Steve In Russia

Moscow Journal #09 Getting back to Moscow

2007-05-31T02:18:00.000-07:00

Well, I'm back in Moscow (and not quite as tired as I look in this picture). Before I start with the current round of exploits, I have to start with the tale of getting here. As you might recall from a previous entry, before you can apply for a business visa from the Russian Embassy or Consulate, you might first obtain a Letter of Invitation (LOI) from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Moscow. The American Express office in Moscow handles the paper work for us, and I duly filed my paperwork with them (as I did back in January).

Not quite sure why, but for some reason, it takes longer to process a multiple entry visa than it does for a single entry visa (even though the only difference on my part is which box I checked on the application form): the advertised duration is 15 to 20 working days. Much to my surprise, on the lower end of the scale, I got a message from Amex informing me the LOI was in their office - now I just needed to arrange for pick-up.

But I'm thousands of miles and eight time zones away! Since Amex overnighted the LOI to me back in January (and that is a bit of a misnomer as it actually takes 3 days for the package to arrive), I asked them to repeat the process. However, true to form, there was a recent change in some rule or regulation, and Amex can no longer ship LOIs.

I called the local shipping department at work, and they informed me I should contact UPS. However, UPS in the States told me they can't arrange for an international pick-up and I need to call the Moscow office. Rang up UPS in Russia, and after putting me on hold, they hung up on me.

Decided to call the IBM office in Moscow (figuring they had a vested interest in my arrival in Moscow) to see if they could help. Unfortunately, IBM Shipping would not respond to any of my instant messages or notes, so I have to drag the secretary for lab director of software developers into the fray. After a few more exchanges with the secretary as the intermediary, Shipping finally got UPS to pick-up my LOI, and this was on March 21st.

A few days went by, and still nothing arrived at my house. On the 23rd, I asked the secretary for the tracking number (because Shipping would not communicate directly with me), and eventually I got a number. However, when I tried to locate the package, the UPS web-page stated the number was not valid. Due to the time difference, I had to wait until Monday, the 26th before I could contact Moscow again. The secretary informed me that after they gave me the original tracking number, they realized it was the wrong one and then she gave me the correct one. And it was still not valid (according to UPS.com).

Now I was beginning to get a bit anxious as my intended departure date was Monday, April 9th, and I still needed a couple of days for the consulate to process my application. I contacted the secretary again, and she got in touch with Shipping and they insisted UPS picked up the package. The secretary was getting frustrated (but not as frustrated as I was), and asked what more could be done.

"Well, if Shipping believes this number is valid, then ask them to track the package!"

The next day, the package finally showed up in the UPS web site (with a pick up date of 3/26). Finally, some progress.

Alas, the joy was not to last long. The following day, I got a note from the secretary informing me there was a problem with the package; for some reason, Russian Customs was holding it at the border. That seemed odd, but there didn't seem to be anything to do about that.

A couple of more days went by, and the status on the web-page changed; now the package was being held for non-payment. This completely perplexed me. Turns out, IBM and/or Amex was in the custom of sending LOIs to their destinations COD, and some recipients have not paid their bills. UPS decided to hold my package hostage until IBM (or Amex, I am still not clear on this point) paid an outstanding bill of over $2,000.

I contacted a few more more senior people in IBM Moscow, and the best advice I got was to start the whole process all over again, and this time, they would either send the LOI with a different carrier or they would ask someone heading over to the States to put it in the US Mail to me once they got to America. Back in January, I asked Amex if I could apply for a multiple-entry visa at the same time I had an application in the works for a single-entry visa, and the answer was an emphatic, "No!" So I doubted the Ministry of Foreign Affairs would let me file for another LOI when the first one was never completely process.

While all this was happening, a situation arose at one of a customer installation (I'll omit the name, but they are located in Arkansas - that should be enough of a clue to figure out their identity). I was really hoping to make it through my career at IBM without visiting north west Arkansas, but given my LOI was still in UPS's possession in Moscow, I had to respond to this request for an on-site visit.

(As a side note, the trip to Bentonville really wasn't that bad. Then again, it wasn't the typical engagement either. However, that is a different story).

Just before I left for Arkansas on April 9th, I just happened to instant message with a co-worker in Moscow. He asked when I was scheduled to return to Russia, and I explained how UPS was holding my LOI as a hostage. Not sure how he did it, but they next day, he asked me, "If I pay UPS the equivalent of $50, they will deliver your letter. Is that OK?"

"Of course!" was my immediate response. Oleg paid the money, and while I was in Arkansas, my LOI finally arrived at the house. I assumed Oleg must have relatives or a close friend at UPS, but that's not the case. According to him, he went to the UPS office (which is not far from his house) and explained to the agent that IBM was not going to pay the $2000 bill just because this one letter was held hostage. Somehow he convinced the clerk that it was more practical to pursue the issue of non-payment with IBM and allow him to pay for this parcel. Still amazed that I ever got this LOI.

Anyway, back from Bentonville and armed with my LOI (and the rest of the application materials), I applied for the visa. I just had to change the dates of the trip from 4/9 through 4/26 to May 14th through June 1st.

While waiting for my passport to come back, I contacted American Express (here in the US) to change the flights. As it turns out, the original flights I booked for the April 9th departure was actually two separate tickets. For some reason, it was cheaper to book the NYC to London leg (on American Airlines) as one segment and the London to Moscow (on British Airlines) portion as another segment. What I didn't realize was that when I had to cancel/postpone that trip, American Airlines gave me a credit, however, the British Airlines' ticket was non-refundable, non-changeable, non-anything; BA simply kept my (OK, IBM's) money!

Now I had two reasons for despising Heathrowe - not only do they only allow one piece of carry-on luggage, they don't refund tickets!

Since I had to use American for part of the way (to use my credit with them) and I didn't want to go through London, I opted for FinnAir and Helsinki. The big shock came when the travel agent priced the new ticket. The relatively short hop from Helsinki to Moscow costs almost as much as the big leap across the Atlantic from JFK to Finland! Amazing. Also, for some reason, the first leg was booked as an e-ticket, but the Helsinki to Moscow leg was a paper ticket.

Eventually, the day of my departure arrived and it was time to schlep out to the airport. The night before, I stayed in NYC, so I opted to take the subway out to Jamaica and then the AirTrain to the terminal. I hopped onto the subway with plenty of time to spare, so even when we get stalled for a few minutes in Queens, I didn't panic.

Rolled my new luggage (thanks again, siblings!) through the terminal and over to the check-in counter. A bit of a line, but I had a book and I was just chllin'. To the front of the line, I produced my passport and paper ticket for Helsinki to Moscow, and the agent generated my boarding pass and handed back my documents. And I still had almost 2.5 hours until boarding.

Wandered around the terminal for a bit, got a bite to eat, wandered around a bit more and then finally went through security (with over 90 minutes still to kill). The Finns should really complain about their allotted space in JFK - what a grungy little section of the airport. First of all, it is isolated from the rest of the gates, and the only services available on the other side of security is a little newspaper stand and a poorly stocked coffee shop. Finally found an outlet and decided to power up the ThinkPad for a bit. (I should have started writing up this note then, but, true to form, I am doing this the day before I return!)

About 45 minutes before departure and just 15 minutes before boarding, I pulled out my documents and took a look through them. "Humm," I moaned to myself, "this is a bit odd. I only have 1 boarding pass. With only a 40 minute layover in Helsinki, I don't think I'll be able to get the boarding pass for the next leg while in transit."

Decided to pop over to the counter and I explained my situation to the agent. She asked for the claim ticket for my bag, and that's when I noticed my luggage was only checked as far as Helsinki! So much for being a "world traveler" - what a rookie mistake! You always check your boarding passes when you the agent checks you in. Oy.

The agent made a few calls and put an alert on my back. However, the way FinnAir can handle a 40 minute layover in Helsinki is they put the bags for Finland in one set of containers and the bags for Moscow (and the other destinations) in other containers. When the plane lands, all they have to do is move the large container from one plane to another. She said she would try to get my bag moved from one container to the other, but given I checked in so early, my bag was already loaded on the plane. So much for arriving early!

Sure enough, when we touched down in Moscow just after noon, the other bags went round and round the carousel, but my bag never showed up. Being the optimist, I waited about 30 minutes before walking over to the Lost Baggage area to file my claim. They already knew about my bag and informed me it would be on the Aeroflot due in at 10pm. I left the address of my hotel, and they said a courier would deliver it.

Humm - maybe it wasn't such a bad thing after all?

When I checked in at the hotel, I told the receptionist I expected my luggage to arrive sometime after 10pm, but I didn't expect to still be awake. And sure enough, the next morning, the red light on the phone was blinking and my bag was waiting for me downstairs.

OK - I think this is enough for the one.

Moscow Journal #08 02/24/2007 - 03/03/2007

2007-03-23T08:43:00.000-07:00

Begining of the eighth journal entry.

I don't know why, but somehow once I get home, I have a tough time finishing up these journals. The only reason you are getting this note (aren't you lucky) is that I am back in Moscow for another 16 days or so. But you 'll have to wait a while before you get to hear about any recent exploits - first you have to tolerate my recollections from the February trip.

When we last left off, it was Saturday, February24th, and Alexey and his girlfriend offered to drive me out to Sergiev Posad (Сергиев Посад), which is a small town about 60K (37.2 miles) north east of Moscow. The main "attraction" there is Trinity Monastery of St. Sergius, one of Russia's most important religious and historical landmarks. Of course, I needed a little refresher on the life of the Saint and the monastery, and luckily the OCA (Orthodox Church in America) came to the rescue.

After a fairly quick car ride, we arrived at our destination. They didn't offer any audio guides, but they did have an even better option - a live guide, and we even had a choice of languages: either Russian or English. I wanted to ensure Alexey and Natasha got something out of the experience, so I offered to get one in Russian. However, Alexey felt Natasha's English was up to listening to the tour in my native tongue, so I made arrangements for a English speaking guide.

For about $30 (for all three of us), we got a semanarian student for a little over an hour. He started off in English, but once he discovered I spoke or more accurately, listened (my passive vocabulary is much stronger than my active) to Russian, I noticed he reverted more and more to Russian. Every once in a while, I had to remind him he was now speaking Russian, and I didn't quite understand what he just said.

Anyway, I thoroughly enjoyed the tour, especially since we gained access to Assumption Cathedral, which was closed to the general public. While visiting that church, our guide explained the layout of church and he asked me what we call the room outside the nave in English. At first, the only word I could come up with was "vestibule," but I knew there was a more exact term. Rather embarrassed I couldn't recall this word (maybe my active vocabulary in English isn't very extensive, too), I was relieved when "narthex" finally popped into my head.

Our tour ended, and our guide left the three of us to continue exploring the grounds on our own. We made our way into Trinity Catherdal, where St. Sergius is entombed. For Alexey and Natasha, the visit was about looking at the icons and soaking in the history; however, they didn't feel any need or desire to wait on line to venerate the tomb of St. Sergius. They took off and continued to tour the grounds while I inched my way along to the final resting place of St. Sergius.

Once back outside, I figured this would be a good place to look for some wooden crosses. (Before I left for Moscow, my priest back home showed me some crosses he picked up on a recent visit to Ukraine and asked me if I could find some more). The three of us popped into one of the gift shops and asked the attendant at the first counter if they had any wooden crosses.

In true Soviet (or is it Russian) style, the one word reply, "No."

Alexey started to walk away, and I had to pull him back and asked the woman, "Do you know where there might be any?"

That produced a little more information and we located another room down the hall that had a stash of wooden crosses. But they looked so small. Turns out, there are a bunch of vendors outside the monastery, and we opted to pay them a visit.

Found a vendor with a single cross, and when I told her we needed three, she went trotting off to another guy all the way down the road for the additional two items. As a side note, once I got them back home, they looked so big compared to the ones my priest already had. Maybe the original ones I found inside the monastery were of the desired dimensions?

While we were on the tour, the guide mentioned there would be a service later that day around 5pm, and the choir was supposed to be most impressive. Unfortunately, we already finished our tour and souvenir purchases, and it was only 2pm. Didn't think I could talk Alexey and Natasha into hanging around for another 3 hours just so I could listen to Vespers. So we took a walk around the outside of the grounds and snapped a few more photos before heading back into town.

Here are some shots. I must admit, I am still a sucker for onion domes. These are from Assumption catherdral:

This is Assumption Cathedral with the Holy Trinity Icon

Bell Tower

This is the Metropolian's Residence. Notice the Roman Number XV at the bottom of the seal? Every year that is updated as it represents the current year of the Metropolitan's reign.

