some things I love about Moscow - headgear heaven

This current bout of seriously cold weather means that both the eccentricity and furriness of headgear has expanded exponentially. I could hat-watch (and coat-watch) all day, especially on the metro, where the sheer density of shuffling crowds brings every kind of person - and thus assemblage of 'fashion' items - into one closely compacted viewing space. London can't even begin to match it....  

10-of-the-best: No. 1 Mayakovskaya Metro Station

I have been putting together a list of the 10 best things to do in Moscow, that aren't in the standard tourist guides.

And I find myself starting with one thing that is ALL the tourist guides, the Metro. The best station must be Mayakovskaya - which has the most breath-taking light/flight/air themed mosaics on the ceiling. It is also the most 'lightweight' in design and looked after well; it has no adverts for example. The glorious part though, which is easy to miss, is the entrance hall to the north exit directly onto Tverskaya.

To find it when you get off the train, take the direction where the escalator goes down. And then rise up into a masterpiece of art and architecture.

finding that metro feeling

dog-in-the-metro

I don't know why the stray dogs seem much more obvious in the winter. Do they take summer hols? Anyway, I have also started to see more of them underground; it is a well known Moscow belief that strays travel this way. The dog pictured here has just left the metro through the main doors, where it was waiting patiently and with much dignity to be let out. (I attempt to take quite a few pictures of these dogs; as with this one they seem not to like it much, and turn away as soon as you point a camera. Well, at least that is what I think it is, it might be me being a bit anxious about getting barked at - which has also happened.)

wearing the ribbon

Tried to take a surreptitious photograph of these young women on the metro - obviously unsuccessfully - because I wanted to show the black and yellow ribbon tied around the handbag of the girl in the middle. This is a georgievskaya lenta, or St George's Ribbon, worn - like the poppy in England - to commemorate bravery during the War, and a lot of people are wearing it, usually in a single, crossed loop.

Lubyanka flowers

Traveled through Lubyanka metro on my way home yesterday. There is a beautiful memorial to the bombing developing there as people pile up flowers, mainly single carnations.

the metro bombs

Am getting emails and texts from around the world about the bomb attacks on the Metro here this morning, which is a weird way to find out about something on my doorstep. I live close to Lubyanka (pictured) where one of the explosions happened. It is where the KGB - now called the FSB - have their headquarters, but who knows if this is connected.

Missed everything because I am towards the end of a big writing project which means hardly leaving my building except to go to work (and I don't work on Mondays). We did wonder why there were so many police around yesterday, but again who knows if that is connected.

Hope my colleagues and friends are okay......

Handy hints for travelers 3: metro again

The metro is confusing for a couple of reasons. First, at interchanges, the stop will have different name for each line - and are often quite a walk apart. The lines are coloured, and this colour (almost always) appears in the signs, telling you which way to go. The second difficulty is that metro stations can often be huge underground warrens, both where different lines connect, and in the many entrance/вход and exit/в’ыход points. Look for the sign that says exit to town/город.

Shown is a typical metro sign, to be seen on most platforms. These are actually really clear. The horizontal top line lists all the stations on the line you are on in order and direction. The vertical 'drop-down menus' beneath each station title give the name(s) of the line and the stations that are linked from it (including, first, the name of the linked station of there is one.)

Simple.

Handy hints for travelers 2: metro

The other thing that everyone said before I got here is that you need to count your stops on the metro, because there are very few signs on the platforms and the announcements may be difficult to understand. What they didn’t say is that at each stop, the announcement tells you what the NEXT stop will be. This is helpful to indicate you are going in the right direction, but certainly confusing for a Londoner where the tube system tells you which stop you have arrived AT.

(Actually, now I ave been back in London for a few days I notice that they also announce the next stop on the tube; something I have clearly never noticed before!)