Happy 4th of July to America…

Have a happy and safe 4th of July, 2011!

When I was young this was my second favorite big holiday (Christmas was first of course!) I just loved to set off fireworks. Sometimes I wonder how I survived after thinking about some of the things I did and created with fireworks… 🙂

Happy 4th…

Windows to Russia!

Update on Host Issue for Windows to Russia…

After an interesting day, Windows to Russia has been moved from a USA based hosting to a hosting based out of India… (As several figured that out and expressed to us, their thoughts in comments and e-mails!)

As per this article: “Coffee and Blocked” explains what happened and enough information of why we had to leave. I will state and add that the same day that “Coffee and Blocked” was posted. We were knocked offline again for over three hours. It covered a 6 hour period and was a one sided affair by me. The site would be blocked and I would write an e-mail. (I would also try to connect by live chat and that just did not work either.) Then the site would come back on line and they would never respond. The site would go back down and I would write an e-mail. The site would be unblocked, again with no word from the host. This became a game for about 6+ hours until they tired of said game and gave up on it for the day. It only affected the Windows to Russia blog. All other blogs were unaffected. No explanation was offered by said host…

On Saturday Sveta and I finalized who we wanted to use as our next host. This host right now is only for Windows to Russia. We have acquired two hosts, one in India and one in Russia. We will have a reflective updating mirroring system set up after we are all done and that will allow Windows to Russia to be able to stay on line better against server crashes. Of course this does not happen over night because Sveta and I have to learn as we go…

We are officially on the Indian server as I write this and the new hosting company has been very nice to work with during the transfer. It looks to be a good situation for Windows to Russia and we will decide later about moving all blogs. As of right now Coffee Talk, Thoughts of Moscow, Russian News From Russia and Windows to Russia have been moved. They all reside on the same domain…

Thanks everyone for patience and lets hope over the next few days that we get everything back in the groove again. Sveta and I have learned a lot this weekend and we had fun…

Windows to Russia!

Update: After being asked several times by e-mail how we knew we were blocked and not just hosting problems? That is a fair question…

Answer: The host was changing our index file to unreadable. They physically blocked our index file. They did this from higher up than what we have access to on the server. I tried to change this file back myself but they refused to allow it to be changed. Then they would change the file themselves and allow us access. That is how we knew that the host performed the block themselves. If index file was unreadable the whole blog was unreadable and that is how they affected only one blog out of all that we have. It was a direct targeting of Windows to Russia…

Coffee and I Hate War…

“I hate war as only a soldier who has lived it can, only as one who has seen its brutality, its futility, its stupidity.” by  Dwight Eisenhower…

That sums up what I was thinking this morning while sipping that cup of coffee…

Windows to Russia!

Coffee and Blocked…

Coffee was good this morning but thinking’s lay heavy on my mind as I sipped that cup of java…

Yesterday I posted an article that evidently hit home to some organizations. This article touched on the subject of “Political Rot” in the Western System…

I have known that I am going to have to protect Windows to Russia better from censorship by the West. It is an issue that has been predominate since Blogger tried to shut me down over a year ago. I have watched the development of the internet issues in America and also Europe. It seems that every week now we have sites being knocked off line by the governments. It seems to me that last week, when they took several whole servers offline in America for one bad site and many people lost their websites, that the writing is on the wall…

So to make a long story short! Windows to Russia was knocked offline yesterday on purpose and deceitfully. My article was going viral and exploded. That is when Windows to Russia was shut down and after many hours of calls, e-mails and chat sessions. They finally had no legal grounds to keep our site shut down and grudgingly put it back on line. But by then the damage was done and we lost the momentum of the moment and Google then turned tail and ran from it… 🙂

The article took off in China, Russia, India and several other countries. That was accomplished by their search engines. But the one place that it needed to be presented was curtailed… (That was the goal!)

