us by two different sources and in my opinion did an exceptional job of sharing interesting information, giving us the history and the lay of the land, encouraging questions and even engaging the children. I can't recommend her highly enough.

Close encounters with identity theft

I planned to spend part of Sunday evening writing about our recent trip to Veliky Novgorod. Instead, it was entirely derailed by a phone call.

Woman: "Hello? Can I speak with Mr. or Mrs. Poczak? I'm calling from XXX Airlines and wanted to let Zoltan Poczak know his flight tonight is delayed..."
Me: "Zoltan is my 2 year old son, he is definitely not on a flight tonight. Can you tell me what kind of credit card was used?"
Woman [says the type, then the last 4 digits, no match for any of ours. We start freaking out anyway. She asks if she can call back on this phone number? Sure]

I start Googling what to do if your child's identity is stolen, and it turns out I have to send to any of the 3 main credit bureaus (1) a copy of his birth certificate; (2) a copy of his social security card; and (3) a copy of my drivers' license.  Um, if my kids' identity has been stolen, how safe am I going to feel sending through the mail the exact items that would enable anyone to more effectively steal his identity?? Let's not even go into the fact that for me, the absolutely fastest FEDEX-type mail i can use still takes close to a month to get to the USA and the option of certified mail is not available to us (once more, the glamor of a foreign service life).

The same woman calls back later and apologizes that it was a misunderstanding. She said some number was similar - it sounded like she was saying the phone numbers on record were similar so I was incredulous: "You're saying there is a another Zoltan Poczak with a similar phone number?"

So now I am thinking she's part of the scam, somehow, because that is just not possible. We freak out some more, try to find any possible way to do something regarding Z's credit life (on a Sunday) and it finally occurs to me to call the airline and see what I can find out.

The only phone number on the entire site is for reservations and even then the automated system made me demand 3 times to speak to a human before it relented. I sorely regret I never caught the name of the woman who answered the call, because she was pretty awesome. I apologized that I wasn't making a reservation but it was the only phone number, explained the story, and explained I wasn't even sure anymore where the fraud lay - did someone from XXX Airline even call us - but that something sketchy was definitely up. She was able to check on that flight and ... it turns out there is a Zoltan with a similar last name who was indeed booked on that flight. He had a traveling companion, same last name, first name none of ours.

What were the odds?

We'll still pursue things with the credit bureaus because it's still sketchy and how did Zoltan's Frequent Flier number get involved (the only way they could have pulled up our phone number), but now it's less of a panic to do it later this summer when we are actually in the USA and where Fedex or registered/certified mail are all options and all take mere days to reach their destinations.

Zoo-riffic

What were the odds? Saturday we went to the zoo for the very first time ever even though we have lived here 3 years. Monday when I come home I'm chatting with our nanny about what she and Zoltan did that day. She had taken him to the zoo and was so surprised he seemed to know exactly where everything was, where to enter the buildings (some had entrances to the side almost behind the building - you had to know where to go).  It's been a zoo-tastic week for big Z!

Shashlik season

The parks are open after the April "drying out" and the weather is increasingly sunny and occasionally warm. As a true Petersburgian, I strive to be outdoors every possible reasonable minute while the sun shines and the temperature crosses the freezing threshold. The best way to do that? Shashlik in the park.

Each of the last 2 weeks we have been able to get out to the park once for dinner, good company for us AND the kids and the freshest air in Tsentralny Rayon (the central region of the city).

Bedtime always gets pushed back on these nights, especially when they are too filthy from playing and ice cream to be put to bed as is. I didn't get good shots of the kids during the evening, but here's Zoltan's poor jacket, victim to his inability to eat ice cream from a stick. Lesson learned - next time we try a cone.

Leningrad Zoo

Budapest it ain't, but it wasn't nearly as traumatic and depressing as I had been led to believe.  Some areas are still from the 1900s and it was hard to even look at the animals caged therein (zebra, wildebeest, I am talking about you), but other areas were sufficient for the animals who were clearly content and even happy. It was interesting to watch the tiger tear into the meat-laden raw limb of something. The petting zoo, always a hit, was full of happy goats - as you can see.

The baby polar bear was cute as can be.

We hadn't known there was a small amusement park inside the zoo. Zoltan wanted a turn on one of the rides for his "treat". Alex got cotton candy - her first - and loved it. We hadn't expected to stay so long but it was a good half day's adventure. We wanted to save things like Elagin with its playground for when Alex can take full advantage of it (maybe even throwing her bike in the trunk to ride the trails  - the No Bikes prohibition does not seem to hold true for little kids).

