When Ireland meets Moscow

On return to the ‘big chill’ we were happy to be greeted with somewhat of a ‘new order’.  The older demographic that materialised in the obshejitie was a definite calming influence. After several months it appears that the Koreans have finally made the switch to daylight hours. The same does not go for the bird they have acquired and harbour in their room. Yet the silence without and the Italians and Belgians has not gone unnoticed, and the delectable aromas from the kitchen are sadly missed (10 Americans have been promised to fill the vacuum).   It seems everyone is happy (or extremely unhappy) about being back at college: in our first lecture the teacher said something that sounded far too like ‘ya znayu chto vi vse pyaniye’ (I know all of you are drunk...) (remember, drinking between classes is a custom to which the Lit students have never been hostile to) Furthermore a well-deserved spring was also rumoured to make an appearance, which it has, shyly, reeling in plus temperatures, the end to the fatal icicle peril and a factor that we Irish can deal with like no other.  So unreceptive are the Russians to this form of precipitation that the matrioshka stalls, that remained throughout the ‘cold spell’ (the -20 degrees), pack up and leave at the sight of rain.  It was with quite an inflated sense of self-satisfaction, umbrella in hand, that I swanned past comrades Stalin and Lenin sheltering in an Ukranian eatery (good to see that they are finally embracing the nationality question). As if to protest this disgrace of a weather condition, in a great tempest of snow, temperatures in recent days have swung back down to -5. Sigh. We definitely have not seen the last of comrade winter.  Unfortunately no one told the festival of Maclenitsa.

Maslenitsa is a week-long celebration of the beginning spring and the gorging of pancakes, two good reasons we felt to head down to the old Kolomenskoe estate to partake. Immersing ourselves in the spirit of the festival, (which is never hard when it involves food) myself and Julia went to purchase blini (pancake) and learnt a great deal about the practice of queuing in Russia. At a disadvantage against those with 70 years of queuing experience (and it became clear there were quite a few with such expertise) we found ourselves keeping the places of absentee queuers, apparently negotiating several queues at once. Elderly ladies would surreptitiously drift to the front of the queue for a closer look at the menu and return with pancakes, while a man  standing at the head of the queue held a money-making racket, making a profit from impatient queuers who gave him a couple off rouble to make their order.  Having queued for 40 minutes in freezing cold, we left, not lasting to see the main event, the pagan burning of the doll. If this is spring, I have been misinformed for far too long! Luckily Maslenitsa wasn’t the end of the festivities, it was in fact just the beginning beckoning in (not without some God-like manipulation of the days by the authorities) an uninterrupted chain of holidays including Women’s day, Day of Defenders of the Fatherland and Patricks day (more of that anon) ...

Queuing for pancakes- Maslenitsa

40 minutes later and Julia is barely talking to me :-p

Let it not be mistaken however, it is not all holidays and pancakes for us.  Our former identity as students of TCD is beginning to catch up on us: a certain 3000 word essay looms, calling for a ‘settling down’ and the imposition of somewhat of a routine.  It was fully expected of course, but the library system in Russia is still served by an inscrutable bureaucracy, an understanding of which is only gained by covertly tailing readers to different desks to see what is required. This generally is several listochki (reading tickets) and a library card which you will come to value more than your passport.  If familiar with the work of KGB library man (in Trinity) , I think I know where he was trained up. A visit to the Lenin or Russian State Library (Leninka) necessitates going through a scanner, surrendering of personal belongings (the law comes down particularly heavy on bringing in books (?) and scarves) and several security checks ... Oh and if one should even consider talking (I doubt anyone actually has, fearing the scolding of the giant and studious Lenin at the top of the reading hall.) Another unsuccessful attempt was made to recapture my former routine, when I decided to hit the gym. Once the security guard had finished chuckling at the idea, he led me a tiny room, with just a non-working treadmill and a number of weights. All around on the walls were inspiring soviet posters with captions like ‘Excersize! Be a man!’ and three lone photographs of probably the only sports team the Lit-institute ever had- a weight lifting team. It being the Litinstitute someone had drawn a very flattering portrait of one of the athletes and stuck it underneath. The skipping rope was the only thing still functional so I skipped for a while. Then I broke it and had to leave.

feeling a little snowed under at times!!

