I Like Chinese

Just like the Huns of so long ago, busting through the great wall and running amok in the lands of the Han seemed like the logical next step from Mongolia. Busting through the great wall these days only requires an overnight train, but not still without some protective measures against those crazy northern nomads; when the train gets to the border the tracks are different size between Mongolia and China, which means a complete change of the train wheels is in order. This is done by lifting the entire damn train in the air while they swap the wheels! It’s pretty epic and even more exciting when they ram the train carriages back together afterwards at 30km an hour… *feint boom* .... *louder boom* .... *REALLY LOUD BOOM* coupled with luggage all over the ground.

Ultimately though what is more difficult than busting through the great wall is busting through the great FIREWALL of China which only allows websites the government can control. It blocks many useful things, but most critically this digital prophylactic does not allow the hallowed Vegemite Ambassador Blog to be accessed (along with other serious threats to national security such as Facebook). It is therefore with some subterfuge I fight to bring you this blog, it’s still made in China (isn’t everything?), but it’s successfully bypassed the great firewall in a manner that would make Genghis proud.

The first thing you notice upon stepping through the wardrobe into China is the sheer quantity of people. One and a half billion people yields a crowd at every public space that rock concerts would envy. The very moment you are thrown off the train you plunge into the social rapids, in which you are carried on a voracious current through a vast, noisy, 5ft deep ocean as far as the eye can see, being spun and surged to and fro until you can clamber to the safety of a small section of the shore.

The next sensation that hits you is an overwhelming fear for your personal hygiene whilst amongst the masses. I estimate that if you take a crowd of twenty Chinese folk, one of them will be hocking up and spitting on the ground as if they are exorcising some phlegm demon at any given time. That means in China right now I estimate there are probably over half a million people spitting on the ground as you read these. That’s over 20,000 litres of spit and an uncomfortable statistic to calculate. Add to this that the vast majority of Chinese babies don’t come equipped with diapers/nappies. Instead they just have pants with no crotch so the baby can just let it all out over the sidewalk whenever or wherever. It’s possibly the most eye opening thing you will ever see in your life coming from the west. That and the spit.

The next sensation is the lack of foreigners here, even in Beijing. Ok, there are a few foreigners, but there are just so many locals that it is extremely rare to see others of the tourist ilk, so much so that as a white westerner you are repeatedly stopped by people who want to have their photo taken with you. Even if they don’t ask, they take photos of you anyway, sometimes brazenly, sometimes in a pathetically and embarrassingly clandestine manner. I usually get a photo too, making for quite a collection so far of random Chinese people.

Even when you are not caught in a Chinese person’s sights, you will be certainly captured on the governments. China has the largest standing army in the world, and when they say “standing” they mean it; they are on every corner and at every building. If the guards staring at you isn’t uncomfortable enough, big brother is near … they have the world’s biggest collection of CCTV cameras, each acts as an eye of Sauron; looking for “free Tibet” shirts in range and automatically deploying a myriad of police in kitted out golf buggies and Segways. I can almost imagine at some point they may have considered making the eyes in portraits of Chairmen Mao follow you too like a clichéd horror house, becoming red at a glimpse of dissent.

Shop attendants also watch you like a hawk. In their normal state they are asleep in their own arms or on their products, but via some sort of extra sensory organ, they will detect a passing tourist instantly and arise from their post like a selling juggernaut. They will proceed to describe as many of their strategically un-price tagged products to you as they can in fifteen seconds followed by a peppering of “hello” as you are walking away; as if the only reason you could be turning down their epic sales pitch is because you are deaf. One woman standing over a hundred metres away picked up a megaphone and yelled “HELLO, WATER!". It’s never too late to make a sale.

China is designed for one and a half billion little people too, not 6ft giants. This means each day is a constant challenge; you don’t fit on a single bus seat, you’re too tall to stand in the aisle, you’re too long for a bed, you’re knees are angled too high to fit under a table, your head is on par with door frames, your feet are too big to buy shoes, your hands are too large for a cup, your skull is too wide for a hat … basically, your something is too much for everything. Tall folk must become very adept at rolling / folding / tucking / squeezing and exhaling.

