Made it to Moscow

Well, so far we've made it from Battle Creek to Moscow - no issues with any of the flights so far. We had an 8-hr layover in JFK, so that was an exciting day. The plane to Moscow was full, and we had bought tickets this time, so no business class. We still managed to get some rest, though. By the way, there was a flight attendant on the plane who was a dead ringer for my cousin Sarah. So Sarah, I guess that means that you could pass for Russian if you wanted... We got a "day room" at a hotel nearby the SVO airport, and we both got some more sleep, so feeling pretty good so far. Our flight to Kemerovo leaves at 10:30 pm, in another 3.5 hrs from now. Glad to have the internet access to kill some time.

Seems like we are slightly better communicators this time around with Russian. We were the only ones at the gate at JFK for hours, then they brought this old woman to the gate, who spoke no English, only Russian. She asked something about Moscow, we said "Da", then she took that as a sign we spoke Russian, and started speaking very quickly. Luckily, the only thing that came to mind helped - the equivalent of "I don't understand" in Russian. She ended up calling her daughter on her cell phone and handed it to Chris, who assured her that her mother was in the right place. Later in the day, all sorts of Russian people showed up, so she had people to talk to.

Tonight after checking out of the hotel (unfortunately we had to check out at 6 pm, and our ride is not coming until 8 pm), we ate at the hotel restaurant. Traditional Russian food - that is always challenging to pick something off the menu, but we both had spaghetti with mushrooms, and it was really good! No tomato sauce - more like an alfredo with onions, but it even met Chris's approval as the 2nd best thing he's had so far in Russia! They had brought us bread, and I was very proud of my ability to ask for butter - and we got butter! (some of you may remember me trying to ask for hot water on the plane to Siberia last trip, and getting coffee with milk instead...).

I believe there is no internet access in the hotel we'll be staying at in Kemerovo, only an internet cafe ~4 blocks away, so may not hear from us much for the next few days. We'll be able to make up for it in Moscow, where our apt is supposed to have free high-speed for our laptop.