Trip Report: Moscow, Russia

Last Friday I went to Moscow to meet with @etherdesign, and work on the design for SteemQ. Well he did most of the work, and had to put up with all the questions stemming from my ignorance in regards to design and the Russian language/culture. Сергей is one of the best people I've ever met, and the new design is absolutely killing it.

Airport Taxi Scam

I have been swamped by a group of 'official taxi' man the moment I walked out of the airport. I have politely rejected their taxi offers at least dozen of times. I wasn't fond of the way they approached me, sort of like predators. Also, I had private transport arranged, thanks to the courtesy of @etherdesign.
Unfortunately, I have missed that ride (I was running late). One of the 'official taxi' man has seemed somewhat friendly, so I've decided to cautiously ask him for the price of the ride to the city, without the intent of committing to a ride. He told me that the price is 90EUR, and I thought that was quite an excessive price for a 30-40min ride. So I offered 40. We haggled for a while and reached the price of 65EUR (which I still thought was too much). The taxi man has yanked my luggage from my hand and thus started dragging me to his car. I should have listened to my instinct and took it back and walked away, but being in a foreign country without knowledge of a single Russian word, cold and 48 hours without sleep I didn't have the energy and determination to take care of this situation, so I gave in.

Thinking back, I should have just walked out of the airport zone, and flagged down a normal taxi, or taken the bus to the metro.

Shortly after the ride had started, the driver started complaining. He has entered the address in GPS, and said it would take 2 hours to get there. The GPS said it would take 40 minutes. The google maps I looked at from home said it would take 40 minutes too. So I knew he was bullshitting me. I asked him to use his phone to send 1 text, and he told me that he has no service on the phone. I could see it was connected to LTE internet, so I told him its not possible to have LTE and not be able to send 1 SMS. He didn't budge from his lie.

Then he started complaining about bad traffic, saying 'look, bad traffic' at least 20 times, despite the fact there was barely any traffic in the direction we were going (the opposite lane was pretty busy however). At this point I was very angry at myself for being so stupid and walking into an obvious trap. To add the salt to the wounds, the guy started chain smoking in the car.

We arrived at the final destination after a not-so-pleasant 40 minute ride. I have given the driver the money, but he wanted more. I gave him all my RB ($100) worth, and said I didn't have anymore. But he wouldn't budge. He asked me for Euros, and I said no like 10 times. But he wouldn't stop. He had my luggage, and he wanted 50 EUR more. So in the end, I just gave him the stupid money, got my luggage back, and walked away.

The good times

@etherdesign has a very sound advice - if something looks strange, just walk away. By applying this simple principle, its possible to stay out of trouble, and have a good time. And good time I had.

On Sunday, we went for an excursion, and I'd like to share some of that experience with you fellow steemians.

Я любовь баграш

Seriously, this is one of my favorite soup like dishes now.

Метро

Every station has a different design...

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Cool looking shopping mall

Near the red square. Didn't shop there, just had to take a leak...

Statues

I took some pictures of statues and mostly nothing else.

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A miniature one.

And a really big one. Standing under this one made me feel small and insignificant.

Censorship

Many websites are banned in Russia, and thus blocked by ISPs. BTC-e is one example.

Fin

This is all I have for now. More good stuff is coming in the next SteemQ update, coming later this week.

Спасиба, И досвиданйе.

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