Perhaps establishing a routine in  Russia is somewhat of a pipedream for the time being. After all there is an awful lot for the Irish person to get used to, and probably some things one can never expect to get used to. The ‘marriage rush’ at 21 is definitely one of these. We received our first Russian wedding invitation the other day from one of our young college-going friends, which isn’t so surprising except that the bride-to-be is still married to the first husband (who is still completely unawares!)  Of course there are other things here I don’t think I could ever get enough of, like Russian hospitality, the pleasure of which I was afforded when my Russian-Irish friend who came home to Moscow and invited me to guest.  In times of famine I will remember the array of caviar-filled blini, cakes, salads, soup, sausage and French cheese, and other displays of generosity from the loveliest people in the world.  Other things, then, are best forgotten if at all possible.   Inconveniently, before entering the Live Butterfly Exhibition I had let slip my mind my 10 year long fear of the winged terrorists, after the death of one on my illuminous green t-shirt when i was ten. Also I hadn’t realised that the butterflies would be given so much freedom to fly around the room (imitating a tropical climate.) I actually had to take to the oversized creepy crawly part of the exhibition to avoid their trepidation. Oh and that day I had decided to wear a bright pink t-shirt that day...Yep, some people never learn! 

...And there is far more of just the plain odd. Here I should mention the surreal matrimony of incense and smelly feet at a gig in an abandoned shopping centre where a man played what seemed to be an elastic band in his mouth (this went on for about an hour). There is evidently quite a demand for such spectacles and to avoid paying heavy entry free, we had to disguise ourselves as members of a Siberian pagan band.  In another unusual venue across town we attended an exclusive film premier given by Russian banker friend (mentioned in earlier blog), at which I had the honour of winning one of the only copies of his 7 minutes worth of adventures in Europe. The strangest part of this night, however, was when were escorted to an all-night photo studio to get a glimpse of how the bright young things in Moscow let off steam- by sprawling across car bonnets and fireplaces and having their photos taken (yet another ‘profoundly Russian’ experience to add to the book!) When it came to our turn, (responding in a ‘profoundly Irish’ way) we bundled into to the vintage mini and pulled pantomime scared faces.  I got a little worried when smoke began to emerge from under a locked door. It turns out I had every right to be as a smuggled-in George Foreman grill began to produce chicken breasts that became less and less cooked as the morning stretched on and the sangria bowl emptied.  I can only hope my fast-approaching film premier will be half as glamorous...

link to the trailer of  Generation P

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oqe-nNhp0kw

There is always the fear that such unique events will fail to shock as we become more familiarized with Moscow. Necessary sometimes are a fresh pair of eyes with which to marvel at Russia’s idiosyncrasies. Luckily this need was satisfied when our Irish friends came to visit and pointed out all the things we have become too accustomed to: the abundance of cabbage and dill, indiscreet and omnipresent soviet insignia, how ever so slightly chilly it is. To ease the transition there was naturally a lot of clubbing, a shisha bar and a trip to the obschejitie for a look at the cockroaches. It has to be said their cultural adaption is remarkable when after only a couple of hours in Russia they formed an impromptu queue in our kitchen to be fed!

impromptu queuing by Irish comrades! 

Whatever the culture shock of us Irish in Moscow, I had never stopped to think about what we have inflicted on the Russians. Not until march 17^th and the Paddy’s Day Emerald Ball: shirtless potbellied males of the 50+ age group dancing on tables, expressing  for their homeland a wistful allegiance, of which they were never before aware. Though, who am I to complain?! After moonlighting selling raffle tickets I got to enjoy free 4 course meal and a free bar (of course this is how it all started!) and the company of a self-proclaimed Leprechaun.  Day 2 of the festivities involved the consumption of Irish stew and Michael Collins to ensure that our loyalties haven’t been swayed by this heathen communist country (thankfully they have!) Later, while some 200 Irish expats sat in sober enjoyment of native musicians and poetry readings by our good ambassador, some 2000 insubordinate shamrock-bearing Moscovites took to the streets of Moscow in a defiant disregard of the embassy’s no-parade instructions. When it comes to Irish dancing and drunken of revelry we should have known to leave it up to the Russians....

