Team Russia: Moscow ... Very Interesting Place

Yesterday we arrived in Moscow. Lets hit upon the positives first! After we checked into our Hostel we went to tour Red Square, St. Basil's Cathedral, The Kremlin and the Armory. Being a history teacher I have come across many photo's of these places in books but I cannot even describe the awe inspiring feeling that overcame me when I walk through the gates and into Red Suare and saw this colorful, towering piece of architecture called St. Basil's Cathedral. I have included a picture but to be honest you really have to see it for yourself. I cannot remember a time when I felt to overcome with such emotion and those of you that know me know this is rare. :)
The tours were wonderful and I enjoyed every minute of them even though I had only gotten 3 hours of sleep, we had ridden a few hours by train that morning, checked into our hostel and oh wait my shoes were broken.......
Th train ride was good and when we got here we were met by Tom our American contact here. He told us that the place we were staying in had flooded and he had to find us last minute accommodations. We got to our accommodations and were met by Brad the scab who was a British guest and began talking to us about everything and nothing. I thought he was just a friendly guy and began talking back while the rest of the team ignored him and kept giving me looks. I was obviously missing something. I finally extracted myself from the conversation and went into our room where Sarah was panicking. Come to find out our accommodations are not quite what we had in the last town and Brad the scab looked like he had seen better days. How I missed this I am not sure. I am sure you will here much more about this from the others so lets just say this story is to be continued........ because we are still here for 4 more nights. Last night we decided to drink in order to fall asleep, I am sure that says a lot. ON the other hand Tom worked very hard to get our accommodations and we trust his judgement it is just not what we expected. We also appreciate the fact that he found us accommodations at such a late hour considering Euro vision is going on all this week!
Just a quick story about he armory. I decided to where my boots which I actually borrowed from my friend Amanda who was nice enough to part with them for the month. Amanda you may not want to read on.......The boots have heals and I wanted look like the Russian women who always have boots on... well I no longer have heels. While touring the armory I tripped and broke off one of the heels. They were pretty high heels. The girls began laughing hysterically and the men were like what in the world are you going to do. I told them I saw a movie once where this happened and the girl just broke off the other one so after some time of walking funny and Sarah and Robin breaking out into the giggles I sat down and muscle man Mike broke off the other one for me. I felt so much better but had to go to our presentation that evening with my toes pointing up in the air because I did not have time to change, and yes people noticed but I am sure it did not look half as bad as it would have if I have left one heel on and one off. Sorry Amanda I owe you a pair of boots!!!!
We are off to breakfast so more to come later.

Jen