Temperature

I would just like to point out the fact that the max temperature of today was 4°C. The minimum is supposed to be 0°C. Apparently it was snowing yesterday morning! 

I'm sure I felt some snow as I walked to class.

My Russian friend in dance class said she thought it might start snowing next week. 

HOW EXCITING! 

Don't know why I'm excited about snow, it always turns out to be a massive

failure in the UK. I'm hoping I'll be impressed by how the Russian's deal with snow. I've been 

told that flights ALWAYS take off from the airports, no matter how much snow there is!

Halloween!

We're hosting a Halloween party on Friday in our dorm. I'm on the organizing committee and also in charge of decorations! I'm having a blast making paper spiders, bats, ghosts, witches & graves. It's been a chore to find the supplies here in Russia though. Pritt Stick style glue is super expensive for some reason. I couldn't find proper string so I've had to use thin wrapping ribbon to hang things up. I also couldn't find ANY black colored paper. They had sheets of a multitude of other different colors but NO black! It was so weird. I asked the sales lady in Russian if they had any только черный (only black), but unfortunately no!
I mean they didn't even have colored paper in any of the stores in the Mall, not even in the childrens stores (Early Learning Centre you FAILED ME) or the book stores. Finding colored paper was difficult in the first place! Poor children in Russia, they must be starved of creation! 

Soviet Subway Art..

As promised a selection of various Soviet decorations from the Metro. The Metro was commissioned by Stalin in order to commemorate the memory of Lenin, hence why there is a theme running throughout all the decoration, architecture and the station names. 

1905 Street

For example, there are stations named 1905, Ленинский Проспект (Lenin Avenue), Библиотека Имени Ленина (Lenin's library) , Площадь Револуции (Revolution Square)...etc... 

Lenin's face on the red flag of Communism.

A sort of homage to Lenin...

As you can see these aren't just small paintings or murals, but large carved decorations. All of them feature the Hammer & Sickle, the 5 point star and a reoccurring theme of violence & war, Lenin is also pretty present in all of them. They all emphasize certain dates in Soviet history - 1905, 1917, 1941. 

  

We sinned.

Today Joelle and I took a trip.......to Ikea! There are 3 Ikea's in Moscow, all located on the outskirts of the city. We both had a need for some Ikea products, given that most household items are extortionately priced here in Russia and you can't go wrong with a bit of Ikea!

We left our dorm at 11am and travelled to теплый стан (Tyoply Stan) on the outskirts at the end of Metro line number 6! It only took us about 45 minutes to get to our destination. But this was only half the journey! We had to get from the Metro station & shopping mall to Ikea. Basically due to a massive failure of Google Maps we ended up spending an hour & half wandering around in search of the mysterious 952 bus. We tried to hitch-hike (standard practice in Russia. you pay a driver 200/300 roubles and they'll take you somewhere. helps people make a little bit more dosh really.) but unfortunately no-one picked us up! We took that as mortally offensive, though I was wearing a hoodie so maybe the Russian's were put off for good reason. We walked for ages around the massive mall at the station searching for the bus stop of the 952. We saw stops for every other dang bus, but not ours! We even saw a 952 bus (well it's a minivan thing......popular in Russia) drive by us so we knew it existed! Asking for directions in Russia is like asking to be questioned by the police so we resorted to looking for a taxi. Taxi ranks like in London or New York don't exist here, nor is there an abundance of cabs. Finding a proper and legitimate cab is like trying to find a needle in a haystack. I could have made a number of politically incorrect jokes there given that I'm in Russia, but I decided to stick to political correctness for today. 

At long last we spotted what appeared to be a taxi. A banged up Lada sat in the parking lot with a shady looking driver and a orange triangle on the roof. As we approached the driver got out and spoke to us. It cost us 400 roubles to be driven to Ikea and took us under 5 minutes to get there! There were no seatbelts and I genuinely thought that the car would just conk out and die every second it was running. We got to experience Russian driving and traffic. They like to honk their horns in frustration for a reaaaally long period of time. Honking does not solve the problem my dears. Finally we made it to IKEA! We took photos outside the entrance because we were so excited to have made it to our destination. We never gave up hope of making it, even though it was tough going. 

