Russia in London

London cab wearing a team Russia design!!

I visited Russia in London yesterday though I'm not sure how authentic the experience was.  Did you see the advertisements?  Come and visit Russia Park and Sochi Park, and enjoy our four dimensional cable car ride.  Watch some folk dancing, taste some of our traditional food and listen to some Russian music.  We had hoped there might even be free vodka.  We paid £18 for our tickets and happily travelled on quiet Tube trains to an unusually serene Kensington Park.

We had been warned to be on time (our tickets were valid between 10 am and 1 pm) and I expected to be carried to the location by the weight of people attending, if not by signs, but on arrival the Park was pretty much as quiet as it would normally be at 6 am on a January Sunday.  By dint of following my friend's internal compass ("I'm sure it will be somewhere near the Embassy") we eventually found Russia Park, only to discover that entrance was now free of charge because of lack of interest from the great British public.  The ticket office where we might have obtained a refund was of course closed.

We wandered round the Park unaccompanied and unbothered by other visitors, and had a lovely sit in the dappled shade of a deserted food tent, drinking our bottled water while the Embassy staff enjoyed a morning exercise class on the lawn outside.  Eventually, in search of excitement, we decided to visit the Bosco shop, but an assistant told us (in Russian) it was closed.  The most exciting thing that happened was when a ping pong ball hit me on the head.  We had a really good laugh about that with the Embassy staff who were enjoying the table tennis facilities.

Bravely we trekked across the lush but deserted plains of Kensington Park in search of Sochi.  "I think it's this way" said my friend, and eventually we ended up back where we had begun.  We enjoyed a pleasant walk through the shady bowers and finally arrived at our destination ... Sochi Park Experience.  The 16 year old on the security desk advised me to talk to the guy on the left about a refund "They know all about the money and stuff" he said.  "They are the volunteers, but we are only the paid staff".

The man was about 5' 9" tall, fairly handsome with tightly cropped blonde hair and a healthy complexion.  He had a large 'volunteer' label adhered to the back of his white T shirt that revealed some well defined abdominal muscles, and advised me to discuss the matter of a refund with Ticketmaster.  I wasn't going to argue.  Where do we enter?  I asked, and he pointed us to the right of the security desk where we negotiated the long and arduous route to the front of the queue.  "Welcome to Sochi Park" said the same handsome volunteer, "You will now wait for ten minutes for the next guided tour".  As he spoke, snow began to fall from what would have been the sky.  Gradually, about ten or fifteen people amassed and enjoyed the queueing experience, complete with fake precipitation.  We then, with a great sense of anticipation, approached the point of our travels ... Sochi Park!

It was a massive tourism advertisement for Sochi complete with lots of pretty pictures.  I enjoyed a virtual bobsleigh ride complete with air conditioning (necessary on what was a fairly hot day),  had a go at a few quizzes and discovered that I was fluent in Russian (because I know the word for doctor) and participated in the unique four dimensional cable car experience (Russian for a few uncomfortable seats and a three dimensional four minute long opening sequence to Ski Sunday).

It was an experience, I did enjoy it and I most certainly will remember it.  I think some of my experiences were more authentically Soviet than Russian and certainly might make a good sketch for Monty Python.  It was well worth the money, but where's my refund?