2004 July 14

July 14, 2004

Weather Report – seems like it rains every afternoon in Switzerland… but it was nice and cool… about 60 F.

Adjustment Challenges – this was my first business trip since our move, so it was hard to leave Sara behind. Thankfully it was a good trip and things went OK for her in Novomoskovsk…

Interesting Observation – Swiss money is about the prettiest I’ve every seen. But even the paper money is all different sizes…

Hi all – thought I give you a brief update about my recent trip to Switzerland… normally that would sound exciting, but it was tough leaving Sara alone in Novomoskovsk after only being there for a few days… but I had a meeting to attend at our office in Geneva, and Sara and I originally planned on being in Russia by late June. I posted some pictures of my trip.

Geneva

Anyways… I flew out of Domodedovo (DME) airport in Moscow on Sunday… this is on the southern side of Moscow. It was a nice change to fly out of DME as this airport is closer to our home in Novo (a mere 2 hour ride from our door to the airport J). The travels were generally un-eventful, and I arrived in Geneva at 5:45 PM local Geneva time (6 hours ahead of east coast time).

I found Geneva to be a beautiful country… very scenic via its mountains… but I was most surprised at how absolutely quiet it was, especially for a big city. After I checked into my hotel (a 37 room boutique hotel), I figured I’d go for a walk to get dinner. Lesson #1 about Geneva – nothing is open on Sunday evening… absolutely nothing. No restaurants (that I found at least), no groceries, not even a gas station. I returned to the hotel and ate the snacks in the minibar (or as comedian Mitch Hedberg says… the machine that makes everything more expensive).

My meetings on Monday and Tuesday were good… nice to meet the people in my region… although it was hard to catch exact names. Our office in Geneva is beautiful… nestled in a quiet neighborhood… wonderful gardens surrounding it.

Wednesday was my travel day back to Moscow… I had breakfast at the hotel (as I did Monday and Tuesday)… it was a “buffet” – but not like I’d find in US hotels… there was blocks of cheese… some derivative of ham… croissants… fresh fruit… nice crusty bread… cappuccino, juices…etc. It really hit the spot... but the best part was discovering what I guess is the Swiss equivalent of the doughnut – a flakey pastry with a chunk of chocolate in the middle. Very tasty!

Pizano’s? You stealing my money?

I got back to the Geneva airport without issue… checked in for my flight… and had some time to kill. Stopped at the duty-free shop to pick up a bottle of Bailey’s Irish Crème (goes great in our weekend coffee, but is kind of expensive in Moscow, so I figured it was good to get it here). Found a coffee shop in the airport… had another cappuccino. Decided to get a bottle of water before I got I plane… so I went back up to the counter with all the Swiss Franc coins I had left (I had a 4.35 Francs in coins that I want to get rid of. 4.35 Swiss francs is about $3.48). The water was 4.50 Swiss francs… I was .15 francs short (about 2 cents). I saw what I thought was the standard “give a penny… take a penny” tray on the counter. So I started pawing through the tray… looking for my magic .15 francs… I thought it was unusual that there were a couple 2swiss franc coins in there (about $1.50)… before I knew it… in perfectly clear English… the counter worker saying to me “hey hey hey – that’s me tips!”. Embarrassed again… reminded me of a good Seinfeld episode… the one where George was getting calzone from Pizano’s… and put a buck in the tip jar – but the counter worker didn’t see it. So George tried to grab it back and the counter worker caught him, and kicked George out of Pizano’s… after I walked away, I could understand what the counter worker was saying as he laughed and told his co-workers about our little exchange J.

I flew back to Moscow… and my plan was to meet my driver… and go to a place called “MEGA MALL”. It’s also on the southern side of Moscow, and I wanted to stop there to do grocery shopping, electronics shopping, and IKEA shopping to get some home décor stuff.

Shopping

My day was actually going really well… we got the mall at a pretty good time (just a bit after 6PM Moscow time). I was going to do grocery shopping at a French chain called “Auchen”. I told the driver to expect me to be done around 6:45 PM. I grabbed my cart… and started my mad dash around the store…. 1^st stop – the electronics section to get a clock radio, hair dryer, and power strips. I noticed people walking out with big expensive stereos… so obviously people were spending money here. This was a big store… I believe there were 65 cash registers… and a line at every single one.

