Culturbia

Although not somewhere I would normally choose to go, Moscow was the final port of call before catching the Trans-Siberian. I hadn’t heard much about Russia apart from all the Cold War/Soviet type things, and recently watching the film Farewell (which was very good). After doing a small amount of research about what to do it was hard to find much that wasn’t either Red Square or really far in the outskirts. I found out about a traditional puppet theatre, but this was too far away. As far as art galleries and contemporary exhibitions Moscow seems particularly sparse, favouring lavish independent art collections which will often be European Art.

 In feel Moscow is much like a European city, though obviously with Cyrillic rather than Roman alphabet everywhere. The metro is extremely easy to use, just paying for single journeys which can be anywhere in the city, no zones like London. The currency, Roubles roughly translates to 50 to £1. So a metro journey costs roughly 50p. Russians will often neither associate themselves as being Asian or European and class Moscow as being very multicultural, despite what I saw in the city centre which was almost entirely Caucasian faces, especially compared to the multiculturality of London. Read More »