Enjoying Moscow

Today was truly an incredibly exciting day, beginning with one of the best breakfasts I have had in any hotel. My favorites were the vegetables, greens, slaw, beets, etc, with cold cuts and sausage and deliciously prepared kasha. (I don’t know why it never came out that way when I made it.)

Then I went right into a meeting followed by seven hours of interviews of Russian students and researchers competing for Fulbright scholarships to the United States.

These young people, the best 130 of 700 initial candidates, showed extraordinary intelligence and sheer courage. Some of them traveled thousands of miles—remember that Russia is much bigger than the United States—to undergo an interview entirely in English in which they had to explain often complex scientific projects in clear layman’s terms. Imagine having to spend 15 minutes trying to describe computer analysis of electrocardiograms in Russian clearly enough that a music teacher could understand it. Suffice it to say, that if I had had to do that to get my Fulbright, I would not be here.

At any rate it was thrilling to meet 14 of these future leaders of medicine, science, linguistics, and government. Oh, and one candidate had a project to study American marketing of funeral homes. She said she had seen every episode of Six Feet Under.

In the evening, I managed to take the Metro downtown and had a whirlwind self-led foot tour of the major sights of central Moscow: The outside of the Kremlin, Alexander Garden, State History Museum (again, only from the outside), Red Square, Lenin’s Mausoleum, St. Basil’s Cathedral, the ritzy Gum shopping center (from the inside), Revolution Square, the Bolshoi Theater, Tverskaya Street, and back to my train. As I entered the station, I waved to the apparently beautiful “Christ the Savior” Cathedral in the distance, but could not walk another step.

When I got back to the hotel, I discovered that I am allergic to the new socks I bought.

St. Basil's Cathedral

Bolshoi Theatre