The Thaw and Refreeze

After the record snow fall which Muscovites haven't seen the likes of in over 50 years, the temperature has begun to reach above freezing. This is the first time I've walked by the Metro station Университет (Universitet) and not seen a negative sign in front of the temperature. This is great because that means spring is on its way, but this is also terrible because the 4 feet of snow is starting to melt and if anyone has dealt with slush and melting snow they know how disgusting it is. But of course this is Russia and nothing is too easy, so the temperatures today dropped. Everything is frozen again and all the gross slush is now slippery ice.

So on Tuesday it was Defenders of the Fatherland Day which replaced the old Red Army Day from the Soviet times. This is essentially "men's" day. Women are supposed to give the men in their lives flowers and celebrate them and their service to the country. Not knowing how to properly celebrate "Men's Day", Amitesh, Angela and I took a trip to the New Tretyakov Gallery. This art gallery focused on the 20th and 21st centuries in Russian art which was very convenient since I had taken a course about this less then a year ago. We got lost in the immense collection of art for over 2 hours and didn't even realize how much time had gone by. The sad part was we even skipped some exhibits. But it was so great getting to see the real masterpieces by constructivist Tatlin (Tatlin's Tower), neoprimativist and suprematist Malyevich (Black Square) and many other works by artists such as Goncharova, Kandinsky and Repin.

On Wednesday I was able to prove myself as a true Russian on the ice skating rink by doing moves that Evgeni Plushenk wouldn't even dare to do. Even though this might be slight exaggeration, I had never been ice skating on an outside rink or gone ice skating so cheaply before.

Thursday and Friday are blurred together but I do know that on one of these days we traveled out of the city to visit an old monastery. Коломенское or Kolomenskoye was originally a small village outside of Moscow which was loved by the aristocrats. The Tsars soon began to build in the area a palace, monastery and things of that sort. So Amitesh, Sasha and I metroed out to the area and took a nice walk through the slush to these stunning old orthodox churches.






Later that evening we went to a hilarious Tex-Mex restaurant called "La Cantina" which was located down the street from Red Square. Going to a Mexican restaurant in Moscow kind of killed a dream of mine to be the first to open one up there, but it was still a very nice reminder of home. Inside was hanging American, Texas and Mexican flags as well some unexpected ones like Germany, Austria, Argentina, etc. Their idea of nachos is a little different then ours, especially the salsa. There was really no spice to it, only bell peppers and a ketchup taste. The enchiladas that I ordered really weren't too bad, plus they were a good size portion which is rare here. My favorite part of the whole experience was the lady who professionally walked around wearing cowboy boots, hat and short shorts from table to table explaining what tequila was and then charging people to take a shot with her. I fondly name her Tila Tequila.



This is a really awkward group picture in front of the Mexican restaurant, but I think it's awesome.

Over the weekend we went to an Indian restaurant on top of a hotel that looked over Moscow State University and the Moskva River. And we're also trying to deal with a lot of issues and problems regarding KEI (my study abroad program) and the coordinator here in Moscow. But other than these few bumps, everything is sailing along fine.

Da Svidaniya!