(
I am still an hour away from SPb (
The flight to
It was interesting to see the passengers as their make
up suggested to me that the Finns are not very finnikity
(pardon my pun) as to whom they give visas to, since about 25 % of the
passengers were young ladies of Thai origin, whose presence amongst the
bargirls of Bangkok would have been quite normal. Maybe some were going to
(SPb
Thursday) The plane which took me to
SPb was also Finnair and it was far from overloaded.
There were just 11 of us, not to mention the crew and the 4 hostesses. One of
those attracted my interest due to her old fashioned hair do which I simply had
to photograph. She admitted that I was not the first and only one interested
(in her plaits) and told me that not even in conservative
Because our low number of passengers the loading of
the plane took less time and even than we were assisted by wind, so much so that
we arrived 20 minutes early. Luckily for us the immigration officials made
heavy work for the meager number of passengers and thus delayed us sufficiently
to make up almost all the extra time Finnair gave us
to spend in
You form yourself into an orderly queue in front of a
narrow corridor on the side of which there are two little lights, one green and
the other red. You wait behind a red
line on the floor, but you cannot see anything but the person who is being
attended to. When the green light comes on you enter and through a narrow slot,
which is your only contact with the uniformed lady officer, who has stars on
her epaulettes and ribbons to show her decoration for the heroic interrogation
of some foreigner or more likely a Russian who dared to go away for a holiday,
you hand in your passport together with the pieces of paper you filled in on
the plane. Two of those are immediately flung back at you. You realize that you
are fool since she is not interested in how much foreign money you imported
into the country, nor is she interested in any other valuables you brought
along wishing to clear through customs. (You don’t realize at this stage, that
nobody else will be remotely interested in these declarations and in fact you
will not see a customs person and you could have brought along the gold
reserves from
Once she is finished with you the tubular gate which
was the fence between you and Russia opened and you were out of the narrow
corridor where you were confined until your credentials were checked and you
found yourself watching a luggage carousel, where my luggage booked in at
Sydney arrived as intended. A quick look around for a customs man, where I
wished to declare my biological weapons produced no results, so I spent some
time in setting up my three pieces of luggage with the straps, so that I may
wheel the whole lot out. However, in another room suddenly an X-Ray machine
with a very bored operative, yet resplendently uniformed gave me to understand that I should place my
luggage on the conveyor belt. I dismantled my straps and lifted the small bag
and my notebook computer and sent them through. At the other end there was some
trouble and the lady waved on my heavy piece of luggage and I wheeled it across
without it being checked. When on the other side I realized that the exit
conveyor broke and while I tried to show my engineering skills by assisting
her, she just left it broken and I continued until the driver Sacha from last year and Valentina greeted me. Sacha is a fairly young man and certainly stronger, so he
took over my luggage and stowed in his car, after which we set out to find the
flat which Valentina found for me.
It turned out the while the position of the flat is
excellent, the facilities provided are not all that good. However, there is hot
water, a bed, a table for my computer, a telephone, kitchen etc. The design is
almost as crazy as our house in
Soon after arriving we went out to have something to
eat and to do a bit of shopping. While last years mosquito attacks on me caused
me to bring along both roll on and airozone insect
repellants, the sight of two flies made me wish to buy some chemical warfare
equipment in the form of some fly spray. We set off to find a supermarket, but
while we went past ample watch retailers, jewelers, carpet merchants, antique
dealers, carved timbr showrooms, etc, most of them
with very few customers or even enquirers it took some time before we found a
supermarket, which did not have any fly sprays only sprays for treating floor
bound creepy crawlies which could have been exterminated by the age old method
of walking on them. After a lot of enquiries we found another supermarket where
we were taken by an assistant to a shelf which was in danger of being
overloaded by fly sprays of different makes and origins. True to form I chose
the cheapest and it turned out to be Mortein and Made
in
While walking along the busy streets, full of people
coming from work or just enjoying a bit of warm sunshine, I was impressed, as
usual by the beauty of the building is St Petersburg, except that this time I
had to be impressed by all the clean or rejuvenated and restored buildings
along the boulevard of Nevsky Prospect. In my
excitement of finding the fly spray I forgot to photograph some of the building
along our walk from the Metro station, where the escalators still move at
breakneck speed as they carry the thousands of peterburgians
to and from their destinations.
Before I left for SPb I was viewing a website and came
across the area where people could apply to be accredited journalists to
the tercentenary celebration.
Remembering that my brother was the “correspondent” to the well-known Hungarian
comic weekly by the name of “Äz Ojság”
I decided to apply for accreditation as the Editor of “Pace Publications”. That this was approved
was obvious because next day I started to receive dozens of press releases by
email. Unfortunately most were in Russian but when we went to the Press Office,
we were greeted by a charming receptionist who gave me an photographic
Accreditation Card the poser of which I have not as yet tested, but which
undoubtedly will not be sufficient to interview Pres. Bush or the other 45 Heads
of State who are arriving some times today. Afterwards we progressed to a well
displayed exhibition on the history of
Later that day Valentina and I set out to visit her
parents, where we were also to meet her daughter Tatiana. Her brother, Michael
(Misha) also came and while he was adventurous in
using his limited English, Tanya seemed to understand me, but was too shy to
practice hers. Vladimir and Zoya Kopichev were watching us as
we arrived by a minibus (which was really just a small van with seats
masquerading as a people mover) and we met them after a 9 story ride in the
lift. We could not exchange a great amount of news as they spoke no English and
I spoke no Russian, but they were as cordial as they could be and when we sat
down to a table laden with various goodies, such as cold fish of a special type
which required a special way of eating or you finished having more bones than
meat. It was very tasty just the same and I had this with various types of
salads. Also there were cuts of cold meat and bread, etc. I was offered the
customary vodka, which I declined but enjoyed Russian wine. When I was getting
almost full with my fish and garnishes, Zoya
disappeared to serve the cold fish in aspic she cooked for us. This too turned
out to be just a starter, which arrived a bit later and turned out to be pork,
with potatoes and other vegetables. By this time I was getting worried about my
capacity and withdrew to sit away from the table, but it did not help because a
sumptuous cake referred to as a Napoleon cake. Like Napoleon in 1812 I was
beaten but not only did I eat the huge portion, but confess to have enjoyed it.
We could only discuss things through the help of
Valentina, who did good job as our translator. Zoya
did not spend the whole of the 900 days of the Leningrad Siege in the
beleaguered town as she was evacuated through the frozen ice of
And thus ended our day.
It turned out that a convoy of cars was waiting for
the big wigs to exit from the hotel in which some Heads of States were staying.
The interesting thing about all the inconvenienced people was that none
expressed anything but an understanding attitude to the cops. Obviously 80
years of Communism made people aware of the dangers of not yielding to a
policeman, who is instructed to keep the great unwashed away from some Minister
of Uganda or Nigeria! I can just imagine the reaction of some Sydneysiders if the have to cross onto the other side of
William street so as to avoid walking in front of the Boulevard Hotel, because
little Johnny Howard is planning to exit into his armed vehicle!
What worried me, that on TV we saw President Putin’s arrival from the airport. The completely empty 8
lane Nevsky Prospect was the scene as 4 police cars
in line with sirens going were traveling at great speed, followed by several
more until a long limo, surrounded by smaller Mercedes’ police cars bore Putin on his way to a visit to a city where the inhabitants
were obviously inconvenienced and kept waiting in the side streets. In fact we
saw signs of the culture of personalities in various shops were his portraits
were displayed. Valentina told me that one of her colleagues was presented by a
portrait of Him by a friend, which was found to be ridiculous by Valentina, but
not by the recipient!
We headed towards an exhibition of Faberge type
jewels. This guy Ananov used to be an actor during
the old regime, but started to make small jewelry and when perestroika and
finally capitalism arrived, he started to manufacture very expensive and
elaborate objects. Eventually he employed the finest craftsmen to make things
to his designs, books were published by him with photos of some very expensive
pieces and the exhibition we saw was attended by many who will never be able to
afford anything but a view of these items. His eggs in the tradition of
Faberge, must sell for hundreds of thousands of dollars and under the
circumstances I did not purchase sufficient eggs for a small omelet but was
satisfied to admire the exquisite workmanship.
We went to a nearby newly repainted building which
very appropriately was called the House of Books. We only visited two of the
floor and found the amount of books published on
From there we made our way to the
Theatre, concert, circus or opera tickets are being
sold in little sho
|
|
ps all over the City and we bought some for that days
performance in the
The people, who greeted us on entering the palace
turned out to be the dancers and another girl sang some classical arias and
also some extracts from operettas including at least one Lehár
song. They were all real good value, a fact to which I am becoming accustomed
in
Following the performance, during which we moved from
one theatre to another and members of the audience finished up dancing with the
dancers, (well some did, but none of the girls risked dancing with me, in case
the excitement might induce a heart attack in this ancient foreigner).
And thus ended the 30th May.
Eventually we made our way beside a canal towards the
After viewing the castle we went back onto the streets
just in time to see the thousands who watched the procession of the bands
dispersing. It was quite a crowd and I felt as if I would have been part of the
great May-day demonstrations ordered by the Party. I was less than impressed
when we tried to enter the Metro Station. There could have been 2 to 3 thousand
people outside and the police or whoever locked all doors except one, causing
not just a bottleneck but a dangerous situation. I lost Valentina in the tumult
and was totally in the power of the surge from behind. When I finally got
through the narrow door the rush subsided and I could see Valentine waiting for
me. Next we were pressured towards the escalators to take us down to the
trains, which were strangely empty.
I am ahead of my story when I say that at
|
|
We went to see
On our way home we were confronted by even more police
guarding a 5 star hotel, where some of the delegates must have been, judging by
the number of Mercedes and BMW’s parked outside. Although quite late, it was
still not dark when we got back to the flat. Unfortunately there was something
wrong with the power supply in the house and Valentina, who is the burglar
alarm operating expert must have fumbled with switching it off, because about 2
minutes after arriving the phone rung and it was the police asking if we are
the burglars or if we are being burgled! She reassured them because they did
not come to check on us any further. We ate in semi darkness and in fact I did
not notice until this morning that I did not finish my sandwich and left it
half eaten. Btw it was reassuring to note that the power was repaired by
Tonight we are going to the Mussorsgky
to see Prince Igor, a very Russian opera with, hopefully, lots of deep bass
voices.
P.S. I almost forgot the most important item:
President Bush and his wife arrived.
|
|
What never ceases to amaze me are the many young
people, aged 20 to 25, who come to cultural performances alone or with their
friends. In
I also loved to see two children, beautifully dressed
in one of the boxes, with their parents. Being taken to the opera is a festive
occasion and she remembers carrying her good shoes in a paper bag and putting
them on in the theatre in case they may become dirty on the snowbound streets.
These two kids too looked immaculate in their party dresses and I could not
help but photograph them in their box.
While signs and even announcements in various
languages ask that no photos be taken during the performance, people do use
their cameras. I confess being one of the offenders, but at least I switch off
my flash, while their others do not. No one seems to be put out by such
disregard of the bylaws, which are so strictly policed in
Before lunch Valentina decided to buy some groceries
and go to the “supermarket”. I went along as I needed some rubles to be
converted from my US Dollars I sent to her bank. Unbeknown to us the weather
became colder and we were confronted by just 8 degrees C and a wind, which
seemed to reach through our various layers of clothing. (
Just as we finished our lunch, which she cooked from
some ingredients purchased, the doorbell rang and two policemen arrived. They
seemed to be expecting some burglars with masks and coshes,
but instead became quite friendly when they realized that there is some problem
with our burglar alarm. They inspected the lease of the flat for the period we
paid for also looked at Valentina’s Internal Passport
(but not mine although the lease is in my name), rang the owner of the flat,
arranged for a technician to come and inspect the alarm and smiled sweetly when
I asked if they are going to arrest Valentina, just in case she is a burglar. They
did not and thus proved that they have a sense of humour.
I was also impressed by their efficiency in being helpful.
There is nothing on the cultural scene for tonight as
yet, although I may yet find that some concert, of which there are dozens being
advertised in ticket shops around the streets, will be our place of
entertainment tonight. But I do know that for tomorrow Tuesday) evening we have
tickets to the circus (or at least to one of the several circuses in SPb).
After that, we only have tickets for The Merry Widow on Thursday next!
May well you ask how I can afford this type of
sybaritic life, especially as I insist on paying for Valentina’s
ticket also. Her tickets cost between US
$2.00 and $4.00, while mine have gone as expensive as $20 for Prince Igor. We
sat in the first row of the balcony, next door to the box where the
Tsar/Stalin/Gorbachev or Putin would sit, so we were
not exactly roughing it! They do fleece us foreigners! While the program in
Russian costs 7 rubles, the same in English costs R70 or about US$2.20! How
they can mount such splendid productions defies my imagination.
Stick around, there will be more.
PS: I am unable
to upload my photos to my site on the Internet on the rather slow connection we
were able to arrange. Please wait until I advise otherwise.
Notwithstanding the cold day we braved the walk of
some 300 meters to the Metro Station, where once you manipulate the heavy
swinging doors (no mean feat for people at their strongest !) the temperature
is much m
|
|
ore clement, using the body heat of the multitude of
travelers. Is it realized that people are exploited for their heat output even
in this system of democracy?