Some other small victories:

• noting that Skazka Dom, a fairytale museum/experience, it literally next door to the zoo entrance. We're saving that one for a rainy or wintry day as it's indoors, but our friends' kids absolutely loved it and we weren't sure where it was.
• Being able to ask completely grammatically correctly where was the entrance to the zoo, and understanding that the family we asked wanted to know the same thing as the entrance they just passed wasn't yet open.
• Also being able to answer completely correctly directions to the only cotton candy stall actually serving cotton candy when a lady saw Alex eating hers.

Nipple

I am supremely new to "foreign service blogging" as a community. In fact, I am pretty sure my readership is still entirely made up of family. I haven't even put up the standard FS blogger disclaimer because my mom knows I have no official capacity to say anything about anything. I am also pretty new at actually talking about thoughts and opinions on my blog, previously sticking to travelogues and the cute things the kids say and do.

But here's the thing. This is a "Foreign Service blog" anyway. No matter who hears it, thinks it, or believes it. No matter if there isn't a single actual or potential member of the Foreign Service who reads it, has ever read it, or has even heard of it. When one member of the family becomes paid by the US Government to be in the Foreign Service, everyone else is immediately recruited.  What my children and I say and do is being watched (and not just in the spy thriller way). I bite my tongue when, in the USA, I wouldn't. We're not just along for the ride, we are part of it.

One source of frustration for me has always been meeting FS people, either paid or family, who are surprised by some facet of our life that is easily discovered through any of many online or print resources. As an academic at heart, I research everything thoroughly. The more important the issue, the more important is having full access to all relevant facts.

There is a theme here. There is a reason I'm ranting about this in a post entitled Nipple. Gimme a minute.

The #1 reason FSO/FSS leave the Foreign Service is family issues. It costs hundreds of thousands of dollars to train and security clear each person. It's really in everyone's interest to be sure that person intends to stay. If the spouse is unhappy, and said Officer/Specialist still likes said spouse, that staying is less likely.

Blogs are one of the very best ways to learn about the real nitty gritty of FS life. You have hundreds of people writing about their actual daily life. Living "on the economy" is very different from living somewhere as part of the FS community. It matters to know what it's like. It matters to enter an A-100 class with every literate family member having some sense of what's coming up. Because what happens to the Officer/Specialist happens to the family. We get separated and employees go to places where they will be shot at. We DON'T get separated and family members come down with dread diseases, risk kidnapping and muggings on a scale not one USA city can match, or our parents die while we're still on the flight back to be with them during their last days.

One member of our community, one of the earliest and best Foreign Service Bloggers, was recently removed from the blogroll State uses as a recruitment tool. Jen Dinoia's story is here and here. The gist is, receiving the diagnosis of breast cancer while your husband is on an unaccompanied tour is too personal and not FS enough. One specific example of inappropriate content was her mention of "nipple cozies". The odd thing is that the story itself, how DOS let her husband curtail from an AIP assignment, found him a job in DC to be with her throughout the ordeal, and MED working to find a suitable onward assignment the entire family could go to, is a great recruitment tool - a story of how State put families first.

Here's some more bloggers who are writing about this in solidarity with Jen, much more eloquently that I have.

Here's from Life After Jerusalem: What makes a blog an FS blog?
And Connie at Whale Ears and Other Wonderings: Not FS Enough
And Sadie Abroad: Nippletastic: A Rant for FS Bloggers
And Noble Glomads: Don't tell us who is relevant to us
And The Wandering Drays: "Nipped in the blog"
And Well That was Different: It's the Little Things
Four Globetrotters: Nipples, Nipples, Everywhere
dp's Blog gives us: I guess I'm not as important as I once assumed

Alex is too clever

So, Alex broke her arm about a week ago. Since then things have been interesting:

- Since the break she has been asking for help getting dressed. Especially getting shirts over the cast, I had assumed she needed assistance. Last week was a holiday Monday through Wednesday, then Thursday was her doctor's checkup so her first day of school was Friday, and I picked her up before naptime. Monday was her first full day back. She loves gym class, and it's the last class of the day so I made sure to get to school before class as I knew she couldn't participate. Imagine my surprise when I got to school and found her all dressed and ready for gym!  I asked the teacher if she was able to participate and she started laughing. No, of course not. What happened was that when all the other kids got changed for gym, Alex just got herself changed too. Little sneak!

But wait, it gets better.