First stop when we got inside was the restaurant. Nothing like meatballs and fries! Here in Russia, Swedish food and products are a novelty. My meatballs were presented with a mini Swedish flag on them! Very interesting. After that we had a good browse of the store and enjoyed the free wifi. A variety of items were purchased including a lamp, bedsheets, desk organizers, postcards, towels and tea-towels. We thoroughly enjoyed our 6 hour trip of joy to Ikea and will definitely be returning, if only just to have some more meatballs!

Want some cigarettes?

 A lot of the shops here in Russia are just glass boxes with each of the products on show, but you have no access to them! You have to ask the assistant who sits inside (all day mind you) to show you or get whatever you want. Most of them only have a small opening for you to speak into which can mean confusion if your Russian pronunciation isn't up to scratch. This is why I waited a few weeks before trying out my first real Russian store - most of which are predominantly in subways and around Metro stations. I'm comfortable with them now! Unlike in the UK where you buy cigarettes practically in every shop, here in Russia you can only buy cigarettes from specially designated "табак" stores.

This is an example of one of these stores. It's a табак but they also sell snack type food and drink. There's only the little hole below the Bud sign where you speak into and inside is a person who'll go and get what you want! As you can see there is a huge variety of cigarettes available to purchase, and all extremely cheap! Only about £2 for pack. They also have a lot of brands I never knew existed - including 'West' who I only remember from Mika Hakkinen's Maclaren F1 car! From what I can see 'Kent' and 'Parliament' seem to be the 2 most popular brands.
You can also see the types of food they sell, surprisingly they use some of the same names for popular Western products like Snickers and Mars bars (thank goodness!) but they also have a lot of Russian things which I would not have a clue how to order! When you order the person inside usually just barks at you asking what size you want or for water, без газ (without bubbles) and then barks the price at you! An interesting experience. 

Another busy week!

I've had another super busy week. I've started having 2 on 1 Russian tutorials with my Russian friends so as to better my conversational Russian and also to help them with their English. We divide the time equally between each language - this is how I spend my Friday afternoons. Then I rush off to dance class! 


I must admit I had a lazy weekend of waking up late, reading my books and just relaxing. Considering that I'd been rushing around all week doing lots of things I deserved it! I went to the bookstore to get my textbook for learning Russian and had to go into the "Russian as a foreign language" section *shudder*. It was a dusty corner in the store and not very well sign posted. I got a few funny looks from people who were milling around. I also picked up some Tolstoy & Bulgakov so as to increase my Russian literature base. I've only ever read Russian literature for class and that involves intensely studying the book and picking it to pieces. I don't enjoy that and I always manage to lose the spark that I get from reading it. 
I made the mistake of going to the supermarket on Sunday to get my food instead of Monday. The supermarket was unbelievably packed with people! They seem to take the entire family out food shopping. I survived though and had doors held open for me on the Metro which was quite nice! 


Tuesday, as ever, was a busy day. I left the dorm at 9am and returned at 9.30pm. All my classes were interesting, history especially. We're moving onto Peter the Great next week - something which I know barely anything about! Economics was as usual extremely useful and our teacher gave us this theories & predictions for the next 12 years and Putin's possible options from 2025. Apparently once he's President it's practically impossible to get rid of him, even if he does something drastically horrendous or if his approval rating is negative, such is the nature of the Russian constitution & system. Fun huh? Imagine being stuck with a President who the whole country was dissatisfied with and had no way of removing them or preventing them from having an additional term? I won't delve into his deeper conspiracy theories but I'm open to discussion!! Mergers & Acquisitions was a little complicated but nothing some extra reading can't sort out. We just learnt the triple step in dance class, I actually find it easier than the double step which is weird. Though I did get shouted at by the instructor for not placing my feet correctly on the floor. 