Tall folk are not the only ones contorting bodies here though; every morning, every person seemingly gets out of bed and stumbles to the nearest piece of grass (regardless of how much concrete surrounds it) and starts stretching, patting, shaking, jiggling and rolling their bodies in every which way as a start to the day. It’s quite funny to watch the weird and wonderful ways people prepare their bodies for the long day ahead of waiting in queues.

Actually I take that back, nobody waits in queues here. People just swarm around the point in question and then do whatever it takes to be next in line, even if that means standing on top of small children, the elderly or a corpse of someone who was in the queue some weeks ago and died there. It’s of such intensity, and so foreign, that you just stand there in disbelief and laugh while being jostled about in the flurry of people and miasma of body odour. 

Speaking of odours, China is full of them. It’s a constant olfactory onslaught of people, undefinable food, stagnant water, petrochemicals, smoke, humidity and backpackers … hmm, no wait, that’s me.

All this craziness aside, it's easy to like like Chinese! Those who speak some English have been so excited and happy to talk, so keen to learn about the west and teach about their own lives and so willing to walk hopelessly lost travelers around the streets.. It’s been an honour and a real stroke of luck to be able to share time with them

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But that’s all for now, it’s time for you to build up visual and gastrointestinal strength for the next post where you can enjoy some stories of the food (and many other weird things).

KHAAAAN (s) !

So, what might lie beyond Russia for the intrepid Vegemite Ambassador I hear you ask? Well, ponder no more astute reader, saddles were packed and it was all aboard the Trans-Siberian express to Mongolia for the trip of a lifetime. Over five days, over 7000 kilometres and over six time zones, crossing vast tracts of Siberian forest, Ural mountains and Mongolian steppes aboard a rickety old Soviet train that delivered enough locomotive excitement to ensure all accompanying five nights are devoid of sleep.

The Trans-Siberian is a meandering beast, rolling through the deep bowels of Russia and into the endless tundra that made Russian gulags so formidable. Of particular note was passing the magnificent lake Baikal in Irkutsk at the crack of dawn and watching the sun peer through the mist and clouds on the lake and hills around. The hills then eventually give way to the grass and become the wild and rugged borders of Mongolia. As I wrote about this on the train, looking out into this vast nothingness I was overcome with feelings of being VERY far away from home stronger than ever before.

Life on the train is a communal affair; you become sleep deprived comrades in arms with those in your carriage as you all find your way adapting to life on the rails. Social life begins at the mission critical samovar water kettle on the carriage; the font of life for all the packet noodles you invariably bring. Many good friends were made en route to the Samovar as well as the odd boisterous Siberian or Mongolian child who knows that hanging out with foreigners can yield weird and impressive snacks. The social life inevitably escalates with the discovery of the canteen wagon (which is really just a glorified vodka dispenser) and the one litre beer cans that are brought on board en masse at each 30 minute stop. Needless to say, when the trip comes to an end, it is quite sad to say goodbye to your fellow passengers with whom you have forged a strange connection in REM sleep hardship. There is even an admiration and spot in your heart for the formidable, surly train woman for your carriage. 

I should really elaborate a bit more on this train woman … whilst in train employee mode she keeps things in order, ensures the toilets are locked when you need them the most and has an uncanny knack for bursting in and vacuuming your cabin floor when you are naked and getting dressed. However, when the train stops at a station these women throw away their train employee pretense and attempt to sell clothes, toys, curtains, knick knacks, doo-dads, whatever out the train windows to the screaming consumers below that shove up against the train like a concert crowd. Every Siberian passenger on the train does this type of collective selling too, basically converting the great Trans-Siberian Express into the world’s longest moving discount bargain store.

