Kazanorama

Now I am back from the city of Kazan. It was a pretty nice city and I had some interesting experiences there so I can't wait to tell all of you!

So we had a nice little 14 hour train ride there which wasn't bad since I actually got to sleep this time as opposed to the other overnight train trips I have had in Russia. Our hotel was pretty decent and was in a nice location within the city. The first day we met with one of our guides, Guzel. She led us around for the day and our first stop was of course the Kremlin. I was surprised and extremely happy to see a mosque since all I have seen are russian orthodox churches. After our Kremlin adventure we headed to the pedestrian street, Baumana, which reminded me a lot of Arbat in Moscow actually. Then we headed to lunch where I had a nice little conversation with Guzel. We were just talking and she asked me "Do you have a girlfriend?" and I just told her "No, I'm gay". Oh my god! Her expression was PRICELESS, I wish I could of taken a picture of it. I imagine that I was the first openly gay person this poor girl has ever met. She was definitely shocked and for some reason thought I was joking. But the situation subsided and we headed to the national museum where we learned a bit about Tartarstan. Our dinner was fun, we ate at the hotel and watched some movie that was basically a combo of Hocus Pocus and Pirates of the Caribbean.

Our second day we had a tour at an island that is near Kazan. On the way there our guide(not Guzel, thank baby Jesus) gave us some bits about the city as we saw it. We got to the island and okay... it's like the beginning of March and there are supposed to be two rivers but everything is FROZEN. Once you get on the island, the view of the frozen everything is quite amazing and eerie at the same time. Our tour on the island consisted basically of churches and more churches. One really interesting thing was the icon that was made with a non-human head. It seemed kind of weird and out of place to me but I liked it. After our island trip we had lunch at some little cafe where we got to taste some Tartar foods. That night we had a theater event to attend, Delafruz. It is a remake of a Soviet play in which a girl picks her true love out of 4 candidates. It was a fun little endeavor and the whole thing was actually in the Tartar language, but we had headsets that translated so it was alright. We decided to go to an Irish pub afterwards and we met the owner who took us through a very creepy tour of his second bar which is currently being renovated. In the end we all made it out alive and now we have a new friend in Kazan.

Our final day in Kazan was Monday which was International Women's Day! We made some plans to visit the souvenir market, hit up another church, and possibly see some of the metro. Okay... so I'm not gonna lie... this was pretty much the worst day during our trip, in regards to weather. It was snowing and pretty cold, so we weren't really excited to hit the road and get our day started. We got to Sts. Peter and Paul Cathedral and it was like one I have never seen before. The outside was ornately decorated and the inside was as well. Afterwards, we walked a while towards the souvenir market. It was a nice little setup inside of the city's exhibit center with interesting little souvenirs. We decided to see some of the metro and compare it to Moscow's. So Kazan's metro is only one line with basically six stations. It is pretty much a tiny little thing when compared to Moscow's insanely huge metro system. At the end of our day we were all pretty beat, we were so ready for that overnight train. We got on the train and headed back to Moscow.

Kazan was a pretty nice city but I definitely expected much more Eastern influence than what I got. I also think it would be a city that is much more beautiful during the warmer months when every body of water isn't totally frozen.