Walking Around Moscow Day 3

Sunday May 1 A National Holiday in Russia

I slept until 0730.  Jeff gets up soon after.  He looks a little cranky, says I snored last night and he didn’t sleep much.  We go back down the hill to the Coffee House and notice that Tsvetnoy Bulvar is packed with protesters.  The protestors are being bused in by the hundreds.  There are more policemen out today.  It turns out that May Day in post Soviet Russia is a day of national protest.  Seems orderly but a big change from yesterday.

This is our last day in Moscow and I am hoping to see the Armed Forces Museum which is in the northern part of the city.  But first we have some business to attend to.  We catch our first train tonight at Kazansky station at 2210. I’ve ordered all of train tickets in advance from a website called RealRussia.com.   I have a receipt with a barcode for each leg of the trip, similar to what you would get when you order airline tickets online.  These cannot be used to board the train;  we need real tickets.  So we’ve decided to go to the train station this morning to see how to get a boarding pass.  I could not find any information about this before we left.   I get the impression that most Russians buy their tickets at the station,  most Europeans have the actual tickets delivered to their homes before leaving, and I think most Americans book tours.   We had the option of having all of our tickets delivered to our Hostel, but since we arrived in Moscow on Friday afternoon and were leaving Sunday night, it seemed too risky.

So after breakfast,  we go to the Metro  and  find our way to Kazansky Station which is in the NE area of the city.   The Metro has much more security today in light of the May Day activities.   We find our way but it’s not exactly intuitive, but in advance we write down the names of the Metro stations, in Russian, and this helps.  There are 3 large train stations all located at the same place, Leningradsky, Yaroslavsky and Kazansky and each is huge.

Moscow Kazansky Train Station

 We locate Kazansky, see lots of information but no English and no Information Center with English speakers.   The main terminal is a large building that reminds you of a National Guard Armory but it is beautiful inside with colorful walls and ceilings.  There is artwork everywhere and chandeliers on the tall ceilings.

 

 

 

We start taking pictures and are told by Security that no pictures are allowed, so we stop.   The warning we got was stern but polite.   Last time I had something like this happen was back in 1971 when I was ‘arrested’ for taking a picture of a rice farmer outside of Taipei.  No big deal, and we focus on trying to figure out how to solve our problem.

Seems like the local trains are handled in one area and the long-distance trains in another.  We are hoping to find an area for converting e-tickets into boarding passes but see no kiosks or self-service machines of any kind.   We see lots of Kacca windows with long lines, seems like a good way to start.   I had read that in Russian train stations; there are usually administrative windows where foreigners might get some help in English.  Ok so what is the word for Administrator in Russian?  We look it up and it’s администратор so we look for this and find something that looks close.

There’s a long line, but we finally get to the window, and I ask the lady if she speaks English….Nyet(no), she says!  So I show her our bar-coded receipts which are in Russian, but she starts talking fast in Russian and I have no idea what she is saying.  Suddenly, a Russian in line behind Jeff starts talking to Jeff in German, thinking we are German.   Jeff explains in German, to the Russian, what it is we are trying to do, and the Russian in line explains this to the ticket agent who directs us to a different window.  We were not at the Administrative window but she sends us there.   Once at the Administrative window, the agent checks our passports and changes our eticket into a real train ticket and we’re all set.   Jeff thanks the Russians for their help.    This is a process we would need to repeat at each train station on our route.   Whew, we got thru it for leg 1 thanks to some friendly and helpful Muscovites.

Only in Russia?

After all that work, we are now hungry, and we’ve seen some great food stands in the train station, so let’s eat.  We try to find one with a short line but no luck, so we go for where we can order by pointing.  First, I tell the lady in Russian that my Russian is bad, but I want to eat.  That works and I then point to the hot dog and a coke.  She gets them but then asks me something in Russian that takes about 30 seconds.  I tell her in Russian, sorry I don’t understand.   She’s ok with that but there is a drunk guy behind me who thinks I cannot hear her, so he starts repeating what she has just said, only much loader.   I tell him in Russian I don’t understand (big mistake), so he repeats it again much loader and looks really frustrated.  The lady behind the counter diffuses the situation by throwing a cold sausage into a bag and handing it to me.  Apparently, she wanted to know if I wanted it heated up.  Ok it’s been a difficult morning, but it’s early in the trip, and we’ll adapt.  Before leaving the train station, we familiarize ourselves with the arrival and departures marquees.   There are 9 departure platforms, and they are all indoors so we should be all set when we return tonight.