We were on our way to the
That part of the building which was restored is
magnificent. One of the rooms has a wall of mirrors, all have parquet floorings
with inlaid flowers and decorations, paintings and in the middle of the rooms
glass cases in which, on this occasion the porcelain work of a
The rooms were strictly observed by the eagle eyes of
the ladies who are employed as guides and who would have nervous breakdowns at
the mere sight of a camera, but who are not at all disturbed by some heavy
boots ruining the exquisite inlaid timber floors. Strange that you are allowed
to photograph the priceless treasures in the Hermitage, where flash photos will
damage the oil paintings, but to photograph the chandeliers or the porcelain
sets of crockery is a big Nyet in this part of the
Museum’s annex.
It was time for a coffee break and we visited an
elegant café-cake shop along the lines of the Gerbaud
of Budapest. It was interesting to observe the well dressed and groomed ladies
having a leisurely chat while consuming delicious cakes.
Perhaps at this stage it will be interesting to say a
few words about women in SPb especially as the accepted view of the Russian
women is what we used to see of heavy ladies wearing heavy weatherproof
garments cleaning the streets or carrying bricks. Nothing could be further from
the truth. Girls are dressed fashionably and they seem to be just as
romantically inclined as their Parisian counterparts, cuddling and kissing
their boyfriends. They are not only nicely dressed, but some are also beautiful
and have figures which would belong into magazines. I have also observed what
large proportion of the girls are tall, in fact often they are having to be
accompanied by men of lesser stature. Amongst the young, black seemed to be the
colour, but some girls are not shy in wearing lively
outfits. The cold snap has not made the girls wear shapeless overcoats, it
seems they are prepared to sacrifice comfort in exchange of being attractive.
And they are as attractive as any.
Walking around the Hermitage we saw a wedding party on
bicycles. I made some photos and wished them good luck. I also observed a
police car speeding along the
Quite a change from the policemen at
We visited it in the morning on an island of the
Late in the afternoon we left for the Circus. This is
located in the City in a permanent building built for circus performances in
the round. Entering the foyer it could be seen that no opportunity will be lost
to
|
|
make the parents pay for everything the kiddies might
desire as there were several tables set up to sell flashing toys, clown’s noses etc. As we moved in, we saw the circus
people leading horses with children riding on them for a fee of 50 rubbles (AU
$ 2.50), while their parents were furiously photographing the little darlings.
In the interval (and also after the show) the horses reappeared for rides, but
in the foyer also a horse, a monkey, several circus people in their costumes
were available for a fee to be photographed by a professional photographer,
with the pictures ready to be picked up at the end of the performance.
It will not surprise you if I say that the performance
was excellent. Generally speaking I am yet to see any costume at any
performance in any of the branches of art which are not sparkling clean, colourful and usually sumptuous. The various acts, whether
juggling or an act with bears and wildcats, trapeze artists or people riding
horses upright or under them, standing on the feet or on their heads, a couple
changed their costumes in the blink of the eye and kept doing so for dozens of
new outfits, they were all sensational and while I did not have a laughing fit
watching the clowns, the audience certainly did and I joined them in
appreciating the dancers who did their routines in between the acts. I was always
a great fan of the circus, having last been about 40 years ago, but if in
Leaving the circus for the bright streets (after all
it was only 10 PM) we had another laugh with Valentina at the expense of some
Russian custom as we and about 2000 other circus audience tried to leave the
place. What I am going to explain is really a fact and difficult to understand,
although Valentina assures me that in 1930 a French writer has attempted to
explain what causes it. In the case of the circus there were, like everywhere
else and due to the extreme harshness of the winter, two sets of doors. To
cater for a building such as we were in last night, there were three sets of
double doors followed about 2 meters away with another set of 3 double doors.
Need I tell you that only 1 half door was open, which allowed at most two
people to squeeze through. Once this was negotiated, the other half door, not
in a direct line to the previous door had to be squeezed through before the
wide open spaces of the street were reached. Why all the double doors could not
be opened so that at the same time about 12 people could exit, I will never
understand, but as Valentina would say: “Zis iss Rrusssha!”
Generally speaking there is a fetish about doors here.
Most of them are heavy and require the strength of Peter the Great to push open
against a heavy spring which shuts it tight to test the next one, most are openable both ways so that sometimes you need to work
against the person, who is also trying to push it open, but mostly they are
shut, as was the case of the Metro doors when we tried to enter on our way
home. Why? I certainly could not guess, but I was told that the escalators on
that entrance of the station might be out of action. So we walked for a while
and entered through the other entrance of the same station. That the entrances
were some 500 meters apart must suggest to the uninitiated that the size of
these stations are enormous and indeed they are and they are also very deep due
to the marsh on which SPb was built. One escalator which I timed goes about
1/3rd or ½ faster than escalator in
Would you believe that we have no cultural engagements
for tonight? Not even a circus. But Thursday we are seeing the Merry Widow or
more to the point Vesyoloya Vdova.
I will never understand what went wrong at
|
|
The Faust I saw in
What was so marvellous? The
singers were superb. Mephistoteles had a rich voice
and an energy filled performance Russell Crowe would have been proud of.
Margarita was sung by a beautiful young girl (what happens to non-beautiful,
elderly 40 years old singers in
The scenery needs to be described by people who know
how it was done. I was watching and marvelling at the
ingenuity of it all. Imagine a five stories high mirror suspended at an angle
at the rear of a stage. By the way, the stage is only slightly shorter than the
6 stories high auditorium and its width is the same, in other words very wide!
The scenery was the mirror showing the floor of the stage onto which from above
the desired background was optically projected. If the action took place
outside and trees and a house was to be seen, it was projected onto the floor
of the stage and reflected in the mirror as a background. To change scenery it
seemed that a carpet was being rolled back, except in one scene the soprano
lying there was also pulled back on a non existent carpet. The mirrors were not
the only feature of the scenery. One part of the mirror allowed a platform to
be moved onto the stage and at times the mirror was back lit to reveal a singer
to appear as a ghost or being real.
To top it all, what seemed as wrought iron gates and cathedral
wings appeared on the stage to indicate a minimal but highly successful
addition to enable the audience to realise where the
action is taking place. I have certainly never seen anything like it and I
wonder if I ever will.
What else can one say? That it is almost unbelievable
that productions of such quality can be put on when the cost of tickets (for
Russians at any rate) are almost ridiculous. Or that tomorrow an equally
impressive performance of Aida or Tosca will be mounted with a nonchalance of
naturalness? At what stage will the Maly (the small)
Theatre be as well known outside
While at the Mussorgsky we visited their museum with
some mementoes of olden days and their various appearances in
Valentina liked this Faust, but suggests that we try
and see the Queen of Spades which she considers even better. I am game, but
looking forward to a Russian interpretation of
Lehar’s Merry Widow tonight. Btw I was really
sorry not to understand Russian last night. Every syllable of every singer
could be heard clear as bell, something which is not the feature of operas sung
in their original language. Next week we are seeing the four parts of Wagner’s
Ring. I wonder if it will be sung in the original German and if I will
understand it.
Stick with me if you want to know how “Vilja, oh Vilja” sounds in
Russian!
Today we had a fairly busy program, so much so that
for the first time since arriving I missed out on my afternoon snooze.
Valentina received a phone call this morning asking what is to happen with her
pay and to avoid it being placed into the safe we went to collect it. Once it
became known that I tagged along, her colleagues found some biscuits, a bottle
of wine was opened, coffee cups were laid on the table and a plate with fruits
prepared. Valentina bought a cake on our way as our contribution and her boss
and the other two who shares her room sat down for an hour or so of chat with
intervals of showing their family pictures displayed on the computer screen.
It was interesting to note that amongst other subject
we entered into a discussion on the various productions of Gounod’s Faust in
various cities and on my complaint that the Rakoczy
March was left out of the marvellous SPb production I
was assured that the
On our way from her office we called in on a small
café, where we had lunch. It was one of the nicest little places one could
imagine, with its equipment gleaming, brand new vary tasteful furniture,
waitresses in uniform, etc. Surprising in a suburban place, but showing how
things will develop during the years if not months to come.
Next we called in to a brand new computer shop,
occupying at least two floors. It would have made any city proud to have such a
well appointed shop. However when I photographed the line of at least 36 – 40
monitors on show, security guard came up to me wagging his finger and stopped
me photographing. Quite understandable since computer monitors are probably a
State Secret but even if they are not, it does pay to be cautious as people are
still a bit suspicious and work on the principle that if not expressly
permitted, it must be forbidden. However, the young man was quite pleasant
about it, but not the uniformed lady in the Metro Station who has noticed that
I am going to photograph a bronze plaque where Tovarish
Lenin was featured. She just about had a seizure as she screamed at me with
frequent use of the Nyet, known from the Khrushchev
and Brezhnev period. She was as red as a beetroot and no doubt would have had a
stroke had I not put away my camera.
I will have something more to say about the Metro and
my favourite subject about the disappearing doors,
but I have to tell youse all about our evening’s
entertainment. It happened that we have nothing planned for the evening so
after having had a cake (of the type which makes you thinner, the more you
eat!) we picked up a free English language
paper and decided to attend a concert. For reasons which I did
understand it had something to do with Pushkin, whose birthday was today and
Mozart and Salieri. It appears that Pushkin w
|
|
rote a poem about these two and accused Salieri in poisoning Mozart. So two actors took it in turn
to lecture us on Mozart an Salieri, after a 20 minute
dissertation by the conductor of the concert, while the orchestra sat listening
to it all on the stage.
At last a piece from each of these composers was
played by the about 120 people of the orchestra and in the second half a choir
of about 150 and a boys choir of about 60 joined them for a rendition of
Mozart’s Requiem. The power of the orchestra and the choir needs to be
experienced. Every now and then the two actors stepped forward to recite the
poem mentioned above while the music stopped or else they joined the action.
Not to be forgotten, I have to mention the four soloists and the violinist who
entered the stage wearing his black glasses to give a short solo of a child’s
ditty.
Although I did not understood a word, the music was
exciting and I became emotionally involved, realising
how my late music loving wife would have loved to have been there and would have
enjoyed the great music and the fantastic performance. The audience certainly
agreed with me and appreciated the performers and as is customary in
I just need to add some simple mathematics. Our two
tickets cost 100 rubbles which equals exactly
AU $5.00 or US $3.35. There were about 800 people in the audience, so
the total would have been AU $4000 for the evening. We had an orchestra of 120,
2 actors, a conductor and 4 soloists. If they received equal share they would
have received AU $31.75 each or US$ 20.95. Not a penny would have been left to
pay for the hire of the building, the usherettes, the electricity, the
cleaning, etc. etc. Not a penny for the choir, for the dry cleaning of their
uniform outfits, nor a penny towards the dinner jackets of the grown up or boys
choir.
I also need to add, that every member of the orchestra
wore white tie and tails, the choir wore either a caftan by the ladies or
dinner jackets. They were clean, ironed and smart and their voices were
brilliant and their sound exciting. How do they do it?
The
As we travelled towards the
lake the road was marked by slabs of marble showing the Soviet Star or the
Hammer & Sickle every kilometre apart and a
number of memorials listing the names and resting places of Russian soldiers
who lost their lives in the battle to keep the road out of Leningrad open for
their only contact with their hinterland. After the 39th km. marker we reached
an arch the apogee of which was broken to show the breaking of the blockage and
in a simple and most artistic way underneath this the wheel marks of trucks
were set in concrete showing the place where they entered the frozen surface of
the lake, on which the trucks had to travel another 140 kms
before they reached Russian territory.
A marble slab extolling the people not to forget the
Siege of Leningrad had some fresh flowers and the only other reminder of the
Great Patriotic War was a single anti aircraft gun sitting forlorn nearby for
the past 60 or 62 years. As always the Russian memorials to their War was
simple, emotional and moving.
We were greeted in front of the house where they live
by Jora (Georgey) Pashenko, husband of Sacha
(Alexandra) and their three boys: Kostya 18 (Konstantin), Zenya 15 (Evgeniy),
And now to the background of this, according to Valya
(Valentina), “rich” family is that Sacha studied
electronic engineering with her and at 21 married Georgy,
who at that time was a KGB officer, who served in the ill fated
When does she cook? As she explained to me she
prepares food for two or three days and does so between
So why are they rich? They have a big flat, namely a
room for the boys, where they have a settee and two armchairs, each of which
converts to beds at night. They have another room which is the equivalent to a
sitting/dining/TV room. The semiround corner settee
here converts to a double and a single bed. And finally the parents have the
luxury of a bedroom and there reposes a sign of their richness, a bed which is
just a bed and need not double up as a seating facility. They also have a brand
new Volga car, the dream of Georgey, as Sacha referred to the car they bought just days ago, using
their combined savings, but which I could not see as it was garaged too far
away from the flat! Also they have two TV sets, two VCR’s, two computers, a
piano (which the 8 year old proudly played for us as well as showing off his
paintings in the staircase of the house) a bicycle stored on the balcony, a
kitchen large enough for a table and some chairs and enough for the parents to
attend a concert or play at least once a week in St Petersburg’s centre, about
25 kms away.
