Our second day in St Petersburg and this time we knew our commute into the city. Incredibly it was the same conductress on the bus as the day before, she recognised us and made sure we got off at the right stop. We really warmed to these conductress ladies. Each one is definitely in charge of the bus. If a woman gets on and there are no seats available a young man will receive a sharp tap on the shoulder and they are very obedient and vacate their seat straight away. The passengers are also very polite on the metro. Seats are vacated for children as well as older men and women. I tried to give up my seat to an elderly lady but she just said 'Sit' to me. I wonder if this was because I am a tourist as she did accept a seat further up the carriage from a Russian, younger than herself. In a kiosk at the bottom of each escalator to the metro is a small booth with a uniformed member of staff inside, wearing a bright red Thunderbirds style cap. Each one, we only ever saw females, would just look at a computer screen and we wondered how anyone could tolerate the boredom. As our train approached a station an order was given in Russian and everyone got off the train in a very obedient, orderly fashion. No one said anything but a few exchanged glances. Thunderbirds meant go for the lady in the kiosk. She shot out, sprinted to the train and checked each carriage very carefully. It must have been some sort of security scare or practice. When she had finished the empty train just trundled away from the platform. One more bit on the metro, if you ever visit St Petersburg, the stations are lovely on the red line, including chanedeliers.
Our first stop this morning was the The Church of Our Savior on the Spilled Blood. Another church that was more of a museum. This was beautiful inside and it's coloured spiral shaped onion domes looked like they were made out plastic and are the same colour as seaside rock. They're actually ceramic and in a spiral shape so that snow can't settle on the domes. That shape is also meant to represent the flame of a candle.
We spent some time in another 'real' church nearby where people were queueing up to be blessed. From there we visited the museum comemorating the siege of Lenningrad, a sad and moving experience. People were so hungry they were living off items such as boiled leather belts.
We met Jon and Linda in the evening for a curry near St Isaacs Cathedral.
Our first stop this morning was the The Church of Our Savior on the Spilled Blood. Another church that was more of a museum. This was beautiful inside and it's coloured spiral shaped onion domes looked like they were made out plastic and are the same colour as seaside rock. They're actually ceramic and in a spiral shape so that snow can't settle on the domes. That shape is also meant to represent the flame of a candle.
We spent some time in another 'real' church nearby where people were queueing up to be blessed. From there we visited the museum comemorating the siege of Lenningrad, a sad and moving experience. People were so hungry they were living off items such as boiled leather belts.
We met Jon and Linda in the evening for a curry near St Isaacs Cathedral.
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