Rompin' in Moscow!
All soda is served from a bottle or can so you can see where this is going. Every meal I went to I felt like I had been standing in Iraq during Desert Storm waiting to get rehydrated or to kill some 'Raqis... me thinks neither happened during Desert Storm! Overall we had some good eats, but man I just don't enjoy my food the same without liquid in my stomach. Oh well, enough petty bitching!Language barriers, though, are a major bitch... I know they exist everywhere but man this is rough. Most languages are based on Latin and I can at least SOMEWHAT figure out what people are saying. Not Russian. In fact, not only is the language impossible to understand verbally, but the alphabet is Cyrillic. A totally different alphabet (which isn't a big deal) except it uses many of the same characters but they have different sounds. For example, the letter that looks like "C" is actually an "S", and what looks like a "P" is actually an "R". It is insane! To top it off, except for the real international businesses and tourist traps, most people in Russia DO NOT speak English. Although as I'm learning, most people under the age of 24 or so should at least have a basic understanding because in the schools now children take English classes the way we take Spanish classes in the USA. That'll be great – in 20 years! I need to get to the strip club now and the driver of the random car that picked me up to take me there doesn't speak a fucking lick of English and doesn't understand the words NAKED or WOMAN! Oh well, tame my libido, Mr. Cab Driver... or should I call you Boris? Let me speak on this cab situation.Actual cabs only exist on a mythical basis in Moscow. Well, maybe not entirely in myth but they are few and far between. But alas comes the great capitalist mockery of the common man cab. In the USA it is illegal to pick up a hitchhiker, and for damn good reason. In Moscow, it is the standard. Everyone hitches rides, and I mean EVERYONE. All you have to do is stick your hand out similar to a Nazi salute and the next car that wants to give you a ride will stop. And any person driving a car made prior to 1992 will usually stop to give you a lift. Every once in a while a nice car will stop and you get a ride in a Beemer, but I would imagine most people who have the money for a nice car here know that you would have to be a damn fool to pick up a total stranger whose shoes are covered in ice and sludge and give them a ride for under 10 bux! But like I said, it's standard operating procedure here. I've come to understand that a lot of people just don't drive here; they simply hitch rides everywhere. And for the most part all it costs is 200 rubles... 300 at worst to get pretty much anywhere within the confines of Moscow's anal rings (take a look at a map of this city and you'll understand!). By the way, ruble conversion is about 28 rubles to a US dollar so 300 rubles is just over 10 bux. No worry about your cabby taking the long route to run the meter, but chances are he won't speak English – just like every FES (foreign exchange student) who drives a cab in NY. Now let us speak on the party scene. I went out a couple nights with some young lads around the same age as me. They mostly spoke English, at least a little and all of them like to have a good time and to batter the foreign kid (me) with all kinds of questions about the USA and life outside of Vodkaland! Well I can handle this because like I said the women are hot! The guys for the most part are good to be around because most of them are not meat heads. You can actually have fun in a club in Moscow, cuz most of the guys just want to drink, dance and have a good time. This is compared to the States where every guy in the club has a chip on his shoulder and can't wait for someone to hit on the slut he thinks is his girlfriend so he can break a beer bottle over their head. I only say this because I worked in the bar business long enough to see it OVER and OVER and OVER. We went to a couple clubs, at least half of them WISHING they were in Manhattan. I think most of the teenagers in Moscow wish they lived in the States. A lot of the women dress like Party Paris Barbie or any other skankish celeb that you can name. Not that I'm complaining cuz they are hot and they are nice in comparison to their US counterparts. They aren't digging for gold, just the occasional drink or possibly money for sex (I forget which I was asked for more often). The other clubs we hit up were the typical European Party clubs that you see all over the E! channel when they do the "Wild On" specials. Very loud, very crowded and very fun. Those motherfuckers dance like the world is going to end soon and they need to squeeze every single grind out in one night. Maybe it was the absinthe or the vodka but so many hot bitches dancing in a confined space + naked women dancing on the stage makes for a nice club. One of the chicks even danced with a python wrapped around her and put the pythons head in her mouth like she was sucking a 7 foot cock that had a mind of its own...HOT HOT HOT!
Now I'm not much of a dancer and I really don't dance that often (some beer in me may make me shake my ass and freshly pierced wang on the dance floor a little here and there) but this Euro club scene definitely made me want to change my mind. I had a great time dancing ALL FUCKING NIGHT with my beautiful friend Olga who appeared to be one of the best dancers in there (she was there with her dance instructor so maybe that was the reason why). No beer and no Tequila or vodka make mike j something something... wait that didn't happen. I had a lot of beer, tequila and vodka that night and it didn't fall out the window of a yellow cab like it did in Soho last week. I think I got the most intense cardio workout I''ve had in a long time in the six + hours I was at one club. The snow is falling harder every minute as I lay here in my tiny fucking half twin hotel bed and my flight home is in exactly 12 hours. It's 1AM and I'm not even tired. I haven't gotten more then 10 hours of sleep in the five days I have been here and I don't think it's going to go much over 10 after tonight. Maybe the 10+ hour flight home will give me some much-needed sleep. See ya next time Moscow…..Mike J out!
