Easter Sunday, Moscow Rules

Happy Easter

We were up late last night having gone to dinner at a lovely spot not far from the apartment.  The food and wine were wonderful and we didn’t care about the price since we go out so infrequently.  I was a bit worried about the restaurants being crowded on Easter Saturday evening, but we were almost the only ones in the restaurant, which ensured great service.   We ran into a friend of Cindy’s from work, one of the Russian teachers. She sat with us for awhile and shared stories of Russians and her recent vacation to the Dominican Republic.  She also helped us with some restaurant words and we now know how to order an ice bucket for the wine.

We got up late at about 8:30 and while Cindy ran, I spent twenty minutes on the treadmill.  After coffee and a very light breakfast, we cleaned up, dressed up and headed out for a walk to the Old Arbat so that Cindy could see it for herself.  I somehow had pictured Easter Sunday on the Old Arbat as being like the Easter Day Parade on Fifth Avenue in New York.  I was wrong! You would think that after a hard winter a beautiful Easter Sunday would make Moscow smile, but alas the Muscovites are still somber and sullen.  For the most part the Arbat was filled with young kids looking for love in all the wrong places, skinheads looking for trouble and drinking enough beer to cause their own, a few tourists and lots of “Stans” (from Khazakstan, Uzbekistan, etc.) walking around on their day off.  All of them joyless. Even the parks were filled with empty faces and emptier beer and vodka bottles.  About the only place where you could hear any laughter and see lots of smiles was around the Zoo, which was jam packed with families today.

Unfazed, we walked for several hours enjoying each other’s company, stopping for a coffee and marveling at all the old and ever so beautiful buildings and offices. My but this is grand city if you look in the right spots.  I’m predicting that by Wednesday most of the trees will have some tentative leaves and Moscow will once again start turning green.

With the good weather comes the opening of windows, which is a mixed blessing. While the cool breeze is most welcomed, there is a lot of dust that comes with it since we have had no appreciable rain in weeks.  Cindy had to get out the Swiffer Duster and go around our bedroom, which was coated with fine white dust and dirt.  The open windows also let in lots and lots of the music of the streets.  Our parking area has become the skate board/inline skate hotspot of the neighborhood.  We have lots of Asian families that live in this complex; most of them are from Vietnam and all of them seem to have four kids.  On the weekends and after school now that the weather is fine, they are out in force and at times the noise can be overwhelming and is always annoying.  Punctuate that noise with two or three car alarms and a few ambulances arriving at the clinic next door and you have a cacophony of chaos.

So, as the sun sinks slowly in the west, I’ll chill the Champagne and we’ll toast our first Easter in Russia.  I hope you all have an interesting day – Let me leave you with this Happy Easter rap.  Cindy and Wm.