place2place

spirit animals

Took a trip out the flea market the Americans call Ismailova today. For Mosvites, the metro stop closest to the flea market is Ismailova, and the market itself is the vernisage, which also means art opening, so as usual, I'm confused.

While I was there, I can't BELIEVE I didn't buy this taxidermied hedgehog! Look at how he looks at you out of the corner of his eye! I think he might be my spirit animal.

Based on Aleen's good taste, we did buy these platters from Usbekistan. They are a little Davis hippy, but I love them. I love them so much I think my spirt animal is a blue flower. Or dishes. 

And here is what Nina and Ana look like when they come home from the ballet and have caviar for a snack:

Ana says her spirit animal is the wolf, but in an former life she was a an octopus. Nina says her spirit animal is either the Siberian tiger or a frog. What's yours?

head spinning oy

Old Arbat graffiti today.

There was talk of the world ending this week-end but instead, Stefan went to a pizza-making class. Because of her Russian connections, our 16- year old niece Ana brings us closer to real Moscow culture. While they were throwing pizza dough with Ana's aunt and someone named Kirill, I walked down the Old Arbat and indulged my current Lomonsov obsession and looked at tea pots and sugarers. Then I saw a painting I wanted but only for 1000 rubles and the seller wouldn't come down, so I kept walking.

We are living in a soup of pre-packout haze: schools to register for (I haven't done that yet?!) plane tickets from Moscow to London, hotel in the UK, plane tickets from NY to California, why am I eating this candy? My dad's memorial in California, what shoes will we need this summer? When does Nina get here? Why haven't I ordered presents for my co-workers yet? When do our new passports arrive so I can register us on the ship? Who wrote in ball point pen all over Camille? How many TWIM topics do I have left? What else can I obsess over? 

Somehow using the thirty or so pieces of his artwork that we have with us, I managed to put together an exhibit of Gene Garson's paintings in the Hall of Ambassadors. Seeing the paintings being hung brought tears to my eyes. They look beautiful and people stop to look at them and want to talk about them and I hope Gene is watching. A website of his work starting with this latest show: another fixation.

Our last month in Moscow. The world didn't end. Party on.

great mother's day

Tsaritisno today was a major check off the list!

First we rode the metro out...if we'd driven it would have taken hours. The metro goes super fast.

Then you have to wear these airport-style booties to protect the newly-made Catherine-the-great-deserving palace floors.

You have to sneak in a photo of the interior before you get called out by a guard. And that will happen, don't worry, that is their job. But you can take as many pictures as you want outside.



After you tour the museum, which was totally recreated by the mayor of Moscow in the last ten years, based on 18th century sketches--and what a great use of space, I must say--each room of the palace is filled with arifacts from all corners of Russia, from classic heavily embroidered costumes to Lapland papooses.

Afterwards, you have to pick your favorite Lomosov pattern in the gift store.

Amazing day, seeing some of Catherine's huge collection of painted urns and mechanical birds in pretty little cages and 100-year-old-postage-stamp-sized books brought from Kazakstan and palace-sized rooms filled with Mongolian yurts

Then, for a dramatic time-travel juxtaposition, we went to the mall and bought Camille clothes at Zara.

I wish everyone I know as weird and wonderful a Mother's Day as this.