Windows to Russia

In America the below items that are expected in Russia are not very often expected in America….sometimes it is proper, but most of the time not…

a. Bring a Gift: This is practiced somewhat in America, but more often than not, you just go visit and take nothing. Unless the party is BYO (Bring Your Own)…

b. Do Not Give Flowers in Even Numbers: I have talked about many things like this in the past twelve years. Do not bring even number of flowers to your girlfriend. If you want her to be your girlfriend that is… 😉 And if you want your mother and or grandma to keep you as their kin?

c. Do Not Shake Hands Over a Threshold: Never shake over a doorway threshold. Just never and just do not do it…

d. Forget Something? Look in the Mirror before leaving again and before you actually leave the first time, sit for a moment, just before you walk out the door…

e. Never Exchange Money After Nightfall: I learned this from Vova in the Tiny Russian Village. I have been taught many things living in the village. This is one very important thing to remember…

f. If Staying the Night, Bring Some Home type Clothes: Or if taking a train trip, even a car trip and or such. Russians do not sleep in their walking around clothes….Russians change clothes when they get home as a habit…

g. Keep Your Cup Half-Full and or half-empty if You’re Not Ready for More Alcohol: Bottom line in my opinion keep you glass over half full. Sip that drink, or you will find it filled and filled and filled…

h. Be Sure to Toast that drink you get: Toast and toast and toast. It is an unwritten law that every drink is toasted….maybe it is an official law?

i. Never Argue with Babushka: Argue all you want with grandpa (dedushka) he will most likely enjoy it, but forget grandma. She will argue with you against grandpa even, but try that with her and you will loose. Everyone and I mean everyone listens to grandma (Babushka)….bottom line Russians respect their elders, yes even grandpa…

j. Take Off Your Shoes: You go to someones home? Take off those nasty shoes! Very simple….remove your shoes….which means don’t have nasty dirty feet and holes in your socks… 😉

{Exception to (j.) in the villages and you have friends like Vova, you don;t worry about such things. We stomp all over each others home… ;)}

WtR

Sveta and I got caught in a speed trap. Everywhere, but at this particular spot that we got caught speeding is 70 kilometers an hour and many times 90 kph. We were doing 78 kilometers an hour and that is fine. Except at this spot, hidden behind another big sign, is a speed limit sign that lowers the speed to 50 kilometers an hour…

I was ready for the 70 kph, but 50 kph is just a speed trap number and we are guilty as caught. Except, there is no way short of standing on the brakes to keep the correct speed and of course that means you will most likely have an accident…

This trip we knew the spot and crawled through the camera. The camera was still there and catching people in a speed trap…

Here is a better shot of the criminals…

And this is the letter below…

gibdd

But we got to pay only a few hundred rubles because we paid immediately…

Criminals we are… 😉

WtR

Here is another one they sent. Just in case you don’t like the first ones…

Shaheen, Wicker, Coons & Rubio Warn Against Russian Leadership of Interpol Ahead of General Assembly Vote

November 19, 2018

Helsinki Commission Members Call on Trump Admin & Interpol General Assembly Members to Oppose Alexander Prokopchuk’s Candidacy for President of Interpol

(Washington, DC) – U.S. Senators Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), Roger Wicker (R-MS), Chris Coons (D-DE) and Marco Rubio (R-FL), members of the Helsinki Commission, issued the following joint statement, urging the Trump administration and members of Interpol’s General Assembly to oppose the candidacy of Alexander Prokopchuk of Russia to serve as the President of Interpol. A vote to elect the next President of Interpol will be held at the Interpol General Assembly in Dubai on Wednesday.

“Interpol electing Major General Alexander Prokopchuk as its new President is akin to putting a fox in charge of a henhouse,” said the Senators. “Russia routinely abuses Interpol for the purpose of settling scores and harassing political opponents, dissidents and journalists. Alexander Prokopchuk has been personally involved in this intimidation strategy which ultimately seeks to weaken democratic institutions and embolden Putin’s authoritarian regime. If elected as President by the members of Interpol’s General Assembly on Wednesday, we have no doubt that Mr. Prokopchuk will further institutionalize the abuse of Interpol red notices and block ongoing efforts at meaningful reform. Further, the potential access he would gain to sensitive law enforcement data will bolster the Kremlin’s ability to harass critics living outside of Russia and aid other authoritarian regimes seeking to do the same. For these reasons, we urge all 192 members to stand for the integrity of Interpol as a legitimate international law enforcement mechanism and vote against Mr. Prokopchuk. We continue to call on our administration to use its voice, vote and influence to ensure that Interpol can no longer be co-opted by Putin and other dictators for their own nefarious purposes.”

The Russian Federation is one of the main countries to exploit Interpol’s red notice system, whereby notices of arrest are sent to all member countries. Russia has used the red notice system to harass Russian dissidents, critical Americans and other individuals opposed to the Kremlin’s aggression around the globe. Russia’s candidate for the President of Interpol, Major General Alexander Prokopchuk, has been particularly involved in the Kremlin’s continued harassment campaign since he served as the head of Russia’s National Central Bureau since 2011.

Source: Shaheen, Wicker, Coons & Rubio Warn Against Russian Leadership of Interpol Ahead of General Assembly Vote | U.S. Senator Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire

We really are a sick country that is very fearful of the world in general…

https://www.shaheen.senate.gov/news/press/shaheen-wicker-coons-and-rubio-warn-against-russian-leadership-of-interpol-ahead-of-general-assembly-vote

WtR

Think “Bill Browder” and you get all the answers…

Update:

“And what I’m saying to the Canadian Parliament and the Canadian government is Canada should lead right now on suspending Russia from the Interpol system, in the same way as Russia was suspended from the Olympics after getting caught cheating,” Browder was quoted by Canada’s CBC news network as saying.

