Russia / Poland 1998

July 25, 1998, Saturday

A nine-hour flight on Scandinavian Air landed me in Copenhagen. After a two-hour layover, a two-hour flight delivered me in Moscow where I went through customs. My vouchers got me a taxi ride into Red Square and a room for the night in the Intourist Hotel on the way into town. I watched with interest the good and the bad of the Russian architecture. The older buildings of brick or stone were pleasing to the eye with their parapets, towers, and statuary. The many storied apartment buildings constructed under the communist regime were ugly grey cement structures that looked like giant egg crates.

My room on the nineteenth floor had an old refrigerator that worked and a very ancient bathroom and fixtures that surprised me because they also worked. The bedding and mattress had seen better days—probably in the days of Catherine the Great.

On the hotel elevator an elderly woman traveling with a group from Florida told me how to get to the famous (or infamous) Red Square, a block from the hotel.

Pedestrians weren’t permitted to cross the busy streets. It was necessary to walk down steps and cross under the street through a tunnel and ascend more steps emerging close to the square. Most of the buildings surrounding the square were of red brick with intricate sculpture surrounding the windows and eaves. The most spectacular structure was a temple with several towers capped with domes, each dome a different design.

The taxi driver couldn’t speak English so I was left to wonder what the buildings were that we passed. The desk clerk was an efficient middle age squarely-build Russian woman who spoke good English with an accent. A German business woman from Hamburg sat next to me on the plane spoke at least three languages—German, Russian, and English. Many of the people dealing with the public must have been bilingual. In the crowded Red Square I heard many languages. People, most of whom carried cameras, came from all over the world to visit this famous landmark.

At the hotel money exchange window the women gave me 210 rubles for $35. 00. That is six rubles to $1.00.