I am alive and have arrived. Will someone please get me a bib?

Ladies and gentlemen, I have arrived. Actually, I arrived on Saturday morning, but I haven't really had the energy to write anything until now.

What to write... There is so much... I guess these would be some good things to start with:

-I don't actually live in Moscow; I live in really up-scale gated neighborhood in the middle of the woods a little ways outside Moscow. No joke. I live in the snowy, beautiful, Russian woods near a suburb. Definitely not what I expected.

-My apartment is way nicer than I thought it was going to be. In fact, it is nicer than most apartments that I've been in in the States. We have a kitchen, but we're still not not sure if the disher washer works.

- I don't have a bed. I have a couch in the living room. There are five girls and four beds in our apartment, which means one of us has to take the couch. It's a weird sleeping situation. I don't mind sleeping on the couch, I enjoy sleeping on couches, it's just really weird because I don't have a bedroom, so there is traffic around where I'm trying to sleep and I have to fold my bedding up each morning. I'm sure I will have more to write about the situation later. It's livable for now, though.

-We weren't able to go to church yesterday because Gulya, our amazing local coordinater, wanted to take us to get money changed, see Red Square, get metro passes/ learn about how to get around, and find some groceries. It was a great day still, but I hate that it didn't feel like Sunday.

Walking out of the metro near Red Square.

Is that giant blue marshmellow in front of St. Basil's Cathedral Amy? Why, yes, it it! Walking into one of the other cathedrals is about the closest thing I got to going to church yesterday.

Pyelmeeny (I hope that spelling makes since. Writing a word from another language/alphabet into another is challenging... especially when you have trouble spelling in your own language). They're the same concept as a pot-sticker; boiled dough stuffed with a little ball of meat. Only, these are Russian, tortillini-shaped, soaked in butter, and usually eaten with sour cream. Russians seem to eat almost everything with sour cream. Maybe that's why they never smile; they always have a sour taste in their mouths.

Here's a sign for an Ashawn, which is something along the lines of a big grocery store chain. Notice the MTC sign? I'm guessing that's not the Missionary Training Center.

Here's a road sign in the near our neighborhood for the school where I will be teaching.

-Our building has a Peter. He is our... well, I'm not totally sure what he is. He lives in a room in our building, just outside the enterance to our apartment. He doesn't speak any English and is probably about thirty. Julia, the coordinater at our school, said that he's there to help us. I guess he cleaned the apartment for us before we came and is kind of like our maintainance man. We also have a guard dog named Black that will supposedly eat us if we don't let someone know we're coming in/out after dark so that Peter can put him away for us.

-One of Russians' favorite hobbies appears to be making-out in public places. In the food court. At the park. On Red Square. In the metro station. On the stairs in the mall. You name it- there is probably a young Russian couple there right now making-out like no one else is around, like breathing at least once a minute is not neccessary for survival, like it is the last time they are going to get to do something with their mouths before having their lips permanently amputated. Sorry if that created some disturbing images. Now you at least know what I witnessed pretty much everywhere I went yesterday.

- While out on the town yesterday, I successfully asked (in Russian!) where McDonalds (aka- international free bathrooms) is and ordered a water without bubbles at the foodcourt in the mall. The road to proficency has to start somewhere, hey? It's one baby step at a time, which means my 6-month old nephew is about as mobile as I am.

-Russians speak Russian (surprise! surprise!) and I love getting to listen to them speak. I love the language and it's all I can do to not drool on myself everytime I hear some of them conversing

This post could go on for a lot longer, but there is other work to be done. At least you all know now that I am not dead, nor have I been carried off by the Russian mafia.