Today was the Russian-American club at the State University for Humanities. We shunned the typical meeting in the university and went to a modern art exhibition instead. We got a little lost on the way and it was super cold so walking wasn't that enjoyable! The gallery building was an ex bus depo and so had exposed brick walls, high ceilings and lots of big metal doors - I thought the building itself was the best part of the exhibit! Modern art doesn't take my fancy. The were 2 exhibitions, one by Marina Abramovich and another by a South African artist. Basically it just involved a lot of naked people, violence and things which I wouldn't consider art. I wasn't convinced! I was much more excited about going to the gift shop & having dinner - but then again I am always amused by gift shops. The best thing about museums I feel. 

Subway/Metro/Tube

This afternoon I headed to the State University of Humanities by новослободская (Novoslobodskaya) station with a couple of Math friends. One of their assigned buddies mentioned there was a Russian-American center at this university and they held a Russian-American conversation club once a week! The first meeting of this academic year was today so the 3 of us came along. It was quite nice to be in a room dedicated to American/English things - they had a number of English movies (on VHS may I add) including Black Adder, James Bond, Die Hard and other memorable movies as well as a picture of Barack Obama, map of the US & lots of different academic books.

We 3 were the only foreigners there and the rest of the group were Russian. We spent 2 hours talking to each other, getting to know one another and playing games, both in English and in Russian. We also ate biscuits (I ate far too many.......it's the chocolate...too tempting!) and drank Russian tea. It was a really lovely environment and everyone was welcoming and enthusiastic. We'll be attending once a week and we're also going to have some cultural excursions and fun things like ice skating and bowling, as well as discussing American politics & domestic issues. It's a really exciting prospect and also another good way for me to practice my Russian and make new Russian friends! Also I don't have class on a Wednesday so at least it's something for me to do!


I've decided I'm going to start taking a lot more pictures of life on the subway with my blackberry so I can share this on my blog! I started today! The subway is far too beautiful not to be photographed. The only problem associated with this is that I will draw attention to myself, especially in the tourist frame and I just don't want to get into difficulties with the police!

Snap of an incoming train at новослободская station, as well as the chandeliers in the ceiling! 

The subway station at  новослободская was really beautiful and had stained glass murals on the walls. All of the murals were centered around a 5 point red star (any guesses why?) and were all incredibly beautiful. There was also a stained glass mural of Lenin sitting at his desk. Each of the stations has a tile print of the line you're travelling on up on the wall - there's only one on each platform mind you! It shows you the following stations, as well as the other lines that you can change onto at these stations. Pretty useful if you can't remember where you need to change and as there's only ever one full map of the Metro in each station, which gets crowded so it's handy!

You will notice that the wall is made of marble too..

Russian Parking

Russians have a thing for parking anywhere and everywhere they can. The city wasn't built to deal with the volume of traffic it now receives and thus the city is ill prepared for the number of cars that there are. There are no underground or multi-story car parks nor any actual car parks with marked bays.
This means that Russians are forced to park where-ever they can, even if this means parking on the pavement.....as illustrated by my picture below. Their favorite trick is to park on the pavement so that pedestrians have to either squeeze between the car & a building or make it so pedestrians have to walk in a main road. Logical thinking there. They will also freely drive along the pavement till they find a place to park which also increases the likelihood of getting run over.

There were also roadworks...

Did you know?

I found an interesting article yesterday whilst searching for the weather forecast for Moscow. In February this year President Medvedev announced that on March 27th this year the clocks would move forward to Day Light Saving time for the last time! This means that when the clocks go back at the end of October in the rest of the world, the clocks will stay the same here in Russia! Actual legislation was put in place to abolish the switch between the two times. The time difference will go from 3 hours to 4 hours for RU-UK. This clears up the confusion I had over why my flight would leave Moscow at 11pm RU time, fly 4 hours back to the UK and yet land at Heathrow at 11pm UK time.


The reasoning behind this bizarre legislation is that the time change apparently has a number of serious effects on the health of the Russian population, as well as confusing them. Medvedev said that, "it really disturbs the human biorhythm," and there was me thinking he's a simple politician, who knew the depths of Medvedev's intelligence? 
There is an ongoing conflict in Russia over time zones and time currently. Russia boasts 9 different time zones and in 2010 one of the far eastern time zones was abolished in a bid to get the country on central Moscow time. 


