First-person travel notes, city stories, photos, and videos from the Travel Map archive.
#Beijing The air quality in Beijing is clearly visible. The difference between the photos is literally just a week. When the city is shrouded in haze, visibility drops to a few kilometers. On a clear day, you can see up to 20 kilometers, even the mountains…
#Beijing The Summer Imperial Palace in Beijing is truly magnificent, and it's a huge complex of buildings built by the lake in the north of the capital. Unfortunately, it's often overshadowed by more popular attractions, and not every tourist has the time…
#Beijing Even though China isn't famous for its bar culture, you can still find something interesting! Of course, it's just for fun. Of course, it's aimed at tourists. But the cocktails are still not bad! And anyway, the visitors are all Chinese - there…
#Beijing If you haven't been to Russia in a long time, like me, and have forgotten what it's like when the state treats people like cattle, feel free to come to Beijing! The experience of standing in queues at checkpoints under the scorching sun at +37°C…
#Beijing The southern districts of Beijing are absolutely huge, and each one could be the subject of a separate post. There are streets with food stalls, streets with cafes, streets with antique shops, and streets with tea houses. You could spend an hour…
#Beijing One of the districts that really struck a chord with me is Yangmeizhu Byway. It's a very green street with low-rise buildings, lots of small shops and cafes. At the same time, it's not overrun with tourists like the neighboring Qianmen. As they say,…
#Beijing This is roughly what premium-class housing looks like in China. The main entrance didn't make it into the shot, as there was security there and I didn't want to film them. Otherwise... It's just a beautiful residential complex with landscaping and…
#Beijing To the south of the Forbidden City lies the Qianmen commercial and tourist district. There used to be hutongs here, as I showed earlier, but much of it was demolished and transformed into a purely commercial area. However, in general, the…
#Beijing Police officers in public places, just like their own (no matter how disgusting it might be to say this). It seems that these vans don't move from their spots for months. Many of them even have a full-fledged outdoor air conditioner installed, to…
#Beijing Who really pissed me off in China were the moped riders. I haven't been to Vietnam, and apparently that was a good thing, because I've already had enough of these assholes. It pissed me off so much that it'll be one of the top reasons why I don't…
#Beijing is just extremely spread out across the plains. The distances here are really huge, and it can take an hour to walk to a neighboring district in a straight line. Moreover, you often have to walk along highways, which, let's say, doesn't add to the…
#Beijing One of the examples of the products I'm talking about. The brandy (or cognac?) "Katyusha" with an anti-aircraft installation on the engraving. It's written that it's made in Armenia. I wonder if Armenians know about it? I think not)) It's…
#Beijing Recently, "Russian" product stores have appeared in tourist destinations in China. And I'm using quotes because there's really only about... 30% of the products that are actually Russian. You'll find Alenka chocolate and Tsar's vodka there. Plus,…
🤨 #Beijing
#Beijing When walking around the city, you often stumble upon such areas. They're very similar to post-Soviet ones, except that sometimes you'll spot something in Chinese. The buildings are certainly run-down, but at least the sidewalk is smooth and clean.…
#Beijing In China, retirees are quite active and love to gather together in parks or just in squares. Most often, they do various exercises and breathing exercises, but such choral singing is also popular. In one park, there are several groups of 20-40…
#Beijing The city park and the view of the Forbidden City from the hill. The weather... Well, you can judge for yourself. The amenities in the parks are very good, with trails, gazebos, and historical buildings. It was even a shame that we didn't have time…
#Beijing My love for tea dates back to the times when I lived in Moscow. It turned out that finding good tea shops around the world isn't easy - in most countries, they're simply not available. Thankfully, they do exist in China. But finding a good one is…
#Beijing The cult of Xi's personality in China In China, two figures are particularly prominent - Xi Jinping and Mao Zedong (other figures are usually not mentioned without a reason). While everything is clear with the latter (Mao is to China as Lenin is…
#Beijing was a city that grew extremely rapidly, and where there were slums yesterday, skyscrapers now stand today. But within the central ring, there are still many areas that have not been affected by gentrification. They are simply called hutongs (alley…
I guess you could say I'm nitpicking, but I think this is literally what separates good human infrastructure from a promotional image. Well, if you have the money to build a 600-meter skyscraper, then at least make the surrounding area decent too!
