A Crash Course in ...Moscow?
Moscow: Day 4
...But when the alarm went off I didn’t wake up. It wasn’t until I heard people stirring in the room at 8:09am that I actually woke up enough to realize what was going on...
But I was still moving faster than most of the people in the Hostel. Meg was kind enough to inform me that the Sox had forced a game 7! Thank goodness for some good news.
I had cake and OJ for breakfast at the cafe down the street. It wasn’t bad but I wasn’t feeling 100 percent, so I didn’t eat all the cake. Most of my not feeling good can be attributed to the complete lack of sleep that I got on the trip thus far.
We left breakfast and headed to the metro to catch the scary communist trains to go to the Novodevichy Convent. We emerged out of the depths of hell that is the metro again and were in this beautiful area of Moscow. It wasn’t busy, it was quiet for the most part, and the greenery was beautiful.
We arrived at the convent and Tatiana procured our tour guide. She spoke English very well, and was very funny, making jokes the whole time she was leading us thru the convent. She offered many stories about how it was built, who built it, why it was built, etc. There was an absolutely beautiful bell tower that has been posted under the pictures part of my site.
We then were lead thru the museum on site, most of us 1/2 asleep. I put my camera around my neck so I didn’t have to carry it. But it’s on a short strap because it is usually firmly wrapped around my wrist, so it hung more like a necklace than a camera. After we finished the tour I went to take the camera off. My hand-eye coordination must have been off because instead of pulling it off my neck, I pivoted it directly into my forehead, slamming the flash hot-seat right into my skull.
Slightly bewildered I took a few steps forward. Stephanie and Seth who had just witnessed the who series of events sat in shock inquiring if I was okay. I replied, “ouch,” and proceeded to carefully remove the camera from my neck.
I was bleeding from my forehead from two marks that were parallel in the exact proportion to my flash hot-seat. Seth “helped a brother out” and found Thea and grabbed me a tissue to stop the bleeding. Nothing serious, but I felt like a total moron.
The group then walked to the cemetery for more morbid fun. All sorts of important Russian writers were buried here, as was Boris Yeltsin, and Lenin’s wife. I think the pictures do a better job of explaining the cemetery than I can do with words, so just go check them out... I do have to say though it was creepy with all the statues of the dead people above their graves, it was like they were watching you.
We headed back into the metro station, picking up an extra metro pass because most of us were out. We headed off to see two other stations in the Moscow metro that are world renown for their beauty, yet most of us were so tired that it didn’t matter at that point; not to mention hungry, so the next stop was to another cafeteria to have lunch.
I had some sort of ribs and potatoes with rosemary on them. And it was not that great. This was the first meal in Moscow that I actually resorted to the remaining crackers in my backpack to fulfill my need for sustenance.
I broke off with two other people to go souvenir shopping. I did end up buying a mink hat, after I was able to get the sales guy to cut the price in half, to 4000 rubles. Kind of expensive, but it’s one bad-ass hat. We hopped the Moscow metro and head to the Red Square to pick up a few more things. I picked up a zippo style lighter with St. Basil’s on the front, a deck of playing cards, and that’s about it. I’m not a very nostalgic person, so souvenirs don’t fill the void like pictures do for me.
The three of us headed back to the hostel to prepare for our 6:30pm departure. I had to rewind the film in my camera and prepare for a bear of a time getting thru security, one last time, without running my film thru the x-ray scanners. The reception people at the hostel were watching Alien v. Predator 2, really loud and in Russian, so it made sleeping impossible, but I remained in a semi-conscious state until 6:15 when the bus arrived.
It took us an hour and a half to get to the airport. Plus. Nearly 2 hours because of the traffic in Moscow. It’s normally a 45 minute to an hour drive. No matter though, our flight wasn’t until 10:20.
We arrived, in the rain, and lugged our baggage into the terminal, where we were instructed to find dinner. I was dying for a McFlurry and french fries, but there was no McDonald’s, so I had to settle for overpriced, and slightly cold, rice and meatballs. We then as a group had to get our tickets, go thru passport control, and finally security. This process took an hour. Yes, an hour. And there weren’t any lines.
Step 1: Tickets
You go thru the “nothing to declare” end of the customs duty, and proceed to the first x-ray scanner where they scan your bags. Tatiana had to take my film thru again. You wait in a short line and pick up your boarding pass, check your baggage and then move on to...
Step 2: Passport Control
They give you the hairy eyeball again, stamp your passport, and check your visa status. You exit passport control and move on to...
Step 3: Security
I’m getting so sick of security by this point. You have to remove your shoes, put on booties, run all your bags thru a scary looking x-ray, and then walk thru the metal detector, and get patted down AGAIN. Tatiana had to take my film to be hand inspected again... As you can tell Russia is not a very film-friendly place. But once your thru this security, your thru.
I stopped into the duty free store. Everyone was buying vodka and such. I opted for the M&M’s. I can always buy liquor in Prague. I wound my way thru the terminal and found the gate and waited for the rest of the group to show up. I was talking to Tania for a few minutes and brought up the, “WC” which stands for the toilet. I was unsure of why they called it the WC. Tania straightened me out... WC stands for “Water Closet.” Go figure. And speaking of the WC’s in Moscow, the TP (toilet paper) needs some serious “Charminazation.” It’s like newspaper. Honestly, it’s a wonder the people of Moscow can sit after visiting their water closets.
While waiting I saw a bride, still in her wedding gown, waiting for the plane too. Myself and other, curious as to why you would ever wear a wedding gown to an airport, asked Tatiana about it. Evidently its common to show off on your wedding day, and wear the damn dress all day long.
We boarded the aircraft and took off without issue. They actually served us dinner on the flight home, no real complaints here, but I wouldn’t have had that no-so-great dinner in the terminal if I had known.
The flight landed 2 hours and 20 minutes later. I had napped briefly, but nothing substantial. We deplaned and started hearing the Czech language again. I never though I would be so happy to hear Czech. I can actually understand parts of it and can pronounce it okay too.
Russian, not so much.
They had hired a bus to take us back to the residence halls. The order was: Osadni, Machova, Slezska, and Jaurisova.
Yes we were last. I walked up the stairs upon arrival at 1 am. To my body it was sometime around 3. I talked with Jack and company for a little while, unpacked, and watched the Red sox until 5am. I turned it off when they were down by 2, and knew they were going to lose.
Some final thoughts about Russia:
The water: It tastes a lot like Massachusetts water, like the stuff in Westborough. But after it sits in the bottle for a while it tastes more like naphthalene. Mothballs for all you non-chemists out there.
Yum. I love mothballs.
Not really.
The vodka: smoother than most of the Grey Geese (or Gooses?) of the world. Nothing award winning, but still pretty damn good.
The subways: whoever designed the system should be shot. It’s crazy. But it works pretty well, so I guess it could be worse. The stations are upwards of 300 feet underground, so they make good bomb shelters if necessary.
The people: friendlier than Prague, but speak less English.
The language: the Cyrillic alphabet is a bitch to put it bluntly. But it seems to work for them. The fact that they used the Roman alphabet and phonetics on the maps is absolutely asinine.
Casualties: one girl had her camera stolen at a club. I managed to lose my towel in the hostel. And about 6 million brain cells.
Quite the experience as a whole. If you can make it, its worth it. But for the love of God, find a Russian who understands both languages and take them with you. It makes life so much easier.
Be sure to check out all the photos. Everything I have posted was shot on film and scanned.
Finally, this is a 7000+ word series. I apologize for the length.