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Several times earlier in the week, we noticed that other people were having champagne for breakfast, and on Friday we had tickets to the opera, so we decided – what the heck! — let's have some champagne for breakfast. After breakfast, we did the last must-do item on our list, entering and touring St. Basil's Cathedral, the iconic one that has become a symbol of Moscow, even more so than the Kremlin itself. By chance, we got there right at 11am, just as the gates opened. We ordered a single audioguide, after we discovered that ordering one each for the Kremlin cathedrals tour was overkill. The audioguide, however, was not very interesting, full of years and dates and blah blah blah that goes in one ear and out the other. The inside of the cathedral was interesting, and similar to all the others, painted decoratively from floor to ceiling.  <a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-22-russia-2018-part-5-of-6/32544147798_9a61d41096_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow - Day 5">
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The tomb of the unknown soldier, an eternal flame that is guarded during the day by two still soldiers. There is an opaque part at the back of their little transparent booth that we hypothesized must be some kind of a heater. We walked by this flame many times as it was on the way between our hotel and Red Square.

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Approaching our destination: St. Basil's Cathedral

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The cathedral contained plenty of Christian works of art, but this one was the only one that I liked enough to snap a photograph. The Kremlin and the negative-space Christ was cool.

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View across the Moskva River from inside the cathedral.

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The central tower of the cathedral. There was a group of men in the central chamber who sung a cappella hymns. They were unbelievably good. They had CDs for sale, and a sign up with a video camera with a line through it, requesting that they not be recorded, but it's 2018, and everyone recorded them.

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Of course, that far north, near the solstice, it's almost always Golden Hour.

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Another view, from inside the cathedral, to the lower part of Red Square towards the river.

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The Kremlin clock tower.

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Farewell selfie from outside the cathedral. I'll probably never set foot in there again, but I'm glad I did.

After the cathedral, we walked around Red Square, browsing the shops that were set up for Christmas. Part of me wanted to ice skate on Red Square, but we decided not to.

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Pretty cool.

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Ice cream in the GUM is a must-do. Despite how counterintuitive it is to eat ice cream when it's -10ºC outside. Moscow is famous for its ice cream.

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In the week we were there, we saw the number of Christmas trees rise exponentially.

After a brief stop at the hotel, we took a walk along the famous Arbat Street, a pedestrian street that would make any European feel right at home. It was touristy, and we tired of it quickly, deciding to walk along a side street. Eventually it was lunch time and Google Maps said there was an Uzbek restaurant nearby, which we decided to try. Due to being an 88% muslim country, Uzbekistan, there was no alcohol on the menu. We had some mediocre soup and salad, all very bland, lacking salt. Our green tea was good, though.

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Uzbek food.

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Some sort of stew.

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We actually managed to successfully visit Moscow and not purchase a single matryoshka doll. We don't need any other things to clean dust off of.

After lunch, we walked all the way to the area near the Bolshoi, the famous theatre in Moscow, where we had opera tickets at 7pm. We entered a shopping mall where we were not the right class of people. A pair of sneakers was 750€, and we saw a not-that-impressive-to-us fur coat for 13,000€. On the ground floor, there was an Apple Store, so I got to paw at the newest iPads, which I had never touched in person. Soon it was time to head to the Bolshoi.

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I care less about nationalistic symbology than most people, but something about these shoes struck me as offensive to Americans. Perhaps that was the point?

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Apple Store selfie.

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Selfie in front of the KGB building.

We had purchased our tickets online, for the only show available during our visit, _La Bohème_, which we had never heard of. It turns out to be one of the most popular, most performed, operas in the world. We walked up the grand steps of the Bolshoi like we belonged there, despite my blue jeans, and I showed the PDF of our tickets on my phone to the guard, and he said something and pointed to his right. So we went one door to the left and did the same thing, and got the same response. At this point, the next door was around the side of the building, and the guard there told us that we had to across the street to the next building over. It turns out that our opera was being performed not in the historic famous building, but in a newer "New Stage" built in 2002. Oh well, it still counts as The Bolshoi.

For some reason, they wouldn't scan the QR code on my phone until I went to a ticketing desk so that they could scan the QR code on my phone and print out the pages of the PDF that was on my phone, so that the lady at the next entrance could scan the same damn QR code off of the physical paper. 🙄🙄🙄

Inside, the elegant upper class were clinking champagne goblets together, but we were concerned with finding our seats. I asked several ushers as they pointed in the direction for us to go and ask the next usher. Finally, we got to the door, and the man there gave us a big fat _Nyet!_ that we have become accustomed to hearing. So we went back to the previous usher woman, and she said, "Well yeah, obviously you can't go in until the bell rings!" Experienced opera goers are now laughing, I'm sure. About 8 seconds later, the bell rang.

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Bolshoi foyer

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At our seats, before the rest of the crowd shuffled in.

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Impressive ceiling.

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At almost every establishment in Moscow, they have a coat check, where you leave your big heavy coat from outside with a guy in exchange for a little numbered token that you can use to exchange for your coat upon leaving. These were some of the nicest. Maybe its because we had just swung by the KGB, but I can think of so many opportunities for dead drop espionage involving swapping someone's coat token.

