A City's Drunken Tour


	St. Petersburg, Russia, has plenty to offer thirsty visitors. (Photograph by Bill Swersey)

ow are you feeling right now? Shaky on the feet? Disoriented? Things can only get worse." So begins John Nicholson's online tour of St. Petersburg's underbelly. Originally published as a book, the text of the droll pub-crawl guide is now featured on NEVAlink, the Russian city's strikingly uncensored Web page. John, a British expatriate who teaches English in St. Petersburg, was surprised when the designers of NEVAlink asked permission to include his book, The Other St. Petersburg, on their website.

Once he saw the NEVAlink site, though, he understood why they wanted to feature his writing. The Web comes closer than a book to re-creating the experience of walking in a city. "A book is linear inasmuch as readers normally only move forward or backwords," says John, explaining the popularity of this Internet gateway to St. Petersburg. "A publication on the Web can have many different directions, which the reader/viewer can follow at will.


	A tour of "the other" St. Petersburg would not be complete without a stop for a drink and a smoke in one of the city's cozy stairwells. (Photograph by Bill Swersey)


	The comfortable Samson bar is not a usual stop for tourists -- but it's a good place to share a song, a hot dog, and a bottle of vodka with locals. (Photograph by Bill Swersey)


	After leading visitors on a drinking tour of St. Petersburg, author John Nicholson (left) and his friends need to sit down often -- even if the nearest seat is a snowbank. (Photograph by Bill Swersey)

This makes the Web ideal as a medium for portraying complex worlds such as, well, cities."Visitors to the Web version of John's book can stagger from one random bar and gritty hangout to another. They can discover the city as hard-drinking locals know it -- but without the risk of a hangover.

In a tribute to Western-style free expression, NEVAlink offers an honest and unsanitized perspective of St. Petersburg, the former Russian capital once known as Leningrad, as well as many practical services. You can view postcard panoramas, study the work of composers who hailed from the city, read a local newspaper, or even arrange to stay with a St. Petersburg family. Some Net cruisers jump right to the personals page, where they can make a proposal by email or send flowers to one of the local singles who advertise themselves. Coming soon is an electronic version of the city's great Hermitage Museum.

http://www.arcom.spb.su