Upon arriving into Ulan Bator and getting those land legs back (it takes a while!) you receive a bright welcome to the Asian side of the continent; taxi drivers yell a lot and people stare at you. A young boy crashed his bike into the back of me and a Buddhist monk blessed me at the traffic lights and then immediately proceeded to throw uncooked rice over me before one last praying gesture. It was to be my first official drive by rice’ing. 

In Mongolia they have a saying, “Every woman is beautiful, every man is drunk and every car is a taxi”. The latter part is especially apt; every car IS a potential taxi, even if it no longer resembles a complete automobile but more a moving hunk of scrap metal guaranteed to convert you to a believer in SOME greater power by the end of the journey. The buses and their Schumacher wannabe drivers (who like to ventilate their stomachs a lot) are even more rousing, offering a journey that will excite and exhilarate in every aspect. This includes the on-board entertainment which either consists of endless cheesy 80’s pop on repeat or a collection of bizarre Mongolian movies containing endless gore and brutality for the ample stunned children aboard.

Ulan Bator is the capital of Mongolia though not really what you would call a stunning city to the eye. But, it does have a kick ass Genghis Khan statue, awesome Mongol warrior pedestrian traffic lights and one of the few Buddhist monasteries that wasn’t trashed by daft communists. In the monastery you can easily experience RPWSI (Repetitive Prayer Wheel Strain Injury) from having to spin several hundred prayer wheels as you walk the all-important clockwise direction around the massive Buddha in the main temple. It’s particularly hard work on your right arm being a Buddhist.

The real heart and soul of Mongolia however lies in the vast open expanses. Fleeing the urban crawl of Ulan Bator for the country side. The opportunity was afforded to stay with a Mongolian family in their Ger, smack bang in the middle of nowhere and surrounded by constantly farting animal herds. No language was shared making for a cultural experiment that will never be forgotten. They were a lovely family and had three little children which were incredibly cute and very interested in the weird foreign types gracing their floor, especially those fancy digital cameras.

A visit like this to a Mongolian family in the country side for a vegan would basically be a death sentence; these people live in an Atkin’s diet heaven. In fact, the five Mongolian “food groups” summarise the cuisine nicely: there is the white group which is the milk food, the yellow group which is the butter and oil food, the red group which is the meat food, the green group which is the grass and herb food and the black group which is the water and alcohol food. This forms the spiritual chain of earth-water-plant-animal-food-human, with particular emphasis on the animal to food step.

At the Ger (and indeed each Ger visited) guests are offered endless platters of cheese, cheese biscuits and ultra-dried cheese, all with a slightly tangible “off” taste. On top of this mountain of cheesy goodness will be some fresh cream and sometimes some yoghurt. You can rinse this lot down with some fresh sheep milk or some very special Mongolian tea; which is warm cow milk with some salt AND (if you’re lucky!) some random bits of meat floating in it. If you are not bloated of dairy food yet you might then get to share some fermented horse milk which is truly one of the great acquired tastes of this Earth. If you want to simulate it you could probably do so by adding some Vodka to some milk and then chuck in some vinegar for good measure.

Meat is next on the agenda and it’s no holds barred in this department. The welcome meal was a hearty boiled sheep brain stew and the next day family slaughtered, skinned and carved a goat. From this the vast majority of the innards were thrown into a huge iron wok of water to form a great big ol’ goat guts stew. As a side dish, and a delicacy reserved for the guest of the house, the kidneys and liver were wrapped in udder fat and flame grilled. Top this off with some intestines filled with blood to make sausages. This is all uncharted territory. It was absolutely a real honour to eat with them this way but the whole process is admittedly overwhelming for the faint of stomach or heart. Particularly as the remaining cuts of meat will be hanging in the Ger next to you, along with the goat head, as a morbid reminder each time you go to sleep of what you’ve eaten.

If that’s not weird enough for you yet, I found a list of other typical Mongolian delicacies fortunately missed out on such as: udder soup, boiled cattle head and shanks, singed off skin salad, jelly of sheep head meat, bone broth, spleen ham, testicle dumplings, elk lip, dish of spinal cord, steamed tongue, jaw meat and scabby mouth soup, retina and nasal cartilage salad, baked oesophagus, fried camel hump and the ever popular hot camel toe which is sure to evoke a different picture in the mind to what would be served. 