Our seats were excellent, on the third row, decently centered. The opera was in Italian, with subtitles placed on monitors in Russian. Let's just say that it's good that we had read a plot summary before we got there, because otherwise nothing would've made sense. Two characters fall in love in the first act, acts two and three are mostly a blur, and in the final act, one of the lovers succumbs to tuberculosis. All the articles I had read about the opera said that, no matter what you think of the rest of the play, if the final death scene doesn't move you, you're dead inside. I was feeling really doubtful that I would be moved, as I didn't really like or care for any of the characters (again, whose words I could not understand). But holy crap they acted the hell out of the last scene! It was a deliciously emotional dessert at the end of a fairly boring meal.

Don't get me wrong, the music and singing were amazing, but it was just sounds to me, with no meaning. Even if it were sung in one of my two languages, I think I might not have been able to follow along. I appreciate that others like opera, and all the best to them; I guess now I know how some people feel when I say that I like golf. I've been to one opera in my 20s, one in my 30s, and at age 40 and 1 month, I think this one will do for this decade.

After the opera, we had a fairly disappointing final supper in Moscow, accidentally stumbling into a chain restaurant that we had been to once, but this time got considerably worse service. Oh well, you win some you lose some...

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Post opera dinner for the lady. As you can seee, it's the kind of chain restaurant where you can do puzzles on the placemat with crayons left at the table. Classy!

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Post opera dinner for the gentleman.

Tomorrow is our final day in Moscow. The low tonight will be -17º C (1.4º F).


Russia 2018 - Part 5 of 6

Russia 2018 - Part 4 of 6


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We got to the Theatre District subway stop 45 minutes early and decided to stop for a drink and snack to tide us over until a late dinner. The Metro tour started at 7pm and was going to take two hours.

After my blini and honey beer and Marga's milkshake we headed to the meeting point, at the fountain in front of the famous Bolshoi Theatre. We are often nervous pre-booking guided tours because we have been stuck with such horrible tour guides in the past. This time, however, we got lucky. Our guide introduced himself as Johann, although his English had a slight Spanish accent to it (the tour booking also offered guides in Spanish). After we introduced ourselves, I asked him where he was from, and he said he was from Colombia, but that he had been living in Moscow for 12 years. There were three other people with us, a couple and a single retired gentleman, all from the Netherlands. The couple were a bland bunch, paying very little attention and cutting off the guide as he was pointing things out to us entering the Metro, "Um, I thought this tour was of the Metro?" Sheesh!

I could not tell you all of the stations we visited, or all of the details our guide shared with you, but some of them really stuck with me.

### Voices

On the trains heading out of the city, the voice telling you the name of the next station is man; and when you are returning back towards the center of the city, the voice is a woman. This is meant to symbolize your boss pulling you out to work, and your mother/wife calling you back home. For the circle lines, that simply go around the city's center, the male voice is on the one going clockwise – the way you would turn a screw in – and it's a female voice going counterclockwise; make of that as you wish.

Also, until literally last year, none of the voices were in English, and none of the Metro maps had any Latin alphabet names (which makes it a _lot_ easier to quickly comprehend), but when they were going to host the 2018 World Cup, they did a study and decided that it would save many headaches if they would make the Metro more comprehensible to the European and World masses.

### Advertising

Something about the Metro stations was a little "off" to me, but it wasn't until our guide pointed it out that I realized it. There is _no advertising!!!_ Since I only ride Metros once a decade, this wasn't quite a salient to me, but I remember the London Underground well, and how it is plastered with posters from floor to ceiling. This is also a recent change that happened a year or two ago. The mayor banned advertising in the Metro and had all the ads all removed. I wonder what effect it had on the local economy. It certainly makes the Metro a much nicer place to be.

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Look at those gloriously blank walls!

### Structure

All of the stations that are under some structure, like a building or a square, have two exits, one on either side of a long hallway. The stations that are not under something only have one exit and end at the far end.....in a shrine. The stations are like cathedrals in which to worship...The State. This sounds a little bonkers, but once you know this, you see it in every station.

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A shrine end, glory to the comrades.

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Shrine to Lenin. The statue was actually made from his death mask.

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'sup, Lenny?

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Lenin's all over the place.

### Allies

Many of the stations are dedicated to Russia's relations with neighboring nations, like Ukraine and Belarus, with many paintings and mosaics telling stories of heroic acts and symbols of products and trades that those nations excel at. Other stations honored the heroes in Russian history, both people and cities, like those that fought foes from Napoleon to Hitler.

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Sturgeon fishermen.

### Construction

Our guide taught us many other things about how the stations were made, how the city grew, and how the Metro stations were build to accommodate such growth. It was not easy building Metro stations in Moscow. One station was estimated to take 4 years to build in Stalin's master plan, but when the constructor got on site, the ground was harsher than expected, and he had to go back to Stalin and say that it was going to take 6 years. Stalin looked him in the eye and said, "It's going to take four years!" Dude was so terrified, it was built in only 3 years.

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Gorgeous chandaliers

### Lack of Danger

We started the tour learning that Russian does not have a word for "security"; the Russians only refer to a "lack of danger". Russian life is about minimizing danger. That's why every corner of every station is covered by a security camera, and how there are many, many fire extinguishers around. But most importantly, the stations are, and have served as, bunkers. The tunnels between the stations have huge one-meter thick doors that can slam down to protect those inside from attackers or nuclear radiation. Each station has food rations to last 3 months. They are some of the safest places in the world to be during global thermal nuclear war, despite being right underneath ground zero.

