Bright Lights and Cityscapes [Moscow Day 3]

Moscow continued . . .

On Thursday morning, I made the trip out to Парк Победы (Park Pobedi)--Moscow's Victory Park. It is massive. I didn't realize how big it was going to be. I should have. I mean, WWII is a really big deal in Moscow. And it's built near the place where Napoleon watched Moscow burn in 1812 . . . and then decided that if the people weren't fangirling over him like he thought they should, and since it was freezing cold, maybe Moscow wasn't worth it to him. He's not the first and hasn't been the last person to realize that you should not fight a land war in Asia. And that Moscow is harder to take than you'd think. 

 When I walked out of the Metro station, it started snowing. I thought it was very fitting.

[On my way to the monument. It was a good seven-minute walk to get to the monument. And this was at a brisk pace.]

[I am including this selfie mostly because I think it is funny. It's one of those accidental selfies. I didn't smile in time. But that's okay because I think it 1) captures the feeling of me being cold, and 2) probably captures the feeling of what the French felt when they made it to Moscow. "Enhhhh. This is not what we signed up for."]

[That's more like it. Cold but happy to be at Парк Победы.]

[And with the monument behind me. Again, I apologize for the amount of selfies. I was the only one at the Park that early in the morning.]

[Russia crushing the forces of fascism. With a dusting of snow.]

[Views of Moscow.]

[To remember.]

[Beautiful Moscow.]

[A monument to those who fought on the Ukrainian front. There were four Ukrainian fronts memorialized.]

After Park Pobedi, I met up with Derek again and we took a small hike through a Moscow forest to see a beautiful view of Moscow: 

[Moskva, Moskva.]

[Apparently this is part of a map which lights up at night. The thick white band is the Moskva River. The Red Star is, you've guessed it. Red Square.]

We were right across the street from Moscow State University (MGU), so we stopped by. It is a very impressive building. And I have a feeling that in my other life (the one where I grow up in Russia, Ukraine, or Belarus), I would have aspired to attend university there and try my luck in Moscow. 

[Our friend Lomonsov. The founder of the Russian university.]

[MGU.]

[The doors were really cool.]

[Me with the "Geography" panel. The didn't have any history or literature panels . . . MGU specializes in science and math. But I do love my geography.]

Derek set me loose again and I followed my heart and went to the Tretyakov Gallery. I will do an entire blog post about that art museum because I took so many pictures and I absolutely fell in love with that place. So it deserves an entire post where you can admire the pretty pictures and I can talk about them to my heart's content. In the meantime, enjoy these pictures from the inside: 

Yep. Beautiful. 

I then went to Kitai-Gorod, which translates into "China City," but it's not a China Town at all . . . it's just a really old part of the city. And there are a lot of old cathedrals scattered along a path which leads from the Old Square to the New Square. 

[Really, the bright colors--the greens, reds, blues, and golds--are so striking, especially on grey days. You can tell that this city was made for winter. And made for looking great in winter.]

 [Inside a cafe in a monastery.]

I then went to the State Historical Museum and got to see a lot of beautiful, old things. Because that's what you do in museums. 

[Just look at that ceiling.]

[Big globes.]

[A really old throne that you can tell was frequently used.]

After my museum detour, I met back up with Derek and other Russian friends (including Maxim Efoshkin, who served in the same mission as me--it was fun to see him again) for LDS Institute. It was neat seeing the church building there. Something that surprised me was that the church building smelled the same as the ones in eastern Ukraine, where I served.

And, of course, since Red Square has a magnetic draw, a few of us went there after Institute to enjoy the lights, crowds, and blini. And take glam shots by the yolichka (Christmas tree), obviously. Because what else do you do on Red Square? Especially when there are yolickhi and reindeer involved?

[There is also a picture with me, Derek, and Maxim, but I don't have it on my phone. But Maxim was there, too, and as we all know, trios have more fun. Also. The most important part of this fotka? THE SUPER KONTIKI I AM HOLDING IN MY HAND.]

 короче (in short), Moscow doesn't fail to impress.