Oh and you can’t forget to break the animals bones as you eat them as it releases the soul of the animal. If you can’t break them with your hands then you can smash them after dinner with a hammer or axe as after dinner exercise. Have no fear though, even the bones you can’t break such as the knuckles get cleaned and used as dice in games and as a way to divine the future. Truly no part of the animal goes to waste here.

These folk live in a really spectacular landscape; the Gobi desert and grassy rolling plains dotted with Gers and herds of animals. The air is clear and every sunset / sunrise seems to be more majestic than the last. Life here is hard, but hearty. The people have an incredibly strong dependence on their Gers that the poem below explains better than I could ever hope to do.

Ode to the Ger The finest felt made of wool from a thousand sheep,
lattice walls and poles made of willow branches
like extended bows of a hundred warriors,
when the typhoon blows it does not shake,
when a storm pours it gets even stronger,
when the snow falls the air inside stays warm,
and soft furs are piled up for comfort,
the Khuur musician plays a fine melody,
and the dancers delight next to burning fire,
the smoke of the night raises to the air
and disappears into the dark of the night,
it casts a lonely shadow in the moonlight
and though the kings decorate their palaces with carving,
they’d never equal my truly great and comfortable Ger
in the fresh wind and on the young grass
within the mist prevailing in the land of the north.

The Mongolian herdsman are naturally excellent horse riders and wear elegant, rugged robes of the plains matched with surprisingly random hats. You see, it’s tradition for fellow Mongols to swap hats with each other when they meet – but this has now extended to travellers from other lands, so it’s quite funny to see a herdsman kicking it in a bad-ass fedora, beret or even a sombrero.

Horse riding is also one of the main sports at the Naadam festival, which is the Mongolian Olympic games equivalent. It also includes wrestling, standing archery and horseback archery as well. These are “real men” sports, other crap that involves kicking little balls and the like have no place here.

As much as one might want to learn some Mongolian language to smooth travels, it’s practically impossible for English speakers. I am not too bad at languages and I can’t even pronounce “thanks” and I doubt I ever will be able to either. The ancient Mongolian script is really exquisite though and the calligraphy is very artistic, it doesn’t even look like language.

There have been some excellent introductions to “Engrish” here too. If you are not sure what it is, Engrish is the attempts by east Asian people to write in English without knowing the language. Whilst brave, the results are often quite tragic, in fact I am going to wrap up the blog post with a taste of it. This is from a tourist brochure promoting a musical show …

“The performance will be the unforgettable time. A climax of the dear tourists who are going to visit from around the world in order to introduce with richer Mongolian history and nadition. You will see the following perform by us:

- Horse head fiddle that seems the wide territory for you
- The contortion that moves creamy just like a motivation without articulation
- Tsama that shows and means to remove the trouble of people moreover to soothe the nymph for all people

These all interested performances are for tourists on our side so we hope that you will pass one night with us when you were seeing the cultural gascinating performances, unforgettable lots of things, when you were introducing with some of the clothes, living hood and tradition of some ethnics.”

They had me at "the unforgettable time".

From Russia With Love

Welcome comrade, to the big, red blog post freshly harvested from the fertile lands of Russia! The former epicentre of the USSR and cliched provider of countless James Bond villains, Russia provides so much interesting material for me to write on that I had initially considered splitting this blog into two or more posts - but everything here in Russia is big, overwhelming and difficult to manage, so I one massively long blog post is more appropriate.

So, get ready for a concrete fist full of Russian blog to the face!