On a side note it's pouring here in Moscow and has been since the middle of last night. My roommate has a cough and so I had the joyful experience of being woken up a number of times last night, hence why I noticed it started raining at 3am. Apparently it's supposed to be a MAX of 5 degrees on Friday and a min of -3.

An affront to my feminism.

Firstly, the weather was strangely warm today so when I stepped out to go shopping in my scarf & coat I immediately boiled, but I couldn't be bothered to go back and change. I wasn't sure if it was just because the sun was shining & I was in black jeans that I got hot. 

I went to the supermarket and when I came home I had 4 bags full of food. I'm pretty strong and capable so I was having no problems carrying them - I'm the bag lady when I go shopping with my mother dearest in England so carrying 4 bags was nothing. I came into my dormitory and saw some of my Russian dorm companions - one of them being a boy I'd been introduced last night during our discussion of our plans for our Halloween Party (another story for another time) anyway - he said hello to me and said "May I please help you?". Instantly my Western feminist brain sprang into action - who was this man to be asking me if he could help me? What did he think I was weak or incapable of carrying my own shopping? How dare he? 

Then I realized - here in Russia they do think that. Men are seen as the superior & stronger sex and Women are weaker and need to be helped. So whilst he mortally offended me as a Westerner, if I was a Russian I would have just expected it as normal. I smiled and said "Alright, thank you".  He carried my shopping up one flight of stairs for me and to my door. Incredibly sweet & thoughtful but a massive offence to me as an independent, free & intelligent woman.
I mean I'm not a raving feminist, it's just that whenever a man gives his seat up for you on the tube in London it's only ever because he thinks you're pregnant. Which at 19 when you're wearing a baggy mens jumper, just had a 3 hour exam and you're stressed because you need to get to work in Westminster & the Jubilee line is experiencing severe delays is a MASSIVE offence. Also men in the UK never offer to help me carry things, I'm always struggling up the stairs in the tube or at the station with my suitcase or bags and NO-ONE ever offers to help me! Thus when this charming Russian offered to help me my natural response was to be offended - that's just because I'm not used to being treated this way! Though I think it's better if I don't get used to this because I'll just come back at Christmas and be totally disappointed when I travel in London again. *sigh*

Some more quirks for you..

