One of the photos attached is of me and the Director of touring for the Bolshoi Ballet, Elena Perfilova. The dancers were marvelous, especially the lead, but the set and costumes left us a bit cold.
And, on a funny note, It was Sponsor night at the Bolshoi, and the Sponsor was Samsung and the Bolshoi theatre was overrun with Koreans!!! Koreans speaking both Russian and Korean. So, when Tom and I arrived at the stage door, no one could figure out who we were - it turns out they thought we were there for Samsung. So the one time in Russia where there are too many Koreans! The CEO of Samsung Russia, a middle aged Korean man, came out and delivered a long and boring speech in Russian (Long and Boring to us perhaps because we couldn’t understand it).
We left the theater to board the midnight train to St. Petersburg.
Anyway, we are now fresh off the train from Moscow and are in St. Petersburg. Its incredible the difference between these two cities. As we drove away from the train station, it immediately came clear to us that this city was much cleaner, orderly and much less chaotic. Also, NO SNOW! Thank god!
Also, while Moscow seemed exotic as it was rare for us to find any english speakers or signs in english and very few, if any, tourists, St. Petersburg is filled with tourists and english speakers. Its actually a bit of a let down for Tom and me.
Lastly, the train ride was terrific. I actually did sleep for a few hours before we rolled into town and was served a hot breakfast of some unidentifiable meat patty with some french fries, all covered in gravy.... Yuck. The Grolsch helped it go down fairly quickly.
More from St. Petersburg later today or tomorrow.
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