About 5:30am I realized that I wasn't going to sleep, and since it seemed like a pretty sunrise was on the way, I decided to take some pictures. After that, since I had my camera with me I just kept taking photos all the day. So for your viewing pleasure (or if you simply have nothing else to do), here is a photo gallery of my May 8th. This is Bolshaya Pecherskaya, the street my dorm is on. The snow has completely melted, at long last! The down in is that without the super-cold weather, the quality (or lack thereof) of the city's air is really noticeable.
While much of Europe is celebrating V-E day today, Russia's Victory Day is May 9th. This year is the 60th anniversary, and large celebrations are planned all across the country.
The local stolovaya, or cafeteria, of the Polytechnic Institute (across the street from the Linguistic University where I study). It has cheap food, but be wary - my roommate spent three days in bed after a run-in there with some sour salad.
Naberezhnaya, the street with runs along the bluff overlooking the Volga. All trees have the bottoms of their trunks covered in white. Supposedly, it's supposed to help them stay healthy and avoid bugs.
The most direct way from the street to the Volga is down some rickety wooden stairs. Thanks to a lack of snow, the descent was not quite so perilous as the last time I went this way.
A small stretch of land jutting into the Volga is home to a restaurant/club. It is now sunrise at about 6am.
Go out any given morning and you will find literally hundreds of bear bottles lining the streets. Even though a law was passed officially banning the drinking of alcohol on the street, many people can be seen drinking with their friends at the end of the workday. Since there is a person who has a job to clean the streets, most folks don't worry about throwing thier bottles away and just leave them on the ground once they're empty.
Looking across the river to the industrial town of Bor, known throughout the region for its glass factory.
Sunrise on the Volga.
Looking back towards the city. Naberezhnaya Street, which gives beautiful views of the Volga, runs along the top of the embankment seen here.
As the sun starts to come out, I pass by the Checklovski Stairway once again. I've learned that the stairway was actually built by German POWs who were shipped to Nizhny Novgorod in 1945.
Looking up towards the stairway and Kremlin
Early-morning fishing on the Volga.
Here's a part of the Kremlin I haven't been to before (mainly because earlier it was buried in snow). These are the remains of Zachatievskaya Gate, named after the nearby monastery and destroyed by landslides in the 1600s. Further back is the Belaya (white) Tower.
A view from inside the Kremlin looking up towards the Clock Tower. Our Kremlin is free and open to the public at all hours, unlike the one in Moscow.
The Russian flag and Red (Soviet) Army flag have been put up side-by-side all over the city in preparation for Victory Day.
More fishing on the Volga. I really hope they're doing catch and release, as I'm not sure fish from there would be the healthiest in the world. The river looks much better than it smells.
If you are a teenage Russian, and you are cool, then at some point you will spay-paint the word RAP on a wall. If you're a really bad mo-fo, you just might even write HIP-HOP.
The river docks along the Volga, where you can catch a boat all the way down to Astrakhan, where the Volga empties into the Caspian Sea.