Beginning of the seventh journal entry.
On Monday, I decided to change the morning ritual a little. Instead of snagging some cookies from the lobby on my way to the gym (and them eating them back up in my room for breakfast), I decided to get a little more "healthy" and replaced the cookies with a green apple from the check-in desk in the gym. Similarly, I changed the morning beverage from black tea with sugar and milk to green tea. However, there were no green tea bags conveniently left in my room every day; I just happened to notice them next to the cookies so I snagged a couple from the lobby.
The other item of interest this day was the arrival of my third line (the manager of my manager's manager) along with her manager (my fourth line manager). When I came to Moscow, I decided to arrive on Friday for two reasons: first of all, the flights were a little cheaper (but probably not cheap enough to offset the additional night in the hotel), but more importantly, I wanted a few days to deal with the jet-lag and adjust to the local time.
I guess these managers (we'll call them M3 and M4, just to make it easier) march to the beat of a different internal clock; they landed in Moscow around 10am, arrived at the office around 11am and had meetings the remainder of the afternoon. The next day, it was another day of meetings, and it all culminated with a 3am departure on Wednesday morning for the next leg in their tour: India. Not the way I would like to travel; I guess that's why I'm not in upper-level management, or more accurately, just one of many reasons I am not in upper level management.
Back to Monday and the visiting managers. Towards the end of the work day, the lab director in Moscow (an American on international assignment) made arrangements to transport the guests to their hotel (the Metropol, just off of Red Square) by taxi. I tried to convince M3 to take the metro (I met M3 years ago at one of the many IBM courses I took in the beginning of my career with the company, and she is one of the few executives I feel comfortable just chatting with as a friend), but she had luggage to contend with and felt guilty pawning it off on her manager. We agreed to meet in the lobby of the Metropol at 7:30pm and I would show them around Moscow.
Even using the metro line with the longer wait (which, again. was much closer to the 15 minute mark), I made better time to the hotel using public transportation than they did by taxi. I gave them a bit of a head start anyway to give them a chance to get settled into their rooms, so I had to wait a few minutes for them to pop down to the lobby.
In addition to M3 and M4, we had one more person in the group, and here I have no choice but to use an alias as I forgot his name! We'll call him O1 (his is responsible for managing our outsourcing, which I found out is a term I am no longer allowed to use; I also can not use off-shoring; the mandated terminology is either Global Test Team or Global Development Team). O1 got stuck on a conference call and was a little late joining us in the lobby, so we didn't begin our "tour" until after 7:45pm. Just to make matters more interesting, M4 had to get back to the hotel in time for a 9pm conference call, which left me with just about an hour to give them a tour of Moscow.
Luckily, the hotel sits almost right on top of Red Square, therefore we didn't waste any time in transit and in a few minutes, we entered the heart of Moscow. 
"That's the Kremlin, which actually just means 'wall' in Russian, so many cities have a 'kremlin', it is just that Moscow has THE Kremlin." 
"That's where Lenin, or at least a wax model of him, is housed." 
"That's GUM" (note: I am NOT using IK5 here; GUM is an acronym for, in English, State Department Store; when I was in Moscow 25 years ago, it was a huge depressing building filled with little shops with either empty shelves or stocked with merchandise you would not want to buy; now it is chock full of designer stores, so once again it is not a building I felt compelled to enter). 
"That's St. Basil's; after the cathedral was finished, Ivan IV was so impressed with its beauty, he asked the architect if he could make another; the architect, thinking he was about to get another commission, replied in the affirmative, which was the wrong answer as Ivan IV then blinded the architect to prevent him from producing a more spectacular building; they didn't call him Terrible for nothing."
While walking around Red Square (where M4 and O1 did not have any head gear and O1 didn't even have a winter coat, and by this time, the temperatures returned to "normal" and it was indeed colder in Moscow than it was back home in Poughkeepsie), a couple of hawkers approached us offering ushankas for sale. M3 wanted to buy one for her husband, and someone at work gave me a link to a store that sells the hats. I visited the site earlier in the day and discovered that rabbit fur hats go for between 450 and 700 roubles (about $17 to $27). M4, who doesn't speak any Russian, managed to negotiate the first hat for only 550 using just a series of hand signals and facial expressions. By the time we got to the other end of Red Square, O1 decided he needed a hat, and this time M4 got the vendor down to 500 roubles. Not too shabby (assuming the fur was indeed rabbit and not some less desirable product).