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We rode on the longest escalator in the world, up from the deepest subway station in the world. There is some controversy over that title with Kiev and St. Petersburg. Our guide said that if you measure by the depth of the rails, Moscow wins.

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Going down...

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Each station was more impressive than the last.

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Actual gold plating on the ceiling.

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Impressive mosaic work.

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In case there was any doubt that these are churches...

### No Smiling 😐

Johann also explained to us why the Russians do not smile, a fact I had both read about and noticed first hand. He explained that during Stalin's USSR, there were two different types of currency, the Ruble and Beryozka checks. The only way to get Beryozka checks was in currency exchanges when exchanging other currencies. So if you were a successful businessman, traveling to other countries to sell your wares, when you got back to Russia, you could choose to change some of your foreign currency into Beryozka checks. And there were many luxury shops that would only accept Beryozka checks, thus creating a class system.

But the real reason people don't smile is that back then, if you were nice and invited someone, say your best employee, over to your house, if that person later went to the authorities and, without accusing you of anything, said, "I went over to Mr. Jones' house last night and he seems to have a lot of nice things...I wonder what he's up to?" This was often enough to have the government come and put Mr. Jones into prison for the 6-8 years while his finances were investigated. In the meantime, what happens to Mr. Jones' house? Well, it's not really his house, because Soviet Russia doesn't believe in personal possessions; it's the people's house. So who should have it? Well, probably this outstanding citizen that ratted him out to the authorities!

It doesn't take much thought experimentation to conclude why Russians are not even remotely socially proactive in forming relationships. Also, he said, that if you were grinning a little too much looking into your love interest's eyes, or crying a little too much after your love interest not returning the interest, someone might report you as having something wrong with you, and off to jail you go! So Russians are extremely poker faced in public. This jail-on-suspicion policy lasted up until 1991, so only the very youngest Russians are willing to turn up the corners of their mouths when they look at you. In fact, we later witnessed some old women that would cover their mouths with their hands when speaking to their companion on the train.

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Non-Russians smiling like goofballs.

### When you outlaw religion...

Probably my favorite part of the entire Metro tour was all in one station full of bronze statues on every column. Atheists like myself often imagine that the world would be a better place without religion. Whenever we reference all the violence and bloodshed throughout human history in the name of religion, the religious apologists love to throw Stalin at us as a "but what about!" argument – arguing via exceptions to the rule is an inherently weak argument, but that's neither here nor there. Our tour guide explained that, when Stalin outlawed religion, the Russian people had to find an outlet for their superstition. This one Metro station became such an outlet.

There were certain places on many of the bronze statues that were thought to have effects on your life if you touched them: the dog's nose for happiness (d'aww!!), a pistol for winning a symbolic "duel" against some foe of daily life (i.e. a boss that won't give you a raise or a friend that won't return a loaned book), the beak of a rooster to specifically request bad luck in order to achieve a goal (i.e. a flat tire to get out of going to a party you don't want to go to), the head of another rooster for money to arrive in your life, the statue of a man holding a child if your son wasn't making you enough grandkids, and a woman with child for the opposite scenario, including the penis of the child the mother was holding if you really wanted to son or grandson rather than a daughter or granddaughter. He told us all of these things, and we could clearly see that the specific parts of the statues he mentioned were extremely shiny compared to the dull aged bronze of the rest of the statues.

I found this fascinating, but wondered how often it really happened. Then, right before our very eyes, a train full of passengers arrived, and I swear to you, every fourth or fifth person touched the dog's nose as they walked by. Some people would walk from the other side of the platform just to touch a statue. It was amazing to me just how engrained in the culture this tradition still is, all these years later. It made me consider what a world "without religion" would look like, or if it could ever exist.

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Don't dual with my wife!

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Who's a good boy??

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Here comes the wealth!

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Johann, and the other nice Dutch guy that went on our tour.

### Conclusion

We were so pleased during the entire two hours by our luck in tour guide, both his depth of knowledge and charming charisma. At the end, I asked him how he ended up in Russia, and he said that he'd met a Russian girl, causing me to nod knowingly. I asked him where they'd met, and he said that he had met her when attending university in Moscow. In the admissions interview, they asked him if he was going to learn Russian, and he gave an enthusiastic YES! and they let him in. I asked what he studied, and then he admitted that he was a practicing medical pathologist, working in a lab and also a lecturing professor, and that he also teaches children Spanish on the side. Wow!! No wonder he struck us as so intelligent! Amazing job, Johann! _Gracias_, thank you, and _Спасибо!_


Russia 2018 - Moscow Metro Tour


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The first place we went on Wednesday morning was the [Cosmonaut Museum](http://www.kosmo-museum.ru). We had been told that it was fairly small, but that information was decades old, and incorrect. The first section of the museum was all dedicated to Sputnik and Yuri Gagarin, the man-made object and first man to orbit the earth. Also highlighted were the dogs, Laika among them, and other animals that went into space. Also featured was [Valentina Tereshkova](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valentina_Tereshkova), the first woman in space, who is still living, at the age of 81. As the countdown for her rocket reached 5 seconds, she paraphrased a famous Russian poet and said, "Sky, take off your hat. I'm on my way!" Boom! That's almost more of a mic drop line than Neil's "one small step".  <a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-07-russia-2018-part-3-of-6/46201118321_877d7e0407_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 3">
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Cool space monument!

