Indian Coffee and Russian Ramblings…


I do not know how or why, but the temperature has risen to 0+ degrees Celsius and looks to stay there for a few days. So I took advantage of this treat in the weather and worked on getting the car unburied from 2 to 3 feet of snow…

I was not the only one out doing this. It seemed like everyone has taken advantage of the warm weather and were all out trying like me, to get their cars out from the drifts…

So I spent hours helping people get unstuck from there parking places. I have a tough sharp rake like tool and it digs through icy packed snow like a hot knife through butter. I used that and we got 5 cars out of their cubby holes that they had become buried in. It was fun but I got soaked and I hope that I do not pay for that type of fun… 🙁

I got our Volga uncovered and she started no problem. Then she crawled out from her cubby hole and went right back in to sleep some more. I have some work to on her, but it will have to wait another day…

Now I sit at the computer and sip on a cup of delicious coffee from India. I have posting a little less and I thought that I would give my excuse. (Other than a super long holiday) Sveta bought me an Android phone for my Western Christmas, New Year, Russian Christmas and Birthday gift…

Being born near Christmas has always been a bummer in life. Everyone sends you a gift and says, here is your Christmas and Birthday gift. But it is only one gift. I use to wonder what it would be like to have a Birthday in the Summer time and get gifts for you Birthday only. I still wonder…

But I will not complain in this case because Sveta buys good gifts that cover it all. Since, I have wanted an Android Phone and because I had decided to start working on the Android Operating System. I like to hack OS’s and make them better. The Android OS is ideal for this being Open Source…

I received an LG phone model GW620. It is a hackers delight and I have literally wore myself out playing with it. Android makes it easy for you and all you have to do is install their software, Android SDK and have fun… 🙂

It is the best cell phone I have ever had. It puts Windows OS based phones to shame. Sveta has a Sony Ericsson Xperia mini X10. That her son gave her. So she is not left out in the dark. But she wanted someone to terrorise the phone and make it do everything that she wants. That becomes my job… 😉

Sveta is an IBM and MINIX expert and I cover the Windows/Linux end of life. Since Android is Linux kernel based. It is right up my ally…

I also had to upgrade our data transfer system at home and I install a WiFi router. Now I can really play. It allows me to even move the laptop into other rooms if need be…

So Sveta and I had a wonderful Christmas Holiday…

Windows to Russia!

Coffee and Morning Thoughts…


Good Morning from Windows to Russia. Today as I was sipping that great cup of coffee. I was doing some thinking’s about various issues all over Russia and the world…

I took notice of Robert Gates in China…

“They clearly have potential to put some of our capabilities at risk,” Gates said en route to military talks with Chinese leaders. “We have to pay attention to them, we have to respond appropriately with our own programs.”

That is cool! Lets increase our (USA) military budget even more, to keep up with the big bad world. You see Russia is upping the ante and now China is upping the ante. Iran, India and many other countries have all upped the ante. The whole world is on a military spending spree. (Spend, spend, spend, and spend) While half their population and the world starves…

Well – while we found out how scary China is now, with words of wisdom from Gates. Lets go to an interesting situation that really bothers me…

  • 8,000 Turtle Doves Fall Dead in Italy With Strange Blue Stain on Their Beaks…
  • Two million dead fish were found to have washed up on shores in Chesapeake Bay, Maryland…
  • 100,000 fish died in the Arkansas River…
  • 450 red-winged blackbirds, brown-headed cowbirds, grackles and starlings found littering a highway in Baton Rouge, Louisiana…
  • 3,000 blackbirds on roofs and roads in the small town of Beebe, Arkansas…
  • Thousands of ‘devil crabs’ washed up along the Kent coast near Thanet…
  • Thousands of dead fish found floating in warm Florida creek…
  • Hundreds of snapper fish found dead in New Zealand…
  • Scores of American Coots found dead on Texas highway bridge…
  • Whole bunch more have died…

    • This map below is at link:

    http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&oe=UTF8&msa=0&msid=201817256339889828327.0004991bca25af104a22b&source=embed&ll=10.792681,-120.48912&spn=0.005027,0.006866

    It shows the mass death areas of animals (Blue tear drop). Go ahead and check it out. Google lets you have lots of links to go see the articles on the situation…

    So while we have a real issue, that so far gets very little main media attention. We will just ignore the fact that something is amiss…

