The next day we all headed for the train station to buy our tickets to Yasnayo Polyana, this is the summer dacha of Tolstoy. It is supposed to be a great day trip, so about 16 or more of us will be going; not all seniors, some are friends of Jonathan's and Whitney's. We will take that trip on Saturday.
After we purchased our tickets, we headed out to find the theater for the Chinese Imperial Circus. We had seen a billboard of it when we were on the Moscow River cruise.
So, we looked up the theater (The Estrada Theater) on the internet and printed out a map with the metro stations shown. We had never been to this metro station before. It was a four station metro and the absolute busiest we had ever seen. We popped up out of the metro and took a look around trying to get our bearings. Everything infront of us is fairly nondescript. Then I notice in the distance the Peter the Great Statue. I am estimating that we are on the West side of the statue near Gorky Park. (So much for my sense of direction. We were actually to the East of the statue.)
With our noses in the maps and trying to read street signs we made a decision to turn right. As we began to walk our vista began to change as the buildings began to reveal more of the city before us. We hadn't gone 20 feet and when we saw the big cathedral that we described and showed in the last post. Then I looked to my right and noiced something that I thought looked familiar. It is green garden edging on lawn filled with flowers spelling Moskva and something that looked very similar to one of St. Basil's onion domes. Then I look up and there is the Bibliotecka (the Lenin Library! (To be fair, there was a row of trees between us and the building.) In disbelief I immediately looked across the street to the see red brick walls surrounding the Kremlin Palace. We were about 1/4 mile from Red Square. We just shook our heads and smiled. Our noses were do deep into the maps. If we had just kept looking ahead...
Now we reverted back to the maps and determined that the main bridge that cross the Moscow River (which we have been on many times) is the bridge that was indicated on the map. So we began the trek. And then, the river came into view. In another moment of disbelief I looked across the river and saw the billboard, which ended up being the main signage for the theater itself. When I took the picture, the only thing I captured on film was billboard. Right above the billboard was the name of the theatre. You can see from the photo, that the roof of the boat kept me from seeing the name of the theater.
Well, so much for another senior moment. By the time we arrived at the theater, it was about 6:50 p.m. We looked at one another and with a little discussion, decided that there was no point in buying tickets and coming back. We had no other plans for the night. So we asked the cashier if they had tickets for 7:00 p.m. Ten minutes later we were in our seats. Ten minutes after that the show began.
The Chinese circus is all about acrobatics; strength, flexibility and balance, and boy do they have it. Our jaws dropped with every act. They are like human pretzels that can defy gravity. Here are a few pics I took off the iternet.
When the show was over, we were greeted by a thunderstorm with lots of lightening. We found or should I say a couple from Ireland found us. We talked for about an hour, until the rain let up. We had left our umbrellas at home and at the office!!
On a temporal note, the markets have been in turmoil every since we went to Paris...a 2,000 point drop in the DJIA...straight down in less than three weeks. Fortunately, some leadership was shown by Wells Fargo bank yesterday and their stock went up an amazing 32 percent in one day. Thank goodness. It seems to put a bottom in the market and wrung out some of the fear that led some people to believe that the sky was indeed falling (well at least I did!!). Oil also has lost 15 a barrel in the last three days. Things are looking up!! Only $129 a barrel!! I hope you kids see that reflected in the pumps soon.
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