St Petersburg, Part 1

Two days after my arrival in the homeland, my Mom and I took off on an overnight train to the great city of St Petersburg where my brother leaves. The last time I was in St Pete was when I was twelve years old. I remember not knowing much about history, art, or architecture, but still being fascinated by the city and the friendly people who inhabit it. This time, I was coming to explore it with a greater appreciation and knowledge of history, so I was very excited to look at the city with "new eyes."

Even though it was a loooong sleepless trip on the train, my brother, being the great tour guide that he is, took us on a tour of the a beautiful garden estate that used to belong to the Russian tsars---it was their "summer" residence. Besides the absolutely gorgeous and very tranquil grounds and gardens, it is also the site of a unique palace with the famous Amber Room---a room made entirely of amber, which was stolen by the Nazis during their siege of St Petersburg (the estate is about 40 min outside the city). The entire room has never been recovered, and its whereabouts remain unknown. However, several pieces were found and brought back to the palace, and the room was restored to look identical with the original pieces incorporated into it.

Here are some pics to capture the day:



After a delicious sushi dinner, we hung out until about 1am and then embarked on a night tour of the city. Since it is located on a navigable river, its bridges gets drawn up every night beginning at 1am, one by one. It was very crowded on the embankment, but the "bridge show" was quite incredible.

London, Day 2 (July 20th)

I actually got to sleep in a bit and after having delicious pancakes for breakfast, we went for a walk in the Kensington Gardens, enjoying a leisurely morning stroll around Kensington Palace and its beautiful grounds. After the walk, I took the Tube to another part of London to complete my “walking tour” of the city. I first went to see St Paul’s Cathedral, which is a magnificent structure that sits on top of a hill. I have always wanted to see this landmark, but when I tried to remember some interesting facts about it from highschool, I could only recollect the name of the architect (Sir Christopher Wrenn).
My next destination was the Tower of London and Tower Bridge. To get there, I walked along the Thames so I was able to see the majestic Tower Bridge from afar. I took about thirty pictures of the bridge from every distance, and I think Im developing a serious bridge obsession (judging from another twenty or so pictures of the Golden Gate bridge I took this past weekend). .
The Tower of London itself turned out to be more than I had expected. Even though I had only a few hours to explore, I managed to see lots of various parts of this historic structure. I first took a tour of the grounds given by a real Yeoman Warder (aka Beefeater---ceremonial guard of the Tower), which provided a lot of interesting background. Apparently, the Tower used to be a fortress, a seat of the monarchy at one time, and, of course, a prison for many famous people, accused of various crimes, including religious disagreements with the mainstream church.

After the tour, I went to see the most famous attraction of the Tower---the Crown Jewels. They were absolutely breathtaking, and each crown (there are several for various occasions) has an interesting story behind it. After the Crown Room, I only had about thirty minutes to see the rest of the exhibitions. Even though it was clearly not enough, I did manage to visit some of the buildings: a prison chamber with writings from its former inhabitants, the museum telling the story of some of the diamonds, and some other chambers that were set up as the living quarters of the pastOverall, I was very satisfied with my 40 hours in London: catching up with a friend, seeing most of the famous landmarks, and getting a feel for this city. The next morning I took the Tube to Heathrow (so convenient) and was off to Russia for a 3-week long vacation.

London, Day 1 (July 19)

This is a few months late, but better late than never, right…
The day after I got my very improbable best paper award at the conference, I departed the quiet city of Cheltenham for London where I was prepared to see as much as I can in the span of two days. It has always been a dream to see this great city since I have read and studied so much about it while learning English in school in Russia. After battling the stairs at metro stations again with my two suitcases (with the help of some polite Londoners), I arrived at the apartment of one of my friends who used to live in DC and now lives in London with her husband. After some quick catching up, I embarked on my grand tour of London. My first stop was the Westminster Abbey and the surrounding area. Even though I have pictured that area in my mind so many times before, I never realized how truly grand it is. Right after getting off the Tube (the metro), I saw the magnificent Houses of Parliament and the Big Ben, one of my new favorite sites ever! The whole building was exquisitely made of brown stone with lace-like carvings all over. And Big Ben…what a sight!


The Westminster Abbey was another beautiful building, but its real beauty awaited inside. It wasn’t grand as many Catholic churches are, but it had soooo much history woven into its walls and floors that made it up for the lack of opulence that I have seen in other places. Most of the British monarchy throughout the centuries was buried there, including some more known figures such as Henry VIII, Mary Queen of Scots, Elizabeth I. In the Poet’s Corner, there are a number of famous British writers and poets either buried or commemorated (Charles Dickens, Jane Austen, John Keats, and many others).

