Adjusting to Russian life

Day 12

I didn’t really do much except work on my paper and do some laundry. In the evening, Adrian and I went to the little café/restaurant in the neighboring building. They have student prices there with basics of Russian food such as Borsht soup, pelmeni etc. Afterwards we stopped by the Producty across the street to buy some desert. At the checkout a little plastic bag with little brown balls caught my eye. I went to confirm my suspicion and was right – caramelized peanuts! A big portion for only 50 rubles, that just made my day!

What I also discovered at the dairy product shelf – they have RUDIs here! I was introduced to Rudis in Hungary and love them. They are small chocolate covered little things, filled with what we Germans call “Quark” or in English “curd”. It sort of tastes like bitesize chocolate covered cheesecake. The traditional one is with dark chocolate and plain white Quark (sweetened) inside. However, here in Russia they have all kinds of different variations, from low fat to double chocolate, vanilla quark, coconut quark, ones with a jelly core inside etc. They cost around 8-14 rubles (0,18 – 0,32 €) depending on the brand.

Other interesting observations I made at the grocery store: in the frozen food section you can bag your own frozen French fries or frozen clams (I wondered about the hygiene there). Then there were yoghurts stored in non-cooled shelves as well as cooled ones. Also I think milk is expensive. I bought a tiny half liter box and payed around 50 rubles, the 1 liter sizes are from 70 to 110 rubles (1,60-2,50 €). In Germany we pay around 0,7 € for a liter of regular milk.

Day 13

Today I finished my paper and wrote the summary and conclusion. At 2 I drove into the city. I wanted to check out the Zero Kilometer thing, and fortunately it wasn’t busy this time. So I stood in the middle and threw my little coin and made a wish.

 Lenin and Stalin with tourists

Then I went to the GUM again to find out what the historic toilet was all about, because several people have asked me what it was. I only know that you have to pay around 80 rubles to get in. So I took some pictures of the old photographs that hung on the wall instead. 

 the tower in the old picture is probably the same one as in the lower picture

Then I walked in a U along Nikolsky street back to Teatralnya metro. Infront of the Bolshoi Theater I fed a poor fog crow with a broken wing.  He was very mistrusting but got a lot of big bites of pastry from me. Then I had to head back to take the green metro line towards campus. I met Artem who told me that Someone had told him about the cat in the room and of the boyfriends that spend the night, so he told me he would talk to the person responsible for the dorm to put me in another room. I also got my passport back (I had to hand it in for registration). Then I met my supervisor who is really nice and we talked about my work and what my next task would be. I would have to prepare a small presentation for Friday. I went back to the dorm and ate some of my instant tomato soup. I also met Marc who said that I could move to another room this evening. So we went and got the keys, he did all the talking, and went to the room. The girls, one Malaysian and one Indian, weren’t there, but as soon as I had a look at their bathroom I decided I would rather stay in my current room. But Marc talked to the lady in the office again and she decided that I could stay in the guest room. So I will take a look tomorrow and see if it’s any better.

Day 14

I woke up when my roommates had already left. I really don’t understand their wake-sleep schedule. And either they had opened the window for me to be nice, since I’m the only one opening it, or the wind had pushed it open, because they only turn the handle to the swing open position and then push it shut. The handle shows a little resistance when moving from one position to another but as I mentioned before I don’t think they know how to use it. So anyway, the window was open and it was indeed a bit chilly and to my surprise it was snowing! Actually more like snow/rain. I immediately checked if my milk was still on the window sill and it was, nice and cold too. I was concerned when I put it there last night, because the window sill is a little bit slanted outward and the German guy had warned me that the cheese they put on his window sill had disappeared during a stormy night.

