Notte sento (with English subtitles)

They’re so cute, aren’t they?

You feel you became Russian when…

1. When crossing the street, you sprint.
2. In winter, you choose your route first by determining which icicles
are least likely to impale you on the head.
3. You give a 10% tip only if the waiter has been really
exceptional…meaning he/she smiled or said hello, got up from
thier chair to take your order, got your order right, and the
restaurant actually had what was on the menu.
5. You save table scraps for the pack of wild dogs living in the
courtyard.
6. You plan your vacation around those times of the year when they
turn off the hot water.
7. ‘Девушка! почему в блюде укропa нет!?’ (Why is there no dill in the meal?!)
8. ‘Da net!’ becomes a logical and useful phrase
9. You let the telephone ring at least 3-4 times before you pick it up
because it is probably a mis-connection or electric fault.
10. You hear the radio say it is just at or below freezing outside and
you think it might be nice day for a change.
11. You argue with a taxi driver about a fare of 40 rubles ($1.10) to
go 2-3 miles while it is snowing.
12. You win a shoving match with an old Babuschka for a place in line
and you are proud of it.
13. You hesitate to put on your seat belt to avoid offending the
taxidriver and the impending 5 minute conversation to explain why
you are putting it on.
14. You are pleasantly surprised when there is actually toilet paper
in the bathroom.
15. You look at people’s shoes to determine where they are from.
16. You’re anxiously concerned because you forgot your “just in case”
disposable hypodermic needle in your other coat.
17. You “automatically” hand in your pepper spray at the door before
going through the metal detector.
18. Your day seems brighter after seeing that goon’s Mercedes run into
by a pensioner’s “Moskvich”.
19. You are thrown off guard when the doorman at the nightclub is
happy to see you.
20. You wonder what the tax inspector really wants when she says
everything is in order.
21. You say he/she is “on the meeting”.
22. You have to think twice about throwing away the empty instant
coffee jar.
23. You’re offended when your American friend gives you a “dozen”
roses.
24. You don’t notice that Sony sticker on the front of your t.v.
25. You are relieved when the guy standing next to you on the bus
actually uses Kleenex.
26. You are envious when your friends door keys fit in their pocket.
27. You ask for no ice in your drink.
28. When you stop using “poshol” as a “to go” verb.
29. When you go mushroom and berry picking out of necessity, not
recreation.
30. When you develop a liking for beets or cabbage.
31. When you eat hot dogs for breakfast.
32. When you drink the brine from empty pickle jars.
33. When you can read bar-codes.
34. When you start shopping for products by their country of
production.
35. When you start to “feel” public transport and bridge opening
schedules.
36. When you know more than 60 Olgas.
37. When it doesn’t seem strange to publicly relieve yourself.
38. When the question… “Would you like fries with that?” has been
replaced by..”Would you like bread with that?”.
39. When your soup arrives with sour cream in it and you like it.
40. When you go to a restaurant and you play with the kitchen cat.
41. When you realize you have eaten an entire plate of meat product
and not questioned its origin.
42. When your internet connection hits 40K and you are excitied
because it hasn’t been that high in over a month.
43. When you buy a bottle of Panteen Pro-V and you are shocked when
the shampoo that comes out IS actually Panteen Pro-V.
44. You stare at the innostrantsii (outsiders) wandering around town
45. You ride the marshrutka shouting ‘ostanovite na ostanovke’ EXACTLY where you want to stop, and not worrying about handing your money to the driver via 6 people
46. You don’t think about wearing your stilettoes to the club… when it’s -20 outside
47. You don’t get it when your parents laugh if you order ’sock’ (сок=juice) in a restaurant
48. You keep typing ‘н’ instead of ‘n’
49. You appreciatively murmur ‘bogatstvo russkovo iazika’ (rich russian language) when you learn a new irregular plural
50. You actually start to use the prefixes with verbs of motion
51. You talk with your Russian neighbour about ‘those Europeans’ in the ballet interval
52. You are impressed with the new model Lada or Volga.
53. You start to say oiy, akh, ekh
54. Your friend asks you how your day was and you shake your head and say ‘voobshey’
55. You know which diminutive your friends prefer according to mood
56. You shove in front of that damn bab to get the last carton of kefir
57. You get suspiscious when someone smiles at you (rightly so).
58. You start measuring in km, kg, and, koneshno, sto gramms!
59. You realize that potato is a polezna and appropriate pirog filling
60. You join the queue at the ticket booth according to what time the tekhnicheski pererivs take place at each one.
61. You mutter ‘Дурак’ at the idiot who forgot the gherkins when they bought vodka.
62. You carry a plastic shopping bag with you “just in case”.
63. You know you’re going to miss everything so much when you leave…

