Snow is falling

(not all around me, as I am indoors), but children are certainly playing and having fun. These shifts in temperature and seasons worry me, not least because it means many of our Slavic brothers will have to re-jig their calendars. As you will see in this table, whole swathes of them still rely on a natural calendar, hence why the month named after ‘harvest’ and ‘leaves falling’ varies as you move through Slavdom. And the month of blossoming may have to come forward - although why the Ukrainians bloom so early, we shall never know.

Two mouthfuls and I was there,

back in my brother’s flat in Moscow in June 1996, after 6 weeks in Kazan. The taste was Ben & Jerry’s cookie dough ice-cream, which could be found in his freezer, along with frozen plastic cartons of milk. Finding it in Tesco’s last night was another serendipitious experience - I had bought it to stuff myself, in the vain hope that too much food would assuage my insomniac tendencies. It did.Moreover, the taste also led to a wave of Russophile nostalgia, aided and abetted by Andy Home’s “Siberian Dreams“; his reaction(s) to the Russian suburbs of both Moscow and Norilsk capture beautifully the disorientation experienced by the first time visitor to the Russia beyond Red Square, the Kremlin and Piter.

St Petersburg

is not a place I have spent a great deal of time, physically at least, ten days altogether at most. It does, however, loom large over my Russophilia, the city central to both Dostoevskii and Gogol’s major works, and the Bronze Horseman lent his name to that long poem by that other fellow. Now, you may ask, why on earth am I posting about a city I know very little about - I have read the histories, have read the fiction, and now I am reading a rather wonderful books called ‘Mapping St Petersburg‘ by a North American academic named Julie Buckler - this book, or at least the parts I have read so far seeks to locate those parts of Petersburg that have dropped between the cracks, neither the grand historical scheme, nor the festering slums of Fedor Mikhailovich, but the literature, lore and urban legends that were built up by the residents of the city themselves, both second (third and fourth) rate writers, and by the ordinary inhabitants. This passage, I think gives a flavour:

‘A round black hat was seen floating on the Fontanka near Ismailovskii Bridge on another occasion. A crowd of idlers gather to watch the “inexpensive entertainment,” and Fontanka residents sent their servants out to find out what was happening. The Guards officers took full advantage of the occasion, and Pylaiev records the different story-versions that sprang up along the Petersburg waterways. By the Panteleimonskii Bridge, it was said that the hat belonged to “a clerk, who drowned himself from grief because he was given no recompense when those lower than he in rank and position each received a Stanislav order.” By the Simeonovskii Bridge, the drowned clerk became “a young Kolomna poet, who threw himself into the Fontanka because the publisher of a particular journal did not want to print his verses.”‘

And so the variations continue…

This week

Terry Eagleton
Marcel Theroux
Jimi Tenor
Nick Drake
Pink Martini
Bjork

RIP Boris

1991

9 F00-65036 ROYAL AUCLAIR 10-11-01

Joe Tizzard Paul Nicholls
Second to Hedgehunter under a big weight in 2005. Same owner as Cheltenham Gold Cup winner Kauto Star. Will relish the likely fast ground.
Rating: 7/10 Odds: 40-1

No chance of me winning the sweepstake at work this year, then. This is the first year I actually feel like having a bet on the Grand National - 4 years working at a famous bookmakers put me off gambling in general, but as Point Barrow is so clearly going to win this year’s race, and at 9/1 at present, it must be worth a punt.

The news here is full of the end of Prince William’s break-up - suicide bombers in Morocco have been relegated to second place, and the issues the anti-Putinists in both the UK and Russia are experiencing are way down the list.

And this little story filled me with an immense amount of hope and joy, especially taken alongside my current reading material.

Added: Friday, 9 March, 2007, 18:28 GMT 18:28 UK

“One best leader in the 21 st century to come. He took russia from dust to world only alternative power to save the world…russian and whole world will rally behind him…as the greatest leader to face unjust in the world created by christian and jewish and muslim fundemantals and uniplorasim.
He is the one can save world from religous fanatics…we know nobody perfect whatever that mean.

Turk, Samsun”

Taken from this BBC discussion thread about Putin’s effect on Russia.

Motherland

The photographer Simon Roberts has a new book of this title coming out in March. I happened upon some of the pictures in a discarded copy of the Telegraph Magazine on the Tube home last night - some are entirely predictable, but the slideshow is enjoyable nonetheless.

How are you? My name is Ekaterina.

“Hi!

How are you? My name is Ekaterina. I from Russia, city Cheboksary. To me 28 years. I shall tell to you about myself a little.

I corresponded with the man from the your country before. His name Mark. He is from your country. We had a long correspondence and Mark wanted, that I have arrived to him in the your country that I have seen what life there. We have together submitted the statement on reception of the visa in your country! Mark spoke, that will help my in our meeting. I thought, that have met on the Internet the love.

I and Mark made the big plans for the future, but in a flash all has changed. From the moment of submission of the statement for the application of the visa has passed 5 months. For these five months there was for what I least waited. Mark informed, that his former wife has returned to him and lives together with him. Soon they should get married. And now in Mark plans there is no me. I wrote to him some times after that, but Mark have wished me only good luck in the further searches worthy men and have told, that our ways miss. And in October to me there has come the invitation in embassy behind reception of the visa.

In the beginning I wanted to throw out the invitation in embassy. To me it was sad, because my dreams were failed, I have nobody to fly in the your country. But my uncle have dissuaded me from resolute actions and have told, that else there is a chance to find worthy the man and to use the visa to a meeting with him. I well know English and practically I have visa your country. My uncle speaks, that it really solves many problems.

Approximately in 7 days the visa will be ready, and I should go to Moscow behind reception of the visa. I write to you because in my heart there is an empty seat. I do not search rich or poor. I search careful and responsible man which wants to enjoy a life together. Is this person you? I think, that I ask not much. I have told to you a little about my life. I have told not all about myself, but it will be easier to me to write about myself if you will ask questions which interest you. I have told to you my history, and now I shall look forward to hearing from you with impatience. Write to me! I shall send you more photo in the following letter. I wait you answer. Ekaterina.

P.S. I shall answer with pleasure if you write to me.”

Funny, in the previous 463 e-mails I received like this, her name was Natasha…

Vasilii Grossman versus TFL

“…After Unecha, we travelled in a freight car. The weather was wonderful, but my travel companions said this was bad, and I realised this myself. There were black holes and craters from bombs everywhere along the railway. One could see trees broken by explosions. In the fields there were thousands of peasants, men and women, digging anti-tank ditches.

We watch the sky nervously and decided to jump off the train if the worst came to the worst. It was moving quite slowly. The moment we arrived in Novozybkov there was an air raid. A bomb fell in the station forecourt. This train wasn’t going any further…”

Vasilii Grossman, A Writer At War

“Throughout the day, fallen trees and other debris have caused disruption to most open sections of the Tube network.

Speed restrictions have also been introduced on some open sections of the Tube network for safety reasons.

LU is working with infrastructure companies Tube Lines and Metronet to remove debris from tracks as quickly as possible but inevitably this will result in disruption to services.”

TFL