I realized after studying the situation that I left myself vulnerable. I am hosted out of the USA and in that sense everything falls under the jurisdiction of America and her idiosyncrasies. So for that fact alone we are going to have to safe haven Windows to Russia in a server situation that can not be exploited by government intervention easily…

Funny – Ha Ha for me and against me! Windows to Russia still had one of the largest days ever for traffic and they succeeded in keeping her off line for almost 4 hours during the peak time frame for Windows to Russia…

So if I am shut down again! You know why…

Windows to Russia!

PS: The issue should be fixed by Monday. Sveta and I are going Indian based…

Russia and Soup: Campbell Soup Gives up on Russia…

Soup maker Campbell has announced that it is giving up on business in Russia. The reason given in the local news for Campbell’s demise is in Russia’s conservative food culture. The American company just could not defeat Russian culinary tradition…

Russian’s say that in Russia, a housewife who cannot cook soup is not a proper housewife. I say that anyone in Russia who can not cook soup is not Russian. In Russia soup is more than a quick meal and it is part of most every meal. So to not be able to make soup means that you simply can not cook…

Soup is part of that “Old Russian Soul” that I talk about time and again…

Windows to Russia has several soup recipes:
http://windowstorussia.com/recipe-from-russia-simple-solyanka-soup_25.html
http://windowstorussia.com/chicken-lapsha-russian-noodle-soup.html
http://windowstorussia.com/recipe-from-russia-very-simple_15.html

These links are just a few of the home made liquid meals available… 🙂

I understand why Russians would not want Campbell soups because they just are not soup in the Russian sense of the world. They are fake soup and full of sodium…

You have to look at Pepsi and Coke in Russia to understand how to survive. Pepsi and Coke are buying up juice companies like there is no tomorrow and Coke is rocking the Kvas world in Russia with their form of Kvas. The bottom line is you have to look at what the Russians want and give them what they want. Kvas and real fruit juice rules in Russia… (Don’t say yuck until you try it!)

As in my article yesterday about fast food: Russia the New Fast Food Haven? Russia is a huge growing market for the fast food industry. But I say growing. Most people in Russia never eat out and that means that you cook food at home and it is not from a can and instant…

Sveta and I eat soup several times a week. In fact I am making some today. Why have condensed soup when you can make the real thing the way you want it to taste?

So it is a good thing in my eyes that Campbell soup has gone home…

Russians do not need that type of food…

Windows to Russia!

Something is Rotten in the State of Denmark or What is That Stink?

The coffee is great but the news out of the West stinks so bad that it almost ruined the coffee…

The US administration said Wednesday that the al-Qaeda network remains “preeminent security threat to the United States” (This was printed by the Wall Street Journal…)

But then France just supplied the al-Qaeda with multiples of weapons…

The AU has become very upset at the weapons that were just dropped into Libya because the AU has proof that al-Qaeda has received these weapons, “It was said that weapons distributed in Libya would contribute to the “destabilization” of African states. “What worries us is not who is giving what, but simply that weapons are being distributed by all parties and to all parties. We already have proof that these weapons are in the hands of al-Qaeda, of traffickers,” said AU Commissioner Jean Ping. Northern African al-Qaeda jihadis for their part are having a ball manipulating NATO to reach their ends – performing the odd lynching or amputation in selected “liberated” environment.”

But I am sure that America has nothing to do with the weapon drop, especially since the Libyan airspace is closed and no one can fly anywhere without everyone else knowing what is going on. Also I am sure America would not allow al-Qaeda to be armed in Libya because we have just made a statement that:

The US administration said Wednesday that the al-Qaeda network remains “preeminent security threat to the United States”…

Hummm and surly if al-Qaeda was in Libya, we would be in there fighting with Qaddafi to get rid of them not helping the al-Qaeda Rebels… (Wouldn’t we?)

We have an old saying: Something is rotten in the state of Denmark! As coined by Marcellus in Hamlet Act 1, scene 4, 87–91. with a meaning of the fish is rotting from the head down and all is not well at the top of the political hierarchy…

Windows to Russia!

