From Russia with love

I still need to pinch myself to check if it’s true but yes: I really, really did make it to Moscow! The journey itself was surprisingly hassle-free. My place of departure had me a bit worried about possible loss of luggage –and I was already mentally rehearsing my best Naomi impression- but it seems they have at last figured out how to run an airport without having to reroute the luggage through Italy first. The customer officers on the Russian end also seemed not the least bit fazed by my double visa and so before I knew it, I found myself standing on the Red Square.

My first impressions of Moscow are on balance very positive. The outskirts of the city that we passed through on the way from the airport frankly look drab: filled with big blocks of communist-era concrete without even the faintest glimmer of joy; ugly, grey, multi-storey monsters that symbolise that infamous Soviet building style. But downtown Moscow is a whole different story. The tiny bit of it I have seen so far is colourful, bright and beautiful. For some reason it feels very… European. It reminds me a bit of places like Vienna with these pastel tinted buildings. The Red Square, however, is unmistakably Russian. The St Basil’s basilica, popular backdrop for many news reports, is so over-the top colourful that it is hard to believe it is not some bizarre form of Russian humour. The Kremlin walls, on the other hand, are deadly serious. The tragic-comic Lenin mausoleum somehow hovers between those two extremes. I hope I will have time to explore all further later on.

I will be working here in Moscow until tomorrow. Then we leave for a week for a city south of Moscow, nearer the Ukraine border. I will be back in Moscow by the weekend after that so look forward to spending that time discovering some of the wonders Moscow has to offer.

До скорой встречи!

Moscow 25 June 2008