Welcome to Moscow

Well, still now official welcome to Moscow sign, but this is just as good.  I took this picture the first morning.  I went to the factory with my long johns, suit, and a jacket.  We ended up waiting (see the next picture) for about 15 minutes outside the gate for our host.  I thought my ears and nose were going to freeze and fall off.  After the wait, we had to walk about 10 minutes to another building.  It took me 2o minutes to feel normal after that walk and wait.

Here’s the gate we waited at for 15 minutes.  It doesn’t really sound like a long time, but consider that the instant you step outside the steam coming from you nose as you breathe freezes before it actually leaves you nose.

This is the well surrounding the factory.  We believe this used to be a Soviet Weapons manufacturing site before the cold war ended.

We plan to go into Moscow and see Red Square after work.  I’m pretty excited about doing that.  I’ll post the pictures over the weekend if I have time.

Moscow

If you would have asked me 25 years ago if I ever thought I would go to Moscow, I most definitely would have said NO!  In the mid 80’s the cold war was at it’s peak and the thought of traveling to the Soviet Union was about the furthest thing from my and most Americans minds.

Sorry, no pictures yet.  I tried really hard to get some when I got in to the airport.  Until now, every country I had been to have welcome to our city signs.  I looked all over for a Welcome to Moscow sign, but nothing!

We landed in falling snow.  It was pretty bleak, pretty much out of a movie.  Our partner was waiting for us and he had arranged a taxi.  That means he walked around talking to all the guys trying to make a little money on the side by transporting a group of people in their Chrysler mini-van.  He looked a little shady to me.  As a rule I never use a non-sanctioned taxi, you know, just some guy with car keys looking to make an extra buck.  Our partner insured us he had talked to a lot of them and found this guy.  So we did it.  It turned out ok.  It took about 2 hours to get to the hotel compared to 3 hours by public transportation.  One small thing, I HAVEN’T BEEN SO COLD IN MY LIFE!!!  The moisture that is supposed to come out of you nose when you breathe was actually freezing IN MY NOSE!!!  Cold.  The next couple of days are work.   Friday we are going to try and go to Red Square, then Saturday to a 20th century Soviet Art museum.  It sounds pretty interesting.

The next post will have pictures of Moscow!

Back in Dresden

I’m back in Dresden.  This time it’s winter and really cold.  This is just the first stop on my trip in Europe.  This trip I’m visiting prospects in several cities in Germany, Netherlands, and Russia.  This trip actually began in Shanghai.  No pictures though of Shanghai, I’ve posted enough.  The first stop in the tour is Dresden.  My partner and I had a couple of hours to walk around a little in the city center.  Here are the pictures.

City Center Area

This is a church that was bombed during WWII, it was only recently reconstructed since Dresden was part of Easy Germany until the wall fell.

Now this is an art museum, I don’t know the original purpose of this building.  It was all in German.

This is the walk to and from the hotel we were staying at.  It was roughly a 30 minute walk.  Along the left and right are soviet era apartments that have been re-conditioned.  We were walking along and this just seemed like it would make a great black & white.  I also have a color version.

Next up is Moscow.  It’s supposed to be about –10 F when we arrive.  Dang that’s cold.