Russia emails

Sorry about the delay in our weekly epistle but we have had an exhausting and exhilarating week! As you can see from the subject title of this email - we have been to Russia. Having spoken to a couple of New Zealanders who had done a trip to St Petersburg with a supposedly reputable company, we went in to discuss a trip with them and decided on a 6 day, 5 night guided tour to St Petersburg and Moscow including an overnight train trip to Moscow, 2 days there and then another overnight train from Moscow to Helsinki.

Gosh, where do you begin. So much history that only a few years ago would not have been possible to see. Probably I will start backwards and talk about Moscow and leave St Petersburg for next week. It is the most amazing feeling to stand in the middle of Red Square and see where the Russian military tanks, troops etc had paraded. (By he way Red in Russian means beautiful and so it is not Red Square because of red for communism, or for the red bricks from which many of the buildings surrounding it are made but because it is the most beautiful square in Moscow - and it is.) The classic pictures of Russian leaders standing and saluting the troops was right there in front of us (minus Boris of course - he is in hospital having more "tests"). They actually were standing on the wall of the shrine of Lenin (who died in 1924). A large brown and black marble edifice that contains the mummified remains of Lenin. I say mummified because ancient Egyptian embalming methods are, apparently, used and although the sceptics say that what you see is probably more wax than anything else, there is still an aura about the place.

Bag and body searches have to happen before you can enter Lenin's shrine. Our young guide (Svetlana) was very intimidated by the attitude of the guards and literally shuddered when at last she was out of the shrine. Very strict rules apply. You must not talk, you must not stop walking, you must not lean over the railing to have a closer look. Lenin is amazingly well preserved and was a very short man with close cropped red hair. Svetlana wants him buried as soon as possible so that Communism is no longer glorified by the presence of thousands of visitors coming to see his body. Apparently the Russian Orthodox church has had many discussions with the current Government about just that but there are still many communists in the current government who are very much against it.

A little about Svetlana, a young school teacher (English language being what she teaches). She was 10 years old when communism was overthrown but all of her family were card carrying communists (a gradual process of classes and examinations during childhood, passing various categories along the way) until at about 25-28 years you get your full qualifications. She had reached the first level when it ended. She hates the communist system and along with millions of other Russians she has a great belief in the Orthodox church that has only since about 1994 been allowed to gain in strength. Her father is a recently retired stonemason who has been responsible for much of the stonework in the new memorial (WW2) park in Moscow also a huge new marble underground shopping complex. He has also done the stonework on some of the graves that surround Lenin's shrine - all Russian leaders, heroes and Stalin's offsiders. I tried to ask Svetlana how her father got the jobs for making the tombs of such prestigious men but she avoided the issue and just said that he was very good at his job. She was happy to talk about his modern work but not that done for the graves.

The buildings around Red Square are primarily red. One side of the square is taken up with the Kremlin walls and Lenin's shrine, another by a huge red building with silver tops to its spires which is now the State Historical Museum, another by a large building that used to be the very empty State Department Store (called GUM, pronounced goom in Russian) that now has exclusive designer label type shops and which, Svetlana assures us, the common man cannot afford to go. Finally, St Basil's Cathedral is a classic picture of Russian architecture. Commissioned by Ivan the Terrible in 1555 it stands as an imposing edifice that is a mixture of beauty and chaos. Ivan the Terrible thought it was so beautiful that he blinded the architect who designed it so that he could never again create such a building. Napoleon wanted to take it back to Paris, brick by brick. Stalin wanted it knocked down because it got in the way of his tank movements but there was enough outcry from the population that it did not happen.

Many churches were knocked down during that time or were completely closed with the priests and nuns being sent to Siberia. Many were used as storehouses or were, after Stalin's death in the mid 50's were opened at museums. It is interesting that most of the precious religious icons were stored and not destroyed. Svetlana was not sure if perhaps some of Stalin's offsiders might not have been a bit afraid of destroying something that had previously been held in great respect and religious honour. Anyway, most of the icons that aren't still in museums, are back in the churches.

