Today I went and saw "The Wolfman" in Russian, it was great. To enjoy a movie where I understand only, please, thank you and the names of the characters, it has to be entertaining. I am sure I would have enjoyed it even more if I could understand it, but regardless I left satisfied.

This is the 2nd movie I have gone to see in the theaters in Russia. The first was Avatar in 3D on IMAX. I had seen Avatar in English at a regular theater around Christmas time in Canada, so I had a general idea of what was going on even though I could not understand the words. I still cried 4 times and although visually nice in 3D, I found it to be as visually pleasing on a regular screen.

Did you know in Russia that a new release DVD bought in the store costs from $7 - $12. I told Alexey that back home we pay about $26 and he was appalled. My brain misses seeing things written in English, and watching tv and movies in English. Maybe it is time to pull out my hard drive and watch some "True Blood", "Californication" or "Dexter". When I go to LA next I plan on planting my butt on Deedee's couch for 2 days and catching up on the last season's of all of these shows. The Olympics have been great, but I miss my brain dead time in front of the TV watching all of my favorite shows on demand without commercials. Now I am missing the USA.

Speaking of the missing the US, I miss hamburgers most. There is nothing like a juicy hamburger and french fries, with a chocolate milkshake. I tried to have a little taste of home and went to McDonalds. Despite all health warning and full well knowing this will not satisfy my deep craving for a burger, I did it anyway. Alexey was very disappointed that I want to eat garbage instead of nice home made food, but he couldn't have that it was that bad since he had a burger and fries too!

No St. Petersburg today and it looks like I will not get a chance to see it this trip, but I am completely okay with that. I am looking forward to getting to sleep in tomorrow, I only slept 5 hours last night and that is not ideal for me. We woke up this morning with the intention of going, but because our friend who we were suppose to travel with had a meeting run late, we had too options take the train, or go to the pool and get a good night sleep at home. We chose the pool and surprisingly I was very comfortable doing statics at the bottom of the pool (my least favorite activity).

Of all of the places in the world that I have had an opportunity to train, Moscow has one of the best set ups for freedivers, from beginners to world class competitors. Why? First off there are many pools in Russia that allow Freedivers to train at specific times. At the particular pool that I am training at we have 2 hours of pool time every day in a 25M pool, that is 6M deep.

On any given day there can be 14+ freedivers sharing this triple wide lane. Natalia Molchanova has created these diving programs that go from novice to athlete and most everyone there is doing one of them. Natalia says that using the programs divers slowing build to their maximum potential. "We have many years to dive."

The program is much different then anything I have trained before. Initially I found them to be very intimidating and uncomfortable because it is not how I have trained in the past, but I am finding that they are really helping me with my general comfort in the water. I also find having a 6M pool to practice equalization very nice.

Does anyone have an extra 2009 WC swim cap? I was borrowing Natalia's tonight and I ripped it on accident. I have never ripped a swim cap before and it only makes matters worse that it was someone else memorabilia.

Xачипури AKA Hachipury (pictured below)

Before coming to Russia I knew I was going to be eating some new and different foods. That makes me happy, I am an adventurous eater especially when I have a guide to introduce to to some new flavors.

What is hachipury? It is a delicious bread baked with I think it might be ricotta cheese in the middle and after it is baked a raw egg is put into the middle and the dish is served to you. To cook the egg you need to break off a corner of the bread and mix the egg with the cheese, then dig in, bread, dip mouth, hmmmm, bread, dip, mouth. This is so good. Hachipury is my reward after a hard training session in the pool. This dish comes from the Caucasian region of Russia.

A national holiday in Russia today. The sun was shining, the roads were clean and relatively free of people. It is traditional today for women to give men a gift. Women's day is coming soon on March 8th.

This holiday is in celebration of the protectors of the home country. I am not sure how long this holiday dates back. I was thinking maybe the Men's holiday got this name because men are required to serve in the army for 1 year in the Russian Federation. I gave a gift to Alexey, Ivan, the Man of the house I am staying in, and to Anna Petrovna, she is Ivan's wife's mother and worked for the military for many years and according to Ivan she is the protector.

I think Anna Petrovna is the protector of the house because she keeps everyone very well fed. Since the day of my arrival there is always something delicious sitting on the stove. It will be tough when I go back to Egypt and have to cook for myself again.

An interesting Russian fact about names. The first name is the given name, the second name is given to the child based on the father's first name, and the ending is slightly varied depending if the child is a boy or a girl and the last name is the family name. Culturally to show respect to someone you do so by calling them by their first and middle name. Anna Petrovna is my elder so I call her by her first and middle name, you would also address a teacher this way. Someone older then me but who I know I would call by their first name and someone my age I can call them by a short name. Ivan's wife's name is Ludmila, but I can call her Luda.

We are planning on going to St. Petersburg tomorrow, if that happens I plan on taking many touristy pictures, if we don't go, I will get a chance to do some more snowboarding and training in the pool.

My morning started off with a ringing alarm, to be following with a fresh cup of coffee. This would have been a perfect morning for me if I had gotten at least 8 hours of sleep the night before, but I only got 5. Anyway after breakfast we loaded up the car and it seemed like it took us 30 mins to clean all of the snow off the car.

To the ski hill for my 2nd attempt at snowboarding and I did well. I was actually carving. Although my butt is really sore and I think maybe I might have gotten frostbite. Not sure, but certainly when I go snowboarding tomorrow I will be borrowing someone's much warmer snow pants. This is the major problem with traveling and weight restrictions, I can't bring everything and I have to make do with what I brought. The most useful item this trip, my Soreal boots. My feet are always dry, warm and comfy.

After the hard work of snowboarding I needed to reward myself with some fast food, a hot shower and a nap. I went to the pool tonight, swam a bit and did some negatives to work equalization.

Very sleepy now, I'm even too tired to watch the Olympics.

After running around the Golden Dolphin Diving Expo all day yesterday, and the center of Moscow when I needed a break. Plus mostly trying to keep myself busy so I didn't sit in sorrow most of the day thinking about my loss, springing the occasional leak, especially while talking to my family, I managed to really tire myself out. By the time my head hit the pillow last night I was fast away in dream land.

This morning/afternoon I opted to stay home from the diving expo. There are a few difference between the Golden Dolphin and Dema, first mostly everyone speaks Russian, second I hardly know anyone and third there are many more booths relating to spearfishing and freediving! However not being in need of any new gear or having anyone left to meet with, I become bored after a few hours and I would rather be a home reading a book. I find solitude to be quite comforting. I did have a few laughs, watching men telling their big, tough diving stories to other men! Even though I don't understand the language it is the traditional show down of testosterone and it makes me laugh.

So today I woke up at noon to turn down my ride to the show and began to meditate. When I'm tired I prefer to meditate while lying down and that is the perfect way to send me back into sleepy land. Around 2pm I woke up and decided it was time for some breath holds and then breakfast. Currently I am working on being very comfortable while holding my breath, trying to stay in a very relaxed state, not really pushing. This technique may decrease my performances for a while, but I think this choice will give me must more longevity in my career.

I finally arouse around 3pm to find an empty house, quite unusual here. I took advantage of the quiet and did some studying. I am trying to learn to speak Russian and on most days I feel quite overwhelmed at what seems to be an impossible task, but on other days I see how this venture is helping to improve my desire for knowledge and I find myself more interested in the English language. My hope is I'm waking up dark corners of my brain and this will eventually lead me to be comfortable with static breath holds.

Currently I am trying to motivate to exercise my quads, with a little bit of English tea and chocolate. Caffeine right now might not be the greatest idea, but I will find out for sure later.