Monday evening around or after dinner time she started complaining that her leg hurt. Like with her arm, there's no outward sign of anything wrong, no swelling, discoloration, she can wriggle her foot and toes. Nobody had witnessed anything that could have caused it and Alex kept saying she didn't remember what she did or when it started. Suspicious. We put her to bed.

The next morning she keeps it up. VERY consistent. Continually refusing to put any weight on her leg, complaining it hurts to much, etc. I tell her we'll have to go to the doctor and get an x-ray on her leg if it hurts so much. I call the Consulate doctor at 8:30am to ask what to do. In the end, the Consulate doctor says she'd be more comfortable if the same doctor who did the last x-rays did these and he didn't work until 6pm so we'd have to have the appointment then. Alex says she doesn't hurt when she just sits, only when she puts weight on the foot. I tell the nanny to get her to the park, she can stay in the stroller if she hurts. My nanny offers to bring us to a regular (public) clinic and we can get an x-ray for 200 rubles. I say it's OK, we'll wait til 6pm. She suggests we bandage the leg for more support. I find an Ace bandage (talk about being prepared!) and we wrap it up. Alex is now willing to put a teensy bit of weight on her leg and says it helps a little. I head out to work, only 1/2 hour late.

A couple of hours later my nanny texts me "We are in the playground. Alex forgets about her leg." One hour later "I took off the elastic, Alex complains it's too tight, now she is walking around the house normal."

That little bugger. But wait, it gets even better.

I come home at night and she's on the floor playing with something. When the nanny leaves she gets up and STARTS LIMPING.

She's only 4. How will we survive her teenage years?

Victory Day

May 8 commemorates the day that WWII ended in Europe. As the capitulation document was signed after midnight Moscow time, May 9 is Victory Day in Russia.

In St Petersburg, there is a memorial ceremony on May 8 at Piskaryovskoye Memorial Cemetery. This is the cemetery where about 420,000 civilians and 50,000 soldiers of the Leningrad Front were buried in 186 mass graves.

At this memorial ceremony the full panoply of military, religious and diplomatic representatives are present and all members of the diplomatic corps lay wreaths. As it would be unseemly for the Consul General to carry his own wreath, volunteers are needed to carry it. Terry and I both volunteered and we both got the job.

We'd never been to the cemetery before, and it was of course one of those days that makes death all the more poignant - clear, sunny, warm in the sun and cool in the shade. Trees were starting to bud and some green leaves promised flowers to come. The ceremony was solemn and emotionally moving, very simple and of course we didn't really understand much of it. Our attention was largely focused on not dropping the wreath, which was not overwhelmingly heavy but awkward to carry. I am happy to say it made its way to its final resting place intact.

Then comes the surreal part. One of the honorary consuls general (a Russian) invited all the other diplomats to his car for a drink. Note I don't think it was quite noon yet, or maybe just on the other side. When we arrived we found a table set up with vodka, wine and zakuski (appetizers/snack, such as blini, pickles, tea-type sandwiches). There were many toasts that Terry and I are happily insignificant enough that nobody cared whether we drank or not, so we each got away with nursing a glass of wine.

Basically, we tailgated the memorial service. Woot woot to Russia!

Happy Mother's Day

It's now the tail end of Mother's Day.  This is how I celebrated it, thanks to the hilarious and fabulous ladies at Rants from Mommyland:

1.I donated to World Birth Aid (http://worldbirthaid.org/) in my mother's name. This was her Mother's Day gift. I promise she didn't get shafted, she got a great gift that lets her shove her adorable grandchildren in anyone's face at anytime - a brag/charm bracelet with their photos.

The organization does one thing, make and distribute Clean Birth Kits to mothers without access to proper sanitation to avoid post-birth infection, which often leads to death. A whopping 1 in 13 women in sub-Saharan Africa die post-childbirth due to complications during and after childbirth. For comparison, in industrialized nations that number is 1 in 4,100.

2.I signed up to give another momma the Mother's Day she was due. A bunch of the other Rants readers made super awesome gift boxes full of personalized stationary, or bath salts and lip gloss, or thoughtful handwritten cards giving encouragement.  Me? I live overseas and mail takes a month to hit the States. I had a week to organize and deliver something. So ... Starbucks gift card from me. With a Twitter-sized card allotment, so I couldn't say much more than Happy Mother's Day. But, she'll get it and hopefully she'll get it as I called myself her Mother Pucker which only makes sense if you know about the Mother Pucker project.  And now you can read all about it.

3. Terry made waffles for breakfast, Alex put on a sock with a heart on it because she loves me, I got to go to Ikea and buy stuff I wanted that Terry very much didn't want and he didn't argue with me at all, and I got a nap.  I got hyacinth plants for International Women's Day and a handmade card from Alex back then so I can't really complain about Mother's Day. It was everything I wanted or needed.