1. Russians don't believe in indicating. If cars are entering a road or switching lanes they won't indicate. This causes trouble when I'm crossing the road to get to my Metro station
2.  Russians also believe in parking EVERYWHERE. Literally they park on the pavement, and will drive up onto the pavement and drive along till they find a good spot. They also park double width ways at the side of a road so that the road becomes a single track road. Instead of parallel parking they often park at diagonals to the pavement. It's quite funny to see some of the places they've parked and I'm going to start a photo album of Russian parking. 
3. Here in Russia in order to drive you need a license. But unlike the UK or US where you have to take lessons and then have a test and finally you pass, usually after failing once or twice, here you don't need to do any of that, you can just bribe your local police chief & pay for a license! As long as you have the permission from your local police chief - which has to be from your hometown, not where you're living at the moment, i.e. where you were born - then you can just pay the correct office and get issued a license. So you don't even need to actually have taken any lessons!!
4. In all the shops & the supermarket when you go to the washing products you see a strange set up. Instead of like the West where hair products or body products are organized by brand, they organize them by actual product. So when I was looking for shampoo & conditioner the other day I panicked when all I could find was shampoo (шампунь). Turns out I had to walk along the shelves past washing up liquid & hair colorants and then I finally found conditioner. Weird. But it does have a logical explanation - cue the history lesson - in Soviet Russia they didn't have brands. They just had products. This meant that wherever you were in the СССР you always had the same thing, so the same sugar, same milk, same tea. It was always just "чай" (tea), "молоко" (milk) or "сахар" (sugar). There was no such thing as Yeo Valley or Duchy Originals milk, just milk. No Twinings, Lipton or PG Tips either! This Soviet legacy of no brands has somewhat transferred to modern Russia in that they organize most of their shelves by products and not by brand. To a Westerner this is utterly bewildering but I can understand where it's come from.
5. Something I should have mentioned immediately when I arrived - Russians don't put milk in their tea! They drink a lot of tea and I just bought some cheap & delicious lemongrass tea but it's considered almost sinful to put milk in tea! 
6. There is an abundance of root vegetables here in Russia and a lot of the fruit & vegetables that are not from Россия are usually from countries that the UK would be unlikely to trade with.....just goes to show the difference in international relations & partnerships that Russia has!
7. All television is state censored & controlled - this is because it is the most popular means of educating oneself to the news & daily happenings. Newspapers & Radio are somewhat censored but not as much as TV. This is because in Russia newspapers are expensive as are radios and so more people have access to televisions than papers or radios, thus it makes sense for the state to control this medium of mass communication strictly than to bother with others. What surprises me the most is that whilst the TV, Radio & Newspapers are all to some extent censored & controlled, Russia has made no attempts to control the internet. I have not yet found a site which I can't access here in Russia, unlike my friends studying in China who haven't been able to access Facebook for ages! Then again this boils down to the fact that Russia has an aging population & they're not highly computer friendly. Though, considering they have a youth generation who are increasingly being opened up to Western influence you'd think they'd want to watch out for stuff like the internet. Maybe by speculating I'm just fueling ideas for the Russian дума (parliament - the word is Duma from the verb думать (dumat) - to think!!)
8. I've seen adverts on the subway trying to persuade women to have at least 3 children because the birth rate is so pants here in Russia and they're facing a population crisis (way more old people who are going to die soon and not enough young people). Basically the government pays generous subsidies to women who have at least 2 or 3 children and you get good social benefits. But this isn't because the government's a crazed socialist government (aka New Labour) it's because they actually have a genuine problem on their hands and so they're trying to solve it. I guess now that Russian women have seen the Western way (no babies or marriage for us, we want careers and such...) they've abandoned the traditional Russian family way of life! Shame really.
9. Though when you do see children the parents are SO careful in the way they dress them. The children are always wrapped up warmly - most of them look like they're going skiing in their onesies. It's not about making the children into fashion statements like it is in the UK, they couldn't give a toss about that, it's about making sure the child is warm and protected. The idea of familial protection seems very important in Russia. 
10. On the subway when the train doors close it doesn't make a noise to warn you and there's no flashing light. It's like the Russians decided to test their people's reflexes & Spidey senses. "Mwahaha, we know when the doors will shut but you don't!" I don't like to run for trains or buses, I like to be cool and leisurely stroll onto them just as the doors are shutting but this way of acting doesn't really work out in Russia because of the fact that the trains don't give me a warning whether their shutting. It's really affecting me! 
11. Oh and yesterday on the subway to class I saw a woman carrying about 250 balloons and almost being blown away as a train pulled in. Also I had to get claustrophobically packed into a crowd of people trying to get up ONE escalator to change station. We were just shuffling towards the escalator in a sort of zombie like fashion. They had 4 escalators. 2 were working going down and pretty empty, one was going up and the other was "broken", they don't even have stairs or an elevator in the Russian Metro system. Illogical and totally unfriendly towards disabled people or parents with strollers.  

I think I had a few others to tell but I can't remember them. I'm always digging out my Moleskine to write down things to remember like this and I'm also always giggling to myself about what I see so I think the Russians just think foreigners are weird. 

Busy week

It's been a hectic week so far! Lots of homework, presentations and classes. 

It started with Monday (понедельник). I had a presentation, article summary & group project due for my Tuesday Mergers class, and I'd also been given about 6 readings to do - 2 of which were book chapters! All these Masters classes have such taxing homework. I'm working much harder than I would in the UK. UCL's a breeze compared to this and there if you haven't done the reading no-one cares or takes notice - here if you haven't done a reading the teacher makes note of it! 