Emerald Ball for Irish in Moscow

 

Paddy's Day a la Russkis..despite ban on Parade

These are the things I’m only now beginning to learn about Russia. There is hope someday the culture shocks, like the snow, might melt away (... this is not something I see happening very soon... in either case).  Perhaps 24-hour flower shops next to Adult Stores, with strict daylight hours, will not seem so bizarre (because for flowers there can be an urgent need at any hour of the night?!)  Meanwhile the process of complete cultural indoctrination is underway in the Litinstitute. The result of this will be an oral exam whereby foreigners must express emotions, like worry and surprise, with a strictly Russian reaction and intonation: ‘I’m pregnant’- oooook ti! (Oh my!- surprise), ‘I’m planning on getting married’- davno pora (‘bout bloody time’- impatience) and so forth... Such Russification may just prove to be handy in the future, given the news snippets that drift in from Ireland: ‘Ireland closed for business. You must move to Russia’ – well, can’t express much surprise there really!

Moscow's Trial Time

Izmailovsky Market

Naturally, I guess, life in Moscow really settled down after Halloween and the Cat Circus. What, after all, could follow the spectacle of cats pushing prams across a stage? (Does it even matter that their feline necks were handcuffed to the handle?!) Whether after 2 months in Moscow our living in Moscow (in particular our linguistic competency) were becoming less offensive to those around us, or whether it was the arrival of fresh Europeans to play with, the novelty of the Irish appeared to wane slightly, as we were suddenly confronted with the odd afternoon to kill wandering around a museum, or studying (God Forbid!) I think it was in this atmosphere, in a heedless plea for attention, I had my roomie chop my hair- a move immediately regretted when I saw my depleted locks and realised that I had just disposed of the very basis of my identity in Russia and the title of Kydryavshik (curly-haired one) which I had so got used to!

Xello-veen

I should not have worried. Little did I know then that my identity as I knew it was about to be usurped by another entity, as in the critical minus temperatures all style and individuality I may previously have enjoyed was to be ceded to my new identity as the walking coat. Together our (much inflated, it must be said) profile would soar.  In fact, in being cast as a Hicksville bible-throwing,  homophobic redneck  in  a Russian film, I do believe my down-filled, puffy lagging jacket is what landed me the job(thankfully  the only one I landed after stalking  camera-sporting tourists around Red Square asking if they were looking for foreign women!) And with coat, American flag, homophobic placards to hand I took to the studio-induced Red Square I did what I do best in Russia- played the foreigner!

-27 degrees
"Bring on the-50!"

"Down with fags"

and the creative ways you use leg-warmers- or
Knee cap savers

However here  it is important not to get to much ahead of myself, a flaw to which I’m sadly inclined with my inherent phlegmatic personality type (that is, an unbridled sense self-importance congruous  it appears, with  those shifty eyes of mine), according to our, first, psycho-analyst and, second, patriotic history lecturer who is mindful to inform us of our intrinsic flaws which she ties so beautifully to the military reforms  of the 1850s (I believe Aleksandr II was also a phlegmatic type)  It is a  good thing, she tells me, that the reposing Irish economy can spare funds for  the upkeep of my ‘glamour’ (that day she was thrown my elastic band-suspended skirt which I think she may have interpreted as bohemian) However we are thankful to have such measures in place, lest we become too cocky. After all given our ever expanding  vocabulary, we did one day say a really long word in History of the Middle Ages (which our lecturer pointedly wrote on the board so as to congratulate us ‘ look girls, you were able to  say a word with at least (counting) 5 syllables!) As if to test such legendary talent for herself, the rector popped in one day unexpectedly – ‘ so girls, do you think the dog should be kept in a kennel or a basket?’ (if the test was to give a meditative response to such a searching question, or even to answer at all, we were sadly defeated!)