View from outside the monastery:

From what I remember, that night I decided just to relax and I read a book back in the hotel.

The next day, Sunday, I dubbed my Day of Mistakes. First, went to Liturgy with Tanya and Sophia, and I'm not sure what caused it, but we had some bonus services thrown in with the main event and it seemed to drag on forever. After church, I wanted to head out to Izmailovo Park, where a bunch of vendors sell souvenirs. According to the metro map in my Lonely Planet Guide, there are two stations with a similar name: Izmailovsky Park and Izmailovskaya, and I needed Izmailovsky Park. I hopped onto the metro, made the necessary change at Kurskaya and exited the metro at Izmailovskaya. Following the directions in the Lonely Planet, after about five minutes, I should have seen the entrance to the park. Well, I went for almost 10 and found nothing, and that's when I realized my mistake. Izmailovsky Park was renamed to Partisanskaya, so I got off at the wrong station!

I was in a bit of a rush as I planned on catching a volleyball match after shopping, so I hustled down the road to the proper metro station and found all the vendors. Not being much of a shopper, I only wondered around for a few minutes. I picked up a few things for the newphews and then toyed around with getting a new fur hat for myself. One vendor had a large selection, and he picked one out for me to try one. He wanted 1000 rubles (remember, my fourth line only paid 500 on Red Square), and when I looked at the label on the inside, it had a Soviet Stamp. This guy wanted me to pay double the price for a hat that was already over 15 years old. I decided to pass on that and then set off for the Sports Club Luch.

Normally I would have walked the entire way as it wasn't that far from where I was. However, I was pressed for time and opted for the electric bus through the park.

Now I was only a few blocks from my destination, and more importantly, I knew where my destination actually was. With great certainty, I navigated my way down the road, through the alley and over to the sports complex. Went up to the door, pulled on the handled and then noticed there was no one else in the facility except the woman behind the desk. Turns out, there was not match here today! I tried to find out if I was in the correct venue on the wrong day or in the wrong venue on the correct day, but she wasn't very helpful

Back to the hotel to drop off my purchases and then back out for a concert at the Catholic Church near Belorusskaya Station. Unfortunately, in my haste to leave, I left the address back in my room, and I didn't realize it until I was already at the target metro stop. I tried asking one of the policemen at the metro stop where the Catholic church was, and he pointed me to the church just across the street. I explained that was an Orthodox Church and repeated I was looking for a Roman Catholic Church. I took his shrugged shoulders as a sign of ignorance, so I contined to wonder the streets, hoping for some inspiration.

Luckily, on a near-by street corner, I noticed one of the many kiosks that sells tickets to various events. The lady inside was extremely helpful and even pulled out her map to point out my destination. I was afraid I was going to be a bit late, but I managed to arrive at the church before the concert even began.

Not sure what happened on Monday (nothing in my notes), and my next reminder is for Tuesday. After work, I decided to try the Indian Restaurant in the Sputnik Hotel. It moved floors since the Lonely Planet was written and now sits on the 16th floor with a wonderful view of town. The food was extremely tasty (not that I know much about Indian food) and they even had entertainment - a belly dancer. I didn't think that was quite Indian, and I was even more perplexed when she performed one number balancing a silver cane on her head. I had a feeling no one would believe me about this part of the story, but I didn't have my camera with me to snap confirmation of this feat.

On Wednesday, Tanya and I went to see Hamlet, and I must confess, we were a bit confused before the show: was it an opera or was it a play? I thought it was a play, but there was definitely someone listed on the ticket as the conductor. Turns out, there was just some music to accompany the production so it was definitely a play. Even though I am somewhat familiar with the plot, I printed off a synopsis of the action, and it was handy to use as a reference. This being Russia, even though they followed the plot (mostly), the ending was extremely odd. For some reason, this is where the music really kicked in and overpowered the actors, who literally just mouthed the words for the final death scene (this is a Shakespearan play afterall). Most bizarre.

After the show, I decided to walk back to my hotel, which wasn't that far away as it was one of my last nights in town. I cut through a park, and I guess my timing was just right (or was it wrong). I managed to get into the park just after all the gates were locked so by the time I got to the opposite end, I had no exit. I tried a few of the gates and there were all secure. Seems like I had two options: run back to where I entered (hoping that one was still open), or hop a fence. Given the former was not very likely, I actually opted for the latter and found a spot where the snow piled up against the side of a building and eased the climbing over the 6 foot fence. Of course, I waited until I couldn't see anyone on the other side as I didn't need any witnesses to this particular activity. Once back in the hotel, I decided to stop at the German restaurant within the hotel and celebrate my exploits with a pretzel.

Finally, we are up to Friday, March 2nd - my last full day in Moscow (for this trip). After work, the original plan was to head out for some drinks with a co-worker. However, something suddenly popped up, and he couldn't keep the appointment. So I did what I always do when given some free time in Moscow - to Red Square for one last look/gawk at St. Basil's and Lenin.

For dinner, I decide to try the Boris Godunov restaurant, which is just off of Red Square and serves Russian cuisine. And once again, I availed myself of the Lenten menu (I almost feel like cheating when I dine this way) and had a wonderful borscht and plemeni. To top it off, dinner also included entertainment, and instead of a belly-dancer with silver cane atop her head, it was a quartert of hefty Russian women dressed in traditional garb belting our, for the most part, traditional Russian songs. I mouthed the words to Kalinka and Moscow Nights, but they really confused me when they did an a capella version of Silent Night!

With a full belly and lightened heart, I decided to finally take my "subway" tour. I stopped at a few of the stations along the Circle Line and snapped a few pictures. Unfortunately, it wasn't until I was almost done with the loop when I tried taking some pictures without a flash (and those came out much better), but it was a bit late and I was too tired to start the circle over again. Here are some of the pictures:

Lenin in the stain glass at Novoslobodskaya Station

Fancy artwork at Prospekt Mira.

Chandeliers and artwork (with some people) at Propekt Mira.

Memorial to the 1917 Revolution at Krasnopresnenskaya.

Long view of the same station

Mosaic of Lenin at Kievskaya Station.

Long view of the same station.

Another one from Kievskaya (I liked the mosaics).

Ceiling at Belorusskaya

After my tour of the metro, I returned to the hotel around 10 pm. I was already packed and I just had to stash a few remaining items into my bag. (Since I had to return through London, from my recent experience, I knew I could only have 1 carry-on and I did NOT plan on repeating that mistake on the return trip). Now the dilemna - with a 5am departure, the taxi was scheduled to pick me at at 2am to ensure I could get to the airport at least 2 hours before departure time. With only 4 hours before the taxi, do I take a nap and risk oversleeping or do I stay up and pull an all-nighter?

Surprisingly enough, I opted on the latter and managed to keep myself alert and awake until 2am. Dragged the bags downstairs, checked out and only had to wait a few minutes for the driver.

At that time of morning, there wasn't much traffic on the road, and we pulled into Domededovo Airport before 3am. I didn't believe there would be anyone working there at that hour, but sure enough, the agent was at the counter to check me in.

I wondered around for a bit, sat for a bit, read for a bit, and eventually I got up and walked around the airport again. A duty-free store was open, so I bought a few boxes of Russian chocolates and carried them in a separate plastic bag. Found an open restaurant and decided to grab a bite to eat. I tried to order breakfast (which seemed like a logical choice to me given the time of day), and the waitress told me they didn't start serving breakfast until 4am. I took a look at my watch and noticed it was only ... 3:57 am. I pointed out I was only 3 minutes short, and she actually took my order (I half expected having to sit their in silence for the next 180 seconds).

Finally boarded the plane, and I slept on and off (more off than on) from Moscow to London. Basically by the time I arrived in the UK, I had pulled an all-nighter, and I was a bit cranky. I thought for sure the plastic bag would pose no problem, but sure enough, the security officals barked at me to collapse my possessions down to one bag or leave the terminal and check-in one of the offending bags. As I mentioned already, I was a bit cranky after getting very little sleep and the absurdity of this regulation really ticked me off. So, I placed the boxes of chocolate in my winter coat (thank goodness for large coats with many pockets) along with the plastic bag, placed the coat, my computer bag and shoes on the conveyor belt to the x-ray machine and the walked through the screener. As soon as my stuff passed through x-ray, I took the plastic bag out of my coat and placed the chocolate back into the bag and exclaimed, "Look at that - I have two bags! How was that any quicker?" Did I mention I was a bit cranky from lack of sleep?

Once I got back security, I had to make my way over to the connection desk, where I learned my original flight from London to Chicago was cancelled, but there were two other options. They automatically booked me on the one that kept me in London the longest (again - another ploy to get you to buy more stuf from their duty free stores, I am sure of it!)

However, I was hoping to use some frequent flier miles (along with a co-pay) to upgrade from coach to business, and I wanted the flight that gaveme the best chance of that. Turns out - same flight (and again, the duty-free store ploy, I'm sure!)

On the flight from London to Chicago, I could my second wind and that's where I finally caught up on most of the journal entries for this first trip. Once in Chicago, I posted a bunch of them and even wrote up another entry or two before boarding the final plane back home.

End of eighth journal entry.

Moscow Journal #07 2/19/2007 - 2/23/2007

2007-03-22T13:23:00.000-07:00

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

Moscow Journal #06 2/12/2007 - 2/18/2007

2007-03-03T16:39:00.000-08:00

Beginning of the sixth journal entry.

For my next trip, I really need to keep on top of these journal entries. Right now, I'm composing this note on the flight from London back to Chicago, and as I look at my skeletal notes, I can barely remember what I did yesterday let alone almost three weeks ago. Then again, maybe that is just the side effect of pulling an all-nighter last night, but you'll hear more about that later (and at this rate, it will be much later!).

As many of you already know, telling time in the Orthodox church gets a little confusing. Some churches still use the Julian (or old-style) calendar for fixed dates, and that system for reckoning dates is 13 days behind the Gregorian calendar (or new-style calendar). That's why "Russian" Christmas falls on January 7th; for the folks that use the old calendar, that is actually December 25th. However, just to confuse matters even more, certain feasts and holidays are based on fixed offsets from Easter, and almost all Orthodox churches (with the exception of the Finnish Church) use the same formula for determining the date on which to celebrate the Feast of Feasts, and this calculation usually produces a different date from the one used in the West.
Furthermore, even when we celebrate Easter on the same day as the West (as is the case this year), we don't enter Great Lent at the same time. For us, the Great Fast is the 40 days before Holy Week, including Sundays (and in my interpretation, Holy Week is just a "bonus" week of preparation for the Pasha), while for the West, Lent is the 40 days before Easter excluding Sundays. When the dates for Easter align, the West marks the entry into this period of the church's life with Ash Wednesday and we begin two days earlier on Monday.

However, in a somewhat similar manner to feasting before a fast as expressed in Carnival celebrations and Mardi Gras, the week before Great Lent is called Maselnitsa and is a time for consuming massive amounts of dairy products and blini (a Russian treat that is somewhere between a crepe and a pancake). This is not something we quite do back home though last year I tried to have crepes one night during Maselnitsa only to be told they won't heat up the crepe iron for just one person. Since I was in the land of blini, I decided to take full advantage of the blini options.

Even in the cafeteria, at the station called "Tastes of the World", blinis were the taste of day for the entire week. Traditionally, you place caviar (something I still have not acquired a taste for), sour cream, chives, fish, jam, honey or more recently chocolate, either separately or in any combination, though I'm not sure I would try a caviar, jam, honey chocolate combo. Or course, given my genetic predisposition for sweets, my blini that week were of the dessert variety.
To supplement the lunch-time blini, every night that week, instead of taking the bus to the metro and returning straight back to the hotel, I altered the route. From the office, I walked to the closest metro station, where the wait was sometimes up to 15 minutes (after 5 tries, you would think the law of averages would dictate that at least one night I should be able to arrive in the station and simply walk onto the waiting train, but I would swear that I had to wait at least 10 minutes each night), but the last stop on that line was Oxotny Ryad (Охотний Ряд) - very close to the tower of the Kremlin that provides access for the visitors of the Kremlin grounds. From there, it was a short walk to the mall, where the food court provided other dairy options for the main course (usually a slice of pizza) topped off with yet one more blin. Most nights, I went for the chocolate with banana, but one night I had to settle for wild berries since they were out of chocolate (comforting to know I am not the only person who enjoys these dessert blini). Even in the consumption of blini, I reverted to being a creature of habit.