On to the Kremlin (which in Russian means fortress). I don't know what I thought the Kremlin would be but it was not anything like I didn't think it was!! (Thank goodness most of you know what I am talking about.) It consists of many buildings, three of them being churches (with beautiful Icons), the President's palace in which Boris choses not to live but many of the Presidents have. It is also where Boris works when he is not in hospital - he is a joke amongst many of the Russian people. The Parliament is not within the Kremlin walls. There is a huge palace that is now for entertaining on a grand formal scale and an armoury that contains arms and costumes from many centuries. Gold leaf cupolas on the churches caught the sun and were stunning to behold. (Actually I have to tell the truth here because an American couple who were the only other ones on the Moscow part of the trip with us are now receiving our emails - Welcome Mo and Ken.) The truth is that the day we were in the Kremlin it was raining but the day before you could certainly see the sun shining on the cupolas beyond the walls.

We ate in two of Moscow's top restaurants each day we were there and Svetlana could not believe that she was eating in places like they were. She had never eaten with her tourist groups before and her eyes were as big as saucers when we walked into the "Crown Casino" for lunch. It was all marble and brass with waiting staff in red and gold livery (including one in a large Napoleon hat). Food was fine (beef stroganoff was very tough, great mushroom soup) but nothing to write home about - she was still shaking her head in disbelief that people could afford to eat there, let alone use the casino facilities.

I could go on and on but, although we went to a convent in which Peter the Great's sister was forced to enter, take the veil and eventually drown in, it all seemed to pale into insignificance compared to being able to see Red Square and the Kremlin. We did go to the Novodevichy cemetery which houses the bodies of the rich and famous of Russian life. Here are buried Chekov, Stanislovsky and Krushchev. They have no ordinary grave stones. All of the headstones are huge, intricate and in many cases extremely over the top. The grave stone of Russia's first heart surgeon consists of a huge black granite slab with two hands, approximately a metre high, holding a red crystal about the size of a human heart but many faceted that caught the light and positively glowed, even on a dull day. Famous pilots would have intricate models of planes hewn from stone above their graves whilst the most famous clown from the Moscow circus has a huge grave area and on it sits a life size bronze statue of the clown and his schnauzer dog lies at his feet. Next to his grave lies a very famous Bolshoi ballet dancer who died only 2-3 years ago (can't remember her name - sorry) and whilst we were there an old lady threw herself down on the grave of this dancer and wept bitterly. It is a very strange place in which you could have spent hours because of the diversity and intricacy of the tombstones.

Nothing I can say could tell you what it was like. More stories next week. The most interesting of which is the fact that we had no tickets provided for us for our trip home from Moscow to Helsinki, officious border guards and invalid visas!!!!! Keep watching for the next instalment of "Night train to Moscow".

From: damag@bigpond.net.au
To:
Date: 8 August 1999
Subject: Night train to Moscow (Part 2)

We have been back from Russia for almost a week and the time has passed so rapidly. To briefly sum up this week – Arnold (and Mo who was also on the Russian trip) spent most of Monday negotiating with Finsov (the tourist company we used for Russia) to get some of our money back. We got back our out of pocket expenses and a percentage of the trip – why? Watch this space. The rest of the week has been spent in the Finnish Archipelago around Turku. There are about 22,000 islands in the archipelago so, needless to say, we didn’t see them all. The weather has been fine and so most of the time has been spent sitting in the sunshine, researching what we are going to do next week in Sweden and a little further on in Germany. The grass of the caravan park is parched – Australian style. It is really strange. A lazy week really but almost necessary after the whirl of our Russian trip.

Our trip by bus from Helsinki to St Petersburg was uneventful, except that when we got to the bus the Finsov representative told us that our visas had the wrong return date on them (a day too soon) and that money h ad been given to our tour guide to pay the border guard to correct it – there would be no problems. We spoke to our tour guide who seemed to know nothing about it. However, that straightened out and once more with reassurances that all would be easily settled at the border, we set off – minus 2 people who apparently hadn’t turned up. Twenty minutes out of town a mobile phone rings, the bus does an about face and we return to the point from which we left. Apparently the ship from Sweden carrying the two “no shows” had been rescheduled and Finsov were not aware of the time change. Hence, it was not the fault of Bill and Emily (the “no shows”) and the bus had to return to pick them up. Okay, things do go wrong sometimes! We collected a few others along the way and all seemed to be well.

