The Heart Of The Day

I want to emphatically state (and I think Bob would concur) that I have nothing but admiration for this proud and resilient people who have survived 70 years of this “ideological tidal wave that affected virtually the entire globe,” according to Robert Harvey in his “Comrades…The Rise and Fall of World Communism,” “that left maybe 100 million dead in its wake, as well as twice that number homeless and suffering, and more than 30 million as slave labor of one kind or another and that shaped the lives of billions.”

Robert Conquest in “Reflections on a Ravaged Century,” argues that a group of sub-intellectuals fastened upon Marx’s convoluted and half-baked theories because of the new turn-of-the-century faith in science as the answer to every problem, including human ones” which was one response to a bewildering new world of social upheavel and unseen forces as lost men sought to gain control over the destiny of their lives.

I mention to three of our homestay hosts that I see T-shirts with CCCP (USSR or Union of Soviet Socialist Republics) and hammer and sickle on the backs…black humor born of a young generation that did not have to live through the bloodbaths…and when I see the responses on the faces of these women, I know I will not wear this T-shirt. It is not funny.

Are not some Muslim men today, full of shame because they are jobless and without family also reaching from out of a medieval creed with a leveling response in a desperate attempt to gain control over their lives? From communism to this?

Siberian countryside with endless kilometers of grassland and golden pine and white birch trees… small wooden, weathered, unpainted, picturesque, single story bungalows throughout Sibera with blue painted shutters-the banya (toilet and shower) in a small building nearby…Outside the cities groups of small two-story dachas (2nd homes with three-sided pitched roofs with garden in front providing relief from tiny flats and a chance to grow their own vegetables for those who can afford it…intensely flavored wine-red berry jam on Olkhon Island.

Drab, dilapidated Stalin-era block style apartment buildings that make maximum use of space but with absolutely no aesthetic value… there’s definitely a market niche in this country, Bob laments, for brooms, scrub brushes, soap and paint…. black leather jackets, Lenin-style hats (never saw any baseball style hats) and shoes with pointed curled up toes on men and women with spike heels—click click click)…. Especially in evenings, but any time of day, people strolling or standing around with an open bottle of beer in hand… Occasionally someone toppling over from inebriation to be caught by a comrade before falling…people with an aloof veneer-not an air of superiority-just reserved as in “I’m minding my own business…you mind yours”-sometimes seemingly shy but when the exterior is cracked they smile readily and extend themselves with varying degrees of warmth and good humor-especially on the train where we have an opportunity to interact……deep underground metros-monumental works of art in themselves (no photos allowed)…wonderful rich soups and more soup, each a little different than the next…

Experiencing daily life in cozy cluttered apartment homestays with friendly middle-aged to elderly single women who get 30% of what we paid. The provided breakfasts range anywhere from here’s the eggs-cook your own to elaborate spreads in tiny rooms… tiny bathrooms (literally wc’s) with sit down toilets that took three times to flush clean…overheard conversations that sound like arguments in a tone of voice you and I would take offense at but then we think it’s all just bluster…people walking in-between and in front of us with no regard for personal boundaries but not intending to be rude…urban store windows full of fashionable clothing and products that only about l% of the people can afford and then only because they operate on the black market (one woman who works for the central bank whispered “yes, we take white money and black money.”

The wait at the Russian-Mongolian border is a grueling 5-6 hour wait for customs to go through each carriage and take our passports, return to the office to fill out forms and then return with our passports. Olga takes ... [Continue reading this entry]

The Tajik and Olga In Irkutsk, when we find our seats on the train to Ulaan Baatar, we find a good-looking 40 year old Muslim man from Tajikistan in our cabin. He has studied ... [Continue reading this entry]

Back in Irkutsk we watch women walking swiftly always carrying a plastic shopping sack or two (ovoiska from the Russian 'ovois' meaning 'just in case') of varying brands that have to be purchased)...a hold-over ... [Continue reading this entry]

Back at Nikita's "resort" I spend half a day taking care of monkey business while Bob goes hiking around the island. It is the end of September but Siberia lives up to it's ... [Continue reading this entry]

After hanging out a couple days...glad to be off the train...Gregory, a former University teacher of German, drove Bob and I, three Germans and a Pole on a half-day excursion to the north of ... [Continue reading this entry]

The next morning we are picked up at our homestay in Irkutsk by a sullen driver who drives us five hours over pot-holes, through the taiga and across a bay of the beautiful blue ... [Continue reading this entry]

Off the train again, we dump our luggage at Nadia's, our homestay and look for a cafe where there just might be an English menu. We find one...not too expensive...that looks full of ... [Continue reading this entry]

Vladamir makes crying motions with his fingers running down his cheeks as we prepare to leave him on the train. Astrakhan in 2--5 he writes on a piece of paper...Astrakhan in 2005 we say to him as he helps ... [Continue reading this entry]

The evening we are to leave Yekaterinburg on the train, Bob loses his change purse containing a credit card getting out of a mini-bus. Olga's son drives us in his car to the ... [Continue reading this entry]

Most carriages are of East German origin solidly built and warm in winter. Each carriage is staffed by an attendant whose "den" is a compartment at the end of the carriage. She ... [Continue reading this entry]

Yekaterinburg is most famous, however, as the place where Tsar Nicholas II and his wife and five children were murdered by the Bolsheviks in July 1918. Having seen where the bodies were interred ... [Continue reading this entry]

This autumn of 2004, our second time around the world, our train wanders through a rolling fairy-tale landscape in Siberia filled with gentle grassland (steppes) and Birch trees (the forest is called taiga) with ... [Continue reading this entry]

Video We boarded a Moscow train at midnight. We are headed across Russia on the trans-siberian train system. However we will be breaking up the trip by getting off in Yekaterinburg and ... [Continue reading this entry]

Video 2004-09 Like in the big Central European cities we visited, there are cranes everywhere... old soviet buildings built during the Stalin era are scheduled to be razed and new one modern ones put up. ... [Continue reading this entry]

Our homestay in Moscow is in the "burbs." Tanya works for a French men's underwear company and later admits that her son is the wholesaler and she works for him under the table. ... [Continue reading this entry]

Local police don't allow anyone in Red Square until 10 in the morning so when Bob got there the Square was jaw-dropping empty...the Kremlin and Lenin's Tomb on one side, Gum's Department Store the ... [Continue reading this entry]

The night before we leave St. Petersburg, Elena and her childhood friend, Dula, breathlessly excited, bring home bags and boxes of forest mushrooms. Bob and I haven't eaten and we hope the ... [Continue reading this entry]

I had watched "Russian Ark," a movie about the history of the Hermitage before I left home so I was excited when we found Sasha, a university educated art historian, to take us ... [Continue reading this entry]

Video We hail down a minibus, just like we did in Viet Nam, which takes us across the Neva River to Nevsky pr (like Rodeo Drive in LA which has to have some of ... [Continue reading this entry]

St. Petersburg, Russia September 6, 2004: We had been monitoring the hostage crisis in Beslan, North Ossetia, all through Europe...but was one day late to witness a demonstration in Palace Square on Monday where 40,000 ... [Continue reading this entry]

A Homestay has been arranged for us by our tour company, White Knights, with Elena who lives in (and owns) a 3 room very cluttered flat four flights up in a poorly maintained government ... [Continue reading this entry]

May 11-15 2002 City of Stone Town Island of Zanzibar The tropical island of Zanzibar has a more cosmopolitan and warm and open ambiance than other African countries we have been in-more like the islands ... [Continue reading this entry]