After a nice tour of the Abbey, I walked over to the Trafalgar Square to see the famous statues of Admiral Nelson. Unfortunately, there was a rally going on the square, so I wasn’t able to take really good pictures of it (I did get to use the restroom in the National Galleries of Arts building). After some map reading and people-bugging (for directions), I found myself at Picadilly Circus, walked around some busier shopping streets, and finally found a quiet park near St. James Palace, which turned out to be the actual residence of the British monarchy (where Prince Charles lives now). There was some kind of a royal wedding going on, so I made friends with one of the paparazzis to find out who was getting married: it turned out to be the younger sister of Princess Helen (I’m not making this up), and Kate Middleton, Prince William’s girlfriend, was supposed to be in attendance. After this exciting brush with the nobles, I walked down to Buckingham Palace, walked around the square in front of it, and then down one of the numerous London parks in search of my last stop of the day, Harrod’s.

On the way down there, I saw a nice monument to Wellington and walked alongside Hyde Park. Harrod’s turned out to be really pretty inside, but too busy to really enjoy any of the sights. I did buy some tea and had some tea at the café in the food section of the store. Upon the return to my friend’s place (which happens to be right next to a beautiful Anglican church), we had a delicious home-cooked dinner in the garden by their apartment and did lots of catching up.

And the blog lives...

Even though I have taken a long blogging sabbatical, I am determined to catch up on the rest of the England trip, my time and travels in Russia, and my recent trip to California. Now that baseball season is almost over, I have time again to blog...

Stanger things have happened...

So, today started with me deciding to ditch the morning sessions of the conference and instead walking some more around Cheltenham since this is my last day in this town. I went around various streets, peaked into a few shops (Marks & Spencer's), visited the local museum (where I learned some interesting things about an Antarctic exploration that ended tragically), and perfectly played the part of the Japanese tourist in Disneyland by snapping a thousand pictures of the beautiful surroundings full of flowers and gothic structures.

I showed up at the conference around lunchtime right in time to have a delicious fruit tarte for dessert (I simply had to mention it because these fruit tartes just happen to be my absolutely favorite dessert and always bring a smile to my face). After sitting through some final discussions (and I wouldn't be able to tell you what they were really about since my brain simply stopped taking in any new research information), we moved on to the closing session of the conference. After the usual round of "thank you" speeches, the organizers began passing out a few awards for best presentations and best papers. I really cannot describe my utter surprised when I heard my name being called for the best paper award (one of three)!!! I was beyond shocked since this paper is definitely not my strongest one by far (and it took me two months to write it). In any case, this was a very nice honor, which also came with a nice monetary reward---woohoo! After a relaxing Thai dinner with a few new friends, I'm now attempting to pack. Off to London tomorrow!

One of Cheltenham's parks

Another one of the old churches in Cheltenham

South Wales

A field trip is a normal part of most research conferences, and this one was no exception. There were many choices, but I decided to go to Gower Peninsula in South Wales to discover another part of the UK. My choice proved to be the right one. I LOVED Gower and the Welsh people. It took us about 3 hours to get there with part of the way taking us on some windy narrow roads that reminded me of the roads in the Andes. All along the way, we saw green pastures with sheep, cows, and horses happily grazing on the rich grasses. They all looked so content that I just wanted to run out and pet them:)
We got to the beautiful Gower peninsula and had a chance to take in the incredibly picturesque and somber Worm Head island. Even though it was quite cloudy and windy, the view of the Atlantic, the green grassy hills, and the sandy beach was breathtaking. We had the leaders of the Gower Commons Association share about their activities and how they manage their land. It is amazing how much pride they take in the commons on which they graze their sheep, cattle, and horse just as their ancestors had done for several centuries. Unfortunately, the younger people are leaving for urban areas since farming is not profitable anymore.
We had lunch outside on one of the commons called Cefn Bryn (pronounced “Kevin brin”) and walked around it taking it the view from the top of the hill and even encountering some stones and rocks, which were the remains of an ancient burial ground (of the same type as the Stonehendge). After lunch we drove to an area where the members of the association demonstrated how they deal with bracken (a fern-like weed that prevents heathgrasses and other beneficial vegetation from growing) and even learned how to make organic compost.
Overall, I must say that so far the Welsh are the friendliest and most kind-hearted (and funny) people I have met here. They speak fast with their own cute accent, have delicious foods (oh, the tasty Welsh cakes), and are proud owners of some of the most beautiful sights on the island. It was interesting to see that most road and street signs were in both English and Welsh, the ancient language of Wales originating from the Celtic language. It was a truly enjoyable trip, and we once again got to see the cute sheep laying or frolicking around in the green pastures along the way.

Beautiful Gower Peninsula with Worm Head island in the background
Views of South Wales

Conference

The conference is winding down, and it has been very interesting. My boss is actually the president of the association that organized the conference. There are about 400 people from all over the world working on issues of common property resources such as forests, grazing lands, fisheries, etc. We had a senior UNEP official give a speech during lunch one day, which was pretty fascinating. On Wednesday night, we had a conference dinner in the town hall---it was really splendid inside, as was the meal. I gave my presentation on Wednesday afternoon as part of the panel of 2 other researchers from the workshop I attended in Kenya: it went well, and even though we didn’t draw that many people, we had an excellent informal discussion after all the presentations, which will help me strengthen my paper.