Sitting down for lunch we started with vodka,
continued with champagne and wine (Tokaj which we
bought along). We also used some brandy type liqueur we had to use in our
coffee after lunch and there were many other drinks on offer, which I certainly
declined. There was another friend there and the two guys finished off a ½
bottle of vodka, with some help from me, without any of us being affected by
the beverages. I cannot say the same about the food, which came in an
uninterrupted stream throughout the afternoon, brought in by Sacha, a most vivacious lady very much in love with her 4
men, who never stopped talking, telling stories, laughing and did a good job of
it all, mostly in Russian but with some English directed towards their guest.
The boys and their father also had varying degrees of English, with the eldest
boy telling us a story of how they tried to write a protest letter about an
ecology related issue to the various authorities without any result other than
being advised to cease their arguing or else they will have certain
difficulties, which they read as being death threats. Needless to say I was
astounded at their story, confirmed by the parents, who were encouraging their
son to protest in what now should be a democratic country, but is still run by
corrupt politicians at various levels.
We came home by bus, changed to Metro and another line
of Metro before getting home after a most interesting day in the company of an
interesting family.
The ballet dancer’s former love nest is now the
|
|
The Museum was full of facts,
photos, relics and personal items of
some of the political figures. Most of those who emerged as Soviet
politicians in the Revolution after 1917 were flourishing in the ’20s and shot
in the ‘30s. If they survived the purges, they fought in the Great Patriotic
War and if they survived that, they managed to get themselves purged in the
50’s or just escaped due to the death of Stalin, the greatest person who ever
lived on this Earth. This is not exactly the present view, but it crtainly was just before he died and was exposed by
Khrushchev in 1985 to an unbelieving population.
Visiting any of these museums is most interesting, but
it has its drawbacks. Every room (actually the size of these rooms in these
palaces and mansions would suggest that they be called halls) has it’s lady
guarding the contents and the rooms with loving care. Every one of these ladies
is immensely proud of the relics she guards and dislikes you leaving her room
for another before receiving a verbal lecture not only what the room might
contain, but also some stories past and present. Thus one lady, with an
excellent knowledge of English which she learnt without ever having been
outside her city, apologised profusely that the
little cards affixed to the exhibits in Russian and English are insufficient
and augmented them with her own commentary, while another lady in Lenin’s study
told with great hilarity but in Russian the story of someone having dressed up
as Lenin and giving a serious interview to some visitors and cameramen a few
days earlier.
After another nice luncheon in a café (a meal with
pork schnitzel, potatoes, vegies, beer, cake, coffee
at about AU$ 5 each, nicely served) we walked towards the Aurora a ship built
in 1900, which has served from the Japan wars right up to WWII. However it’s
claim to fame was the famous gunshot signal for one of the many revolutions
which originated in
|
|
nst the Tsar. Of course we wished to board and see
whatever was to see, but the way was barred by a chain and a young sailor.
Valentina decided that a 10, maximum 20 rubble bribery will allow us to board,
but the sailor suggested that 200 might just do the trick. So we paid the money
in full view of the other hopefuls and the chain was opened for us and another
couple, whose contribution to the Sailor’s Benefit Fund I do not know. At the
top of the gangway we were met by another young sailor, who seemed to be our
tour guide. Unfortunately there was nothing but the ship to see, no museum, no
descending into the bowels of the ship, just a conducted tour by a sailor who
was doing his 3 years of national service and who was making a bit of money on
this Sunday afternoon.
We have to find a dentist for me today (one of my oft
repaired teeth just fell apart, luckily causing no pain), no doubt Valentina will have some sightseeing
plans to fulfil, and who knows an opera or concert in
the evening. Of course I am only mention evening for you people, for us and the
other 4 ½ millions in SPb it is the White Night, meaning that there is very
little difference in the lumens supplied by the sky at 11 am or pm.
PS. (Pre Script) (This epistle is not to be read by Russian
readers as I do not wish to hurt the feelings of a nation, which is the only
one showing respect to an ancient guy like me. For your information, it is a
regular occurrence that people offer their seats in public transports to
venerable gentlemen like me, who is highly embarrassed by such actions.)
Some years ago when
It occurs to me that I am
unable to write about the abundances of public toilets in red ink, so I must
admit that the best idea is to either bring red ink or portable toilets with
you. My suggestion is prompted by my having had to walk about a kilometre from a place which is one of the tourist
attractions back to another tourist attraction, in front of which were two
portable toilets, the type which are used on building sites, with a little lady
outside, who owned or supervised the use of the establishment. The use of one
of this was undoubtedly the low point of my
I only mention this as I was
astonished to find that the Metro stations do not have any toilet facilities
and when I questioned Valentina on the subject she told me that people who wish
to use a toilet should visit a restaurant or bar or café for such purpose. One
lives and learns.
Another phenomena I can
report on is the quaint habit of certain entrances to the excellent Metro
system being blocked, so that people need to use another entrance. This would
not be too bad, except that the other entrance is about ½ a kilometre
away and there is no guarantee that that entrance is open. As someone who comes
from the Lucky Country I should not be mentioning this, but I am not the only
one who noticed it. Discussing this in the presence of Valentina’s
boss-lady or “my chief” as she is called it turned out that she experienced
this so many times that she wrote to various people about it and she received
nothing but acknowledgements. Seeing that she needs to spend an extra 15
minutes, sometimes in temperatures of minus 20 degrees C, in snow, wind and icy
streets to go to another entrance which might be open to lead to the same Metro
train, this is no laughing matter to her, but the authorities see nothing wrong
with this method of crowd control. To me it is simply unbelievable that they
wish to do this. Do they really think that if they make it difficult to those
wishing to get to their offices, they will give up and will go home for the day
and thus reduce the congestion on the Metro system?
Incidentally, while the
locals are outraged about these matters, they are not too keen to admit it to
outsiders like me and while seething inside they treat it as a big joke. That
they accept it without being surprised is something I observed when confronted
with locked doors. Valentina also, just turned around and set out to go towards
another station entrance, but had to agree that locking entrance doors is
idiotic and does not solve congestion, but simply adds to the frustrations of a
much suffering public, which is patient, although known to rebel. (See history
books on the revolution of 1917).
The matter of one door open I
have already mentioned, I think. It is one for constant amusement for V and me
to find that masses of people are forced to go through one narrow door, while
the other half of the swinging door is locked. Once you are pushed through that
first obstacle there usually is an area before encountering another single
door, the other half of which is similarly locked. Need I say that these two
partially opened doors are not in line, necessitating a right angle turn before
being squeezed through the second set of half opened door? I need to add, that
I have never seen a theatre or the circus or any of the palaces with less than
two, but mostly more double doors, but it is a universal rule of the land that
no more than half of one these, rain or shine, is to be opened irrespective of
the crowds wishing to exit. If two doors are in existence, they open just 25%,
but where four double doors exist the opening is just 1/8th of what
was envisaged by the architect. I am being told that maybe the people wish to
keep the warmth inside, but seeing that it is summer it is more likely that
those in charge of doors are reluctant to break the tradition of “one door
only”.
With all my niggly criticisms I am a great believer that this nation,
in spite of the apparent stupidity of doors, Metro entrances, etc. is destined
to become along with the Chinese leaders in the future. Just look at how
quickly the Chinese mastered the production techniques when given a chance and
look at the tremendous steps
Having fulfilled this important part of our agenda we
made our way to where the boats leave on tours of the canals which made SPb the
Venice of the North. These canals are, amongst some palaces, the Hermitage and
other beautiful buildings the cause for SPb’s claim
to fame. As the weather was not too hot we chose a closed boat and found that the
charge of foreigner’s was exactly double to the Russian passengers. Fair
enough, but we expected a multi language commentary, at least. This is not what
happened and Valentina and I fumed all the way through the Russian commentary
of the lady who never let up on her amplified text. Nevertheless I gathered that there are some
600 bridges across the various canals and quite a few of them date from the
days of Peter the Great.
On arriving back at our starting point I approached
the lady, who could not speak English, so Valentina translated for me and I set
the question to her as to what did I receive extra for the double price I was
charged at AU $15 or US$10. She told us that this is how it is in every other
country, to which my answer would have been a quick exclamation of “Bullshit”
but in Valentina’s translation became a more gentle
“This is not so” and as witness to which some French tourists were invited to
become involved. On being asked by some onlookers, who became committee members
embroiled in the meeting as to what her
foreign visitor expected for the extra money and on being told that I would
have expected a multi language commentary, Valentina was told that visitors to
Russia should learn Russian before they come here. On this gem of information
and advice we adjourned the meeting and visited a nearby café for an adequate
lunch, following which Valentina purchased the missing lens of her contact
lens’ and we visited another of those huge shopping areas, where a large number
of shops congregate through two or more avenues inside blocks of buildings
which reach from one street to another.
The shops are individuals shops along lines and we
have never seen any body doing any buying of merchandise, which is displayed
most attractively in great abundance. There are a large amount of security
guards, usually dressed like Rambo or Arthur Schwarzenegger (these two might be
the same?) and they outnumber even those who came along just to look but not to
buy. I did break the rules and I did buy
a few things, which Valentina carried in her plastic bag, which is usually
hidden in her handbag until it comes out to carry whatever she may have bought.
Very sensibly, if you buy something you are being charged for your plastic bag
and thus there is less disposable rubbish.
We visited a small ticket agency and there bought
tickets to a performance of the Male Choir of St Petersburg in the Cathedral of
the Peter & Paul Fortress, where a number of Tsars, including Tsar Nicholas
II murdered by the Communists are now buried. I must photograph one of these
tiny ticket agency shops, where every available wall space is taken up by
placards showing the huge number of shows of all types and a tiny window beyond
which sits a lady selling tickets for anywhere and for anytime. Furthermore I
must photograph it at a time when Valentina is bent into half to be able to
speak to the lady, otherwise hidden from the site of her clients.
After my regular afternoon snooze, while Valentina has
her daily conversation with her parents, children and sundry friends and
relations, checks her emails and irons my shirts, underwear and sox, we set out
for the island where the Fortress is and where we sat ourselves in the front
row of the Cathedral awaiting the arrival of the choir. There were 18 of them
between the ages of about 30 and 70, all in white tie and tails. Further
statistics are that 7 of them were soloists during one or more times during the
evening and only 4 of the 18 middle aged men needed glasses to read their
music. It was be the carrots they ate when young, but owing to some periods
when residents of SPb were less than well supplied with food, it would be
advisable to look for other reasons. But I digress.
The 90 minute program was chosen from Church music
composed for choirs and this lot has certainly made a fine job of it.
Especially the deep bass was pleasing for me, - I simply cannot imagine Russian
music without a bass voice and last night gave a preponderance of this along
with one particularly fine tenor soloist. One of the singers looked almost the
smitten image of Tsar Nicholas II. The performance was well worth a visit to
this place, even ‘though it rained and the Metro is located about 2 kilometres from the Cathedral.
It is 8:30 am on Tuesday and I better wake Ms Krasavina
and suggest that we have breakfast. She has been up already once to make
coffee, drink it and disappear under the blanket or rather under a doona. Like someone who is used to cold weather, she
disappears completely under a doona and not even her
head would betray her presence in the bed.
St
Petersburg – 10th June 2003 And an interesting day was had by all. Draw up a chair
in front of the fire, sit yourself down and hear my tale.
We decided to visit the Hermitage this morning. It was
a nice summer’s day (St Petersburg style, only two degrees cooler than in
Sydney’s nice winter’s day) and we walked towards the trolley bus stop. On our
way I was surrounded by a bunch of gipsy kids begging and when their mother
holding a bundle of whatever might have been in her arms turned onto me as
well, I decided to push hard and lashed out with my furled umbrella. A few step
behind me was Valentina, who received the full attention of the kids and had
the zip on her handbag opened, before she too has gotten rid of her assailants.
We considered ourselves lucky and on arriving to the
bus stop I took out some money for the bus fare, noted how much money I had
left put back my valet in my rear pocket, buttoned up same and patted it as I
went to board the bus. No sooner did I make it onto the bus I noticed that my
valet was gone and I started to shout at the person who was behind me as we
boarded and who was without any doubt the pick pocket. He answered in bad
English: “What you want?” and in the crowded bus I shouted to Valentina that my
money is gone and she should get the bus to stop. She in turn spoke to the
conductress, who did not understand what stopping the bus would achieve. In the
mean time the swarthy man I suspected to be my crook moved to the front of the
crowded bus and was observing me and Valentina from there while another guy
standing beside me started to offer to pay for our ticket and was most
solicitous about the loss of my valet. He also told me that he saw two gipsy
kids at the bus stop and that I must be very careful because there are lots of
bad people about. At the same time he paid his ticket from a bundle of money I
estimated to be at least 10,000 rubbles or $300, an enormous amount of money
being flashed around in a crowded bus, where the ticket would have cost him 6
rubbles at the most. We alighted at the next stop as did he and of course my
pick pocket suspect disappeared through the front door.
