Russia on a Whim

When I received my acceptance letter for the Irish American Scholars program for a semester of study in Northern Ireland, never did I expect to have to opportunity to travel through Europe for 2 months—let alone visit the country of Russia. As we were taking a break in our hostel, my friend Miles paged through a leaflet on Helsinki tourism and after a few moments he said excitedly: “we can go to Russia!” After a little research, we discovered that it was in fact true—you are legally allowed to be in the country for less than 72 hours without applying for a visa. The next evening—we boarded a ferry destined for Saint Petersburg, Russia.

As we arrived at the port in the early morning—all that could be seen of the city were the massive constructivist apartment buildings towering all around the port. They were blank, concrete towers—all built exactly the same and lined up in rows as far as the eye could see. The architecture was typical of the socialist era—I recall seeing the same type of buildings in Bulgaria while on the King’s Short-Term Study Abroad program through Bulgaria and Turkey. Once past the “wall” of concrete buildings—the city of Saint Petersburg was surprisingly Western. The architecture featured in the city was quite beautiful and the city had much to see.

We went to the Hermitage, which is the biggest art museum in the world—bigger than the Louvre in Paris. The Hermitage actually has over three million pieces, but only displays 5% at a time. We spent hours there and I even recognized some paintings such as “Woman holding a Fruit” by Paul Gaugain, which I had originally learned about in Dr. Scarboro’s Honors Modern and Contemporary History class in my first year at King’s. The Hermitage was beautiful and enormous on the outside and is known as “The Winter Palace,” featuring a baroque architectural design.

Aside from the Hermitage, I also enjoyed visiting the Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood, so –named because it is built over the site where the Russian Tsar, Alexander II, was murdered. The church was, in my opinion, the most unique building in the city—with both Baroque and Neoclassical elements. The church contains over 7500 square meters of mosaics, more than any other church in the world. It took over 27 years to restore the church to its current state because during World War II, it was used as both a morgue and a vegetable warehouse.

We also learned about the Siege of Leningrad, and about how over a million civilians died there in Saint Petersburg. The city now bears little visible scars from the attacks, and was overall a great place to visit. We were very fortunate to have to opportunity to get this taste of Russia and to really see how Westernization and Globalization has even reached as far as Russia. Not everyone speaks English there and sometimes getting around with street names in only the Russian Alphabet was a struggle-but the experience was well worth it.

My next stop is the country of Estonia, the last place that I will visit before making my way home.

Cheers!

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