St. Petersburg, Russia - After a hard period of culture shock, I think I've reached Stage 2. Understanding. This was initiated by a few things, including a boat trip, bridge rising, sushi eating, live theatre, and a beer factory visit, as well as a deeper appreciation for hot water and clean hair! I'll start with the cleanliness issue first. So we haven't had hot water for about 2 weeks now, and I can tell you it's really made me appreciate water heaters. R...

St. Petersburg, Russia - Day #1 of "Russian Business" Conference, and there are a number of Finns, Austrians, Germans and Americans. We went for a quick coffee and pastry, then to a welcoming session - finally! A proper welcome to Russia! I was so very excited to see the mix of people at the conference is academic and business-minded, as well as a very interesting panel. I very much look forward to the rest of the conference. After seeing the intinerary, it seems...

St. Petersburg, Russia - Went to the Hermitage yesterday, and to my surprise I saw some DePaul U. students! Half way around the world and I'm attracted to DePaul like a magnet! Well, low-and-behold we had to part ways (they paid big money to get a study abroad trip, I'm just bummin' it). I also had a meeting with the Executive Director of AmCham Russia, which was very interesting and extremely informative. Much construction is going on in St. Petersburg prep...

[Sunny] St. Petersburg, Russia - It's sultry here in Sunny St. Petersburg. There isn't much humidity, so it's not too bad. Had some good salads since I've been here, an eggplant and carrot salad, a spicy carrot salad, a tuna a peppar salad (filled with vegetable oil and then refrigerated - that one wasn't so nice). I also tried the local veggies at the store, I got so excited that one store took my visa card that I bought about $15 worth of veggies. It felt nice ...

St. Petersburg, Russia - Had quite a scare with the bank. A wonderful grad student picked me up from the bus (Tallinn- St. Petersburg). Luckily, the busy was safe (no seatbelts) and clean and healthy. The good news - there was a one hour change (ahead), which made the bus trip only 7 hours. The bad news - the child who sat next to me had some sort of whooping cough. The poor kid coughed every minute, on the minute, for 2 hours. And the border patrol made every si...