Russia

Russia was difficult to get to and very easy to leave, I've met up with my sister in Budapest, I really like this city and the Hungarians. This email is a bit of a whinge, it picks up towards the end. I learnt a valuable lesson in reconfirmation, I got to Hong Kong airport and could find no counter for Aeroflot, Malaysian airlines handle their inquiries. I was politely told that there were no Aeroflot flights that day and there had been a misprinting on my ticket, she then put on a sticker with my flight leaving the next day. Back to the airport the next day and still no Aeroflot counter, back to Malaysian airlines, "I am sorry sir but this flight has already left she wrote the wrong time on your ticket". Off to the airport hotel for a free night of relative luxury and a few free meals, back the next day and a flight to Bangkok and finally on my way to Russia. Aeroflot are a classy airline, its an open office plan, no middle division, looks like a converted cargo plane, no games/movie console on the back seat, no general movies, simply no entertainment, no displayed row numbers, seat numbers on the back of the seat, the first international air flight attendants in the world who do not speak English, two drunk Russians next to me at 11am, a low altitude flight plan that enables viewing of all below, no free booze and a fairly decent rocking motion. Russians stumbling round on the plane drinking from a bottle of spirits, a cheer when the plane landed, no smiles and the big noses. I always thought it was difficult to tell the difference between Europeans but the Russians seem to have really big noses, I wonder if this is an evolutionary trait, more nasal tract to warm the air before it hits the lungs. The Russians wear their animals, giant coats ringed in fur, covered in cow, no runners, leather on head, foot, hand and back. Awful Russian pop music everywhere, tinsel town music, upbeat, Russian versions of Kylie Minogue and the Spice Girls, you would think they would all be listening to the blues. Seriousness like they are on the way to a funeral, a death in the family everyday. At first I thought the people were cold and exceptionally impolite, impenetrable and unmeetable. Every time I would try and engage with someone a blank look, not engaged. It is only on my last day here that I have properly realized, its not that people are unfriendly, its just that their faces have frozen into a permanent frown. They are willing to engage, I should just forget all rules of social interaction Maybe the cold war was not about ideology and power but relationships to life, the American's, possibly the most outgoing, friendly and over the top people on the planet, laughing at jokes that aren't there versus the most austere, the most depressed, most somber and generally most dark. Maybe its just weather creating culture. Its easy to see how the Russian have produced great literature, their emotional states, they exist in some indefinable half way house, at first I thought they are terminally depressed from 1000 years of chronic misrule. Now I think its just a look, as there a laughing clubs in India, emotional states are infectious, maybe the tone was set centuries ago. They are definitely the saddest looking people I've ever come across. I was talking this Estonian girl about it, she also refused to smile, she said its because of the harshness of the life, what about South Asia? Maybe its just a climate thing, Melbourne is the outer limit, humans should never be more than 40 degrees away from the equator. The lines, at immigrations, everywhere, there is no order, its a mess, its even more disorderly than the Chinese. To have enough staff to meet the demand would be un-Russian, this reminds me of Cuba, that hardcore socialism, its still here. Its difficult to find things, find laundry mats, shops exist in caravans, makeshift along the road, no permanent setup, private enterprise is tenuous, no spirit of entrepreneurship to fill the gaps. It reminds me so much of Cuba, the difficulty because of a lack in advertising and marketing, I'm sure these services exist, how to find them is a mystery. How to reconcile this with my disgust with advertising and marketing? The subway system in Moscow is superb, possibly the best public transport system I've ever used, covered in art for the masses, the Kremlin beautiful if not austere, Moscow is blighted with commission flat looking buildings, cheapest and least creative possible, along Chinese lines. Moscow is in the middle of a heat wave, the hottest January on record, just below minus during the day, further anecdotal evidence that the climate is changing. This has been a constant theme over the past few years of traveling, I wonder if its the effect of environmental propaganda creating perception or of reality creating perception? The confusion of coldness, to wear thermals and invite overheating or be slightly cold and remove the layers on entering buildings heated to t-shirt temperature. Those that live in the extremes crave the opposite, in the tropics it is freezing air conditioned buses and shops where you want to put on a jacket, here everything is heated to mid twenties and beyond, The alphabet is a dyslexics dream, back to front N, K, picking the metro stations by the first three letters. I went to the Hermitage, the art museum in the Winter Palace, I'm not much of an art fan so a lot of it didn't mean much to me. A lot of the names rang a bell, they have the art that the Tsar's bought, the Nazi's stole then the Soviet Union plundered. Apparently its one of the great art collections in the world. The grandiose of the winter palace, the Tsar's old hideout, and all the ancient art produce mixed feelings within me. At first I am slightly dazzled by the awesome display of wealth and power, daunted and I feel small, ashamed, culturally insignificant and poor in comparison, then I move to feeling defiant about it all, a little man's rebellion. I justify my indignation with the countless lives and misery that the Russian people must have gone through to produce such wealth. A peasant country, so much must have been drained from them to build such buildings and purchase such art. Then I feel diminished by having such an impotent rage against it which is driven by a feeling of inferiority. That the culture I come from seems so base in comparison, this really really shits me. These buildings are built for this purpose, they are symbols of power and prestige. The Russians have had a complex for centuries about not been up to the standard of western Europe, maybe this was built to reassure themselves, a statement to the world of their power. The Winter palace with its high ceilings, it is baroque style apparently, this means nothing to me, chandeliers, powerful crests adorning the walls with eagles, gold adorned bits, haughty Russians everywhere. Its all a little grand for me, it makes me feel small, like a peasant. It is not the way i remember it from soviet propaganda films, where's the stair case that the workers charged up? Anyways St. Petersburg is by far the most beautiful city i have seen, the four storey buildings, with cannon proof thick walls, the beautiful old yet superimposing churches, nothing is small or meek everything is powerful. I'm sure living in snow would give me the shits but seeing it as a tourist attraction is pretty cool, a white city is truly beautiful. Outside the winter palace an enormous pillar commemorating the victory over napoleon, canals of ice criss-crossing the city, ten foot tall stone men holding buildings up. They are affirming there place in the lineage of Europe, they are in the line of the Greeks. Melbourne should have Greek statues up everywhere, we have so many Greek descendants we have a bigger claim to Greek legacy than the Russians. I have been a good tourist in both Russia and China, I've seen a lot, taken loads of photos, walked the streets looking at the buildings, seen art and I went to Dostoevsky's house, its a small museum. This was definitely the best thing I did in Russia. The young women are postcard beautiful the old the most ugly in the universe. It seems the old are battered, men and women, ravaged by unmentionable suffering, or maybe its just been Russian. I think I would like to come back to Russia and spend more time here, its an intriguing place, not a quick visit country, a pick axe is required to get into this place.

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