The many (mis)Adventures of Sydney: White nights, city lights & men in tights!

I’ve been looking forward to this evening for quite a while and glad it finally happened! We’re in St. Petersburg, Russia, as we will be every 12 days for the rest of the summer and there are day tours as well as evening tours available because we are here overnight each time. When I saw the opportunity to see a ballet in Russia I jumped at it! After an easy afternoon at work, I ran to my cabin and changed clothes to look presentable and feel like more than a uniformed worker and then headed to immigration. Immigration took no time at all today, so I sat outside for about 30 minutes and read my book (on my fancy new iPad :) )

Finally, the bus was packed full of guests so I could get on and I squeezed in the very last seat at the back. Forty minutes later, we arrived at the theater and a very old theater it was. We entered through small wooden doors and walked to the Cloak Room area where they had racks upon racks for people to check their coats. These racks were very old and rickety, but I thought they were so neat so, of course, I took a photo!

To the right of the cloak room was this grand staircase made of white marble (or maybe limestone) leading up to the main theater where we were to sit and watch “Swan Lake”.

Walking through this old theater and hearing the creaks of the old wooden floors really took me back to “The Big House” that we spent every summer in up in Tybee Island, Georgia. Every step had a loud creak and there is no sneaking out of that ballet!

As I entered the theater all I could do was smile because I love the feeling of being in the theater with the muffled murmur of people chatting and the orchestra warming up in the pit at the front along with the energy of anticipation and excitement filling the room. The curtain that hid the stage was just as old as every other item in the theater and just looked heavy because of the thick blue velvet that it was made from.

I searched for several minutes through the long chain of chairs in order to find the chair that was labeled row 12 and seat 26. As I sat down in the wooden chairs upholstered in blue tapestry fabric, I quickly came to the realization that the seat was not made for someone of my height. My knees barely fit in front of me which made me quite nervous because I’m quite fidgety and I was unsure if I could make it through the ballet comfortably.

Before the ballet began, I was ridiculously thirsty so I headed out to a stand selling juices, coffees and sodas. The stand was located right outside of the doors next to my seat and was surrounded by old paintings of ballerinas dangling from the ceiling with black wire. I bought myself a water and a grapefruit juice and headed back to my seat because the lights had started to dim. Lucky for me, the seats behind me (located on the large aisle way) were wide open so I had a seat with plenty of leg room!

Finally, the ballet began (15 minutes late) and the lights dimmed and the curtains were drawn. The set was fabulous. It looked like “One Starry Night” Painting from top to bottom and front to back of the stage. I watched for the next hour with a smile on my face and enjoying the experience and opportunity to sit in St. Petersburg, Russia and watch “Swan Lake”. Amazing. The first Act finished and after a short intermission, the second act began. Fifteen minutes later – act two was over and it ends with a curtain call, which left myself and Jay (one of the cast members I ended up sitting with) quite confused. Act three begins and FIVE minutes later another curtain call was taking place and it was over. Definitely a different way of wrapping up the show, but hey – the Russian’s definitely like to do things different!

It was like herding cattle to get everyone out of the theater and back to the buses, but twenty minutes later I had made it to the exit and it was still light outside at 11PM! Our guide, Daria, explained to us that Russia was known for “White Nights” where the sun didn’t set until 2-3AM and would rise again about 4 hours later. She told us that it was a popular time for folks to go out and about and walk around to enjoy these “White Nights” in the city. It only took us 10 minutes to get back to the ship (it took us close to 40 minutes to get to the theater earlier) simply because there was no traffic. I hadn’t even realized how close to the ship we really were until I saw how quickly we had made it back “home” that evening.

Another blessing to add to the books…Thank you Russia.