My favorite local, selling fish, beer, children's toys, second hand goods
and womens lingerie (all under one roof!)

We were quite happy to find all other examinations more manageable. And I was worried about failing exams! Chuckle! I clearly hadn’t envisioned the following situation: Teachers leaving the room, on seeing that we still could not answer the questions, returning, placing book on the table, and leaving again for prolonged coffee break. Fearing an exam on middle ages might be a bit taxing for our little foreign minds (too many multi-syllabic words, of course) our lecturer instructed us to write “something about... schools.... in Ireland”. When I told her didn’t manage to finish the essay in an hour and half, she  “Ah well, there are more important things in life”,  which probably best encapsulates the Russian attitude towards exams where, like so often happens, the lines between work and prazdnik (party, holiday)so easily gets blurred,  quite evidential in exam time conditions for Russian students(you have to imagine a Primary School setting with students  on walkabouts and pieces of paper and text messages flying across the classroom)

Taking lead from our masters and inventing excuses to prazdnik:
this one, an  joint 21st birthday between 6 of us
(course, everything is communal these days)

Not all of Russia’s tests are fool proof (Napoleon, you know what i’m talking about!) Lest Russia threatens to become too habitable, its climate has an inbuilt obstacle course designed to keep you on your toes (or rather to facilitate their falling off) Cue the minus 27 degrees. Amazingly boredom becomes less of an issue when bits of your person keep freezing (hair for example) and your body turns strange colour. Just when you thought you had mastered rush hour metro, you have to factor in the sea of coat in which everyone is suspended. Of course there is nothing like the Russian winter to bring out  much-loved Russian stereotypes- Ushankas (Russian hats), troikas (sleighs, and very seldom), vodka bottles on the breakfast table (this was only a matter of time) and alas! bears do roam the streets (fortunately not in their live form!)

Russian bears!

The Russian winter entails yet more peculiar sights. When better to mosey through Gorky Park, than when it is entirely forsaken, save a few snowdrifts, howling wind and creaking rollercoasters. It was in these treacherously icy temperatures that  I made my first trans-Russian jaunt with a troupe of Italians and a competent Russian guide to Suzdal and Vladamir on the Golden Circle to view their 50 odd churches (that is, if our  blood circulation had allowed. The twenty or so we did see were enchanting!) Though our perseverance should not be doubted as an epic odyssey across a vast frozen lake to view one church can attest.

Across a frozen lake to church (in the background)
Worth every step (or steppe, better put perhaps)

Suzdal skyline

You  may ask what the point is but....

Of course with Russian winter comes the Russian Christmas, which predictably the Russians have taken to a whole new level. Who else would think of putting an aubergine on the Christmas tree?! Other traditions nevertheless proved to be far more imitable. Watching the Bolshoi Ballet perform Swan Lake and the Nutcracker are definitely keepers (tickets for less than €10 might I add) On the other hand emulating a New Years Russian salad was probably not one of my better ideas (who knew the combination of cheese, pineapple, shrimp and egg could be so.... nauseating.) rather like the effect of bungee jumping over the frozen Moskva river (an invitation which I was quick to pass on)  The Christmas shopping frenzy justified another trip to Izmailovsky Market (and still no dancing bears!) to ruthlessly haggle the hand-knit socks off a Russian Babushka, although much of this is most likely a display for foreigners,  not unlike the annual Christmas production by students in the Lit institute, melting our hearts as they did with renditions of Oh, Tannenbaum and German folksongs. Christmas being Christmas (and probably more so as it was a Russian Christmas) it quickly descended into an orgy of gorging and partying ( prazdniki a plenty!)

Christmas in GUM

and the Christmas tree decorated with aubergines!