Flying through the week again (since work is just work), and Wednesday of that week was St. Valentine's Day. In the morning, I went to the gym, as was my custom (snagging some butter cookies from the lobby before performing the daily ritual), and I was in the process of getting ready for work when there was a knock at the door. A bit surprised as I wasn't expecting anyone at 8:30, I opened the door to discover someone standing there with a little bottle of red wine along with a small plate of 6 chocolates. including a chocolate covered strawberry. I was even more surprised by appearance of these goodies as I didn't order anything from room service, and the delivery woman informed me they were compliments of the hotel. How nice (but in retrospect, for $250 a night before taxes, they could afford to throw little offerings like that to long-term guests every once in a while. Turns out they did; about once a week, I returned from the office to find some treat left for me in the room. But that is another story...)

I tried to be good by rationing the treats and to stretch them out over at least two days, but it didn't quite happen. The first three pieces fell victim to breakfast, and the survivors didn't make it past the evening when they became part of a second dessert (after the blin with chocolate and banana).

Earlier in the week, Tanya took a look at Afisha for options on Friday night, and she selected a performance at the Main (Big) Hall of the Conservatory. During the day, when I started to poke around to ascertain my best choice for metro station, one of my co-workers noticed my activities. She asked what I planned on seeing that night, and true to form, I had to confess ignorance. We both took a look at Afisha and when we came to the entry describing that night's concert, she just looked at me and said, "I hope you didn't already by tickets; maybe you can see something else?" Russians tend to be a bit blunt (Remember the comment about the chocolate? "What's the matter - don't you like Russian chocolate"? On similar lines, on my last day there, one of the guys asked me, "So, what don't you like about Moscow?" It took a great deal of self control to not say, "How much time do you have, buddy?"! Or another incident; on my way over to Moscow, I saw a book in Chicago that looked intriguing called The Romonov Prophecy; it is set in Moscow and I thought it would be a hoot to read it while I was in Moscow. That never happened as I worked on some other books first, and trying to lighten my load, I decided to leave the book with another one of the guys at work. He took one look at the cover and said, "Well, I am not sure how good this book will be; I have a feeling the author doesn't really know Moscow and it seems to me it just shows Moscow as a stereotype, like Russians are often portrayed in bad American movies." Honest and blunt)

Wow - that was a bit of a tangent. OK - back to the concert. R's concern (in Russian stories, when the author didn't want to name a given character or place, he would simply use a single letter; that's a bit easier than saying "the woman from work" all the time) was the program Afisha advertised: it was some sort of drum thing. I was willing to try anything and I knew Tanya had already purchased the tickets.

Left work a little early to give myself ample time to get to the Conservatory, which was a good thing as I good lost. Well, not quite lost, confused is more accurate. When Tanya gave me the directions, she told me it was on Nikitskaya Street (Никитская Улица), which is very close to Tverskaya Street (Тверьская Улица), but for some reason, when I got out of the metro on Nikitskaya Street, I misremembered the directions and wondered a long block away to Tverskaya Street. Once there, turned left and started down the road in search of the Conservatory. After about 15 minutes in what should have only taken 5 at most, I figured something was wrong. By this time, I was already all the way down at Pushkin Square, and I basically had to complete my square by returning to Nikitskaya Street and heading back to the metro. What a dope. As I said, luckily I left work early as we still had time for a quick bit to eat (fettuccini with, you guessed it, a blin for dessert, but I had to settle for apple since neither chocolate nor wild berries were on the menu) and then over to the Hall.

Turns out, Afisha was a bit mistaken and it listed two performance for the Main Hall that night both at the same time. The one we saw at work was the more modern performance, while what was actually performed was a set of pieces by Tchaikovsky. Unfortunately, I accidentally tossed away all the programs (put them in the wrong pile while packing); I remember the pieces after the intermission consisted of 6 of the 12 months of the year, but I can't remember what they played before intermission. Oh, well.

After the concert, just to stick to my evening ritual, after walking Tanya back to her car, I trekked back over to Red Square to take another look at St. Basil's and Lenin. Trying to be somewhat good, I skipped the blin in the mall and took the metro back to the hotel. However, there is another blini kiosk on the route between the metro and my room, and I could no longer resist - I had to have yet one more; this little booth didn't offer banana with the chocolate, and as it turns out, they were even out of chocolate, so it was a wild berry. Instead of dining al fresco (and when I say fresco, I mean fresco - it was minus 10 or 15 Celsius that night) as some folks do, I got mine placed into a little pouch, transported it the ten minutes or so back to my room and devoured it in the comfort of my surroundings.

Before I left for Moscow, AnneMarie (one of the manager's in my area) gave me the name (Olya) of a contact in Moscow. Turns out AnneMarie is Olya's career mentor, and they thought it would help for Olya to practice her English on me while I was in Moscow. We make plans to go sightseeing one day, and this Saturday (2/17) was it. I wanted to see Novodevichy Monastery, and as it turns out, Olya had never been there. We met on the platform of the metro station closest to our destination at 10 am (I left like such a spy - I was going to tell her I would be the one wearing the white carnation in his lapel, but then I remembered my outer coat doesn't have a lapel) and off we went.

The Monastery has a colorful history and Peter the Great confined his older sister there after her failed attempt to overthrow him, and his first wife (maybe second) also managed to end up there, too. One of the interior buildings housed a display on, you guessed it, icons, which we investigated. The other interesting feature of the Monastery is the cemetery, which after the Kremlin Wall, was the second most prestigious placed in Moscow to be buried. Partly what lends to this prestige was the hosts of famous Russians from the pre-Communist Era. The Lonely Planet provides a basic map of the grounds which indicates where some of the more famous residents are located.

However, before we could make our way over to the cemetery, I had to find the Duck Statues. A friend sent over a link with some pictures of a set of statues that was somewhere in the park surrounding the Monastery. The piece consists of a mother duck along with 8 baby ducks, and from the pictures on the web-page, I had a general appreciation for which side of the monastery I had to be on, but with a foot or two of snow on the group, I wasn't sure how visible these things were going to be. Were not talking gigantic statues here - just slightly larger than life size, and I feared there were buried under a blank of compressed snow.

Olya was a trooper and didn't question my motives as we plodded along in search of my target. Came across a few snow women (not sure if this is customary in that Russians always make snow women or this was part of the Maselnitsa celebration, where the "mascot" is a tall female doll that is burned on the last day, along with all the leftover blini). Anyway, I was just about to suggest we start asking for assistance from passers-by when I spotted my fowl in the middle of the walk way between us and the Monastery. Across a small snow field, and it was time for some photos. It's good thing I took a picture of the plaque so now I can give you a little more on these ducks. "This sculpture is given in love and friendship to the children of the Soviet Union on behalf of the children of the United States. It is based on the beloved American children's story 'Make Way for Ducklings,' by Robert McClosney. The sculptress is Nancy Schön. 1991 Presented by Mrs. Barbara Bush" Never heard of the book, never heard of the author, never heard of the sculptress (did hear of Barbara!), but most importantly, I got the pictures. Of course, I forgot to send the photos to Mark so I better go do that know before I forget again.

OK - sent Mark the note with the pictures, so back to our story. A few people passed by, and I seemed to be the source of a fair amount of entertainment for them as I swept of the plaque, knelt on the ground trying to get some decent shots, running from mom to the ducklings and back again. I wonder if anyone took a picture of me? After snapping said pictures, it was time for the cemetery. Around a corner or two and down the road a piece and there was the entrance. Olya seemed a bit shocked that I was the one playing the role of "guide", but it was only because of The Lonely Planet. We started off in the newer section where we paid our respects (if you can call snapping a photo of their tomb stones "paying respect") to Khrushchev (his monument is half white and half black, to represent the good and evil aspects of his personality), Raisa Gorbacheva (a statue of a forlorn looking woman standing over the slab of a tomb stone), Typolev (a triangular monument with the point down on which is carved his bust along with an airplane, just to remind you he was a famous airplane designer), found a family of Vinogradovs (gotta find out if Fr. Alex is related to them), Gromyko (Minister of Foreign Affairs - this was an interesting one: it was a cube where one side contains a relief of his face and another side contain a negative relief; you'll have to wait until I put the pictures out on the blog to appreciate this one). I wasn't sure how much Olya enjoyed this activity - I must admit it is a bit odd to go sight seeing in a cemetery. However, once we made our way over to the older section, it was like a Who's Who in Russian History: Gogol, Chekov, the workers the sacrificed themselves in order to seal the reactor at Chernobyl, the Tretykov brothers (founders of a famous art gallery), Stanislavsky (founder of a theatre and a method of acting), Bulgakov (writer), Stalin's second wife (Nadezhda Allilueva) along with a host of other characters (whose names escape me right now). At the point, Olya seemed very taken with our task and I no longer felt guilty about dragging her here.

The original plan for the day was to head to Kolomenskoye next (this is an ancient royal country seat) set in the southern portion of town. However, it was a bit away, and we spent much more time at Novodevichy and in the cemetery than I had originally planned. Since it was such a beautiful day with blue skies and sun, I asked to head back to Red Square for a few more photos under these "different" conditions. I also had an ulterior motive: in the exhibition hall where I caught the "Light to the World" on my first Saturday in town there was a new feature: the Honey Market.

Olya was extremely obliging, and back to Red Square it was. However, the view from there wasn't sufficient, so we have to circumnavigate the entire complex again going the long way around (so I could get more pictures from across the river) before working our way back to the Main Exhibition Hall and the Honey Market.

This place was incredible. The hall is extremely large, and it was completely covered by booths of honey vendors. Producers from various regions across the country (and from a few of the newly independent states, too, I think) converge on Moscow for two weeks to sell their wares. For the most part, it is just honey (a few people sell the entire honey comb, there are a couple of products made from honey, but the vast amount of what is sold and bought is simply honey). Who knew there was such a selection and variety of honeys. In general, the honey here is quite different. Instead of the transparent dark brown viscous fluid we are accustomed to squeezing out of bear shaped bottles, the honey here tends to be pale in color (a very dark off-white or light tan) and opaque. The best part of the Honey Market is you get to go from booth to booth sampling all the varieties. Each vendor has a container of little plastic spoons and you simply take a spoon, dip it into the tasting jar, swirl it around a little to pick up some honey, place the spoon in your mouth, let the honey coat your tongue and gently slide down your throat, dispose of the sampling spoon in the receptacle for used utensils, move onto the next sample and repeat. I sometimes use honey in my tea, but it tends to be clover, and these honeys have quite a different taste, and it also varied not only by the region but on the type of flower the bee extracted the pollen from. Some of the honeys had a course, grainy texture (and given my exposure to the amber clover variety, I didn't quite care for the those) while others were smoother and tasted more familiar (well, at least in texture).

When I was here 25 years ago on one of our class trips, we went to Suzdal (a small town outside of Moscow), and I remember getting some honey that was used as spread on dark bread, and it was wonderful. It might have been just that the food, in general, at that time was so miserable that the honey left such an impression on me. However, I forgot about that taste sensation, until the Honey Market brought it all back.

Olya and I sampled a fair number of specimens in my attempt of finding a smooth, creamy variety, similar to what I had in Suzdal. At some point, Olya pointed out that we should have come prepared with something to drink, and she had a point; you can only eat so much honey before it starts to get to you. While we never found what I remember tasting 25 years ago, we made a valiant attempt, but in the end, had to admit defeat. Even though it wasn't particularly late, I started to drag a bit and decided to call it a day.

Before parting, Olya told me about the metro station Revolution Square, which is adorned with large life-size metal statues of people from various walks of life, including a soldier with a dog and another one of a soldier holding a machine gun. Olya informed me people rub the tip of the machine gun to improve their love life and they rub the nose of the dog for general good luck. I expressed surprise (since I didn't think the Soviet man was supposed to be superstitious), which I think she took as an expression of complete disbelief. Since we were both heading to the metro anyway, and Revolution Square wasn't too far away, off we went. Sure enough, the tip of the machine gun is nice and shiny while the rest of the statue is dull and worn, and it was a similar situation for the dog's nose. Of course, I had to get a picture, and just as I started to frame the shot, a train arrived in the station and dispersed it load. I'm not sure if it was just because I was trying to take a picture, but I think every person who passed by felt compelled to touch that dog's nose! Eventually the crowd cleared, and I got my desired picture: one of the just the dog and another one with me touching his nose. Mission complete, it was back to the hotel for me and home for Olya.

The next day, Sunday, was the last day of Maselnitsa. After Liturgy in the morning with Tanya and Sophia, I went back to my room, changed into my play clothes and popped down to the Park of Cultural named after Gorky (usually referred to as Gorky Park in English). Before heading into the park, I decided to swing by Sculpture Park, which is just across the street. This is where some of the monuments to Communist Achievement and old Communists were housed after they were removed from their pedestals across town. Interesting, there are also some more recent pieces here, too, including a tribute to the victims of Stalin's purges.