After finally finding out in a jewellery
shop where the nearest police station was we set out for it. In a run down
building we found a room with two bored young women, one of whom sat of the
desk while the other on the only chair. They started too listen to Valentina’s question but waved her towards the next
building, where we did find the place in a similarly run down building and in a
place off a courtyard. Behind a window sat two cops and at navel level there
was a small slot through which a slim envelope would have been possible to
pass. She bent herself double and shouted in her story and she was invited in
to a wall map where she was able to show the location of where the bus stop,
where the crime was committed was. One could see the relief on the face of the
policemen when they explained with the required disdain that she is not at the
correct police station.
We set out towards the next place. Both of us carrying
our umbrellas and trying to avoid the potholes in the pavement where the water
was accumulating. With every drop of rain off the roofs coming out at intervals
of not more than 10 meters through 8 inch pipes onto a veritable rivulet across
the pavement it was not easy to avoid getting your feet wet, but by now
Valentina was silently shedding a few tears due to her shame that this should
have happened in her country. I tried to assure her that other countries are
just as efficient in providing pick pockets, but also some provide more
friendly cops. However it was much later in the day when I was thinking that I
too should be shedding a few tears, - it was early days as regards our Calvary of
trying nothing else but reporting the loss of a valet.
It was getting too wet to walk and when Valentina
confessed that the place we are walking towards might be quite far, that I
suggested that we get a taxi. There was a car with a sign on top on it parked
at the side of the road, with a driver and I suggested that she should speak to
him. He responded and we set off for a journey of about 5 km where the driver
found the police station purely by noting a number of police cars parked
haphazardly in a lane way. We entered
and after a somewhat aimless wandering saw a uniformed man in a little room,
who without even looking up at us waved us on. The doors along the corridor,
equally as dangerous, due to the loose linoleum covering as the pavements,
stated what lies behind them and finally Valentina thought that Door No. 72
displayed a description which might have fitted in with our purpose.
However the door was locked and no amount of knocking
would change that, so she went for a bit of a wander to find a living person
(other than the waver on officer) in the building. While she was away a young
man in civilian arrived unlocked the door of No. 72 and went in. On Valentina’s return I told her that our man arrived and
after respectfully knocking we entered his office. He sat there with a string
and some sort of medallion, trying to make the string and medallion into a
single unit and never have I seen a guy less interested in his visitors than
him. He carefully avoided moving his head towards us and while he must have
heard a woman’s voice and knew that someone else was in the room (me) he never
looked up or towards us and he never once addressed either of us.
After a while I got fed up and with as much strengths
as was possible for maximum noise threw my folded umbrella on a table in the
corner of the miserable room, where the nicest thing to see was a girlie
calendar and an aquarium with a tortoise. Even this did not wake him up, but
suddenly with a movement that indicated that the young man was actually alive,
he put down his string and medallion, found a piece of paper and pen and
started to draw on it. From where I was standing I noted that he was drawing a
map of a square, with roads leading into the square or round about and after a
while, min a minimum of wasted words and considerable disdain pushed his map
towards his visitor who pointed at one of the streets to indicate where the bus
top was located, at the sight of which this sample of intelligence, charm and
advertisement to the finest of the police force took another piece of paper,
but for reasons of economy and even smaller piece, wrote something on it and
without wasting another word handed it to Valentine and immediately resumed his
stringing operations.
Realising that we are yet to visit another police station I
followed her down to the street where our taxi driver was waiting. After an
approx 20 minute drive we passed our flat and stopped nearby where our taxi
driver thought that he saw a police car disappearing into a courtyard. Indeed,
this was the police station, but where was its entrance. The two doors we tried
off the courtyard gave no indication, but luckily one police jeep was leaving
the yard and I planted myself in front to give him the choice of knocking me
down or divulging where the entrance was.
It was the metal door on the street and there was a
bell. A voice asked her business and the buzzer sounded to allow us in.
Valentina told the uniformed man at the window, which actually had a slot about
10 x 4 cm, but which could be closed as we found out later and we sat down to
await the next step in our saga. After a wait of about 20 minutes a guy arrived
in a sleeveless black shirt displaying beautiful muscles and a body which made
me wonder if my heterosexual inclinations were the correct ones and an amount
of gold jewellery which put those owned by Liz Taylor
to shame. He listened to Valentina with considerable disinterest, even ‘though
I suggested to her that she explains to all those people that we don’t want
them to find the culprits, but take note of my having reported it for my
insurance company. In the end he told us to sit down and wait for an official
interpreter who will be required to take down my statement. I may add that he
was baffled as for what language an Australian might be using, but seemed to be
quite surprised that I will be both speaking and understanding English. He told
us that the interpreter will be here in half an hour’s time, went to his office
and put on a jacket and left the building while I asked Valentina to enquire
about a men’s toilet. The guy behind the window told us that there is not one
in the building except for those under arrest and that cannot be used by
anybody, not even the policemen!
So we rushed out to our taxi, who drove us back to the
nearest corner to our flat in a one way street, we rushed upstairs to use the
facilities and to collect some information on my credit cards, pick up my
mobile phone while Valentina picked up a phone card believing that using the
card we might get a phone in the police station so that I can ring Australia.
How nice to find an optimist in Russia ;-)
By the time we got back to the police station it must
have been half past two or three o’clock and there was still no sight of either
our muscled Olympus not his interpreter of the Australian language. I rang
Sydney and cancelled one card, but my battery gave up the ghost while I was
speaking with another credit company. So there was nothing to do but sit and
wait. At this time poor Valentina’s main concern was
to calm me from blowing up or walking out. She was telling me about the might
of the police in Russia, even evoking Raoul Wallenbergs’s fate, suggesting that I might disappear the
same way if I upset these bumbling dim wits, who were cavorting with each other
behind their glass curtain in full view of the waiting people. The only
amusement we had was the sight of a shapely young lady in a formfitting pair of
trousers whose attempt to be heard caused her to drape herself across the table
which was in front of the small opening and whose position revealed not only a
plumber’s rear but also every fold of her underwear.
Suddenly, from where we never knew, our beautiful boy
reappeared and actually invited us to follow him. We did as fast as we could
but even than he was already at his desk searching for a paper when we entered.
My attempts to close the door failed as the lock would not work and after a
while I gave up. There was just one chair in front of his desk and I found
something resembling a bench which may have been a table near the door where I
sat. The conversation flowed between him and her, with never any interpreting
required as I never opened my mouth. Finally I was asked to write in my own
words that the text stating that my valet was pinched was translated to me and
that I agreed with this. I did so before any pressure being applied. I may add
that my note was almost longer than the report in Russian.
Now I was trying to get this man to give us something
which stated that I have reported the loss of my valet, containing money,
credit and health cards, my driver’s licence, etc.
but that was not a possibility as there was not a form prescribed for such a
purpose. I asked for a photocopy to show my statement. No photocopying machine,
the only one they had was not fixed as yet. Can I take the statement and
photocopy it and bring it back? A most emphatic Nyet
yet. In the end to shut us up he put on a piece of small paper the address of
the police station in case the insurance company wishes to query my report. (I
wish them luck, letters from one part of St Petersburg to another district take
up to 2 weeks and I guess a letter in English would take anything up to 6 month
to be translated, never mind answered!)
And thus we left. A very subdued Valentina and an amazed
Steve. We walked to the Metro station where I withdrew some money from my Visa
account, just to prove that it still existed. Hence to a ticket agency, where
to cheer up ourselves we bought tickets to a concert, which proved to be
wonderful. We made friends with a South African couple, who hearing my tale of
being pick pocketed told us about their experiences in Barcelona, Paris and
Johannesburg. That was good, it allowed Valentina to be less ashamed of her
city. I don’t quite know what we can do to restore her respect to the police
force of her city, but dear Lord, I am trying.
St Petersburg 12th June 2003.
Discussing the cheek of the policeman or detective who was so busy in trying to
thread a string through the hole of a medallion, (vide Trip Report # 12) while
avoiding to look at us, Valentina told me a true story which I think is worth
repeating for my long suffering readers:
The brother of a colleague of hers was called up into
the Army. Due to a traffic accident the young man had only one hand and so he
went to the doctor to ask for a certificate in order to be excused from
serving. When he went home he noticed that the doctor stated in the certificate
that he is only suitable for light duties. He returned to the doctor and asked
her how he can possible be fit for any duties in the army when he cannot even
hold a rifle. The doctor said: Why did you not tell me that you are short of a
hand? and it was than only that she lifted her eyes and has actually looked at
him for the very first time. Then she wrote out a new certificate. So there, if
a doctor does not cast her eye on a patient, how can we expect that a cop will
look at an ordinary human being?
Our first port of call yesterday was at Menshikov’s Palace. He was an uneducated peasant boy who became
the trusted friend of Peter the Great, a great administrator and an even
greater military leader. He became very rich and self educated, so much so that
he was appointed a member of the British Academy of Sciences. On the his mate’s
death he became really ambitious and wanted the new Tsar to marry his daughter.
His plans misfired and he was exiled to Siberia where he died aged 56.
His palace was full of Italian and Spanish furniture,
Dutch ceramics being used in the heating and even on the walls and ceilings.
Overall the richness of decorations was such as may only exist amongst the
excesses of the Russian nobility. It is interesting to note that my entrance
fee to this palace overlooking the Neva
was 240 rubbles, (AU $12) whereas Russian visitors would have paid 10 rubbles.
However Valentina was only charged 5 since she came with a foreigner. I must
also add that the lady admitting us decided that my cost was so high that I
deserve a private conducted tour and she called upon one of the staff to take
us around. The palace is part of the Hermitage organisation,
but used to be a military school during the years of Soviet rule.
We next visited the Academy of Arts, also on the banks
of the Neva. A huge building with enormous statues and frescoes within its
public areas in two of which an exhibition was mounted to show the various
plans for the extension planned for the Mariinsky
(previously Kirov Theatre). They decided to invest
100 million US $’s into the project and invited architects from all over the World
to submit their ideas. Each of the plans had to prepare a submission using
models, drawings and video presentation. The effects created by computer
graphics were staggering. All the submissions were modern, some outrageously so
and had to include at least two new theatres with a bridge to span a canal
between the old building and the new complex. I will be interested to see which
design was judged by the international panel as the winner. Which ever it will
be it is sure to be controversial (see Sydney Opera House) and already people
are protesting as a few old buildings need to be demolished to make way for the
new.
It was public holiday in Russia today. No one knows
why, but it was Independence Day, in a country which was never colonized and
never really occupied, unless one counts the invasion by the Swedes, Napoleon
and Gitler (there being no H in the Russian).
Nevertheless everything was open and the crowds were enjoying the sunshine
which warmed up this summer’s day to about 16 degrees. At the same time people
in the Sydney winter were shivering at 19 degrees C.
We made our way to the Marble Palace, which used up a
hell of a lot of Marble inside and outside the place which was about 200 by 100
meters in size and 4 stories high with a huge dome on top of it. As most things
in Russia it is immense and was built by Catherine the Great as a pre
|
|
sent to her lover Orlov.
Unfortunately he died before the palace was completed and so she gave it to
another of her favourites. After the revolution of
1917 this building became the Lenin Museum and Valentina remembers being taken
there by her teachers to learn about the great Leader.
There are plenty of Russian paintings and statues on
display but also Russian furniture together with a large number of English
grandfather and French mantle clocks. I was yellow from envy. There were two
special exhibitions staged, one quite extensive about the 200 years of the Mariinsky Theatre and another showing some American
paintings of the Wild West. The former with the costumes of famous operas and
mementoes of Pavlova, Ulanova,
Chaliapin and even Margot Fontayn
was of greater interest to me. There was even a wooden hollow elephant with the
mechanism to operate the trunk by the man hidden inside and used in the staging
of Aida. An entertaining and instructive exhibition showing the pride of the Peterburgians in their wonderful institution, the first
opera house in Russia.
It is interesting to note that after Richard Wagner
came to conduct one of his operas, SPb became very Wagner conscious although
after both World Wars performances of his work were not staged for a while.
They are back on the program and just a few days ago Parsifal was sung in the Mariinsky, while we start our Ring Cycle tomorrow evening.
Related to my discussion of Wagner is our meeting with
a Scottish couple, who have attended the Ring in Edinburgh last year and came
to the Petersburg to see it here and they already have their tickets for the
restaging in Edinburgh. The other item refers to our meeting with an elegant
lady of about 65 with a French accent from London, who turned out to be the
daughter of a Russian lady and who married her husband in Sydney, a musical
snob who on hearing that we have tickets for The Ring announced that the Mariinsky cannot stage Wagner properly and she will not
attend.
Valentina’s son arrived after my rest this afternoon carrying and
installing their VCR so that I may watch a couple of English speaking tapes. No
sooner was it installed I became interested in a Russian football match, but
will find the time to watch a tape to justify Oleg’s effort and Valentina’s worry that I will be bored. As long as I don’t
have to give up on the “kultura” I am soaking in, I
will not mind watching some Hollywood creation.
St Petersburg
– 13th June 2003 First of all I must thank those of my friends and
relations who very kindly encourage me by their message to continue my literary
efforts. It is gratifying to know that some people out there not only receive
my almost daily verbosities, but actually read them. They are very kind in
saying that they enjoy them, but of course there is no knowing what makes
enjoyment for some and punishment for others.
There was very little pain by Valentina and I as we
prepared to go to the Mariinsky Theatre last night.
