18 дней в Петербурге: Днем 16.12
December 18, 2011
My camera was left at home, so we practiced with Dan’s camera and had super results!
We ate Chinese food until we burst and then Dan ordered a mountain of fried Carmel Bananas. There was much “Waddling” happening.
Then the Extreme Lunging started….
Even the American’s got involved!
Kill Fish Bar to start…
Metro Acrobatics by a talented small person…
..and her slightly taller companion.
Found Dan’s Dodgy Facial Hair Brother on the cover of a Russian book.
First ancient depiction of a bad breast job. Also found at Russian Metro Book Store.
The Men give some posing sass.
Appendage Sale. Mix ‘n Match for your own special look.
Table of the dictators. Errr, presidents.
Wait. Thats not chocolate?
And thats what we think of you Mr. Lenin.
Going in for the treasure!
Wolf Man wins the “Worst Dog Breath” contest.
Dictator Dan?
Being an egomaniac requires wicked posing skills.
With great age comes great facial hair.
Mikhailivsky Theater.
Men in tights, Faux Leaping Swans: High culture or Comedy? Swan Lake
Russian Bridges Falling Up!
McWeddings!HardCore Iraqi Women!A dictator gyrates!
March 1, 2011
Recommended Random Goodies to Dig Through.
January 18, 2011
New photos+ writing are on standby.
In the meantime, noteworthy (and not so noteworthy) music/sites/randomness/videos/underground sewerfresh that seems fit to pimp out. (as if they need it!!!)
IDM2011
Dirty men underground London. Can you spot Siologen?
MGMT: Hippie Dancing! Gentlemen, ready your airplane! 😉
Poison & Wine-The Civi Wars
Since I cannot resist steamy dirty drain bois and their photography, yet again another yell for 2 of my favorites-if you haven’t already gotten with it. Groupie applications are being accepted now!
UnderCity with Steve Duncan-that desk job isn’t so appealing now, is it?
Dirty Little Secrets (an old favorite)
Whimsy&Wonder-sometimes hit/miss but good visuals for graffiti ideas!
Under The City-just started on Blogger: underground rivers/history/iphone app (sweeeeet!)
Oldies but Goodies #3
December 7, 2010
Best form of Cheeky!
Made to be climbed!!
Somehow this made it on to UER (wtf?) which is self explanatory on the low content. Anyone want to bump a long, long, mercifully dead thread? Yea didn’t think so. >___<
Inspiration to a horde of noobs and coutchtoppers!
SnotSickle! (from Krazy) Gooey tasty, kiddies!
Mapping Alpha!
Detroit, Hotel.
EastCoast Hospitals attract the best!
Get Some Action! (under the U of M)
Danvers State Hospital (RIP)
Burning, Frolicking and Assassins.
May 26, 2010
What better way to spend the weekend?
Bake evenly on both sides!
Baku wants to be Dubai
May 24, 2010
Zira Island can’t be left alone.
Jeff Koons sculptures?! The flag pole really is there…
…and has sparked a spat between several countries who want to claim the title of tallest flag pole.
Georgia Snaps
May 22, 2010
GA Metro! (Urbanrail + map)
BRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIINNNNNNNNNNNNS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Zombie Chow. A little lamb was killed for their enjoyment.
Peace Bridge-city wide party at the opening! There was a group of pirates walking around swashbuckling, this is another reason why, Tbilisi wins!
(Skyscrapercity forum with a bit of info)
Vinoteca: one of my favorite Georgian boys and B!
The Titanic: a rant etc.
May 21, 2010
The public transportation system in Baku and AZ at large is a beast of far reaching power, nasty temper and a horrible hair problem. When stepping aboard a metro car, marshurt, taxi, bus, or dump truck, one never knows what adventures will befall them. Like the great epics of Frodo and the Ring and Lewis and Clark, transportation can hold fear and abuse, surprises and joy and white knuckle near misses than leave your lunch on the roadside. When going from Baku to Ismailli there is the palpable anticipation of the 3 hour marshruta ride ahead. Will I be smashed against the window by an Elephant Xanim and arrive like a pancake? (This happened) Will I share a seat with a puking baby and smell like sour milk? (This too happened) Will the marshuta slide on the snow and stop 6 inches before plunging over a 60 ft. cliff? (I thought death was near and so did the other 13 occupants of the bus.)
