I was here two years ago, and I feel like I both remember everything and have forgotten everything at the same time. On the one hand, I'd sort of forgotten how big Moscow is. In terms of pure city limits, it's the 7th biggest city in the world, with more than 2 million people more than New York, so I'm not sure how I could forget that, but somehow I did. Tomsk is a respectable city, but it feels like a village in retrospect. Here there are huge buildings all over the place; even in the peaceful residential area where my apartment is, there are 25-story apartment buildings. There are restaurants and cafes everywhere, clothing stores, electronics stores, movie theaters, etc. And it really caught me by surprise.

It has gotten me really excited, though. I guess after spending most of the past two summers in Tomsk and most of the rest of my time in Chapel Hill, I've been missing big cities without even knowing it. It's fun to just walk around in central Moscow; today I went by metro to Red Square and then walked along Tverskaya (maybe Moscow's biggest street) for a couple hours. And even without actually doing anything per se, it was exciting. I'm sure this effect will wear off, but for now I'm having fun just by being here.

At the same time, like I said, some things are very familiar. The metro brings back memories, of course, and makes me again wish that Houston had something like that. I remember some other places specifically, too; important ones like Lenin's tomb, of course, but also stupid ones. Today on Tverskaya I saw a Rostik's, which is KFC but renamed for some reason, and I got tempted by the prospect of fast food and went in. Once inside, I realized suddenly that I'd been to Rostik's once two years ago, and it was that exact one. So it's all coming back to me, I guess.

As for my setup, I'm living in an apartment that's pretty much the exact opposite of the one I had in Tomsk. The other apartment was modern, sparse, had recently been renovated, and had a very spacious and well-lit, if empty, main room. The man I rented it from certainly never lives there; he just owns it and rents it. This apartment, on the other hand, is home to a family of three, as far as I can tell, and is about the same size as the last one in overall area. It's divided into more rooms, though, and feels very lived-in; there's homey wallpaper, rugs, little trinkets and books all over the place, etc. It's very cozy, in a good way. At the same time, it has some typically Russian quirks. For example, the woman who lives here told me to only turn the cold water on when I need it, and otherwise turn it off (I mean the cold water to the whole apartment, turn it completely on and off). She said it's because it's very expensive otherwise, which seems to be due to a problem with the toilet; it runs a steady trickle of water constantly into the bowl when the water's on. As a result, if I want to go to the bathroom, I turn the water on, do my business, wait for enough water to accumulate, flush the toilet, and then turn the water off. But that's just Russia.

This post is probably already too long for one day's attention span, so I'll talk more about what I've seen and done so far later. I'll also post pictures later (I won't have my laptop's internet working until tomorrow anyway). До завтра!