It looks familiar...

Metro tour; complete! Today the rain made going anywhere fun nearly impossible so we popped 60, one ruble coins into the ticket machine and had an afternoon out. This caused a revelation. If you travel far enough on any one metro line, especially on the less traveled ones outside of the city center, you will start to see duplicates. For example, at the Northwest corner of the city, there is a station almost identical to the one at the Southeast corner. I'm sure most Muscovites don't go outside of their vicinity very often as it's really quite unnecessary. We are, however, shameless foreigners who saw fit to explore the extremities of the outer rim where no man has gone before. Well, nobody we know anyway.

I'm still unsure what I have gained from the experience of seeing and photographing all 180something stations, but the novelty and pride of saying it to newcomers is certainly worth impressed looks. Name me a metro station, any station and I'll tell you the color of the line. It's something like "pick a card, any card."

This sparks the thought of another recent revelation. Perhaps people are made in duplicates as well. At various times and locations I have spotted people who look like somebody I know in the US. I've seen my brother, my sister-in-law, classmates from high-school, celebrities (was that Matt Damon on the metro?), and an RN from my doctor's office. Is there somebody who looks like me running around Europe? If so, does she wear her jeans better?

Also food for thought, we Americans are a melting pot of nationalities, but how is it that I see Russians who look so similar to someone who is an ethnic mutt? Please feel free to comment any scientific or psychological explanations you may have. No matter what, I'm sure the other me hasn't seen all the metro stations in Moscow and that gives me a little bit of satisfaction.