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Credit to the workers down below.

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Could be an awesome sledding opportunity... 🤔

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Yuri died young, so he remains youthful throughout history. He's one of the few non-politicians buried at the mausoleum in Red Square.

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I had grabbed an apple from the breakfast buffet, never ended up eating it, but it was the perfect prop for this photo.

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There were many replicas of spacecraft, at various scales. It was never clear to me, as most of the text was in Russian, exactly how big The Real Sputnik™ was.

The rest of the museum was all about the Russian space program. The USSR really accomplished a lot in the space race, as did their competitors. At the very end there was a bit about the Apollo 11 crew and Saturn V rocket, but it was very much targeted at Russian greatness. There were many classes of little Russian children running around and listening intently to their tour guides. I can only imagine the sense of national pride that such a museum must instill in the youngsters that visit.

I only wish we'd had an English speaking tour guide to help describe it all to us. The Mir, for example, was an outstanding accomplishment, but we couldn't understand much of the details surrounding it, as most of the plaques were in Russian only.

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See that paper up top? That's Yuri Gagarin's EKG readout during launch. It must have been terrifying!

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Apparently the Russians had their own Space Shuttle??? This fact was not reported to Americans, I think. Also, "CCCP" = "USSR".

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They _really_ worship Yuri!

For lunch on Wednesday, we searched Google Maps for restaurants near the Cosmonaut museum. Very few results were returned, but there was one that claimed to be Arabic food, so we attempted to find it. We were clearly in "residential Moscow" for really the first time of our visit. We love walking the actual streets where people live and shop. The coordinates took us to a fairly dingy-looking hotel. We figured we were mistaken and walked away, but then on the other side of the building, we clearly saw, through the windows, what looked like a restaurant. Very cautiously we entered.

The waiter knew a surprising amount of English, given how remote we were from any tourism center. He sat us down at a table and tried to explain the menu to us, but his English fell flat. Luckily I had a Google Translate app on my phone that could translate menus on the fly. It translated all but a few of the words. For the mystery word, the waiter offered, "Arabic chicken?" Marga took the safer beef pilaf route, and I went for the Arabic chicken. Marga's dish started with two traditional Russian dishes, borscht and Russian salad, and finished with some rice with some chunks of beef on top. My meal was unlike anything I've seen. The main plate was full of rice, and then I had a bowl of what looked to be boiled chicken and something not unlike spinach, but with a very bitter flavor. Then I had a plate of what looked like ingredients that the chef couldn't be bothered to actually prepare: fresh garlic (stalks), a bunch of parsley, some spearmint, half a tomato, some black olives, some pickles, one green pepper, and one pickled spicy pepper. I went munching on the raw veggies as I consumed my rice and spinach chicken. We then had tea included in our meal. My dish came out to 7€ and Marga's was half that, so we had an entire meal for about 10.50€.

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The decor felt like we were in Arabia somewhere.

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Borchst and Russian Salad.

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My spread.

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Here, have a pile of random stuff from the garden!

To entertain us during our meal, like the night before, we had a Russian romantic drama play out before our eyes. Two tables down, there was a blonde woman who was wheeled in in her wheelchair by a young strapping lad who we thought was her boyfriend. The lad went away and a few minutes later, an older gentleman, at least 15 years her senior, who reminded me a lot of a late alcoholic friend of mine. He plopped down a dozen white roses on the table, much to the gal's delight. A waiter later brought out one of those buckets to chill wine for the roses to sit awkwardly in. The man then pulled out a small box, which turned out to be chocolates of some kind. It was after the chocolates that he produced a flask and proceeded to pour what looked like cognac into their empty wine glasses. The woman giggled. He polished off his glass in one swig, before briefly flashing the fact that he had a whole wine bottle in his bag. The glasses were refilled once or twice. At that point the waiter came over, looking very disappointed and said something that must have been along the lines of, "Sir, you can't bring your own alcohol in here," which our table agreed would put an end to the contraband, but no, this man makes his own rules when it comes to wooing his women and liver; the cognac kept flowing, despite two other attempts of weak pleading from the waiter.

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Snowy residential park.

After exiting the restaurant, we walked several kilometers through the residential neighborhoods we were in, occasionally darting into supermarkets to ogle the foreign supermarket offerings and, more importantly, to warm up a bit. It was -10º C (14º F) outside. Once we decided it might be an unforgettable experience for Marga to get a manicure at a local neighborhood salon, but she said the prices were much higher than in Spain, so we excused ourselves back out into the cold. It was almost time to catch the subway to meet our guide for the Metro Tour.

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The [Vystavka Dostizheniy Narodnogo Khozyaystva](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VDNKh_(Russia)) (Exhibition of Achievements of National Economy) park area looked like it would be pretty cool. A few Russians said that that's a place that the locals go to hang out. They were busy putting up Christmas decorations.

### Metro Tour

The metro tour was so fascinating that I'm going to separate it out into [a separate post](https://erikras.com/2018/12/07/russia-2018-moscow-metro-tour/).

