Petrovskoye. Aristocratic legends and entertainments.

07.18.2013

Pictures:

http://www.slideboom.com/presentations/800926/Bugrovo-or-Delights-of-village-life

Today was devoted to an estate of Pushkin’s African roots: of his great grandfather Abram Hannibal, who was called “blackamoor of Peter the Great”. He was born and spent his childhood in a small princedom in equatorial Africa. His father was a prince in this tiny country as Abram wrote later in his biography “my father had a blood of local aristocrats in his veins”. When he was about 5 years old he was stolen from his family and sold to Turkey. He lived in Constantinople where he was noticed and most probably stolen again by a Russian ambassador as a present to Peter the Great with two other black boys (in Russia it became fashionable to have black servants). A proof of the version that boys were stolen is the fact that they were carried to Russia in secret and were allowed to catch a breath of fresh air only for about 2 hours at night. Because of such terrible conditions only two boys arrived alive to Russia. Peter the Great didn’t want to have two boys so he chose only one of them, Abraham. So we could say that future Hannibal was really lucky.  Peter baptized the boy and gave him the Biblical name Abram and a last name in honor of his benefactor Petrov. Peter the Great was attached to Abram and took him to all battles and campaigns as his assistant. When the guy grew up Peter sent him to France, to the military academy to study fortification, geometry and algebra. After he graduated he came back to Russian and became a professor for young soldiers in Russian military schools where he taught fortification, geometry and algebra. There were no textbooks for these subjects in Russian language so Abram decided to write his own textbook for algebra.  He finished it at the empress Ekaterina the First time. Ekaterina, Peter’s wife, didn’t forget her husband’s favorite “blackamoor” and Abram became a family teacher of her son Peter the Second. However, after her death his ill-wisher Menshikov sent him to Siberia under the pretext of the restoration of fortresses there. That was the time when Abram wanted to prove that he’s not the exile so he took a patronymic Petrovich and the last name Hannibal insisting that his father was descended from this famous commander of Roman times. 

When Elisabeth, Peter’s daughter, became the empress, Abram wrote her a letter and she gave him this estate Petrovskoye as a present and returned him to Petersburg where he married a Greek girl. But pretty soon, they broke up as he excused her in cheating on him because his wife had a white daughter. He started a divorce proceeding but never finished it and just cloistered her. Abram was sent to Revel as a head of the fortress and married there Christina Regina, a girl with Polish-Danish background. She finally gave him a black son and 10 other kids. All his daughters he married off and bequeathed everything to his elder son Ivan. However, after Abram’s death Ivan decided to divide his father’s land among his 3 younger brothers so Peter (the eldest one of the three brothers) got Petrovskoye estate. He became a true landowner, established despotic willfulness, flogged his bondmen and forced his guests to stay for a long time in his house (for example, he ordered to hide their clothes or even to spoil their horses’ harness). The youngest of the three brothers was very inventive and organized an orchestra of bondmen and taught them to sing aristocratic songs.

All these interesting facts told us our tour guide as well as other details. For example, she told us how scared were all local bondmen of Abram Hannibal because of the color of his skin and his violent character. When he was sitting in the park, in his “green study” waiting for guests to come, they were saying: “Here is a black devil sitting on his black stone and thinking his black thoughts”. Actually, I liked the mansion house here even more than in Mikhailovskoye and Trigorskoye. A kitchen, children’s room, a heavy device for cooking waffles, a huge luxurious dining room, stories about Pushkin’s cousin of dad was making the servants to learn Pushkin’s poems by hearts – everything stuck in my memory. Park is smaller than parks in Mikhailovskoye and Trigorskoye though with their own charm: a nice grotto-pavilion with a great view on the lake, corner “Parnassus” etc.

In the evening we went for a little walk and my sister discovered a road to Bugrovo where are Pushkin’s village and a big watermill. While she was checking this road she met a local resident Peter (who actually live in Saint Petersburg but spent the whole summer here, in his wife’s house). He showed us a short road from Mikhailovskoye to Savkino settlement (where we live) along the bank of a river Sorotj. He told us that in spring the whole meadow is covered with water so that the lake is joins the river but in the summer it dries out a little so you can cross it by the planked footway. Peter was a sociable man and we talked the whole way home. We got home just in time to escape a wonderful summer rain with magnificent aspen aromas…

Bugrovo. Village life and folk customs.

