EXPATS. Atlantic Blog (if you think being a Displaced Cheesehead (TM) among Flatlanders is challenging, try being a conservative Yank in an Irish college) has information about Independence Day observances overseas. I have spent exactly one Fourth of July outside the U.S. -- in Russia! The staff at the hotel was kind enough to bake a Stars and Stripes cake (You really should post those travel pages) that nobody wanted to cut and eat, and we rode past a reconstructed cathedral that figures in fireworks concerts all over the U.S. We later flew -- on a 727-ski -- to St. Petersburg, where the people with more energy stayed up for a twilight fireworks show at the Hard Rock Cafe.