Drunkcyclist.com

From: Andrej
Subject: Sector Southeast: The Beheaded Forerunner
Like Eddy Limonov, in “It’s me, Eddy,” I have undertaken an epic walking tour of mighty Moscow. I have divided the city into five sectors:
1. The center around the Kremlin
2. Sector Southeast
3. Sector Southwest
4. Sector Northeast
5. Sector Northwest

I got an ass pack, my red short shorts, my short goggles, a compass, a blade, and a fist full of babki (grannies=money).

I still have my Arctic tan, and I am determined to maintain it.

Day First: Sector Southeast
It’s hot and humid and overcast. Blue sky and clouds fight for territory.

From my residence in Sevastopolskaya, I walk due east.

The roads here are extremely wide; easily eight lanes wide, and few stop lights. So crossing them is perilous. There are plenty of underpasses everywhere. As a result, women here are forced to climb lots of stairs, and that probably accounts for their fantastic legs. (They should change the name of the this country to Leg Show.)

Every block, there is a playground, where I do a set of pull-ups or dips.

Eventually I get to a huge park. This park sits on a 300 foot bluff overlooking the third bend in the Moskva River. On the bluff is a little heavily wooded hill. In the midst of this thick forest is the pogoda like Cathedral of the Beheaded Forerunner; that’s what the Russians call John the Baptist. It’s interesting that the very tall trees grow almost to the walls of the Cathedral, so it is impossible to get a full view of it. On the key stone of the brick arch gateway is an adorable little mosaic of the Forerunner’s head in a bucket.

But there many little fairy tale churches in this park. Pick up a stick, chuck it, and there’s another one!

And it’s hot and I need a beer. I see a girl standing next to an ice chest under a big Lowenbru sun umbrella. A cop is hitting on her. I walk up and buy a Klinskoe lager tallboy. There is a new law in Russia banning public drinking. I wanted to see if this law was being enforced. I take a sip and continue along my merry way. The law is a dead letter.

I continue up Andropov street, and into the center of Moscow.

By the time I get there, five hours latter, I looked like a Socialist Realist sculpture. Along the way I had done two hundred pull-ups and one hundred dips, and the sun had turned my skin bronze.

(And I had about three liters of beer in me.)

In Red Square I sat and stared at the men restoring St. Basil’s. I wished I was restoring St. Basil’s. But those guys probably wished they we me, chillin and drinkin a cold one in the furious heat at the foot of the Kremlin.

I haven’t been inside of the Kremlin yet. I’m gonna wait until I come back and speak Russian, so that I can appreciate it a little more.

On the north side of the Kremlin, there is a little narrow and deep fountain, filled with statues of Russian fairy tale characters. The place is swarming with hot chicks. I see a kid in the fountain. And that was all I needed.

And so there I am, in deep emerald water, enjoying a cold one. Next to me is a statue of a maiden mourning a drowned lover. In front of me are the battlements of the Kremlin and the Eternal Fame.

After a while I realized that no one else was in the fountain with me. So I thought it would be best to move on.

But I was hot

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