Happy Chinese New Year in Moscow, the year of the sheep and fly to Ukraine and Amsterdam

I woke up super late today because I badly needed to sleep. Woke up early to skype with my husband and realized that our grandmother was not doing so great - she is in the hospital where she thinks that she will die.

It is never good to have bad news when you travel because you feel guilty and feel that you need to fly home right away. He informed me that I don't need to worry and that everything is fine. We chatted for a bit and I kind of fell asleep in front of him.

Woke up at 14:00 and ate some pancakes with caviar and sour cream, my FAVOURITE thing in the world! Also some fish that Sasha's mother made, raw fish, it was delish!

Sasha's fish recipe

You buy good raw salmon, cut it in pieces, desinfect it with cognac, put salt and lemon  (not too much salt) and wait a bit. It was so delicious. I think I gained 10 lbs coming to Russia.

Taking the train by myself!!

Afterwards, I went on my own in the subway to meet an acquaintance of Sasha in order to go to a famous art museum of Moscow. It was quite fun to be alone in Moscow, I felt like a lost tourist which I was because I couldn't read Russian well.

I met Jane in the Library station and we went to the Gallery in an old part of Moscow. A rich merchant donated his house and arts to the city of Moscow. Something that bothered me was that they charge foreigners more to visit the museum because they think that foreigners are rich (this is what I was told) so she bought the ticket for cheaper because she is Russian. This is a practice that you can find in China and India which sucks! I don't think it is right at all... we are all humans so we should be charged the same... Anyways, that is another discussion for another time when I actually have the brain to really think about it.

There were a lot of paintings, especially portraits. The famous Puskin's portrait was there and Ivanov's Jesus painting was also there. It was huge, took the whole wall and you feel sucked into the painting - you felt everyone's pain and anger, quite amazing.

Afterwards, we went to the restaurant, Georgian food was very good and we chatted.

Her friend, Kolai (short for Nikolai) was going in the same direction so we went on and he got lost a bit which was funny because he has been taking this metro for the past 2 years. He also traveled a lot so he was telling me about his love for hiking in the mountain (fast forward one year, he has opened a hiking company, please visit his site)

Went home and thanks to free wifi in the subway, I was able to let Sasha know when I was going be home. Afterwards, we had a night drive together through Moscow, it was soooo nice!!!! I love the lights on the building and I will never forget that Sasha almost went into an opposite direction and I said huh No no no Sasha so she turned around. We LAUGHED for hours - oh I love this girl!

Again we had our fun conversation and drove around Moscow without any traffic. We went home and talked all night. Drank Georgian wine. Georges was nice enough to drive me to the airport the next day, early in the morning. My flight was at 7:55am to Kiev, Ukraine.

I arrived in Kiev and I HATED IT! The people at the airport were rude, pushed me around and yelled at me. I wasn't really allowed to leave so I stayed behind. I was so annoyed and could not wait to get out of here to Amsterdam. On the plane, I heard two old American men talking about their girlfriends... their internet brides... I will never forget those two and I had 2 rude women behind me yelling and kicking so I didn't really have a good rest. Ukraine International Airlines also didn't feed us breakfast and give us water so I was soooo dehydrated when I arrived in Amsterdam that I wanted to DIE! Note to self, never take Ukraine International Airlines...

When I arrived in Amsterdam, the cute custom agent asked me where I was going - Amsterdam., FINALLY he said! you have only been in the Netherlands Antilles so welcome to the Netherlands, wink. He was so cute! LOL

I saw Marielle right away when I got off the plane!!!!!!! Hugged her sooo hard, I missed her so much. My pretty sexy girlfriend. If I was a guy, I would totally date her because she has a great personality and she is so much fun ;) Guys, I have a friend for you if you are willing to move to Holland for her...
I really needed to EAT and DRINK because I was so dehydrated that I had a really bad headache so we went to a small supermarket in the airport and got some sandwiches and water. Took pictures and went on with our day walking in Rotterdam!