07.19.2013

Pictures:

http://www.slideboom.com/presentations/800926/Bugrovo-or-Delights-of-village-life

Today was opposite to yesterday: a village and folk life instead of lord’s world. We went to Pushkin’s village in Bugrovo where a watermill became a place of the action in Pushkin’s unfinished poem “Mermaid”. We read this poem again with a great pleasure during our breakfast. Despite of a heavy raining, we enjoyed our tour in the village where another wonderful guide plunged into the vivid world of Russian village of 19^th century with its beliefs and wisdoms, its omens and songs. We hided into a big barn where the guide showed us how men were threshing (they did about 50 strokes in one minute!) and how women were dressing seeds using the wind (they opened either two big gated in opposite sides of a barn or small doors on two other sides: it depended on the wind direction). She showed us how women were hackling the flax three times: the first one is for rough fabric for tablecloths and towels, the second one if for clothes and the third one for a famous “Pskov silk” – delicate muslin which was used for wedding veils. The interesting fact is that number 3 is used everywhere: on the watermill there are 3 grades of flour (rough flour for bread, the softer one for pies and the softest one for pancakes), 3 times we wound a thread round our dolls that we were making during the workshop in the village.

Our guide told us about a bathhouse: why girls were fortunetelling only there and why this place was considered as the most evil one in the house. The reason is simple – it’s almost the only one place in the house where is no icons. We also visited two izbas (Russian historic village house): the “white” one and the “black” one. On the “black” one nobody needed an alarm clock in the morning: when a hostess burnt a stove nobody can stay in the house because of the smoke. This house is heated with a chimneyless stove: that’s why it’s called “black”. So everyone went to do their business early in the morning. As for the “ white” house it was the place where girls were needle working and boys were making wooden tableware. Boys checked how the girls were working and which one is the best in spinning and put a wax candle from the church (they were very expensive) in front of the girl they liked most. Some girls had a lot of candles (as well as a lot of admirers) and some girls didn’t have any. Weddings took place also in the “white” house. However, the bed for the newlyweds is in the inner porch because the roof of the house was covered with some soil to make it warmer and it was a bad omen to start a new life “under the ground”. Another reason was the fact that usually newlyweds didn’t know each other well enough before the arranged marriage so the cold forced them to get closer in their first night…

After the houses we went to the watermill where a charming junior miller told us everything about a mechanism of a watermill where everything is equipped so that it will work for a long time without renewing. First of all, it’s hard to change the details of this mechanism, secondly, as it’s a watermill it could work only when the pond near isn’t frozen so the local residents had to arrange milling with a miller a year in advance. We tasted 3 different grades of a flour and even bran. And a miller played balalaika for us – a great pleasure!

We also sent our relatives letters written by a quill and ink! First of all, I understood what “a squeak of a quill” means, and secondly, it’s really hard to write with it. I can’t imagine how Pushkin and other people at his time were writing with a copybook hand so smooth lines. Plus, our hands were covered with ink stains.  But it was so much fun!

We had lunch in a café of a hotel “Arina R.” (making fun of this stupid name-reference to a Pushkin’s nanny) where I tasted cloistral food: “Cloistral Salad” with fresh cabbage, cucumbers and apples and a buckwheat porridge “Mikhailovskaya” with mushrooms. It was heavy raining but we managed even to buy souvenirs from Pushkin Mountains: miniature-books with Pushkin’s poems, ceramic jugs, magnets, “brownies” (Russian house spirits) and other nice things. At home we were reading Pushkin’s works aloud, frying potatoes, playing cards and having great time. Nobody wants to leave…

Trigorskoye. Friendship, love and anguish.

