WARNING START You are browsing 2001-2004 newsletters archive
Prices and events mentioned refer to past times, some links may not work, To get back to current issue, click here WARNING END

Dear Sir or Madam,

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year ! Thank you all for being with me. I'm so proud to tell you that at the moment 3 000 people from all over the world are subscribed to my simply country boy monthly stories. I just can't believe it, imagine: 3 thousand ! To follow up with your needs and interests, I decided to run a little survey. I hope it will allow me to improve the newsletter, it will only take ten minutes to fill in the blanks, so without further ado just click here to participate :)

Holiday time is coming. New Year's eve is by far the best of the Russian holidays, promising a month of parties, with little work breaks designed to collect incoming salary and plan further activities. It's also one of the most romantic holidays, when the affair can evolve from a moment's eye contact, and your feelings start to take control of you, making decisions for life as easy as choosing between coffee or capuccino. I'm not really a Don Juan, with all of these monthly deadlines I still ain't even got a family name. I'm just Peter, and I'm telling you, no matter whether you are single or not, the Russian saying : "You'll spend the next year in same style, you had the New Year's party" will apply to you completely. In practice, it means that you need to find out who your best friends are, and just go for it with them. Then, you will get the best New Year experience, you ever wanted to have. 

Russian lessons from Peter
or introduction to Russian New Year

Russians love Christmas and New Year so much they celebrate it twice. Originally, it comes from switching from the Gregorian to Julian calendar a couple of hundred years ago, but nothing else except love for holidays, can explain the strong tradition of celebrating every winter event twice. Evil bosses might try to ignore not-public holidays, but only if he wants to see the bad sides of the work force, proactively chatting, smoking, drinking and flirting during these "supposed to be off" business days. For the self-motivated hard workers - you will feel like a sheep running the opposite way to herd, trying to concentrate on datasheets and calculation in an atmoshere of joy, jokes and the "5 more seconds to take off" attitude of others. So say no to productivity, and better precisely analyze your gift ideas.

Typical gifts for people you don't really know, and have no intention to know better, are butilka shampanskogo (bottle of champagne) or simple korobka konfet (box of chocolates) .  For close friends and relatives you can buy something intimate like  parfumernij nabor (set of perfumes) for women, and a good dose of strong alcohol, butilku (bottle) for men. The last gift idea is absolutely universal, the best thing about it is, that probably you can taste your gift right after you made a present, because this is the usual policy. Once, when I was at my good friend's birthday, I arrived with bottle of tequila and left few hours late, with at least 3/4 of my present successfuly consumed.

There is one more category of people. These invaders, who plan to occupy your heart, deserve something exclusive. The same applies to registred owners of your heart, because you will need to acknowledge your liege oath as often as possible. You will have to apply your creativity and find enough money to invest in vecher v restorane (late-night restaraunt party), koltso ili kulon (ring or coulomb, e.g. some jewelry), or even romanticheskoye novogodnee puteshestvie (romantic New Year tour).

I don't want to leave you here with hard thoughts about difference between you and Bill Gates, so let's go straight to EducaCentre news.

What's new in EducaCentre

Today we have news on Russian bride hunting, EducaCentre stationery, a Swiss partner web site opening, and St. Petersburg is over-booked crisis.

Piece of advice, to those who is planning to marry a Russian girl

I've got a message saying : "Please unsubscribe me, I already married Russian girl. Roy Morris". I thought that Roy might like to share his knowledge with other subscribers, and in a few hours, he sent me the following story: 

To those who wish to marry a Russians girl I will say­ the following. The first thing to do is… Get interested in her country, and you could do that by reading Peter’s newsletter where you also can get some links to other Russian sites. It will provide you with the humour and some of the typical Russian characteristics, which in turn will make it easier for you to find the love of your life. Though I must say she sometimes still surprises me. Like a few nights ago when she asked me to take her to a club. At first I was confused but then I understood she meant a nightclub with dancing. And I still remember the day when she invited me to her mother’s house where the table really was LOADED with food and drinks, and wanting to be polite I consumed just a little. But later I found out that the table always is loaded with food and drinks when a Russian family invites you and Russian hospitality expects you not to be shy in that case

P.S. My marriage was the result of my own activity. I did not contact any marriage office. I live in Sweden but I was born in Southamerica (Surinam) I think it's about 15000 km from the place my wife was born. Love will always find a way.