Moskva, Moskva [Day 2]

Some highlights from Day 2 of Moscow: 

[RUSSIAN BREAKFAST AT THE HOTEL. Guys. The bread was soooo good. And the yogurt! My favorite Russian yogurt! With pineapple! I was so incredibly happy.]

[Храм Христа Спасителя. The Cathedral of Christ the Savior.]

[Beautiful. And only about 20 years old. Did you know that Stalin completely demolished this cathedral in the 1930s? It was rebuilt in the 1990s.]

[Happy to be in Russia. And yes. I took a lot of selfies on this trip. Because often there was no one to take a picture of me but I had to document my face in the Russian motherland.]

[Case in point.]

[Saints and apostles wait at the gates.]

[You see that red star? That's the Kremlin. Not too far away at all.]

I kept coming back to Red Square. It pulls you in, really.

[Ice Skating on Red Square! Because everyone needs a chance to feel like Levin and Kitty from Anna Karenina.]

[Oh haiii, St. Basil's.]

[And from inside St. Basil's.]

We also went inside Lenin's Mausoleum, which was one of the more creepy things I've ever seen. At first I didn't think his body was real. But when I got closer . . . yeah, I think it's real. We both left trying to shake off an overall feeling of ickiness. 

(Although honestly, I was also thinking of this clip when I was in there. So I was laughing inwardly to myself while the guards kept telling us to move on and get out of there.) 

"Must. Crush. Capitalism." Because we all know that when the zombie apocalypse happens, Lenin's leading it. 

Seeing dead people made us hungry. So we brightened our spirits by eating amazing Russian food. Including borscht. Which just made me incredibly, incredibly happy. And it was good borscht, too! 

 

After that, Derek left me on my own to explore Moscow. And once I was set loose, I headed straight for Lev Tolstoy's house. I had to make the pilgrimage.

[There is beauty all around when you're at Tolstoy's home.]

[Happy Megan.]

I also went exploring around вднх, which is a really big park with more bike paths, a ferris wheel, ice skating, etc. And lights. Lots and lots of lights. 

On the way there, I stopped by a park devoted to kosmonauts and then ended up finding the big Soviet statue, Worker and Kolhoz Woman. 

[Moscow at dusk.]

[Kosmonauts.]

[Soviet art.]

[Finally made it to вднх.]

[So many lights.]

[Москва.] 

After a stroll around вднх, I found some Russian bookstores. I mean, it's me. Of course I found my way to some bookstores. There was one, Biblio-Globus, which was basically like a Barnes and Nobles on steroids. My favorite one, though, was a smaller bookstore right nearby. It simply had a sign with an arrow that said, "Books." So in I went. It felt a bit like an absent-minded professor's office, with books piled to the ceiling and around the floor. It was lovely. 

[And, I found a biography of Winston Churchill in there, which I thought was amusing, considering that I am writing this less than 10 miles away from where Churchill grew up.]

And even more nighttime explorations: 

[Red Square at night. Including гум (Gum--a massive shopping mall) all lit up.]

[The Kremlin.]

[St. Basil's at night is quite a sight. Sure am glad Napoleon didn't blow it up in 1812.]

[Christmas Village at Red Square.]

[Inside GUM.]

[They decorated GUM with fruit, candies, and New Year's postcards reminiscent of the 1960s and 1970s. A friend of mine said his grandmother would have loved the Christmas village/inside of GUM because it would have reminded her of good, happy times.]

[The Tomb of the Unknown Solider/The Eternal Flame.]

[The Bolshoi. Also, you can see the billboard for Tsum--another huge shopping center.]

[Inside Tsum's Christmas market.] 

Guys. There was so much opulence. Like, both GUM and Tsum were more decked out than either Macy's or Harrod's. And they both had this nostalgia for things past--GUM was playing off of Soviet nostalgia, while Tsum was going for the Russian fairy tale theme. Being the over-analyzer I am, I found it extremely interesting. I also thought it was very telling that GUM's ice skating rink on Red Square (and right across the way from Lenin's Tomb) was rented out for a corporate event. Russia is full of paradoxes. Just one of the reasons I find it so incredibly intriguing.