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!

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)

The Post-Soviet Chronicles Part 3": Three Inches of Snow in Dushanbe

Read part 1 here and part 2 here. Totally fascinating reads, I promise. 

Part 3" begins in Dushanbe with the thirteenth chapter of my Tajik visa drama. The details are largely unimportant because, whatever, but this chapter ends with me having to leave the Tajik borders and travel to another Tajik consulate/embassy to get a visa. The easiest/most obvious choice for an American is Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan because, well, no visa... but the Tajik government said that I can't get a visa from there right now, for whatever reason. So, the next few choices were Dubai, Istanbul, or Almaty (Kazakhstan).

Kazakhstan? Why Not!

Getting a visa to Kazakhstan was the next big hoop I had to jump through. Luckily there is a Kazakh embassy in Dushanbe, and thanks to some knowledgeable friends I found the embassy pretty painlessly.

Unfortunately, the embassy operates on an apparently very strict schedule. They accept documents only on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays from 9am until 12pm, and then give visas on the same days from 3pm to 5pm. I of course arrived at the Kazakh embassy with all necessary documents on a Tuesday at 3pm where they politely told me I could wait until Thursday morning to submit my documents, and it would then take 3-5 working days to provide the visa if my application was accepted.

So, keep in mind that if I wanted to not stay in Tajikistan illegally I pretty much had to fly out on the following Monday (six days away). Obviously I was a little concerned about this Kazakh visa process. The following Thursday morning I arrived and luckily there was a consular officer there who spoke some (but not really all that much) English. I explained to him the situation and asked if there was anyway I could get the visa by Friday (the next day). He said he would try his best, and with that told me to return Friday morning.

On Friday morning, to my pleasant surprise, the same gentlemen let me know that I could get my visa that day so long as I went and paid the visa/consular fee at the Kazakh bank. After some searching, I found the bank, paid it off, and got my visa as soon as I returned to the Kazakh embassy. I was feeling pretty excited, but deep down I knew that it went a little too smoothly...

The Post-Soviet Chronicles Part 2: Lviv, Ukraine

Check out Part 1 here!

Pronouncing Lviv

Look, I know what you're thinking. L and v are two consonants, and there must be a vowel in between them. Otherwise what the heck is that sound?! Slavic language 101: they will make the strangest and most impossible combinations of consonants ALL THE TIME. What I find so strange is that the way they pronounce Lv sounds as if you're saying the word "live" (as in "live, damn you! live!") but as short as you possible can. So remind me again why there's no vowel there? Liv is really how we should transliterate that but whatever....

Now the most confusing part is that Lviv is not pronounced "Liv-eve", but it is actually pronounced "Liv-ohv". Now take a second to wrap your head around that one. Whatttttt?

So now that we know how to pronounce Livohv, let's talk about getting there.

The Post-Soviet Chronicles Part 1: Kyiv, Ukraine

I have been atrociously bad at blogging these last few months, and so I made a late New Year's Revolution (read: I'm bored in my hotel room in Almaty) to blog more for you all. I decided to start with a series on my recent Post-Soviet travels to Ukraine and Kazakhstan, with some fun Tajikistan adventures in the middle. And so, without further adieu, part one...

Kyiv, not Kiev-- if you've got some free time, this is a great read

Ukraine is cold. The temperature says one thing (4-5 degrees farenheiht maybe) but your body tells you something completely different. BITING cold. Wow it was chilly. Super icey and snowy too. It's no wonder Ukrainian people were not very nice-- how could they be when they have to *live* in that cold.

But seriously Ukraine was interesting. My non-existing Russian moved slightly closer to being existent and I navigated the metro system all on my own once (yay for metros being pretty much the same worldwide!). "Hryvnia" is the currency in Ukraine, and before you even try to pronounce it let me tell you it's pronounced completely differently. Ready? "Greev-na". What?! Anyways the exchange rate was about 1 USD to 8.5 Greevna and prices were generally pretty low. The stuff also looked/felt like monopoly money. 

One of the world's deepest metro's at the Arsenalna Station in Kyiv