    Now Russia has been having fun in the ice while animals are dieing all over the world. For the last week or so, Russia has been trying to get several ships that have been froze into the ice in the Sakhalin Bay in Russia’s Far East. This has been a big deal here and I am not sure what the rest of the world knows about it. Since I have been goofing off lately, I have watched but been doing other things than to mention it. There seems to be 4 or 5 ice breakers now trying to clear a path to open water to allow the ships to get free. They say some of the ice is 8 meters thick. (8 meters about 26 feet thick…) Now that is some ice…

    One last thought before I am done boring you. I found this picture of Christmas in Russia. It was with out incident and over 80,000 people attended the 268 churches in Moscow…

    I really like the picture…

    That is all and have a great day…

    Windows to Russia!

    Russia Today and Mass Animal Deaths Sweep Globe…


    Russia Today has a very good video about the deaths of millions and millions of animals, all over the world. This is not an isolated problem and looks to be getting worse instead of better…

    Authorities in northern Italy say more than a thousand turtle doves have dropped dead over the past 5 days. It’s the latest in a series of unexplained sudden death incidents affecting creatures in the sky and underwater. The events have sparked a media frenzy, with doomsday speculators saying it hails the end of the world. But is there really something fishy going on or is it being overhyped? RT’s Katerina Azarova reports…

    Is this the “Ends of Days”? As Many bloggers are starting to report…

    Windows to Russia!

    Americans Are Getting to Adopt From Russia Again…


    For the couple from Tennessee, Derek and Kathleen Hunter, this New Year was very special.  They finally brought two Russian children who were adopted by the couple.  They were waiting for this moment for much longer than planned.

    In April last year, Russia imposed a moratorium on adoptions of Russian children by American citizens, after an American woman who adopted a Russian boy, sent the child back to his home with a note where it was stated that she no longer wants to be with him.

    The Hunters could not hold back their emotions when they were finally united with their one year old daughter and a two-year son whom has finally arrived in Nashville.

    KATHLEEN HUNTER, foster mother: For all the difficulties with us at every turn was God.

    DEREK HUNTER, adoptive father:children who need love and parents who are going to love these children. And when it all together – it’s just wonderful.

    Also, it has become a reunion for children, since they are brother and sister and were in different orphanages.

    The translation is done InoTV .

    The terrible act that Torry Hansen did by sending Artyom back to Russia like a sack of potatoes has really hurt many loving families trying to adopt…

    Here is a video on our Russian Video Blog of Artyom at this New Years Holidays. He is a great kid and really is not the Monster that Torry Hansen portrayed him to be. Funny (not, Ha Ha) that Hansen never was in trouble for what she did…

    I am glad to see that movement is finally being made in the right direction. But the situation is still being discussed by Russia and America. Lets hope those talks do not collapse again…

    Related articles

    Coffee and WikiLeaks on Russia…


    I have received a number of e-mails regarding the Wikileaks menu item that I have. They ask do I understand how to get around and see what was posted on Wikileaks. They also express that pulling information out about the Cable’s is almost impossible…

    I have done a lot of thinking the last few days. So while sipping that cup of coffee this morning.  I decided that to start a regular posting about the “Cable Leaks” that pertain to Russia…

    As I find an interesting “Leak” that tells things that have more interest than a “babushka kicking a tin can down the road”, I will post it.

    I do not promise that they are exciting items to read with lots of drama. They are more likely to be mundane,  but I will give a general gist of what is in the “Cable” and I also will not be cutting sections of the original cable as so many of the news places are doing. I really think that is stupid…

    The cable below is about Russian prison systems and the horrid state that they are and in. It made me wonder about Burns who wrote it because he obviously has not dealt with a Georgian prison in America. I spent years feeding the inmates in a large prison in Georgia, USA. So I smile as I see similarities between America and Russian prisons…

    I also see that Georgian, USA prisons are in the news again. Not a surprise to me…

    I can see how these “Cable Leaks” will destroy the state of affairs between other countries and America. Don’t say it behind someones back if you can’t keep it secrete…

    I see a new thought in the way Russia acts with America now. They seem to be expressing this now, “We are not even gonna get pissed or care. We are just going to learn to expect the lowest from the country that we thought the highest of…”

    Click” More” below to read the rest of the article unless you came directly to the page. It is just too long to have in full on the front page…

    Lets see what this Cable is about: (Click More…)

    (more…)

    Svet Sunday: Stories from Soviet Childhood!