The border – our guide tried very hard to convince the border guard that our (Arnold’s and mine) visas needed to be changed and that it was the fault of the Russian Embassy in Helsinki that they were wrong. He went away and spoke to his boss and then told us not to worry about it, all was okay. We still had nothing in writing to say that we could stay a day longer in Russia – neither our guide nor us were happy with that outcome. Needless to say we didn’t argue too much with a gun toting Russian guard. Our first port of call was Vyborg, a former Finnish town (prior to one of I don’t know how many wars). It used to be a centre for culture and art but now is a very sad, poverty stricken crumbling town steeped in pollution.

The scenery along the way to St Petersburg was nothing to tell about but the long distance splendour of the approach to St Petersburg was stunning. Long low buildings set on a harbour that has earned St Petersburg the title of “Venice of the North”. Closer inspection, however, revealed that most of these buildings were crumbling and the harbour water very polluted. However, looking at it through romantic eyes, the charm of the city was evident. It had been a long day and dinner and bed ended our first day in Russia.

Day 2 – Let’s see if we can get our visas fixed. We met with our Russian guide (Irena) who painstakingly tried to extend our visas through the agency responsible for this sort of thing at the hotel. She eventually spoke directly with the powers that be who said that they were not working that day and could not do it. A lot of rubels changed hands and, miraculously, they said that it would start to be processed that day but no promises! Meanwhile, our fellow travellers were cooling their heels in an unlit hotel lobby or in the bus waiting to start the day’s activities. (Brian – cost cutting devices for hotel engineering departments – only have the lights over the Reception Desk lit and those near the elevator – I didn’t hear anyone complain to management about the lack of light – just to each other! The other good cost cutter is not to have any air conditioning controls in the rooms. Turn the air conditioning on at 8am and off at 10.30pm and let the buggars suffer!)

Frustrations put temporarily aside, off we went on a city tour of St Petersburg. It is a mixture of grand, well maintained palaces and grand, poorly maintained palaces. Many of the palaces are now museums or, as in the case of one place (Nicholas Palace) we went into, now belong to Trade Unions, or business enterprises. The very grand stock exchange building is now just crumbling down around the harbour. Nicholas Palace was amazing. From the outside we wondered what sort of derelict place we were being taken to to have lunch. Once inside, the chandeliers were blinding and the artistry of the engraved columns in the formal dining room stunning. The dinner service was antique and huge and the waiting staff well trained and efficient. All this in the Trade Union Hall!

After lunch we went to the Winter Palace, a 700 room art gallery, with 2000 windows and room after room of artwork that had formerly been locked away in vaults. There were rooms of Rembrandts, Monets, Matisse, Van Gough and 22 Picassos!!! On and on and on and on and on etc etc etc. At every turn, just when you though there couldn’t possibly be any more masterpieces – there they were. Not only paintings but statues, vases, silverware, a room where all the pillars were made of malachite. Apparently it was public outcry about all the masters’ works being locked away that made the government eventually hang the pictures for public display but any of them are in rooms that are not easily reached and no floor plans of the palace are provided to make it easy to see them. After a surfeit of art, with aching feet and full camera disks, we went back to the hotel to see if our visas had been processed – no.

After dinner we saw a very lively Cossack show with whirling girls and leaping guys and very emotive, powerful Russian music. A great show and an evening well spent.

Probably leave the rest till next week. Too much will bore you silly but…will we get our visas?

Welcome on board Oded Straus, a gentleman from Israel whom we met in Helsinki. Hope your trip to Norway went well and that you are back home safely now (or at least soon). Oded and his wife hired a van in Germany and were spending some time touring the same spots as we had. They had previously hired a van in Alaska and done the same thing. Please let us know how your trip went Oded.

Thanks to all those who are keeping in touch. It is good to hear news from home.

We are sitting by Lake Vattern in Sweden's south. Today the weather is not so good but up until now we have been very very lucky. I don't think there is any doubt that the winter is coming. Trees are already losing their leaves and it is not so easy to sit outside after 8pm any more - even with a jumper on. It won't take long before it will be just too cold to sit out at all. We are, however, heading south, hopefully to a bit more sunshine.

