russia: mosow holiday decorations

I think I've mentioned in previous Moscow related posts that GUM, the huge state mall on one side of Red Square changes decorations for various holidays and seasons.

I love visiting the mall to see what the decorations look like, and to figure out what the theme is.

This year the New Year's theme seemed to be space, somehow combined with Christmas.

I saw multiple giant Christmas trees decorated with space ornaments. I saw multiple satellites hanging from the ceiling. I saw multiple stars hanging from the ceilings and balconies.

All the employees in the mall were wearing traditional Russian costumes, I'm not sure how happy they were to be doing so.

The next day was Tuesday, so I decided to make use of my afternoon off.

My first stop was the Museum of Moscow. I'd never heard of it before, so I'm not sure how important it is in the grand scheme of all the Moscow museums.

I walked all the way to the museum, just because I could. There were three buildings making up this museum, it wasn't immediately obvious where I should enter.

When I found an entrance I was presented with the conundrum I hate: multiple ticket options, none of which covers everything. I ended up choosing the option that let me see the history of Moscow exhibit.

Considering Moscow is nearly 1000 years old, I was less than impressed because there was only one floor's worth of items displayed. There was a path to follow through the museum, which made it slightly more convenient.

There were some religious stone carvings. There were some displays of jewelry from I don't know who. There was an old map showing Moscow as a fortified city. There were a few old books, with gold on the edges of the pages.

There was also an extra exhibit, talking about the waters of Moscow.

It started with the 20^th century, and continued through the 22^nd century. Neat to see how someone things the waters of Moscow might be in another 100 years.

After leaving the museum I walked to the House of Photography, free entrance on the day I visited. I didn't know why and hadn't known about that ahead of time, but it was a nice surprise.

Probably because of the free entry, this photography/art gallery was pretty crowded. The architecture of the interior is very modern, and easy to walk through.

As always happens with art, I liked some of the pieces, didn't like others, and had no reaction to some. 

As always happens in a gallery/museum, some people pay attention to the other visitors, others do not.