“There was one who was great in all his strength, and one who was great in hope, and one who was great in love; but greater than all was Abraham, great with that power whose strength is powerlessness, great in that wisdom whose secret is folly, great in that hope whose outward form is insanity, great in that love which is hatred of self.”
-Kierkegaard

Friday
Friday morning we had classes and another trip to the Russian museum, where we looked at 18th century art. Not really my thing, kind of boring. Some of the sculptures were cool though. The bronze, baroque Anna, showing all the brutality of autocracy (there’s a huge mirror she faces, so she can look at herself 24/7), and then there’s the more enlightened representation of Catherine II with her books.

Anna


Catherine (you can see Prof Dorontchenkov off to the side there)


I had told my host parents that I was interested in seeing the one synagogue that Petersburg has, so they offered to take me in the afternoon. A few people from our group had expressed interest, but it was ultimately Zach (another unserious Jew) who went (he especially wanted to check out the Kosher shop). I called Eena, but she wasn’t getting off work for an hour, so Zach and I just went since we had to meet up with people later that evening. The walk was long from Sadovaya, but really pretty—all along the Gribodoev canal. The weather was gorgeous—breezy, sunny, not too humid where shadows were pleasant and cool. It was nice to see some vegetation and Petersburg life—especially this old woman who was really, really angry that the pigeons were hanging out near her window.





We found the synagogue eventually, which is guarded by a police officer and tall gate (they’ve had some problems with terrorism). There was a group speaking Hebrew outside the synagogue. We walked around outside the building, which was enormous and unlike any synagogue I’ve ever seen. I guess it needs to be big since it’s the only one, although there aren’t a lot of jews left in the city anymore, according to my host family, since a lot moved to the US or Israel. Russia has had an ongoing history of anti-Semitism. Additionally, a lot of Russian Jews are pretty secular—thanks to Soviet Russia—or do not wish to be identified as Jewish here, and thus do not go to temple.



The Kosher store was nice and the cleanest store I have seen in Russia. It was soooo nice to be somewhere completely clean (believe me, you’d appreciate it too after living here even a day or two). It made me think of America. Zach bought a few snack things, including something he remembered his grandparents eating, which was made out of sesame seeds, sort of chocolatey tasting, and had the consistency of that fiber glass foam stuff (I don’t know what it’s called, but it’s exactly like that).

The front door of the synagogue was locked, but we got in through a back door. We both look pretty jewish (he’s got an old testament looking beard and my features speak for themselves), so no one gave us a second glance. The synagogue was extremely well kept and clean like the kosher store. Some people were preparing Shabbat dinner downstairs, and we made our way up to the balcony of the synagogue first.





After going to a bunch of different churches, it was so different and refreshing in a way to be in this spacious, light filled, joyous space uncluttered with dark, smoke-stained icons and religious paraphernalia. The synagogue was clearly Russian influenced though, some architectural features even reminded me of Orthodox churches, even if the atmosphere was far different. It was nice walking around there and the people were all really friendly. The bathrooms were also free and clean and had toilet paper, oh my! I almost felt like I wasn’t in Russia for a minute.

We couldn’t stay too long since we had to get back to meet up for dinner. The food at the café was good, although everyone was pretty exhausted and so it was an early night for all.