Russia: Moscow (Ukraina Hotel, Metro)

We finally reached Moscow 2-3hours behind the scheduled time. Apparently we were stuck in a huge traffic jam thruout the night. There is this large convoy of container trucks sharing the roads with us and they were all moving slowly. Being late means we couldn't follow the schedule to stop at the McDonald's along the way for breakfast. So we were all hungry and tired from the overnight drive when we started the guided sightseeing tour of the city.



St Basil's Cathedral built by Ivan the terrible



Red Square

Yes, it's not red. But it is called Red Square cos the Russian word for beautiful can also mean red. The fence and the ever watchful Russian police stop anyone from walking onto the forbidden zone on the Red Square. People are only allowed to step onto the Red Square after a certain time.

The red building in the pic is the Historical museum which showcases Russian history



GUM dept store. The locals refer to it as the "exhibition of prices", joking that no one could actually buy anything on display



Lake outside Novodevichy Monastery where Tchaikovsky reportedly got his inspiration for "swan lake". Notice that some ducks are swimming in the lake while others are walking on the frozen parts.



Newly-weds dancing on Sparrow hill, one of the highest points in Moscow. There were quite a number of newly-weds taking pics here and most of them celebrated the occasion by dancing(russian folk dance style).



Russian wooden dolls. Got myself one that has 10 layers.



After the city sightseeing tour ended, we checked into the Ukraina Hotel (above) which is an awesome 5-star hotel.



Awesome view from my window



The White House containing the Russian govt



Moscow's metro stations are the "underground palaces". The magnificent halls are adorned with sculptures, mosaics, paintings and stained glass panels. But I felt this oppressive and tensed atmosphere bearing down on me. Look at the above pic. There may be many people but imagine that it's totally quiet except footsteps and the loud screeching of trains. No voices, no laughters. Just everyone minding their own business. And everyone looks coldly expressionless.

Anyway one word of caution: Going up the escalator from the train station means that u have exited the train station. When we reached this train station, we wanted to find out exactly what station this was(there were little signs around), so we went up this long escalator to see whether there was a name anywhere... The top of the escalator led out of the station so we had no choice but to pay again to get back into the train station.



Completely quiet in the train except the rumbling of the train & the screeching of brakes.



Cathedral of the Christ the Saviour. Behind it is a huge statue of Alexander II.

This Cathedral has quite an interesting history. Nicholas I originally built a cathedral here for Russian's victory over Napoleon. Stalin demolished it to erect a "Palace of the Soviets" which was to be the tallest building in the world. But the ground was too soft, so the project was abandoned and changed to an outdoor swimming pool. But the vapour from the heated water damaged the paintings in a nearby building so this cathedral was built back up again.



Old Arbat street

This pedestrain-walking Road was where we had a rather cheap(finally!) meal at Marche-style Mu-Mu