So I had my sweet bread and milk for breakfast when a man from the dormitory administration came and I guess he wanted to speak to the Vietnamese girls about the cat and so on. I asked the Columbian girl to translate and afterwards I went downstairs to meet Marc downstairs at the office at 10. There were now 4 people plus me and Marc discussing about my room situation. Of course I didn’t understand anything, but in the end what happened was that the guestroom they had talked about last evening apparently was not available after all and that they would send the Vietnamese student representative to talk to the girls this evening and make them remove the cat and forbid them to let their boyfriends stay overnight. I felt really bad because I didn’t want to get them into trouble.

Then I continued working on my research. And at 6 Adrian and I left to meet the remaining IAESTE people at a nice restaurant to celebrate his last evening. I also learned that Russians can’t speak the letter “H”, they have a sound corresponding to the German “ch” which they spell with “X”, but every word they adapt from other languages that starts with an “H” they use “G” instead, for example “gamburger” or “pizza gawaii”. I thought this was funny.

Day 15

I worked on my presentation which took much longer than expected and then took the metro and tram to meet my supervisor at 6. There were 3 others from her team and I presented my work and then had to introduce myself for her colleagues, where I come from, what I’m doing etc.

Then they continued with a presentation from one guy about the centralized maintenance system Airbus uses and why it’s such an advantage over what the Russian aircraft have. But all in Russian, so naturally I could only follow things he wrote on the board and afterwards they wanted to calculate some leasing rates for aircraft, explaining that the method to calculate lease rates are different according to Russian economic law. So all in all it was a very unspectacular evening. At 9:30 I went back home and stopped at the grocery store near the metro Schukinskaya, where the tram stops. And what bothered me most was that you can’t really go window shopping because all the stores that are not from international brands use kyrillic letters and you can’t tell what’s inside from afar. Next to the grocery store there is a shopping center with several stores, but I wouldn’t know what they sell without actually going in.

What I’ve noticed as well was there are lots of little stores that sell flower bouquets. And lots and lots of men buy them for their wives/girlfriends. And I’m not talking about the average small bunch of flowers but really big bouquets with long stemmed roses and all extras.

I also decided to go to St. Petersburg because I was only required to come back to a meeting next Saturday so I looked up some hotels, flights and trains.

Day 16

I spent the morning figuring out which hotel to book and which train to take. When I finally decided and wanted to book my ticket it didn’t work. So I had to call Anna, who also arranged the train ticket for the other German guy. I booked my hotel, which seems really nice in a good location. Then I went to Metro Park Pobedy to go to the Victory Monument. It was very pompous and not very pretty in my opinion. I walked up the Obelisk which is all black, so you can’t really distinguish the designs on it then went past another flame memorial for 2^nd Worldwar and walked up to the ticket office. Everything was in Russian so I looked around a bit to figure out what kind of exhibition it actually was. Then I saw the sign for the war weaponry and fortification exhibition which showed a big blue arrow pointing right. To the right were stairs going down towards the back of the halfround Monument building. So I went down. And then where? No sign, no nothing. There were big doors on either side of the stairs, but they didn’t look open nor was there any sign. I walked around a bit to maybe find another sign, but no. So I walked back up and asked someone. He actually spoke English and said, yes, down the stairs and then straight for one kilometer. So I thought ok, that’s far but we’ll see. I went back down and along the walkway until some distance away (maybe 500m) I saw another big sign with a big blue arrow pointing left. So I walked left on the pathway through the trees. And yes, soon I saw a big fence and some tanks behind it and people with cameras. But how in the world would I get on the other side of the fence? The Fence obviously was built later than the pathway and jus placed right across it. There were no signs, no gate, not even a pathway parallel to the fence. So I wound my way through the trees on partial pathways following the fence, turning a corner and then finally saw something that looked like an entrance with ticket office. So I bought my ticket, this time she didn’t accept my student ID and went in. The setting was neat, lots of tanks and guns and a rebuilt trench. Sadly it started raining a bit and it was freezing cold. My jacket kept me very warm, but my face was just super cold. Putting on my hat and hood and gloves I kept on walking towards the area with the airplanes, helicopters, trains and even boats. All very interesting – with English Info signs!