After we left our metro tour, we decided to go to the restaurant next to our hotel for dinner. When we walked inside, the incredibly friendly (sarcasm) woman said, "Group?", to which we said, "Table for two?" She said, "No!" and pointed to the door. We asked the man standing outside the door with four coats on, presumably to open the door for clients, where the nearest restaurant was, and he pointed in one direction (away from the hotel), but when we walked 50 meters in that direction, it became obvious that he had screwed us and that we would have to cross a 6 lane highway and a river to get to any businesses. Thanks, random Russian!

We looked in Google Maps and found a place that claimed to serve Armenian and Georgian food. Even with Google Maps, the place was really hard to find, having to wind our way through several labyrinth like passageways in the middle of a block. Despite being 400 meters from the Kremlin, there's no way your average tourist finds this place. When we approached the door, we saw that the place was empty, so, in a moment of doubt, we read some of the online reviews. They were all quite positive, so we decided to give it a shot. Marga ordered the "Meat Prepared Caucasian Style", which could be anything to us, and I ordered the "Boiled Goat With Herbs". Both were amazing.

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  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-07-russia-2018-part-3-of-6/45476991044_14835e3f08_z.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 3"/>
</a>

I got my goat.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-07-russia-2018-part-3-of-6/32329003358_3f64d5b251_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 3">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-07-russia-2018-part-3-of-6/32329003358_a681ee9553_z.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 3"/>
</a>

Caucasian style meat. Great sweater to visit the Cosmonaut Museum, eh?

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-07-russia-2018-part-3-of-6/32329003038_5997309e85_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 3">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-07-russia-2018-part-3-of-6/32329003038_ef6e0c3c9b_z.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 3"/>
</a>

The place was called [Dolmama](http://www.dolmama.ru). It was the restaurant we returned to for our final meal in Russia the following Saturday.

Then it was almost midnight and time to head to the hotel for a nice toasty night's sleep. They keep our hotel room at about 25º C (77º F).


Russia 2018 - Part 3 of 6


<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46137046192_cd8d0948dc_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image post-thumb" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46137046192_f2a9443df6_t.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

The breakfast buffet at our hotel left much to be desired, but over the course of the week we learned what we liked. For the morning of our second day, we decided to tour the Kremlin itself. At the tourism office, the people selling tickets to get into the Kremlin, and the audioguide gadgets that you wear around your neck, were _astonishingly_ unhelpful. Almost no one spoke English. The sign said that the Kremlin Cathedrals (there are a bunch of churches inside the Kremlin's walls) tour with audioguide was 250 RUB. When we requested tickets from the lady behind the glass, she said, 1000 RUB! We said, "No, the 250 RUB one," but she assured us that the price was 500 RUB each. No matter how much "But it says _right there_!" arguing could assuage her, and eventually she told us to go talk to some other people at the "Help Desk". They spoke slightly more English and told us that it was 500 RUB each, _plus_ another 200 RUB for the audio guide. Rather than continue to argue over quantities under $5, we went back to the super unhelpful ticket lady and forked over 1400 RUB for the entry and two audioguides.  <a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/32315675378_719244162b_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/32315675378_4ac2fc6f79_z.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

After going through some pretty exhaustive security, we were finally entering the Kremlin!

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46137057872_56646b337a_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46137057872_ebfe4b0399.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

[The Tsar Cannon](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsar_Cannon) is literally the largest cannon\* in the world, created in 1586. It's mainly decorative as a Russian phallus.

\*Artillery nerds, yes, it's really technically a mortar.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/32315675338_f077d756cd_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/32315675338_91217d8a89_z.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

The other impressive feat of bronze casting is the [Tsar Bell](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsar_Bell), which is 6.6 meters (22 feet) in diameter. It has never been rung. #facepalm It was really interesting for us, because [_just the week before_](https://erikras.com/2018/11/18/that-rings-a-bell/), we had learned a ton about bell casting.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46137053132_1e03000ca3_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46137053132_953a2fee95_z.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

Also, Marga broke it.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/32315675028_33305e64c1_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/32315675028_fe4eb9a85d.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

The Russian churches were very impressive, and not at all like the cross-shaped Catholic Cathedrals across the rest of Europe. Almost every single surface of the walls were painted ornately with scenes from scripture. The audioguide was very hard to follow because it would say things like, "Okay, now face the southern wall of the church," and I think some of the things have moved around since it was recorded. We were puzzled as to just what a church service would be like, as there were no pews and not much in the way of an altar from which an elder could speak to the gathered masses.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/32315674918_b6213a9627_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/32315674918_de88961057_z.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

This was one of the only photos I took inside the churches, of an ornate tapestry. The [double headed eagle](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double-headed_eagle) is a common symbol around Russia.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46137052352_2c9b0949ac_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46137052352_8959a7bc6b_z.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

One tour guide told us that the words for "Christ" and "gold" are very similar in Russian, and somehow the metal got conflated with being holy, as such, many of the churches' onion-shaped domes are actually plated with real gold.

