The unexpected weekend, and nerves.

Weekends, I'm beginning to realize, never quite work out the way I've got them planned. The plan for this one, as you'll recall, was a trip to the City Bar for burgers and expats, and then some Russian practice with the one English speaker I know who's fluent in this crazy language.

What actually happened was this: Robin texted me about going to see the triumphal arch commemorating the victory over Napoleon then checking out a market. I was set on City Bar, so I suggested a City Bar/market compromise. On Saturday, we met at Chernyshevskaya metro station. Here things began to go awry. I was hoping to pick up a new umbrella while we were at the market, since mine is broken and not particularly good even if it weren't. I didn't figure it was going to rain, so I didn't take it. This was a mistake: It was raining when I got out of the metro station, and continued to rain on and off all day. I did what I could, which was basically to put on my hat, and we set off to find City Bar. It's right across from the American Consulate. (People inevitably ask if I've visited it. I haven't, and am not quite sure what I'd do there if I did. They've helped with a few emailed questions, though.) It was also closed, with no explanation. Did we just catch them on an off day? Were they closed for Thanksgiving? No telling.

With empty stomachs, we set off on what turned out to be a much longer hike to the market than I'd expected, and of course a much damper one than I'd hoped. (Not without the opportunity for a handful of pictures, and relatively pretty bits of Petersburg on the way, though.) When we finally got there--it turned out to be on Sadovaya; I've walked past it several times without particularly realizing it was there--it turned out to be rather like an indoor-outdoor less-spacious Russian Trader's World. Small stalls selling everything from clothing to cellphone accessories to locks to scooters lining a walkway no wider than my wingspan. (I'd guess it at about 5'.) The outdoor portion was a bit more spacious, but had much of the same. It also had an astonishing lack of cheap umbrellas. We thought we'd found one, but quickly discovered that the sign on the door that we couldn't translate meant something like "bulk sales only:" I couldn't buy just an umbrella; it was the whole box or nothing. Everywhere else, they tended towards being 500 rubles or so, or $17. If I could be fairly certain it was a good umbrella, I might be willing to spend that--but I can't, and most likely it'll just get left here anyway, since I've got my Gustbuster (only $30, incidentally) waiting at home. So, getting rather soaked and irritated, I called off the market expedition and we started heading for a Chinese restaurant that I knew of on Lermontov. It wasn't burgers, and it wasn't the best Chinese I've had. But it wasn't bad, and it had the peanuts I've been craving for a few weeks.

Sunday, the plan was to meet Peter and try to do some Russian practice. While I was waiting to head out, he sent me a text and suggested a slight change of plans: Zenit, St. Petersburg's football (soccer) team was playing, so we moved the time up an hour and headed for a pub to catch the game. As it happens, you cannot stick two English-speaking people in a pub in a foreign country and expect them to speak Russian to each other, because none was spoken. To be honest, I didn't particularly mind it: Things have been lonely here, as you might've noticed, and the chance to sit, drink beer, and shoot the breeze for an afternoon was nothing short of wonderful. The first pub was empty but for a trio of police watching the game and drinking what seemed to be tea. The beer on tap was a local, unfiltered brew and really quite delicious. Easy enough to drink that I put away… well, several. At some point during the game, the police wound up spread across two tables, and two of the three wound up sprawled out on those tables, out cold. The bartendress commented that she felt sorry for them and that they must be tired, or something along those lines. After the game finished up--2-1 Zenit--we went to the cafe next door; not that we particularly wanted to relocate, but the toilet was out of order at the first establishment. More beer and conversation ensued until we both decided it was time to stumble onto our respective trains and head home.

On the whole, not the weekend I was looking for, but not a bad weekend regardless.

Today I started the process of extending my visa, or perhaps only got started on starting that process. In short, I went to get my obligatory HIV test. I was dreading this a bit--it meant diving into an area where I have no vocabulary to speak of, and where I couldn't be certain that anyone would be particularly helpful. As it turned out, things were easier than I'd expected--after a bit of trouble finding the right place, I went in, paid, wound up in line behind only two people, and got it done with no trouble. The nurse/doctor/technician? who drew my blood spoke to me in a slightly odd mix of Russian and English--in particular, she kept saying 'please.' When I asked her where to pick up the results, she found it terribly amusing, and laughed all the way down the hallway and back. Not malicious, and it left me feeling a bit better--the little acts of kindness and generosity that I'm occasionally lucky enough to receive here mean far more than they might have back home.

The rest of the day found my mood slipping, however. Extending my visa has awakened a whole variety of worries to nip at me. First, extending my visa means having my passport out of my possession for several weeks. I've yet to have anyone ask to see my documents, and I presume that I'll get a spravka to explain the situation, along with photocopies. Nevertheless, I don't like being away from my passport. Plus, if I was to need to leave quickly in the interim, I'd need to track my passport down again--not an attractive prospect. Second, extending a visa is known to take a while. I was originally advised to do it at the beginning of December; the signs up in the school recommend at least a month before the expiration of the visa. I've got 8 weeks left on mine; this ought, I hope, to be sufficient. But I can't help but worry about it not being so, which would leave me in an awkward position until it got done. Finally, my visa, once extended, will expire on the day that I intend to leave the country. That means that if anything was to happen to my flight--a delay, a rescheduling, etc.--I could be in extremely dire straits, because a valid visa is needed to leave the country. This brings up the specter of the missing middle name on my reservation/e-ticket again; if I found myself at the airport facing a difficult counter agent, etc., it could be a true disaster. I can't help but be nervous about it, but I can't figure out any way to completely assure myself that nothing will happen.

Tomorrow is the Gogol Bordello concert, which I'm both looking forward to and a bit nervous about. Hopefully all will go well.

Pictures will be posted soonish; just need to free up the USB port.