Then I went to Kiewsky station and wanted to take a look at the big shopping mall because supposedly there was a Matrushka exhibition there. I thought I might grab a hot cocoa or tea and tried to locate the food court. I’ve never seen such an unorganized shopping mall. How anyone could find their way around without getting lost beats me. I walked up and down around corners but thing I found was a sushi bar in the middle. So I decided to go back instead. By then it was rush hour, but being Saturday not too bad. I even got a seat on the metro and took the bus from the metro to the dorm without complications. I stopped by the little café and had some Borsht soup which was surprisingly good. Now I also know how to say “check please” – it’s “schtschot paschalusta” which you pronounce more like “shoat pajaloosta”. I packed my things for St. Petersburg and organized my stuff a bit before leaving to Leningradsky Trainstation. 

For day 17 - day 21: see my post "Saint Petersburg" (click on the link in the blog archive on the right)

Day 22

What I thought was very funny when I arrived back in Moscow was that at the train station they played real Russian music, in Germany the equivalent would have been the Bavarian oohmpahpa music. I headed “home” and when I arrived my roommates were about to leave, so I went to bed for 2 hours or so because I wasn’t feeling too well. I stayed in that day and worked on my paper. In the evening I had borsht soup again at the little café. Having no access to a water boiler or kettle makes life really difficult. I always have to ask the girls next door, but they were gone that evening, so I couldn’t even make myself some tea.

Day 23

I went do Novodevichy Monastery today because it was supposed to be very pretty. At first I looked at the cemetery which was interesting, I wouldn’t call it beautiful, but interesting. Apparently, it’s a Russian thing to have the deceased image on the tomb stone. Old stones had photo-medaillons attached on the tomb, others had entire stone busts or profile engravings. The new ones had laser engraved photos. Some tomb stones were like real monuments, expressing important things from the person’s life. For example, someone was depicted ice skating, others with airplaces, rockets, racing jumpsuits and helmets, women as ballerinas etc. Some very actually very pretty, some just plain grotesque. But all in all, it was very pompous and the choice of stone (black or dark red) made it depressing as well. In Rome I went to a very pretty cemetery with only white marble tomb stones and that made it so much nicer. There was a map telling you which person lay where, but only in Russian of course. You could have bought the English map for 100 rubles, but I just looked at the displayed sample to find Tolstoy’s grave, which I didn’t find very pretty and then went around the block to the monastery. I immediately thought this would have been an ideal setting for a Christmas market. Very spacious, but also enclosed by high walls. The monastery was used to get rid of high society wives and daughters as early as 1598 by Tsar Boris Godunow. Peter 1^st sent his half-sister to the monastery because she conspired against him and later his first wife as well.

I then took the metro one station further to the highest metro platform in the world in the Moscow “sparrow hills”. I walked up the path to look at the map to find the lookout point. When I saw the walkway I thought that at that small angle it would take forever to get up the little hill. I saw a couple of people walk up a steeper slope just in front of me and thought that they seemed to know where to go and decided to follow. This turned out to be a very stupid idea, because the slope was super muddy and slippery and of course I was wearing my sneakers instead of my boots. But oh well, half way up I decided to keep going and managed not to slip or fall and then arrived right next to a big highway. Even further up there was a bridge, so I had to get up there as well. Up there I found the upper pathway towards the lookout point, so indeed, it was a shortcut, but a very muddy one. At the lookout point there were tons of people from several wedding parties taking pictures. I didn’t think the view was that memorable to be chosen for a wedding picture because there were factory towers and other ugly buildings in the background. I turned towards the university to look for the metro station that was supposed to be there. It turned out the metro station was little further on. 
The university building is one of "Stalin's 7 Sisters" with the typical architecture.

