#RememberMoscow

 

Birthdays are a big deal in my world. They are so big in fact they take place over 2 months. No your eyes are not deceiving you, I said 2 months. This happens in 3 phases: Birthday countdown (3 June – 2 July); Birthday celebrations (3 July – 5 July) followed by Chizama Month (6 July- 31 July). I tell everyone I come across, a month in advance: family and strangers alike. I do not want to know whom within my small circle of friends and family will/not remember, I gather if I tell you often enough you have no way to forget.

Birthday Countdown usually comprises travel and shopping for a perfect gift that I wrap and surprise myself with on my birthday. I do realise that nobody in their right mind would want to join me in this madness, I do most of it on my own.  My best friend joined me for a Eurotrip in 2013 where we travelled using road transport from France passing through Paris; Monaco; Cannes; Nice then Switzerland Geneva and finished in Italy Montecatinni; Venice; Florence and ended in Rome.


Monaco 2013

I decided last year to add a daredevil stunt to the countdown and went skydiving. This year, I climbed Mt Kilimanjaro though that took place much earlier in the year. Anyway a perfect opportunity presented itself this year that landed me in Russia for my birthday countdown.

 

Welcome to Russia

I have always wanted to visit Russia. My dad talked about it a lot when I was younger. He spoke about The Russian Revolution in the early 1900s and the rise of the Soviet Union. He spoke of the Communist Revolutionary Vladimir Lenin and others so of course I was interested to tread where these Revolutionaries had done.  History, Museums in particular fascinate me. They remind me how little I know about where we come from as a pepole.  I had read that Moscow has plenty of them so I looked forward to them the most.

On the day I landed, I was welcomed by the Cyrillic alphabet, no English. I thought Oh My God -  Why do they combine capital and small letters; they spell N backwards? (И и) kill me now!!! I was back to being toddler. "Chizama, you cannot read." **facepalm**  I mumbled unpleasant words about Bantu Education failing me. Here I am in my 30s and can’t read, WTH? My parents did not pay good money towards school fees for me to turn out this illiterate LOL! It did not help that Russian people speak virtually no word of English. Before you judge me, I always make sure to not learn the language before visiting a country. It makes things more interesting, getting lost in a foreign city and working my way out of a maze is one of the few ways to run into those hidden gems like coffee shops or vintage shops where 87 year old salesmen with brown teeth smelling of cigarettes from yesterday will tell you about how good the world used to be. I enjoy those wise conversations, I lost my grandparents at a young age.

                     
 

The trip started in Obninsk, approximately 100km from Moscow. That is where I met crazy people with whom we drank at Caspary Brau, a German pub and made fools of ourselves. Look, we painted CasparyBrau in international colours mmkay? South Africa; Japan; Mexico; Brazil; Armenia; Turkey… we represented. 

Mommy, it's orange juice I swear

                                                                      

Moscow

Moscow is amazing no matter what mode of transport you use to get around. The first time we used the train and got off at Moscow Railway Station.

Moscow Railway Station
 

We used a street map to navigate the city, the best way to know the place for me. You get to see things more up-close; speak to random people and almost get run over by cars because you forgot that you’re in Europe and looked left; right and left again before crossing the road.


The second time we drove into the city in a bus and had the pleasure of sitting in traffic for almost 3 hours. Now the one thing I love beyond shopping is being driven, a little pleasure that keeps me smiling ear to ear. I got to appreciate the city better. I could not get my mind around there being so much traffic while they have such an effective transport system; subways and buses that is. Population is ~12million in Gauteng vs.~12million in Moscow. This made me wonder: Is South Africa ever going to solve the traffic problem? I doubt

 

Man, how beautiful is Moscow? It was nothing like I had imagined. I expected a “grey city” with dull buildings, military style and unpleasant people.  The architecture;  flower gardens; Moscow river; oh and beautiful people. Russian people are very beautiful and that is not an exaggeration.

Moscow River

 We were sitting in Lubyanka for lunch one afternoon. It was a warm day; I had been sitting facing the streets thanking God for the wonderful  creation that is Russian people. One would swear they collect all beautiful people around the world and put them in Moscow. I was sitting there, taking pictures of randoms. I do that, yes I’m strange what else is new? Russian men: FadaGaaad, average height 1.9m in tailored suits and sunglasses;  they smell good too. The sexy attitude of women. They wear 6inch heels in subways and have that swagger about them. They wear mini-skirts ; body hugging clothes and a lot of make up; 26 inch long hair and have that “I know you’re looking at me” kind of attitude.  MAN!!!

 

That dress is transparent and she knows you're looking

Back to my afternoon, we had been sitting there admiring all this beauty our heads kept turning with every passerby when it started raining. Out of the blue the skies went dark and it started pouring. Women did not even run, they strutted "the runway" with that wet hair and tight clothes stuck to their bodies...stuff you only see in movies. LOL! I love Moscow

Afternoon in Lubyanka

 

The beauty of Russia

That long train slithering through Trees and grass uninterrupted for kilometres on end and clear skies. At more than one occasion I was tempted to get off two stations early and walk just to smell that fresh air.

