Technical Difficulties

Last week I attempted to visit Petrozovodsk, the capital of the Karelian Republic of Russia, and Kizhi, a small island in Lake Onega off the easter shore of Russian Karelia. Unfortunately it stormed, it poored, and it hurricaned (well, not really, but it was really windy). And I was left disgustingly soaking wet for most of the day with no clothes to change into and no where to dry off. It was sort of depressing. Since I took the overnight train from Piter to Petrozovodsk and I had booked the overnight train back the next night I didn't get a chance to even really get a feel for the city. The main purpose of my trip was to see Kizhi and its amazing wooden church, and though I did get to visit the island it was so unpleasantly cold and rainy and muddy that all I could think of was how much I wanted to get back on the boat to Petrozovodsk. I was reminded of the soccer games I had to play in the late fall on Long Island in freezing cold rain and hail.
I know some of you were really looking forward to photos of Karelia and I'm really sorry that all I have to offer is one of the big church. Only when I stepped inside the pogost chapel across from the big Church of the Transfiguration (photo coming as soon as Blogger fixes my blog) was it dry enough for me to take out my camera. The church's edifice is over twice the height of Moscow's St Basil's.The pogost complex of wooden churches and a bell tower was built over three centuries by local carpenters. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kizhi_pogost
Last night I visited the famous Marinsky Theater to hear Shostakovich's 3rd and 13th Symphonies conducted by the world-famous conductor Valery Gergiev. I got the second cheapest tickets (5$) but somehow the best seat in the house, in the balcony right above the conductor's head. I had people coming up to me asking if they could stand behind my chair just to get a glimpse of him during the performance. Watching him conduct with only a toothpick (apparently he usually has nothing in his hands) was quite an experience. This year, as part of the "Stars of the White Nights" festival, St. Petersburg is celebrating the 100th anniversary of Dmitri Shostakovich's birth and presenting all of his symphonies through the summer.
The bridge I was standing on while taking this photo down Canal Griboediv is guarded by four griffins and stands right next to the FinEc, the city's business university which Genya attends. There are always lots of drinking students here posing with the griffins in interesting and varied poses.
St. Isaac's Cathedral looks quite scary in the late evening. White nights are (almost) here. Some people say they've already started but that's only because they are sleeping through the 2 hours or real darkness between about 1 and 3AM. This was taken on my walk home across the river a few nights ago at about 12:30. The signs on this fence read "The garden is closed due to techical reasons." In fact, lots of things in St. Petersburg seem to close quite often for technical reasons. For example, the cafe down the street from me has looked abandoned and has had a sign like this on its doors and windows since I arrived in St. Petersburg. The store around the corner from my apartment, which just this weekend put up signs that say "NOW 24 HOURS!!!" took down those signs on the first night of their newly extended hours to replace them with ones that announce that the store will be closed tonight between 10PM and 8AM due to technical difficulties (difficulties which I assume had something to do with either lack of staff or lack of customers).