NANCY'S BLOW BY BLOW REVIEW OF THE BIG ARRIVAL IN MOSCOW:
It's about 4 am here and I finally don't feel drugged. We arrived at 10:30 am in Moscow. Waited about 30 min for a wheelchair to get to the plane for Russ. (He twisted his knee pretty bad on the flight from SLC to NYC.) While waiting at the Moscow airport, the flight attendants constantly apologized for Russian slowness, rolled their eyes, said how bad the old terminal was, etc. Then luggage took forever. We paid $30 for three men to lift and move our eight suitcases from baggage claim through customs and into the reception area of the six month old beautiful new terminal. Waiting for us were Dima (our supervisor, 37 years old, handsome, charming, kind, attentive) and the Pattersons (senior missionary couple from Springville, UT - ready to leave for home in two weeks). We arrived with the Souths, the couple from Georgia with whom we went through the MTC. There were two drivers waiting for us and we piled all the luggage and people inside a larage van and small car and went directly to the American Embassy to apply for our second passport that will be used when we leave the country every 3 months to fill visa requirements. That was an interesting event in itself. The Embassy building looks like something out of movie, very Eastern Europe and heavily guarded.Next lunch. Then to the Marriott where Russ and I are spending the night. The Souths went to a currently vacant apartment (it will be used permanently by another couple when the arrive next month). Souths will move into the Pattersons place when they depart. Today we will move to a hotel closer to our office and also start looking at apartments that have been lined up for us to see. We will live within walking distance of the office, on the green metro line, the Sokol stop.
This city is ginormous!! We were told yesterday that while the official count is 16 million, the actual population is more like 30 million. It is much like NYC, only on a larger scale. Architecture is fascinating. yesterday we drove past two of the "seven sisters," seven buildings Stalin had built that look exactly alike and atop each of the seven hills of Moscow. This looks like many European cities, but bigger and shabbier in some instances than places like Berlin, Vienna, etc. Of course, we have only seen an extremely small sample of the city. Can tell you that traffic crawls, but we will mostly be on foot so how fast cars travel will matter little to us. Looking at the way women were dressed, it is again like NYC....lots of high fashion and very high heels. We had lunch in a Chinese restaurant across the street from the Marriott. Prices were about what they would be in NYC, perhaps a tad higher. I had lamb with onions; delish and the rice was just what you'd expect at a place in Salt Lake City--not real Chinese rice, but the non-sticky stuff with a few veggies thrown in.
Speaking of being on foot, dad's knee seemed a little better when we awoke at 8 pm last night from our nap and before we went back down at 10:30 pm. For now he is taking only ibuprofen, and hopefully it will improve enough today that we won't have to go to the SOS American Clinic, although we've been told that the care there is quite decent. I have visions, of course, of having to turn around to the States for him to have his knee scoped. Let us hope it doesn't come to that. I am so anxious to get going and walk everywhere.'
As soon as dad wakes up I will get out the water purifying bottle from a suitcase so I can brush my teeth. The hotel gave us one bottle and we drank it last night. Just the beginning of our Russian water routine.
Well,nice to be awake and not feel drugged. Surely, we'll be out of it later today, but for now jet lag is taking a back seat. Our driver will be here at 8:15 to schlepp all of our bags from here to the hotel we'll stay until we find our apartment. Not sure why they put us in the Marriott for only one night, but probably because a room wasn't available yet at the other place. Of course, I'm not complaining because this is very nice.
There are 14 other senior missionary couples in Moscow. We'll have dinner with them this coming Thur. Today the Packards (Eden Jaussi's parents) will have lunch with us and take us out to see potential apartments. We haven't seen them - Bethany and Chad - since Eden's (former Showtime student of Russ's) wedding reception and that's been a few years. They are fun loving people, so it's bound to be a great time, although Russ will no doubt stay at the office while I go with them. Dang it! This is no time for a bum knee. We sure thought we'd left health problems behind us once we got on the plane, but you know what it's like to be rushed onboard and have to stow luggage immediately, etc. Dad reached up to get a small suitcase back out to get - what else - food that he had packed inside it, and it fell on his knee as he turned or some such thing. Whatever happened, the end result was a lot of pain and at first he could put no weight on it at all. Imagine dad not getting up and going to the restroom every 1/2 hour....that's how bad it was and he couldn't put any weight on it at all. Don't know how he managed to get any sleep on the flight. As for me, I used an eye mask and ear plugs and slept deeply for a couple of hours. He has been doing much better throughout the night, so I hope healing is on the way. A knee brace wouldn't be such a bad idea. We'll see.
------------------------------- A FEW DAYS LATER -------------------------------
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I keep telling people that we are not hypochondriacs or sickly people, but we sure act like we are. Hopeflly, health issues are now behind us. My doctor who suspected cancer while we were in the MTC was surprised but pleased to learn, after the biopsy was analyzed by four experts, that it was benign. I believe in miracles!!
We found an apartment the very first day after our arrival. It is a two minute walk from the office - just across the street - and it is better than I ever expected: a huge bedroom with king bed, big living room, very big dining room, typical size kitchen and bath. Everything has been remodeled and is clean and bright. There are huge windows on three sides of the apt and two terraces with celing to floor glass doors. Sixth floor, and we hear flies and mosquitoes stop at the fourth floor, so that's great too. Really, it's a lovely place and we move in today. yesterday it took 2.5 hours for the landlady to negotiate all terms of the lease with the real estate specialist in our office. Actually, it was her real estate broker that made the process so long. I couldn't believe it, especially since they had already met for 1.5 hours the day before. We are starting to learn the Russian way of doing business.
Wow! Do Russians speak rapidly, or what??? We're in for a real learning curve. A few missioanry couples here take private tutoring twice a week at $70 a lesson. Whooo, we won't be doing that, but will try learning the old fashioned way by simply learning as much as possible as we talk with Russians.
Jet lag has been a killer, but we got a pretty good rest last night. Waking at 5 am is a whole lot better than at 1:30. We're on our way!! Photos of our luxury apartment will be posted as soon as Russ learns how to do it!
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