Math major

Alex has trouble falling asleep. Usually I tell her to think of all the words she knows that start with A, then B, then C etc til she gets sleepy. Tonight she didn't want to do that so I told her to do addition tables, i.e., 1+1, 1+2, 1+3 etc up to 10, then 2+2, 2+3 etc.

She's 4!

Of course, one of the other October kids read a book today. Honest-to-goodness new book he'd never seen before, at the library. He's always been the smarty-pants of the bunch.

Adventure and Mis-Adventure Vilnius: Sightseeing

Our main purpose for traveling to Vilnius was to spend time with our good friends, but of course one must go touristing when one visits a new city.  On Friday we attempted to take a bus tour. On the company's web site the pickup time is listed as 10:30am. On the brochure we had, the pickup time is 10:30am. On the ad on our taxi's video monitor as we left the city, the pickup time is listed as 10:30am.

At 10:20am we met our friend at Town Hall Square (5 minutes from the hotel) and went to the pickup location. Pickup time: 10:15am. Grrrr. So we went on our own tour with me reading the Vilnius guide book out loud and my friend driving us around.

Here's the brick masterpiece of St Anne's Church.

Here's Cathedral Square.

And some random kitty cats

As mentioned previously, on what turned out to be a blistering hot Saturday my friend filled her car with us and her children and we jaunted out to Trakai Castle. Here it is:

On also-hot Sunday we attempted to visit the Museum of Genocide Victims, housed in the former KGB headquarters. For some  reason, I successfully go arts-ing (museums, ballet, etc) with my children individually, but when the whole family is together it's chaos.  The stone blocks that form the building's outer walls have the names of the individuals who died in that place and their birth and death carved into the rock. I really wanted to get some photos but there was too much hysteria.  The museum was interesting and definitely worth even the mere 30 minutes we spent there.

Lastly, here's Terry carrying the kids off into the sunset on our last night there, at Belmontas restaurant. It's what Karl & Friedrich in Piter wishes it could be.

Pretty little princess

I asked my mom to send some light cotton summer dresses for Alex to wear. To the park, the playground, that kind of thing. Here's Alex modelling her favorite one.

And of course, whatever Alex does Zoltan must do too.

I admit, he's got a good curtsey. Think he's ready for an audience with the Queen?

Rite of Passage

Our poor Alex. Yesterday evening she ran into the kitchen to give me some good news (she won a game with Terry) and slipped in her slippery socks and fell, using her arm to break the fall. She complained of the pain, except for when the TV was on. No swelling, no discoloration, she could move her fingers. Figuring she just banged it hard, we gave her Motrin and ice packs and we did dinner, bath and bed.

This morning she continually vacillated between "mommy I hurt so much" and "it doesn't hurt at all" so once it was late enough to call a doctor at home on Sunday I called the Consulate doctor to confer with her. She advised we wait and see for a few more hours and we did, eventually deciding to get an x-ray. She called the clinic that was walking distance from our apartment, set it up and called me back to say they were there and waiting for us. I pack a bag, throw Alex in the stroller and we race down there. We get to the reception area and the girls there have no idea who we are, who we're there to see or why we're there (they do speak English so it wasn't my bad Russian) I eventually have to call our doctor again to put her on the phone with the receptionists and they do indeed find me in their system.

The doctor came out, asked "shto slushilas?" (what happened) and between Russian and pantomime I think he understood that she ran and slipped and fell. He felt her arm and said we'd go for the x-ray. Of course Alex was very nervous but she was brave and did everything the doctors said to do. They let me stay in the room with her too, which helped a lot. The picture came right up on the screen in the room and they showed me the fracture. The doctor even said "fracture" so I am pretty sure that's what it is.

He then said something to the effect that they didn't need to do anything, just the arm needs  .... and then pantomime of something around the arm. I asked "splint"? and he said yes. Turns out that was a miscommunication because he meant that she didn't need surgery and she only needed a cast. So he was probably amused when I asked if she needed to wear it all the time.

He led us to a hallway with a bunch of clusters of chairs in front of doors and said something I didn't quite catch, so I asked Alex if she'd understood. "Yes, he told us to sit down." I am sure she hears that command a few times a day at sadik! so I figured she was probably right. And she was. They put the cast on, which was another nerve-fest for Alex but I held her good hand and she clung to the stuffed animal she'd brought and we made it through. She has to wear a cast practically up to her armpit for 2 weeks, then they can cut off the part from the elbow up and she has to wear the shorter cast for 2 more weeks.

