Spring Break!



So, like I said, I got my sister's digital camera and snapped up a wheeheezy of pics to share from all over the place. I'm exhausted but envigorated at the same time, a very alive kind of tired, and the only thing I really wanna do is go back to Italy and keep backpacking. I love Copenhagen and all, but I'm gonna need a day of adjustment, as you'll see...



But first, ROSSIA. (This is gonna be a pretty long post, if you wanna just go straight to the pictures' source in Flickr click here and here.)



Some observations about Moscow: everybody made such a big deal how completely different Russia is from everything else, totally alien, but I thought it was all bogus. Yes, I probably have never felt farther from home, and with the heavy and low grey skies I really felt like I was near the end of the world. But it seemed to me like every other sprawling industrial messy city, just a whole less inviting than say, Caracas or something. Every other billboard is the Marlboro Man (that's where he went), or either a Samsung ad. Slumlike apartment complexes stand dirty and unkept for everywhere, and its only in pockets do you see a true beauty... but it just made it seemed more random than awe-inspiring. Yes, the Kremlin was amazing, and the Red Square surreal, but doesn't St. Basil's Cathedral look like Disneyworld to you? We couldn't get over how plastic it looked, as if in a 1000 years, Cinderella's castle in Orlando will be dug up and be deemed one of the wonders of the world, with Mickey Mouse our most revered king or god...



Yeah, so that's pretty much how you would picture Russia would be, and that's pretty much what you get. I couldn't get over the fact that Russians actually DO wear big fuzzy fur hats! All the time! And, also, Russians ARE rude and the most uninviting people I have ever met... I never saw a Russian smile or tell a joke.







The water is so bad there, they actually do recommend you to brush your teeth in vodka. This was also around the time where I slipped on the ice (my FIRST time this winter I promise!) and gashed my right pinky. It bled like crazy, and I kept cutting my hands so I left Russia with bandanged fingers. Still looks kinda nasty...





We got SO lost in here, all of us seperated into tinier and tinier groups. We literally could not for the life of us figure out our way to our entrance, and it took 45 minutes to get to the bus! Like most everything in Russia, everything seemed to be a hassle to do...



We stayed in HOTEL ROSSIA which is the biggest hotel I have ever seen, housing a supposed 5000 guests at any given time. It literally took 20 minutes from the nearest entrance to the door of my room, and it reminded me of a bad Hunter s. Thompson/ Terry Gilliam mindtrip, passing by small bars and smoking areas of huge cigar chewing businessmen, old russian hookers, small mousey bartenders, garish and loud colors, and terrible russian pop songs. Just to get to my room. There were also statues of pirates near the west gate.





Also, I wasn't expecting the whole trip to be as touristy as it was, but it wasn't exactly like I was feeling frisky and wanting to go off the beaten path. Each day was swamped in tourist traps, which got tiring and annoying after a while, with bus tours and droning guides, but it was ok. I have never felt more paranoid and unsafe, with all the stories they tell (like, stories that happened last week), with the police being the most corrupt of them ALL. Yep, that was Moscow in a sketch...

St. Petersburg

Speaking of sketches, ran out of batteries in my camera eventually and kept forgetting to recharge. So, thankfully, there were many architecture friends that had to sketch all the time anyway, making me feel less dumb and show-offy carrying a sketchbook around. I'll upload these sometime later, they're a lot, but this is getting long enough...







St. Petersburg was a lot prettier and nicer than Moscow, it being a more European city and resembling Venice bizarrely at times. Good times.





But it got annoying after about the 18756th russian palace we would see, seeming to say once again that, boy, Russian royalty sure had a lotta money. Gold plated EVERYTHING, while thousands of their countrymen died from starvation... there's only so much palaces you can see without thinking about these things, you know?







Ah, the Crimson Coach. Remember middle school fieldtrips, shuffling in and out of the bus, and all that business? That pretty much was our trip, with bus culture and everything. Russia was an amazing place to go to, really a once in a lifetime experience, and I'm 100% glad I went, but I'm also pretty glad in knowing that I probably will never be there again. The kids were cool, most of them I didn't know previously, some sights were insane, but it feels like the whole world is just... stuck there, the only thing bringing it all together is an incredible history. Otherwise, it's just a sad outpost of life of depressed people and fried food, absorbing all the worst aspects of globalization and none of its better ones (the 2nd largest mcdonalds in the world!! in the heart of moscow! definitive proof that Russia lost the Cold War). After being lost in St. Petersburg scary slums, a friend and I basically praying for our lives in a van from the early 80's in the middle of nowhere, I was ready to leave, and needed a definite change. Thus...



ITALY! Spring Break pt. 2 coming soon, maybe tomorrow...

P.S. Oh! And I almost completely forgot: not all Russians were awful, as this photograph attests, being one of my favorite pictures of all time. His name was Valentin and had been doing photography for 30 years... we talked about how he set his basement darkroom and his family and his craft, he was so cool. So cool he let me take a picture of him dancing in front of his stand. Valentin is badass.