A much shorter anecdote here.

I was walking around the (admittedly rather dull and residential) part of Moscow that I call home one night with my flatmate. It was pretty late, about midnight.

Now, you might not know but Russia is full of little roadside kiosks that sell all sorts of stuff pretty cheaply, from fried chicken to knick-knacks, but more often than not the kiosks just sell alcohol.

Well, we had just passed one of these little kiosks when a great big articulated city bus pulled up beside us. We were surprised to even see a bus so late. We were even more surprised to see the driver jump out and buy a bottle of beer from the kiosk!

He then jumped back into his bus, and drove off, beer in hand!

It makes you proud to use public transport.

Wow - I haven't written anything here for a while. A few people have even started to complain! My brother suggested that it's because I'm finally 'going native' and just don't notice all the strange things happening around me. Trust me - I still do! But sometimes I'm too busy having things happen to me, to write.

So here's something from a little while ago.


UNORTHODOX EASTER

Julia wanted to experience a Russian Orthodox church service so I suggested going on Easter Sunday to the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour, which is the newly-rebuilt and very impressive church in the centre of Moscow.

The four-hour service actually began midnight on Saturday night so we turned up at the metro station at about 11.30.

"I know which exit it is. Follow me!" I proclaimed, smug in my geographical knowledge of the metro system. It isn't often that I get to be smug about things like that, so I was feeling particularly warm and fuzzy as we walked along the station platform, deep in conversation.

Suddenly I was shaken from my warm fuzziness by a Russian military police officer shouting at me through a loudhailer: "Stop! Stop and leave through the opposite exit!" I looked up to see a quite formidable police barricade set up in front of me, manned by three heavily armed officers (we're talking sub-machine guns).

Naturally we left through the opposite exit, quite hurriedly.

We walked round to the church, getting there a little before midnight. A huge crowd had gathered outside the church, blocking several busy roads. We fought our way through the crowd, which was surprisingly young, and split pretty evenly between men and women. Actually, it was a good cross-section of society, with little old Russian grandmothers, groupd of young men drinking beer, couples...

Suddenly the church bells began to toll midnight. Easter Sunday! As some of the crowd dispersed we could get closer to the church itself. Soon we came across another, much larger and again manned police barricade, this one preventing anyone from approaching the building. At one point in the barricade an officer was letting through an incredibly small number of people. What was this? A one-in, one-out system? Moscow: the only city in the world where you can saunter into any old club but you have to queue for churches.

What could we do? We waited for around twenty minutes, finally realising that the chances of us actually getting into the church before the metro closed were minimal.

*

It was only later that we found out that the main man, Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin himself, was due to attend the service that evening and that was the reason for such high security. I don't know what it is about that guy - he seems to follow me about wherever I go.

PARK KULTURI

On Saturday Julia and I went to 'Park Kulturi', Moscow's very own 'Park of Culture'. Opposite the Central House of Artists and in the historic heart of the city, I was expecting somewhere refined, beautiful and, well, cultured.

I wasn't really expecting a fun park. Which is what it was.

Also, it being the start of April and a little nippy over here, it was also almost deserted. None of the rides were open either, which is a little bit of a drawback in a fun park. I'm glad the entrance only cost 50 roubles...

So Julia and I were in the park. We couldn't go on any of the rides, so we decided to get something to eat. The nearest food stand was a kiosk selling fried chicken, and the menu went something like this:

Chicken soup with noodles 30R
Chicken wings (4) 70R
Chicken leg 60R
Half a chicken 90R

...and so on for a page and a half.

We went up to the guy serving, whom opened his little hatch.
'Two chicken soups please -'
'Sorry, no soup.'
'No soup?'
'No soup.'
'In that case,' I continued, two portions of chicken wings -'
'You want chicken?'
'Yes...'
'Hmmm. Maybe. Chicken'll take some time.'
'How long exactly?'
'Twenty minutes. Maybe half an hour.'

Russian fast food!

In the end we went to a bar inside the park that had a more comprehensive lunch menu. It also had a Mexican theme, complete with oversized plastic cactuses (cacti?) and wagon wheels. I'm not sure that the Russians who designed the place had much of a grasp on the Mexican way of life, as there were also several large reindeer dotted around the place.

Perhaps most bizarrely, the bar had Leffe on draft for only 90R (less than two pounds).

This isn't really Russia-related, but I wanted to tell you anyway.

My hair had been looking rather shaggy, and when my boss started making Austin Powers jokes every time I walked into the room I knew that it was time to get it cut. Not being a big fan of barbers, I was pleased when Julia told me that she had worked in a salon in Portland for a while and would happily cut my hair for me.

So it began. I sat in Julia's bathtub while she set about trimming my mop. There was no mirror to see her progress, so you can imagine that I was a little apprehensive.

'Just a trim, then, Julia, okay?' I asked.
'I was thinking, something kinda more rock n' roll.'
'Er....'

A couple of minutes passed, and Julia was still cutting my hair with, how can I say, quite a lot of vim.

'This is pretty easy! And fun!' she exclaimed.
'I thought you'd done it before?'
'No, I never said that.'
'Didn't you use to work in a salon in Portland?'
'Yeah, I was a receptionist. But I watched how they did it.'

Great...

Although - and I am relieved to say this - the finished version does actually look quite good. Even Kostya didn't mock me too much.