Peter gets even hotter???

So last time I blogged, I thought that Peter couldn't get any hotter - but this week I was proven very, very wrong. Just today, I read on BBC that this has been one of the most treacherously hot summers in Russian history - not exaggerating even in the slightest - over 200 Russians have apparently already died this year from drowning. Its suspected that they've all been drinking vodka and then going for a dip to cool off. And it wouldn't even be so bad, if they just had AC here. I lived through Peter's coldest winter and its hottest summer - it's been a year of extremes.

Anyhow, besides dealing with the face melting Russian heat, it's been a splendid week. Last Friday I ended up having an unexpectedly fun-filled night. In the beginning, it seemed that no one was in the mood to do anything, but at 10:15 I finally found one other soldier to meet up and join with me on this Friday night of debauchery. We decided to go to Fidel's, the bar/dancing pit that always saves the night when all our options have run out. For about an hour my friend and I just had beers and talked as we waited for our other friend to join us. Just before she arrived, I got acquainted with a Russian who began talking with me by questioning me about the typical demographics of the bar on Friday nights. After about a sentence of my chaotic russian response, he realized that I was a foreigner and asked where I was from. We then continued to talk for another hour until my friends, along with my friend's Russian tutor & Russian friends, decided to move to another new club down the street. My new Russian friend came along with us and there taught me how to take a vodka shot like a proper Russian (apparently you have to exhale before you imbibe...). After the others had danced to their satisfaction, our group, led by the Russians, migrated over to the 24 hour produkti (oh how i will miss you.) to purchase 2 bottles of champagne, rum, coke and plastic cups for our canal party. We then sat along the canal until morning until one of my friends started feeling a little less than healthy. My Russian friend and I got her home in a cab and everything turned out alright. I ended up returning to my apartment at 5:30, but when I got to my door, I found out that my host parents had accidentally locked me out from the inside (I had left so late the night the before, I don't even think they realized that I had been out). I rang the doorbell at 6 o clock and still noone answered. Thus, I walked to the grocery store, bought a bubliki (kind of similar to a Russian bagel), walked around the park and then returned to my apartment around 6:30. I slept on the windowsill in the stairwell until 7:30 and then rang the doorbell again. This time however, my host mother came to the door, obviously surprised that I had been out. I then slept until 11 or so, then got up and met my friend Grace at Krestovskiy Ostrov, where my tutor had taken me earlier in the week. We rented bikes there and enjoyed the scenery - the bikes were a little expensive, but I'm totally glad that we did it - I had forgotten how nice it felt. The next day a small group of us went back to the Gulf of Finland to tan and swim for the day. And thus passed yet another unforgettable weekend in Peter.

The rest of the week was pretty normal. On Wednesday we had our excursion to the Baltika Brewery, in which we get to attend a taste testing of all their beers at the end of the tour. A small group had planned to go to the banya afterwards, but I decided not to go because I had a presentation due the next day (today) that I hadn't started yet. Instead a small group of us bought beer and Jaguars and drank under a tree in the Field of Mars for an hour or so. Today after class I went and walked around Aleksandrovskiy Sad for a little while before going home and saw three wedding parties all in the same area. After I got home and had talked with my mom on skype, I sat with my host father for probably a good couple of hours just talking about languages, education, and life. He made me salami and cheese roll and I swear the cheese tasted exactly like the string cheese that I used to eat everyday in elementary school - soo good :) I also finally found out that he is an engineer that makes ships and he actually manages about 100 workers. But right now he is on vacation until the end of the month (which I also didn't know. ). Lastly I found out that my littlest host sister is going to come back home soon! Looks like my days of candyland playing shall return once again!