I had hoped to circumnavigate the Kremlin with them as I really enjoy the view from across the river. To that end, we started along the northern side of the Kremlin and made our way over to the Eternal Flame, 
the monuments to Hero Cities of the Great Patriotic War
(what we refer to as WW II, and while all of these cities were in the Soviet Union about a third of them are outside of Russia) and then past the Architecture Item (not one quite knows what it is doing there). 
We started across the bridge over the Moscow River, but at this point, I realized that we simply didn't have enough time to complete the circle as we weren't quite half-way done, yet, and it was already 8:30pm.
A quick re-trace of our steps, and I met the objective of getting M4 back to the hotel in time for the conference call (gotta make sure that finds its way into my work goals for 2007: get 4th-line manager back to the hotel in time for a conference call). O1 decided to remain at the hotel and thaw out, but M3 was game for a little more touring.
Didn't want to spend too much time acquiring food, so we opted for a quick bit to eat back in the food court of the near-by mall (where I had blini almost every night the week before). Unfortunately, the blini store was already closed (again, not sure if it was just a bit late, or if they were sold out from the Maselnitsa celebration). Fortified with a bit of nourishment, it was onto the subway.
The metro system really is quite spectacular, and many of the older stations are works of art. We went down Revolution Square (petted the nose of the dog) 
and then over to Kievskaya Station to gawk at the mosaics. 
By this time, I was beginning to fad a bit, and so it was back to the Metropol for M3 and to the Renaissance for me.
Tuesday - cold. This was the type of cold I expected from Moscow. On the walk from the hotel to the metro station, it was so cold (I think it was -20 C) my ears started to tingled. However, to pull the ears of my hat down to cover my own ears with the fluffy fur required me to take my gloves off, and I didn't want my hands to freeze. Years ago, when my brother and I were young enough to spend an entire winter's day outside sledding, as we walked back to the house, for some reason my ears were exposed to the elements and very cold and beet red. My brother then came up behind me and flicked my ear. As my hero Bugs Bunny says, "Agony!" I thought my ear shattered and crumbled to the sidewalk, just like in the cartoons; the stinging, burning sensation was so intense. I was extremely glad my brother was not walking beside me on the way to the metro that morning.
Wednesday - this was our last day at Krasnopresnenskaya Towers as the next day saw us at our new location on the south side of the city near metro station Kalyshskaya. True to my style of waiting to the last minute, Wednesday was the day I finally decided to time each leg of the commute to give you a feel for how long each portion took. I had this great plan of giving you most of the segments and asking you to perform the math to determine where the missing 4 minutes were. Unfortunately, once I exited the metro at Krasnopresnenskaya, all ground vehicles (cars, busses, electric busses - everything) were not moving and traffic was at a complete stand-still. Not sure what the problem was, I heard mention of an accident, or maybe it was congestion due to a major exhibition at a conference center a bit down the road. Anyway, it didn't seem like we were going to make any progress by bus, so it was back onto the metro, through Kievskaya (where there were still TONS OF PEOPLE!) and to the Mezhdynarodnaya metro station, which is within walking distance of work.
In case you were wondering, the answer to my little puzzle about the missing four minutes is: escalators. Not all the metro stations are so deep in the ground (particularly the newer ones, which don't even have moving stairs), but many of the older stations are so deep down it takes 2 minutes to get from the top down to the tracks. Then another two minutes to get from the tracks back to the surface on the other end for a total of 4 minutes a day just riding the escalators. I figure I spent at least two hours during my stay in Moscow simply riding the escalators.
Even though the green tea bags were available each morning at the complimentary coffee and tea bar set-up in the lobby, but the time I finished at the gym (and banya), the set-up was already dismantled. This left a slight feeling of guilt for swiping a tea bag on the way into the gym. After work that night, I decided to assuage my guilt by asking for green tea to be delivered to my room instead of black. The agent seemed quite surprised by such a request (I can't believe that a Japanese guest never made a similar request), and she went off to confer with her superior in the backroom. However shocked she looked, I was even more taken aback by the response: "No." I questioned her reply, and she stated they didn't keep any green tea in stock. I just simply shook my head, returned back to my room and continued my life of morning-tea-bag-snatching.
Back in the room, I was greeted by another surprise. A little placard with "Fresh Seasonal Fruits" on one side and "Compliments" on the other sat in front of a plate with ... meat filled little pastries. Huh. Here it was Ash Wednesday and Orthodox Lent already started, and they left meat filled pastries. A bit disappointed (as I really wanted the Fresh Seasonal Fruits!), I decided to leave a little note in Russian thanking them for the gift but also explaining that I prefer to refrain from consuming such products during Lent.
