We crossed the border about 4:45 PM. First we cleared Finnish passport control at the last Finnish town (Vainikkala). Then we went a little ways further and the Soviet border control got on. First they collected the passports and visas and checked the compartment for any hidden persons. It was then we discovered that the seats lifted up and there was luggage space under them! Then we crossed the border while they began doing luggage checks. For this, everyone went into the corridor. Then the guard asked Mark to come back in and point out his luggage. He went through Mark's luggage asking about various items. When he got to Mark's copy of FOOTFALL, he looked at it and said, "It is forbidden," and passed it to someone in the corridor. They passed it around, trying to figure

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out what it was, but had trouble knowing what to make of it. (Let's face it, most Americans wouldn't know what to make of a novel about elephants from outer space invading Kansas.) They were trying to decide if it was "pornographia." Eventually they decide it wasn't and returned it. What was notable was that their immediate reaction to something unknown was, "It is forbidden"--just like the Orwellian "Everything not required is forbidden." Then I was called in. They went over me with a metal detector, checked my pocket knife (no problem), glanced at my diary, and looked at my books. The Xeroxes of articles on the post-moderns in science fiction also got passed around and returned. They went through one other person's luggage from our compartment, and let the other three pass. None of the guards ever smiled or even ceased scowling. It was an interesting experience but not what I would call a pleasant one.

The border was after a frontier zone in Finland. The trees and shrubs had been cleared along the border strip and there was a barbed-wire fence, guard towers, and a guard pit from which they checked for people or objects riding under the train. As Erik said, a true "iron curtain."

This took a while, but eventually it was over and we reached Viipuri, the first stop inside the Soviet Union. After that it was pretty much straight through to Leningrad. We passed many more forests and lakes, along with farms and small towns. The houses we saw were all very run-down and in need of paint, a sharp contrast to the neatness and brightness of the Finnish houses just a few miles away. It had clouded over somewhat, but it was still quite light (sunset isn't till midnight or so).

We got to Leningrad about 9:00 PM and unloaded our luggage from the train (porters would only take it from the platform). Our Intourist guide is named Olga and she is a fourth-year student in English. Her English is passable though she has some problems. We drove along the Neva (I think) through a shopping area and then out to our hotel, the Pribaltiskaya on the Gulf of Finland. It seems a bit far off the beaten track for strolling, but we'll have a better idea tomorrow.

The apartment buildings are also run-down, even more so than in China, though most have curtains. They have balconies with panels over the railings, but the panels are bare metal and really need a coat of paint. In general the buildings are dilapidated, with broken windows and peeling facades. Only the museum buildings are really kept up well (or moderately well).

Dinner at 10:30 PM was an experience. First of all, it was at 10:30 PM. It was still light out. We were put in a dining room with a discoteque off it. We sat down and were served a slice of cold roast beef, another of cold pork, and two slices of cucumber. On the table was bread and butter. There was also beer to drink--

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one large (liter?) bottle for each two people. We ate this and waited. Oh, also on the table were some dessert cakes. Some of the people starting saying that this was it for dinner, because the dessert was already out. After a while we started nibbling at the dessert. Finally the main course arrived--beef stroganoff and rice. It was delicious, and that wasn't just because it had been eight hours since we last ate. They had coffee and tea, but no milk for the coffee. There may be a shortage because of recent events. After that, we had a quick run-down of Monday's schedule, wrote in our logs for a while, and went to bed.

Leningrad

July 1, 1986: We got up at 8:00 AM for breakfast at 9. The hotel room is better than the ones in China, with three classical music stations on the radio, twin beds (Scandinavian style, meaning a two-inch mattress on top of the box spring), television, and refrigerator.

Breakfast was cold pork, fried eggs (a bit runny for my taste), bread and butter, apple juice, and coffee. They had milk this time.

At 10 we left on our city tour. Our first stop was at two Rostral victory columns (following the Roman tradition) erected along the Neva River. These were put up some time in the 18th Century. Across the river we could see the Peter and Paul Cathedral and Fortress and a monument to Lenin. Then we crossed the Neva and drove past the Artillery Museum and the Fortress. Behind the Fortress was a small beach on which people were sunbathing and swimming, though it was only about 60 degrees Fahrenheit. Crossing the Neva again, we got a good view of the buildings that Leningrad is known for--the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Century homes and palaces of the aristocracy. Although the interiors have been completely changed in most of them (except for the museums), the exteriors are maintained in their original style, including being painted in pastel colors. The Hermitage, for example, is green; the Admiralty, yellow.

