Fatherland Defender's Day and Gypsy Cabs

Fatherland Defender's Day (Feb. 23rd). Basically, it's a rename of the old Soviet holiday "Soviet Army Day" or "Red Army Day" and is usually considered the men's holiday, with its counterpart being the women's holiday, International Women's Day on March 8th. We (the girls) made food for the guys, and celebrated. There were fireworks going off all over the city. If you look close in the picture you can see them everywhere on the horizon. It was really an awesome sight.

Felix and Laura dancing on FDD.

Nick, Celine, and David on FDD. Celine (I think I'm spelling that right) is actually a French student who is studying here now, and has studied in Lithuania previously. She can speak French, Russian, and English.

Some hardcore "futbol" players just outside our building, playing in the snow.

Felix with his bottle of Coke at the Miraj restaurant, somewhere in Moscow. Getting there was the tricky part, but we managed. There were seven of us (Me, Felix, Alex, Dave, Jenna, Celina, and Celine-the French woman), and so we decided to take the Metro down as far as we could. Still, it was too far. So, we decided to ride in some gypsy cabs. Now, for those who don't know, gypsy cabs aren't actually cabs, they're just people driving around that want to make an extra few rubles on their way back home. Never ride in a gypsy cab alone. But there were seven of us. Oh, and yes, we all fit into one gypsy cab. Again, for those who don't know, Russian cars, much like any European cars, are small. Very small. So you can imagine fitting seven Americans into a small gypsy cab, with a Mongolian driver.... I don't know how we managed that, but we did. Well, we did it again on the way back as well. So really we managed to fit seven Americans into Russian gypsy cab twice. Booyah.

Celina and Dave at the Miraj.

Dave and Alex at the Miraj.

After we ate, we were trying to find a "klub" which is basically just a bar with billiards, and we found this little place. I'm not sure what it's used for, but it was pretty and empty, so we walked around for a little while, then continued our search.

Some shots of one of the Metro stations, and our group waiting....again.

An old church. I don't know the name of it, but I thought it was pretty.

Some Moscow authorities...I think the one on the right was giving me the evil eye.

Chunks of ice next to the sidewalk. That guy in the back wearing the lime-green vest was breaking it up. He still had a long way to go.

SpongeBob!!!! I have no idea what 'x-Badges' is.

At the Tretyakov Gallery. Well, outside at least. Saw some pretty sweet paintings, and Alex managed to pick up a Russian girl. His pick-up line was, "Do you speak English?" She didn't, but that didn't stop him.

There were a bunch of sculptures outside the museum, and one of them was a throne. Only Jeff and I wanted to sit on them.

Oh yeah. Sunglasses compliments of Jeff.

On our way back from the museum, we encountered a really good violinist playing in the Metro. I took a quick video of him, but couldn't stay, because we were in a little bit of a hurry to catch the next ride. I'll try and see if I can post it at some point.

Ok, and a kinda funny story. A little while ago, the cleaning lady in our building decided to throw out Jeff's boot. I do mean his boot, as in his one boot that he uses because he's on crutches. He left it next to the fridge, which is next to the trash can, which is next to the door. The cleaning lady thought it was trash, naturally, and threw it down the shoot. Well, after spending some time trying to find someone that could speak English, they found a babushka, who held a bit of authority, and basically told Jeff that they would talk about it and decide whether it was worth it to go digging in the trash for. After some time, the babushka told the cleaning lady to go rummage through the garbage for his boot. Needless to say, she wasn't happy....at all. Anyway, a few hours later, Jeff got his boot back, and has learned his lesson--that in the Motherland, keep all items of a functional and valuable nature far, far away from any trash can.

(And to Kelly: I would chat with them online if I had internet...that is, immediate access to internet. It's a slow process getting anything [it takes half a day to unlock a door; we're still waiting on getting our light bulb in our bathroom replaced by the babushka...we replaced it ourselves], and we're still in limbo on whether we're going to be moving into our actual dorms or not...none of us really want to spend money on installing internet in our rooms (and wait for the installation) if we're not going to stay there. There was supposed to be some meeting with the head guy at the university today, but he was conveniently out of town. So, we'll see, I guess.)

Love you all!!!

~Jessica

More Pics and Red Tape

View of the Cathedral of Christ the Redeemer from the Moscow River. This was a church that was blown up under Stalin's orders in 1931, and was finally rebuilt in the mid-1990s at huge costs. Hopefully I'll get to see the inside at some point.

These were random locks all over the side of one of the bridges crossing the Moscow River. I have no idea what they are for or why they are there. Some kind of superstition maybe?

View of outsie the Kremlin.

Ah, Peter the Great.

Aslan?

Beautiful door on the Church, with detail above.

Alexander II.

Views from my window. Russians love to park anywhere.

One of our resident Kazaks. We call him #66. The sign next to him says not to smoke. But the babushka was asleep, so he (and the other Kazaks) didn't care.

So, these guys are from Kazakstan. Yes, they've seen Borat. (Ha!) And they kept trying to offer me vodka...and more vodka...and more vodka...geez theses guys can drink a lot.

One of the Kazaks playing chess with our Jeff. I'm not sure who one.

In the kitchen, making dumplings?

Random plants hanging around on some floors in our building.

I just had to. Come on. It's a Black Russian...in a CAN. It didn't taste all that great, actually. They have other alcoholic beverages in a can too, even a Gin&Tonic. The most expensive beer here is a Corona. Go figure. I've tried a Baltika 7, which I thought was pretty good. They have 8 different kinds of the Baltika, but I don't think I'll be trying all of them anytime soon. Maybe eventually...slowly.

So far, I still haven't taken the language course (due to much Russian red tape, blah blah blah), but I have learned 'piz diz' (the 'i' as in 'ee')--I don't know how you spell it, but that's the closest to the sound I can come. Basically, there's no translation. It's a swear word, that has been described as useful in many situations. Like when two cars hit each other head on and cause a 20 car pileup--piz diz! You can come up with your own.

We are going to be moving into our new dorms soon....I think. They are much smaller, but are all singles. So, we'll see how that works out. I can't go into the Moscow University library, even though I'm a student, unless I have some kind of pass, which apparently take a lot of papers and more Russian non-sense to get. So, I'll probably never get to see the inside. Typical Russia.

I went to a pretty big bookstore yesterday in Arabatskaya and got a Russian propaganda poster book, which is pretty cool. It was a bit more expensive than I wanted, but was worth it because it was the only one that had the English translation of the posters. Learning the language without the language class is slow, but being surrounded by it is helping a lot. I can understand general conversational stuff, but can't speak it. I'll get there.

I'll post some stories later about life here in general. They'll be awesome, I swear. :)

Red Square and Kremlin Pics

Waiting for.....what were we waiting for?

Soldier staying warm.

White Wedding. For real, man. Apparently there are many of these in Moscow. Today I saw a wedding celebration and there was a pink limo. Old style too. It was pretty sweet, I have to say.

Changing of the Gaurd.

As we were waiting, someone decided to make our own "Red Square". And Felix stood there. "I am Red Square".

The Tomb of Lenin. Cue the music....

The boys: Nick, David, Felix, and Jeff (lovingly called the "cripple").

Place of beheadings during Soviet Russia.

Museum at night, outside Red Square.

Oh yeah.

The GYM (pronounced 'goom') and skating rink in Red Square.

Me. Heh.

The gang.

A cathedral. There were many.