We ended up not finishing the audio tour, as there's only so much history about Tsars commissioning artwork that one can stand. We wandered the Kremlin grounds as much as we felt comfortable doing.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/32315674578_a960fbd98d_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/32315674578_d87baf798a_z.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

There was a cop with a long stick that was very adamant that we stay on this crosswalk.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46137056962_e1d907f32a_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46137056962_ef2bd9916a.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

We found the official Kremlin helipad.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/32315677038_0a44cfe8d0_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/32315677038_b4911635b9.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

There was a beautiful little park.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46137051722_6d577d5fcc_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46137051722_8e17c1769e_z.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

Back outside the Kremlin walls, it was time to start looking for some lunch. We remembered a nice looking place inside Zaryadye Park [the day before](https://erikras.com/2018/12/05/russia-2018-part-1-of-6/), so we walked there.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/32315674278_a97b1645cf_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/32315674278_0d1f74881f.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

One more Red Square selfie... The place is just so photogenic!

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46137055172_d57e1376e7_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46137055172_aa10482346.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

Artsy!

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/32315676058_26f7fb8d9b_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/32315676058_1a1dce9b66.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

The [Zaryadye Gastronomic Сenter](http://zaryadyegastrocenter.ru/en) was pretty impressive. I had a salad with lamb tongue.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/32315673848_3f320d4124_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/32315673848_808d066013_z.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

This beer name cracked me up. It's amusing to see the results of non-Americans brainstorming the most American thing they can come up with.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46137049572_ae665d2d8a_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46137049572_c14d3ed49e_z.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

After lunch, I ordered a Polugar, a "breadwine". To quote [a website](https://www.liquor.com/brands/polugar/) about it: "In terms of its taste, Polugar is unlike any alcoholic drink available today. Everyone who has tried it raves about its natural bread taste and aroma and is unable to compare it with any other known alcoholic drink. Polugar is not like modern vodka. It is something different, a more ancient type of alcohol, which has stayed true to its ancestors." My hot take on polugar is that I'm glad I tried it and don't really need to try it again; it was similar to vodka or moonshine.

By the time we left the Gastronomic Center, it was snowing...hard. So we went back out onto the bridge over the river.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/32315675708_2a0a1be12c_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/32315675708_e8b2ae7fdd.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

It was pretty slippery.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46137048612_5163723579_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46137048612_302463ffa2.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

One salient feature of the Moscow skyline is the [Seven Sisters](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_Sisters_(Moscow)), seven similar buildings commissioned by Stalin to celebrate the Russian victory in World War 2. That's one of them behind us.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/45275183945_6a64dea28b_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/45275183945_2269a138a9.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

Snowy Moscow

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46137047482_e5f56d3dd2_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46137047482_a2fc9871f9.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

We ducked into a shop to get warm. It was full of Russian souvenirs. Were we the kind of people that collect such paraphernalia, I definitely would have bought one of these Christmas ornaments.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46137046192_cd8d0948dc_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46137046192_f2a9443df6_z.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

Now _this_ is the Moscow I expected!

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/45275182325_d9fbf2dd2f_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/45275182325_b4865f2296.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

So I saw these people walking by and took this photo. They saw me and asked if we'd like to have our photo taken with them. We said, "Sure!"

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/45275181055_e523c57fc3_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/45275181055_97730a148c_z.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

Looking good. That's the lights of the GUM blowing out the background.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46187678901_106aabaecb_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/46187678901_b240feee0e_z.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

They suggested we pose this way.

After I got my camera back, they said, "Okay, that'll be 4,000 rubles ($59 USD), please." If they had asked for five bucks I probably would've said sure, but the fact that they asked for so much was positively offensive, and we refused. They called us some names in Russian as we walked away. Screw you guys.

Next on our list of things to see was the [Russian State Library](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_State_Library), or Lenin's Library. We noticed that everyone was scanning a membership card to get in, so we asked if we could get a visitor's pass. The woman gestured with her arm to direct us to another door, so we went back outside and into the next door. The man there gestured us towards yet another door. The guard behind that door told us to go back to the first door. Just when we were about to give up on the whole endeavor, I spotted the word "visitors" on door in the first lobby, and we were granted passes.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/44370346550_4c0f42215b_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/44370346550_5fc07434fc.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

To be honest, it was "just a library". I'd recommend skipping it if you are reading this for tourism tips.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/44370346170_82bcee9fcd_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 2">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-06-russia-2018-part-2-of-6/44370346170_5961138e87.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 2"/>
</a>

It is nice to see so many books and also so many people all being quiet together.

After leaving the library, it was time to look for a place to have dinner. The word "рестора́н" is an important one to learn if you're visiting Russia. If you translate the letters to the Latin alphabet, you get "restoran", which I'm sure you can figure out.

This night we chose the worst restaurant of our entire trip, a place that was trying to be extremely hip and cool, but failing. It was very dark, and we could only see by the flickering candle on our table. Marga ordered the lamb-burger, and I can't even recall what I had. The most interesting part of the evening was the drama that played out right outside the window we were sitting next to.