It was the opening night of The Ring and when we arrived in style being driven
by Sacha, (the food importer from Hungary) the place
was humming around where the latest Mercedes was exhibited on a platform and a
large bunting announced the joint sponsorship by Mercedes and Nescafe Gold.
They were offering free Nescafe, albeit in paper cups, but there was not a free
Merc to be had.
Since the stair cases in the Mariinsky
were designed to be just as baffling as in the Mussorgsky, we had a bit of a
problem to find the correct one, (you see, the going up stairs do not
necessarily go to the next floor, in fact some go up and after a while finish
where you started as we found while searching for the box where we were to sit
during the 2 hours 40 minutes with no interval) especially as there were plenty
of others who were on the same quest. Eventually we found our box’ entrance,
but as the second bell went on for the performance which should have started 15
minutes earlier, what was missing was a little old lady dressed in her
customary black outfit with white pinafore and a key to open the door, so that
we could enter. Just as I was contemplating to climb from one box into ours to
open the door for the others, the lady arrived grumbling something which did
not seem to be complimentary about the horrible people who not only pay for
their seats but wish to occupy them and my offered gymnastics in full view of
the other 1599 people did not materialize.
Eventually all of us were seated, including those who
sat in the isles of the ornate 200 years old theatre, the first opera house
built in Russia. All what was needed was some oil and we could have been canned
as sardines. The arrival of the Russian star conductor Valery Gergiev was greeted by thunderous applause
and by some people rushing forward with bunches of flower before he even found
his baton. But he did and the famous opening bars of the Der
Ring des Niebelungen quietly and ever louder started.
Many books have been written about The Ring and some I
have even lost in my move to my flat, but the best abridged version is the
spoof which the English comedienne Anna Russell has performed in a 22 minute
long sketch and I certainly do not wish to compete with her. Let it be said
that in German with Russian surtitles it makes just
as much sense as sung in French with Spanish subtitles. Even if somebody
understands it all, it still makes very little sense, but the music of that
horrible rotten little man Wagner is divine and after sitting for 2 hours and 40
minutes on an uncomfortable chair your only sorrow is that it has ended for
that day.
I am just a lover of opera and music, but listening to
Wagner I have to force myself not to become overcome by the sound of the
singer, but to listen to the music which seems to be on a different plane. I
hope that those who understand music do not criticise
my thoughts, but to me the melody of the singer and the music seem to be
complimentary, yet completely different. My problem is that I cannot listen to
just one and afterward to the other. Yet the total experience is fantastic in
spite of some of the stupidities the designers of the scenery and costumes wish
to force on us.
Thus, while I accepted the three Rhein
maidens to arrive in a diver’s bell since the action takes place in or under
the river Rhein, but the lowering of 4 plastic
bodies, each about 16 meters long and covered by pearl shells and dressing Alberich in a crocodile outfit with a potbelly and carrying
the ring in a lit up globe hanging on his neck is to my mind more disturbing
than contributing to one’s enjoyment. I accept that some costumes can be
outlandish, but if you have to spend time wondering, why a singer has red hair
and green hands, while the other’s fingernails light up and his hair colour is in every hue, instead of listening to the music
and sound created by Wagner, the effects might disturb instead of contribute.
Why two monsters about 5 meters high and 4 meters wide with animated arms
(which fall off when one of them expires) with a singer’s head perched on top
of them? Do those who thought up this imagine that we shall be fooled in
believing that these people are really 5 meters high?
Nevertheless, the rotten little Wagner’s creation
still triumphs. No designer, however outrageous can thwart his artistry and
genius. I hate the bastard, but he was supreme.
Sacha waited for us amongst the busses, taking the
foreigners back to their hotels and the Mercs with dark windows in which waited the chauffeurs and
bodyguards of the politicians and New Russians.
He drove us along the Embankment of the Neva where Valentina wanted me
to see a second set of Sphinx. The previous set was from Egypt and we saw them
some days ago opposite the Academy of Arts, with a wedding party drinking their
champers from paper cups.
|
|
This was a different pair of Sphinx and while I did
not protest having to cross the street to have a closer look I did think that a
glance from a distance would have been sufficient. Of course I was wrong.
Closer examination showed the faces of the Sphinx being different from each
side. A beautiful face on one side and the grinning face of a skeleton on the
other. There were several plaques and while all were in Russian (by different
poets and writers) one showed in two languages that the two statues were a
“Memorial to Victims of Political Repression”. As I walked over to the other
Sphinx to my surprise one of the plaques showed the unreadable signature of a
person with the name “Raoul Wallenberg” under it. I
am afraid we both shed a few tears. To see his name set in bronze on a memorial
in Russia is a sight I never ever expected to see. My thanks go to those
Russians who made it possible.
We finished the evening with dinner at a restaurant
called Swan Lake. No dancing swans nor were there any dishes of swans , but the
food was good. With caviar and another starter for Valentina, two main meals
and a sweet for me and a bottle of Spanish wine, the bill came to 780 rubbles
(AU$ 39 or US$25.75). If only one could live in Oz and eat in St. Pete.
Tonight we start Der Ring in
earnest. Die Walkure starts at 6 and ends after 11.
If I recall from my last Ring in Adelaide, a sheer delight and judging on last
nights experience a sore bottom. But having seen the theatre in Bayreuth I realise that Wagner wanted us to suffer, since there is
only a minimal covering on his wooden seats, designed not for comfort but for
resonance and acoustics.
St Petersburg – 14th June 2003
We started off with a
conference over the map of St Pete to discuss if going by bus and then walk or
walking all the way to the Summer Gardens is better for my aching feet. After
taking into account all the pros and cons we set out for a walk, much longer as
is customary by spoiled Sydneysiders, whose idea of a
long walk is to go to the lift and descend into the car park and walking to the
car.
About 4 kilometres later in
what cannot be termed a summer’s day even in SPb we arrived, having seen many
familiar landmarks from Churches, palaces and even the circus building.
Valentina is a willing but not terribly well versed city guide, (of course she
never suggested that she is, but I tease her, because she does not know the
maiden name of either of Peter the Great’s wives) but
nevertheless I learned from her that the circus building was used to house the
elephants, who were each given a bucket full of vodka every day on the Tsar’s
order. Not withstanding this fact, there is not an elephant in SPb left,
proving once and for all that vodka is not good for you.
The Summer Garden as so many other beautiful places in
SPb was established by Peter the Great and was in his time divided into a lake
for experimental breeding of fish, a vegetable garden for new varieties of
vegetables, previously unknown in Russia and a garden where herbs being used by
the medical fraternity were grown. All this was in the past and now it became a
place for the population to relax in amongst the trees and grass (in need of a
lawnmower) and along the paths a large collection of statues copied from the
Italian originals.
Within the Summer Garden also is a brick building
built around and over Peter’s original wooden palace, which in size is not much
greater than many a home in the Western World. In spite of it’s relative
smallness it houses many interesting features collected, bought or designed and
in many cases personally fabricated by this man, great not only by what he
achieved, but also in stature, having been 2.07 metre
tall. (It is worth noting that there seem to be a lot of similarly tall people
around the streets and in my view they are either all descended from good ole
Pete or else the Russian are a race of budding giants.)
We were invited to visit Lena, a colleague and friend
of Valentina’s and we went there next. She greeted us
and having been given a pair of men’s slippers to wear was shown around the
flat or at least the communal kitchen, bathroom and toilet before ushered in to
her area of residence. There are in all 6 rooms in this old inner city flat in
which 5 families live. In actual fact the 6th lives here illegally in the form
of the de facto wife of the son of one of those who is registered here. The
kitchen houses 5 cookers, 5 fridges (with sizes similar to a bar fridge and
mostly wall mounted) and five little tables where the inhabitants cook and may even
eat their meals. The bathroom has a bathtub with a shower in it but only an
empty shelf, since your requisites need to be moved in and out of the bathroom
and stored in your room.
Lena’s room, which she shares with her 5 year old son,
at present in the Crimea with her parents, houses a settee which opens up and a
similarly convertible arm chair, a small table, two or three chairs, a cupboard
in which and on top of which all her belongings are stored, a TV set and a VCR.
Perfect order everywhere and Lena had no trouble in finding her photos and all
she wanted to show us. She knew where everything was.
We did not need to wait long and the table in her room
became filled with pancakes and various other goodies she was bringing in from
the kitchen to offer to us. Thoughtfully, Valentina brought along coffee for me
as she did not think that Lena will have anything other than tea. But her
hospitality had no bounds and if you people out there in another World think
that she was anything but cheerful, happy and non complaining, you are
seriously mistaken. In fact when I exclaimed to them the problem of my having
to explain this in my next trip report they had a good laugh. For Lena her life
is completely natural and even Valentina, who saw how the other half lives, the
life they have here may lack some housing facilities, but otherwise it is
happy, filled with laughter, love of their families and friends and their
music, their poetry, their books.
|
|
We were picked up at 5:20 by Sacha
and driven to the theatre, where our box was unlocked soon after 6 PM when the
performance of the Ring was to commence. In fact it only started some 20
minutes later (and finished at 12:15 AM instead of the scheduled time of
11:40), but the wait was worth it. Superb voices in every part, a wonderful
orchestra compensated for the continuation of using the immense fibre glass monstrosities on the stage. The fact that they
were arrayed differently and lit up in different colours
may have shown the ingenuity of the stage designers, but did not contribute to
our enjoyment or understanding. However I must confess that the costuming was
spectacular as were the acting abilities of the singers. By the way, I have
never been to an opera where, however small proportion, some of the chorus
shows his or her obesity and I never been to any in Russia where the chorus of
singers was anything but beautifully presented, nubile and being able to move
with the grace of ballet dancers. Not just female, but male also. The female
singers at the end of my powerful glasses seem to have been picked as much for
their beauty and figures as for their singing ability, a real rarity in
Wagnerian operas, where traditionally size of the women used to be a requisite.
That every one of them was superb in the singing department goes without
saying.
The male singers may not have been as thin as their
female counterparts, but the way they moved and acted was showing that the
rehearsed their parts for months before hand. The fact that The Ring is being
put on for just one performance, yes ONE performance is almost incomprehensible
to me, and I am awestruck in admiration,
but certainly nothing is scheduled prior to October!
Sacha picked us up and extended to us his wife’s invitation
for a visit to their home, no doubt for the customary feast which such visits
become. However, we had to ask for another date, since we have a minimum of two
more Ring nights, followed by Boris Godunov, La Boheme and Nutcracker, leaving us bereft of “kultura” for only 4 nights before my departure for the civilisation represented by McDonalds and Who wants to be a
Millionaire, shower recess’ and TV news I can understand.
St Petersburg – 15th June 2003
- As it was past 2 AM when we finally got into bed,
exhilarated at the Walkure we saw, we were slow in
getting moving this Sunday morning. In fact yours truly returned to have a
sleep on top of his bed after breakfast and it was after an early lunch that I
started to be ready. As usual it was Valentina who made the plans and thus we
were to visit another one of the Hermitage’s extension Museums not far from the
Winter Palace which houses their main collection. Although it was just after 2
PM and the doors were open we were not admitted, the reason being that they are
expecting President Putin next day and therefore
closed down early to prepare for this. Valentina thought it most unlikely that
the small extension some distance away will be the one being visited by the
great man, but nevertheless she thought that all portions of the organisation were readied, just in case. After all, he and
some 45 other Heads of States were at various St Pete venues, including the
Hermitage some 10 days ago, so inconveniencing other visitors to the City’s
attractions should by now be routine.
As we left to walk back towards the Hermitage we noted
that the police were harassing people who have parked or about to park their
cars on the Embankment, no doubt in anticipation of the President’s visit,
which was to take place the next day. Why else would they not allow parking in
the vicinity of the Hermitage on a Sunday afternoon in spaces which are always
full of cars?
Interestingly, there was a long queue of people
waiting to be allowed into the Hermitage and the number of buses parked outside
suggested that there are thousands inside with many hundreds waiting to be
admitted. We did not queue but decided to walk on and eventually entered a 3
story building full of shops of well known brand name products, such as Givenchy, Max Factor, Dior, Omega, etc and also some
attractive souvenir shops. I was impressed and took a photo of the elegant
shopping centre when a security guard advised me in no uncertain terms that
photography is forbidden. I was less than impressed and lost my temper and
shouted at him (in English) as to the place being a bloody state secret or
what. Hearing this a young man who minutes ago was trying to get us in
connection with his market research duties to ask which TV station we prefer to
watch came to the rescue of the guard and being proficient in broken English
answered that it is not a state building but photography is forbidden. My next,
rather impatient question as to WHY, was answered by this cheeky young man with
a typical Russian logic: “Because it is forbidden”. At that we should have
asked for this to be shown in writing or we should have asked to see the
management, but we gave up and left wondering when the people here will realise that the photographing of a bunch of cosmetics
display does not constitute spying.
Subsequently Valentina, just as puzzled and even more
offended has told me that not many months ago a law was passed which regulated
the use of some matters connected with housing and when people affected by this
asked for a copy of that law, they were told that it is unobtainable due to it
being a secret.
