The weekend

So oops. hehe

Thursday we finally made it to the Cathedral of Christ the Savior. It is gorgeous and huge. AND new. Stalin destroyed it. shocker, and tried to build something in its place but that didn't work out so he put a swimming pool there instead. After the fall, they Orthodox church got permission to rebuild it, so the built it like it was before and finished it in like 2000 or something. Anyway. It was way cool and amazing on the inside but unfortunately pictures weren't allowed.

Friday we went to an ex-Soviet park. It is funny to me when things are described like this because technically everything is ex-soviet. Anyway, this park had buildings for each Soviet Republic. And apparently they had festivals and such. I don't know too much about it one of our friends was telling us about it and another was translating...and they got stopped by the police. I think they said Stalin too loud. look out. After wondering around the park for a while we went across town where I made my debut on TV as an audience member of the Russian version of dancing with the stars. I know right? it was kinda hilarious and uncomfortable. we were sitting on the floor and the speaker was right in our ear. I don't know if that ear will ever be the same.


(thanks to linsey for stealing a pic, and letting me steal it from her)

Saturday we went to Tsaritsyno
This was a summer get away for Catherine the Great...that she never used.
It is a massive park and castle with several huge buildings.
She had it built to celebrate her (Russia's) victory over the Turks. It took ten years to build, she came by didn't like it and had it torn down and told them to try again. The next one also took ten years to build and was finished the year she died. The tsar after her didn't like it so they didn't even finish the interior and just let it rot. However, in 2005 they decided to fix it up and now it is super cool and has a 21st century interior..modeled after Catherine the Great's time period of course. haha. it was pretty cool. The gardens and parks are amazing. Apparently Russians think so too because there were at least 30 brides taking pictures there on Saturday. Apparently it is normal...or ridiculous. Linsey and I lost count. After the park we went over to our program director's house to have a party and get together. It was really fun and nice to just relax for a bit.