Russia the New Fast Food Haven?

Within a month the American based company Wendy’s opened two stores in Moscow: The opening of Wendy’s on the Arbat marks the second store in the Wendy’s corporate plans to launch at least 180 restaurants in Russia over the next 10 years. Russia’s first Wendy’s opened June 14 in the food court of the Kapitoly shopping center on Prospekt Vernadskogo in southwestern Moscow. Now Arbat has their Wendy’s…

With this latest intrusion into the Russian food market we now have McDonald’s, Burger King, Kentucky Fried Chicken and Wendy’s. We also have lots of full scale restaurants like TGIF and such. But the fast food world of America is invading Russia at a fast pace…

Now this contradicts all the low down instigation’s that the Western world says about how the business system in Russia is evil and corrupt. I guess it takes one to know one and it seems to me that Restaurants from America have no problems getting a foothold in Russia…

I am sure Wendy’s will do good as long as they follow their rules as if they are in America. That is how the others are doing so well. McDonald’s is exactly the same as in America and that is what Wendy’s has to do also. Contrary to popular belief, Russians do appreciate the fact that they can go to any McDonald’s and get the same food anywhere in the country…

How to understand what the corporate draw for fast food is in Russia? A typical Russian McDonald’s is twice as busy as its American counter part. The only reason that they are twice as busy is because they just can’t turn it out any faster. In Russia the food is staged just like it use to be in America. They have 20 burgers, 20 Big Macs, a mountain of fries, etc etc etc waiting to go…

If they tried to have it your way. The system would crash and burn because of the huge volume of business. Burger King is staging and I promise you Wendy’s will be staging also. Unless Russians dislike Wendy’s…. (Asking for no onions and ketchup does not work and that is how it should be.)

So Wendy’s sees those dollar signs flashing. It is hard not to see them, when you walk into a McDonald’s and count 200 people waiting in line to order! Then realize that the McDonald’s drive through line is wrapped around the building and pushes out into the main road. I have seen drive through lines of around a hundred cars long. I have seen highways blocked because of people trying to get McDonald’s food…

Now if we could just get a Hardee’s and how about Arby’s. Then maybe it is fish and chips time from Arthur Treacher’s Fish and Chips… 🙂

Poor Russia…

Windows to Russia!

 

Slice The Dollars From Russia’s Federal Reserve…

Russia likely to cut dollar’s share in international reserves says Kremlin aide:
Russia’s central bank is likely to cut the share of U.S. dollars in its international reserves, Kremlin aide Arkady Dvorkovich said on Wednesday.Read More >>>

Remember my articles of warning shots fired by Russia. This is one of those warning shots to America and the world over the state of the dollar…

Windows to Russia!

Russia Studies Downed American Drones in Iran…

The tidbit of information today that is floating around Moscow is that Russia has been to Iran and been studying the American drones that have been shot down by Iran. It seems that the US has been playing sky games with Iran and now Iran is in the mood to knock every unmanned drone from the sky that the US tries to send their way…

The information is that 2 or 3 drones have been taken down within Iran territory and airspace. Russia requested to see the drones and according to information being passed around, Russia was allowed to come and do some studying on the drones. So it seems a technical team of Russians have determined that Iran does indeed have several shot down drones from America…

It seems that Iran has reversed engineered the drones and have come up with there own version of the drones made in America. These drones made by Iran have caused concern in America but…

Of course America refuses to talk or acknowledge about said drones shot down by Iran, that Iran copied from…

Now Russia has had a chance to study the famous drones of death from America…

Windows to Russia!

Russian Visa – What You Need…

This picture was posted by RIA awhile back. It is a good basic look at what is needed to get a visa for Russia. It is not for any country in particular and things are different from country to country. But it gives a good idea of what you need…

Windows to Russia!