One has to be mentally prepared to come to Russia. It's quite intense and the first few hours were a great appetiser. The Russian website for the bus said the bus stopped at a different location than it actually does. When trying to confirm where the bus actually stopped, the bus driver informed we were at "X" but we he was completely wrong too. It wasn't until after walking two super sized Russian city blocks that complete confusion set in. The solution was to haul ass for another hour and a half across St Petersburg in sweltering heat to the hostel. Upon arriving at the hostel there was no street sign at all so it remained hidden. After several flirting visits to cafes that falsely claimed they had wifi, the internet was finally untapped and the "secret entrance" to the hostel became known. Upon arrival, the hostel offered a cheerful greeting of "You are late. Here is your bed.". Such charm is wonderful to hear as you stand there dripping with sweat, 20 kg on your back and having just climbed 5 flights of steps because the elevator is "temporarily" broken.

The next day, the water broke at the hostel, which meant no shower or toilets. In fact each day something seemed to be broken or unavailable, as if the hostel could only ever manage 80% functionality at any given time. This is actually somewhat symbolic of a lot of Russian infrastructure; they built so much of it that I guess the thought of ongoing maintenance was brushed to the side, leaving an illusion of function at the surface masking borderline chaos just underneath the surface. The people that live here have adjusted to this, complaining is pointless and not in the national psyche, so things just keep on trucking in a semi-delapidated state. Just like the clock with no hands at the main train station; once you are in Russia, you don't tell the time, time tells you.

What may be at times absent in quality here is certainly made up for in quantity; everything is big ... really REALLY big, especially in Moscow. The former Soviet leaders definitely win awards for ambitiousness in their building projects and in most cases they succeeded in delivering the goods in what would have been some of the most monumental building efforts since the pyramids of Giza. I really can't impress enough on you the scale of everything here, it's very intimidating and extreme.

The weather also has been extreme too, almost 37 degrees and swimmingly humid the day we arrived and overcast, windy and 15 degrees on the day we left. The weather forecast only told half truths so you are constantly short of either sunglasses or umbrellas or jackets each day. You see, in Russia you don't predict the weather, weather predicts you.

Once you get used to what is dubbed "Russian extreme", you can start to tap what is special about Russia. Firstly, it's home to vividly colouful churches - adorned with countless frescos and iconostases inside. They're normally topped with onion like domes in solid gold or twirling tiled patterns. Despite their enormous size however they can be quite cramped and narrow inside, especially those that use a quite unique "pillar-less" structure; this has the bonus advantage of being very cosy during those nasty winters.

The Red Square, Kremlin and St Basil's church are the most obvious landmarks that people will recognise, all situated in the imposing beast that is Moscow, Moscow, queen of the mother land, built like a rock to stand, proud and divine. After you do that song a few times and calm down, you can then go and visit Lenin's mausoleum where you can see the mastermind of communism and the USSR lying there sedately in a nice three piece suit and a polka dot tie. He's absent a brain though as Stalin had that removed and placed in a jar so he could study 'the perfect communist mind'.

The Hermitage is another must see too, a massive museum similar to the Louvre; it's basically impossible to see it all in one day, so you have to pick what interests you most and focus fire on it. It houses an incredible array of priceless artifacts that, like all good museums, has been pilfered from around the world in what can only be described as legal theft.

Certainly one really cool and quirky thing about Russia is the ramshackle beer stations where you can take a plastic bottle in and get it filled up with the beer of your choice for an absolute pittance. In addition you can pick up a varied range (arguably too much so) of salted, smelly fish to have with your bottle 'o beer. The whole re-bottling thing is certainly something we'd never seen before and remarkably good for the environment (something that is quite rare here!).

Foodwise, you can enjoy typical Russian cuisine in any number of far too brightly lit cantinas playing endless elevator music. Some interesting eats were Borsch, a red beetroot soup delicacy we enjoyed many times over (judging by the stains on our clothes), Ochakovo (a very 'special' bread beer) and Cherburecki (fried dough) - the latter being representative of the overall healthiness of Russian cuisine and the havoc it wreaks on your digestive tract and arteries. You see, in Russia you don't explore every bit of food, food explores every bit of you.

