From Russia with love....

So, made it to the hostel. Great fun. The plane ride was not too bad, although I got to the airport - like a good American- 3 hours early, and I was told to sit around before checking in, for two hours! They are a little faster in Berlin. Made it to Russia, and then the fun began. Finding a ticket to town is exciting when nobody speaks English- nobody. Not the employees, not the people, there's few tourists (i didn't see ANY)... I almost got on a train to southern Russia (I think), but got off in time. Then, got directions to the right train. I asked at that train- that was the wrong train too (have no idea where that was going, but it was basically empty). Finally found a train, crossed my fingers, and rode to Moscow.

Getting off the train, I found myself faced with a row of barriers. Luckily, enough people were moving through that I figured out that you need your train boarding pass scanned to get through. Still not outside though. I could see the outside, but the Metro was in the way, and you needed another type of ticket to get on that. I bought ten metro trips on a cool scan card (by slowly reading the Cyrillic, guessing, and holding up ten fingers) and it was off to the metro. Couldn't find the way outside yet.

The metro is AWSOME, but confusing. Again, all in Cyrillic. The ride down to the train level takes several minutes on an escalator, the Soviets loved to dig deep I guess, and the walls are lined with marble. After getting on the wrong subway for a while, I found my way back to where I started, and got on another subway. It was the right one, but when I got off, I couldn't get out. Stumbled into a police post, then back down to subway level. Proceded to wander through a marble lined labryinth, ending up twice back where I started, only several minutes and escalators later.... still in the same place, miles underground....

Found the way out, however, and the building the hostel was in. After stumbling into two Russian living rooms, I found the correct door (on the outside, across from the Yemen embassy). Communicating with sign language was getting old, but I made it... So now, in a "nice" place with lots of English speakers (although the employees don't really)... not too bad.