My my, how the truth comes out…

Is friendly Russian Bear from YouTube show a Putin stooge? | Daily Mail Online

A Russian-made children’s cartoon show has been accused of being part of the Putin propaganda machine. Masha and the Bear focuses on the relationship between a slight but imposing young girl and her protector, a huge bear. In one Masha even dons a Soviet border guard’s hat as she repels invaders from the Bear’s carrot patch.

Source: Is friendly Russian Bear from YouTube show a Putin stooge? | Daily Mail Online

This is your newest bad Russian…

Please be careful when enjoying the Masha & Bear cartoons…

WtR

Home back in Moscow. The trip was okay, Sunday’s are always the best to travel back to Moscow. We got the paper work done on Nikolai’s Home and now we have to start the next round of paperwork. Hopefully by this time next year, it will be done….most likely this is the last car trip to the Tiny Russian Village, for this year. It has started to snow and that means deep buried roads…

Have a great day…

WtR

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has been charged under seal by the Trump administration. This has been revealed by a purportedly accidental copy-paste error in an unrelated court document which used Assange’s name, interestingly not long after it was reported to the Wall Street Journal that federal prosecutors “have considered publicly indicting Mr. Assange to try to trigger his removal from the embassy because a detailed explanation of the evidence could give Ecuadorean authorities reason to turn Assange

Source: The Empire Keeps Proving Assange Right About Everything | Zero Hedge

Definition of have a chip on one’s shoulder informal : to have an angry or unpleasant attitude or way of behaving caused by a belief that one has been treated unfairly in the past He has had a chip on his shoulder ever since he didn’t get the promotion he was expecting.

Source: Have A Chip On One’s Shoulder | Definition of Have A Chip On One’s Shoulder by Merriam-Webster

Well Uncle Sam and all the wannabe Uncles, are walking around with a chip on their shoulder and daring anyone to knock it off…

Ole Uncle looks at Russia and says, “I dare you!”

Then we are looking at Iran and say, “I dare you!”

Now we look at China and say, “I dare you!”

The list is rather long and getting longer at the countries we are walking around strutting like a rooster and saying, “I dare you!”

Just the last few days, we just threatened China with toeing the line or else…

United States is prepared to escalate economic, diplomatic and political pressure on China, Pence said. He believes the U.S. economy is strong enough to weather such an escalation while the Chinese economy is less durable.

Source: Pence: It’s up to China to avoid a cold war – The Washington Post

Oh Boy!

More sanctions against the world…

I guess that means we are looking for a fight and daring someone to knock that chip off our shoulder…

WtR

I rode a 1959 Panhead for many years. It was freedom and a freedom I see many do not know about anymore…

Harley-Davidson bets its future on the LiveWire electric motorcycle | TechCrunch

It’s been a four-year wait since Harley-Davidson first showed off a concept electric motorcycle. Now, the production-ready bike — called the Harley-Davidson LiveWire — is finally here.

Source: Harley-Davidson bets its future on the LiveWire electric motorcycle | TechCrunch

Oh well!

It was fun while it lasted. I have to admit I grew up and lived in a wonderful time. Freedom rang and liberty ruled….and cars and bikes had soul…

I just have images of the “Hells Angels” pulling up to the bars in electric bikes and everyone gets into a fight trying to be the first to plug in…

Or the guy who walks out and kicks over the bikes, gets away from them, because their bikes are not charged enough to chase him in his old pickup truck..

Sorry, I gotta charge my Harley, before I run you down and beat the crap out of you…

Kinda changes charges everything…

Times change charge and it sucks…

WtR

STK bought out the Wileyfox company, which was in bankruptcy, due to EU sanctions. These sanctions destroyed a very good British company and now STK has proven itself to be trash. The last Oreo Android update that I installed fried the phone. The phone was all stock and running excellent at the time of the update…

I decided to try the update that STK pushed out and found myself with a bricked phone. I am not alone in this issue and Wileyfox Swift 2 Plus has fallen to the wayside of advancement. In fact if you do not install a custom ROM, you will ultimately end up with a bricked phone. I truly think that STK did this on purpose, that is how it feels..

I only was able to salvage the phone by a complete ROM wipe and repartition of the ROM. I lost 2.4 Gigs of the ROM, due to total corruption by the updated firmware. The firmware came straight from STK themselves…

I know what I am talking about and this issue has taken weeks to solve. The phone, minus a few Gigs of blocked away ROM is working perfect again and has the original Cyanogenmod firmware installed. The phone was fantastic with original firmware and went downhill after Cyanogenmod failed as a company….and the icing on the cake was when the EU shut down the Russian money source for Wileyfox and put Wileyfox into bankruptcy…

It is a sad state of normality in our world…

1. Good company + Good software = Great cheap phone.
2. Software fails due to internal issues and personal crap + Sanctions (illegal) destroyed finances of good company = Collapsing company that had potential.
3. Trash company (with lots of money from grey area sources) buys out failing company and you have garbage as the end result…

It is the normal: Good struggles and bad seems to flourish…

WtR

The crosswalk is to the right of the image. The car on the truck being taken away was parked smack in and blocking the crosswalk. The city has been for two weeks hauling cars away that park upon a crosswalk that has thousands and thousands of people a day walking across it. This is one busy crosswalk after all us humans wake up…

I have been griping for years about idiots that block our walk way. Looks like the city has woke up finally….to make matters worse, there is school farther to the right of the image and it is huge. I have seen people park and block the front entrance to the school with their cars. They could not get the gate open of the school…

Duh! Dumb people everywhere…

This morning no cars parked on the crosswalk… 😉

WtR