More Art and Cafe Reviews

(Yet another back-logges post)

Well, today was a lot of fun. I was sitting in my room last night, contemplating over what to do for Sunday when I got a call from Dasha. Dasha's mom works with Natasha and we exchanged phone numbers through them. She called and invited me to a photography exhibit. Since I was already feeling so artsy, I decided, why not? Francesca, Susan, and I headed out and met Dasha this morning. We ended up going to this really cool exhibit which was a collection of the best photographs from Russia for 2008. It was pretty awesome. Dasha is an amateur photographer (and a snowboarder. Very interesting person.), so she acted as our personal tour guide. Francesca was as crazy as always and ended up taking over 100 pictures of random pigeons and stray dogs....

Later, we headed out to Red Square and she showed us this very cool little cafe behind McDonald's and diagonal from Red Square. It has now officially become my favorite cafe in Moscow. It is underground and designed like a flat. There is a “kitchen” with a bar, a “kid's room” with bean bag-like couches, a “bedroom” with a bed, and a “library” with records and books. The food is excellent and cheap, which is a nice change. You see, cafes have recently beome the new cool thing to do, so there is a proliferation of bad, overpriced coffee houses throughout Moscow.

Typically, the food is pretty basic and very overpriced. This cafe, on the other hand, has a great variety of unique and tasteful food (I had eggplant soup in a black bread tower and summer tea with mint and lime in a pint beer mug) at decent prices (my total came to about $8.50). Susan and I were ecstatic because they have a whole vegetarian fare that is not greasy potatoes and Greek salad. Great good, good prices, and a very relaxed atmosphere. We will definitely be going back.

For Claire and Grace: To get to the cafe, get off metro Ohotni Rod (Red Square stop) and walk away from the Square. Go a couple blocks until you see a McDonald's/Max Kafe. Take a left right before McDonald's and walk down until you see a green fence on your right. Go through the green fence and on the left there will be a yellow yawning of sorts. Go down the stairs and you're there. It's called FAQ or Cafe Prosto. Make sure you go. Oh, and get the tea...

Now, I am headed off to Francesca's room for a make-shift, Charades party. Tomorrow is the first day of Maslenitsa, so after classes I am going to go see what's going on. Maybe just shopping and blini-making. Yum...
I LOVE MOSCOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!