The next day, Thursday, was the first day in the new building, which was still going through some "growing" pains. The place was still under construction, and there was no cafeteria on-site (so everyone was in a bit of a tizzy as to where to go for lunch that day). But I promised not to bore you with work details, so we'll move on to the commute back to the hotel that night.
While walking from the metro to my room, I saw these two guys ahead of me asking a local for directions. The reply was a bit terse, and the questioner then targeted me as the next recipient of his query. "Do you know where the Renaissance Hotel is?" came the question in Russian with a heavy accent of some sort. I replied in Russian, "Yes, I myself am going there." We exchanged a few pleasantries, and I asked them where they were from. "India". "Ah, so you speak English?" "Yes!" and I think they were glad to chat away in English.
Turns out their destination was not quite the hotel, but rather, the cinema right next to my building. I was wondering what that dome was (and sure enough, the movie theater is called "Cinema Under the Dome"). Most foreign films in Moscow (and probably all of Russia) are dubbed into Russian, but this movie theater is one of the few that plays films in the native language. I've been walking past the door to his building for almost three weeks and I never noticed. (I know, I know, so what else is new?)
Back in the room, and the complimentary dish of "fresh seasonal fruit" along with my note was still on the desk. Slightly disappointed, I decided to return the dish to the front-desk. And again I confused the agent; she started to translate the note for me, and I interrupted her to inform her I knew the contents of the note as I wrote it. We finally cleared up the confusion, but even more disappointed, I return back to my room empty handed - I was really hoping to score some actual fresh seasonal fruit. Oh, well.
Friday was a national holiday, which 25 years ago was called "Red Army Day". However, with the collapse of the Soviet Union (and therefore the Red Army), the holiday was renamed, and it is now something along the lines of "Defenders of the Motherland Day". The cold weather convinced me to select an in-door activity, and I opted for the Tretyakov Gallery. This museum consists of 62 rooms of Russian art ranging from icons through the 19th century movement called Peredvizhniki. Armed with the Lonely Planet and the audio guide (again paying the extra 100 rubles to get the English version), I toured the collection for almost five hours. I knew I should have taken notes while I wandered through the rooms as I have such a short attention span for art, but now I can hardly remember the name of a single painting. However, I do recall coming across several famous works like the portrait of Dostoyevsky by Perov, and Kiprensky's portrait of Pushkin, and Boyarina Morozova by Surikov, and Repin's Ivan the Terrible and His Son (side note: another reason Ivan got the moniker "Terrible" - not only did he blind the architect who designed St. Basil's, but in a fit of rage, he also killed his eldest son) and thinking, "Wow - I've seen pictures of this before!" Towards the end of the day, I was getting a bit saturated and I'm not sure how much new material managed to filter into my consciousness.
One of the highlights of the collection is the famous icon by Rublyov called "Holy Trinity". According to the tour book, every visitor to the museum makes his way through the maze of rooms to find this icon, but someone must have forgotten to tell that to everyone in the gallery that day. By the time I got to room 60, there was hardly anyone else in that section of the museum. Once again, I got to enjoy almost complete solitude with the icon (except for the attendant in the room and the occasional visitor), and what initially struck me was simply the size of the icon.
Back onto the street, I lowered the ear flaps and set off towards, where else, Red Square, which wasn't that far away by foot. 
Over the bridge, past St. Basil's, past GUM on the right and the Kremlin wall with Lenin on the left, and by the time I got to the other side of Red Square, I was a bit chilled. Just as I passed the Kazan Cathedral, I could hear the sounds of the evening service from the choir inside over the speakers to the outside. Seemed to be a sign I should attend Vespers, so inside I went. Got a little worried when I thought we just started a full blown Liturgy, but sure enough it was just the evening service and soon I was back out of the road.
Inspired my encounter with the two guys from India the night before, I set off down Tverskaya Street in search of Restaurant Tandoor. Unfortunately, restaurants come and restaurants go and it is tough for even the Lonely Planet to keep up with them, and unfortunately, Tandoor was no more. Instead, I had to settle for Planet Sushi (you knew at some point I was going to end up at a Japanese place, didn't you)
Wow - this went on a bit longer than I had expected. Seems enough for this entry, so I'll sign off here for now.
End of the seventh entry
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