I spent the day working on everything and making sure it was to a good standard. My grades for this class are made up of all my work during the term so I can't slack off - something else which I admire in Russia. Most classes grade students via their homework, attendance and participation. This means if you're an active student then you're likely to be getting better grades, but it also means that students have to work harder so that they can be sure of good grades. If, like most UK students, you spend every night in the pub and go to class hungover having not done any reading or work then you're going to be failed out in Russia! I much prefer this kind of academic environment, like they have in the US too. You're rewarded for working harder during the semester rather than just having one chance in an end of year exam!

As usual my Tuesday (вторинк) started with a rude awakening at 8.30am and a rushed half an hour of breakfast, dressing, checking emails, preparing my bag & teeth brushing! History class was interesting too and we learnt more about the Golden Horde (Золотая Орда) and started to learn about Ivan The Great. Next week we're going to learn more about Ivan the Terrible!! My economics class was cancelled again as our teacher had something else to do....he mentioned government work so we can't really complain about that. It just meant I could go home and have some lunch before my M&A class. 

M&A class was interesting and 3 people gave presentations. It's horrid to say I know but some of the people who have given presentations in class have a truly horrendous level of spoken English. I know that I'm learning in a foreign country but as part of my exchange programme here I was promised classes in proper English, not broken English. As a native English speaker it makes it terribly difficult to concentrate properly when someone's mumbling in English. I have no right to talk as I'm sure that some of the Russians are irritated by my slow Russian but it seems cruel for them to have to give presentations in class, in a class taught in English, if their actual English isn't up to scratch. Some of the other members of the class - especially the boys - talk during the presentations where the persons English is faltering and I think that's mean.
Anyway, because of the slow nature of the presentations the class ran on longer than normal and we didn't manage to do everything that our teacher had wanted to. This mean that there wasn't any time for me to present my presentation that I'd spent all of Monday perfecting! It was so annoying!!! I'm going to do it next week though.

Then rushed home through the rush-hour and straight back out to dance class. It's getting easier - I'm not the most dance friendly person and I need to work through moves slowly before I get them, however I'm getting better. наташа (Natasha) one of the instructors keeps telling me to smile but I tell her that I'm trying, but it's hard to smile when you're concentrating on getting the moves right! The male instructor comes over and barks at me if I'm doing something wrong so I like to concentrate fully! This week's class was a real workout and we all got so sweaty because of the nature of the room, but we all had a good giggle about it!

On Thursday I had my Russian Space & Russian State class and it's a highly interesting class on a subject I find interesting, but some of the things that my teacher says I find totally ignorant. If you've studied Russian History and especially Soviet History from an outside Russia perspective you know a lot about the negative aspects of the USSR but it appears that much of what has been taught inside Russia is from a completely different point of view, and almost appears positive. Our teacher wouldn't acknowledge that Russia lacks a natural civil society and thus a sense of a nation because of the fact that everything under the Soviets was state organized and so natural civil relationships & groups didn't develop. He blamed the lack of a Russian nation on the way the country was set-up in the 14th century or something silly like that. I was squirming all class at most of the things he was telling us about, my friends sat a few rows behind me told me they had seen my discomfort! Oh well - ignorance is bliss right? Must not judge him too harshly. The history books have been changed here so as to make Russia seem like a more positive nation & to skim over some of their shady past, but the same's happened in Germany with the Nazi past & the Holocaust so the Russian's aren't alone in that respect. 

The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier

Most countries who have been drastically affected by wars have a memorial which contains the remains of an unidentifiable soldier. A lot of soldiers throughout history have died without being specifically identified.

Russia's version is located here in Moscow. It's in алехандровский сад (the Alexandrovsky Gardens) right outside the Kremlin walls. It's beneath one of the Kremlin towers. The floor is made of maroon colored marble and the actual monument is made of brass. It features a soldier helmet & a banner bearing the Hammer & Sickle of the CCCP. There is an eternal flame which features in the middle of a 5 point star. The writing around the 5 point star reads Имя твое неизвестно, подвиг твой бессмертен - Your name is unknown, your deed is immortal.

