This is honestly my first chance to write since we landed in Russia. Right now, we’re back on a plane, headed to the city of Murmansk. We are one of the few groups traveling by plane within the FSU, and as I look around this Russian-made airplane, I just keep reminding myself that the Russians were indeed the first ones to put a man in space.

So far, the trip has been amazing. It started out with a bit of a hiccup, however. Upon landing in St. Petersburg, we discovered that our luggage hadn’t made our very short connection in Vienna. Of course, we discovered all this before clearing customs, and thus before we met up with our translator, Zina. Somehow, we managed to file our paperwork, with promises from the airport that our bags would be on a flight from Frankfurt that was landing at 11pm.

Despite the best efforts of various people in St. Petersburg, our luggage didn’t actually get to the hotel until the noon the next day. So, we ate dinner, took a brief walking tour with Zina, had dessert, and met with the Rabbi in St. Petersburg, Michael, before going to bed wearing the same clothes we had put on that morning at 2am.

Of course, we also wore the same clothes when we woke up the next day and went on a guided driving tour of the city. St. Petersburg looks like a mixture of Paris, what I imagine Venice to be, and Texas, with some Caribbean color thrown in for good measure. Everything is ornate. Buildings are often a mish-mash of architectural styles, punctuated with beautiful statues everywhere. The city is actually a collection of islands, blended together almost seamlessly by a series of bridges. Everything is huge. We’re talking absolutely enormous, and thus the allusion to Texas. Standing in the Palace Square, on feels absolutely dwarfed by the immensity of the Hermitage and the General Staff building, not to mention the square itself, which is at least a good 300-400 yards across. Everything in the town is built to impress with its size, it’s grandeur, and it’s beauty.

After briefly seeing the sights, we finally claimed our luggage and changed into something, if not more comfortable, at least clean. Our first real job as part of the Pesach Project was to visit an international school that has a Hebrew/Jewish track (they also have a French track). There, we were asked to lead “seders” for two groups of high schoolers. We planned to lead a significantly shortened seder, and then engage them in a debate/discussion on the text of Exodus in the Torah.

Upon arriving at the school we were introduced to Mira, a Hebrew teacher who spoke only Hebrew (obviously) and Russian, no English. We also met Zana (the first syllable of her name is pronounced like the French name Jacques), the director for the FSU of Netzer Olami (the international version of the NFTY youth group). Then we met the kids. The first group was as obnoxious and frustrating as any group of American teenagers. We fought through our program with them and then collapsed in chairs afterwards while receiving repeated assurances from everyone that the second group would be much better. The second, and older, group was indeed much better, and we were able to communicate with many of them in Hebrew, which they had learned at the school.

Once we were done at the school, we were to meet Michael (the rabbi) for a quick meal to review plans for the community seder that night. The issue we faced, however, was getting from the school to the restaurant. In St. Petersburg, regular taxis are very expensive and not very prevalent. So it is common to stand on a street and flag down regular citizens, negotiate a price, and have them take you where you’re going. So, with Zina’s help, this is exactly what we did.

As a farewell to chametz (bread products forbidden during Pasover), Michael suggested we meet over sushi. Never could I imagine that I would travel to Russia to eat sushi, but given the dearth of good sushi in Jerusalem, we were thrilled by the idea

A few dozen sushi rolls later, we left for the location of the community seder. The various non-religious Jewish organizations in St. Petersburg (i.e., not Chabad or the Reform synagogue) had recently opened a joint location modeled after the stateside JCC. As we were expecting nearly 80 people (about 50 more than the congregation’s regular space can hold), a room was rented at this facility for the seder. The seder itself was a lovely affair, with lots of singing, laughing, and Russian. We provided some entertainment in the form of a skit on the Exodus story and visual aids for the plagues. After the seder, we ventured out on our own to find some dessert and then crashed. Hard.

This morning, we packed up our stuff and went to the synagogue for services. Afterwards, Michael and his wife had us for lunch. After a traditional Russian meal, we had just enough time for some souvenir shopping before heading to the airport to catch our flight.

The good news is, we’ve landed. The bad news: 5 foot snowdrifts on all sides of the runway. This should be interesting…