Just outside the park is another somewhat controversial sculpture. Yuri Lushkov, the Mayor of Moscow commissioned Tsereteli to produce a monument to Peter the Great. The result is a gigantic ship (I would guess it is over 300 feet from the base to the top of the mast) with a rather large Peter standing on the deck looking forward to the future through a telescope. Like the Cathedral of Christ the Savior (which was also designed by Tsereteli - have you noticed a pattern), this monument to Peter also has it critics and its proponents, but the vast majority of people find it abhorrent. Now as a sculpture, I like the concept, and though it is a bit large for the setting, I don't find it that disagreeable. However, I think what most people find distasteful is simply the concept; why construct a monument in Moscow to the man who moved the capital from here to St. Petersburg. It would be almost as inappropriate as erecting a monument to General Sherman in downtown Atlanta. (NOTE: we have a Tsereteli much closer to home; he designed a monument called Tear of Grief, which is a gift from the Russian government as a memorial to the those that died in the attacks on September 11, 2001, and we placed it in Bayonne, NJ.)

After snapping the obligatory pictures (which you'll get to see at some point, I promise), it was back over to Gorky Park. During the winter, they flood the paths, let them freeze and then people just skate around everywhere. I didn't have all that much time, and I didn't feel like waiting on line for rentals, so I had to be content with just slipping along the ice and taking in the scenery. In addition to the skates, they had some traditional games for Maselnitsa: tug of war (where the combatants still had skates on their feet, so that looked like an accident waiting to happen to me) along with some game with people toss sticks at some pegs (kinda like duck pin bowling, but using another pin instead of a ball) and one last game: jump rope. When I first entered the park, I thought what's the deal with that - why are people having such a tough time with skipping rope. Then on the way out, I realized they were doing it on skates over ice! Well that would definitely increase the level of difficulty.

While I was having a good time enjoying this public celebration, Tanya was throwing a blini party for the last day of Maselnitsa, and I didn't want to miss an opportunity for home made blini. And I am extremely glad I didn't as they were the best tasting ones of the lot and I stuffed myself to almost bursting.

However, I am almost embarrassed to admit this. After leaving Tanya's, instead of taking the metro the two stops to the station closest to my hotel, I decided to walk back to my room. By the time I got near the hotel, I had to pass the local blini kiosk, and since I was passing by anyway, I just had to have just one more chocolate blin.

With an overstuffed belly, Sunday came to a close.

End of the sixth journal entry.

Moscow Journal #05 2/6/2007 - 2/11/2007

2007-03-03T16:36:00.000-08:00

Beginning of the fifth journal entry
For this entry, I'm going to go back to my traditional style, and we'll just fly by the work days when nothing especially exciting happened. But before we get back to the regularly schedule diary update, a side note from a concerned reader. Carolyn suggested I use a blog to post all my ramblings and then I can also put some pictures in a central location and not clutter up the network lines by sending out the images to everyone on the distribution list. Sounded like a good idea, and Carolyn was even kind enough to set-up the blog for me. Didn't seem like I had all that much more to do other than put some appends out there. Followed the link to the web-page, and she even put my first note out there! What a pal!

Unfortunately, the hosting program, in an attempt to be accommodating to all users, displays the text on the action keys in what it thinks is your native language. Not sure exactly how it makes this determination, but for some reason, the blog program thinks I am in Germany. Until I get back to the States (or possibly during my layover in London) when I hope those keys will display in English, I'll keep sending out notes as normal. However, be prepared - at some point, you'll just get a little note to remind you to go check the blog for an update...

Back to the journal. As I said before, work was/is work, with nothing of particular interest for the first few days. That jumps us from Monday right to Thursday night, when I went to my first concert. Moscow is a city of over 11 million people, which means there are tons of options available for evening entertainment, and there is a fantastic web site ( http://msk.afisha.ru/ ) that lists all the possibilities. For my first attempt at an after-work mid-week outing, I opted for a classical concert. Thanks to Afisha, I found the location of the venue (St. Andrew's Anglican Church), and it even listed the closest metro station.

The concert that night was a selection of work from Handel, Bach and Haydn for organ, voice and some woodwind. Even though I was only about 10 rows back and I thought I could identify most instruments, this one had me puzzled; I was torn between oboe and bassoon. Then it dawned on me to look at the program outline, and thankfully my little pocket dictionary had the translation for - oboe. I hope that even without the dictionary I would have figured it out eventually as the Russian word габой sounds more like oboe than bassoon.

I enjoy listening to some classical music (even though I am not an "informed consumer", as evidenced by my inability to identify the oboe), and one of the very nice features of listening to a performance in Russia is that before the players begin, an announcer takes to the stage and gives some information about the pieces on the agenda for that night. This is one of many situations where I wish I had studied more earnestly before coming back to Moscow. All I could get was this composers were not fully understood until the 20th century, blah, blah, blah (or should that be blah-ski, blah-ski, blah-ski?). One last comment about this concert: again, this just might be my untrained ear, but I really think they need to tune the organ at St. Andrew's!
Friday - work. (See, I told you these few journal entries would just fly by).

Saturday - the weekend, time to hit the streets and explore! Since my last visit to the Kremlin was a bit rushed and we didn't get to go inside any of the churches/museums, I opted to return to the heart of Russia and take it all in again. Off to an early start in an attempt to beat the crowds, and I had to make my way across Alexandrovsky Gardens to the ticket window. The snow had been falling gently all night, and the soldiers were out in force shoveling all the paths. With all the army units stationed in the capital, there is no lack of cheap manual labor. To make matters worse, the shovels these guys (not being sexists here, only men serve in the military here, and in theory, service is compulsory for all men, but many guys get exemptions for educational reasons) use are just planks of plywood with a pole attached as a handle. No nice curved metal scoopers or molded plastic models for these guys; just plywood and a broom stick, and most of the poles were not long enough (in my opinion) as every guy had to hunch over to use his shovel; talk about back breaking work!

Anyway, the ticket window opened about 30 minutes before the gates to the grounds, and I secured my entry pass and went to queue up at the main gate. It felt great to nudge out a tour group from Paris and get first in line! (Didn't know about that competitive side of me, did you?)
Passed through the security gate (as if boarding a plane; these security gates guard most tourist attractions and gathering spots, including shopping centers and malls) and headed straight for Успенский Собор (Assumption Cathedral). No one managed to pass me en-route, so I had the entire place to myself (excluding the women who check for the proper tickets on entry to the "museum" and who man the souvenir stalls). Times like these highlight my poor command of the English language as I find it difficult to locate the words to sufficiently describe the beauty of the place and moment. Fr. Alex, while commenting on the decorations of another church we had visited together a few years ago, noted the Russians "fear of empty space," as they just can't leave any portion of a wall unadorned. As you would except, Assumption Cathedral is a prime example of this form of decoration. Indeed, every piece of wall, pillar and ceiling was covered with icons, and there is the iconostasis itself (the wall that separates the nave from the altar). Upon entry to the Cathedral, the sense of amazement is overwhelming, and even though I'm not sure how it could be any more ornate, somehow in this setting it seemed fitting.

The Tsars were coronated in this cathedral and while I'm not a royalist (by no means do I advocate the re-institution of the monarchy and I might get ex-communicated for this, but I don't think Nicholas II and family should have been canonized since he was a weak ruler whose inept administration lead to the rise of the Communist), but to stand in that solemn place and in solitude for about 10 or 15 minutes (not sure what took all the others so long to get here; they must have stopped at some of the outside attractions before coming here), it was almost mystical.

But then the tours started to arrive and the somewhat hushed tones of the various guides in several language dispelled the tranquility of the moment and I took this as a cue to move on. The audio guide I rented (I love these things!) suggested I follow the coronation route of the Tsars, and so I did. After the official crowning ceremony at Assumption Cathedral, the procession moved to Архангельский Собор (Archangel Cathedral). All but one of the Tsars who ruled while Moscow was the capital (Peter the Great moved the capital from Moscow to St. Petersburg, his "window on the West", in 1712) are buried here, and the newly installed monarch would pay tribute to his ancestors here.

This cathedral was not as crowded (all the tour books indicate, and rightly so, that if you are pressed for time and can only visit one site within the Kremlin, it should be Assumption Cathedral, so I guess most people are pressed for time), and while it was almost uplifting to stand in Assumption Cathedral, something about all the tombs in Archangel Cathedral lent the space a more medieval and eerie atmosphere.

While I wandered from tomb to icon to tomb, I noticed a man remove the hat from his head (as custom warrants), but then he proceed to tell his girlfriend she should do the same (contrary to the custom; in working churches, women traditionally keep their heads covered with either a dainty napkin or they go for the full-blown babushka look with the massive shawl tied around the head). Even though this is not a working church, I didn't want the couple to incur the wrath of the babushka later on during their stay in Moscow, so I tried to politely inform them of the custom. Rather quickly determined they were Italian, and they didn't speak any English. Didn't seem like the time for the only phrase I can say in Italian ("mi piace il dolci" which means "I like desserts"), so I managed to grunt in very basic French - "Man - without hat. Woman - with hat."

Hoping I didn't offend them, I continue to wander around and as I gawked at another tomb, this group of 5 people dressed all in black glided past me and took up position in front of the iconostasis. Before I could figure out what was going on, one of them gave the pitch, and they began to sing "Our Father". What was a cold and foreboding surrounding was transformed into a spiritual and uplifting environment; I couldn't ask for more. Once they finished, they returned to a little table near the entrance, where they had a set of CDs for sale. How convenient - my first souvenir from this trip to Moscow.

After paying his respects to his ancestors, the new Tsar (and the rest of the gang) would then make one more (and final) stop in the royal procession - Благовещенский Собор (Annunciation Cathedral). Unfortunately for me (by maybe lucky for you?), that one was closed for renovations.

Since my ticket allowed it, I popped into Патриарший Дворец (Patriarch Palace), which for many years was the largest room in Russia without supporting columns and then into Церковь Ризоположения (Church of the Deposition of the Robe), where I latched onto a guide talking about the Holy Trinity icon to a group of Russians.

In theory, my time within the Kremlin was limited to two hours (the duration of the audio guide rental agreement), and I didn't want to see what penalties were levied for violating that contract. After the in-door sites, I only had a few minutes to wonder around the portion of the grounds open to tourists, and I soaked in a few more minutes of snow gently falling on the Kremlin before returning to the modern world.

Talking of the modern world, that was the next stop on the agenda. A woman at work highly recommended an exhibit at the Museum of Private Collections (Музей Личных Коллекций). During her description, she indicated the exhibit was closing this weekend and that it was extremely popular. However, I am fairly certain she did not mention the style of this artist's work. Anyway, while wondering from the Kremlin towards the museum, I overtook a group of three American girls and I overheard them talking about the Pushkin Museum, which was in the same general area. It wasn't as if i was eavesdropping, but when they seemed to be a bit lost, I figured I should stop and help them get their bearings. The Pushkin is a slightly larger museum and they found their destination quite a bit sooner than I did mine.

Wondering up and down Volkhonka Street, I keep missing the entrance. Eventually asked a set of guards in front of some museum if that was the Museum of Private Collections, and one said yes and the other said no. I felt like I was talking to the scarecrow in the Wizard of Oz! I guess my accent through the yes-man off, as I was definitely in the wrong spot. My destination was on the other side of the Pushkin, but off the main road just a bit. The line of people should have been my clue, but I was not functioning on all cylinders, I guess.

Queued up for a while and watched the two workers clear snow from plaza in front of the main door. The exhibit was indeed so popular they only let a finite number of people in at a time, and we had to wait for some folks to leave before being allowed to enter. A few minutes later, the lines shuffled forward and 15 of us were permitted to enter. Down to the cloak room to shed the outer wear ("Your coat is HEAVY!" exclaimed the attendant in another nice application of IK5 - a camera, small tripod, little tour book, pocket dictionary and a few snacks will do that) and then back to the main floor to secure a ticket and an audio guide. Once again, there's a price to pay for being a foreigner as the guides in English are about 50 rubles more than Russian (OK, so that is only about $1.50 or so, but it is the principle of the matter. I guess I should just be thankful they even had English and stop my whining.)

However, it took a little longer than expected to procure the audio guide. A sign on display case for the guides indicated the attendant would be back in five minutes. I guess she was on island time as 15 minutes later, she finally arrived to resume her duties.

