russia: moscow in november

November turned out to be a month of rain and gray skies. Not so fun. That being said, it didn't stop me from getting out and trying to see a bit of the city from time to time.

Throughout the month timing for the mornings worked out that I got to see a number of beautiful sunrises. They got later and later though, rather quickly, much to my dismay.

One Saturday I met up with Claire, in the Arbat area. We started our day with visits to a coffee shop and an American chain donut shop. I'm not going to publicly admit the names of either store, but suffice it to say, this is a very international city.

We took the metro to another area of the city, trying to find a spot called the Alley of Leaders. It was originally opened in 2016, with the busts of 33 historic figures who have ruled Russia since the 9^th century. A couple months ago 7 more busts were added.

Not everyone in this 'alley' is fully supported by the world. Stalin, for example is not universally loved, nor is Lenin. Other famous names include Gorbachev, Brezhnev, and Khrushchev.

We wandered through the small garden, the busts are lined up in two rows. Not surprisingly, we only recognized a few of them by sight. 

For an unknown (to me) reason, one of the busts was just a head, the body part had no clothing. Very strange.

We left the alley and found public transport to get us to our next stop: a museum. We'd made plans to meet up with Shawn and Tania and a couple others to see a temporary exhibit at Garage Museum. The exhibit was of works by Hurakami Takashi. If you don't recognize the name, this is the guy who puts smiley faces everywhere, many many times in a single piece. He is probably most famous for smiling flowers.

Takashi was born in 1962, and is still living. His work has been displayed all over the world, and even though I didn't know his name ahead of time, it sounded like a fun exhibit to see. It was fun, I'm glad we went. We arrived early enough in the day that we didn't have to wait in a queue. By the time our group left, there was quite a queue, both for the ticket booth and then to enter the exhibit.

After leaving the museum, all of us agreed to go together to a Korean restaurant for dinner. Yum. I ordered too much, as I usually do when I get the chance to have good food.

Another day in the middle of the month I decided to go see a house in which Gorky lived for a few years. I was disappointed when I walked in, as I discovered there was a special entry fee for foreigners. There was also a fee for permission to take photos. How annoying. I'm not a human ATM, I live here and earn local money. Argh.

Maxim Gorky was a Russian/Soviet writer and a political activist. He was also nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature five times, not too shabby. His political activism originally had him supporting Lenin, but then he became a Lenin critic. 

Not surprisingly, he was exiled due to these views. He was only allowed and encouraged to return when Lenin died and Stalin came to power. Gorky was born in 1868 and died in 1936.

Throughout the house, the rooms were set up as they might've been when he lived there. I don't think all the furniture was original from when he lived there, but it was all in the same style he would've known.

I liked seeing all the books, and the tables like he might've used. The part I liked best was the staircase, it was just really nice.

On another Saturday I met up with Claire again. She and I had realized we got along quite well, and were both keen to explore Moscow, and much of Russia. Yay for exploring friends!

We met in the Arbat area of the city, then started walking. We walked across the Moscow River, and kept going for quite a while. I think we walked for two or three hours, paying attention to traffic, the architecture of the buildings we could see, and people on the street. Moscow is such a big city, with different atmospheres in different areas. You never know what you might see.

We walked all the way to Park Pobedy, which I think would translate to Victory Park in English.

By the time we arrived we were already losing daylight, so the photo we'd wanted to take with the victory arch wasn't possible. Well, I guess it would've been possible, but the light was terrible at that point.

We crossed the street and gazed up at the Victory Museum and the obelisk standing to honour those who died in wars. They were all lit up, we both liked the way it looked. Eventually we want to go into the museum, but it was cold enough at that point that we just weren't in the mood. 

Does that make sense, even though going inside would've gotten us out of the cold?

The following weekend Claire and I met up again to go back to Izmailovo. Both of us had specific gifts we were looking to buy, and that's a great place to get better prices for souvenirs. I was happy to find a matrioshka frog, perfect for my sister.

Toward the end of the month I fell down stairs at work, majorly spraining my ankle. It wasn't pretty, and hurt a LOT. I barely moved the rest of the day, sitting on a chair with wheels as much as possible. 

I went to a doctor a week later, the doctor yelled at me for having been on my foot at all, ooops. Sigh, just call me Grace.

It was not a great end to the month health wise, but overall still a good month! What will December bring?