After we drove along the Neva, passing the Hermitage with its long lines of people waiting to see it, and the Admiralty, we passed the Peter the Great Monument. (Peter the Great "westernized" Russia in the Eighteenth Century, introducing scientific and technological advances from Western Europe. He also introduced a lot of repression and torture, so he wasn't an all-'round nice guy.) Then we drove up to St. Isaac's Cathedral on the same square as the Hotel Astoria, the Nicolas I Monument, and the local Soviet (council). We were going to visit the inside later in the afternoon, but this stop gave us a chance to walk around and take pictures of the exterior and surrounding area. It is no longer a church, but a Museum of Religion and Atheism. You can see the places on the exterior where the shells hit during the Siege of Leningrad.

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I should mention that because next year is the celebration of the 70th Anniversary of the October Revolution, many buildings are covered with scaffolding as restoration work is done. (Sound familiar?) St. Isaac's is partially covered, as is the Church of the Resurrection.

We also went past the Winter gardens to the Smolny Nunnery. Nearby we saw the Smolny Institute, where the Bolsheviks were headquartered during the Revolution.

We then drove along Nevsky Prospect, Leningrad's main street, passing many important buildings (most of which I can't recall). One was the Cathedral of Our Lady of Kazan, also now a Museum of Religion and Atheism. This seems to be true of several of the churches, though there are still some "working" churches in Leningrad. We also saw many theaters, concert halls, opera houses, and literary or art museums.

It occurs to me that the low standard of living in the U.S.S.R. can be explained by the Three Laws of Thermodynamics. The First Law says you can't get more energy out of a system than you put in. So the Communists couldn't take the wealth of the aristocracy and hand it out so that everyone could live in opulence. The Second Law says there is always some energy that is lost. So when the wealth *was* re-distributed, some was lost in the process, lowering the total available. Actually, I suspect that a lot was lost. The Third Law says this is happening to the entire universe. So bringing in outside wealth won't help either. (The Three Laws were best summed up in, of all places, THE WIZ, in a song: "You can't win, you can't break even, and you can't get out of the game." This phrasing of the Third Law applies too--no one can get out of the U.S.S.R.)

We returned to the hotel about 1:00 PM. The Beryoska was just closing for lunch so we went back to our rooms and wrote in our logs until 1:30 when it was time for lunch: ham, beef and cabbage soup, pork cutlets, cabbage, and rice. And of course, the ubiquitous cucumber--apparently the cabbage and cucumber crops were good this year. To drink we had Pepsi-Cola. Dessert was orange slices with sugar.

I should explain about Beryoskas. There are two types of stores in the Soviet Union: those which accept rubles and those which accept "hard currency" (dollars, pounds, Finnmarks, etc.). You cannot spend dollars in a ruble store or rubles in a hard currency store. The hard currency stores are designed for tourists and are called Beryoskas. They carry a lot of items not available in ruble stores (the standard store for residents, like a grocery or bookstore). These items included imported cigarettes and liquor, as well as other imported goods which are unavailable in ruble stores. So many Russians would like to get hard currency to be able to shop there. This is where the black market comes in and why you can do

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much better than 0.7 rubles to the dollar. Of course, you can also land in prison.

After lunch, we left at 3:00 PM for St. Isaac's Cathedral. The interior is decorated in a mixture of neo-Classical, Renaissance, and Baroque. There are 110 columns, most of granite or marble, but some of malachite or lapis lazuli. There are also hundreds of paintings, frescoes, and mosaics, and right in the center is a Foucault Pendulum (currently under renovation). It seems a bit out of place, but perhaps it's the "Atheism" part of "Religion and Atheism."

I forgot to mention one other stop this morning--Palace Square. In the center of the Square stands the Alexander Column, the world's biggest standing piece of granite (155'). On the north is the Winter Palace, housing the Hermitage. This was built by Rastrelli in a style distinctive to St. Petersburg (Leningrad) and is the culmination of that style, with green facade, white contrasting columns and decorations, gilded statues and ornamentation, and a totally individual look. The south side of the Square is occupied by the classical curve of the General Staff headquarters with its ceremonial arch.

