So last weekend I made my 4th trip to Moscow, Eric accompanying. This time a round I actually managed to see Lenin (he’s very waxy looking and they don’t let you stand still to look at him), and walked a great deal of the city on foot. In the very very bitter cold. It was so cold that when at 4 am we stumbled out onto a completely empty Red Square, swaggering not just a bit, we discovered Ice in our beer. Refreshing.The cold also drove us to frequent steaming beverage stops around the city, particularly in the period between our the end of our sleepless train ride at 6 am and the beginning of Lenin’s working hours (10-1, daily). Unfortunately it’s quite difficult to find a decent, cheap cup of joe in Moscow to say nothing of the incomprehensible difficulty we had finding a place open at the apparently ungodly hour of our arrival (all I’m saying is that shit wouldn’t fly in New York or Chicago) Insult to injury: we found a bunch of “24 hour” establishments but were slightingly rejected by the rather bored wait staff; apparently “round the clock” and 24 hours don’t apply to Saturday mornings. At any rate, we finally settled for some over priced breakfasts and some pretty mediocre coffee at Shokoladnitsa, in spite of my giddy suggestions that we break our McDonalds fast and visit the first golden arches in Moscow that were climbing over the horizon as we walked towards Pushkinskaya Square. The next stop was a Koffee hauz, which was even more over priced and considerably less satisfactory. Having blown something like 40 bucks in our first 4 muscovite hours, we went into cheap mode and dined twice at Sbarro where a 4 dollar combo gets you soup, a slice, and a beverage (a rather swell meal combined with maybe an extra slice and several relatively inexpensive Sbarro beers).

Everytime I’m in Moscow I like it a little bit more, but all the same I’m always happy to return to Petersburg. It’s a crazy, stunning city. The massive, totalitarian “Seven Sister” buildings built under Stalin punctuate the skyline along with steeples and nowadays extravagant billboards and light displays. The streets wind, bend and jut up hills and on each, the nominal “buildings” turn out to be coursed through with alleyways, substreets, and courtyards. Finding hostels and back alley bars is the beginning of an adventure for the uninitiated, but that’s sort of the whole fun. It’s a city that rewards the wanderer. Also, Muscovites seem to ask for and give directions much more frequently than Petersburgers. Which urban group is actually the friendliest is still sort of up for debate, although our friend Lena explained that Muscovites are friendlier because they are stupider (literally “from the village/country”) while Petersburgers are educated, cultured people. It seems nobody that came to age reading Dostoevsky feels much inclination to greet strangers with cheer.

At any rate, it turns out I’m headed back to the great red city next weekend to take my Foreign Service exam…

In other news, Elza leaves for France tomorrow. We’re planning a farewell party tonight and then some kind of Balkan style dirge to the airport, perhaps even boomboxing some of Maria’s gypsy music. Eric jets the next weekend. Everything is sad.