Saturday, June 26, 2010, St. Petersburg, Russia

It is now 3 PM St Petersburg time at the Atlantic Hotel, St Petersburg, Russia, and I have a few moments before THE WEDDING CEREMONY. Pinky and I left NJ last Tuesday evening for Russia to witness the Russian wedding ceremony of Jamie Blackburn and Victoria Leontieva. For those who don't know, the two met during Victoria's PG year at Mersersburg Academy. We have joined a group of 43 which traveled from the US to be here with Jamie and Victoria and meet her family here in St Petersburg. The past few days have been non stop. Victoria arranged for us to take a series of tours with Olga, who had been her English teacher and who has an uncommon command of Russian history, particurly St Petersburg. With her we've had to move "bistro," or quickly. Here in St Petersburg there is much to see. Most of the sights involve what developed before the Bolsheik revolution, with the various Peters, Nicholas', and Catherines. We learned about "Catherine the Spender, " and it is no wonder that the people revolted against them all and their excesses. It is hard to imagine the resources of the people that were directed to support the opulence and lavish lifestyle of the Romanoff family. However, the cultureal remnanta of that time are priceless. The Hermitage in St Petersburg served as the Winter POuralace and has endless rooms filled with priceless art and gildted trimmings. The Summer Palace is located in Pushkin, 15 miles south of the city. It contains a long line of amazing rooms decorated as you couldn't believe, with the crown being the Amber Room, fully restored, paid for by the German government and opened to the public in just 2007. Much of the Summer Palace was destroyed by the Nazi's during WWII, and it has been meticulously restored at great cost to what it is today. Both palaces are very popular with tourists, and they are important to Russia's emerging tourist industry. In fact, tourism is second only to shipbuilding in economic importance to St Petersburg. Our ride back from the Summer palace was highlighted by an incredible lunch at a nearby Russian restaurant, complete with numerous vodka toasts, a Russian band with accordian and great singing, and great food. Olga has been an incredibly informative and pleasant tour director. Her knowledge of the history is boundless. A highlight was near the end of our tour of the Youssoupov Palace, where she recounted the killing of Rasputin right where the shootings actually took place in the basement of the Youssoupov family residence, including how he survived two gunshot wounds to the chest and one to the head before being dumped in the frozen river. She shared with us some of her experiences living in Russia. Most memorable is the invasive corruption that is everywhere. The Traffic Officials command payoffs just to get a drivers license. Without paying a bribe. you cannot pass the driving or written test. Pay enough and you don't need to take the test at all. Between 40 and 50 per cent of the population works for the government (not much different than it is in NJ). In the election when Vladmir Putin was "elected" prime minister and president, those who worked for the government were required to prove that they cast their votes for Putin by taking a photo of their votes on their cell phones and texting it. I suppose that bridges are now being designed and supervised in Russia where the responsible Professional Engineers received their accreditation this way, and this doesn't lend itself to generating a lot of confidence in the integrity of the infrastructure. The WWII St Petersburg Siege Memorable was incredibly moving. The memorial commerates the bravery and unimaginable experiences of the St Petersburg military and citizenry during the 900 day siege that the Nazi's imposed on the city. About one million military perished and another one million citizens died during this incredible time. People were reduced to eating saw dust and rats. Ultimaltely, the Nazi's failed in their attempt to take the city, and the war front contributed to the Nazi loss of the war. Victoria's family invited us all to dinner last evening at a wonderful place just off the river in the city. We enjoyed a variety of Russian fare, including beer. We got to meet Victoria's parents, who served as gracious hosts, and other family members. After dinner our tour of the gardens was abruptly interrupted by a drenching downpour, which caused us ride back to our hotel in our bus drenched to the skin. A great time and adventure all the way around! Needless to say, I've been taking a lot of pix with my new Canon TiII digital camera. Thus far they look great. I'll be pooling them with pix that other wedding guests have been taking, and we'll post them on the net for all to see. Soon we will change and leave for the ceremony. We don't know too much of what is to take place. Even Jamie appears to be clueless. What we do know is that we leave the hotel at 5:30 PM on two buses and travel to one of the many canals in the city. From there we continue to be split in two groups and disembark on two boats to an as yet unknown destination. I suspect this will go on until late in the night.......