The Post-Soviet Chronicles Part 6: Moscow Part 2 -- A Place Where You Can Drunkenly Ride Horses at Night

You should definitely read this first if you haven't, because it's part 1. And this is part 2. So logically you should read part 1 before part 2. So... read it?

Are You Ready for More Churches? GOOD!

...because apparently that's what the Kremlin is? Maybe I'm the only idiot American who was confused and thought the Kremlin was some government building where there were those crazy guards and if you looked for long enough you might see Jason Bourne do some acrobatic stuff and sneak into the building. I really hope I'm not the only one, because it turns out the Kremlin has a government building but is actually more like a bunch of churches in a really small square together.

"You shall not pass!"

The Post-Soviet Chronicles Part 5: Moscow Part 1 -- It Wasn't Me!

Okay okay okay. I'm the worst. I really have been inconsistent with this blogging thing. I've just found that life here has gotten pretty... normal. Nothing I do/see anymore seems all that strange/different so it seems silly to blog. But going to Moscow? That's pretty epic. I probably should have been a little more prompt on blogging about that. So without further ado, I present to you the first in a series of two blogs on my travel to Moscow, Russia.

Hey, look! It's that famous church in Russia that everyone thinks of when they think of Moscow!

Northeast for the holidays

The irony of the English transliteration of Garm is that garm in Tajik/Farsi means 'warm'. For the record, the actually pronunciation of Garm is more of a guttural gharm-- which does not, in fact, have the same meaning. Garm is actually quite colder, as it is at a higher altitude and further north than Dushanbe.

Why You Should Always Have a Snickers on Hand

I know what you're thinking: "Another blog post about soup?!" but wait. Hear me out.

Tonight I tried to cook soup.

The night began with me, being lazy, and not having any bottled water around (which, unfortunately prevents me from doing most of the cooking I'm capable of). So, after some arguments with my stomach I finally forced myself to walk the ten minutes down the road to go to the store. I had been wanting to make a soup for awhile, I figured it was easy, and should be tasty.

The Post-Soviet Chronicles Part 4: Almaty, Kazakhstan

After a short stint, we return to the post-soviet chronicles and review Almaty, Kazakhstan.

Previous editions can be found here, here, and here.

Pronunciation

Good luck. No, but seriously... the English pronunciation is super easy and it's said exactly as it looks (Al-mot-e). Unfortunately for us, no one seems to understand when you say Almaty in the English pronunciation. They simply look at you oddly and wonder what you could be possibly talking about. So here are the variants on pronunciation I encountered there and in Tajikistan:

Kazakhs pronouncing it in Kazakh: Almatiye (Al-mot-e-a)

Russians pronouncing it in Russian: Almat?? (Al-mot-*choke on your tongue*) 

Some Tajiks pronouncing it in Russian: Almato (Al-mot-o)

Strange how one city's name could be pronounced so many different ways. Or not pronounced. Or whatever.

So, like, Almaty is... where again?

It's Almaty-- and then some! (Click to enlarge)