Armed with my personal narrator, I entered the exhibition hall only to discover that Filonov (the artist on display) is of the modern variety - and I'm not much for modern art. I much admit I can see how some pieces provoke or invoke certain reactions, but for the most part, I just don't appreciate the items. My favorite piece was the first one on display, and like a good "student" I turned on the audio guide to get the inside scoop on this painting. Hey - this is the same guy who told me all about the Kremlin! It is a good thing I had the guide to give me the inside scoop on these pieces as I would never have seen most of what was being described on my own (and of course, if I see the pictures again, I'm sure I won't remember a thing about them). Even better it was in English because I could barely follow the commentary in my native tongue, I would have been completely lost in Russian.

The woman from work was definitely correct - the exhibit was tremendously popular, so popular the engagement was extended by a month (or possibly two). And not only that, a week or so later, the BBC ran a segment on the display, mentioning the importance of such an exhibit and of Filonov's work in general.

I lasted for almost 2 hours, at which point I was saturated. Returned the audio guide (and this time, the attendant was still at her post so I didn't have to wait a 15 minute version of a 5 minute break), got my coat (which was still heavy, and I was informed of that again) and on the road again. Next stop - Храм Христоса Спасителя (Cathedral of Christ the Savior). As I walked past the Pushkin Museum, the three American girls were making their way in the opposite direction. We exchanged a brief nod and greeting, and I hope they didn't think I was stalking them.

A few minutes of walking brought me to the Cathedral. From 1839 to 1883, the original cathedral was constructed on this site in commemoration of Russia's victory over Napoleon. Stalin demolished that one (probably not personally, but I wouldn't be surprised if he took a swing or two with a sledgehammer) during his reign and intended to replace it with a 900 foot "Palace of Soviets" including a 300 foot statue of Lenin. That building never came to fruition, and in it's place, the Soviets constructed the world's largest outdoor swimming pool.

With the fall of communism and in celebration of Moscow's 850th birthday, this version of the cathedral was completed in just two years at a cost of $350 million. While the structure is immense and beautiful with its huge marble pillars and marbled walls with icons in the Romantic style, even with the enormous iconostasis, the Romanesque architecture just didn't give me the feel of an Orthodox church (or cathedral) to me. I know St. Isaac's in St. Petersburg is off a similar design, but I felt as if I were in St. Paul's in London and not in Moscow. Turns out, I am not alone in my assessment, and most people either love the place or hate it. I wouldn't go so far as to say I hate, but I don't plan on coming here for Sunday services.

After wandering around the upstairs, I could hear the sound of a choir coming from a door leading downstairs. A sign indicated there was church down there (just like there are often many chapels in a Catholic cathedral) and nothing said I couldn't go downstairs, so down I went. I can't remember the name of the church (and I can't believe this, but my Lonely Planet guide doesn't list it either - horrors! My favorite tour book is letting me down), but this had the look and feel of an Orthodox church to me. The choir must have been off in a side room practicing because I couldn't find them in the church. Content with my little discovery, I felt I could resume my wanderings outside.

A bridge on the far side of the cathedral grounds crossed the Moscow River, which gave me another chance to stroll along the back side of the Kremlin and take in one of my favorite views of the city. Continued circumnavigating the Kremlin by crossing the river again and making my way past St. Basil's and Red Square, which brought Saturday to a close. (Well, I know I ate dinner, but I didn't put anything in my notes about where, so it must not have been anything noteworthy! Just didn't want you to think I skipped a meal.)

On Sunday, Tania and her daughter picked me up at the hotel to take me to their church (the Orthodox Church of St. Andrew, not the same place that had the organ concert earlier in the week). Luckily I had the bilingual outline for the service (prepared by Tanya's aunt Olga, who is a fellow parishioner at St. Gregory's in Wappingers Falls). It was a clear sunny day, the first in many weeks I was later told, and the chiming bells seemed to rejoice in the good weather as we left the ground after Divine Liturgy.

Part of their normal routine for Sunday includes a stop at the diner after services. Yes, Veronica, there is a diner in Moscow. Actually, there are two, both run by the same person. I couldn't pass up a chance to have pancakes with maple syrup (or maple-flavored syrup to be more accurate, not that I am a maple syrup snob) in Moscow, and it was tough finishing up the remains of Sophia's milk shake (milk cocktail, in Russian), but I was up to the challenge.

Fortified with a hearty brunch, we swung by my hotel, where I quickly changed into "play" clothes (do you remember doing that as a kid? When I was in elementary and middle school, we had school clothes, and as soon as you got home, you stripped off the school clothes, put on the play clothes and ran back outside to keep busy with your friends until dinner time, which was 6:00 pm SHARP, but I digress, again) including a pair of snow pants over my jeans, and then it was over to their house so Tanya could pick-up Sophia's winter gear. All dressed for a Moscow winter, we headed off to Silver Island Park (Серебряний Бор). Tanya is an assistant principle at the Anglo-American School in Moscow, and since the primary mission of the school is to serve the children of the staffs of the Canadian, British and American Embassies, Tanya gets certain "diplomatic" privileges, including a red diplomatic license plate on the car. It is good to have a red plate! The park is located in the area of Embassy dachas (recreational homes outside the city center), and with the red plate just you past the barricade guarding the compound. The police also tend not to stop red plates and try to extort fines (bribes) from their drivers...

On the way out to the park, we passed a few ominous looking towers. To me, they appeared to be cooling towards for a nuclear power plant. I commented as such to Tanya, and she assured me (as she posed the same question to locals), that these are strictly for the steam plants that are used to power Moscow and they are not affiliated with an nuclear process. I didn't see the typical dome structure that usually accompanies the cooling towers, so I took her word for it; I hope she is right. (But why should this concern me so much when back home I live within 30 or 40 miles of the Indian Head facility near Peekskill, which just happens to sit on the fault line that runs up the Hudson River.)

At the park, they constructed a tower that housed two slides: a little one and slightly higher one. On each track, a few ramps help raise the level of excitement for the sliders. This type of operation would never exist (at least not in an organized fashion where have to pay a small fee to use the facilities, like here in Moscow) back home. You didn't have to sign any waivers, parents didn't have to escort the children, and if you were stupid (or unattentive) enough to stand in the path of oncoming sliders and got knocked over, well, that is just your own fault.
While this park in particular might not be accessible to the "average" Russian, I am sure the typical Russian participates in similar activities all over the country. (One day, I did see a little boy sledding down the hill next to the Kremlin; if you can sled there, I'm sure you can sled anywhere).

By this time in my trip, the temperatures in Moscow finally dropped below those in New York, and after an hour or two, the kids got a bit chilled (and I think Tanya even more so). It was back home for Tanya, Sophia and one of Sophia's friends who happened to be at the park, too, while I hit the road again and made my way over to Sport Complex Luch (Спортивний Комплекс Луч). It was just a few metro stops away followed by a half-mile or so walk.

This was not a major match, and this sports club, while a nice facility, is not a well known venue. According to the map, it looked like it was actually closer to metro stop Perovo (Перово), but Afisha told me to get off one stop earlier at Enthusiasts Avenue (Шоссе Энтусиастов). This part was even chillier, and wind picked up a bit to make it even that much colder. I was very glad to still have my snow pants, and I decided then and there to continue wearing them every single day for the rest of my stay in Moscow. Not only do they help to keep the wind off your legs, but they help keep the grime off the bottom of your pants. I have no clue how the Russians managed to not get their cuffs soiled while walking around these mushy, slushy streets.

Anyway, just a couple of hundred meters from the metro station, a young woman came up to me and asked which station was closer: the one I just got out of or Perovo. I told her the one I just got out of, and what did she do? She turned around and headed AWAY from the station and towards the other one. Now I know I didn't screw up this one and accidentally but in a "not"; did she my accent and then decide I must not know what I was talking about? No clue.

A few minutes later, turned off the main street and down the appropriate side street. Blocks in Moscow are huge, and as such, there are often building behind the ones on that face the street. Supposedly the naming convention used in the address helps you figure this out, but I am not quite tuned into that system. While I was looking for address 10, another guy came up to me and asked where Luch was. I told him I was searching, too, and then I fell in behind him. It took a few more stops for directions (and I am not sure if I would have made it without him), but eventually we found the venue. And just in time, too.

We barely had time to sit down, when all of the sudden, the play began. I turned to the woman sitting next to me and asked, "Where was the national anthem?" She responded that in the old days, we sang and nowadays we drink. (The verbs for sing and drink are very similar in Russian, so it sounds much more witty in Russian).

Spartak (the team associated with the Army, which would account for all the uniforms in the audience), defeated their opponents (whose name I can't recall right now - sorry) in 3 games (should have been only two, but Spartak fell apart in the second game), and before I knew it, it was time to leave the venue. I lingered around a bit trying to figure out if there were ever any pick-up games in the facility, but was disappointed to find out they only conducted league games in this gym. Oh, well - so much for trying to get in some vball during this stay - guess I schlepped the court shoes over for no reason.

Back to the hotel and then another uneventful (or unrecorded) dinner, which brings the weekend to a close.

End of the fifth entry.

Moscow Journal #04

2007-03-03T16:33:00.000-08:00

Beginning of the fourth journal entry
For this journal entry, I am going to use a slightly different format. Instead of a diary where I record happenings and impressions on a day by day basis, today I am just going to string together a series of small stories and observations. Why the difference? Because there are only so many ways I can say "got up, looked for a job, hung out at the drugstore". (OK - that was a rather obscure reference to somebody's comedy routine; of course, I can't remember whose right now.)

The Morning Ritual
When I'm away from home, I usually establish a daily ritual that consists of some aerobic exercise (running, riding the stationary bike or some laps in the pool) followed by, hopefully a steam bath or sauna. I prefer to complete this in the morning since you never quite know how the day is going to progress and what time you'll make it back to the hotel.
Russia is famous for its banya (basically a sauna) so I was full of confidence I would be able to establish my "regular" regime. On the first day, I expected the sauna to be attached to the men's locker so I came to the gym just with my workout clothes, a towel and a bath robe (courtesy of the hotel). Much to my disappointment, the banya was not physically attached to the locker room; instead, it was out by the pool. I didn't feel like schlepping back upstairs for the proper attire, so I simply showered and returned to the room.

The next attempt at solidifying the routine was the following day, a Sunday. This time, I came prepared with my bathing suit . As an added bonus, on the way to the health club, I passed through the lobby, where they were not only serving few coffee and tea (which I didn't feel like having before working out), but they also offered complimentary cookies! Needless to say, until the beginning of Lent, the first part of the routine consisted of snagging a few cookies for a light post-workout breakfast of tea and biscuits back in the room.

Back to the health club. After an hour or so on the treadmill followed by a thorough shower, it was on with the bathing suit and out to the pool. And then some. Turns out the sauna was up one flight of stairs and just past the massage room, at which point there were actually two sets of rooms: one for women and the other for men. Ah - I thought it was a unisex unit since it was outside of the locker rooms; that's why I brought my bathing suit. I entered the men's suite, which consisted of a few rooms: first the outer room, which housed the water cooler/heater (the same unit provides both cold and boiling hot water, from different spigots - why don't we have these back home?). To the left of the outer room were the showers, and just past the showers the sauna. Back into the outer room and through the other door brings you into the "post-sauna" room (or "relaxing room"), which housed a total of 7 chaise lounges, with 4 along one wall and 3 along the other, along with a table with tea and little jars of honey and jam.

As it was fairly early on a Sunday morning, no one else was around and I had the whole place to myself. I left my solitary towel on the bench outside the sauna, popped into the sauna to get the bucket, filled it to the rim with some cold water and dashed back into the sweat box. After ladling a few helpings of water onto the hot stones, started the timer on my watch and sat down on the bench to let the hot steam settle down on me. Aaah...

Several minutes later, it was time to add a bit more water and let the hot air overtake me again. Aaah...

In a traditional banya, at some point during the sweat phase, you would perform self-flagellation with a set of wet young birch twigs. This sounds a bit masochistic and painful, and I must admit I never actually quite performed this part of the process. The theory behind the birch beating is it helps to improve the circulation by bringing more blood to the surface of the skin. However, this last winter in New York, my eldest sister treated the siblings to a session at a Russian-style banya in NYC and they offered a similar treatment; in that version, the therapists used branches of an oak tree (with the leaves still attached) and lightly dusted the client for about 3 minutes on a side, and strangely enough, it felt wonderful. Maybe the birch branches would produce a similar sensation - I still have a couple of days left - maybe I'll got birch branch hunting tonight.