So while a half hour with my finger stuck down a pipe of exploding water (oh the joys of our hostel) gave me some time to reflect, I came to the realisation that one could never possibly be bored in a place that occasionally threatens (albeit with some stretch of the imagination) to kill you. That said I was definitely happy to go home to a fully-functioning shower for the Christmas break! 

Swan Lake

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=heKnpwXiBAI&feature=related

Russification

Thanks Granddad for  the Victory!

One month after our friendless and earwig-infested beginnings, we seem to have had an October Revolution of our own.  We are settled, dare I say it, with something resembling a life, job and friends and Friday tradition (breakfast in GUM, no less).  If settled is when you find yourself ordering Blini (pancake) sushi and knowing where to get the best “Beezness Lanch” (Loodi kak Loodi, incidently) then I am possibly there.  The obshejitye (residence) has elevated itself to new heights garnering more parties, cultural disparities and miscommunications. To the anomaly of third floor inhabitants we can now add: the man who talks to himself, a balladeer, 3 Belgians,  Japanese, German, Frenchman, Chinese, 4 Italians  and an ever multiplying number of  Koreans (with  very strange sleeping habits, non-existent we  suspect).

International comradery  of 3rd floor 

sushi making

To say we have successfully infiltrated the student body suggests an active role on our part. Adoption is possibly a better word (Diddly-eye for being Irish!) Students of the Literary Institute have proved to be just incredible- friendly and forthcoming and defiant of every Russian stereotype I had come to expect. With overtures immediately followed by invitation of some sort has meant no end to the progulki po gorodye(like walking tour of city), invitations to ‘guest’ and cultural experiences, of both the high and ‘folksy ‘ kind (we getting down with r peeps in other words).  Being students of the Lit, the invitations are little more interesting. Last night or friend invited us to cinema to watch cartoons which he had drawn (however thwarted last minute by the projector guy not turning up). Excitingly, we were smuggled into the Russian obschejitye to see how the other half live. We did not find paucity but a party, a hookah and an invitation to Rostov,which was to come into effect almost immediately.

  

Alya at Tsaritsino

 Between these junctures, we have had time to ‘take in Moscow’, the excuse for which was extended by my first visitors from home (yes, I think there’s a distant memory of that place somewhere... ) You only hope that when you have three days to communicate ‘Moscow’ that your visitors would get to encounter almost being knocked down by a manic motorist, crazy pavement driving and wily law bending with the militia on Red Square. Luckily, they got to experience this and some sights as well: the Bolshoi, Lenin, Yeltsin, Tsum, the Metropole, the Kremlin, MSU, the Arbat, Novodevichy Monastery (my autumn visit) and Ismailovskiyi Market (NOT complete with dancing bears and Soviet memorabilia as the guide book promised, but as it transpires, this was possibly NOT the famous Ismailovskiyi Market but a couple of stalls I came across near the metro station. Sorry folks!) With a bit more time (but I don’t think they minded too much) they could also have experienced 24 hour clubbing (and face-control of course), ska-punk gigs  (I have to say I was suspicious of a gig full of skin-heads offering discount to foreigners, but I shouldn’t have been) and the intimacy of 5am in Red Square with just Lenin and a lone guard.

Novodevichy Convent

Former KGB Headquarters-
R+M seem more impressed with Dyetski Meer
(toy shop, which is equallly as formidable really)

...and we somehow stumbled upon Yeltsin's discreet and
modest place of rest

GUM, Red Square and Morleys at night

Having foreign guests over is a cogent reminder of the need to speak Russian.  Although Roger seemed to survive just fine with just ‘peevo’ (beer), dealing with tickets, hotels and train stations requires a certain confidence in the language, a confidence which thus far has not been instilled by having to reading from school textbooks and being made to painstakingly repeat sentences in seminars. While on occasion you can surprise yourself by discussing Max Weber, or by successfully defending your innocence to a Babushka (whether the washing up was ours or not is not important. It is all practice), there are always those days when you inadvertently order 3 Mcflurry’s in McDonalds and finish beautifully by telling the waiter to F off(Stoboi) , rather than ‘I’ll have it to go’(Soboi).