A couple pulled up in a black Bentley [New Continental GT](https://www.bentleymotors.com/en/models/new-continental/new-continental-gt.html), which starts at $200,000. The woman got out and came into the restaurant and sat near us. The man stayed in the car for a while, on the phone. He then came in, but left shortly there after and walked down the street and sat in the passenger seat of another expensive car for a few minutes. He then got out and came back into the restaurant. Another woman joined them. He then left again to go sit alone in his Bentley. Then another man came up and got into the passenger seat for a few minutes. He returned to the restaurant. Shortly after that, the first woman sort of left in a huff and got into the driver's side of the Bentley. The other woman went out and sat with her in the passenger side for a while. Then the man went out and tried to talk to her, but she refused, making his stand out in the cold for about ten minutes. Eventually everything worked out and they all came back into the restaurant. They are clearly Russian mafia drug lords.

Straight back to the hotel and to bed. The next day we were going to Space!


Russia 2018 - Part 2 of 6


<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-05-russia-2018-part-1-of-6/45274464225_8f40846883_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image post-thumb" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 1">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-05-russia-2018-part-1-of-6/45274464225_890eb9f77a_t.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 1"/>
</a>

What better time to visit Moscow than late November? My wife and I left the kids at home with her parents and set off to explore the city of Tzars. To prepare, I read plenty of listicles about "7 things you should know before visiting Russia for the first time", and about a week before our trip, I started a Russian course on the Duolingo app. I'd never been to a place with a whole different alphabet before, so it was a little daunting to feel so illiterate. An American friend in Spain who studies Russian as a hobby gave me some pointers on deciphering the Cyrillic alphabet. All that higher level math I took in college that was never really useful for anything actually came in handy in my ability to recognize some of the Greek letters that Cyrillic has appropriated. We booked a fairly cheap hotel that was literally 500 meters from the Kremlin.  On our first day in Russia, we decided to just walk around and get to know the place. This is our favorite form of tourism. It really was too freaking cool to be in The Actual Red Square with the iconic Actual St. Basil's Cathedral. We were in the square that so many tanks have crossed and in which so much history has taken place.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-05-russia-2018-part-1-of-6/46186941311_edf9ff942d_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 1">
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</a>

The iconic St. Basil's Cathedral

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-05-russia-2018-part-1-of-6/45274464715_c4845f65c4_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Moscow 2018 - Day 1">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2018-12-05-russia-2018-part-1-of-6/45274464715_6b35dc9fd0_z.jpg" alt="Moscow 2018 - Day 1"/>
</a>

The clock tower of the Kremlin. The clock has a diameter of over 6 meters (20 feet).

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Several times during our trip we saw some manner of soldiers or cops marching about in formation, and many official looking armored vehicles.

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Red Square. The whole week we were there, they were installing an ice skating rink and Christmas village in the middle of Red Square. It finally opened just before we left.

From the Red Square, we went to [Zaryadye Park](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zaryadye_Park), a brand new park that opened just last year, designed to celebrate Russian's different climactic zones: Tundra, Forest, Steppe, and Floodplains. Remember learning those in 4th grade, along with the word "isthmus"? Different parts of the park have plants from the different climates.

The park also includes a literal "bridge to nowhere" that takes you out over the Moscow River.

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Hovering over the river, with the Kremlin and St. Basil's behind me. I doffed my hat for many of the photos, but it was never off for more than 20 seconds, as it was _way_ too cold to have an uncovered noggin.

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Pushkin Square, with a statue of the famous Russian poet.

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The famous [Bolshoi Theatre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bolshoi_Theatre).

After tiring a bit of the tourist traffic, we took a turn away from the center, and ended up in an area where local business-folk were on their lunch break. We discovered very charming restaurant called [Vysota 5642](http://5642-vysota.ru). We noticed that a lot of restaurants boasted about where the food they were serving came from originally; there was a lot of Georgian food.

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It was a hip and happening place. The word Vysota, or Высота, means "height" or "altitude". The name refers to the height of [Mt. Elbrus](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount_Elbrus), the tallest mountain in Europe, in the Caucasus Mountains.

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[_Khachapuri_](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khachapuri) Stuffed with Spinach is a cheesy hybrid of quiche and pizza from Georgia. It was just as delicious as it looks.

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To quote a website I found when trying to decipher the menu: “Dushbara is a favorite and popular Azerbaijani dish that is meat filled dumplings cooked in a lamb broth. According to tradition every Azerbaijani woman not only needs to know to make this dish, she also must be able to make the dushbara as small as possible, to fit ten of them in a tablespoon.” The Russians _really_ love their dumplings!

After lunch, we continued walking around some non-touristy areas before seeking shelter in [The GUM](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GUM_(department_store)) (pronounced "goom"), or ГУМ, a huge shopping mall right on Red Square. It contains every luxury brand of clothes or perfume you can name. It was fully decked out for Christmas, with each brand decorating individual Christmas trees that lined the halls.

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Three stories of Christmas consumerism!

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So nice to get warm!

The coolest place in the GUM is the "grocery" store, full of astounding luxury products. I was often reminded of Harrod's.

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So many delicious liquids!

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This upright bass wine rack was cool.

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This 250 grams of Beluga caviar could be yours for the low, low price of $1,317 USD.

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Something about these "Garry Potter" books made me smile and take a photo.

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At the end of the day, we were exhausted. But our journey had only just begun...


