From Russia With Love

Saturday, June 11

Around Voronezh

The following are just a bunch of pictures from our last week or two in Voronezh:

Entering Voronezh sign

The big round about

Metro, the Russian Costco

Octoozheva was one of our main bus stops, we spent a lot of time waiting here

Meenskaya (our main bus stop)

The fountain in the central square of town

The fountain in the main square of Voronezh

These cottonwood trees released TONS of cotton in the air, it was seriously everywhere!

The LDS church building in Voronezh. Even though I couldn't speak the same language as most of the members, I loved going to church here. Strangely, I felt more welcomed at church here than I have ever felt in my life. The saints here are so amazing and showed me an amazing example of how the gospel should really be lived. I will never forget them.

This was on a walk down to the River. We named the walk "The Ruins of Russia" because there were plants and trees growing where steps and paths used to be.

Luckily you can't see all the litter along the river bank.....

More of that darn cotton that was everywhere!!!

We went to this place in Voronezh where there was a war museum and a park of tanks, etc. You could climb on them too. It was neat because on the tank tires it read "Made in the USSR"

Only in Russia could a field of dandelions look so beautiful

Looking across the reservoir from a little Island that was in the middle

I loved that beautiful big reservoir

A popular monument in Voronezh

A cute little church by the river in Voronezh

I really didn't think much of this city when we arrived, but it is a place we both grew to love. Hopefully we will be able to return one day.

From Russia With Love,

Jenepher & Philip

Locking Away Our Love

There are many Russian traditions that I am not so fond of (like getting drunk at every opportunity), but one tradition that I absolutely adore is the lock and key tradition. This is a tradition that pertains to newlyweds. After a couple gets married, they go with their friends and family to a bridge by a river, lake, creek, etc., where there will usually already be many locks locked on. This is called a lock bridge. The newlyweds will then proceed to lock a lock (usually their names and marriage date is engraved or painted on the lock) to the bridge. After this they together throw the keys into the river. The lock is to symbolize their love, and throwing away the keys is to symbolize that their love will forever be strong and unbreakable. I love the romance in this tradition and the celebration of unending love. Here are a couple lock bridges that we saw (the locks are kind of hard to see because they are spread so far apart):

Well, Philip and I loved this tradition so much, that with the encouragement of Amy and Jasmyn (I love you girls and miss you!), we decided to partake and "lock away our love". We went out to the one Lowes-like store they had in Voronezh, searched for the perfect lock, bought it, painted our names and anniversary on it (with nail polish) and went to the lock bridge in Voronezh to lock away our love.

Our love lock with our names on it in Cyrillic

Our wedding date written the European way... and yes, it really has almost been two years!

Us holding the keys before we throw them with our lock locked on the bridge in between us

Throwing those keys away! You can actually see them flying in the air above our hands. They made a nice soft landing in the river, never to be seen again.

Our love has been locked away in Russia

You can see our lock (closest to the front) with other locks in the back ground

So happy we could lock away our love the Russian way!

If we ever get to go back to Voronezh, we definitely plan on making sure that lock is still there!

From Russia With Love,

Jenepher & Philip

Wednesday, June 1

Goodbye from Russia....

We just wanted to say a quick goodbye from Russia! We leave for Moscow tomorrow and fly home to the U.S. on Monday. We don't think that we will have any more time to blog while in Russia, so this is it. Stay tuned though, because there are still 3 or 4 more posts to come (I'll do these once we get back to the states)! And at least one of them will be worth reading! For the last time.....

From Russia With Love,

Jenepher & Philip

Tuesday, May 24

America is so close I can almost taste it!

We will be home two weeks from today and we can't wait! The following picture may seem weird, but I know there are those who will understand this insanity. I was sitting there on my break thinking about America and naturally I started thinking about all the food I missed.... and trust me, I didn't run out of American food I wanted to eat, I ran out of sticky notes.

If you can't read what the sticky notes say, click on the picture to enlarge it.

From Russia With Love,

Jenepher & Philip

PAMOHb

A week and a half ago we went to a little town called PAMOHb (Ramone) that is about 40 minutes away from Voronezh. We went because there is an old "castle" there. The castle was neat to see, but very run down. I'm sure it was much more impressive in its glory days. Our favorite part of the trip ended up just being walking around this pretty little town. It was so quaint, quiet, and refreshing. It was a picturesque Russian village.

Fun at the park.

Their small Orthodox Cathedral.

The castle.

Dandelions look so much more beautiful here than in the U.S.

From Russia With Love,

Jenepher & Philip

Tuesday, May 17

Snapshots of Saint Petersburg

Saint Petersburg is a beautiful city. Much more European than Russian. They call it the Russian Versailles. Even though the weather was cold and wet, the trip was really great. We even liked the 24 hour train rides!

Sometimes pictures say more than words. I hope you enjoy these pictures as much as I enjoyed the places they were taken at and the people they were taken with. =D

Pretty self-explanatory picture

Not self-explanatory..........

Yummy little cinnamon cookie man!

A neat cathedral in the little town near Peterhof

Cascade of fountains at Peterhof

A raining mushroom!

Peterhof has tons of fountains, it would be really fun and beautiful to go in the Summer!

A raining bench!

At Peterhof

Some of the first green we saw in Russia

That is the palace in the background

From left to right: Nick, Philip, Me, Jasmyn, Amy

At Peterhof

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peterhof_Palace

Check out some information on Peterhof palace

At Peterhof

At Peterhof with a fabulous faced statue

At Peterhof

The Neva river and Winter Palace (Now the Hermitage museum) in the background

Neva river

Just having fun downtown

We were lucky, the fountains in Saint Petersburg were turned on right before we got there. There are so many fountains there and it was beautiful!

Victory Square, commemorating Russia's veterans

Some flowers were in bloom!

Oops, my head is covering the cathedral spire of Peter and Paul fortress in the background.

In the background is the Marble Palace. Guess what? Its made out of marble, lots of marble.

Girl picture! At the Narva Gate (triumph arch)

Narva Gate, Triumph arch in Saint Petersburg

Interesting art work painted up the whole side of an apartment building.

One of the many cool metro stations in Saint Petersburg, this one is old school

Smolny Cathedral

Taken while we were on our river boat tour through the canals of the city

Inside St. Issac's Cathedral, it was a really beautiful and inspiring cathedral. Usually you can't take pictures inside of cathedrals, but this one was not an active cathedral.