We spent four days in Stockholm, Sweden's capital city. It is a gracious old (about 700 years) city set on 14 islands and has a blue green haze because of all the trees and water around it. We found a caravan park that was for "husbils" only (house cars) and although it was under a bridge and the facilities left a bit to be desired, it was within walking distance of the metro and only 4 stops to Gamla Stan (the oldest part of the city). .

You think that is small. At the town hall where the Nobel Prize dinner is held each year on 10 December, each guest has 60cm of room in which to sit and eat. The Royal Family has 70cm (because they are special) as do the recipients of the awards. The hall is only just able to take the 1300 who attend the banquet. There is a room in the town hall that has almost 19,000,000 goldleaf mosaic tiles on the walls and depicts much of Sweden's history. Stunning! We also ate moose for the first (and last) time. Maybe it was the fault of the restaurant (Sweden's oldest, established in 1421) but it was very dry and over-cooked. We made the best of it though and imagined it cooked just like a good piece of kangaroo because it was certainly not unlike kangaroo in appearance but somewhat different in taste. Great city Stockholm, could easily go back there, except that it is "bloody expensive".

To finish the tale of Moscow: we go back to St Petersburg. Our last day in St Petersburg and still no visas - off to a nearby town of Peterhof, still not knowing if we would be able to continue to Moscow that night. Peterhof is the Summer Palace of Catherine the Great and once again is stuffed full of treasures. We spent a wonderful day there and finally got back (with 5 minutes before the office closed) to find that (having handed over an extra US$95 each) that our visas had miraculously been altered to the correct day. Okay, lets kill an hour or two before getting the train - let's not. There is no one to get us to the railway station. Our Finnish guide tried to find our bus driver. Our bus driver had had a few drinks. Let's find the driver of the opposition tour company, they have people to go to the station - no they leave on another train. US$15 we get a cab to the railway station. Which train, which platform, when (ah, we know that one). Lets have a beer and wait to see what happens on the announcement board. Four people, four beers - very bloody cheap. Let's have another one. Find the train, get on the train, get the right carriage, let's go!

Have already told you about our days in Moscow. On the last day there got back to the hotel with about 5 hours before the train was due to leave for Helsinki - NO TRAIN TICKETS. Many phone calls, a couple of beers, Mo got stuck into the travel agency, rushed trip to the railway station to pay (out of our own pockets) for tickets (first class) back to Helsinki. The only good thing was that Arnold and Ken got to see some of the Moscow underground which is, by all accounts, magnificently decorated with mosaics and works of sculpture etc. Svetlana had run around like mad to get us our tickets and we got to dinner to find that she was not allowed to eat with us - we soon changed that (again out of our pockets). She escorted us to the train station where we gave her the equivalent of a month's rent as a tip and she was very happy (believe me it did not break the bank). Sit down, sigh of relief, have a beer, have two beers, buy some more beer for the train. All four of us in one train cabin laughing at the relief of finally being on the train and staging war plans for fighting Finnsov Tours when we got back.

Adventure over - not quite. Border guards. Our train guard woke us at about 7am. By 7.30am the train was swarming with guards. Passports that had been taken from us the night before left the train in great bundles. Would we ever see them again? How many times have they been copied?? Sitting minding our own business in the cabin. Deb decides to go to clean her teeth. Open the cabin door - two great burly guards standing there - Deb didn't clean her teeth. It was indicated that we should step out of our cabin. An armed guard climbed all over it, including looking in ceiling spaces etc. Grunts and nods to each other, we can finally go back in. Train moves on a bit. Stops. Not quite so officious man demands our customs forms. Deb qets questioned why there is such a large discrepancy in the amount of money taken in and taken out of Russia. What did I buy in Russia that cost so much. Show the guard what I bought!! Fortunately, reasonable English. Explained that things had gone wrong and we had to buy more train tickets. Looked at Deb, looked at customs forms, took all the forms and disappeared. What next!? Train moved on.

Seriously folks, despite the hassles, we wish we had have been able to stay longer and get to talk to the "real" people of Russia. We felt that we were cosseted (which we were) and, apart from Svetlana's obvious desire for change in her country and hatred of all of the old ways, we really have no idea what the man in the street feels. Maybe some other time we will go again but certainly not in the forseeable future. Don't let it deter anyone who wants to go though because the trip was worth all of the hassles (she says now that she is safely back).