PANCHO VILLA

     Type: Mexican
     Address: Bolshaya Yakimanka ul., 52
     Phone: 8499 238-52-13
     Web: www.panchovilla.ru

     Oktyabrskaya

                                                                                         Price: 1500 rub. p/p

                                                                                         Shit-o-meter:
                                                                                   

                                                                                        

As you can guess from the name, it’s a Mexican restaurant/club. I’ve been here several times, and have mixed emotions.

The first thing that shitted me off was the entrance fee (I think about 200 rubles). I’ve come here for a meal twice, and had to pay entrance! Don’t know about you, but I find it INCONCEIVABLE to pay an entry fee in order to have a meal!!! As if the food here wasn’t SHIT ENOUGH, but I still have to PAY FOR THE RIGHT to be able to eat it?!?!?!?!?!

Once inside, you’re slapped in the face by the décor (and, in some cases the waiter). Why do Moscow restaurants go so over the top with decorations? They just loooove hanging ugly irrelevant shit on the walls and ceilings!

To sum up very quickly, the food is Mexican and extremely average, though the nachos are good. The cocktails are shit (especially the mojito) and take hours to prepare. The prices would be reasonable if it wasn’t for the entrance fee.

But the thing that shocks me most about this place is the crowd! It sort of what I imagined the Hungry Duck would be like in the mid 90s. On one hand you’ve got the sub-species of human being. The type of people who offend you just by looking at them. They’re fat, always very wet from sweating, and look as if they could spawn an alien life form though their oesophagus at any moment. Then there’s the very humble Russian girls. They stand in groups with one cocktail for 6 girls (usually a mojito) all night, waiting for their true love to come and thrust his pelvis into them and say something like “Hola” (with a heavy Turkish accent). Then they can practice the salsa which they learnt in Hurgada last year and (possibly) score another (second) mojito. (Right: Khola! Khhhhochesh menya?)

Then you’ve got the Latinos who came here with one obvious purpose. They’re kissing the hands of all girls who walk pass. The girls, in turn, seem stupidly flattered by this behaviour, naively not realising that they’ve been targeted for Latino annihilation later on in the night.

This makes me sick to watch. Therefore, when I come here, I try to sit under the stairs (best place for getting quick service). Why do I keep coming here? Basically just for the great live music. It’s hard to find good live music in Moscow, and I love Latin tunes. The band I usually see is really top notch and a pleasure to listen to. And I find that the service here is really attentive.

This place can be useful for 3 reasons:

-“Last resort” when you don’t know where else to go.
-You want to listen to live Latin music
-You are nearing the end of your gestation period and need somewhere to go to give birth through your oesophagus and where people won’t give you strange looks when this happens.

The queue to the toilet - great place for new znakomstvo!