No one had heard of this Richard Caring, but the invitation piqued everyone’s curiosity: a giant Russian matryoshka doll, inside of which was a bottle of vodka and an invitation to fly by private jet to St. Petersburg. It asked for measurements, which meant only one thing: a fancy-dress party!—something rich Brits can’t resist. En [...]

Well, something good has to come out of this financial crisis, right?
From the department of silver linings comes this item from Russia: because of the financial crisis, plans for a controversial skyscraper that would have towered over St. Petersburg’s low-slung Baroque skyline have been delayed and — preservationists, architects and many residents fervently hope — [...]

We had a good weekend in St. Pete.  Took the midnight train and arrived Saturday morning.  We stayed at the Herzen student dormitory and it was really nice…good rooms and the location was perfect – right behind Kazaan Cathedral on Nevsky Prospekt.  Since we only had two days there we tried to hit all the [...]

Today was my last day of class, yay!  We are leaving for St. Petersburg tonight.  Our train leaves at around 1am.  We are returning back to Moscow on Monday morning.  Should be fun, although 2 days is not enough time for a city like St. Pete.