Congratulations, Roy, and good luck. Thanks for your information, I hope it will help other friends of mine who are looking for Russian brides.

EducaCentre stationery

EducaCentre get more corporate ... now every EducaCentre student will be fully equipped with an EducaCentre folder, pen, sticker. For those, who plan to spend next year with us we have made an Educacentre pocket-size calendar. Start as student of EducaCentre, and all of these riches will be yours ! :)

Association of Suisse-Russie web site
Our friends from Association Suisse-Russie, recently opened for business in the EducaCentre building, and now are residing two offices on the first floor, they also have opened their web site to the public, feel free to drop by at http://www.swissru.com 

Over-booking of city hotels and apartments
Believe it, or not the city looks booked, and sometimes over-booked - I bet you couldn't find a free room in a hotel or apartment for the upcoming Christmas and New Year period. And that's only a try-out before the the 300th anniversary of St.Petersburg, that will happen at the end of May 2003. So if you have an idea of Russian trip next year, you'd better book everything as soon as possible and reserve for yourself the best accommodation and entertainment options in advance, before it's too late. For planning your trip please write to travel@russian-st-petersburg.com 

This month in St-Petersburg and Russia.

Calendar of events released
With the 300th anniversary coming, more and more details on the celebration are being discovered.  Official web sites www.spb300.com and www.300online.ru published a calendar of events, for the celebration week. Click here to read. Personally, I would like to recommend you www.300online.ru as the source of information on city events.

Free online excursion
A nice feature is offered at http://guide.petersburgcity.com - a free online excursion. You chat with your guide on-line, as he or she (I've got the luck to talk to Alla) is showing you the photos and illustrations and answering your questions. Two tours are present in the online guide at the moment, with plans to add some more, when service will evolves.

The Highest New Year Tree in St. Petersburg 
Installed in front of the Kazan Cathedral 
Seventeen New Year trees will be installed in various districts of St. Petersburg. The highest one, a very beautiful tree which is 25 meters high (83 feet), is on Nevsky Prospect, in front of the Kazan Cathedral. The New Year fir trees will decorate 
St. Petersburg until January 10, 2003. 
source www.300online.ru

Mammoths go Finland
The Petersburg mammoths for a while will move to Helsinki. Next summer the Finnish public will be permitted to get acquainted with the big collection of remains of mammoths from St. Petersburg. The collection of mammoths which the Zoological museum of Saint Petersburg "will lend" to Helsinki for some time, will be the largest ever leaving the borders of Russia. Visitors to the exhibition can get acquainted with the life of our planet 40 thousand years ago. Apart from mammoths exhibition bones and skulls of other animals from this period will also be included in the exposition. 
source : www.300online.ru 

The 80-anniversary of the USSR exhibition
The exhibition with this name is open from Tuesday December 17 in the Petersburg State museum of political history of Russia. The exhibition is devoted to the 80-anniversary of formation of the Union of the Soviet socialist republics and consists of 1922 materials including originals of documents, signs, photos, etc. related to the birth of the world's biggest country, that was shaking and shocking the world for a good 70 years.
source : http://www.petersburgcity.com

More information lot of safety
We have got quite a feedback on the last issue topic "Safety Guide". Now I can recommend for your attention a nice source of additional information, click here to explore. You will find the following topics there :  emergency numbers, advice for women, in case of illness, cash payments, St.Petersburg at night, rights of foreign citizens in the Russian Federation, walking around St.Petersburg. Impressive, huh ? Happy reading. 
source : http://www.petersburgcity.com

This is a monthly newsletter from your friendly travel company EducaCentre/Russian St.Petersburg Tours. Please, contact us if you have any questions about our offers and news. We love hearing from you!!! If you do not wish to receive our newsletter, please, fill in our unsubscription form.