Weekend Update

Dear Readers,
I had a pretty eventful weekend (including Friday). On Friday, our school had a group excursion to the Kremlin. The Kremlin as I learned is far more than the Red Square. The Kremlin is a krepost or fortress and the sort of triangle walls of this fortress marked the original boundaries of the entire city of Moscow. Sort of like how the Ile d Cite marked the original boundaries of Paris. The official residence of the President of the Russian Federation (Vladimir Putin, for those of us who do not bother ourselves with the newspapers) is inside the Kremlin. When the President is actually in residence, a flag is hoisted above the building. If he is not at home, (he was in Belarus when we visited, probably attending an oppressive leaders brainstorming session), the flag is not flown. The inside of the Kremlin is very beautiful and you will have to take my word for it because my camera died right after I took this cool picture of Marshall Zhukov. Marshall Zhukov is eminently famous in Russia for luring the Germans deep into Russian territory during WWII, then unleashing the Russian winter on the Wehrmacht.

Two quick funny stories. 1) While we were waiting for our group to assemble, a middle-aged woman, her daughter and grandson (from Tajikstan) point to me and Roman -- another African-American fellow and says "Look, look at the blacks". She meant it to convey wonderousness, unusualness, etc. Meanwhile, the grandson, about 3 or 4, looked absolutely panic stricken. They came up to us and asked to take a picture with us.

2) While we were waiting for our group to re-assemble, after the excursion, a husband and wife team, from Siberia came up to Roman and I (again) and asked to take our picture. We complied. 2a) The husband and wife team track us down in the metro tunnel and ask to take our picture, with all of their friends. 2b) The husband and wife literally run us down asking for our email address to send the pictures back to us. It was a strange day indeed.


The rest of Friday was uneventful. I do not go out much at night, because I do not feel comfortable in the metro after about 9pm and almost all the cabs in Moscow are private.

Quick sidebar/cultural commentary/sheer wonderment. In Moscow, again for those not paying attention, a city of 10 million people, there are very, very, very few official "checkered" cabs. The few that exist hang out at the airport and near the big snazzy hotels. Don't ask me why, I am sure there is a reason, I am just not aware of it and it almost certainly does not correlate with logic. So, if you need a taxi you have two options -- stay with me people -- 1) pretend you are in Wilmington, Delaware and call a cab and make an appointment to be picked up and dropped off, and then call back 30 minutes before your appointment to remind them to come and pick you up and drop you off OR 2) stand in the street, put your hand out and flag down a private car. Yup...a private car, any old car, with any old body driving it, going any old where. If their where and your where line up and you "dogovorilos" come to agreement on price, you just hop in and you are on your way.

Upon hearing about this practice, and then actually witnessing it for myself (the casualness and frequency of this act is astounding), I am still trying to figure out why the International Brotherhood of Serial Killers does not hold its convention in Moscow, every single frigging year.

Here's the best part, this is the advice people give you, "If you don't like the way the person looks, say no and wait for another car". If not for the sheer stupidity of this advice, it may have some merit. Now I have heard of "gaydar" -- still not sure how it works -- but I have seen some empirical evidence that is exists and is accurate. To my knowledge, however, there is no such thing as "murdar". See, the thing about serial killers is that they look normal, else they would just be a 1-and-done killer or a no-killer. If they looked totally crazy, then they could not entice new victims. This is Russia, for God's sake, nothing is as it seems. Sorry, I just tripped and fell off my soapbox.

OK. On to Saturday. On Saturday, I went to Anton Chekov's estate outside of Moscow.
It was really nice to get out of the city and see what the countryside looked like. The estate was smaller than I expected, but Anton Chekov (Uncle Vanya, Three Sisters, The Cherry Orchard) was much more interesting as a person than I imaged.
He was a doctor by vocation and a writer by avocation and he established three schools for the peasants in his village to send their children to. He tended to the peasants for free and even built a fire station for the village out of his own pocket.

After we left the estate, we went to visit the Holy Spring of St David. The spring is thought to have healing powers. We witnessed dozens of people carrying 10-15-20 gallons of the water away from the spring. I scooped some up and put it on my face, neck and shoulders. I also filled and small drinking bottle and took a few sips. The water was shockingly cold, but it was virtually tasteless. Visiting the spring was something that I would never had done alone, so I am grateful to my friend M. at the embassy for inviting me along to the tour.

On Sunday, I had an attack of homesickness and I was determined to cure it with food. I went to the only authentic 1950's style diner in Moscow -- the Starlite Diner" . I ordered blueberry pancakes, orange juice and coffee -- what could be more American. The pancakes were so sweet that syrup would have been an insult. The blueberry compote was good, but it arrived next to the pancakes instead of inside of them. The pancakes were more cakey than panny (I like my pancakes more like bliny'), but they served the purpose.

I putzed around the "Moskva" bookstore and then went to church in the afternoon. Church is good and I really like the people a lot. I think great things are going to happen with the Racial Task Force, and I am glad to be a part of it.

Well, good people, so ends my weekend recap. Two things to note: 1) I do read your comments, please keep them coming. I have not yet figured how to respond to the comments, but I do actively look forward to recieving comments.
2) For those of you who are interested, I am on skype.com my skype name is shereeinrussia.
Skype is a free way to make international calls. You just download the free software and you can call other people in Skype for free. It is an amazing tool. Mark, the girls and I use Skype to talk every single day. I would love to talk to more folks.