Oi.

---

So first, here's the bad news. the internet cafe in which i'd been eating everyday and doing email is closed for the rest of the summer. so updates and email replies will be very irregular from here on out.

second:
so we went to Vladimir and Suzdal last weekend. It was super lame. Almost didn't make the bus from moscow, where i was appointed to tell the bus driver to wait until Andrei, the man with our tickets, showed up. i went up to him and said, "uh...wait...uhh...please." and he replied, "where are your people?" meaning "just get on the bus." this was an interesting lesson: as long as you pay the driver(the going rate is 100r($4)) you can get on and go anywhere. no official tickets are required. in fact you're probably taking money away from the driver by buying a real ticket, and upsetting him. so anyway we make it on about two minutes before it leaves. we make it to vladimir, where we all get off except reggie. the bus takes off around the building. i call him ten minutes later to see if the bus is coming back around. he says probably not. we find the bus. it leaves one minute after we sit down and would've left without us.

we arrive in Suzdal. we have lunch, they make vegetarian food for me. first time i've ever enjoyed squash. they made it tasty, don't ask how. then we met our tour guide and got driven around the city two at a time in our driver, Dima, 's old Lada. saw an old church. 12th century, it was interesting. from there, more walking and onto the suzdal kremlin. kind of interesting, not really. then onto the Cucumber Festival. not quite as exciting as it sounds. left soon afterwards. this was the plan for catching the next bus: Dima would drive us four tourists back to vladmir, about 10 miles away. Andrei would catch a gypsy cab to vladimir, then show us around the ancient city and its old, important churches.

so we arrive in vladimir at the bus station. the bus leaves at 7. it is 4.50. by 6.30, Andrei has still not shown up and then suddenly dima and his old lada roll up and andrei hops out and says, "LET'S GET ON THAT BUS" and we run to the bus that says MOCKBA and get on about 10 minutes before it leaves.

So my summation for the trip: almost missing 3 busses, seeing one interesting church, and that's it. plus having gotten up at 4 in the morning, not showering cuz the light in the bathroom was out, not sleeping on the bus, dealing with the old women who thought that opening the vent on the bus made them cold and therefore sweating, and pretty much wasting the whole saturday. it was not as interesting as advertised.

This weekend, Petersburg!

---