Saint Petersburg - The END of my trip to Russia

I just decided to put on some random pictures to finish up the last week and a half of my trip. LOL. Lots to cover in one post but I figured it's the only way it will get done. So here is our trip to Saint Petersburg and then some more from being back in Moscow.

This is on Christmas Day in Russia. We went to a museum on Napolean. The invader who tried to conquer Europe. He was actually stopped in Moscow. It was an awesome museum and since it was Christmas we got to see a special live performance that was broadcasted on TV. It was a reinactment. I enjoyed it even though I didn't understand what they were saying.
The inside of the museum is a dome and all the way around the dome is a painting of the war. It was INCREDIBLE!!!!!

Some Russian police officer's that I met... very nice! ;^)

When I saw this sign, I knew I had been in Russia too long because I was beginning to understand and be able to read Russian.

Hard Rock Cafe Moscow. Where is this place not!?

We went to a chocolate factory!

Inside yet another AMAZING palace. This one was COMPLETELY covered in gold. Seriously. Real gold too was what they initially used.

Don't you worry about this ice melting - it's cold enough there that ice sculptures stay frozen day in and day out.

This is a masque

Saint Peter (the first King's) home - I really grew to admire him & his life.

This boat set off the bomb that began the revolutionary war. Well it let people know that there was a war. This was the war that killed Anastasia's father, the king and her whole family. Which is a sad story since he was a good king.

Another palace - It was built for Saint Peter's daughter and holy amazing! SO DETAILED!!! Not even to mention huge! It took over 4 hours to walk through - and we skipped the last half!

This was one of my favorite places in the palace. It was a hallway that was pained by Divinci I think. They had different rooms in the palace for various artisits: Michaelangelo, Raphael, Divinci, etc. THey were all pretty dang incredible. I never knew I could love art so much. At the top of each of these arches was painted 4 scenes from the bible. Each was different, in this picture you can see Adam & Eve being cast out of the garden.

This was my favorite place in St. Petersburg... It was the first museum in Russia and it was a collection of wierd things. Saint Peter loved learning and working with the townspeople. He would take classes and then work with them and make sure they were building or doing whatever correctly. He took an anatomy class in another country and began to really appreciate the human body. He came back to Russia and made it legal to disect human cadaver's for medical purposes. He also passed a law that all stillborn fetus's with birth defects be sent to him so he could prove they weren't monster's. It was incredible to look at all of these fetus's and to see the variety of birth defects that are out there. It was incredible and at the same time so sad. It again really made me appreciate the plan of happiness that we know about and have a better understanding of why things happen and the fact that these children's bodies will be perfect one day.

Russians don't drink cold water. It's all room temperature or heated up to make herbal tea. One morning I filled up my water bottle with water from the kettle. We left the apartment around 10:30 AM and by the time this picture was taken at 2:30, the water in my bottle had turned to ice! Yikes, it must've been cold walking around St. Petersburg but I didn't notice at all.

The Savior on the Blood Cathedral in St. Petersburg ... INCREDIBLE!!!!!!!!!!!

Every part of these cathedral is covered with these amazing mosaic pictures of events from the bible. I loved loved loved loved it! The time that it must have taken to do this is something else. It was beautiful!!!!

Oh yea... can't forget this. After the train ride to St. Petersburg I had to use the bathroom. I paid about 1 American dollar to use this bathroom. I walked in and I thought, SHOOT this is a shower not a toilet. But then realized every stall looked like this. So I walked in. It's kinda like an outhouse, not a real toilet. But it is on the ground. I figured out the best way to do my business and then realized there was no toilet paper in there. Apparently you have to get that out by the lady you pay. So I left and then came back with toilet paper. THEN i decided I needed a picture of this toilet and as I took it, in fell my camera case. BLAH!!!!! That was not a good experience!

Sweet Shots Photography Giveaway

I have a friend who takes pictures that are AMAZING!!!!!!!!!!!!!! You should all head on over to her photo blog to enter in for a totally cool FREE session giveaway! everybody loves something for free!!!! http://www.sweetshotsphoto.blogspot.com/

CHECK IT OUT!!!! FOR REAL! I know you will love her pictures as much as I and everyone else does!

New Year's in Moscow

Sorry that I am so slow at posting --- things are crazy as always with school and work and life in general lol. But I will be having lots of posts coming up if I can stay on top of it all. So... To Celebrate the New Year in Moscow, this is how we began!

*************************************************************************************

Sister Tatiana Ignatova and me. (A companion from my mission - from Omsk, Russia)

The next few pictures are from a Exhibition Center we went spent most of the day at! There were tons of amazing buildings and exhibitions that we went to! I loved it! The pictures don't really do them justice, like everything - they were just so neat!



We went to a museum where you got to try on clothes from different parts of Russia throughout different times in history. LOL. That was lots of fun! :^D

We also went to a shark exhibition which was neat. I liked this fish below.

This was a dinosaur exhibition - I loved how they spelled Dinosaur. Without actually being able to read Russian, I knew what it said.

We saw a few more things before going to celebrate the New Year. We spent New Year's Eve with a few of Tonya's friends from church. It was a small gathering but it was lots of fun. Thankfully a lot of them spoke English. In Russia they all eat Mandarin Oranges for New Year's... I guess it's a big thing. It surely looked like it from the people going crazy at the grocery store. HAPPY 2009!!!!!!!!!!!!