Interesingly though, one of the biggest attractions in Russian cities is the Metro! You would not believe how stunningly elegant and majestic their train network is; some stations look like they have been built by Italian masters! Though again the beautiful facade only masks a raw level of function. The trains accelerate and deccelerate like a slingshot and are about as quiet as a jet engine in a sewer. It's also awkward to navigate the metro network when the stations have little in the way of station names on the platforms, which means you just have to count how many stops you have to go since you can't hear the announcements. This means no one can really socialise because a) it is too loud and b) you might lose count of how many stops you have left.

Amusingly, the ticket barriers to metro stations are not blocking your entry waiting to open upon insertion of a valid ticket, they are open, waiting, watching, ready to crush you to death should you attempt to pass through with no ticket or an invalid ticket. We were told to walk through confidently, the gates can smell fear ... and gypsies. You see, in Russia you don't just catch the metro, sometimes the metro catches you too.

It takes a rough and resilient type of person to survive life in Russia and the Russian people are just that. Because of this Russian people can be a little like hermit crabs; initially suspicious of you (they don't get THAT many outsiders) but once they come out of their shells they are fantastic fun to be around, deeply passionate and rightfully proud and knowledgeable of their country's undeniably significant contribution to the world. They know they live in a slightly crazy place, but they wouldn't have it any other way. You can leave your smile at the door though; smiling for no reason appears to be some form of weakness or stupidity. This means the daily commute can be quite depressing with all those long faces. 

Russians are also religious people (religion was banned for a long time so now it's back with a vengeance and people are making up for lost prayer time). They are also quite superstitious. Nearby the Red square is a small golden tile that marks the "centre of Russia" from which all distances Russian are measured. Here you can throw a coin over you shoulder on the ground and make a wish, at a higher level I wonder whether the wish coming to fruition is impacted in any way by the homeless people all crowded around the person waiting to get the coin as soon as it hits the ground. Similarly there is also a small cave nearby where you can wedge a coin in the rocks and make a wish; if no one finds your coin then your wish comes true. Naturally the homeless also come here in droves armed with wire, chisels and magnets; ready to extract every last ounce of precious metal out of the rock face. It's quite a sorry state of affairs, the people should really cut the chase and just give the money to the homeless outright and make a wish based on the fact they've just shouted a homeless person a beer.

Since the change to a free market economy, people spend big here. In fact while public infrastructure generally wears away, private wealth seems to be flaunted at exaggerated levels everywhere you turn. Many younger women in particlar are nothing but man-hunters, with no real goal in life other than to totter about in ridiculously expensive outfits hoping they'll catch themselves a millionaire. These women always seem to have a very hopeful or temporary boyfriend with them that has no money to buy anything decent for himself except a massively expensive camera to take endless modeling photos of the female at every pole/tree/bridge/flower. There is a saying for young Russian women looking for modern love, "better to cry in a Lexis, than on a bus". You see, in Russia, you don't go and change money, money changes you.

If the young women and their spritely embrace of capitalism don't scare you, the middle age Russian women will. They have no tolerance for anyone or anything and will constantly try to jump queues, ram your tray along at a bistro, knock you out of the train, reach over you for food, close doors on you or generally not give a shit about anyone but themselves in any situation. Somewhat frustratingly they have managed to usurp all key positions you need as a tourist too such as at train ticket booths, convenience stores, entrance fee windows for sightseeing and information desks. This means the level of service you get approaches zero in most instances; they need to deal with you abruptly so they can get back to relaxing.

If you don't take the metro then you'll be forced to cross gargantuan eight lane streets (most people call these motorways) filled with Lada's, the old school Soviet 'car of the people'. Many of these cars have now landed in the hands of young men and have of course had obligatory but ludicrously big spoilers and stereos stapled onto them. These deathtraps bounce around at breakneck velocity well beyond the road and traffic conditions. I am not convinced the brakes work in these things at all given how much warning drivers get at red lights to stop; firstly there is a second countdown to when the stopage must commence, then the green light flashes for while, then the orange light is on and then finally the red. If you haven't managed to stop by then, you are pretty much assured of wearing a pedestrian or two. This is why it is safer to cross the road in big packs, one or two people is no problem to mow down for a Lada, but three or more represents a threat and possibly paperwork.