You can only stay in the sauna for so long, and after ten minutes, I was ready for phase two: a rinse in cold water. (In a "traditional" Russian, and I think Scandinavian version, too, the second phase is usually a run into a snow bank; I was extremely grateful this sauna was on the second floor without an egress to the outside!) As I think I mentioned before, this temperature shock is supposedly very beneficial to the one's health (assuming you don't have a pre-existing heart condition.)

Finally onto the last phase: the resting. Prepared a cup of green tea and plopped down onto a chaise lounge to allow my body to come back down to room temperature, which took about twenty minutes or so. If I had enough time, I would have repeated the whole process again, but I had plans to meet Alexey at 10am, so I needed to return to my room to get ready.
On Monday, I started my ritual as normal (this time only 30 minutes on the bike as I had to leave the hotel by 9am to start my trek into work and you know I wasn't cutting the sauna portion short) and then walked up to the sauna suite in my bathing suit with my towel in hand. This time, it turns out I was not the only occupant, and this is when I discovered the proper "attire" for the sauna. Since the units were segregated by gender, all the other partakers were "au natural" and sitting on towels. Since I only had 1 towel, I could not quite do this, so I kept my bathing suit on (just to have something between me and the hot boards). Most of the other guys also had something on their heads (either a special "banya hat" or simply a towel wrapped around the head) because the steam from the water can get a bit overpowering when the water is first ladled onto the stones and it really hits you in the crown. Again, not something I could do with just one towel.

My timer popped and I exited the sauna, performed the pulse-quickening cold water rinse and entered the "relaxing" room. Now I really suffered from towel envy! Here I was with my single towel where all the other guys had four or five towels each. Seems like the norm consisted of at least two towels to cover the chaise lounge. Once you settled onto the chair, you then draped one more towel over your lower portion with the fourth draped around your shoulders and chest, and a couple of guys even used a fifth piece to cover their heads so by the end, they were covered in a towel cocoon. And here I was with a single towel!

Not much I could do to remedy the situation as the towels were all the way downstairs and back in the check-in counter. Slightly embarrassed and very aware of the lack of towels under and around me, I completely my cool down and calmly returned to the locker room.
By Tuesday, I had the routine down pat. Following the work-out, I wondered up to the sauna suite with my towels and bath robe; in a very minor attempt at being green, I only used 3 large towels and 2 small ones: 1 small one to sit on, the other small one to cover my head, 2 to line the chaise lounge and 1 to cover myself with during the cool down. After a few days, I seemed to notice a pattern: the older the person, the more towels he used - maybe that was my true motivation for cutting down to 3 large and 2 small. Also noticed the younger kids (based on my large sample size of two) didn't quite get the routine and were almost as towel challenged as I was on my first foray into sauna.

My Sweettooth is Genetic!
As you probably already know, I have a bit of a sweettooth (is that the understatement of the year or what?). From what I can tell, all Russians enjoy their sweets. During my first visit back in 1982, I figured the Russians consumed so much sugar (in tea, chocolates, cakes, ...) because they had to prop up the Cuban economy. However, maybe it was the other way around and they exerted their influence into that country to secure a sugar source for their population.
Even now, the Russians are incredibly proud of their chocolate. Since I knew they enjoyed chocolate and tea, I decided to bring over some Ghirardelli chocolate and Harney and Sons tea (their shop is in Millerton and is worth the 30 minute drive from Hopewell) as a gift for the group. Yesterday I finally brought the goods into work and set them up on the cabinet near my work station in this open floor plan office. The person next to me took a piece of the dark chocolate, and without even sampling it, asked me, "Don't you like Russian chocolates?" While this struck me as incredibly rude, I'm writing it off to lack of fluency in English. By the end of the day, all the chocolate was gone, so I guess they were acceptable.

Back to the banya. In the "relaxing room", the occupants enjoy a cup of tea (the selection consists of only decaf varieties) and some sweets. The table is decked with little jars of honey and jam. Some guys put the contents of the jar (or two!) into the little paper cup with their tea. Other guys just eat the honey or jam straight out of the jar! OK - these are little jars (the individual size you sometime see in restaurants), but they don't consume the contents of just one. The normal serving size (again, this is based on a sample size of 5 or 6 regulars, so maybe I just sweat with the sweetest) is 2 or 3 jars.

What a relief - now I know it is not my fault I have such a craving for sweets - it is in my genes!

Banya Talk
On a slightly related topic, there seem to be basically two categories of banya goers: those who talk and those who are silent. Regardless of which one you are, you still utter the customary greetings when you enter the sauna (something along the lines of "Greetings - have a good sweat") and once you leave the relaxing room, you utter the normal departing phrase ("Congratulations on your sweat" or "Have a good one"). Some guys actually take a nap while in the relaxing room, where most guys engage in some small talk. However, there is one guy, we'll call him The Judge, who acts almost like a sauna arbitrator. I can't really follow the conversations, but I can catch bits and pieces, and it seems as if The Judge is always offering his advice on the problems and predicaments of his follower banya-goers.

Just a couple of days ago, there were only three of us in the relaxing room: The Judge was in the middle with me on one side and some guy fast asleep (well, at least snoring) on the other side. By the way The Judge fidgeted around, I could tell it was killing him not having anyone to talk to! Eventually, he resorted to waking up the snorer just to fulfill his need to pontificate.
On another occasion during Maselnitsa (the week before Lent), I could follow along with the conversion, which not surprisingly, eventually turned to religion and customs. The Judge informed everyone that Maselnitsa was originally a pagan customer (which is true as many Christianity adopted many local customs to ease the introduction of the faith), and then they started to talk about faith, in general. Everyone agreed that some faith was needed, and I was aching to ask how they acted upon that faith during the communist era, but I didn't want to seem like a rude foreigner. Then they started to debate the date when Prince Vladimir brought Christianity to his land (called Rus at the time) and since they were off by a few hundred years, I finally chimed in with the date I remembered from school: 988.

Then the conversation took an unexpected turn. Before I knew it, The Judge commented on the composition of Lenin's Politburo and Central Committee (inner circle). Over 90% of the members were Jewish, maybe as much as 95%, and even Lenin himself was at least a quarter Jewish. And no one explicitly stated it, but you knew they were all thinking it. Which leads to the next topic...

To be PC or not be PC
Being Politically Correct isn't quite a necessity here. As we heard in the banya, anti-Semitism is still alive and well here in Russia. I'm not saying all Russian are anti-Semites as I am only working with a sample size of 6 and only one person made the comment, however, I was just surprised to hear it all (especially in the presence of an obvious foreigner). Xenophobia is fairly strong, too. The Duma passed some laws recently that limit the number of foreigners that are allowed to operate stalls in markets and kiosks along the street (from what I remembered, the limit was dropped to a maximum of 50% allotted for non-Russians and that number is going to be lowered later in the year). Furthermore, I've heard cases of, and was witness to a few incidents, where the police harass a person for his papers (every one needs to carry proper papers with them at all times, including foreigners; usually I lock my passport in the room safe, but this was the one place where I always have my passport with me).

At first I thought maybe I was over-reacting and projecting my preconceived notions onto a situation that might have other possible explanations. However, one day in the The Moscow Times (the English language daily newspaper delivered to the room every weekday), I came across an article about a Newsweek reported based in Moscow. One night, just about midnight, a bunch of hooligans approached the reporter and asked (I am paraphrasing here), "Don't you know Russia is only for Russians?" I'm not sure what made the reported stand out so readily (and from what I remember, his name sounded somewhat Russian), and I am not such what prompted him to respond as he did, but the reporter took a somewhat confrontation tone. I am not saying this justified the hooligan's behavior, but I think it isn't too surprising the verbal exchange progressed to a physical encounter. Don't worry - I'm not usually on the metro that late at night, and you can rest assured I won't strike a confrontational tone with drunken thugs.
In today's paper, there was another interesting article. A government official from Ingushetia was in town for a conference on energy tariffs. Before the event, he decided to visit his brother in northern Moscow, but he never made it that far; during the middle of the day, he was attacked outside of metro station Sukharevskaya and bludgeoned to death. Since all his valuables were still on him and he has an Asiatic appearance, the officials are treating this as another potential hate crime. The scary part is that this metro stop is one stop before mine, and I've walked around that neighborhood in search of Chinese and Japanese food.

On a more humorous non-PC note, almost every day I walked past an Italian restaurant called Il Patio. The first few days I was here, they were running a promotional campaign for some specials, and they called it The Mafia Grill.

Along similar lines, a couple of nights ago I ventured into a supermarket with a supposed large Asian section (it was on the second floor and I never made it up there), and the name of the place was Jappo.

I can't wait to see what they call a soul-food restaurant.

OK - I think I've rambled on enough for now.

End of the fourth entry.

Moscow Journal #03: 2/5/2007

2007-03-03T16:31:00.000-08:00

Beginning of the third journal entry.
Monday, February 5th - the first day of work! On Sunday, Alexey told me there were two options for getting to Krasnopresnenskaya Naberezhnaya Building Number 18 Floor 19 (also known as "the IBM building" from here on out): first, after walking to the closest metro station to the hotel (Prospekt Mira), I could take the Circle Line 3 stops to Krasnopresnenskaya Station and then look for the free shuttle bus for a 10 minute ride to the IBM building; second, I could take the metro one additional stop to Kievskaya Station and transfer to the Filyoskaya line and take the second train another 2 stops to the end of the line, at which point the IBM building would be just a few minutes by foot. Since I wasn't exactly sure where the shuttle bus would be outside the metro station, I opted for the second option.

After the morning ritual (tread mill or stationary bike followed by a sauna, cold rinse and then 20 minute rest of a chaise lounge, but you'll more about that in the next note), I got dressed for work. I knew to pack good boots and I also brought a few sweaters with me figuring I needed to prepare for a Russian winter; it might have defeated Napoleon and Hitler, but I was determined to survive. All geared up for the elements, I set off for the metro station. Within a few minutes, as the sweat started to drip down my back, it was apparent I was a bit over dressed for these conditions. Turns out, just like back home, Russia (well, at least Moscow) was in the middle of an abnormally warm winter. Alexey said it even rained on New Year's Day this year, and no one remembers that happening before - ever. Once I got to work, I checked the forecast for Poughkeepsie, and for my first few days in Russia, New York had colder temperatures than Moscow. But I jumped a little ahead of myself here. Back to the metro.

Years ago when I studied Russian, one of the aspects of the languages we learned was called "intonation constructions". In Russian, there are basically 5 patterns for the pitch within a sentence, and for the most part, they are very similar to patterns we use in English. For example, IK1 (intonation construction 1) is used for a simple statement of fact: I am going to the store. Russian is more constant in pitch than English, and you stay on one level until you get to the word you want to stress, and then you drop a bit and stay at that level for the remainder of the sentence. IK2 is used for questions that start with a question word: where are you going? You stress the question word a little more than in IK1 and then you go lower. IK3 is used for re-asking questions or expressing disbelief (similar to asking, "You are going WHERE?" in English). When listing items in a sentence, you can use IK4, which almost sounds a bit like the Valley Girls (I went to the STORE, and then met my FRIEND and then we went to the MALL), where you rise in pitch towards the end of each phrase. The last one IK5, is used almost exclusively by women, or maybe more accurately, more expressively by women, and it used to convey extreme emotions. You start low, then go as high as you can, and just kept going. The example I remember hearing when we learned these was someone commenting on the number of people in GUM (Government Universal Store - the huge shopping area on Red Square) around New Years, "In the store THERE WERE PEOPLE!"

For some reason, that always stuck in my head. Well, IK5 definitely came to mind when I had to transfer from the Circle Line to the Filyoskaya Line at Kievskaya Station. Three metro lines meet at that locale, and above ground is one of the 9 major inter-city train stations. As the people burst forth from my metro car, I joined the swarm of commuters in the rush to make the transfer between lines. It wasn't quite like being a sardine in a can as we were all moving; it was more like being a blood cell squeezing through a blocked artery. (OK, I do subscribe to the National Geographic, and yes, I did bring the February 2007 edition with me and indeed, I did just finish the title article "Healing the Heart".)

To complicate matters (at least in an American's eyes), the Russians, like most Europeans, don't really queue (line-up). As we bumped our away along, gently swaying from side to side in a shuffle, surging ever closer and closer to the escalator, people would swing along the outside of the mass and just squeeze their way into the pack. While there might not be rules about queueing up, once you step onto the escalator, you better stay to the right if you plan on standing (and allow those who want to walk to pass freely on the left-hand side). One of the few "rules" Russians willingly obey, and there are even escalator monitors, one at the top and one at the bottom of each long stretch, and their little booths contain multiple monitors for them to keep tabs of the people on the moving stairs. If a particular behavior needs correcting, they announce the infraction over the PA and remind the transgressor to conduct himself in a more appropriate manner.