I maneuvered around the store… I was a little surprised I actually saw things like paint and garden tools – first time I’ve seen this in Moscow. I found most of what I needed (but keep in mind grocery shopping is still very hard as I cannot read any of the labels… mostly I go buy shape of the package and pictures on the packages. I bought what I was pretty sure was bouillon cubes (later confirmed it was) – but was only able to select them via the picture of the cow on one package (beef bouillon) and the chicken on the other (chicken bouillon). Sara also wanted me to get some steaks / beef as we were planning to have beef stroganoff on Friday of this week. I went to the meat section… was looking at what I thought was beef… picked out what I thought was nicely sliced pieces of filet mignon…. But I thought it was curious that it had no fat on it. We later learned, that what I bought, was actually… Salmon steaks. I’m not what you call a big fish fan J

Insufficient Funds

Anyways… I checked my watch and noticed that it was getting late (about 7PM). Remembering I told the driver I’d be back @ 6:45 PM… I figured I better go check out. I invested 1 hour in grocery shopping… time to go wait in line. As I was waiting and observing… I noticed… I didn’t see any credit card readers – anywhere. But people were leaving with stereos and expensive stuff! Surely they aren’t walking around with this much cash in their pockets?

Wisely… I approach one of the cashiers who was waiting to switch in for her shift… I showed her my credit cards and asked, in very bad English/Russian – do they take credit cards. I heard the dreaded “niet” – which is Russian for “no”. Yikes… lots of groceries, esp. with things that we need, like dishwasher soap… and I did not have enough cash on me to buy them. So… I parked my cart behind a pallet (hoping nobody would take it)… and went on my quest to find an ATM machine. Thankfully there was one right at the edge of the store. I put my card in… press the magic “English” button, and start processing a withdrawal. No good – get an insufficient funds message (which was troubling… I know my account balances – and I should have been good for this transaction). I step back from the machine… and let a few others try to use it… they were unsuccessful as well… so I figure it was a machine problem.

I had to continue on my quest for cash… this was a big mall… and I walked almost all of it. Not a single ATM machine would give me cash… not on my ATM card, not on a credit card.. nothing. Now getting frustrated… it was almost 8 PM (I was looking for cash for an hour)… still wanted to get to IKEA, and had a 2.5 hour ride back to Novomoskovsk ahead of me as well. I was thinking… as I walked back to the store… that I was going to prioritize my groceries, and get as many things as I could for the amount of rubles I had in my pocket (about $60 worth). I walked past the very first ATM that I tried… and I figured I give it another shot. Would you believe – it actually worked! So I took out several thousand rubles… and proudly walked back to my cart. Everything was still there… so I went to wait in line again… as I was loading my groceries on the conveyor belt…. Some Russian woman behind me in line pushed past a few people… started pointing at my groceries and shouting at me… literally shouting. Something about buying electronics… I wasn’t sure what her issue was… but I’m quickly learning that often, Russians just like to argue for the sake of arguing… they have a collective history that I believe gives them the right to do this.

The cashier rang me up… tried explaining something to me (I really think I wasn’t supposed to buy electronics in grocery line or something like that) – but no one stopped me, and I walked out… very happy that my shopping trip turned out OK.

The Drive back to Novo

I skipped the electronics store stop, but did go to IKEA to get some décor stuff, pillows, etc. At checkout I was asked for my passport (thankfully I had itJ). I grabbed a tasty (sarcasm intended) IKEA hot dog for dinner, went outside, loaded up the car, and headed back south to Novomoskovsk.

The weather on the trip back was awful… very rainy and lots of thunder and lightning. Not exactly a pleasant drive if you know what I mean. Thankfully – got home safe and sound… Sara, Joe, and Rommel were all pretty happy to see me… and I was glad to be home.

Thanks for reading…

Michael

P.S. – we did learn that one of the major banks in Russia collapsed in the earlier part of the week, and there was a run on money at ATMs as a result… I think that is was caused all the ATM craziness… but I’ve learned, if nothing else, only take cash to Auchen’s!