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Published: September 27th 2006
Ok, so here's one for all you mathematicians out there (Mum, you may not want to read this paragraph):
Q: Kerry is in the biggest city of the biggest country in the world, he has been there for approximately 36 hours & in the last 6 hours has shared a dozen beers and two bottles of vodka with two very nice, yet crazy Russians. He does not know where he is, but to get there he took 1 underground train, 1 chairlift, 1 bus, and walked for approximately 2 hours. He did not backtrack. There are 9 interlinking subways in Moscow, each has aproximately 20 stops & trains go in 2 direction from each station. There are 6 letters in the Russian alphabet that make the same sound as the english alphabet. Given that Kerry will not remember anything after the first bottle of vodka, what is the probability he will find his way back to bed tonight unassisted?
A: Later...
Yeah, that's Moscow - Right now i'm sitting on anothe train to the Black Sea resort town of sochi. It's been a long journey from Irkutsk to here. You might be surprised to know that Russia's a
big country, It's also qwite flat and swampy - no wonder it's all one, mountain ranges make better borders than bogs.
I last wrote on our last day in Irkutsk, we raced from the internet cafe to find some food for the train journey & then off to the station. This was our most expensive ticket by far & the trip to Ekaterinberg is 2 full days, H was going 3 days straight through to moscow. so you can imagine our stress when we showed up at the station, showed our ticket to an official looking person who looked worried, told us to stay put, then hurried back and pointed to "missed" in our phrasebook! It was a warm day but we were both sweating like Mexican hookers. Fortuitously (as always) two attractive english speaking girls (and 1 fed-up looking russian-only boyfriend) showed up and untangled the mystery of the missing train - IT was 30 min late, giving us plenty of time to "practice english" with the girl.
The trip was uneventful, we had a cabin with two older russians who talked politics & puzzled over crosswords for the entire journey. I went a little crazy and
would not have enjoyed another day of instant noodles and stale air... Getting off in Ekaterinberg was a real mixture of feelings (err.. nerves) as it slowly dawned on me that I'd chosen to step out bu myself with no accomodation or plans close enough to the centre of Russia that the closest border to escape over would be Khazakstan.
Someone was obviously keeping an eye out for me, and after the taxi driver refused to give me a ride to where i showed him, the reply e-mail at the hotel accross the road told me that I should go to the very same hotel and get the girl I had just spoken to to ring ahead to the only "hostel" in Ekaterinberg. They gave me a room for $40nz (it's Russia) until I made the right noises (literally) and managed to acquire the cheapest, least comfortable bed in the city - in a room with two russian guys. In a stay that was an experience in itself, room 534 cost just $11.50nz, and by the look of the staff's faces was somewhat notorious.
Ekaterinberg lies on the edge of the Ural Mountains and since WWII has primarily
The Church of the Blood
Ladas, cold, and a gothic sounding church.. yep, it's Russia!been a manufacturing centre. Which is "guide" for ".. is cold and grey." It's also had a chequered and violent history, is famous for giving birth to much of Russia's musical talent, and surely has more references to it's geology than any other city in the world - museums, hotels, streets, metro stations, you name it - they've named it. The overwhelming thing for me was the cold rather than the grey, the temperature dropped below 0 on day two and didn't really get much above it for the rest of my stay. Powdery snow dusted my hoodie on more than one occasion, and I was forced to scurry from sightseeing to fast food or internet like a vampire escaping the sun. Borderline pleasant to say the least, and a shock from the warmth of Baikal three days ago.
My roomates were a mixed bag, one was good value, spoke no english but was quite happy to aid in a supermarket tour of Russian beers & playing profession pictionary (a surprisingly bad idea as "yes" and "no" knowledge still doesn't help when you don't understand the guess). The other guy was weird and kept to himself, studied, watched his
For all you Wellingtonians
Throw me a frickin' bone here! I'm the boss! Need the info! phone ring, and spoke to me only in exasperated russian. He really came out of his shell on my last night when he was really drunk. He got fucked off when i couldn't understand whatever he was trying to tell me no matter how he worded it in Russian, or how loud and fast he spoke. I might've been worried if he wasn't so drunk - as it was he had enough trouble sitting down let alone having a go at somebody.
To be honest, right now i'm sick of drunk Russians. I'm sick of the smell of stale beer and vodka, i'm sick of people stubbling into me bloody mouthed and broken, I'm sick of seeing men stagger accross the footpath at 10am seemingly with no drive in life, and I'm sick of the streets that smell like piss (free the toilets!). I read an article that said 36,000 Russians die each year of alcohol poisoning alone. Not bad for a country of just 147mil. I'm guessing that would equate to about 1000 each year in a country the size of NZ! Alternatively, if we drink two nights a week, that's 10 every weekend!