I went back into the city and wanted to meet with the girl from Portugal. She was late though so I went to the GUM to get some tea. It was super busy inside and the queues were really long. But I stood in line because I really wanted something warm to drink. When I got to the checkout I saw that they even had hot cocoa for only 50 rubles – woohoo! I met her later on at the Zero Kilometer with a friend of hers and we walked towards Pushkin square looking at some buildings, for example the old telegraph center. Then they left and I went to meet the others at Kitai Gorod. I had dinner at subway and was surprised that they charge you extra for cheese. The little parks were all nicely lit up and when I met the others we went to a Chinese bar with a real fireplace.

Day 24

I started my day by going to the Produkty to buy some water, food and toilet paper since there was none left. This is my third pack of toilet paper I’ve bought since I’ve been here. I don’t know why it’s always gone. We are 5 girls, and usually there are at least 2 or 3 rolls in the little toilet vestibule (ontop of the water tank, since they don’t have a toilet roll holder). You might recall that the toilet is separate from the sink and shower.  I’ve bought, white, yellow and now pink toilet paper, all “aroma” versions, since they have that a lot here and the pink one is just what I grabbed at the Produkty. I worked a little bit on my paper and then met the IAESTE people on the island in the Moskva river to go to a gallery with a photo exhibition. I didn’t expect too much since I’m not the usual exhibition-goer but the photos were actually quite nice. The topic was 70s rock stars, so it was fun to see Santana, Mick Jagger and ABBA etc. when they were young.

Then we went to the GUM to have lunch at the soviet style self-serve restaurant. I tried a carrot-fritter. It was ok, but very greasy. Downstairs in the GUM they had a small exhibition about vintage clothing and oldtimer cars as well as a Christmas ornament market in the middle.

Day 25

I stayed in the dorm and finished my calculations. It was raining anyway. I then took the metro and tram to the university and met Artem who took me to an office where I got my salary, 2700 rubles. I then went to a café on campus where I had some tea and finished the layout and some alterations on my report and then met up with my supervisor. I presented my work and when we were about to leave she asked me which tram I would take. She told to come with her and her sister, so we walked around the block to her car and she drove me to the tram stop, which I could have walked to. But it was a nice gesture. She also offered to meet me on Wednesday and show me the Tretjakov gallery.

Day 26

When I woke up it was snowing! It didn’t really stick to the ground, but it was snow none the less.

I took the metro to Kitai Gorod to go to the Polytechnic Museum, but of course it’s closed for renovation. So went to the Romanov Chambers instead, when I arrived, it was closed, because of course Tuesday is the day off. The opening hours of museums are really strange. Some have either Monday or Tuesday off, the Kreml has Thursday off and then they have weird extra days like the first Monday of every month or last Friday of every month.

So I fed the birds with the yucky leftover pastry I still had from the boys on the trainride. They look like sweet filled little things, but one was evidently filled with sourkraut or something similar. I didn’t even try the second one, but I suspect it was filled with red beet. The ravens are always very reserved, they won’t touch the food unless you back up at least 10 feet. But the sparrows make up for that being really tame and inquisitive. Then I had tea and honey cake for 80 rubles at a small little café in an old building next to the Romanov house. It was very cute, with tiny little windows and tea from a real hand painted porcelain cup.

I walked to the Bolshoi theater because I wanted to take a tour. The security staff there naturally spoke no English and only told me where the “kacca” (ticket office) was, there it said that only one tour is offered in English each day and costs 500 rubles. I then decided to do some other little things instead, so I went to the grey metro line and got out at the Nikolin Circus to take a picture of a cool brass statue of a guy and a car. Doesn’t sound spectacular I know. 

I went one stop further to Mendelejev to take a picture of the doggie statue which was erected in tribute to a stray dog, Malchik,  who lived in the metro station and protected it against drunks and other dogs. He was stabbed to death by a crazy drunk woman.

