I’m getting time lagged from my limited access to internet. I find myself about what happened yesterday, today… Hope it’s OK with all of you.

Today marks 7 months since Sam’s accident. I woke up thinking so hard about him. Today is the longest day of the year and I am going to spend it with Sam in my heart.. as I do everyday… I love you my son

So.. where was I ? (There’s always that akward transistion) Yesterday.. I mentioned I started with a 6:30 AM run around the Kremlin. It was so cool being out on the street in braod daylight with hardly another soul in sight. Folks seem to get to work here around 10 AM.. that’s because they eat dinner around 10PM.  Here are some pictures from yesterday’s run.. Note that Ameikansky culture is all around.. 

 It was a little surreal to see an McDonalds overlooking the Kremlin gardens. 

The walls of the Kremlin

More of St. Cyrils

Lenin’s tomb again

After my run in the elevator

Built like a brick s**thouse

I then went to the pricy ($32 $US)  but yummy breakfast buffet and grabbed some fruit and smoked salmon.

Breakfast food

The bus ride to work was quick. We saw a few cool statues on the way.

Yuri Gegarin, first man in space !

Kommrad Lenin

A statue that’s being moved because it’s ‘too ugly’  And that’s saying something here

I know I briefly described yesterdays meetings at IBM.They were really productive.. I think this Academy stuff is the most creative and satisfying part of my job right now..    I love meeting folks in other IBM communities.  Here’s a picutur of one of the roundtables we had with new employees. These were amazing folks… all were perfectly fluent in English,whip-smart,  funny and cynical as hell. Cynicism has been raised to an art form  here.. folks have a highly developed sense of irony but they seem to have fun with it.  

Some smart new guys at IBM Russia (Note: not all the smart people here are guys.. the lab director is my freind Jen T)

We also met with 4 senior professors from Russian universities. Profs V. Ivanakov, V., Gergel, I Galiamova, S,. Kalinkow.  Prof Ivonakov is  the dean of Physics and Technology at Moscow State University.. that’s the most prestigious Technical university in Russia.. ,, Its like their MIT.

The visiting Prof’s

We were introduced as visiting dignitaries.. By title, I’m one of the two most senior folks of our 20 person group  which is uber-weird for me. I’m certainly the most immature. Most  of the Profs spoke perfect English, but protocol demanded we have a cold-war style interpreter..

The interpretter

it was pretty funny.. the Profs kept correcting the translator… and would start to answer us in English. Then remember and restart in Russian . After the meeting we were able to talk to them informally which was great. Prof Kaliniokow is a world expert in visualization and is really excited about helping kids visualize science and math concepts. I think I’ve found a friend.

    We grabbed lunch in the cafeteria in this building. The food was hard to figure out…. But tasty enough…

Lunch.. (Note: most food here is brown)

The gang !

Then back for another couple of hours of meetings. My US-based day-job colleagues started to wake up in late afternoon over here and I dropped into trying to be in two places at once. I do feel guilty for being over here while they struggle back at home.. I need to pay attention to that feeling.. I’m always feeling torn between what I ‘should’ do and what I ‘want to’ do.   Anyway….

    Around 6 we headed back to the hotel. Last night was our big communal dinner . We went to a traditional Moscow place and it was fantastic.. The place was all decorated with mosaics and murals. The staff were all in native costumes. I could tell that the place was geared to tourists.. but it felt real. They kept bringing cool food out.. and we kept eating. The food was amazing !

The Russian flag

 The front of the resturant

Buns filled with meat, mushrooms , or cabbage

Special cranberry juice

One of our waitresses

One of my sculptures

Peter the Great and John the Pretty Good

Candle people

A sturgeon

Steve’s Lamb

My Stugeon

A ‘Heart- Sturgeon’ (Billy, thats for you)

The Lady Singers (see the movies !.. they sing beutifully)

My Beer (I added Cranberry juice just for fun)

The Balailika Boys

Serving

Joe and Jane

One of the really cool things was the entertainment.. despite the cramped quarters, we had two bands.. the first was two accordions and a balalaika 

Reminds me of a an old Yiddish song that I know… Eddie new it too and we started to sing it

 
Tumbala tumbala tumbalaleika,
Tumbala tumbala tumbalaleika,
Tumbalaleika, schpil balaleika,
Tumbalaleika, frejlech sol sajn.

 The next band was 4 women dancers and an accordion player. The women had really beautiful voices. They danced despite all the foot traffic moving around them.. it was really fun

 

After dinner, we could hardly move !.. We went once more to Red Square to try and walk off our dinner. Here are a few more pictures from that.

The gang in front of St Cyrils

Note the time..it’s 5 minutes of 11PM.. and this is the color of the sky.

We went back to the hotel around 11:30 and ended up having a spirited meeting on a work topic until about 12:30.. Vodka helped us all reach a good technical compromise. I went up to my room and dialed into the internet over the phone. I added all of last nights pictures over the 56kB phone connection.. which was pretty painful .  I also called home and talked to Max which was great. I miss those boys like crazy. I heard that Gabe has a 103.5 fever and still feels crummy.. It’s hard to be away when the kids are sick. It’s a big burden on Diane, I know.  I haven’t been able to catch her by phone yet.. I miss her so much..  I love you my family !  At about 1:30 I fell asleep and slept great..

    This morning I was up at around 7.. then met up with  a brave subset of my posse here for an attempt to get to work by subway.. It was a hoot !…  Pictures from that tomorrow !

 Anyway.. now I’m in the meeting and trying to type and participate  at the same time.  I’m not nearly as good at multitasking as I was before Sam’s passing.. So.. I’m going to stop now and pay attention.. 

 Talk to you later ! Love you all. Dasvidania !

 -jc