Cathedral of Christ the Saviour

Sand Sculpting World Championship at Cathedral of Christ the Saviour

Not surprisingly, our current lack of language brings us no closer the enigmatic Russian soul. Although if I had to make a guess at this point I would say it has something to do with a devotion to literature and alcohol. The combination usually goes like this: our friend Sasha telling us on the way to a bar that he could only speak like a 19^th century novelist  after he spent a month locked up just reading Dostoevsky;  having beers with friends in the park of the meeting place for  ‘Master and Margarita’ in Bulgakov’s famous novel, being invited to drink in between lectures on a Monday morning,  or my favourite and most Russian day of all with our poet friend, Maxim: watching Soviet movies with intermittent shots of vodka and dressed herring cake, followed by poetry readings (that meant us stumbling through in our terrible Russian as well), after which Maxim and friend, Dima argued about politics and the Russian mentality, to be tied up nicely with the combination of minus temperatures, moonlight, a small orthodox church and ‘Russian Champagne’.

  

Aforementioned day with Maxim, Julia and Nil

Cleary quite far from Russian soul, we often find ourselves out of our depth, even when linguistic abilities allow some mutual understanding. Conversations too often dwindle into questions of marriage, strong men and children. When I suggested to an comrade the possibility of not having children he laughed ‘Visegda bugut dyeti’ (there will always be children) Our lecturer, who perhaps at home might be referred to as a little tapped, insists that we shall have Russian husbands before the year is out. This could well be another case in which Russia just knows, just as it did when I typed Ireland is the greenest country into Google Translate (Translation: Russia is the greenest country). I was told that the metro station would not accept my student card application as my hand writing was not Russian enough. At the counter the lady tipexed out my password ( which was in numerals) to something more to her suiting (after 8 failed attempts and more than 5 hours of queuing I was not going to question). Here you bend to Russia; Russia does not bend to you. When our inferior western immunity rendered us unfit, at first, to survive in Moscow, as miserable bouts of food poisoning and flu proved, the standard counsel was: nado priviknut (you need to get used it). So this month when I lost 2 phones and ended up with a broken I-pod and laptop, I just learned to get by.  When it is the coldest winter from 1000 years word has it, you live with that too... And so when Russia hands you lemons, you take them, perhaps to use in your vodka sometime.

First Snow

Probably best photo I've ever taken...
Whey It is Lenin in MacDonalds!

Pobyeg- (Russian Prison Break)- one of the things conspicuously stolen wholesale from the West, perhaps little more thrilling a Russian Prison

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=suZd545PuG8

Kak ya vstreteel vashu mamu- (How I met your mother!)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvUg-GZJ3Gs

Chapter 1- the first two weeks

After Ikea

Pre Ikea

There was something familiar to me about being dropped off at an obschejitye in a seatbelt-less Lada. We spent the first day in shock, however, after somehow negotiating bread and water at the grocery store where we made our first enemy and learnt our first lesson about (post)soviet Russia- you don't leave your change as a tip. It will result in the worst of Russian insults- vyi bogatii ludi (rich people)?! The shock came not so much from the nakedness of our room (it was taken as a given that we would share) but the squalor of the toilets and general nostalgia for Stalinist interior design. Ukhovyortka (earwig) became our first ‘word of the day’ (sure way to become fluent within a year…). Fortunately it is a little thing (earwigs, maybe) that Ikea can’t fix and the colourful bed sheets and children’s’ plastic cutlery are a bright addition to the room. Although having heard of the want for a fridge, TV and cooking facilities and clampdown on electricity usage that our comrades in MSU endure, we have learnt to consider ourselves bogatii ludi.