One thing I will say - from the moment the cast went on she had not once complained about pain.

From the minute I walked out of my house to the minute I walked back in was a bit over 2 hours. Not bad for what was essentially an ER visit on Sunday afternoon.

Adventure and Mis-Adventure Vilnius: Posh (or not)

As mentioned previously, the Stikliai is a fancy hotel. Beautiful. When Secretary of State Clinton came to Vilnius, she stayed here. When my friend mentioned to a friend of hers we were staying there, the friend mused we must be posh. Ha!

I guess we joked about being "not-posh" too much. The night before we checked out, as we were on our way out to dinner the lady behind the desk asked when we would leave the next day to get a sense of our checking out needs. I mentioned we had to go early. She then said to me with a "particular" tone of voice, Queen Latifah head roll and much eye blinking "Well, how were you planning to pay?"

W. T. F.???????

I restrained myself from strangling her right there and simply said I had assumed there would be someone at reception at 7am to process our checkout.

Does this hotel really have a history of deadbeats? What was it about us that made her question our intention or ability to cover our hotel bill?

Every single other member of that hotel's staff treated us professionally, graciously, and kindly. They all smiled at the kids when we walked through the lobby. I hate that one damn fool had to mar such a special experience.

The kicker is that while we were out that night the airline called us to say the flight was cancelled and we were re-booked on the earlier flight (6:00am). We decided we really should do the checkout that night when we returned as there may not be someone available to process us at 4:30am. Terry went down and spoke with a different woman. She assured him that she herself would be at the desk at 4:30 and would happily process us then and we could call to have our bags picked up when we were ready (it did in fact take the bellboy all of 5 minutes to get to our apartment after we called).  This makes the first woman's comment and attitude all the more WTF?

Uzupis

My friends live in this neighborhood of Vilnius called Uzupis. Well, it may be a neighborhood. It may also be a neighboring country, as Uzupis announced its secession from Lithuania on April 1, 1997.  The region celebrates its independence day on April 1 and has its 41 point constitution posted in several different languages along a brick wall. Provisions include the serious: "Everyone has the right to hot water, heating in winter and a tiled roof." and the less serious: "A cat is not obliged to love its master, but it must help him in difficult times." The full Constitution is here.  Here I am reading it:

The most famous monument is the Angel of Uzupis...

Like in Russia, the custom of married couples locking a padlock on the wrought iron of one of the bridges is alive and well. We even saw one that was particularly special to us.

After our sightseeing, we stopped at a random cafe (Uzupio Picerija) for a snack. Who knew? We each got what were essentially blini and they were fabulously delicious. Thus fortified, we headed over to Tibet Square, a little park right by the bridge out of Uzupis that has Tibetan prayer flags all about as well as some sweet wooden swings hanging from several trees.

Adventure and Mis-adventure Vilnius: Prologue

We wanted to check out Vilnius and visit friends there. We booked a flight. We spent more time than we should have researching apartments to rent, going back and forth with our friend who lives there about locations and other issues.  We finally booked a place with Apartments Inn (www.apartmentsinn.eu). We paid our deposit.

Fast forward to 7 days prior to travel. I'm tidying up loose ends and realize I never wrote back to the place letting them know what time we're arriving, so I send a quick message. The reply:  Oops. We never booked the place for you, someone else is in it right now and won't leave before you get here.

Panic.

They added that they do have another apartment available, but it's on the other side of town and had other inconveniences. We're pretty much up the creek so we say OK I guess we have to take it, but it would be nice to get some compensation for the trouble.  They offer a measly 5 Euro per night discount on an apartment that is more expensive than the one we were going to stay in AND didn't meet our needs as well as the first one.

We spend all the free time we have for 2 days trying to find something else. We realize if this is the service we're receiving from this place before even arriving, what can we expect when we get there. We cancel and request our deposit back.  We book at the Stikliai, which has apartments as part of its hotel. We realize we're going to pay more than twice what we had planned to pay for our housing.

What we didn't realize yet was that it would be totally worth it! Here are some photos of the place:

The courtyard outside our apartment

The living room and kitchen. Why yes, that is granite on the counters.And a whole bunch of pretty glass tchotchkas along the top of the cabinets that were once within easy range of little fingers.

Our bedroom had pillars. Need I say more?