The tomb itself with freshly laid flowers

To the right of the tomb & lining the walkway along the Alexandrovsky Gardens & along the Kremlin wall are blocks which contain soil from the "Golden" or "Hero" cities - Leningrad, Kiev, Stalingrad, Odessa, Sevastopol, Minsk, Kerch, Novorossiysk, Tula, Brest, Murmansk & Smolensk. Obviously it is worth noting these cities are all in the former Soviet Union as this is a Soviet Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. 

Dmitri Medvedev lighting the eternal flame during a ceremony in the Winter.

On the left hand side of the tomb there is a granite wall which reads "1941-1945 для тех, кто погиб за Родину" or "1941-1945 To Those Who Have Fallen For the Motherland." The dates on the signs note World War Two as 1941 to 1945. This is because 1941 began Russia's involvement in the war as one of the allies. Russia was involved in the war long before this and had a pact with Nazi Germany, but only when the Nazi's broke this pact by invading Russia did they join the allied forces. It has been noted that the reasoning behind the official statements of Russia's involvement in WWII being from 1941 onwards are because beforehand they were not only allied with the antagonists but also did some shady stuff. 1941 is when Russia suffered losses at the hand of the Nazis, but before then they were the ones killing on behalf of the Nazis. I just find this all so hypocritical, but also so typically Russian.

Red brick wall behind is the Kremlin wall

 My Russian friend told me they were learning in history class about the American Civil War, only they were being taught that it was the bourgeoisie american civil war & was a class battle. Class had nothing to do with the civil war in the US, but they're being taught over here that it was instigated by the bourgeoisie & so aligning them with the negative. 

Honor Guard

Anyway, enough of the lecture. I found the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier to be very moving and was interested to see the guard being changed at the top of the hour. The guard is changed every hour on the hour, come rain or shine. 

Traditionally newlywed couples place flowers & wreaths on the tomb in order to thank the unknown soldiers for allowing them the ability to get married. Especially as marriage & family are such big elements of Russian culture.

A beautiful view.

Finally a beautiful view. I took this from inside the Kremlin. It's part of the gorgeous skyline of Moscow. 

In the distance you can make out (through the misty clouds) one of the Seven Sisters - Stalin's skyscrapers as they are also known.

Also you can see the Cathedral of Christ the Savior. (the Russian Taj Mahal)

There's the bridge going over the река москва complete with traffic (the Moscow River).

In between the Cathedral & the Seven Sister you can also see 2 other Russian Cathedrals, I don't know what their names are but you can tell them by the gold plated domes & spires.

Finally on the far right you can see the Water Supplying Tower of the Kremlin wall. 

It would obviously look a lot better if the sun were shining!

Spot the Hammer & Sickles.

Today we woke up super early to get to the Kremlin! We wanted to get inside but they only have a certain number of tickets per day for entry and once the tickets are gone, there's no more entry! You can't even pre-book tickets! We arrived at 9.15 and queued up to get into the ticket office which opened at 9.30. You can get 4 different types of ticket for entry into different parts of the Kremlin. We got tickets to allow us into the Armory (which was spectacular) and also into the Cathedrals. Obviously there are parts of the Kremlin you can't go into as they're governmental buildings and there is a heavy police presence on the site. There were a lot of tourist groups, mainly Japanese, Russian and the occasional American or Spanish group. 
Though as Winnie the Pooh would say it was a blustery day and it rained a little. But we utterly enjoyed ourselves nevertheless.

Moi, the Trinity Tower and to the left the State Kremlin Palace

The Armory was a pretty amazing experience and I've never seen so many beautiful items in my life. The number of precious jewels that were in each of the artifacts was amazing. One particular crown was bejeweled with over 2 thousand diamonds. The first thought in my mind was what spectacular engagement rings they'd make! If we ever run out of diamonds or precious stones the first place to look is in the Armory! There were lots of items from the period of the Tsars which had been perfectly preserved. This surprised me a little considering what the Bolsheviks thought of the Tsars, I would have thought they would have destroyed all evidence of them & melted down their grand fancy things to make weapons & such. Obviously my ideas of socialism & communism which I've learnt from Lenin & Marx are not the same that Stalin used.........need I say more really?