I took the ring line to Park Kultury to go to the Moscow city museum. When I got there at first it was difficult to figure out which building was the correct one because there were three and the signs only in Russian of course. When I finally found the ticket office and asked a lady who spoke English, she said that the museum is only in Russian so I decided not to go. I then walked around the block to the Tolstoy estate museum. It was sort of cute. In the middle of big ugly apartment building stood this little house with low ceilings and crooked walls. Inside it was nice and every room had an info sign in English. I went back to Arbat street to have something to eat at My-My (“moo moo”). The cheese soup was very good with big pieces of broccoli and potato. But the so-called ceasar salad was not good at all. I don’t know if that was the Russian version of it. Instead of real (white) chicken meat it was more like chicken-döner meatstrips and instead of ceasar dressing it was plain mayonnaise. The croutons were good though.  

I then walked to Pushkin square in the snow and met Erik’s colleague’s friend at Ulitsa 1905 metro station.  We went to a nice pub and then I went back home where I finished the condensed version of my report. By then the snow was sticking and everything looked very pretty, at least as pretty as snow covered ugly buildings can look like.

Day 27

I was supposed to meet my supervisor at 1 to go to the Tretjakov gallery, I got there early and waited and waited. I finally texted her and she said that we would have to postpone. So I walked around the red square in the snow and back towards the Romanov House. I had tea again in the little café I went yesterday and then went to the museum. They had info sheets for every room. It was very interesting and the doors were soo small! They must have been tiny people. 

I walked to the metro and drove to Kolomenskoje Park. It was really cold and because I anticipated a day in the museum I only wore normal clothes and my big jacket. I wished I had my thermo leggings on to keep my legs and butt warm! The park was nice, nothing too special, with a couple of old buildings, for example Peter 1^st wooden house he lived in while supervising some project. They re-erected it here.  Everything was glittery white and even the sun shone! I saw a very cool horse drawn carriage like from Disney’s Cinderella movie, round and see-through. 

I went back to the dorm and had some Kartoshka at the mall. I also found a stand selling little cakes on the top floor of the mall. It’s good I only discovered it now, otherwise I would have tried a different kind each day! ;-) 

Day 29

I drove to the IAESTE office and picked up my certificate. On my way back to the metro I saw the ugliest little dog. It was one of those that are almost naked and he definitely was in need of his winter coat, scarf and hood!

Then I went to Izmailovo market and bought some souvenirs. This is really the cheapest place for souvenirs, you just need to make sure you browse each stand first, without letting your gaze linger or the stand owners will try to persuade you to buy their items, a little bit like in Mexico. Once you made the tour you and compare prices you can come back to your desired booth.

Then I went back to the dorm and did some last minute edits on my report because my supervisor asked me to change some things. Then I headed towards campus where I met my supervisor and one from her team. The head of department couldn’t make it so I thought it was sort of pointless since I had already told her everything and had presented my results last time. But oh well.

When that was done I went back to the dorm and met with the girls next door and some of their friends and had a nice evening.

By the way – it’s less than 4 weeks until Christmas!

Day 30

I met Sarah, the girl from Manchester I met in St Petersburg, at the GUM where we had something to eat and then we took the Metro to Tsaritsina park. As usual there were several exits from the metro and we decided to take the left one. It was not a very nice neighborhood being almost at the end of the metro line with just lots of little kiosk stores etc. We went up this street because there were lots of people coming and going but the street ended at a train station. So we asked the security guard how to get there. It was actually very easy, we should have turned left instead of right and then walk along the street which led right up to the park. Even from afar it looked pretty with a big palace in the middle. So we walked around, over the bridge across the lake, fed the ducks and walked up to the palace. We went into a new building that was the entrance to the museum and as usual there was a security guard. She didn’t speak English and seemed very angry and annoyed with us, because she wanted us to close the door behind us which we didn’t understand. But after walking back and forth through the security thing we were finally allowed inside. But at the ticket office they did not accept my student ID and the regular price would have been 300 rubles to see the royal porcelain. I’ve already seen the porcelain collection in Dresden and Vienna, so I didn’t want to go for that price. We walked around some more and saw a squirrel and fed him some more bread and then went back to the metro. We also saw lots and lots of brides and grooms who were having their photo shoots at the palace and park. At the GUM we saw a few as well.

