Closing one trip to begin another

Catherine Palace, Tsarskoye Selo, Russia

I meant to do this last year and am finally doing it this year. Christmas present (yes, belated, of course) to BFF is an album of photos from our trip to Saint Petersburg in November 2004. I have printed 64 photos so far and probably have an equal number to go.

It is fun to revisit the trip, our second there. I hope there will be one more this side of glory.

This entails going through all the photos, taking advantage of the fact that one can adjust exposure and contrast (and occasionally saturation) to turn a so-so photo into one that is quite acceptable. Copying them into a folder to be printed. Moving them to the "printed" folder when they have been. Then trimming them with a paper cutter and putting them into the album in some kind of order.

A nice project for a long weekend. (Along with making my trademark spaghetti sauce tomorrow and having friends over for dinner, then preaching on Sunday.)

This is a form of closure on that trip. Today I submitted the passport application to go on the next one which is less than a month away. (Yes, cutting it way too close; let's not get into that story tonight.)

I am wondering how many photos I will take this time around. I think the first trip to Russia had about 185 photos and the second trip, of equal length, had about 370.

Alexandrinsky Theatre, Ostrovsky Square, St Petersburg

Russian birches

--the BB

Keeping abreast

Juan Cole's post today is titled "Are the Taliban Surrounding NATO Armies and Cutting them Off? Why Washington Needs Iran and Russia."

I commend it to you for an update on Afghanistan-Pakistan-Iran-Iraq-Russia.

Informed Comment is a great source of current information on the Middle East and Southwest Asia.

--the BB

Двадцать три

The Winter Palace viewed from the bus going to the Strelka
St Petersburg, Russia

Today we were joined by a guest from the Russian Federation. Welcome!

I was blessed to visit St Petersburg twice, once in September 2001 (yes, then) and again in November 2004. I love the city and I enjoyed meeting and chatting (to the extent I could) with the Russian people there.

Just a few more weeks until my first Russian class. Очень ҳорощо!
--the BB

Questions about the strength of the Duma

Atrios notes that the Secretary of State has made certain recent utterances without any evident awareness of irony.

MOSCOW -
The Russian government under Vladimir Putin has amassed so much central authority that the power-grab may undermine Moscow's commitment to democracy, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Saturday.

"In any country, if you don't have countervailing institutions, the power of any one president is problematic for democratic development," Rice told reporters after meeting with human-rights activists.

"I think there is too much concentration of power in the Kremlin. I have told the Russians that. Everybody has doubts about the full independence of the judiciary. There are clearly questions about the independence of the electronic media and there are, I think, questions about the strength of the Duma," said Rice, referring to the Russian parliament.

(Associated Press via Forbes)

Let's run that by one more time: "In any country, if you don't have countervailing institutions, the power of any one president is problematic for democratic development."

SSJOAS = Sweet Suffering Jesus on a Stick