We didn't see the Aurora (it was being renovated). We did see the double windows that Leningrad has in all its windows to keep out the winter cold.

After St. Isaac's, we went to a Beryoska nearer the center of town where people did some shopping. We got some mineral water and a few souvenir pins. This was near one of Leningrad's newest bridges, decorated in the Egyptian style with sphinxes and obelisks. Leningrad is laced with rivers and canals and has many bridges. Traffic was unusually heavy because two of the main bridges were being renovated.

Dinner (at 6:00 PM) was sardines with hard-boiled egg, some sort of breaded meatball (it sounds strange, but wasn't bad), creamed peas and carrots, and tea. (There was also bread and mineral water.)

After dinner was the usual--do some laundry, write in our logs, then bed.

July 2, 1986: Breakfast at 8:00 AM was ham, bread, and "cheesecake" with what was either sour cream or yoghurt. The "cheesecake" was something like the inside of a cheese blintz. This was much better than the fried eggs.

We left at 9:00 AM and got to the hydrofoil station by 9:30 in spite of traffic. Our hydrofoil left at 10. We started out inside but soon decided to ride on the observation platform amidships. We

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got a good view of Leningrad from the Neva, including a lot of apartment buildings being built along it. It was very brisk, with white-caps on the water. We arrived in about a half-hour and walked up the avenue leading to Petrodvorets (the Summer Palace). This avenue had a canal down the center, used to drain the water from the Grand Cascade, a series of fountains in front of the Palace itself decorated with ornate gilt statues. There were also many statues and fountains along and on either side of the avenue. To one side we saw a crew of women working on the landscaping, much of which was still being restored from the damage it suffered during the War. The Palace itself had been used as a German barracks and nothing that hadn't been taken to safety in Siberia before the War survived except the shell of the building.

When we went in, they gave us felt slippers to wear over our shoes to protect the floors. We then went through a whole series of rooms which I will try to list and describe.

There was the Blue Reception Room with blue Russian silk wallcovering and blue and white tile stove. The Chesma Room had a dozen paintings depicting the Russian victory over the Turks at Chesma. For this the Russian navy blew up another ship in the Atlantic, since the artists had never seen that before and couldn't paint it. (This was Mark's favorite room.) Next was the Throne Room with turquoise walls and red curtains (and a throne, of course). The Audience Room was a small room for ladies-in-waiting, using mirrors to give the illusion of space. It was white with a lot of gold trim. The dining room was predominantly white with green trim. The dishes were Wedgewood with a lavender floral design (196 pieces--service for 30). Next was a Chinese room, which we couldn't stop in--a pity, since it was quite elaborate, though small. Then came the Italian Salon with 338 portraits done by one artists using only six models. This was followed by another Chinese Room, then the Partridges Room, called this because of the French silk wallcovering with its motif of partridges. The Divan Room had Chinese silk wallcovering and was dominated (not surprisingly) by a large Turkish divan. Then there was a dressing room and a study, the latter with satin wallcovering. (All these rooms are also filled with valuable paintings and furniture, of course.) The Green Silk Room was covered in green silk (surprise!) and the last of the living quarters was the Cavaliers' Room, also known as the Crimson Room, with crimson silk wallcovering, Chippendale furniture, and blue and white tile stove.

The rest of the rooms we saw (the far side of the Palace from the Grand Cascade) were done in the style of various Emperors and Empresses of Russia: Nicolas I, Catherine III, Elizabeth, Peter the Great, the Crown Room, and Peter the Great's Study (paneled entirely in carved oak). Unlike the living quarters, which were furnished as they were when they were in use, these are more "set pieces" for a museum, collecting furniture from the period represented.

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The rooms in Petrodvorets were watched over by old women. I'm not sure how old they were, but they were certainly past what we would consider retirement age. It's possible they want to keep working so that they can be surrounded during the day at least by luxury and opulence. One of them saw me using my binoculars to see the ceiling better and thought I was trying to take a picture (not allowed). How do you say "binoculars" in Russian?

We did see more smiles from people in Petrodvorets than in Leningrad; I'm not sure why.