    Hello,

    Today we want to introduce: Stories from Soviet Childhood! (This became a blog by the way.)

    Childhood is the most important period in the life for everybody. Most of our beliefs we get from childhood. We learn what is good and bad when we are kids. And these beliefs are very difficult to change later in life… So we [my generation] are like we were brought up in our Soviet childhood.

    So in these series we’ll try to tell what was the cultural ground where we grew up. Another reason to make this series – we think that is just interesting to read and watch – and if you have your children maybe you would like to show or to read it for them? Believe The Stories from Soviet Childhood would not teach your kids something bad!

    We plan to have this series on Wednesdays. But we’ll start today! Nikolay Nosov (Николай Николаевич Носов) wrote his stories about Mishka in 1945. Today we’ll read one of them:

    ZIS

    When Mishka and I were little we wanted very badly to go for a ride in a motor car, but we couldn’t get anyone to take us. We begged all the drivers we knew but they were always too busy to bother with us. One day, as we were playing in the back yard, a car drove up. The driver got out and went off somewhere. We ran over to look at the car.

    “It’s a ZIS,” I said. (ZIS is a car)

    “No, it isn’t, it’s a Pobeda,” said Mishka. (Pobeda is a car)

    “It’s a ZIS, I tell you.”

    “And I say it’s a Pobeda. I can tell by the front.”

    “In the first place it’s not the front, but the bonnet. Look at the back. See that luggage rack? Did you ever see a Pobeda with a thing like that?”

    Mishka looked and said: “Let’s get on it and have a ride.”

    “No,” I said. “I don’t want to.”

    “You needn’t be afraid. We’ll go just a little way and then we’ll jump off.”

    Just then the driver came back and got into the car. Mishka ran to the back, climbed on the luggage rack and whispered to me: “Come on! Hurry up!”

    “No, I’m not going to.”

    “Come on. Don’t be a coward.”

    I ran up and hopped on beside him. The car started and before we knew it we were racing down the street. Mishka got frightened.

    “I’m going to jump off!” he shouted.

    “Don’t you dare!” I said. “You’ll get hurt.”

    But he kept on shouting: “I’m going to jump! I’m going to jump!” And he already put one leg down. I glanced back and saw another car coming behind us. “Stop!” I shouted. “You’ll get run over.”

    Passers-by stopped to stare at us. A militiaman (militiaman is policeman) at the intersection blew his whistle. Mishka jumped off, but he didn’t let go of the rack and his legs dragged along the ground. I leaned down and started pulling him up by the coat collar. I tugged and tugged until at last I got him safely back on the luggage rack.

    “Now hold on tight, you silly,” I shouted. Just then I heard a laugh and looked up to see that the car had stopped and a crowd had gathered. I jumped down.

    “All right,” I said to Mishka, “you can get off now.”

    But he was too scared to move. I had to pull him off. The militiaman came running up and took the driver’s number. The driver got out and everyone jumped on him.

    “You ought to be ashamed of yourself, letting children hang on behind like that!”
    There was quite an argument and Mishka and I were forgotten.

    “Let’s clear out,” I whispered to Mishka. When nobody was looking we dived into a side street and ran home. We were all out of breath when we arrived.

    We did look a sight! Mishka’s trousers were torn at the knees and his knees were scratched and bleeding. He got a proper scolding from his mother!

    “I don’t care about my trousers, and my knees will soon heal up too, but I’m sorry for that poor driver,” said Mishka. “He’ll get into trouble through us. Did you see the militiaman taking down his number?”

    “Yes, we ought to have stayed behind and told them the driver wasn’t to blame.”

    “I tell you what,” said Mishka. “Let’s write the militiaman a letter and tell him what happened.”
    I agreed and we sat down to write a letter. We wasted a lot of paper before we got it done. Here’s what we wrote:

    Dear Comrade Militiaman,

    You took down the number of a car, and it isn’t right. That is, the number is right, but it wasn’t right to take it down because the driver wasn’t to blame. Mishka and me are to blame. He didn’t know we were riding behind. So please don’t punish him because he is a good driver and it was all our fault.

    We addressed the envelope as follows: “To the Militiaman at the corner of Gorky Street and Bolshaya Gruzinskaya.”

    We sealed the envelope and dropped it into the letter-box.

    We do hope he got it!