Don't remember how long I was part of the mob (I think I was just so shocked, I completely lost track of time), but eventually I located the platform for my second train. Most of the trains in the system runs extremely frequently (every 2 minutes during rush hour and every 4 minutes off-peak), but this line is much less frequent as it is so short. According to the sign board, I had a 15 minute wait until my train arrived in the station. Retrieved the complimentary copy of The Moscow Times from my computer bag and started to catch up on the local and international news. A couple of minutes later, a train pulled into the station, and according to the board, it was bound for the other destination (this platform was the splitting point for a line that serves two different end points). However, I just caught over the PA the announcement that this train, contrary to what was posted on the board, was indeed bound for Mezhdynarodnaya - my destination! I quickly headed for the doors, just as the onboard taped announcement chimed out. "Watch out - the doors are closing! The next stop is Delovoi Tsenter. " Well, those doors close with some force, I can tell you! Didn't quite make it into the car by the time the doors slammed shut, and I got a bit pinched. Not quite the graceful entry into the train I had hoped for. Luckily someone inside the train helped pull open the door to let me in, and I must admit I was a bit afraid I was going to become a statistic of the Moscow Metro System!

Just two stops later, out of the train, up the escalator and onto the street. There was a sign indicating my street was just outside this door, but once I exited the metro station, there were no more signs. I had an address: 18, and I knew I was looking for a building that was at least 19 floors tall. However, surveying the surroundings, all the buildings in the immediate proximity were only 2 or 3 stories tall and all the taller buildings were under construction. A few blocks to the left (east) there appeared to be a building of sufficient height and fully built, so I made my way in that direction. Unfortunately, that building didn't have the right number. From here, I spied a few more possibilities now on my right (south from the metro), and off I went.
Along the way, I asked an old-man sweeping snow off the sidewalk in front on an office for directions, and he sent me along in the same direction. A couple of blocks away, I consulted with a policeman for further instructions. Turns out, I was headed in the wrong direction; instead of continuing straight, I needed to talk another right (now heading west from the metro). A few minutes later, I finally hit the river, which was a good sign as Naberezhnaya means river bank. As it turns out, from the metro, the IBM building is located behind two buildings that are under construction, and I made a huge circle in getting there.

IBM is not the only occupant of the building (actually, I don't think IBM even occupies the largest number of floors in the building as Proctor and Gamble has more entries on the directory board) and I had to get a building pass from the security desk in the lobby. The interesting thing about this building, and I've never seen this in any other building, was the method for separating the destinations for the elevators. While I've seen elevator banks segregated based on the floors they serve, they take that method one step further here. Once you get to the proper bank, you then have to select your target floor on a number pad outside the elevators. Then the pad tells you which of the 4 available elevators will take you to your floor, and on the way up, the buttons in the elevator don't work. This way you can get all the people headed for same floor (or limited number of floors) into one car, and the car makes fewer stops along the way. Quite innovative!
Up to floor 19, and luckily Alexey happened to step off one of the other elevators just about the same time. Since I did not have a valid IBM badge, yet, he let me into the IBM secured door, and into the clock room. I think all offices, museums, theatres, concert halls and most restaurants have a clock room. In most of them, it is just a place to shed your coat and hat while you enjoy the services inside. For the office (and in the vestibule of someone's house), it is also a place to remove your wet, dirty footwear and change into "indoor" shoes or slippers. This way, you don't track mud, dirt and grime across all the floors; again, quite practical, and luckily I knew to pack a pair of dress shoes in my backpack so I could conform to the local custom.
We'll skip the details of the actual work portion of the day. Work is work, after all, The only interesting item was the exchange I had with the folks I work with about the various options for the commute. When I told them I made the transfer at Kievskaya, they all looked a little shocked and asked me for my impressions. IK5 to the rescue - "In Kievskaya THERE WERE PEOPLE!" And they were duly impressed.

Luckily they told me where to wait for the shuttle bus from the IBM Building back to the metro, and from that I was able to determine where to wait for the shuttle bus the next (and most every other) day.

Looks like this note is lengthy enough, so I sign off here for now. I promise the next few entries won't drag for quite so long (especially since I don't have quite as many notes and I'm not sure how much I am going to recall once I actually get down to composing the next entry).

End of the third entry.

Moscow Journal #02: 2/3/2007 - 2/4/2007

2007-03-03T16:28:00.000-08:00

Start of the second journal entry.
After the rather long day's (or was it days'?) journey to reach Moscow, I didn't feel the need to start off at the crack of dawn with my sightseeing. Even more justification for sleeping in was I had already made plans with a colleague from work to hit some of the sights on Sunday. I am not even sure what time I woke up on Saturday, but at some point I did pull myself out from under the blanket and I made my way down to the gym - after all, I needed to establish the regime for my morning ritual! I had great expectations of taking a nice relaxing sauna after riding a stationary bike or plodding along on a treadmill. Managed to fulfill the prerequisite physical activity, but didn't quite meet with success with the sauna. Turns out the sauna was not in the men's locker room, but out by the pool and I didn't bring my bathing suit with me. What a disappointment!

I generally avoid eating in the hotel and choose to find sustenance outside, but I was already quite hungry (since I managed to miss dinner the night before - believe it or not!), and I opted to dine "in". It was quite a nice buffet: an assortment of cold meats and cheeses, cereals, fruit, pastries, and blini (Russian form of crepes) with a nice assortment of juices along with tea (with water from a samovar!). To be honest, I think the real reason I tend to avoid eating breakfast in the hotel is most establishments have buffets for the morning meal, and I find it very difficult to stop eating!

Even though I was here 25 years ago, it is surprising how little I remember of the city so it is extremely fortunate I armed myself back in Poughkeepsie with my reliable tourbook - The Lonely Planet Guide to Moscow. Given my arrangements to tour the Kremlin and Novodevichy Cemetery on Sunday with Alexey, I opted to follow one of the LP's recommended walks for my first foray around Moscow. First I had to find the metro, and I have no rules against getting help from the hotel's concierge. Turns out, it is just a 10-minute walk with only 2 turns; even after a long haul and who knows how much (or more accurately, little) sleep, I managed to find the entrance.

I checked the Lonely Planet guide for some information on the metro, trying to figure out what would be the most economic option for buying metro tickets given I am going to be here for just about a month. LP listed some multi-ticket packages, but it didn't mention the monthly special I remember getting when I was a student here. This "one pass" ticket was good on all forms of transportation (metro, trolleybus, tram and bus) and was quite a bargain. Checked around the ticket window, and eventually I found the list of options, and my little "one pass" was still there! Not quite as unlimited now as it only allows for 70 trips on the metro, but still the best buy.
The metro has aged a bit since I was last here (but then again, so have I), and the station's could use with some refreshing, particularly around the entrances and exits. However the metro still outshines the NYC subway system. One afternoon, I'll have to make a project of just photographing all the interesting art-work and decorations in the system. And within two minutes, I was on a train towards the center of town.

Just a few stops down the line, I was in Kitai Gorod, which from modern Russian translates into English as "China City", but there's no General's Tso Chicken here! Actually, the Russian word has an older root from the word for "waddle", which refers to an early fortification. This is an older section of town (right off of Red Square, so I had to be careful to not accidentally wander into Lenin's resting place since I was saving that for Sunday).

Usually when I head out of town and I'm going to be away for a while, I try to find an Orthodox church at my destination. If I remember, I ask the local priest for a recommendation, or if I forget to do that, I check the phone book. However, during just this little 2 hour walk around a rather small section of Moscow, I managed to visit 3 Orthodox churches, and I didn't even go into all the possibilities! Shouldn't have any problems fulfilling my spiritual needs during this trip.

Another big change from my previous visit was the lack of the Hotel Rossiya, which used to be one of the largest hotels in the world (from what I remember). Years ago it could use with some renovations, and I guess they finally decided to do something about it. However, instead of simply giving it a face lift, they decided to complete raze the building and construct several smaller facilities on the same foot print.

With the first tour complete, I started to circumnavigate around Red Square and the outside wall of the Kremlin and came across the Central Exhibition Hall, which housed the exhibit "Light to the World" - a display of various icons and other religious articles. Sounded interesting to me, so I popped in. Much to my surprise, I caught the end of speech by Patriarch Alexey of All Russia. Had no idea what he was saying, but the rest of the crowd seemed captivated.
After finishing with the exhibit, I zipped back to the hotel to get ready for dinner. Back in December, I met Tanya (the niece of a friend from church), and Tanya works at the Anglo-American School here in Moscow. Before I left New York, we made plans to hook up for dinner and it sounded like it was going to be quite an evening. Our destination - Old Havana, a Cuban restaurant on the other side of town. The agreement was I would join her group of 5 all female co-workers from school if they didn't mind if my head hit the table during the meal. As it turns out, didn't have to worry about going face down in Old Havana, and not because I got a good night's sleep. Turns out dinner included a show, and what a show it was! A fairly large number of performers (both male and female) performing various Latin flavored dance numbers, and it seemed as the night went on, the amount of clothing on the performers grew less and less. There were several acts and during the intermissions, some women worked the diners hawking their goods; first round was some overly priced maracas; second round, some Che Guevera-style hats. That saleswoman was quite persistent that I needed such head gear, and even though I could use additional hats, that one was just not my style. And I had to be quite forceful in stating my position before she finally decided to leave our table.

Before the dancers shed all their clothes, our group decided it was time to leave. And who was at the exit bidding the departing guests good-bye? The hat lady! I thought for sure I was not going to get my coat out of the coat-check, but her stern demeanor softened enough to allow me to depart unscathed and fully decked in my outerwear.

A quick car ride back to the hotel, and the first full day in Moscow came to a close.
On Sunday morning, I made my way down to the gym with my bathing suit tucked under my arm for the post-work out schvitz. Turns out not only is the sauna not attached to the work-out room or the men's locker room, it isn't quite attached to the pool either. It's located up a staircase, past the massage room, where it separates into the men's and women's room. As I walked past the pool, I noticed a sign board with the average air and water temperatures of 27 and 28 degrees centigrade respectively (leaving the conversion as an exercise for the reader) along with a warning that there was no life guard on duty and people entered the pool at their own risk. Surprising - those messages were only in English! I guess only the American are litigious enough to require a lifeguard at every pool.

I was the only person up early enough to enjoy the heat, so I had the whole place to myself. In the traditional enjoyment of a banya (Russian sauna), the occupant takes a plunge in a snow bank after exiting the sauna. If you don't have a pre-existing heart condition, this sudden change in temperatures supposedly enhances one's constitution. Luckily this banya does not have an external access, so we have to replace the snow bank with a quick rinse in a shower stall. Two things I find amazing about this whole process: first, how long it takes to cool down after just a 10-minute stay in the heat (even after the cold water rinse), and second, how fast your heart starts to pump as a result of the cold water rinse!

With the foundation for my morning ritual established, popped back upstairs for a quick breakfast of tea and the complimentary cookies housekeeping leaves every day and then rushed back down to the lobby by 10am to hook up with Alexey. I got there a few minutes early and stood by the door reading my Lonely Planet Guide. There was a guy sitting on the couch by the door, but he didn't resemble the picture of Alexey in the internal IBM directory. I stood for a while, he sat for a while, and as you probably already figured out, we were indeed waiting for each other. Looks like I might have to update my picture in the directory as he thought I didn't resemble my current entry. (OK, I wasn't in a wet suit with a scuba mask around my neck, but I am still bald and bearded - fairly good parameters for a match!)

As promised, Alexey took me to the Armory within the Kremlin, where there are rooms filled with some of the treasures from the Tsars. This is where (25 years ago), I saw my first Faberge egg, and from what I remember, there was a large display of Faberge items. However, part of the collection must be on loan or traveling as there were a rather limited supply of those gorgeous works of art this time.

Unfortunately, the ticket to the Armory only allows you to visit the Armory; you can't wander around anywhere else. Once we finished with that session (you only get 90 minutes), it was back online for another ticket that allowed us access to the Kremlin grounds. Turns out there are different tickets for that portion of the Kremlin, too, and the ones we got only allowed us onto the grounds and not into the churches and museums within the Kremlin. Didn't feel like exiting the Kremlin to wait online (again) for yet another ticket, so for this first visit, I had to settle for just walking around the outside of the building and strolling around the grounds (while ensuring I didn't stray off any designated path, in which case one of the many militsioners would inform me of my transgression with a shrill call of a the whistle).