Train ride on the countryside

 

 

 Walking in the city, one is certain to find a flower pot almost every 100m and I never wasted the chance to pick them. By the end of my time in Moscow I had a rainbow of flowers in my bag. Put yourself in my shoes, would you have resisted picking these babies?

  

The beauty that is Moscow

 

 I picked so many flowers I feared being stopped by police one day for desecrating the city. The only words I knew were Spesiba (Thank you) & pozhaluista (please). A wiseman taught me those two words and a crooked smile would get me far in life, I agree. Imagine being stopped by those tall Russian men…or women with handcuffs and me putting my hands up crying please and thank you. Hehehe

Russian Police

 

Sightseeing

Moscow River/ Bridge

 

Krasnoluzhsky Bridge

                                              

Red Square
 

St Basil’s Cathedral, I looked forward to this the most. It looks edible doesn’t it?

 

Museums
 

21 June, a long train ride took us to Kaluga, a small town outside of Moscow. As already mentioned, Cyrillic alphabet was not my friend so I relied on my new friends to translate most of the time. We visited he Konstantin E. Tsiolkovsky State Museum of the History of Cosmonautics (Государственный музей истории космонавтики имени К.Э.Циолковского). Have you ever thought about how messed up a human mind is?

Launching into space took ordinary men and women like you and I, maybe I should not be calling them ordinary but yes they wrote codes by hand and launched the Apollo. 




Margaret Hamilton. She is still alive. Google Her

                    How will the world remember us?
 

On the last day I remember Reina; Berk and I running like we were on the Amazing Race. We were pressed for time but were so determined to see The Orlov Museum of Paleontology (Палеонтологический музей им. Ю. А. Орлова). We were there for no longer than 1hour. There was too much to see but all we were able to do was browse and take pictures. 

Diplodocus

                                                                  MUSEUMS



State Historical Museum.




Burial Chamber

 My entire time in Russia, I kept thinking of how I would have loved to have my father with me throughout all these history lessons but with his age and health, that is virtually impossible.  I swear to go back to Moscow one day and spend at least 2 weeks; one Museum and one garden at a time. So thank you Moscow, for your hospitality and good friends I made. #RememberMoscow

Strangers In Moscow

I came across a lot of random strangers; they were all interested in my big hair and asked to take pictures with me.  I felt like a complete joke at times. On the last day, I laughed and said “Oh well, back to South Africa where no one gives a fcuk about my hair"



                               

Language barrier. I do not know what nationality this little Princess is



Two Russian Ladies. I was so sure they were Polish . All I did was smile. It was later explained to me that they were telling me of the fall of USSR

 

Turkish Tourists

STRANGERS IN MOSCOW




Iraqi gentleman

Streets of Moscow

This picture refused to rotate

 

 



 

Not even rain stopped us from seeing the city

   

                                #RememberMoscow

Birthday celebrations

Celebrations started on the eve of my birthday, 2 July 2015. I decided to spend my birthday with my parents this year, for the first time in more than 10 years. 
There I was waiting for midnight like:

Waiting for midnight

My mother woke me up with a happy birthday song, hihihihihihihihihi. We went out for breakfast, just my creators and I. I'm very territorial with my parents I usually go home when I know I'm going to be the only child there just so I can spend more time milking my parents for wisdom. Spending time just the three of us, no siblings looking for attention on my special day was heaven *hides* Next on the agenda was, yes you guessed right:  #Museums. We visited Liliesleaf farm. It was a short history lesson for me and for my dad to tell me more about the 60s and what I missed out on in the fight for freedom of South Africa.

Liliesleaf Farm

 

Since I had not celebrated my birthday since my 21^st, I thought I would host a birthday dinner, design a birthday cake, the whole nine yards.

Hat box with yellow roses

 

 

I was so happy

 

My best friends are better than yours

       

 



 

 

OOCHIZAMA



My dad had last visited Soweto in 1969 for a Rugby tournament. So I thought, let’s take him to Soweto and even better take him to visit Tat’uMandela’s house. It was good to see my 6 year old nephew so excited about visiting Mandela’s house. He kept saying "Makazi we are going to Tat'uMandela's house."

Mandela Home

 

Hector Petersen Memorial

Hector Petersen Memorial

Apartheid Museum. It looks like they were not sure whether they were Blankes of nie

 I don’t know about the others but my father and I were in our element.  

For the first time in eons, we attended church as a family. Everyone got up and joined me for the 7am service. For once, everyone did as I had asked. Nobody complained, we went to church man, all of us. I know that might sound trivial to you but it meant the world to me. Enkosi bo Chizama.




To end my birthday weekend I took my family to Constitution Hill. I had been saying the entire weekend that what they had seen at other museum was only a prelude to what they were about to see at Constitution Hill.

Constitutional Court

 
If you haven’t been there, do yourself a favour and spare 2 hours of your time. Go there and remind yourself that the freedom you enjoy today, was paid for... dearly so.
 

Saying goodbye to my parents at the airport was hard. I prefer to not do goodbyes. I usually do them an hour early and when the time comes I simply disappear.  

 

Those were my birthday celebrations for 2015.

                         I am blessed indeed.
                      Live your life #OrDieTrying