Toilet

 

Kitchen

It is also thanks to a presumed snobbery and wealth that all foreigners are interned on the third floor, away from all Russian students. Suspiciously, though, they are the ones with a washing machine. The third floor has its own treasures though and we’ve made both friends and enemies of some of our co-inhabitants. ‘Showers are not homes’ was a 2nd invaluable nugget of information, gleaned from an angry middle-aged lady who makes me fear using the bathroom (the shouting has become a regular feature…). Generally people are friendly and patient and willing to put up with bad Russian for a couple of minutes though conversations terminated with nado naucheetsya (you need to keep learning). Our first friend was a doctor of philosophy who was content to talk James Joyce, Dostoevsky and the philosophical beginnings of Greece and Rome despite our confused faces. He said we were a good distraction to his books, but he whizzed of Kiev to give more lectures. The security men and babushka seem genuinely concerned for our health and regularly enquire if we are too cold (it is quite cold outside, but inside is toasty!) Another favorite guest was an insubordinate, who ran around in his underwear averse to the scolding of the babushka and the doctor. The resident circus folk are also supposed to be bundles of fun.

It is perhaps a consequence of our unnatural confinement that our permeation into college life has not been quite so successful, but this could also be due to the singularity of Russian students. In lectures students are possibly even more bored than their mentors and although lectures are held in intimate classrooms, sleeping is acceptable, as are public displays of affection, backchat, telephone calls and stroking your pet rat! As far as a dress code goes, the gothic black and trench coat look is always in vogue. Dyed ginger hair is all the rage and there prevails a preppy getup that would have Trinners proud. Thus our ineffective penetration into this hodgepodge is confusing more than anything else, although Antoin (from a successful friendship overture) perhaps by way of explanation queried why my eyes were such big black apples in comparison to everyone else. Maybe this peculiarity explains why there have been so many attempts made by strangers to photograph us (three in total) and why a lady at St Basils felt her memories of Moscow were best captured by two agape foreigners. She conceded in the end to take the photo with one of our cameras instead.

Myself and Julia in front of Basils
 A lady wanted to our photo with her own camera but agreed to take it with mine in the end

Being such obvious foreigners many things remain unintelligible. The price of food is one of these incoherencies. At one of the abundant daily markets we were charged €7 for four biscuits, yet one can eat blini, crab cake and aborigine-carrot roulades for less than €2 from the plush Yeliseevskiy Gastronom on Tverskaya. Gastronom no 1 sells some groceries like bread and sweets for cheaper than the hailed low-cost Pyatyorochka (meanwhile, though, perojki and borsht have become cheap and favourite staples). The food may be one enigma, but I was warned that should surprise you after a year in Moscow. Yesterday is probably the perfect example of this.

For a day that began with a earwig acquainting itself with my hand, yesterday transpired to be very enjoyable. We spent the best part of the (fabulous) day in Novodevichy Convent -an oasis of calm and beauty within the city. We joined a long row of couples to watch the sun set and the bogatii parade their dogs and children. Fleeing from one horrific public toilet (without plumbing) for the more opulent one is Tsum shopping centre, we managed trespass on an exclusive party for the fine young things of Moscow and their sugar daddies. Not settling for a lesser substitute we turned to Barclays bank across the road to encroach on more exclusive revelry (although we were semi-invited this time by my roomies new banker friend). Who says lowly Erasmus students can’t enjoy a bit of caviar, Cabernet and light strings music with rich Russian socialites (my roommate’s friend had to rush off to deal with some oligarch- “a rich, dangerous man”)?! The main attraction was a pioneering tea invention which made use of a sewing machine, a rubber duck and clothes hangers (funny, this did not seem the most surreal part of the evening). Our final engagement was a get-together in our Korean neighbour’s room with incredible food and pigeon Russian from all sides, only to be concluded with renditions of Amhrán na bhFiann, Danny Boy (among their favourite Irish songs) and ‘The Snowman’.

Novodevichy Convent

Couples only please

Rich people parade their sprogs

So while Russian society is still an impenetrable bloc, inroads have been made. There is time still to amend those finer points: foolishly stopping in the underground to take in the splendor, getting caught in metro barriers, getting caught in metro doors, being naively optimistic when dealing with Moscow’s vigorous red tape and accidentally stumbling upon Red Square when looking for a coffee shop (though to be fair this was our first day!) I guess for the time being nado naucheetsya.