I said good bye to Sarah, who had to go home, and then walked around a bit, through the TSUM shopping center where they had a very nice Christmas section with cool decorations and music.

Then back through the Alexander park where I fed the last of my bread to the ravens and then took some pictures of the GUM delicatessen store where they had lots of yummy cakes, candy and pastries etc. 
I met the IAESTE people at the rendez-vous spot in the metro and then went to the Yolki Palki restaurant that I had chosen because it was supposed to be cheap, good food and have interesting decoration. The interior was actually quite cute, with a fake tree in the middle with branches hanging over tables and very rustic accessories. The food was good, I had grenki and kwas. Kwas is a traditional non-alcoholic Russian drink made out of bread. It is very dark brown and liquid like any other drink, not mushy or creamy and tastes a little bit like malt beer or root beer. I wanted to try the cherry dumplings but they didn’t have any, so I asked for the cottage cheese pancakes, but they didn’t have those either. When I ordered the honey cake they were out as well. So I was a little bit disappointed. I said good bye to everyone there and went back to the dorm where I packed my things. 

Day 31

I got up early and finished packing my things trying not to wake up my room mates. But I guess I was a little bit too loud because they woke up and they said good bye and gave me a key chain from Vietnam each. I walked to the Produkty where I bought something for breakfast and headed towards the metro when suddenly one of the miniature buses was driving past and honked at me and the driver waved for me to get on. So I thought ok, and took the bus to the metro instead of walking. I wanted to return my metro card to get the 50 rubles deposit back and buy one single ticket. The lady at the ticket counter did not understand and did not speak English. She thought I wanted to recharge the card. So I was very frustrated and finally found a girl who helped me. In the metro I tried to fix the zipper on my backpack, which of course broke again this morning. I had fixed it previously and tried to do it again. Eventually I wrapped my scarf around it instead to keep it from opening. I arrived at Kievsky train station and bought a ticket and waited because I was bit too early. The aeroexpress is actually a very nice train, clean, modern and lots of room for legs and luggage. At the airport I was very annoyed with the security personnel. To enter the terminal you had to go through security like in the museums. Luggage went through the scanner on a conveyor belt and people had to go through the scanner leaving cell phones and wallets on the little table in between. I did that as well but when I put my little travel purse which only has room for cell phone, wallet and passport she was complaining in Russian and I gathered she wanted me to put it on the conveyor belt as well. But I didn’t want to put the most important things throught that machine where anyone could steal it. In the end I did because I didn’t see any other way to get through, since I couldn’t argue with her. I was very mad though. Then I couldn’t find the Werman Wings check-in and after asking some airline employees who could speak English (wow!) they told me I was in the wrong terminal building. So had to go outside and walk a few meters to the next terminal building and had to go through security again, same situation only this time the security woman seemed nicer. I looked for the check-in and finally found it. To get there you had to have you bags scanned again. After I got my ticket I went to the next floor and through passport control. Then I read my book near the duty free area because I had lots of time left. I also had 100 rubles left to spend, since you’re theoretically not allowed to export Russian currency. So I bought a piece of pizza and had lunch, the women at the pizza place could also not speak English, but pointing to the slice of pizza you want worked well enough. I really think it’s strange that people who work in museums or airports who are confronted with tourists every day do not speak English and don’t even try. You would think it’s a hiring requirement.

After that I went to the gate and had to go through security again, the “actual” security point, but I didn’t have to take out my laptop and I doubt that I was required to show my little bag of liquids. So anyway, I got to the gate and on the plane and finally left Moscow after 30 days. People from IAESTE, the dorm and my supervisor kept asking me what I thought of Moscow and if I liked it and the best diplomatic reply I think is to say “it was interesting”.  I liked St Petersburg and some things in Moscow were nice but all in all I don’t think I want to go to Moscow again. It was an experience. And it made me realize how lucky I am to live in a developed country like Germany, grew up in a house with a garden, have clean air to breathe etc. It made me appreciate the little things even more than I already did. 

Dá Swidania!