🌎📍Moscow
About Moscow
Welcome to Moscow!
Moscow, the capital of Russia, home to Red Square, the largest city in Europe and site of over 120 parks, this city possesses some quite unique features, the most notable (in my view) being: it is a youthful and contemporary, but at the same time antique and historically developed city.
Walking around Moscow, you can be struck with a beautiful skyline, which resembles the concrete jungle in New York — but one can also admire the Dormition Cathedral, also called Assumption Cathedral, from the 15th century. One could also take the metro to Vystavka Dostizheniy Narodnogo Khozyaystva (VDNKh), a really interesting Soviet amusement park which was constructed with the purpose of serving as propaganda for the Soviet Union at the time. Personally, this was one of my favorite attractions in Moscow.
And, of course, one cannot speak about Moscow without citing the Kremlin. Do you actually know what the Kremlin is?
A lot of people, myself included, believe that the Kremlin is the name of the office in which the President lives and works, or quite simply the "Russian White House". In reality, the Kremlin is far more than just that. It is a complex that possesses five palaces, four cathedrals, the Kremlin towers, and the Kremlin Wall, which serves as a fortress around the property. The office and official residence of the President are called the Grand Kremlin Palace, and is located within the Moscow Kremlin complex.
History
One of the most classic, if not the single most iconic monument in Moscow, is St. Basil's Cathedral. Built in the 16th century, it was ordered to be constructed by Ivan The Terrible to commemorate his conquest of the Islamic city of Kazan. It is one of the last remnants of the Mongol Empire on European lands.
Undoubtedly, Moscow is one of the richest and most important sites in terms of WW2 history. We visited a bunker used in WW2 to escape from the bombs and atrocities taking place. This bunker is an 18-story underground tunnel, which up to this day keeps several pieces of airplanes from which Soviet bombs were dropped, and all the relevant information about the bombs dropped in Russia and all WW2 countries.
Business
While in Moscow, we had the opportunity to meet with business people to discuss how Russians do business. We met with the CEO of EuroGazProject, a medium-sized Russian company focused on construction and project management consultancy.
I found this meeting especially interesting because the presenter dived deep into explaining how Russians do business, and how doing business in Russia is. To illustrate this, he alluded to the famous Doing Business Review, published by the World Bank, which ranks all countries according to the ease of doing business there. To my surprise, Russia was ranked really highly — 36º position!
There, we also met with a large company called Siberian Wellness, which is essentially a natural cosmetics and supplement company. There, the presentation mainly served to highlight the importance of Siberia as a natural resource treasure chest for Russia. We had the chance to taste test a few of their products and understand how each component promotes a given health benefit, which I particularly found really interesting.
Art
Moscow's art, certainly, was not limited to museums. Art was expressed on the streets (music, street art), buildings' architecture, paintings, fashion, etc. This is what gave Moscow the vibrancy and life that I enjoyed so much.
The Tretyakov Gallery was absolutely stunning and, in my view, superior to many of the famous museums I had visited in Europe, in the US, and on this trip itself — it was my favorite gallery.
The Moscow skyline, in Moscow City, was also a site I really enjoyed — it reminded me of New York, given its abundance of sky scrapers. Look at the twisted building in the photo — how is this not art?! This building reflects the uniqueness of Moscow's architecture, which possesses a wide array of styles, from classic Russian architecture to highly modern skyscrapers and corporate buildings, like the Tower of Evolution, seen above.
THE COLORS OF MOSCOW: Art is everywhere
Art is even… at the metro! In fact, Moscow is famous worldwide for having the most beautiful underground metro system. They possess beautiful architecture and paintings, making using the stations a delightful outing on the way to work, university, of a walking tour of the city itself.
To wrap up our beautiful trip in Moscow, we went on a night boat tour around the city — from there, we could see some of the most prominent monuments and sites, from the Kremlin, to the Seven Sisters complex, to the Brazilian Embassy (hehe). Needless to say, this was AWESOME.
THANK YOU, MOSCOW