Peugeot 3008 ADs

Volgograd: photos

Heroes alley lightlanes (Volgograd, Russia)

Krasnoarmeisk from underskies (Volgograd, Russia) © Lapra-bobra @ Yandex.Photos

Budapest

How to get to Budapest center from airport.
Bus 200E from airport – just 350 HUF (about 1,5 euro; if buying directly from driver) takes to metro end station (with some woooooooooow!unspellable name). All bus stops’ names which could be important for non-hungarian speaking foreigners are doubled in English (Terminal 2, Terminal 1 and last stop – metro station).
BTW there’re funny trams in Budapest – seen like those only in Strasbourg before. They’re yellow, long and have 5-6 vehicles, so look like worms )))

Budapest downtown
Looks nice: maybe like Vienna or Praha (less; btw still never been to Vienna but ‘as seen on TV’ ).

Hostel
Hostel is named ‘Marco Polo’, but upon entering the room I’ve found nothing connected to this great Portugese. Except my Portugese roommate)
*To be continued…

Found McD with free WiFi and posting this from my Ubuntu 8.04 powered Asus A6J00c

Canon HG10 – Sample shooting @ some car show

© Humphrey Cheung

Wooow, video quality is awesome (if anybody still cares after what is on that video )

Farewell to Pugie

It happened: yesterday I’ve sold him. His new owner friend is a nice girl, she loves him – it’s seen.

My Pugie, he was awesome!

Together we’ve passed 33+K kilometers. He never left me somewhere on the road.
Together we’ve been running in snow, rain, mud, sand, sun and wind.
Together we’ve been to Moscow, Volgograd, Nizhniy Novgorod, Mogilev, Minsk.

He’s nice. He’s elegant. He’s smiling.
Never mind water drops under fog lamps, that was the moment when tears are allowed.
Look at his face, he’s always really smiling.

He’s like me.

Good bye, my dear Pugie. Let your road be safe.

My dear Pugie

Tver’ & some country routes

All the weekend has passed in travel: driving and helping my friend and groupmate to move back home from campus. He’s from Tver’ so we took all his tons of garbage and moved it for 160 km in St. Petersburg direction. Some jams where recouped with nice d’n'b music and so nice society of Tony.

Though we’ve seen lots of police while passing by “Nashestvie” rock-fest (this year it again took place in Emmaus place near Tver’) they we weren’t stopped by them so looks like road police isn’t interested in 9-year old french saloons

BTW in some places route was really cross-country – the road was quite dirty and had no asphalt over it. So my frenchie Peugeot had his first off-road experience. Yeeeeargh *DEVIL*

Tver’ bridge over Volga (by V. Dorogov):

New job location

I’m moving to new job site since next Monday (July, 4th). Looks like there’s some work to do for me, anyway (at least I hope so) my boss wouldn’t sent me there.

Some say this building was built in XVIII century, so I would be nice if it was real – it’s cool to work in historical place in the center of Moscow.

Неглинная

Morning agression

This may sound strange, but I fell in agression this morning. Don’t even imagine how this could happen. Especially if keeping in mind all the tolerance and patience I’ve got… I’m a bit overwhelmed with this fact and even don’t know why it happened.

Maybe it’s all about the subway? The tube is not the best place to get positive emotions. When everybody goes to work at the morning, with a desire for a warm soft bed to sleep in and so that nobody will disturb you… or someone will

Well, to be honest, I suppose some things could induce it… So, yesterday was a st. Valentines’ day. What do I have? Nothing. No girlfriend at the moment but some relations with some girls. Not love yet, not physical relationships – just something is hanging around when we’re together. And I still have and idea to do what I wanted to do to Her. Sounds frightening even to me, but with some determintsation of what I want to be and whom I want to be with I hope everything will happen as I wish.

Amen