Novodevichy Monastery

I visited a neat convent on Wednesday. It is sort of a second Kremlin, because it's where the Tsarina Sofia ruled from when she was in a sort of half-exile. I am probably butchering the history, because to be quite honest, I was only have listening. And I can't be bothered to fact check at the moment. I was pretty distracted by how gorgeous it was there, as you can see in the photos. In that photo album, you can also see the nearby cemetery, where I saw the graves of Boris Yeltsin, Nikita Krushchev, and Anton Chekhov.

What else is new. Moscow is being painted. Yeah, it's pretty much how it sounds. Every year, apparently, the bases of trees are painted white, as are benches and curbs. Little fences are also all painted green and yellow. It's interesting and colorful this time of year. The paint is noxious though, and I sometimes hold my breath walking by.

I could talk about cultural impressions, but I guess they're still setting. I don't want to pass judgment on these people just yet. First impressions are that this is a cold city, but underneath it's not really at all. I like their attitude towards customers. As in, "the customer is always right" is unheard of here. Not that people are rude, it's just different and you aren't pandered to. Which I appreciate. When I act like a dumbass customer, it's nice to be treated like a dumbass customer… which is most of the time here.