Several times already in these notes, I've mentioned a previous trip to Moscow I made back in 1982. As it turns out, there was one more brief visit to Moscow in 1993. In the summer of that year, I participated in an EarthWatch trip to St. Petersburg where I counted dead trees in various forests around St. Petersburg. (If you want more details on that, I'll send them in a separate note). After the EarthWatch project, I popped down to Moscow for a weekend before returning home. On that trip, I once again visited the Kremlin, and the most striking thing I remember was the dual pricing scheme for tickets to the Kremlin. Locals and residents of the former republics of the Soviet Union paid one price, and all foreigners paid a much higher price (from what I remember, it was about 10 times more expensive).

This time, every one pays the same price. However, foreigner still get dinged when it comes to renting the audio guides as the Russian version is always cheaper than all the other languages.
After the Kremlin, we strolled around Red Square, then across the Moscow River for a slightly different view of St. Basil's, the Kremlin and Red Square. On my previous trip, if, for some reason (as if being surrounded by people speaking Russian wasn't enough), I needed a reminder that I was actually in Moscow, I would head to Red Square to gawk at St. Basil's and the Kremlin wall. I have a feeling I'll be repeating that journey many times during this stay, too.

Alexey had to leave around 6pm to hook-up with some friends, so I made my way over to a Georgian restaurant for a quick dinner. (Service is rather quick when you are the only diner in the establishment; looks like the Russians usually eat a bit later in the evening). By the time the check came, jet-lag caught up to me and I was ready to head back to the hotel for some rest.

End of the second journal entry.

First Journal Entry

2007-02-07T08:29:00.000-08:00

Well, it's been a while since I put out one of these travel journals. That is not to say I've been sitting home since the last entry, quite to the contrary. In particular, 2006 was a spectacular year for travel both for work and pleasure. I've grown a bit lazy as the gray has started to take hold of my beard. However, a few people prodded me enough when I told them I was bound for Moscow, I figured I should get my butt in gear and write up some reports.

Back in the beginning of 2006, IBM opened a development lab (called the RSTL) in Moscow. Even though my department was not sending any work over, with my background in development and interest in spending time in Moscow, the lab director offered me a position to help get the new folks on board.

Just as I started to make plans for the first stint of the overseas assignment, all organizations across IBM were hit with a "budget challenge" and the RSTL reduced its costs by eliminating the funding for the International Assignee, which put an end to my plans. As it turns out, in the last part of 2006, my department decided to move some work over to the RSTL, and my manager asked if I would be interested in spending 4 weeks in Moscow to help train the people who will work with us. Four weeks in Russia in February, how could I say no? Restraining my excitement about returning to Moscow, I decided not to advertise my impending departure given how suddenly the trip to Russia in 2006 was cancelled. However, I still needed to start the paper work to obtain my visa. Communism might have been swept away, but Bureaucracy is alive and thriving in Russia. Before you can even begin to apply for a visa, you first have to obtain a Letter of Invitation (LOI) from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Moscow.

Unfortunately, we didn't settle on the dates for this trip until the beginning of 2007, and the Russians were on holiday until January 9th. Plans called for me to be in Moscow for work on February 5th, and I was already cutting it close!

Faxed over the necessary forms to our contact at American Express in Moscow who know how to work the system, and much to my surprise, the Letter of Invitation was en-route to my house by January 12th and arrived several days later on January 17th. (I guess that's why we use American Express in Moscow to get those document for us!). I didn't want to lose any time due to courier delays, so I decided to take off the next day from work and hand delivered my application (including the Letter of Invitation and a list of all the countries I visited in the last 10 years) to a company we use in NYC to handle these requests. CIBT is familiar with the various consulates' peculiarities and quirks, and I figured it would be easier for them to rush the request through the Russian Consulate. As they promised, my passport had the required visa attached by Monday, January 29th and they UPS'ed my passport back to me that afternoon. Things were looking good for my scheduled departure on Thursday, February 1st.

On Tuesday, I tracked the progress of my package, and that afternoon I decided to work from home just in case the document required a signature. The web-site indicated an expected delivery date of January 30th and it also indicated all deliveries are complete by 7pm. At 8pm, I was still without my passport, and the web-site changed the expected delivery date to January 31st. And we had snow in the forecast for that day! Oh, noo!

I had to head into work on Wednesday for some meetings in the morning, but I confirmed with CIBT that the parcel did not require a signature. Just in case, I left a piece of paper taped to my home door asking UPS to accept the sheet as authorization to leave the package without a signature. By noon, I was able to check the web-site from work, and with great relief, learned that UPS made the drop. I also learned why the delivery took so long! I am not making this up; even though CIBT is in NYC across the street from Grand Central Station and I was in Hopewell Junction (about 70 miles almost directly due north), the package took the following path: Manhattan to Long Island City (in Queens), back to Manhattan (where it overnighted), over to Secaucus, NJ, down to Philadelphia, PA up to Kingston, NY to finally make it to my house on Wednesday at 11:30 am! You would think the package was trying to rack up some frequent flier miles.

True to form, even though I knew for weeks I was leaving on Thursday, I waited until Wednesday night to start packing. In my defense, I did have a fair amount of stuff laid out on the bed in the spare room; I just I consider it unlucky to pack too early (yeah, that's my story and I am sticking with it).

Thursday morning finally arrived, and I anxiously awaited the arrival of the driver. Driver? Yes, driver! Since I was going to be out of town for a month, it didn't make sense to leave my car at the airport. And while I'm on the topic of the trip logistics, when booking the flights, the only direct flight I could find was on Aeroflot; not too keen on taking a ride on that airline, the travel agent offered me two other choices: bounce in London or bounce in Helsinki. Trying to save the company some money, I booked a coach ticket, and I thought it would be easier to survive two segments more equal in length then a really long leg and then a short leg. So JFK to LHR it was.
Or almost was. This is another aspect of our arrangements with American Express that baffles me. According to the agent, the lowest airfare she could find was almost $1000. I started poking around and found the same flight for $600 on American Airline's web-site. Even more astounding, I found a similar routing starting from Stewart for the same $600!

Thrilled to not have to drive to and from the city, I thought the extra bounce in Chicago (yeah, I know, the WRONG way) was worth it. It was the same price after all. And transfers costs from my house to Stewart are much lower than to JFK.

OK, back to the driver. He called around 10:15 to inform me he was going to be a bit late and would miss the scheduled 10:30 pick-up by 15 minutes. First leg was scheduled to depart at 1:10, and I wanted to get there at 90 minutes early, but 10:45 was still within tolerance; not as if I had much choice anyway.

Driver arrived as promised, and he made fantastic time over to the Stewart. Unloading the car, the driver commented on the amount of luggage I had: a large bag with wheels, a small bag with wheels, a backpack and my computer bag; in my opinion, not too much for a 30 day stint in Moscow in the winter!

Lugged all my gear to the check-in counter, and was horrified to recognize one of the three clerks behind the desk. This older guy was the one who initially handled my attempt to check-in for a flight to Shanghai back in December, and at some point, he managed to convince the airline reservation system I was a Chinese national; that took so long to straighten out I almost missed my flight.

I was all prepared to let the person behind me to go ahead of me just so I would get one of the other agents when the other agents opened up; turns out they were working as a pair as one was training the other. Ah - someone capable of training another should know how to process an international flight! I handed over my passport and they clicked away, and in matter of minutes, my two checked bags had their tags (checked all the way to Moscow) and I had my passport back. Relief. After a nice cup of tea in the waiting area, my two carry-on bags and I boarded the plane to Chicago.

Flight to Chicago was uneventful, and I had enough of a layover to enjoy my favorite dish of meatloaf with garlic mashed potatoes at Wolfgang Puck's restaurant.

The flight from Chicago to London was crowded but not packed, and I had the end seat of the row of five, and no one was next to me. Not quite luxurious, but comfortable enough. Dozed on and off during the flight, but didn't really get any solid sleep. When we arrived in London (almost 30 minutes early) at 6:30am, I was feeling a bit tired and was more of a zombie than an alert, attentive traveler.

We arrived at Terminal 3, and my next leg was on British Airlines, which has flights out of all four terminals at Heathrow. I had a tough time reading the board with the list of which flights departed from which airlines (all flight to Europe except ... depart from here, flights to those places depart from there and flights to other continents depart from over there). I stopped one of the attendants and asked where I needed to go to get my flight to Moscow. Terminal 4.
Onto the shuttle bus, and 10 minutes later, I was in Terminal 4 with a long queue in front of me. Turns out Heathrow (and I get the feeling, all of the UK) has instituted a new policy - you are only allowed one piece of carry-on luggage. Period. Full-stop. End of story. It doesn't matter that you are only passing through and want to get on the next flight to Moscow; you can only take one piece of luggage through security. Waited a few minutes on the line to check excess bags only to discover I was in the wrong terminal. I didn't need Terminal 4, I needed Terminal 1!
Back onto another shuttle bus, and 10 minute later I was in my third of the four terminals at Heathrow. However, at this terminal, I couldn't just check-in my excess bag. I had to leave the terminal, proceed through passport control and then clear customs to so I could return to the check-in counters and rid myself of my extra bag. At passport control, the agent seemed a bit perplexed as to what I was doing there. A bit frazzled by this point, I (maybe not quite politely) explained that I didn't intend on entering the UK today and the only reason I was entering the country was due to the UK's sudden change in the carry-on allowance. I explained my destination was Moscow and my flight was scheduled to depart in a little over an hour. She started to look through my passport and commented on all the visas and stamps within; I mentioned that I also worked in England for three months at one point, which was a bad move - she started to look for my British working permit! I had to inform her that trip was back in 1995 and the necessary paperwork was in my expired passport!

She finally allowed me to pass through, and I rushed over to the check-in counter. Of course, there was a line of folks ahead of me. With the clock ticking, I started to get a bit nervous about this flight. I've never done this before, but I started to work my way through the line by explaining to the person in front of me that I was in a bit of a hurry and was attempting to make a flight scheduled to depart in less than 50 minutes. Amazingly enough, all 6 groups of people allowed me to inch ahead of them, and I made it to the counter, where I had to explain to the clerk why I was there. (It's a bit difficult to check-in an additional bag mid-way through your journey!) And just to increase the delay, I had to wait for a supervisor to come over and swipe by boarding pass with some special marker so I could make it through the security checkpoint. Rushed through security and saw on the main board that I was to proceed to the gate, which I promptly did. A few minutes later, I was on board the almost completely empty plane for the final leg to Moscow.

On this last leg of the journey, it finally dawned on my that it was almost 25 years to the day that I first entered Russia (well, then the Soviet Union). My 3 traveling companions and I were part of a larger group of American students en-route to Moscow for a semester abroad at the Pushkin Institute of Russian Language. However, the Soviets initially denied the four of us a visa, and after a bit of a delay, we finally obtained permission to enter the Soviet Union.

Unfortunately, the rest of the group already departed for Helsinki, where they caught the train to Moscow. We managed to meet up with the larger group in Finland, but we had to enter the Soviet Union on our own as our visas were not valid until two days later.

As the lone set of Americans on the overnight train from Helsinki, we became the focus of the boarder guards attention. As the guards with the guns entered our compartment and sealed the door, we could hear the dogs, urged on by more guards, sniffing around the outside of the carriage. They selected one person, me, and went through all my bags looking for contraband.

Luckily, I had nothing suspicious with me (except for a set of bag pipes, but they weren't exactly what the boarder guards were looking for), except when then frisked me, they uncovered my chain and cross. Unfortunately, I forgot to declare that object on my customs form, and that became quite the sore point with them (especially since it was an Orthodox cross). They wouldn't let me add the item to my form, which in theory meant the guards on the way out could prevent me from leaving the country with it (which luckily did not happen).

Anyway, all these memories started to flash back to me, and I began to get a little nervous about entering Russia on a plane with so few passengers. Sounds odd, but I figured with just 10 people on the plane, the boarder guards would have tons of time to devout to each and every person.
Collected my bags from the carousel, and before I knew what happened, I was through passport control And then a few seconds later, I went through the "Nothing to Declare" lane and the next thing I knew, I was in Russia. Quite different from 25 years ago!

The local IBM contact arranged for a taxi to transport me to the hotel, which I was a bit reluctant to accept; I had originally wanted to try taking public transportation into town, but after three flights and loaded with 4 bags, I was relieved to see the little plaque with "IBM" on it.
The ride to the Renaissance was less than an hour, and even though I could have gone out for a little walk in an attempt to stay awake until 9pm, I opted to go on-line and try to catch up on a bit of work (just in case I suddenly conked out, I wanted to do it in the privacy of my own room).
End of the first journal entry.

Thanks, Stephen