In general, the old communist Soviet ways die hard and are quite apparent as you venture around. There are relics everywhere from this age, from the USA flag toilet paper to the myriad of communist propagnda posters filled with red tractors, impossibly bountiful harvests, muscular proletariat and square jawed peasants brimming with whistful optimism about how amazingly their productive their society is versus the obviously hedonistic and evil west. These posters range from the militant "Work with no fear, your rifle is near.", the unrelenting "Ploughing time doesn't stop at night!" and the comforting "When the party says do it, the good citizen obeys!"

The communist model certainly favoured rapid industrialisation, but the Soviet scientists had a somewhat optimistic view of how fast their science would make breakthroughs. In the 1970's we were supposed to be enjoying all drinking water produced from sea water, automatic translations from one language to another, nuclear propelled transport, men flying around Venus and most importantly the language of dophins finally being decoded.

In the 80's we would witness a permanent base on the moon, control and command of the weather according to economic requirements and new simple forms of life created in laboratories.

The 90's were somewhat sedate with a mere establishment of a permanent base on Mars, but in the 2000's we should have been witness to some really wild stuff like human settlements on some of the planets, artificial brains, radio transmissions on all five senses, landing on Jupiter (a planet made of gas?) and points of contact with other civilisations.

Beyond that things really crank up a notch; we can look forward to flights beyond our solar system, artificial gravity, perfect life artificially produced and the somewhat cryptic "engines become more reasonable than men" .. which I basically interpret as the first steps towards the Terminator movies.

Dual tariff prices are another hangover from the old days of Soviet controlled tourism trips. If you are Russian born citizen you pay X price for something, if you are not you can expect to pay up to 4 or 6 times this amount. You can circumvent through getting locals to buy tickets for you but in general it's pretty hard to avoid paying exorbitant amounts for getting into anything. You see, in Russia you can't take advantage of special prices, prices take special advantage of you.

Queuing for something here is also in a league of its' own. You stand in line constantly having to edge forwards and angle your body in different ways to stop others (usually a middle aged woman) from sneaking in from the side. The best one we saw was a women walking up to and just standing at the window with a few of her cronies behind her, forming another secondary queue. Before you know it the queue has just doubled in front of you. Additionally, old people will sometimes just join the queue randomly behind you on the assumption that it must be worth waiting for if this many people are waiting for it. One friend shared that he stood in line for an ATM/bank machine and an old person joined the queue then asked some minutes later what is was for. When the answer was money, the old man's eyes lit up as he asked further "Oh great! Is there much left?" 

If there is no queue and you expect there to be one, you are now experiencing the most tourist unfriendly queuing system known to the foreign soul. When you enter a waiting room you have to ask around in Russian who the last person in the queue is, then watch that person like a hawk to know when it is your turn. Naturally the way to ask it is so difficult to say that if you try it no one will answer you - this means you can effectively be there for hours and never get to do what you need to. Here you truly get served, just not in the way you want.

Our accommodation in Moscow had a faulty heating system. It could not be stopped, was overwhelming and could not be fine-tuned or controlled. In many ways this heating system summarises Russia perfectly. Russia is not subtle, but in the end you fall in love with the rawness of it, the vibrancy and energy they have for a newfound life after communism. It's rough, ragged but so much fun to sink your teeth into and get to know. 

When you visit here you don't look into Russia, Russia looks into you.

Even stranger pastures now lie ahead a little disappointed that my Cossack dancing wasn't more appreciated. It's fitting to end with some Russian poetry from Mikhail Lermentov that is somewhat reflective of the avid traveller fleeing the embrace of certainty and stability towards the ball of energy that is Russia ...

Open the door of my prison,

let me see the daylight again,

give me a black eyed maiden

and a horse with a jet black mane.

Over the wide blue grassland

let that courser carry me,

and just once, just a little closer,

let me glance at that alien portion -

that life and liberty.