*Getting there: Cheap flights with airBaltic transiting in Riga,Latvia(Schengen zone)-actually cheaper than taking a train from Amsterdam to Moscow

*Getting around: Single ticket in Moscow metro costs ~55Rubles (~0.8Eur) and can be used to travel any number of times without exiting the metro station, Taxis can be available with Uber or Gett taxi app

*WiFi: Available at SVO airport on arrival terminal, rest of the city public hotspots have poor connection or require Russian mobile number

*Money: Visa and Mastercard are widely accepted and can also be used at supermarkets

*Language: English not widely spoken, so be prepared with some standard Russian phrases. Even better write it down and point-shouldnt be so hard with all the translation apps.

*See: The stunning old metro stations on line4, Red Square and surrounding landmarks (Moscow is lit up during night)

*Tips:Be aware of illegitimate/unregistered youth hostels/accomodation. Carefully hold the departure slip which will be stamped on arrival at Russia (needed while exiting the country). Get Moscow Metro map and familiarise with stations of interest and travel directions (Russians are friendly(shock!!) - just ask and avoid opening with ‘do you speak English?’). If travelling with train make sure the Cyrilic characters match the name pronunciation. If you are in need for some spare electronic parts at the last moment, check pleer.ru. Buying national train tickets is possible on the language friendly webiste of Russian rail rzd.ru. Openstreetmaps has free maps for almost all regions of the world which can be downloaded and used on Garmin devices; get one for the country you are visiting - very helpful! Consider using xend.pay for making bank transfers (to pay for bills/invoices), they provide amongst the best exchange rates in comparison to banks (transferwise is limited in number of countries one can pay into). Use the following link https://secure.xendpay.com/signup/ur/U206565 and get 10euro as joining bonus on successful transfer. Consider applying for credit cards which do not charge the ~2% charge for using in a foreign currency (highly recommend Deutsche Kredit Bank)

We fly into SVO and had earlier tried to find the best possible option for getting from the airport into the city. booking a taxi before hand online is relatively expensive costing anywhere between 20-40 eur, but with the added convenience of english speaking driver. The other possiblity is to take the aeroexpress metro into belorussky station and change over to the corresponding line to get to the end destiantion, but with 22kg backpack + hand baggage it was not the most comfortable (would cost abut 600 rub per person). Instead we chose one of the mega players in the collaborative market, Uber and ended up paying about 13 eur to our hostel. We already warmed up our “hand and legs” language in the absence of understanding each others language. The driver tried to make some conversation about India and pointing to the temperature display, maybe asking why the hell was i leaving a warm country and ending up in -15C, or maybe asking me to drink more vodka since its not as sunny anymore… open to interpretation!

Moscow has the vibe of the perfect immersionist experience if you are looking to get out of your comfort zone. cant decipher many of the cryllic characters, cant speak the language, cant get around in the metro, the music sounds so different, cuisine completely unknown, coupled with the mystery of a “former” communist country its a perfect mix to slip into a new world… of course mcd follows you everywhere if you understand the language or not.

We got off at the address of the hostel but could not find the building there was an old man/usher who showed us the way to our hostel by pointing to go around the building and go up the stairs, what a go around that was … we thought we entered some kind of a drug den. we were later to find out that there are lot of illegal hostels in moscow and booking.com listing does not mean legitimacy. Finally we checked into a very minimalistic hostel. Go there for the friendly people and local experiences but not if you want a very comfortable place to stay.

Using an aircon in moscow at -15 temperatures? believe it or not, the hostel turn up the heat till its a sauna indoors. also something we end up seeing in manzhouli

The next day we went to collect the tickets of our train journey. the office building was just as non descript as the hostel, all so anonymous with no billboards, but we are greeted by Natalia, a very warm and friendly person behind the counter who gives us much insight into the Moscow way of life. We are breaking stereotypes by the person, Russians are quite friendly and willing to help and tolerate our poor language skills till we are able to communicate whatever little we can.

We have lunch at the italian restuarant, Russian cuisine is not really vegetarian friendly and end up paying about 30eur for a good 4 course meal. Credit cards are accepted everywhere, the paywave rfid payment can also be used in metro stations and grocery stores.

In the night we step out to go visit the red square, we also observe something we already saw flying into the city of moscow, they love their lights! all building are lit up on the outside. looks like they are recreating daylight and just showing off the grandeur of some the humongous buildings. Red Square is no exception. the sheer scale of the whole thing exudes dominance but one is still able to find some beauty in the midst of all that awe. the beautiful domes of st basilica. Just a stone throw away is an underground luxuruous shopping mall lined with marble.. classical irony. At this point the camera battery emptied and realisatin dawned that we did not have the charger along with us. Although we could not find the charger we were looking for, pleer.ru is a very useful resource. They have a big warehouse very close to one of the metro stations and can help to find most of generic electronic spare parts.

we go subway hopping on line 4 the second oldest metro line with absolutely gorgeous metro stations, each of them having their own unique characteristics right down to marble colour, archways, ligthing and themes ranging from education, art, history, war/propoganda but real pieces of art. with people just rushing through the stations, we were taking time to admire the beauty of the place, some random person just walks up to me and gives me a russian miniature flag .. am i being marked?

Navigating the meto stations of moscow is like a mind puzzle , if Be is to Б and Ef is to Ф, does Кра́сная пло́щадь lead to the red square?

fun fact: Yakutia region in russia has the lowest recorded temperatures upto -70C and is purpotedly recommended for people who want to stay young - the natural antiwrinkle solution

Up next: Do we freeze on the the trans-siberian express?? Stay tuned