I left Ekaterinberg
after 3 nighta and the trip from there to Moscow took just 1 day. Up till now we've been travelling Kupe (2nd) class, it's all that's offered on international trains. With Hayden off ahead I'm now in Plastkartnay (3rd) class.. it's 40% cheaper, and like a travelling dorm. Good for meeting people, but the beds are slightly (and critically for me) shorter. it's great, but I certainly wouldn't do it for more than a couple of days. Arriving in Moscow was a shock to the system. I'd given up on warm weather after Ekaterinberg & the Earth from Above exhibition was on in the park by my hostel. It felt like being home in Wellington, and for the first time I felt homesick - Free Shapeshifter with Joe Dookie in a warm park on a sunny Wellington day... It's good! What I quickly learnt though is the park in Moscow is a great place to drink and meet people. as i was standing contemplating my navel, someone came up to talk and to my astonishemnt they were more enthusiastic that I couldn't speak Russian than if I could. That started a series of conversations that culminated in me meeting stas,
Cheapest bed in town
Angry Russian included - note anally folded clothes, and "Old Spice" on window sill an energetic young russian guy.
He was a driving factor in the puzzle at the start of this story. You could argue that his involvement finished in a meeting with a fatcop with a Kilasnakov (gun) slung round his neck & perched high on his plump belly (much like a drum of brandy round a St Bernard's neck). He instructed the guy I was walking with to "kom vit me", motioning toward his car. This car, as with many Russian police cars was on the small and crap side of useful. Like wiggam on the simpsons he looked quite disproportionately large as he squeezed into the front seat. A lot of police appear to be leftovers from more regimented times. they get paid little, and suppliment their income by exrtacting backhanded bribes from unlucky citizens. This guy ain't been chasing anybody for a long time & quite happily dropped my friend off 20min later and $50 poorer.
That said, Moscow isn't a bad city, and the people who live there love it! It's also said to be the most expensive city in the world, and with a shortage of hostels, this might explain me paying $20, $44, and
The onset of winter
Ekaterinburg.. Urals.. Siberia!? $30nz/night for "beds" in three separate hostels over the week - none of which would meet Kiwi "budget" standards.
My first task on morning one was to get my finger checked out properly. It was still really sore, but there hadn't been a whole lot of x-ray opportunities in the last week and a half. The pretty blue picture you see cost me $150us, a lecture from a Russian doctor, and 2 weeks with a big white bandage on my finger. After the doctor I started walking.. Russia has had a fairly bloody history, I guess a lot of this part of the world has.. But what Russia does very well is mark devastating violence and killings with incredibly ornate buildings and tributes. Like The church of the Blood in Ekaterinberg (the murder of the last Tsar and his family), St Basil's Cathedral commemorates a victory of Ivan the Terrible. The unfortunate fellows who designed it were so good they had to have their eyes poked out so they couldn't do anything like it again. It almost feels wrong to enjoy, yet it's 500 years old & really quite beautiful, just a little... inappropriate? There's plenty of scope to
spend days wandering round the city, taking in the architecture and history. I did my fair share. A lot of old russian architecture is really quite difficult to believe given the soviet penchance for square and practical. Though, as Stas and Anton so proudly pointed out, things HAVE changed & the city is definately modernising.
Stas arranged for himself and his heavy metal listening giant of a mate to give me an evening tour of their city. They knew how the place worked, & I could help strangers "practice english". Which was the perfect recipe for meeting people and having a good time 😊 Unfortunately at some stage during the night I seem to have decided I'd "had enough" and left them to it.. which is where i found myself at the start of this story.
Well, technically I guess I found myself the next day, in bed, and re-al-ly hungover... And then, unfortunately, without a bed - I hadn't booked far enough ahead! After making a token effort to find somewhere else to stay & pushing it as far as I could with the current landlady (she eventually woke me & said "Kerry,in 20 minutes you will
Hey, it's me from the inside!
Middle finger, end bone a little broke :/ leave") I had to concede and move to the park, thus beginning my homeless alcoholic career. This lasted an hour or so until things stopped spinning so much & I could make the metro trip out of town for a guaranteed bed at the YHA.
I spent the next few days finishing off my Moscow "to do" list, relaxing, trying to catch up with Stas again (so hard via e-mail), and planning ahead. I've got about a week and a half to get from here, accross the Black Sea, through the top of Turkey and accross Greece, & then over the Adriatic sea to meet up with Tans and Andy. It's a bit of a mission, and a shame to be racing through these places, but I'll be back. austria, Czech Republic, and Poland beckon.
PS. I'm now in Sochi - the girl on the computer next to me is checking out boobs on the net - It's a plastic world out there. Euch! I've managed to time my arrival with the World Developmen Financial Whatever Conference which just meens a ton of rich bastards are here and despite every Russian's advice hotel rooms are not $10, they're
$50!! ouch. And my phone was stolen last night so DON'T TEXT ME 😞 I'll work on that.. on the upside, I don't have to wait for a ferry out of here, going tomorrow night AND I get a free "Wet and Wild" (no Shane, different) pass to the amusement park tomorrow wahaay!
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elfreda
non-member comment
russia
Sounds like Russia is a place to remember, for all the right or wrong reasons? I suppose that depends on the individual... Am still struggling to read all your travel stories and finding myself doing the same thing day in and day out working, gym, run, eat, watching telly, sleep, work, gym, run, eat, watching telly, sleep.... But I DO NOT envy your sleeping arrangements. That probably the one thing I hated the most about travelling... Having to pay extortionate amounts to sleep in a cruddy bunk bed with lots of other critters to keep you awake if you don't already struggle with having to share your space! keep up the good work on your journal writing, its a welcome escapism for me!