My plan was to take the Metro down to the Kremlin, spend the bulk of the day exploring the interior of those famous walls, and then step out to see the surrounding downtown area, including the pedestrian shopping area, the old Arbat. Ludmilla told me which Metro lines to take, where to get off, and the highlights that I should be sure not to miss.
As I made my way out, she pressed an apple and some cookies on me, so I could stave off death by starvation on the way downtown.
Now I should mention that both Ludmilla and Alexander are very large people. Ludmilla in particular could be described as what we Americans have been conditioned to think of as a stereotypical Russian babushka. But I still can’t see how she can keep down the quantity of food she keeps shoveling on the table. I think I should fast on the train to Tashkent just to restore some balance to my recent intake. In any case, I pocketed the apple and cookies and rode the elevator down to the street.
On the way to the Metro station, I had to cross Gagarin Square, named for the first man in space. In the center of the square is a two hundred-foot stainless steel tower topped by a forty-foot statue of old Yuri himself. He is standing with his arms at his side but slightly away from his body and swept back. Alexander told me that the local wags have dubbed the statue “Gagarin Returns From The Market” because it looks like he could be carrying a couple of shopping bags in his arms. I told Alexander that if the statue were in the States, no doubt every New Year some joker would hang a couple of huge bags from the hands.
The Moscow Metro is clean and efficient, and I had no trouble buying the token and finding my way to the proper platform. My grasp of the Cyrillic alphabet is getting better every day, and I can now easily recognize certain words without having to spell them out laboriously. So I managed to get off at the right station without riding all over Moscow first.
I walked out onto the streets of Moscow near the monstrous Rossia hotel, whose upper floors overlook Red Square. The rain began again just as I entered the square, so I ducked into the GUM department store across from Lenin’s mausoleum. This warren of small shops evidently used to be a showcase of planned economic consumerism—all the same stuff, and not much of it—but now it has been taken over by the likes of Lancome, Benetton, Nina Ricci, and the place is hardly distinguishable from any downtown mall in America.
Well, I didn’t fly half way around the world to shop for overpriced perfume, so I exited the store on the other side of the square and splashed over to the Kremlin entrance gate to buy my ticket. In order to get in, I had to stand in line to buy the ticket, and then stand in another line where guards scan the people waiting to get in and check to see that you aren’t entering with a large bag or backpack; anything large enough to carry a bomb, I assume. I was one of the unlucky ones, or looked vaguely mad-bomber-like, and was told to get out of line and go downstairs and check my bag with the bag check babushkas.
When I came back up I got back to the entrance behind an American woman who was carrying a large backpack, and as she reached the guard he told her to check it, too. Well, she proceeded to argue with the guy, meanwhile holding up a long line of people behind her. She repeatedly complained, “You let in another woman with the same size bag!” “ Same size! Same size!” she shouted, as if by repeating that phrase over and over again she was going to wear down this uniformed Kremlin guard, who obviously didn’t understand a word of English. I cringed, hoping nobody would think I was with this irritating loon. Meanwhile the line behind her was getting longer and longer. And the guard, to his credit, was being polite but firm. He was not going to budge.
Finally, his supervisor came over; who was not so polite. He opened up another line for the rest of us and then began to make it very clear to this woman that her bag was staying outside, and for that matter, so could she. She finally gave up. It made me wish for the days when they just threw obnoxious Americans like her into Lubyanka prison to cool their heels for awhile.
My $15 ticket got me into the grounds of the seat of the Russian government—though the actual executive buildings are off-limits to tourists—as well as the armory, where the tsarist jewels are kept. I went there first, and examined the glass cases, which contained all the loot those fun loving Romanovs accumulated over the years, including several of their fabulous Faberge eggs. A very impressive haul, I must say. No doubt they worked very hard for it all.
Kremlin Rooftop
Afterward I ducked into several of the churches and chapels on the grounds, leftovers from the days when the tsars ruled by divine right and the church and state were inseparable. The orthodox churches are marvels of gold and icons, some of which dated back to the tenth century, when Christianity was introduced to the Russians. Ivan, I’d like you to meet Christ. Christ, Ivan…
Church of the Ascension
While inside the Church of the Ascension, I could see sunshine stream through the windows, so I hustled outside to snap some pictures during a brief pause in the rain. Then the deluge began again. But by then I had seen all that I cared to, so I exited the Kremlin and headed up Tverskaya Street on my way to the Arbat.