I mentioned that the "guards" and landscapers were women. We saw women working everywhere: driving streetcars, as Intourist guides (almost all are women), in the fields, on railroad construction crews.... Yet as in China, this "freedom" to work hasn't really brought equality. By all accounts in both countries, the vast majority of the housework is still done by women. Lena made a point of how half the local Soviet were women, but that doesn't really mean they're equal yet (second part is my comment, not hers). By the way, I didn't mention that we changed guides at St. Isaac's the first morning. Apparently Erik called and requested a new guide because of Olga's problems with English. Anyway, the move for equality for women seems to have given them the "freedom" to have a full-time job (actually more of an obligation, I suspect) without passing any domestic responsibilities to the men. This, I think, is considerably less true in the United States.

We left Petrodvorets and rode back to Leningrad by bus. There were other palaces along the way, but none you could really see well from the road. We also passed some summer cottages owned by people who live in Leningrad. These had gardens around then and seemed similar to the Danish "allocation plots" except that the land is still owned by the State rather than the individual.

When we returned to Leningrad we went to the Sadko Restaurant (CAWKO PESTAPAO) for lunch. We had appetizers (ham and some tehini-like mixture, along with tomatoes and cucumbers), something that was either thick cream of mushroom soup or hot salad dressing (but good), borscht or red cabbage soup (another disagreement), and spicy beef stew served in a pottery crock. There was also something like cheese danish for dessert and Pepsi and mineral water to drink with the meal, coffee or tea after. But just as the tea arrived, Erik said if we rushed we could see the market across the street. We went under the Nevsky prospect through a walkway to get to the other side.

The market was a series of indoor stalls--something like a cross between an indoor flea market and a mall. Most of the shops seemed to be selling shoes, though that was probably just concentrated in the section we saw, since the display windows outside had a variety of products. We had only about 5 minutes

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before we had to go back, but it was interesting to see.

On the way back we noticed a soda vending machine. These have regular glasses. After you deposit your money, you press one button to get water to rinse a glass out with, then another button to get your soda. This obviously wastes less in the way of paper cups, aluminum cans, and glass bottles than our own system. For the record, I drank the water in Leningrad and suffered no ill effects. Of course, I didn't try the soda machines which seem like a great way to catch something.

We got back to the bus and rushed off to the Hermitage. This art museum ranks with the Louvre, the Prado, or the Met. Unfortunately, we had only two hours. We began with the European art. There are 141 rooms of Western European art. I don't *think* we went through all of them (though my feet might disagree) but we saw Italian art (including two Da Vincis, two Raphaels, and eight Titians), Spanish art (including an El Greco), and Dutch art (including several Rembrandts). I can't remember the names of the paintings we saw, but most were religious in subject. There was one of St. Augustine, and another of Danae and the Golden Rain, which our guide described as being from the Bible. I think that the education they give the guides may be a little incomplete and the guides figure that any silly story depicted is from the Bible. St. Augustine at least comes from the same "mythology," though a couple of hundred years later. Danae isn't even close, being from Greek mythology. I don't think we saw any English paintings but I may have forgotten. We did see some French art, including some Limoges china.

After all of this we went upstairs to the Impressionist galleries--Monet, Seurat, Picasso, Matisse (including the famous circle of dancers), Van Gogh, Rousseau,.... I can't remember them all. We saw the Throne Room, containing Alexander Nevsky's Tomb (though he's actually buried elsewhere) and much, much more. (Go find a guidebook in the library if my memory isn't sufficient.) We took a quick look at a Goya on loan from the National Gallery in Washington DC (a Hermitage collection is touring the United States) and walked through the antiquities section (there were Roman and Egyptian statues, but I don't know if they were original or just done in that style at a later time). Then back to the bus, exhausted.

While walking through the Hermitage, I fell behind the group at one point and a boy in his late teens came up to me. "Pens?" he said. I shook my head no, because I needed them to write this. He followed along and tried again. "Chewing gum?" This I had so I pulled out a pack and gave it to him and he gave me a small pin in exchange. These pins are quite popular. They are usually about thumbnail-sized and enameled, showing a building, a person, or a scene, and the name of the town or whatever. They are very popular

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in China also, with the Chinese as well as with the foreign tourists. This was the extent of my black-market dealings.

