Moscow, Potatoes, and Vodka

No, this is not a U of I frat party, though it may seem like one. This is the real moscow. And potatoes are apparently a huge thing here. The difference though between idaho potatoes and russian potatoes is that in Idaho, at least at ACI, they seemed to figure out how to prepare potatoes in such a way that you never had the same potatoe dish twice in one month, yet there was potatoes everyday at the cafeteria. Here it is either baked potato...or potato made vodka.

8.1 Arrived at the hostel in the morning and kind of chilled out bc I knew that I had 4 days in moscow which would be plenty to see it all. After I got moving I went out and explored a bit of moscow. Away from the touristy areas. Just the city. Nothing too exciting, just kind of a normal city. But I was looking for a supermarket in which to buy things for my train journey like instant noodles since they have the hot water on the train. Then I went and did some of the touristy things like the arabat pedestrian mall full of artists and people selling their wares. Eventually I made it to the infamous red square to watch the sun lighting up the gorgeous and unique st. basil's cathedral with his multicolored domes that look like candy along with all the other impressive areas surrounding the square and the outside of the Kremlin. After that I took a stroll around the Kremlin and watched some of the locals, or at least russians, playing in the fountains. It was over 100 degrees today. Moscow has been having a heat wave for the past month. Over 20 degrees warmer everyday than it normally is.
When I arrived back at the hostel, the guy in charge was awaiting me with a beer...not cold, but hey, how can you complain. I kind of hung out for a while and did some internet stuff that needed to be done as far as my train travel goes.
Then I ended up meeting a very nice russian girl named gylan and two czech guys named martin and radek. The czech guys had brought a bunch of alcohol from home, so we were all sharing that and sweating and having a grand time. The czechs and the russian gal had all lived in the US, so there was much in common to talk about. Definitely a fun time and we stayed up late into the night.

8/2 Set out to explore more of Moscow. Visited the Red square and St. Basil's again. St. Basil's is just sooo cool. You remember the palace in the candyland game? That is what this church looks like. Like a big church with a bunch of candy turrets. Took a stroll along the Moscow river to Christ the Saviour Cathedral, the huge giant, gold domed cathedral in moscow. I also visited the Bolshoi theatre, famous for it's opera and ballet. I had thought about going to an opera bc my book had said that the cheap tickets could be had for 4 bucks, but now they are 15 and I just figured it wasn't worth it, even though it is a "thing to do" in Moscow, bc I don't really like either one of those. Also visited the tomb of the uknown soldier which is in honor of the soldier who died in the farthest nazi advance. It was incredibly hot today. Over 1oo degrees for sure. The moscowians, take to the city fountains for swims in this weather, and eventually I joined them. It was definitely quite refreshing. At one of the fountains I met two stanford students here for a conference on space science. They were interesting bc they had both been to antarctia too bc Stanford has a reseaerch base at the south pole.
After touring I went to the supermarket to get a 5L jug of water just bc it was so hot. I was spending a lot of time trying to figure out which jug was sprakling (soda) and which was still water. In eastern europe they drink a lot of sparkling water and there is nothing worse than buying a water, opening it and having it fizz. Bubbly water just doesn't quench the thirst like still water. I asked a guy if he spoke english, and indeed he did, but he was israeli and couldn't read russian. However he was travelling with someone who could...a russian immigrant to Israel. He was a very nice guy and just couldn't believe I could be travelling in russia without speaking the language or being with someone that did.
That night I took a tour around the kremlin and st. basils at night. As I was walking home around 1am, the temperature still read 92 degrees at the bank.
So the Moscow post has an english paper a couple times a week. I was reading it and apparently this is the hottest summer they have ever had. Before this summer the highest temperature that had ever recorded was 96 degrees. Since I have been here it has been over 100 degrees everyday, and the lows are only like 88 degrees. So you can imagine in the hostel it is insanely warm even at night. Definitely in the high 90's I would say. It doesn't help that they have these huge hot water heaters warming up the whole place. I am sure quite nice during the freezing winter...but not now! I take a couple cold showers per day and go to bed in my wet swimsuit. You sweat a ton and wake up in the morning drenched in sweat. But amazingly i have actually slept quite well. The paper also said that there are like 35 major fires (a lot of them peat fires) outside of moscow which is causing terrible polution (this is true) and is quite bad for the health. As one doctor said, a day in moscow is the equivlant of smoking 40 cigarettes in one day...but one can you do. You just carry on through the heat. Actually the heat during the day doesn't bother me too much as long as I have water, it's more at night when you just sit there sweating. But everyone is... It's funny bc when I was in bali and some of the tourist places in thailand, they have special russian hotels for the russians that cater to them since they can't speak english. On occassion backpackers would get stuck at these, but they always noted how open and free the russians are, with the girls walking around naked all the time in the hotel. Well at this hostel there are quite a lot of russians, and it is true...the guys walk around in their little bikini briefs and a lot of the girls in tiny shorts and no top. It is quite awkward, but all the rest of us westerners laugh at it. The poor buddhist korean here just can't get over it.