St. Petersburg is so ridiculously cold. And the metro makes no sense. It feels like we have been really pressed for time here, so we haven't had much time for taking in the city. The Hermitage was amazing! And I'm not even a big fan of art museums. I also got to see a soyuz capsule from the Apollo-Soyuz mission. Now that the exam is over there is time to just relax before our final play tonight.
Last night we saw Man=Man by Brecht, which I thought was much better than Oedipus Rex that we saw the night before. I just thought Oedipus was full of too much pretentious symbolism, like the guy who was rolling around in a basket. Apparently he was Teiresias, but I could not tell. It also wasn't visually as interesting. The set had a lot of texture, but it was all tan, with occasional red. In contrast, Man=Man had a very visually interesting set. They used the entire huge stage to great effect. I loved the way they would light the stage, especially when they used the shadows on the walls. Like the one soldier whose shadow was caught in a light box in the wall. It was very cool. The live music was also very good, though it seemed to just come in at random times. It was nice that we got invited to move from bad seats in the second balcony to ones on the floor, so I could see this time without standing up. But apparently Russians do not believe in comfortable theater seats, so my back still hurt.
I hadn't read Man=Man, but from the synopsis we got, I felt I could follow along pretty well. I got the gist of where they were in the plot at least. In Oedipus I only knew where they were in the story twice, and I had read the play before.
All in all, Russia has been quite an experience. I am going to miss the blini stands, but not the sidewalks covered in ice. I will not miss the coat checks, scratchy toilet paper, squashing in the metro, and staring dumbly at every Russian who asks me a question. The Babushki, though, I will miss. I wish we could take some babushki back with us to always make us wear hats and button up our coats.
We'll be home soon!