Monday, February 28, 2011

Weekend Fun!

So on Saturday February 26th we went into Red Square because we wanted to go see Lenin’s Mausoleum which is where is body is just laying there being preserved for everyone to look at. He was a big leader back in the 1900’s and I don’t know really any of the history on him I just know he was part of the Revolution of Russia but anyway he is a big part of history for Russia so we wanted to go see that and maybe take the tour through St. Basil’s Cathedral and then go to the Kremlin and go through the armory and see the crown jewels and such.  We were all so excited so we got up early and got ready and headed out about 10am. None of us had any breakfast and so by the time we got to Red Square Daphne, Maddi, and I were starving so we grabbed a Danish pastry thing out of the little metro vender’s station. I was a little weary at first because even though the metros are nice they are not clean so I was thinking aaahh food from the metro station I don’t know but I was so hungry I went for it. I just pointed to this little Danish thing that looked like it had cream cheese in the middle and when the lady handed it to me it was soooo warm I couldn’t’ wait to try it. It was so good I could have eaten like 10 of them. So I was happy that I tried something different and exciting and got a good result from.

So anyways by the time we walked and got to the mausoleum it was 12:35. Well the last group can go in at 12:30 so we missed it by five min but then we were thinking it wouldn’t have worked anyways because we had to go in two groups because you can’t take anything in with you so one group has to stay outside and hold everything then you would switch off. So we really didn’t think about that part. But no big deal because we headed to the Cathedral and saw that tickets were only 50 Rubles to get in, which is like $1.50. We were like heck yeah let’s go!! 

I can’t believe that I went into St. Basil’s Cathedral in RUSSIA!! How crazy is that? When you walk inside that amazement of something so beautiful and so skillfully done artwork just hits you in the face. I’ve never seen something so beautiful before. And everything in that place was hand painted and the detail is so unbelievable I wish I could have taken pictures to show and always remember.  But pictures aren’t allowed unless you want to pay a lot more money for a different ticket, so I tried to take as many mental pictures as I could. So I’ll put up some pics that other people were willing to pay for!!  We just would step into another spiral and be amazed at the craftsmanship at each one we walked through. We just kept looking at each other and saying, “guys we are INSIDE St. Basil’s Cathedral, in RUSSIA!!! How cool is that?!”  

We then headed over to buy tickets to go inside to Kremlin and go tour the Armory and other interesting history things like carriages, crown jewels, all sorts of gold and silver works of art, clothing, war items like the armor and guns and swords, and just so many amazing things. Again cameras were for sure not allowed in so I just took some mental pictures but I loved looking at the carriages and then all the jewelry they would wear. It’s crazy the necklaces and earrings they would wear, they just looked so heavy and uncomfortable. Then there were all these bibles with amazing covers with all sorts of jewels and gold and silver carvings. I was looking at this one portrait outline and it had two of the biggest emeralds I have ever seen on it. They were amazing and I loved staring at them just because that’s my birthstone!  

We ran into some ladies and they all had missionary tags on so we were like yeah we’ll go talk to them and found out they are the wives of all the mission presidents around and while their husbands were all in meetings and doing their church business the wives decided to take a tour of a few things. It was nice to talk to them and just get that familiarity of home.  So the entire tour took about two hours with all our stopping and talking with each other and other people and just standing in amazement of a lot of things. It was nice because we were able to get an audio tour guide thing that was in English and we were able to hear an explanation of a lot of the items we were looking at. We wanted to see some more things that are inside the Kremlin walls but we weren’t sure how to get to them and whether we had to go buy some different tickets so we went to Sbarro’s Pizza and got a slice of pizza and some cheesecake. It was good but still not as good as pizza from Pizza Hut, but the cheesecake is amazing even if it was just plain! Daphne, Maddi, Jessica, Lexi and I had such a good day. It was so fun and relaxing and we just had a blast laughing with each other and hanging out. 

When we were done with Red Square we wanted to go to the grocery store again to get a few things we wanted.  So we jumped on the metro and headed to where we thought the store was, well we were all just sitting in our seats waiting for our stop and when the metro stopped at this one stop we just stayed on cause it wasn’t what we needed, well we looked around and EVERYONE had gotten off the metro and the driver was saying something over the intercom in Russian and we realized he was telling us to get off. We wouldn’t have known that but there was a nice gentlemen waiving at us to get off. We don’t know what was going on so we just waited for another metro to come along and watch everyone laughing at us because we had no idea what was going on!  Well we had a few problems trying to find the grocery store but eventually we made it and were able to get the things we wanted. And when I was checking out I was trying to get all my stuff in my bag and get out of the way I realized I didn’t have my wallet which yes has my passport in it, I turned around and the lady that was behind me and pushing me out of the way had my wallet and was yelling something to me in Russian and all I could do was go to her and say spasiba, spasiba. Which is thank you, thank you, I just quickly looked to see if my passport was still in there and quickly walked away. I was so embarrassed and felt sooooooo stupid, but at least I was able to get it back!  

We headed home to just crash because it had been such a long day and we were just extremely tired and wanted to either watch a movie or just go to bed. We ended up just going to bed and when Sunday morning came, Daphne, Maddi and I all looked at each other and were like we can’t move we just want to sleep in and relax, so that’s what we did. I stayed in my pjs all day and we just watched a movie, and I read my scriptures for like two hours and just chilled. It was really nice to just have a relaxing day to physically and mentally prepare for the upcoming week.

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