Adventure and Mis-Adventure Vilnius: Zoltan

Part I:
On Saturday we filled the Sequoia and headed to Trakai, famous for its castle on a lake, its Turkish Jewish history, and its meat pies (kibinas). Other than the oppressive heat, everyone was pretty happy. The kids picked dandelions, the adults took photos of the castle and the kids.

We took refuge in the shade of trees just on the waterline. Zoltan had been gathering rocks and throwing them into the lake.

He had two fistfuls and started to run headlong toward the water. Before anyone could stop him, the land stopped but he didn't. I was doing something else and suddenly was met with the view of a hysterical screaming Zoltan being carried by Terry and clearly dripping wet from the armpits down. Still clutching two fistfuls of rocks, that he continued to hold onto throughout the next steps.

We quickly undress him and get his sweatshirt on (we had just finally convinced him to take it off moments beforehand ...) As Terry was putting a new diaper on, our friend was in quiet conversation with her youngest, who's the same age as Alex. She had worn a dress with leggings that day, and the leggings were quickly stripped off and Zoltan had his new outfit. You can see that he did recover from his trauma to enjoy the rest of the day.

He did finally drop the rocks, too.

Part II:
The next morning we were heading out. The kids had been arguing whether we should take the elevator or stairs. Zoltan seems to have no love for the elevator - he always asks to hold someone's hand whenever we're in it. BUT he does love to press those buttons. In the end the decision was made to take the stairs so Terry and I head off to the right, while the kids are still by the elevator to the left. We hear screaming. This is not as unusual as one would hope so we just yell over our shoulder to Alex "Why is Zoltan crying?" as she is usually the cause. Alex appears by our side. We realize Zoltan is still screaming. *#&^(@*&^  He pushed the button, got into the elevator, then the door closed. He was alone and trapped.

Luckily it's a small hotel and nobody had called the elevator in the 10 seconds it took to get there and press the button to "call" it and thus open the doors. Obviously, we took the stairs that morning.

Tallinn Airport

Since having children, most factors involved in travel have taken on a whole new rating scale. If it makes my life easier - super! Historical or esthetic value have taken a back seat to comfort, convenience and most of all: keeping the kids happy and quiet.

Tallinn airport, oh how I love thee!  You are so adorably small and yet in our collective 10 hours within your walls we had to turn on Dora for all of 45 minutes.

These are some of the reasons why:

Cadets on the move

Something you don't see every day in the metro: a group of what looked like cadets or new recruits, anyway they all looked 12, all wearing the uniforms and coats of something military and each with a duffel bag at his feet. They were standing in formation, 4 deep and maybe 10 across? Waiting for the metro. It's been a long time since I wished I had my camera on me. Using my phone didn't even occur to me as there was no way Terry would have let me post a photo of the anticipated poor quality it would have been. So I leave it to your imagination.

Take Your Child to Work Day

The official date of Take Your Children to Work Day for 2012 is April 26. To coincide with spring break, however, I organized the Consulate's first ever TYCTWD on April 11.

It all started like this: one of the FSOs sent me a message saying "Hey, are you planning anything for TYCTWD"? It was 2 weeks prior to what eventually became the date for the event. I hadn't even thought of it. I thought there would be no interest at all - maybe some parents would be interested to bring their kids but none of the staff who would need to help me pull it off would want to take the time out of their busy schedules. We're a very small post - not just in size of personnel but in terms of physical size. No lunchroom. No "grounds". No Marines (most of the fun stuff happens with Marines).

All the other CLOs were talking about it on our listserv as many embassies and the State Department in general take the event very seriously. So I browsed some ideas, talked with some of the staff (ones who have kids of their own were the first as they also had a vested interest in keeping them entertained during the week off) and in 24 hours had put together a small program and sent out the dual-language invitation to all staff to register their children for the event.

I was pretty sure I couldn't handle more than about a dozen kids. In the end I took 14 and we had a wait list half as long. So much for no interest!

There were, as always, a couple of hiccups as I had not communicated clearly what I wanted from everyone. I don't think the kids noticed. One interesting observation - we had 2 main parts of the program: getting fingerprinted with RSO and having a visa interview with Consular. We had split the kids into 2 groups to make it easier to manage and to lessen the downtime for them. In each group, I noted the employees involved in the event were much more "showman-y" with the 2nd time. More relaxed/communicative/did more stuff with them. I think the adults had initially underestimated how interested the kids would be in their jobs.

Heck, I won't even be doing this job next year, but I am already planning how to make next year's event even better (and able to accommodate all the kids who want to come).

Having a visa interview

Getting fingerprinted

Fashion Week

So this post won't do much for dispelling the rumors of our high-falutin' fancy pants diplomatic lives.