    Click the picture to read
    the next story: “CUCUMBERS”. ———–>

    Svet

    comments always welcome

    Windows to Russia!

    Viktor Bout and RIA Interview… (01/03/11)


    RIA Novosti was able to interview Viktor Bout. The suspected Russian arms dealer who was extradited from Thailand to the United States in mid-November. As Bout is kept in a New York detention center so only lawyers and officials from the Russian Consulate can visit him. RIA Novosti correspondent Dmitry Gornostayev was given an oportunity to get a list of questions to Bout and received answers via Russian Vice Consul Alexander Otchainov…

    The text of the interview is below: (Click “More” below the article to see the whole interview.)

    Q: Viktor, when did you realize that you would be extradited to the United States from Thailand and the extradition is irreversible?

    A: This occurred on November 16, 17:30 local time. I was taken out of my cell on the pretext of being transferred to a new cell. I saw many police cars in the jail’s yard, though cars never drove in there earlier. I saw many DEA [U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration] officers in jackets with badges. That’s when I got it that my extradition will happen now.

    The Thais brought me to the airport and changed my clothes in a separate room. Then I was handed over to U.S. agents.

    Q: In September you had a similar situation when you were nearly transferred to the United States. What was the difference between these two situations?

    A: In September the jail chief refused to extradite me without a warrant. A scandal triggered by the fact that an aide to the Thai prime minister had visited me unfolded in the Thai parliament. The scandal drew public attention to my case and my lawyers managed to prove that extradition was illegal at the time, which the Prosecutor’s Office also announced then.

    (more…)

    Russia Christmas is Here Soon in 2011…


    Russia Christmas is here soon for 2011. On January 7th 2011. Orthodox Christmas will happen. I was sipping my cup of coffee this morning and thinking about that very happening and happening’s…

    It has always been strange to me that the country (Russia) literally shuts down this time of the year. Everyone in Russia is on a break. Now some work (Sveta has to spend a few days working at her IBM Servers  in Gazprombank.) and some play but the play is by far the predominant. You still have to have cops, border patrols, food and etc to function. But the government, major corporations, many markets and most stores are simply closed from basically the first of January to around the 11th of January…

    Now we are not done yet: The 14th of January is the Orthodox New Year. Yes another New Year holiday. Russians love their holidays and January is a month of holidays for them…

    So for half a month. Russia just does very little. I love it and enjoy the down time. Sveta always says to make sure that we stock up on groceries, because everything is closed. We have found a real problem with bread. The bakers are closed. So we have found little shops that bake their own bread and enjoy fresh home made. You have to be fast though because, all Russians know the spots also and will beat us to the bread. Yesterday, I found one last loaf left in our favorite little store. We grabbed it as three more people came in looking for bread… (That was good bread! Yummy…)

    We have a saying in the Western world, that I apply to Russia: “When in Rome do as the Romans do!” other words, It is polite, and possibly also beneficial, to follow the customs of a society when one is a visitor to that society…

    Also it means grab the bread if you find it first…

    You will not hear me argue… 🙂

    Windows to Russia!

    Ice and Wind Just Too Much…


    This is why Moscow area is having issues. The ice and heavy winds are just too much for the infrastructure. Ice Storms are not that common here, from what I understand. Snow is very common but ice storms are not…

    These are not tiny little telephone poles. These are some big towers. I see them all over the Moscow area and we use to live near some. They are fun to walk under. Well they use to be, but now I may not walk under them in an ice storm… 🙂

    Windows to Russia!

    “Bunker 42” Museum in Moscow…


    I love videos and information like this…

    “Bunker 42” museum in Moscow. is a place that Sveta and I have to go see. It brings back memories of the old days. OK, so maybe not memories that we want to live again, but memories that molded a future of the world…

    It seems that RT has an abundance of bomb shelter stories. One in particular that I had posted (Link), took off like an explosion… (No pun intended)

    I have long studied the Moscow Metro and seen the bomb blast doors on all the stations. Now that is one huge bomb shelter.

    The biggest shelter in the world is the Moscow Metro system,” said Victor Baranov. “Each station is constructed as a bunker and it can save lives of people who are inside in the time of a nuclear strike.” (Link)

    If you watch the video you will see another huge bomb shelter. This shelter is a museum and it really looks exciting. Believe me, you will know if we get to go see it…

    Windows to Russia!