Knocked Down by Beauty


St Petersburg is not the kind of city you should visit for a day. But Ekaterina Kachalova did and lived to tell the tale. Her conclusion is "If you’re saving up on comfort and time, your impressions will also come at a discount." 

This is yet another awesome post written in my "Write for Real: Blogging in English" course. Enjoy the post and scroll down to find links to more.

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Save up on comfort and time, but not on impressions - that was my motto whenever the thought of hopping on the Sapsan train to St Pete became ripe enough for me to reap it. The pinnacle of that particular trip in July 2019 was meant to become "The Legend of Love” by the Mariinsky ballet.

Staying true to my motto, I booked a one-day round-trip ticket with an intention to cover all the bases - to see everything that there was to see in one day. The high-speed train departed from Moscow at an ungodly hour, but what I sacrificed in terms of deep sleep and sound mind, I hoped to make up for in sightseeing.

(Silly me - I did not realize that this is not how the conservation of energy law works. But again, sciences have never been my forte.)

I rumbled to the platform at 10 a.m, got off the train, gulped in the downtown air (something artsy and un-Moscow-like in it), meditated in front of the towering door of the Vaganova Ballet Academy, paid my respects to St. Issacs, and entered the ocean of beauty that is the Hermitage.

At that point, my legs were already giving out, but my mind refused to register any complaints filed incessantly by my body. “Shut up! You’re enjoying it. Stay on track! What on Earth is wrong with you??? Let’s turn that corner. See, there’s a throne room! I’ve told ya so. What a beau…Wait…there is another one. GO!”

Four hours later my head was spinning and my body was not responding to my neurons’ marching orders any longer. I had no clue where I was and lacked the strength to inquire. My only hope was that the Winter Palace (the seat of the Hermitage) would spit me out on its own. Which, thankfully - and miraculously - it did.

By the time I slumped into my seat at the Mariinsky, I was on the verge of a black-out or a breakdown - or probably both. The view from my top-tier box was majestic (supposedly), but I could barely take it in: my goal was not to drift off right in the middle of… whatever it was on the stage. There was something - that much I'm sure of - and it was even really good (supposedly).

If the Hermitage knocked me almost senseless, then the Mariinsky finished me off. How I went back to the railway station the same night I, for the life of me, can not remember - or rather, I wouldn’t like to recall.

Sometimes beauty, indeed, should be rationed. Great in small doses, but deadly in case of overdose. So here’s my instruction for St. Pete: if you’re saving up on comfort and time, your impressions will also come at a discount - a cheap knock-off instead of the real deal you could afford if you just weren’t that greedy.

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Four more awesome posts written by my students in this course: 
- "At the risk of incurring the curse from polyglots and other magicians" - a post about the hardships of learnings three languages at the same time;
- "A finger-licking dinner dish. No unicorn tears required." - a recipe of a finger-licking dish out of broccoli or cauliflower told through the lens of the author's sweet personality.
- "Carrot, spinach and ginger juice, anyone?" - a post about the need (or the lack thereof) to "detox" our bodies.
- "Saying No to Human Zoos" - a post about the consequences of saying Yes when you know you shouldn't.
- "To Answer or Not to Answer" - a post about what a teacher goes through if their student doesn't answer messages (but then suddenly does). 


Image credit: Photo by Hu Chen on Unsplash

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