It was Aurora Fashion Week in Piter, and the Consulate was able to score some tickets. Some friends and I went. It should go without saying this was my first fashion show, and I had no idea what to expect.

An American, Thom Browne, was the headliner and the main show. At 11:00pm. So Russian! We went a bit early to check out the place and other shows but TB was our main purpose. The first show we went to went like this: The show was to start at 9:00pm. Around 9:00pm we wandered over to the crowd of people massed together like Indians at the train station and started weaving our way towards the front. We got as close as we could then waited, crushed alongside the other 100 or so people like Japanese getting into the subway. When the bouncers finally started letting people, the 4 of us who'd gone together got a bit separated but only for moments and eventually we all squeezed through. We even found seating for 3 of us, which was fine as only 3 of us were in heels.

The show itself ... first 4 men in shorts and T shirts, then 4 women in similar gym attire (with super high heels). Sweatshirts .... nothing interesting. Nothing very pretty. One of my friends couldn't get over how unappealing the models were. In sum, maybe worth it to have the experience but certainly not worth our time. We had thought initially that when we got into the show we'd just stay put so we could keep our seats for the next show, but everyone had to clear the room between shows.

We decided to skip the 10:00pm show and save our energies for Thom so we went to get a drink and while milling about we found some more people we knew, including the guy who got us the tickets who was in the VIP section. He did eventually come slumming and hang out with us for a while, and when it came time to line up for TB he invited one of my friends to go with him. Good thing for her as she's the only one of us who saw anything. We got back into the scrum, which at first seemed smaller and calmer than the previous one but after 30-40 minutes of jostling we decided we didn't care that much and our feet hurt so went to get another drink and sit down.

About 15 minutes after we'd settled down - and been checking the progress of the show on the video monitors 20 feet from where we sat - a crowd began to fill into the area where we sat. I recognized some of the people who'd been standing near us; most of the crowd never got in to see the show. We should have quit earlier but at least we got some comfy seating from bailing as early as we did. At least we could watch the show on the video monitors when our conversation didn't take our attention away.

We decided to skip the after-party, figuring it would involve as much standing, waiting and being crushed as the shows had and after one aborted attempt (turns out some bars actually close for Easter. This place isn't as heathen as some might think!) we settled in for some food and beer at the Telegraph. Good wife that I am, I noted they carry 2 Scotches T likes although we could buy a bottle through PJs for the price of a glass.

I got home at 2:30am, which I never do as wake-up time is wake-up time no matter what bedtime was. The kids miraculously slept til 8:00am. I guess daddy being away affected them more than I had thought - which means he's never allowed to travel without us again!

Chaos

It's funny that this month's Blog Roundup topic is "Chaos." Terry's been away this week so I have been single mom, plus I had 2 events at work, 2 IWC-related events and 3 Russian classes - each one of which required preparation, organization, and stress until the thing concluded successfully. And it's Passover so my food choices and severely limited. To top things off, for some reason the cloth diapers decided this was the week to start repelling liquids.

I knew the kids would be acting up more, feeling cutoff from daddy's attention and being unable to articulate their worries (will he ever come back?) In the morning I was able to "zen" my way through it even though Z was waking at 6:30am. At the end of the day my patience was not in such sharp focus and the kids got put to bed more abruptly than usual on more than one night, and paid me back for it by not settling down until 9:00pm (an hour after being put down). I drank more liquor and ate more ice cream this week than I usually do, even breaking into the Maker's Mark that T asks me not to use as I dilute it with ginger ale anyway.

I'm lucky the nannies do laundry and the house cleaner comes on Thursdays or things would have been really, really dire around here.

T came back yesterday and I went out last night. The kids were silent before 8:30pm and woke this morning at 8:00am. I guess with daddy home they were more relaxed and able to sleep better?

Shoot, was I supposed to say something productive?

Massive Parenting Fail

Tonight when I put Alex to bed I promised to come back and check on her - usually I do that 5-10 minutes later.

On the computer during those 10 minutes, I saw a video I'd been waiting for - a panel discussion on "Building Resilience in Foreign Service Kids" - was uploaded. 40 minutes later Alex is on the potty and yelling for me.

Oops.

Anyway, here's the video.

My first seder

This is not literally my first seder; that one occurred pre-memory. This one is the first seder I've prepared. In Malta I was pretty irreligious, here in Petersburg we had Orthodox friends to visit on Passover. This year I've made matzah, charoset, potato kugel, meringue for dessert, and will soon throw the lamb into the oven. As the kids are 2 and 4 I have printed out the "30 Minute Seder". I've made sure we have horseradish, grape juice for the kids' wine glasses, and discovered celery can sub for the parsley I forgot to buy at the store. And I have an orange.