#Beijing The infrastructure in some places looks particularly strange, as if it had slipped into our world from 30 years ago. Well, like... Seriously, is there tile floating around amidst multi-billion-dollar offices? A dust-covered parking lot with a view…
#Beijing There's a modern business district near my home. Probably everyone who's googled photos of Beijing has seen it at least once. That said, even though it looks quite impressive, walking around it is kind of underwhelming. There's a lot of concrete,…
#Beijing I'd like to say it's a meme, but no, they've installed an animated scoreboard in the park's workout area 🤪 Now you can compete with random people in Atjumania games There's even a climbing wall! Too bad it's just for kids ((
#Beijing While walking around the city, I saw a very unusual flag. It turned out to be the North Korean embassy. It wasn't visible through the trees, but it's huge, damn it! The local security guard-like guy is already starting to hassle me about these…
#Beijing No, come on guys, have a conscience! And now you're even getting drunk over this...
#Beijing First walk around the district And you say that the mentality of Eastern Europeans is impossible to understand for anyone!
#Beijing The view from the hotel window - my respect. In many countries, you have to pay a huge amount of money for this, but China is an exception here. But of course, the AQI of 150 does its job, the picture is as dystopian as possible. From here, it can…
Unexpectedly, I'm back with new posts. After Europe, I ended up in... #Beijing! I've wanted to visit China for a long time, and now I'm finally embarking on my first full-fledged trip. The country welcomes me in the most iconic way - with smog, skyscrapers…
#Paris I still think that people who talk about how Paris smells of urine, is dirty, and other such nonsense, have either never been to Paris or stayed right next to the train station and never ventured beyond their neighborhood. At some point, this…
#Paris On my way, I came across a branch of Iran's largest bank. Apparently, the sanctions aren't that scary after all! Would you like to open an account there? And do you think they'd give one to a Russian passport holder? 😆
#Paris Here's such a modern Orthodox church standing in the center. It's a bit questionable, but whatever? 🤨
Rainy #Paris
#Paris A small piece of Canada in Europe While walking around Paris, I accidentally stumbled upon the representation of the French-speaking province of Quebec😁
#Paris A hyped place I was advised to visit - the ramen shop Kodowari Tsukiji It's located in the center of Paris in a historic building, but the interior is designed to resemble a Japanese fish market (with a corresponding smell🤌). It's very crowded, just…
#Paris While I'm preparing new content from Asia, I'm wrapping up my spring trip to Europe on my channel with a final stop in Paris! Back in 2023, I already had a series of posts from here, so this time the narration will be brief. But it's simply…
#Amsterdam #Review And so, after 4 days in Amsterdam, I'm heading off again, so it's time to sum up my impressions. I had a rather complicated experience with Amsterdam, because despite the fact that the city is objectively doing a lot to make life…
#Amsterdam On my last day in Amsterdam, I decided to work in this cute coworking café, which was converted from a former school gym 😄.
#Amsterdam If I win the lottery, I won't tell anyone about it. But there will be signs...
#Amsterdam and the problems with trash I can't ignore this topic, because although I sometimes give many cities a pass (after all, everyone is far from Japan), even by European standards, this is too much. The entire center is literally littered with…
#Amsterdam You know, there used to be collectible cards that you had to rub to release a certain scent. This picture is also infused with a specific scent - the scent of the center of Amsterdam!😆
#Amsterdam The beautiful old houses on the water in the city center are certainly cool, but they have little to do with how people live in Amsterdam. Most of the city is an endless series of brick 3-5-story houses, with long parallel roads. I just lived…
#Amsterdam Here's someone I didn't expect to meet here - my old friends from Bangkok! They're really tough guys. But otherwise, they're absolutely awesome guys!
The quiet and cozy canals of #Amsterdam.
#Amsterdam Booh! Did you get scared? It's not a good idea to walk around drunk in the nighttime alleys😁
#Amsterdam Of course, all the city's roads lead to Chinatown! In Amsterdam, it's located in the very center, on narrow pedestrian streets, and is therefore always crowded with people. Cars don't drive here, but pedestrians are still terrorized by moped…
#Amsterdam They're giving it away for free!
#Amsterdam On the very first day! You bastard, where did you come from? And with local numbers too!
#Amsterdam Finally, I'm getting to the center! My first impression is that the city abruptly transitions from a monotonous brick landscape to a palette of mixed architectural styles. The streets become narrower and more pedestrian-friendly. Separate bike…
#Amsterdam An awesome spot in a city park on the outskirts. Lots of animals are grazing on an open farm, and you can freely approach them. I have a similar "zoo" in Toronto, but there the animals are kept in enclosures.…