The Kremlin Arsenal (no admittance to the public though)

The State Kremlin Palace was built by Khrushchev and was built to house the Communist Party meetings. From the outside you can clearly tell that it was intended as a place for Communists as there are large murals of the Hammer & Sickle & the Soviet Star. I actually found the building quite beautiful and it reminded me a little of the American Embassy in London. Today it hosts ballets and other cultural events.

There are at least 6 Cathedrals within the Kremlin site. Each one has a different name and a different reason for existing. Ivan the Terrible's relatives were entombed in the the Archangel's Cathedral though it was difficult to tell who was who because they used Old Cyrillic which actually makes use of the English 'I' and other letters are slightly changed.

The Annunciation Cathedral

The Archangel's Cathedral

Me & The Ivan the Great Bell-Tower, the Assumption Belfry & the Filaret's extension

Bookstore

There's this bookstore here in Moscow called библио-глобус (Biblio Globus) and they have a massive store right by my university next to лубянка station. I needed to get a diary and I wanted one in Russian so that I could learn the days & months better. They love Moleskine here, but that's no use to me as it's in English AND double the price of London (& Moleskine's not cheap in London either!). 

I walked into the store and my mouth dropped open! But I was hassled by the security guard. They have this thing here in Russia with people bringing shopping bags or bags of things into stores. I think it's because there are a lot of poor people so I guess that stealing is common. If you go to the supermarket or OBI (which is like the Russian Home Depot) and you have a bag of shopping from another store you have to put it in this generic plastic bag & seal it! This security guard hassled me because one of the books in my handbag, my lovely Moleskine set off the detector so he made me put it in a plastic bag & seal it. That perturbed me a little. 

The store is one of the most fabulous things I ever seen and for a book worm it's literally like heaven! It has about 3/4 floors and different зал's (halls is the English word but they're not actual halls more like sections). They have a large section of foreign language material, including books in French, German & English, as well as books to learn English - a LOT of books to learn English! My favorite thing is to find English books I know but written in русски язык (Russian) and see how their title has been translated, such as P.S I Love You or Pride & Prejudice. It's rather amusing. Sometimes they translate directly,'P.S. я лублю тебя' или (or) Звёздный путь which is Star Trek, or they translate it into Russian in a way that if you directly translated it back into English it wouldn't actually mean the same thing or make sense. Just something I find amusing. 

I had a long wander and perused the different sections. There was also an antiquarian section with lots of gorgeous smelling old books & lots of old Soviet coins & paintings. I ended up purchasing only what I came in for, a diary or as my Canadian friends call it a planner, in Russian with россия on the front cover & a large Russian flag and also some new Sharpie pens. I forgot my Sharpies and I always need a Sharpie for something!

          The concept of queuing is something the Russian's haven't quite grasped yet and as a polite foreigner I often end up waiting the longest in queues or refusing to push through everyone to get on the escalator on the subway. It has been noted by a number of people quite how polite I am, and this is reflected on my British upbringing. My parents must have done something right!! So I queued in the store for about 15 minutes, got a student discount of 5% and was given a plastic bag free of charge (unheard of in Russia!). 

Then I went home in order to have dinner & prepare for dance class. I do love being squashed like a sardine on the Russian subway. If you're near the front of the crowd to the doors you will just be pushed onto the train and you have NO way of controlling this. Then you have to stand like a penguin and rock from side to side as the train bumbles along. I've started to be a little more Russian and less polite when it comes to the subway. They just push their way through and don't even say excuse me or sorry, it makes it obvious that I'm a foreigner when I say "umm...извените пажалуиста....." nervously. I'd probably get berated on the tube in London if I acted like a Russian!! But I'm assimilating Russian culture and I'm here to learn so if that's the Russian way then I'll just follow suit! 


P.S. It's OCTOBER! This means I only have 2 months & 23 days left in Russia. That actually makes me sort of sad. 

Casual picture of St Basil's Cathedral & the statue of the 2 men who saved Moscow from the Polish!