The mess and melee of buses and taxis in Baku was moved last year to a new avtovagzal outside the city center. In the months preceding the grand opening, my Baku friends along with various volunteers had both excitedly and ironically warned me of what was happening. Even so, upon seeing the vagzal for the first time, I was shocked and stunned. The complex is built to resemble the mighty doomed HMS Titanic. There are useless smoke stacks, pointless cable lines, portholes and an ocean liner shape. The sheer utter stupidity of this is mind boggling. The Titanic is, unfortunately, one of the most popular movies in cinema history, only recently trumped by another James Cameron self indulgent love fest called: Avatar. The Titanic movie reached pretty much every country in the world-in AZ the influence is felt from seat covers (with pictures of the doomed liner) and advertisements (Titanic sale! Leo and Kate on copy books) to music mixes that combine Celin Deion with Turkish beat and AZ wailing (not for the fait of heart and sometimes played at Toys). There is usually not a public or school event that commences without some brave soul belting forth a badly translated version of ‘My Heart Will Go On’ (ex: ‘You’ve rendered the door’, ‘This far, I know where you are’ [creepy?!] and so forth).
The Titanic sunk, people died, lots of people died, no doubt in a horrid way in freezing cold water, crying out for help. Babies died too, and if you believe the movie, several very fine looking young men sunk to the bottom of the sea, causing the gene pool to lose some handsome points and subjecting us to an influx of average looking males who can’t draw. Then Mr. Cameron became a millionaire and Ms. Deion’s career gave one last futile breath. Pisser, yea?
So then, why? WHY?! Why did the developers/architects/city planner (if there are any) decide to fashion the new avtovagzal to resemble the Titanic? Was it to appeal to the masses and their obsession with the doom and fatality of ‘true love’? Was it to make sure that, amongst the other ridiculously awful buildings in Baku; the avtovgzal would be the lone truthful icon of the horrid transport and worse roads? What was going through their minds? I fear that what lighter fuel vodka was on hand for dinner, or what fresh meet was for sale occupied the foremost thoughts of whoever ever was in charge. Or maybe they were too busy trying to get a mention from Lonely Planet to realize their project was already a grand failure.
In a sadly poetic way the Titanic has fulfilled its own prophecy. The building is cavernous and dark-portholes don’t let in much light (future architects take note) and even so the interior is poorly lit; giving the impression that the entire structure is in fact about to sink into a churning abyss. At the back of the structure, stranded in a sea of dull concrete and seemingly impossible to reach, is a hotel with a fountain. Both of which, at my last Baku visit were neither spewing water nor receiving guests. The toilets are broken. That there are even indoor toilets in remarkable-those who have visited the Goychy/Ismailli/Ganga avtovagzals understand. I paid 40qap to attempt a leap over a pool of what I can only assume was piss so I could hover over a porcelain bowel that was likely salvaged from a rubbish heap. (Why not just pee in the hall then?) People often get lost in the ‘ship’, walking around trying to find exits to bus platforms, as the signs are adorned with random arrows that point no where. It is possible to buy poorly made Turkish shirts with pink feathers and cheap pimp rings, but how many lost souls develop the desire for left over drag wear and finger plastic? (My impromptu poll says: 0)
This begs another, even more unsettling question. Where is the money? No doubt there were some heavy investors in this mass confusion. It may have even looked good on paper, many things do. It’s an irrefutable fact that Baku had desperately needed a new avtovagzal; for the past several years 20 January Station had mostly disintegrated into what amounted to a huge road block of buses and rubbish. In terms of investment, it’s a sure win; public transportation in AZ will be a constant need for at least the next 10+ years. So then, where did the money go? Certainly not for installing proper lights, building pedestrian stair/elevators, or fixing the broken glass doors. Someone likely paid for a holiday in Dubai (real-estate?) and brought a bloated Hummer for the ‘wild’ Baku pavement, by hiring cheap unskilled labor off the roadside. (Said with the recognition that it is painfully difficult to get a job in Baku for both educated and uneducated, and while I support enterprising men taking what jobs are offered in the way of construction, it’s unfortunate then, that they enable drastic cost cutting in places where it’s most certainly not appropriate.) It is even possible to untangle the skimming of funds? Has anyone even investigated this? Will anyone even care?
To be generous, the Titanic shape could be forgivable, if the station functioned. In fact one could argue that the huge structure wasn’t even supposed to resemble the Titanic, but some other ship (names escape me, beyond several sunk subs at Pearl Harbor, depressing!) or simply evoke the idea of ‘ship-ness’. Fair enough, but the vagzal still isn’t pedestrian friendly, still suffers from poor design choices, and still limps under malfunction snafu’s , even after more than a year since opening. It seems that if it has succeeded at anything, the sheer size and pathetic function of the Titanic is a laughably colossal monument to corruption and poor architectural decisions.
Having stated that public transport is never dull, the last thing I want to be thinking of is doomed ships and people dying when I place my life in the hands of a driver, who for most of the 3 hour stretch will run hairpin turns and swerve to miss animals/incoming vehicles/people/roadblocks, all while taking on the mobile, smoking, digging for treasure in his nasal cavity, conversing with passengers and picking his teeth.
inalittlewhile 