It seems to me, having had my problems with
photography, that taking pictures in palaces and museums is permitted on
payment of a special fee (which no Russian visitor will pay and take pictures
nevertheless). You can also photograph to your heart’s content on the streets,
from boats and outside of the buildings. Photographing inside theatres are
strictly forbidden at any time, consequently everybody is being photographed
before the performance in front of the curtain, in their seat, alone or in
groups never being worried that a non-existent usher (they are busy not
unlocking the boxes) will stop them. No sooner does the performance start the
rapid fire flashes indicate that people are just as interested in seeing their
mementoes as watching the performance and there is not a let up throughout the
drama envisaged by Richard Wagner in an age when flashguns were not invented.
(I may add that I too am guilty of photographing during an opera, but always
without the use of a flash, for reasons of not disturbing the performer and
finding that the pictures turn out better in this fashion. However do not try
this in Sydney as the ushers can become more savage than the SPb security
guards keeping the secrets of Palmolive soap and Dior lipstick from visiting
tourists.)
There are many well appointed cafés in SPb and with
aching feet and sweet tooth I am inclined to talk my way into them. Thus I am
becoming an expert in the large selection of delicious cakes on display and
have been known to suggest that we take some back to the flat. From under the
counter out comes a piece of cardboard, is expertly made into a box, it is
lined with paper serviettes and the cake is carefully placed into it and then
comes the piece de resistance: a coloured ribbon, made
into a bow and doubling as a carry handle. A most attractive feature being that
in some cases I saw a whole cake being carried in a transparent plastic cake
box.
In a Metro station we bought some tickets to a
performance by the senior students of the Drama School. The first half
consisted of solo songs from various operas and also duets and chorus
renditions and they were excellent, showing that whatever happens the various
opera houses of SPb will not have to worry about having quality amongst their singers
in the near future. What was even more impressive was that the same girls who
minutes ago had no difficulties hitting a high note in an aria from Traviata became ballet dancers in the next scene, being
lifted by the tenor or baritone who showed his prowess a few minutes earlier.
(This was just a confirmation of what I said in connection with the choir in
the Ring after Saturday’s performance.)
But there is more! In the second half these same
people put in a performance of some Rock Opera excerpts either imitating or
miming well known singers. Their rendition of Porgy and Bess was said to be in
English, but sounded to be in some other yet uninvented
language, even if the rendition was perfect and a spoof on Tina Turner was
indistinguishable from the original, except there must have been a slight
difference of 50 years between two Tinas. A most
worthwhile evening, even if Valentina would have preferred more operas and less
comedy.
I am bereft of her company this morning as she has had
to visit her office for a while. In her absence I am charged to watch her
English language tape so I must close and watch a film in SPB I would not watch
at home under any circumstances. It reminds me of the time when I wanted to buy
an English book to read in Phnom Penh and the little girl in the bookshop lead
me to a shelf full of books on How to learn English in Six Easy Lessons, etc.
See you at Siegfried at 6 PM in the milling crowd
outside the Mariinsky.
St
Petersburg – 16th June 2003 I feel as guilty as you must have felt relieved that
my Trip Report # 17 was not in your box until now. But relax I am back on the
job and will entertain or bore you as before.
I have almost given up going to end this trip with a
week in New Zealand as I did not feel comfortable about driving there without
my driver’s licence. However, my NZ nephew by two
marriages (his and mine) arranged to rent a car for me and advised me how to
get a replacement licence from Australia while in
Russia and our first port of call was to the Australian Consul in SPb who had
to sign my application.
After our adventures at the various police stations
here I suggested to Valentina that one day I will take her to a police station
in Australia, where the first thing a police man will do for her is to bring in
a second chair if there is not one there already. Thus it was great that in
spite of a settee in the rear of the room the very first thing the consul did
was to go and bring a chair for her and then proceeded to have a friendly chat
with us before asking how he may assist us.
Our next port of call was to a food market where an
abundance of meat, fish, vegetables and all sorts of other edible goodies were
displayed and where from the other side of the counters we were encouraged to
buy the merchandise. This is not a sight and sound which I noted in shops while
in SPb, where the staff is quite prepared to show you what you ask for but in
no way shows any sign of being concerned whether you buy or not.
Next door to the market was another big square in the
middle of which stood France’s present of a tall column surrounded by a plastic
on which the word “Peace” was shown in a variety of languages. Apparently not a
very welcome present, as it was the City which needed to pay for it’s erection.
France’s present for the 200th anniversary, a handsome bridge across the Neva,
was and is more appreciated.
We came back to the flat by Metro. The nearest station
was locked for those wishing to depart, but open for the use of those who
arrived. There was nothing wrong at the station we were wishing to travel from,
we just had to enter through a different station entrance. The fact that this
required the crossing of an 8 lane road and a walk of about 500 metres did not invoke any resentment of the long suffering
public. (I can just see Sydneysiders finding the
entrance of Wynyard closed and being invited to walk to Town Hall Station
instead. For any readers in England, substitute Piccadilly and Green Park!)
In the evening Sacha picked
us up early for our visit to see Siegfried of the Ring Cycle. We went early
with our print outs so that we may pick up our tickets for 25th we booked on
the Internet for Nutcracker. After queuing for a while we were told to come
back in the interval. Valentina did so and came back to me without the tickets,
having been told to come back next day, when a programmer will be able to find
out the “key number” to our ticket. In view of the fact that the print out was
detailing when the booking was made, when the payment was made, where we were to
sit, my name, my credit card details, etc I could not believe that they should
not be able to give us our tickets, and angrily set out to do the impossible
and argue with a person in authority. After discovering that I do not speak
Russian and the cashier does not speak English, they called for a young lady,
who repeated again and again that we must come back tomorrow (the Mariinsky cannot be approached by a Metro Station, which is
planned for the past 20 years, but not as yet built and we would need to undertake
a trip by Metro and busses). That this lady was looking at a receipt of the
money they held since the 5th June had no bearing on the matter. In the end the
young lady simply ran away and returned in a calmer frame of mind at which I
too became quieter but no less successful, with Valentina begging me to come
and enjoy the Ring and she will come back alone the next day.
So we returned to our seats and watched the rest of
the Opera, trying to blot out the memory of the stupidity of people in as great
a cultural institution and excellence as the Mariinsky
is. Our admiration for the excellence of the rest of the performance was
undiminished even after having to be jostled by the hundreds of people trying
to squeeze through the single door, while the other half remained firmly
locked!
By the way we did not need to return to the Theatre
and will pick up our tickets when we go to the last performance of the Ring, as
WE were able to retrieve the famous Key Number off the Internet, which they
apparently could not. No doubt they did not try as it took Valentina about 5
minutes to so and that included the starting up of my slow notebook computer!
We started
yesterday with walking to Finnair, where I had to
change my flight bookings to London. Quite a long walk, not made any easier by
the poor condition of the pavements in the side streets. As Valentina remarked,
neither Messrs. Putin or Bush are expected to walk
along that street, so why should it be repaired. Luckily the beautiful houses
along our route were mostly repainted recently so the street could look easier
to look at than negotiate.
As we approached the Post Office, who but the young
lady I battled with about our tickets passed us and my friendly Hello was not
reciprocated. No doubt she feared that I have a go at her in the middle of SPb
outside the beautiful Main P.O. of the city. When we entered the place the
first impressive sight was a marble mile stone indicating the figure Zero from
where all distances were measured when St Pete was the capital of the immense
empire ruled by the Tsars. Imagine our reaction when on the other side of the obelisk milestone a
cardboard sign showed that both videoing or photographing is forbidden of this
historical item on display for the past few hundred years.
Of course this did not stop me doing so and I will
invite the combined forces of ASIO, FBI, CIA and MI5, not to mention the
present equivalent of the KGB to tell me what harm could be done by
photographing this lump of marble that stands forlorn in the entrance of a post
office. I may add that the positioning of the card forbidding the use of
cameras suggests that you may not photograph the obelisk on your way OUT of the
P.O. when only the doors leading to the street may be included in the photo.
The post office itself is located in a very handsome
building and the counters are arranged on three sides of a large hall, where
various windows deal with different matters. Thus the window where foreign mail
may be posted from may not be used to pay a telephone bill, if that is a
possibility at all. I cannot say as the signs are all written in Russian,
except one, with the title “Quelle”, suggesting that
that window is to subscribe to that German fashion magazine. There are over 30
windows, so the services available must be extensive. Must ask Valentina, when
she returns from shopping.
In the afternoon, we planned to see the Museum
extension we were prevented to see owing to the possible visit by H.E. Putin the day after. Valentina made her way to the huge
queue at the Square outside the Hermitage and I obediently followed. I asked
her what we are doing in a queue to enter the Hermitage and she answered that
we are entering it purely to buy a ticket for a Museum administered by the
Hermitage, but which is about 1 ½ kilometre away. I
refused to queue with the about 600-800 other people to visit another place and
we walked away. I saw another entrance into the Hermitage gardens being guarded
by a single man and suggested she should approach him. The guard agreed that it
is crazy for us to queue when we do not plan to go to the Hermitage and let us
in as any other normal person would and even smiled at us, a rare occurrence by
a person wearing a uniform or sitting behind a window.
We walked through the gardens and when we arrived at
the ticket office, we did the dirty on the System and purchased two tickets to
enter the Hermitage, mine costing exactly 21.333 times as much as that of Ms
Krasavina, but not providing even twice as much to see. Not that I am
complaining, because I think that foreigners, who contribute nothing towards
the upkeep of the place should pay a fair price, but on the other hand for
Russian Citizens to enter at a cost of half a US $ is ridiculous. The cost of
entering the Hermitage for foreigners is very reasonable at around US $10.50.
The NY Metropolitan Museum is asking for a voluntary contribution of $7 and
requires less help in funding than the Hermitage.
It seems to me that no matter how many times you visit
the Hermitage, it makes for an unforgettable experience. The richness of the
place, the exhibits, the collection of paintings and art is quite unique. One
wonders about the past and those who had the interest and money and dedication
to start this collection, look after it, safeguard it during the turmoil of
revolutions and the years of the Siege of Leningrad. We should all be grateful
for their foresight and care and I consider myself privileged to have been able
to enter it twice in my lifetime. At the same time my heart weeps at the sight of
the fantastic and intricately inlaid parqueted floors
being trampled on and damaged by the thousands of visitors. In some lesser
places we had to wear felt slippers over our shoes, but in the Hermitage people
just arrive and walk on everything which ought to be safeguarded and is a
veritable work of art. The tourists usually wear comfortable rubber shoes,
|
|
but the worst offenders are the Russian girls, who
wear the latest in fashion, namely shoes with pointy toes sticking out in front
and high stiletto heels in the rear. Some of the floors are already ruined
beyond repair, while some seem to be more resilient. Speaking to one of the
guarding ladies, who sit on the only available seats (none being available for
the visitors), she agreed that something ought to be done, but the management
is against the idea of asking visitors to don a felt cover under their shoes.
Entry to the Hermitage ceased at 5 PM and we stayed
amongst many others until 6PM. To exit we had to go through the customary door
where only one side was opened, but we were confronted by a real obstacle when
movable metal barriers were allowing one thin visitor to exit at a time and
even than while exercising extreme caution since the tubular frames covered the
pathway the person had to squeeze through. I could n
|
|
ot resist photographing the performance of people
negotiating the obstacles. We laughed and Valentina approached the bored
security man who was in charge of the barrier, who replied her that this is
necessary in case people wish to go in to instead of coming out of the
Hermitage. That at 6 PM this would be unlikely did not enter his head and since
he was not instructed otherwise, why should he use his intelligence, since he
is only paid to guard the barriers.
But don’t give up on people power as yet! Suddenly a
girl, as she negotiated the metal barrier used her initiative, pushed it along
about a metre and half, almost knocking over the
security guard who was leaning on it and thus allowed people to descend the
steps with little danger to their limbs. The guard looked at us and did not
stir. Maybe he pushed it close after we left.
I remarked to Valentina that its sad that people are
still like this, not using their initiative. Do they still fear that Stalin is
sitting in the Kremlin? No, said my Russian lady, people know that Stalin is
gone from the Kremlin, but they still have Stalin in their brain! How true!
Let’s be more patient, bolshevism lasted almost 80 years while perestroika is
only 12 years old!
St
Petersburg – 19th June 2003 The final performance of the Ring Cycle was upon us
last night and after a rush trip by Sacha through the
back streets of SPb we made it just in time. For reasons which no one could
fathom certain streets were closed by the police, whose favourite
method of traffic control is to park a police car blocking the street across it
at intersections. Since the secondary streets are fairly narrow and all cars
are parked on the streets, one can imagine how easy it is to cause traffic jams
if the main thoroughfares are blocked off. Nevertheless we made it in time only
to find that 5 minutes before the scheduled time the audience was not allowed
to enter the stalls. Since about 900 of the total of 1600 are to find their
seats there without the usherettes doing anything but checking the tickets and
tearing it apart at the doors, one can imagine the congestion and the protests
from the 60% or so of foreigners waiting to be admitted to their seats.
In front of the boxes upstairs, the situation was not
better and I have a picture showing the people waiting outside for the
usherette with the key, not to be used until the second bell sounds and since
the number of boxes are considerable there must have been some boxes where
people were not permitted to enter until the final bell sounded. Foreigners
must have been, like me, rather perturbed by such habits, especially as we
could not understand the advice being dispensed by the little old usherettes as
to wait patiently.