No time to rest, though. Back to the hotel at 5:15 PM, we had to be at dinner at 6 and at the bus at 6:45 for our folklore show. Dinner started with pickled herring. It was very good, but most people were already thirsty and we had five Pepsis for nine people. This was typical--you could buy soda, beer, or mineral water at the bar, so they provide the minimum to maximize sales. Since many people didn't want the herring, I didn't feel guilty having two. There was also cole slaw. The main course was a piece of beef in gravy surrounded by whipped potatoes, then baked. The potatoes and gravy were good, but the steak was very tough. Dessert was some sort of cookie. (Oh, of course there was bread and butter. The dark bread has a sour taste and is very good.) WE had to gulp our coffee to make the bus in time for the show.

The folk show was at the Dvorets Molodezhi, about 25 minutes away. There was much less traffic and we didn't have any problem in getting there by 7:30 PM (show time). The show was of Georgian folk music (songs and dances) done in traditional costume. Unlike in Peru, this was professional-level entertainment. I can't describe most of the dances, but there were a couple that were notable. The last dance before the intermission was a re-creation of a sword battle. Dancers with shields and short swords "fenced" (for lack of a better word) with each other. When their swords met, sparks would fly off, making this a very dramatic and energetic performance.

The intermission was also different. There was a stand selling Pepsis (at one ruble, or $1.40 each--but only rubles, not hard currency) but also little squares of dark bread with butter and caviar, and some small pastries. No Snickers bars here!

Next to us in the theater was a Swedish group. Their tour leader was a student from Uppsala. We talked about how much older everything is in Europe. He said that Leningrad, being only 300 years old, was a young city. He also said that in the United States we put in museums things that people in Europe would have in their homes. (His example was his bicycle!)

The final dance was also dramatic, with leaping and twirling and flinging knives into the stage. Whenever someone landed on the stage after a leap, the boards seemed to sag about three inches. This, combined with the flinging of the knives into the boards, means they probably need to replace the boards fairly frequently.

July 3, 1986: We left the hotel at 9;30 AM and got to the train station at 10 for our 11:00 AM train. So we walked around for a half hour, took a few last pictures, and then proceeded to our track. When we got on the train we had to load our own luggage. At least our window opened this time.

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The trip back was about the same up to Viborg (the last stop in the USSR). The Soviet border guards had already come through and collected our passports, but we could get out and walk around. Those who had rubles left had to change them here, resulting in lines and confusion. There were pigeons flying through the inside of the station and one girl was able to get them to eat from her hand. We collected some propaganda from the rack and got back on the train.

After we left Viborg, we made another stop just before the border, where they returned our passports (without stamping them), checked for unauthorized passengers in the ceiling (they even removed the ceiling panel in one compartment), and then let us go on. They didn't do any customs checking other than asking if we had any antiques or icons. One theory was that they intimidate you so much when you come in that you're too afraid to try anything illegal. The other was that we hadn't spent enough (based on our currency declarations) to warrant checking. But the first theory also explains why they trusts what you claim on your declaration.

Every time the Soviet guards finished in a compartment, they would go into the passageway, come to attention, salute us, and then close the compartment door. So when we crossed the border into Finland the door was closed and I snuck a couple of pictures of the barbed wire (it is, of course, forbidden to photograph anywhere near the border).

To say we were all happy to be out of the Soviet Union and into Finland would be an understatement. I think at this point we probably appreciated the Statue of Liberty celebrations more than 90% of the people who were going to be at the Statue. As we had heard, traveling in the Soviet Union isn't fun, but it is educational.

The man from Finnish passport control was quite a contrast. First of all, his uniform was less intimidating--blue pants, white short-sleeved shirt, and cap rather than the formal dark green Soviet uniforms. And he smiled, said hello, and said he was from Finnish passport control--no doubt on purpose to inform people that yes, they were indeed out.

I could spend many pages discussing life in the Soviet Union versus life in the United States, but I won't. (What a relief, right?) I will say why I think the Chinese are so friendly and the Russians not. The Chinese see their current conditions (one family, one child and so forth) as temporary. They expect a gradual swing towards a freer lifestyle. They may be right. In some ways they are freer than the Russians; in some ways not. The Russians, on the other hand, realize their lifestyle isn't going to change in the forseeable future and this, I believe, has a very depressing effect.

By the way, I realize that "Russia" is only a part of the Soviet Union, but it is the part we visited, so my use of the term is not entirely incorrect.

Other travelogues around Russia are avialable from the Rec.Travel Library -- Europe/Russia.

If you need more information please go to Impressions of Russia and the Former USSR. If you would like to see more pictures, please go back to All Regions of Russia by Pictures.