I remember in college meeting a floormate who was also Jewish (not exactly a novelty at Columbia) and she said her parents were pretty agnostic until she was old enough to start asking questions, and then they joined a synagogue and started going on Friday nights. Now that I have a 4 year old I totally understand those parents, although I am hesitant to try to seek out the only not-Orthodox congregation in the city - differentiated from the only Orthodox congregation (not too many Jews left in Russia) - and highly doubt the service would be understandable to me anyway. There's also the internal battle of "what do I want to teach my children"?

In the USA it's easy. I find a congregation I like, enroll my kids in Hebrew School and basically let someone else do the heavy lifting. The synagogue would organize the Sukkot, Hanukkah and Purim festivities and there would be friends we'd meet to plan a joint seder together. Being overseas requires a deeper involvement. Alex will ask a lot of questions tonight and I know I won't have the answers. Wish me luck!

Where do clothes come from?

Alex, all excited, told me the other day two of her girlfriends at school had "skirts made from jeans." I told her if she really wanted, we could get her one. She got confused. "How can we do that?"

My 4 year old daughter has never, in her entire life, gone into a store for the purpose of purchasing clothing. We have amazing friends with well-placed children (each one about 2 years older than my kids, along gender lines) so we get boxes of hand-me-downs during Home Leave that we ship to the next post. To fill in the gaps we either buy online or my mom shops and sends stuff to us. Very rarely I've needed to buy locally but even then it's a solo trip. Clothes come home with mommy or daddy from work or we get them from boxes in the storage closet.

I can't quite decide if this is fabulous or tragic.

Friday Adventure

Zoltan's nannies are fabulous, as I've mentioned a few times. Among other things, they take him all over the town, and he's been to museums I don't even know the location of. Lately he's been transiting the city via "rolly-bus", aka trolleybus. Alex has become envious.

With this in mind, I decided to keep Alex home Friday and have an adventure. We went down to Nevskiy and popped onto the first trolleybus we saw (#7). It was pretty crowded and Alex, in the underneath part, couldn't see much but the kids were thrilled anyway. At one point we passed some former palace or mansion and it had Greek style statues adorning it. Zoltan yelled out "Mommy, they're maykin'd (naked)" One lady standing by us started giggling. I think she understood English.

We got out at the last stop as the stroller was too big and the bus too crowded to get out earlier. We ended at ploschad Truda so I had some sense of where we were. I had thought we'd head to the Neva as Zoltan loves water but he started complaining of being cold - I didn't have the fight in me to force him into his snowpants when he refused to put them on in the morning. So instead we headed toward Nevskiy with a short stop for photos with St Isaac's while the kids enjoyed their snacks.

On the way home we got onto a regular bus (avtobus) and were positioned right by the door so this time Alex could see stuff. All in all they were pretty stoked with the day. Of course it began with TV (Charlie and Lola, the first time they watched one) and ended with a play date so there's little to complain about.

Passover preparations

The joys of overseas life! Not like I didn't know Passover was coming, but here I was with 6 days left - no matzah and no menu. Kudos to the internet: I found a "30 Minute Seder" plus a full seder's worth of recipes, all ingredients of which can be found locally. And, surprisingly, a matzah recipe! (this one: http://allrecipes.com/recipe/matzah/detail.aspx)

Of course, if I could find specially supervised flour here I would also be able to find mass produced matzah*, so mine aren't technically kosher for Passover. Given my level of observance of late, though, this is definitely a step up.

* = OK, OK, the Grand Choral Synagogue store probably has matzah just as they had Hanukkah candles, but I wasn't going to have any opportunity to get there before Friday.

Fabulous resource for studying Russian

I'm kind of a dork, and I'm OK with that. I study Russian not only because it's my only hope for ever having gainful, continuous employment but because the language has completely sunk its nails into me (why didn't it do this 10 years ago when my brain actually wanted to hold things like genative case and perfective verbs?). Anyhoo ...

This site was recommended by someone on the chat group for FSO hopefuls: http://nclrc.org/webcasts/russian/

It totally rocks my world. It gives super short (a couple of minutes) broadcasts of current events in Russian spoken slowly and clearly. It has a glossary to go with each broadcast. It has listening comprehension exercises at the end. These broadcasts have been going on since 2004. There are about 100 of them. By the time I finish them all I should be able to listen to news on TV or radio.

Yippeeeee