But all was forgotten when the first bar of the divine
music of that man Wagner sounded. The scenery was the same but completely
rearranged and while not required and did not contribute to our understanding
to this highly complicated saga of Germanic Gods, it certainly was effective in
creating an unreal World. Contrary to the Australian production we had the
additional scenery in the form of both dancers and helpers, who, similar to
Greek tragedies were supposed to be unseen. A mostly different set of singers
taking the same parts showed the immense amount of talent available. Where but
in St Petersburg would 4 singers share the role of Wotan
or Siegfried? And all of that for just one performance. Imagine the effort of
having to teach 4 singers the same long German part and two months later
rehearsing once again the same with the same or different singers for a
re-staging? The Adelaide Ring in 1998 was two years in the making and the
singers and conductor were rehearsing for 4 months for performing the Ring in three cycles.
What a tremendous amount of work and what a fantastic
performance! Especially this, the final Gotterdammerung part is extremely
emotional without having the additional burden of remembering the circumstances
of my seeing it in Adelaide. Joy and I had a particularly happy time in Adelaide
and appreciated the excellent production by a French designer and Sir Geoff
Tate, the crippled English conductor and various Australian singers. It seems
to me that even without knowing that Siegfried and some others die in this
portion, the music squeezes out every last drop of sentimentality from the
listener, - you know that something terrible is going to happen and it is not
easy to avoid tears as you listen to the sounds of both orchestra and singers.
Let’s admit that the music of this rotten man was divine.
The superb singing and sound is augmented by the first
class choreography of the singers and choir, the movements of Siegfried’s
funeral procession just about breaks you heart, or is it the mournful music?
Whatever it is, it is an experience which has to be experienced. It was well
past 1 am when we got back to the flat and we were still talking about the
experience of seeing the Ring at 3 am. Or at least I was talking and Valentina
was listening.
We decided to visit the Museum of
Artillery the next day and to do some shopping. While changing trains at a
Metro station Valentina noticed a number of small gipsy kids following me. She
pushed them away and we moved to another door of the same train. Suddenly the
kids rushed in through the door just seconds before the train was to depart. We
both pushed them away and they jumped from the train. It was over in seconds.
As I reported to a friend:
“Hi Julius, the problem with my Canon Ixus 300 is that
I don't have any problem with it, ever since this
morning when 5 little gipsy kids rushed onto the train
I just boarded, crowded me and when I threw them off
me, they rushed off the train onto the platform. A few
seconds later, just as the Metro train started to
gather speed I patted the pocket on the side of my
leg, where with Velcro secured I had difficulty
putting away my camera and would you believe, (yes you
will) the bloody thing was gone. I would have liked to
call them back and tell them that I still have a spare
battery and some extra memory, but they would have by
then delivered the loot to their Mum or Dad.
In the mean time everybody near me was almost
disbelieving at the professionalism of the little
blighters, none being over 12 at most, Valentina was
crying and I was busy telling her that I could have
broken my arm or leg, so she should be happy to see me
healthy (?) less than wealthy and certainly far from
home.”
Needless to say our
visit to the Museum was not as enjoyable as it could have been. I was totally
unsuccessful in cheering up a tearful Valentina who regards the two losses
incurred by pickpockets as shameful on her city and her country. Since I
attribute both occasions to gypsies, according to her it does not excuse the
Russian police, who, as she suspects are probably paid by the gangs. I cannot
believe that, but as we have seen these kids with or without their mothers
several times on the streets, it would be an easy matter to collect them and
throw them out of the tourist areas, if the police would wish to do so.
Tonight we are off
to the Mariinsky again to see Boris Godunov, the opera in which the legendary Chaliapin made his name. On Saturday we are invited to her
parents where her father’s and brother’s birthdays will be celebrated with what
I expect will again be a gargantuan meal.
St
Petersburg – 20th June 2003 The whole day not
a single disaster occurred with your intrepid correspondent. The reason
might have been that my partner in crime went off to the Bank to get me some
money at the wrong time and had to wait while the bank staff returned from
lunch and therefore after a hurried lunch at 3 PM we got onto the streets quite
late and there did not seem to be a lot of time available for pick pockets and
gipsy children to have a go at us.
We stayed in the neighbourhood trying to buy a present for Valentina’s father to whose birthday lunch I am invited.
That the lunch will be a veritable banquet I can now foretell, so I will not
eat my fill with the first course and thus hope to be able to rise from the
table 3 or 4 hours later unaided.
For reasons because I can see the
good sense of having warm clothing here, I suggested that we buy Mr Kopachev a pullover and so we
went looking. We found a few shops which stocked a small selection of the afore
mentioned article and to my amazement the prices ranged from AUD 250 upwards. I
simply could not believe my eyes. “Is there no Marks & Spencer or Target or
Kmart in this country” I asked and was told that there are some street stalls
in the suburbs with Chinese merchandise, but Valentina feared that I would lose
my clothing, not just wallets in those places.
So we decided to buy Vladimir
nothing but 2 tickets to a musical for his birthday!
Sasha had to pick up his wife Larissa from hospital where
she was undergoing some treatment and he arrived to take us to the Mariinsky later than agreed. The drive which he took us
cannot be explained, although the nearest estimation would be Steve McQueen’s
famous ride in San Francisco in the movie Bullit. He
is quite an amazing a driver, but his passengers and other road users need time
to recuperate. After driving with him in the crazy traffic of SPb, one needs to
consult the regulations to find out which side of the road one drives here and
he is the only man I know who can travel southward, while facing the North. At
one stage he closely followed a police car which made space by using his siren
and I can confidently say that at no time was he more than 10 cms away from the police car. But than I had my eyes closed
and thus I am not sure whether or when he passed the police car in the course
of following it.
Since the opera never starts less
than 20 minutes late, we actually arrived before the curtain went up and after
moving some people from our seats, we settled down although Valentina complained
about feeling sick as a result of the wild drive.
We saw Mussorgsky’s Boris Godunov, based as is so often the case on one of Pushkin’s poems. Once again a superb performance. In fact
in addition to the words “superb”, “fantastic”, “marvellous”
etc. for opera performances in Russssha a new set of
words ought to be invented. In spite of my enthusiasm Valentina was
dissatisfied because the original opera was changed in accordance with the
direction of its famous or famed conductor, musical director and producer Valery Gergiev who was the conductor and co-producer of the
Ring Cycle. It seems that he cut the opera down to one act, used a young boy
soprano to sing the Tsarevitch part and titivated the
stage with huge fibre glass crowns and other
gimmicks. I have never seen this opera, so I cannot compare it to earlier
performances, but Valentina has seen it many times and she felt cheated.
Time is running out on me and
there is only La Boheme and a futuristic Nutcracker
in the offing before moving onto Helsinki and Suffolk on the 26th.
St Petersburg – 22nd June 2003
We were picked up by Sacha and taken to Generalissimo Sovorov’s
Memorial Museum through the rain. Inside we were asked several times if I wish
to have an English speaking guide in spite of the fact that my entrance fee was
the same as for any local visitor. I have learned enough by looking at the
exhibits and Valentina’s translation to know that we
know nothing about this general and why he takes pride of place amongst
Russia’s greats. He was a thin aesthetic looking sickly man, who was the first
to be concerned about his men and who forbade them to be cruel to the enemies
he conquered. In consequence he was just as loved by the population of his own
country and of those his armies occupied. Unbeknown to us he went as far as
Switzerland and Italy on one side and defeated Turkey towards the East. He was
virtually resurrected as a hero during Stalin’s attempts to invoke the
patriotic spirit of the Nation during WWII and than again forgotten afterward
and only acknowledged again in the Brezhnev era and after Perestroika.
Next we went to the Smolsky Cathedral now mainly used as a venue for concerts.
It was raining badly with a cold wind ruining my umbrella but on our way back
we stopped to look at a Bentley, parked on its on in front of a building
adjoining the Cathedral and my explaining its significance to Valentina, when a
security guard rushed out of a building and started to protest, saying: “You
must not look at that car!” I asked Valentina to ask him why to which the
answer “It is forbidden” was given by this guard. I suggested that he cannot
forbid me to look at anything but Valentina gently dragged me away before I got
myself shot. Later we worked out that the Bentley must belong to one of the “oligarchs”
a name which means that the guy owns a TV station, or an oil company or two, is
part of the Maffia or he is a politician who accepts
bribes or may be all of this and also that he is frightened to be assassinated
as so many of them are. Nevertheless it shows the prevailing state of personal
liberty, when an armed security guard can tell a person not to look at
something which is in public view.
We next visited the famous cemetery
where the victims of the Leningrad siege were buried in mass graves. Two
buildings show some details of the siege and between them lie the mass graves
of thousands and thousands of Russian people who starved, were frozen or were
killed by German bombings during the 900 days of this unbelievable saga of
endurance, determination and heroism.
Sacha dropped us off at Valentina’s
parents, where the “old man” (4 years my junior) was to celebrate his birthday.
We were joined by Oleg, Valentina’s son, but no one
else could come until after we left laden with all the goodies Zoya made for us and which we did not eat. For my honour they had a Tokaj wine, all
the way from Moldovia, but the label called it Tokai,
so it must have been making sure that the copyrights are not infringed.
We left in time by minibus and
Metro towards the theatre which we visited earlier to see the final year
students showing off their talents some days ago for a performance of La Boheme. The orchestra pit was covered and the orchestra was
in the rear of the stage while the centre had a circular metal staircase
disappearing into the top of the stage. There were all sorts of props in
apparent disarray when the conductor appeared coming down the stairs. Before
doing anything he shuddered and then donned a big vest over his jacket
indicating that he too will feel the cold which Puccini deemed the inhabitants
of this garret will endure.
Quite apart from the singing (in
Italian) by a relatively young cast, with the exception of Rodolfo, who was one
of the artists of the Mariinsky, which was excellent
by any standard the direction which overcame the limitations of the stage was
admirable and added to the excellence of the production. That the conductor too
entered into the spirit of things and behaved as if he would be part of the
cast only added to the proceedings. Once again one must bow to the artistry of
not just the singers but to the entire cast and staff for the perfect staging
of this great opera. The fact that the heroine dies and that this was Joy’s favourite opera did not go unnoticed by my feelings, but it
did not reduce my enthusiasm in clapping. Mimi was played by a girl who at best
could not have been more than 25 and Musetta by a
slip of a girl not a day past 23 and I defy the judgement
of managements of any Opera House who would not engage them our our Rodolfo or Marcel for the next production of their Boheme.
This morning we were picked up by Sasha who took us to Pushkin where Valentina wanted to show
me the rebuilt Amber room. This room’s walls and ceilings were entirely made
from amber and in 1942/43 it was dismantled and taken to Germany. It was never
found after the war (no doubt it’s pieces now grace the necks and arms of many
German Frauleins) and with the financial assistance
of a German Company with interests in Russia it was rebuilt over a number of
years. It is somewhere in the great palace Catherina
the Great built but the queues were of such magnitude that we took a walk
around the palace instead, did some shopping amongst the souvenir stalls and
returned towards the city. We stopped to view a great memorial to the Leningrad
Siege, entered the underground museum with its exquisite mosaic panels, the
mementoes displayed in discreetly lit displays, watched a film on the siege and
photographed the impressive statuary. Particularly impressive were the two
brass engravings showing the action on this day in 1942 and on another plate
what happened on this day on June 22nd 1943. Tomorrow the large
plaques will show what happened on June 23rd in 1942 and on 1943. By
the way today was the 62nd anniversary of Hitler’s attack on the
USSR.
We were on our way to visit Sacha and family, but first had to stop and photograph one
of the very few Soviet style gigantic statue of Lenin still standing in St
Petersburg, this one in front of an equally gigantic Soviet building.
Sacha, his wife Larissa and their two sons live in the
usual huge block of buildings thrown together in a hurry to ease the building
shortage. After the usual dreary corridors and lifts we entered into a spotless
flat with 3 rooms and a kitchen where the life of the family is being
conducted. Once again I was amazed at the absolute orderliness of all the rooms
and astonished at the boys room. There was not a thing out of place, although
both boys were in their room when we arrived.
Having been in trouble before I
enquired as to what is going to be served and even ‘though it was 4 PM we had
the usual 3 courses, so I was careful not to fill myself up with borscht soup
or the cold meat and salad which was followed by meat and garnishes. Of course
there was the usual vodka and also the wine, once again the familiar Tokai from
Moldovia. We stayed in the kitchen till past 9 PM,
chatting away in a two language conversation and I found that our hosts were
just as interested in Australia and my experiences than I was interested in
theirs.
Having received from Oz the prices
of a replacement digital camera, I will probably buy one here tomorrow at a
slightly higher cost. Although I brought another camera with me it is not
digital and I must confess that I got very used to taking lots of photos and
being able to disregard those I did not like. I must confess that I miss my
little Canon.
St Petersburg – 23rd June 2003 For over two days I lived without my digital
camera and I can tell you that it was not easy. Imagine taking a photo with one
of these old fashioned thingies, where you automatically look for the finished
picture on the back of the camera and there is nothing there. I tried doing
this for over two days, but it was no good, like a heroin addict (or a smoker,
about whose cravings I knew more) I just needed my fix and after several phone
calls starting with :”May I speak English?”, I finally found a shop who was
prepared to give me a miserable 5% off the retail price of the camera I wanted,
i.e. the same I donated to the darling gipsy children, whose deed of boarding a
train, finding and removing my camera from a leg pocket which was safeguarded
by Velcro, leaving the train, - all in about 5 seconds I still greatly admire.