But first I detoured into the National Hotel, a five-star establishment with an international newsstand, where I managed to pick up a Newsweek and Inter-national Herald Tribute. Hallelujah, the news drought was over!
Young Married Couple Posing Before the Kremlin Wall
The Arbat is evidently not as impressive as it was in its heyday, when it was the center of Moscow’s seminal counterculture. Today it’s mainly a sort of pedestrian mall/flea market with a lot of T-shirt vendors selling McLenin and Hard Rock Cafe Moscow T-shirts. But there was a fairly comical group of four enterprising guys who were dead-ringers for Lenin, Brezhnev, Gorbachev, and Nicholas II. They were all dressed up in the proper costumes, and for a fee, you could get your picture taken with a bit of history. I chuckled, but declined without asking how much they wanted for the privilege.
And so I headed back to the apartment on the Metro, stopping along the way to get provisioned for the train ride to Tashkent. I’ve discovered that the stories I’ve read in my guidebooks about the lack of consumer goods are woefully out-of-date. All the stores and kiosks I’ve seen in St. Petersburg and Moscow are filled any sort of consumer good I could want. Fresh fruit and vegetables seem to be plentiful and cheap, and household items like cosmetics, electronic appliances, and clothes are readily available in a variety of brands and prices. I have no idea how things differ out in the countryside, but in the two big cities, it’s obviously no longer hard to get the things you need. If you have the cash.
Of course, Ludmilla and Alexander had another huge meal of Georgian goulash, noodles, sausage, peppers, tomatoes, bread and tea ready for me when I got back, and insisted that I sit down and dig in. Luckily, I hadn’t eaten anything since breakfast, so I managed to make a bigger dent in the pile of food than before. Still, I couldn’t finish it, and I’m sure I left Ludmilla with the impression that I didn’t like her cooking. I did, just not so much of it!
Afterwards I took a shower and checked my e-mail again—nothing from home. I think I made such a stink about not wanting to miss any e-mail from Vilma that now everybody (including Vilma) is scared to send me anything.
So I finished packing my bags, and went back into the family room to slump in front of TV with Ludmilla and Alexander while we waited for Vladimir to show up. We watched a very bad western, Ludmilla explaining that it was a Russian production of a French story about the American West, and it looked it. Fortunately, they wanted to chat while we watched, and so we whiled away the remaining hour in a lively discussion about computers, and the American constitution, and the Russian legal system and why nobody goes to hockey games in Russia anymore (we stole all their best players). I tried my best to explain about computers and the constitution, listened to them express their disdain for the legal system in their own country, and apologized about the hockey players.
Then Vladimir showed up and I said my good-byes and told them that they’d have a home-stay in California if they ever made their way back there. They wished me good luck on my trip, and I said, “From your lips to God’s ears.” which made Alexander double over laughing.
Vladimir was uncharacteristically silent on the drive down to the station. Perhaps he finally realized he wasn’t going to get much in the way of reply from me. We parked outside Kazansky station, and Vladimir waited with me on the platform until my train, the “Ozbekiston” pulled in. I thanked him and found my way into my compartment.
I was hoping I was going to get a two-person compartment, and sure enough it was. Unfortunately, it was right over the bogey at the end of the car, so I figured I was in for a rough and noisy ride, but at least I had my ear plugs and I was only sharing the compartment with one other person.
But that one other person was mighty surprised to see me waiting inside. She, an older Russian woman, evidently expected to be sharing a compartment with another woman, and not some long-haired American punk, and though I couldn’t understand what she was saying to the other passengers gathered in the corridor, it was obvious that she wasn’t happy. The conductor was called over, but my ticket was in order and all the other compartments in first class were full, so there was nothing to be done. She stayed out in the corridor after depositing her many bags inside, and the other women on the train came by to commiserate with her and peek in at the strange American, secretly glad, I’m sure, it wasn’t one of them that was going to have to risk her life with me.
She finally came in when the train pulled out and I tried to ease her apprehension with an izvinitya (I’m sorry) and she waved it off with a “It makes no difference” gesture. Just then the provodnik dropped off our bedding, and I decided to hit the bathroom at the end of the carriage and give my compartment mate the opportunity to get settled in without me hovering about. I stayed in the corridor for a good five minutes before knocking and re-entering, and as I had hoped, she had taken the opportunity to get into bed. What’s more, she had made up my bed too, which made me think that she wasn’t as uncomfortable with the situation as I had feared. So I switched off the light and in the darkness got myself into bed as well.