We head back to the Metro and get on the Circular line that takes us near the Armed Forces Museum.  I had read that this was an excellent World War II Museum, and also had static displays of Soviet tanks, aircraft, artillery and missiles.  We still had a good mile to walk after exiting the Metro, so Jeff fired up the GPS on his Iphone and that made it much easier.   On the way, we walked past an impressive building called the Theater of the Red Army, shaped like a Soviet Red Star.   It is an active theater that has plays that are military and traditional Russian, but it is not open.

Moscow Armed Forces Museum

At the museum, tickets were 100 rubles each, and I paid an extra 100 rubles to take photos.    The ticket agents knew we were not Russian and seem to give us a lot of attention.   They were asking lots of high-speed questions in Russian for some reason.   We were able to tell them that we wanted to take photos.   A couple of babushkas (older Russian women) were talking non-stop and apparently wanted us to check our backpacks which we did.  We found the restrooms and again men and women were separated.  Back upstairs we were looking around and talking about where to start our tour when a young Russian in his twenties starts talking to us in perfect English.   He works for the Museum and starts talking about some of the exhibits.  Then for the next hour he gives us a guided tour through the entire museum explaining many of the exhibits in detail.  He speaks of a great female sniper at Stalingrad and of a famous Russian officer who loses both arms in battle, and returns to the eastern front as soon as he is recovered.  He talks of the wars largest tank battle at Kursk in Russia, a turning point on the Eastern front in 1943.   There is an American jeep on display as we supplied the Russians with equipment during the war.  He shows us one of the first Kalashnikov’s, i.e. AK-47.  We also see the wreckage of Francis Gary Powers U2 which was shot down near Yekaterinburg in 1960.

We then walk outside and there is an impressive display of Soviet fighters including the Mig-15, Mig-17, Mig-21, Mig-23 and Mig-25.   

 It’s around 1700 now and the museum closes.  We decide to walk back to the Hostel which is about 2 miles to the south.  Getting hungry too so we watch for restaurants.  We see a sidewalk café with outdoor seating, the first we have seen in 3 days in Moscow, but it’s not real busy.  We want to try a Russian pizza restaurant near the hostel called the Tsvetnom Pizzeria.  This time the menu is in Russian and English, so ordering is easy.

No More Americans and No More Tourists

After eating we return to Godzillas.  We checked out earlier today, but they let us stow our bags until we needed to depart for the train station.   We have an hour or so to kill so I check my email and start talking to an American who is next to me.  He has been studying Russian Literature at a University in St. Petersburg for several months and this is his first trip to Moscow.   He says the Metro system here in Moscow is more complex and more difficult to navigate than St. Petersburg.  There is some English in the Metro there making it easier to get around.   He was just returning from a day trip to Vladimir where he watched the May Day parade.  He said there were hundreds of old Communist marchers there.  He loved the city and recommended that we visit it.   At Godzillas, we also meet 2 young American Marines who are stationed in California and on leave.  This is their first time in Russia and one of the places they want to see is the Armed Forces Museum, so we help them out.  Surprisingly, these would be the last Americans, and the last tourists, we would see for the next 10 days, as we traveled across Russia and Siberia.

Around 2000, we decide to leave for the train, but find that we have an important email from home.   I used the ATM at Godzillas 2 days ago, and this triggered a fraud alert on my bank account.  Hmmm, I told them before I left that I would be in Russia for 3 weeks.   No matter, I have to call them personally and validate the charges if I want to continue using my card.  I’m ready to blow this one off, but in a role reversal my son protests and demands that I take care of this immediately.   I use Skype on Jeff’s Iphone and cross this off the To Do list.

We walk down the hill from Godzillas to the Tsvetnoy Metro stop, buy some tickets and head to Kazansky station.  We have our suitcases this time but it’s not a problem getting a place on the Metro or getting around, and 40 minutes later we are at the train station.

 

Next:   Train trip from Moscow to Kazan

Prior:   Walking around Moscow Day 2