I am glad to report that once I
made the decision of replacing the camera, I ceased suffering from withdrawal
symptoms and also my recurring dream of being jostled by gipsy kids has gone.
Instead my mind is now occupied in how to make sure that my camera cannot be
snatched from me during the remaining of my trip.
Last night we went to the
Mussorgsky Theatre again. I am glad to report that I have something
unflattering to report, for the Romeo & Juliet ballet we saw was one about
which I cannot say anything better than the fact that the dancers have done a
wonderful job of dancing the parts which the choreographer so cruelly thrust
upon them. The dancers were superb and the choreography was awful. How in a
tragic story of juvenile love find we folk dancers jogging around the stage,
not once or twice, but many times, - how watching a pas de deux
which would have lent itself for beautiful expressions of love between the
young pair, gave me the impression that I am watching a comic ballet by a girl,
who had no bones in her body and who was kept upside down most of the time
dancing with a man, who was athletic and at the same time immensely proud of
his beauty, since most of the time he was strutting around the stage, except
when doing huge leaps.
As you may know, there is a part
for a priest in the story who marries the young lovers and we had a priest in
this ballet also. Imagine my astonishment when this priest approaches Juliet
held by two men in a horizontal position gets hold of her legs and starts to
lift one, lowering that leg, lifting the other leg, scissor like a number of
times. The ugliness of some of the moves cannot be explained, but I can say
that many were the crotches which were displayed in some of the ugliest moves
on a ballet stage I have ever seen. Sorry, this was not Russian art, it was an
unmitigated disaster, - in my humble opinion.
It was more an exercise in showing
ballet steps than telling a story, in fact if you did not know the tale from
Shakespeare, you would have wondered how suddenly two dancers finish up dead
beside each other, while groups of dancers in wedding outfits and peasant
costumes pounce around them, with some others like Mum and Dad and for the sake
of symmetry Juliet’s jilted fiancé dance a dance of grief and desperation
alternatively leaping high and collapsing on the floor.
No, No, Never as those who call
for the reinstatement of Hungary’s
borders from 1914 are still declaring, this ballet will never do and while I
accept modern ballet, it should not masquerade using the name ennobled by our
guy from Stratford-upon-Avon and honoured by the
music of Prokofiev. The emotionless exhibition of dancing prowess left me and
many others cheated.
Yet I am looking forward to my
evening of seeing Nutcracker by one of the futuristic sculptors and painters
(and former dissident) tomorrow evening, my last night in SPb. But first, we
have a concert tonight.
St
Petersburg – 25th June 2003
This is going to be my last report
from St Petersburg and as such I may as well give you a summary of my visit to
Russia, - like it or not.
There is a definite change since
last year and I am not only referring to the public buildings which had a clean
up, repaint or face lift for the 300 years celebrations. There are more cars,
more of them foreign, they look better and cleaner and they driven by lunatics
at higher speeds. The shops are more luxurious looking with almost no
customers, but the people are well dressed and the women fashionable even if
their shoes gives me pain in my toes just by looking at the sheer madness of
their design. I will be interested if I see the like of these in other
countries on my way.
The housing situation, as far as I
can judge is still a disaster. Khrushchev and people after him called for an
urgent solution and identically looking 8 story buildings have risen in the
outskirts of the city. Much as I would not like to call them such, they are
slum as are the buildings in Hungary and in The Bill serials from England. Some
flats I have visited were neat and orderly, but once you get into the buildings
on your way to the flat, the court yards, the corridors and lifts are desolate
and require urgent attention. The surrounds of the building are also completely
neglected although I imagine that the weeds do get the occasional reduction in size
by someone wielding a scythe. As far as I can see, there is no effort made in
removing the cut greenery. Any gardens are on the individual balconies.
On the one day when the weather was
sunny dozens of people lay down outside the buildings on spots of grass in
their bikinis to catch some sun. I understand that there are no swimming pools
unless they are enclosed (natural in this climate) but rain or shine, they
close for repairs during the summer. Equally, all heating ceases on May 1st
and it is during summer that the hot water supply closes down for repairs,
usually during the month of July or August, during which time families share
their hot water or friends make their showers available to others. In the
cities no hot water supplies are available for about a month, but in country
towns it might be for just one month that they have hot water.
The hardships which Russian
families endure would be unimaginable in the Lucky Country (of Australia) and
they endure it with few complaints. At least they do not fear the knock in the
early morning, even if they have to walk long distances for shopping, carry
their own plastic bags for what they shop and find that prices for other than
the most staple products, like milk and bread are very expensive.
On the other hand is what is
equally unimaginable in the Lucky Country and that is a diet of cultural
activities ranging from operas in 3 or 4 theatres, ballet in another 3 or 4,
drama in maybe 10 or more theatres, concerts all over the place and if that is
not sufficient you may wish to watch life performances of same on TV. People
are book mad in this country, huge bookshops laden with art books, poetry,
novels in an abundance which cannot be diminished by the people lined up at the
cashier’s desk. It takes 2 to 2 ½ minutes of duration on the escalators to go
to the trains, but seldom can you see less than 6 individuals using this time
to read and they do so in the crowded trains.
As in many countries a stranger,
especially someone as inclined to be both critical and a stickler for
efficiency (in others) as yours truly will find many an area which can be
criticized and Russia has a fair share of these. There was nothing I found as
infuriating than the doors. Before you can enter anywhere, you will find a
narrow door on one side of which a wedge of people try to approach the lady who
will tear your ticket. To have both sides of a double door open is unheard of
and not only need you negotiate through this narrow opening but you need to go
past the usherette who has planted herself in the middle. Once inside there are
no ushers to show you to your seat and dozens of people are walking around
looking at row numbers and the back of seats for their places. Most times when
you find your seat, you also find someone already sitting in it, but
surprisingly on show of your own ticket they quietly leave for their own.
Leaving a performance is even more
infuriating. There is usually one door open through which you are pushed by the
crowd behind you and than you need to take a right angle turn to exit through a
second narrow door, once again pushed by the pressure of the people. I
understand that one needs these double doors to keep the outside freezing
temperature from cooling the inside, but this is June and even if it is not the
height of summer, it is warm enough.
But the worst are the doors in the
Metro stations. While no two station looks the same and some are quite
beautiful outside and also on their platforms, the doors seem to have come from
the same factory, probably best known for their construction of battle ships.
About 7 ft high or higher, they sport a heavy metal frame with thick glass in
them and hinged so that they can swing both ways. They centre automatically,
provided this works and the door is not stuck somewhere halfway between open
and closed, but there is no person strong enough who can fully open the door to
be at right angles. It just cannot be done. Even to pen it halfway you need to
be strong. I was shown the technique of stopping the door with your foot wedged
against it in the semi open position, sneak through and than let it go, at
which point it is stopped by the next persons foot wedged against it or else it
swings and might hit the person following you.
There is another row of doors
inside which were removed for the summer. Why all the doors cannot be removed,
when usually there is congestion due to the constant use of the outer doors, I
cannot imagine, except that if all door are either kept open or removed, there
is no way the use of the station may be avoided. As mentioned earlier, if and
when there are too many passengers, the doors are locked and the passengers are
sent to another entrance of the same station some distance away.
Finally, I must say that while I
found people just as friendly as in any other place and more hospitable than in
most, the rudeness of those in authority or imagined authority is disgraceful.
To hear an employee of the Metro screaming at a foreigner with foaming mouth
for daring to photograph a wall plaque is something you need to visit Russia.
Similarly to have anything to do with the police is an exercise in observing
could not care less attitude. No wonder, when Valentina finally found out that
there is a sort of a Lost Property office (unknown to police, whom we asked about
this), she suggested that she will visit them alone and without me, because I
might get upset about the rudeness she expects from them. Indeed I would.
In spite of the black marks I am
giving, there are so many gold stars I could hand out that to me Russia is a
place which is worth visiting not just for the cultural brilliance or their
outstanding architecture, but also for the warmth of the people (provided you
are lucky enough to meet them privately) and finally for the overall
experience. Sadly if in Russia you are provided with a uniform or even a
nameplate, it is your permit to become aggressive if you are that way inclined,
because I met plenty in uniforms who were helpful and forthcoming.
I
have no doubt that in years to come the situation will improve in all respects
and I would love to be a fly on the wall and experience a Russia which her
population deserves.
Helsinki 26th June 2003
Both you and I thought that I
finished the Russian part of my reports, but now that I have some time at the
airport of the Finnish capital I must return to describe my last two days
there.
Tuesday with Sacha driving us in this most expert, but to me frightening
way we set out towards Petershof, the palace with
some marvellous fountains and many buildings as
exciting as the palace itself. I have been there before, but Valentina thought
that the place deserved a second viewing especially as the weather was at long
last enjoyable. We left Sacha behind and we went for
a long walk, after which I declared that I regard a 20 minute walk as a walk,
21 minutes is a long walk and one that lasts 22 minutes is a marathon. I will
not disguise the fact that ours turned out to be even longer, so much so that
after finding Sacha, who was waiting for us he drove
us straight back to the flat to pick up our tickets and he then drove us in a
hurry to the concert hall.
The concert was one at which
various singers presented songs to piano accompaniment. Especially wonderful
voices were produced by a base baritone and also by a tenor, both singers being
artists of the Mariinsky opera theatre. Beside us sat
a lady with a mike and a hi-tech recording device looking sternly at everyone
who as much as moved. Sitting in the first row with us, she was apparently
recording all the performance for her radio show to be broadcast later that
week. I would doubt if, even without coughing, she would have been able to
reproduce the fine voices with the simple equipment she so pompously held.
However we all knew that we are in the presence of a very important person and
I did not even need a translator to deduce this.
We took it easy on Wednesday,
my last full day in SPb and although we went out, I was looking forward to my
afternoon sleep. Imagine my surprise when it turned out that our ballet is to
start at 10 PM only instead of the standard 7 PM starting time, which using Mariinsky time translates into 7:15 or even later. Sacha delivered us to the Mariinsky,
which is somewhat out of the way and requires frequent changes of metro trains
plus a bus. In any case the trains start to stop at 12 midnight and there is no
way to get back unless you have arranged a car or a taxi.
I have seen the Nutcracker a
number of times, however I was not prepared to see THAT Nutcracker. Although
they have not changed Tchaikovsky’s music and probably they left most of Petipa’s choreography in place, the décor was designed by a
Russian guy, who has been so modern and so anti-Soviet in outlook that he was
thrown out from Russia and had to slum it in America, where he became a celebrity
making serious money. Just the same he did not give up on his country and has
several celebrated statues (one of which I saw and was impressed with) in St
Petersburg.
His décor and costumes were
less futuristic than I expected, but most colourful
and lots of fun. And as regards the dancing…. well as upset I was with Romeo
and Juliet the Nutcracker I saw has made me forget all my woes and even allowed
for the fact that we had seats in a box with less than perfect view and I stood
most of the performance, fascinated by the precision of the dancers and the
complicated manoeuvres they carried with an air of
nonchalance. At one stage there were 24 girls on stage moving with a unison
which I have not experienced earlier in more than 25 years of ballet going.
Earlier just 20 girls, but with 20 boys were on stage and it was almost
impossible to know how they got themselves into the formation which was so
different seconds ago.
Nutcracker is a series of
dances held together by an old magician type and some of these numbers were
sensational or at least danced that way. The Pas de Deux
was absolutely magic and the individual dances following it by the two
participants, just as exciting and faultless. The décor was exciting too, no
cost spared and colourful without being sensationally
out of context. In the finale there was a huge cake on the stage with dancers
on, around and in it, about 3 stories high and if you did blink you missed
seeing it. The expense must have been huge and the effect stupendous.
As I said, it would be
worthwhile to come to St Petersburg just to see this Nutcracker, maybe not all
the way from Sydney, but certainly from Helsinki, which is just 35 minutes
flying times away.
From a magic evening we came
out into the warm street to find Sacha waiting for
us. He drove us along the Neva and stopped where quite a number of tourist
busses were parked so that I may savour the lit up
city and its bridges and buildings. I made a few photographs and then we
hurried across onto the other side to avoid being stranded on the wrong side.
As we progressed we stopped again to photograph the bridge which opens every
night to allow the boats to pass. I cannot recall its name, but it is a famous
bridge, often pictured in SPb literature. That virtually the whole bridge lifts
up might be cause for it’s fame, but whatever it is, it is certainly
spectacular as are all the other bridges, lit up for the benefit of tourist and
locals alike. According to my 2 amateur guides the many people who were
watching the lights and the bridge opening, at least 60% were locals, who come
out of their slumber whenever the weather behaves.
It was later than 1 AM that
we got back to the flat, where a lot of packing was still to be done. Sacha picked me up at 10 AM to take me to Pulkovo II airport and now I am in Helsinki awaiting my Finnair connection to London Heathrow, from where I will be
taking the bus to another airport where my brother-chauffeur is awaiting me. At
least I hope!