Russia 2018 - Part 1 of 6


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On my flight today from Moscow to Amsterdam I was assigned the middle seat. Ugh. When I arrived to my row, the guy on the aisle, in his late forties, was having an animated conversation with the women in the window seat, in her mid-twenties. He was French, and she was Dutch, and they were talking in English about The Netherlands, although he conflated Denmark and Holland a few times as if he didn't really know what he was talking about. I plopped down between them, and I could immediately smell the alcohol on his breath. I was under the impression that someone sitting in the middle was clear social code for ceasing a conversation, but he continued to lean forward and talk over me for several minutes. I donned my noise canceling headphones, the international language for 🙉, and fired up my pre-downloaded Season 2 of [Patriot](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriot_(TV_series)), which I cannot recommend highly enough.  Once the fasten-seatbelt sign was turned off, I looked around and saw that, on the same row, right across the aisle, there was an empty seat right next to my beloved wife, who also got stuck with the middle seat. I was uncomfortable in my position between these two people on several levels, so I nudged my inebriated French companion and requested an exit. I took all my stuff, and, as I was leaving, I noticed the open duty-free bag full of booze minibottles at his feet. He was understandably confused when I continued right on past the aisle and plopped down in the aisle seat, but figured it out when I got a little caress from the gal I just sat next to. As if to cover my discovery of his stash, he asked if I'd like some wine, despite not having any recepticle in which to pour some (chug from the mini bottle?); I declined.

My two ex-elbow-mates were quiet for a while, but when the sorry excuse for an in-flight meal was delivered, he poured himself some white wine and they started chatting. The conversation was entirely mutual. They were both equally engaged with one another. This was all from body language, as I had on my headphones and was not eavesdropping in the slightest.

After the meal had been cleared, another lull occurred. It _was_ a three hour flight! During the last 30 minutes of the flight, things got seriously creepy. From what I could tell, he used some sort of, "I'm scared of flying/landings; will you hold my hand?" line, but rather than waiting for a response, he just reached over – remember, there's my old empty seat between them – and grabbed her hand. She laughed and held it for a few moments, but eventually released his hand. He said a few more things and grabbed her hand again. This time using a free finger to stroke her arm, a very intimate gesture, in my opinion. This happened roughly _twenty_ times, I swear, each time her arms getting closer to her body such that I'd be amazed that there wasn't a little breast rub at some point. Then she decided to close her eyes, pretend to sleep and ignore him. At this point, he crossed a serious intimacy line, and _reached over to brush some hair away from her face_.

By this point, I'd told my wife what was going on, and she was observing, and pulled me back when raised an arm in an unconscious "look at this asshole" gesture that was going to lead to tapping him on the shoulder. At one point he uttered the vomit-inducing line of, "With your blue eyes and blond hair, you're very beautiful....just like my daughter." Ugh! Someone elect this man president!

He did the hair thing a few more times, and they were not touching during landing. When everyone got up to leave, she did the clever thing and stayed behind for a moment while the local rows cleared, thus not giving him a choice but to leave well ahead of her. My wife and I kept an eye on both of them on the bus to the terminal, and then in the terminal, ready to step in between them if he made any further attempts. I almost spoke to her to console her on her hellish flight and ask if she wanted any help, but chose not to; at no point did either of them know we were witnessing their interaction. Only when we saw with our own eyes that he went towards Connections, and she went towards Baggage Claim / Exit, did we relax at her escape.

We commented to each other that, with his lack of respect for a woman's consent, he most _definitely_ has raped someone and probably will again.

## What to do?

The entire episode has made me think about what someone observing such harassment should do. No doubt there are studies on this, but I don't know of them. What follows is entirely thought experiments run in my white male privilege thought lab.

#### Nothing, until she makes a clear declaration of anti-consent

This is ultimately what we did. If she had ever said, "Please stop touching me!", I was there ready to enforce it. But her giggles and smiles, meant to avoid confrontation, were not a solid "No". From what I have read about this topic, this is a serious problem, where the victim wants to avoid an angry confrontation and sort of plays along, many times (though not in this context) leading to unwanted sex just to avoid conflict.

#### Taste of your own medicine

What I _really_ wanted to do was to grab his hand, as he had hers, with the same line. And then maybe rub his arm. One of the most cuttingly _true_ internet memes I've seen on this topic is, "It turns out that men have a really solid understanding of what 'consent' means if a gay man grabs them." In this thought scenario, I retort, "I was just doing what you were doing to her!" and the airplane erupts in applause.

#### Request consent

I could also specifically ask her. "Excuse me, do you actually want him to be touching you?" When she says no, then the social pressure of another dude watching would be enough to stop him. But this is also going to initiate the confrontation that she is trying to avoid. It might anger him enough to further act once in the terminal, whereas the giggling non-reciprocation avoids that.

#### Tell him to stop

What if I tapped him on the shoulder and said, "Leave her alone, man." I guarantee you that he thinks she's into this, and this would result in the previous scenario where he delivers her an ultimatum, "You like this, don't you?" This seems even worse.

## Conclusion

I welcome anyone, especially those of you who are ovarily-enabled, to provide advice on this topic. After rolling it around in my white male noggin for a few hours since, I think my route of avoiding escalation, but being ready for it, was probably the best course of action, even if she did have to endure his unwanted creepy French hands on her. All thoughts welcome...

Update: After thinking about this some more, I think my best course of action would've been to engage him in a conversation, to capture his attention away from her. My discomfort in talking to a slimeball would've been much less than hers being touched by him.


7 posts from December, 2018