Pictures:

http://www.slideboom.com/presentations/800691/Trigorskoye-and-Petrovskoye

07.17.2013

Today we went to Trigorskoye – an estate of Pushkin’s friends where he spent a lot of time during his exile. We waited for the tour for about 40 minutes, but the guide was the main curator of this museum so the tour was very interesting: he read a lot of poems and was talking with rapture. This estate of Praskovia Wolf (Osipova by her second husband) and her children was always full with a lot of young people. That is probably why there are more real objects and details saved from 19^th century than in Mikhailovskoye. Now there are 8 rooms completely restored as they looked like at Pushkin times. Every room is telling some stories about Pushkin, his life, his loves and his poems. He found a second family here because he had bad relations with his own parents: for his mum he was the most unloved child of all and his dad agreed to spy on him and control his every step when Alexander was exiled to Mikhailovskoye. In the family Osipova-Wolf he was admired, loved and respected. Plus Praskovia Wolf had several pretty and interesting daughters, who ran out of the house just before the lunch to see if Pushkin was arriving by a river shore.

The daily routine of Eugene Onegin was copied from a day of the author; a well-known library room which Onegin checked from cover to cover being bored in the village is restored exactly how it looked like when Pushkin was spending time in it. Aleksey, a son of Osipova, was often the first judge of Alexander’s poems and his destiny was predicted so correctly in the Lenski, a character of the poem “Eugene Onegin”. He was a student of philosophic department in Derpt University, went to the army after graduation, never made a career there, so settled down in his parents’ estate, became an aristocrat and a landlord, organizes kind of a harem of serf girls, encouraged corporal punishments and absolutely forgot thoughts about liberty and reforming of a serfdom in Russia. Evpraksia, the youngest daughter of Osipova, was the girl that Pushkin played with as with a child, but several years later he dedicated one of the most beautiful poem “Winter morning”. We saw a bathhouse where Alexander and his friends, also great artists and writers, were having parties and drinking hot punch whole nights. There was an atmosphere of friendship, flirt, love and an incredible thirst for living everywhere here at that time. And there was an endless anguish in Pushkin’s heart after the whole family Osipova-Wolf left for Riga to live with the husband of Anna Kern (a niece of Praskovia Wolf). The reason was serious: there was a love affair between Pushkin and Kern, and her aunt was worrying about niece’s reputation.

After the house we visited a park around, made in English style, with a sundial and flower dial, “green hall” and another 400 years old oak which in Stephen Báthory was planted on the place of mass grave. There were a lot of beautiful ponds and fragile water lilies. We spent about an hour in a “green hall” just chatting and smelling these wonderful forest aromas. On our way home we bought freshly-salted cucumbers, bilberries and mushrooms from old women in the village. They were so surprised and touched when my dad gave them more money than they asked - “for a start” (how we say in Russia). We had a great lunch with all that delicious food at home. After it we discussed the future of Russian language and played poker.

In the evening we decided to explore the road to Petrovskoye, the estate of Pushkin’s great grandfather Hannibal. This estate is smaller than Mikhailovskoye and Trigorskoye and the house is made more in aristocratic style. However, I liked it and a park around: there is a grotto-pavilion just on the bank of a beautiful lake Kuchina, from where you can see not only Mikhailovskoye on the other side of the lake but also a house of Petrovskoye through the park mall. We ate green sour apples from the trees in the garden and admired huge oaks and elms on the periphery of the park. It was quiet and desert in the park, where drops of recent rain were whispering on the leaves creating a magical aroma of summer freshness…

Mikhailovskoye, Pushkin's Patrimony.

Pictures:

http://www.slideboom.com/presentations/800025/Mikhailovskoye

07.16.2013

Today we went to Mikhailovskoye, a patrimony of Pushkin’s family, where we had a super interesting tour about Pushkin’s life here and his relations with family. Our tour guide was wonderful – she was describing everything so vividly and brightly that you could imagine all events in reality. I almost saw myself how Pushkin’s close friend Ivan Pushjin was coming through fir parkway to the house and Alexander Pushkin was running on porch wearing only shirt and they were hugging without noticing that it was freezing outside and one of them was wearing a fur coat while the other one only shirt. Pushkin was in exile for two years (because of some “freethinking” in his poems) and was obliged to live in this estate far from Saint Petersburg where all of his friends were. That’s why every coming of his friends here was a huge event for him, lonely and bored in these desert places.

The most interesting thing for me were Pushkin’s drafts with a lot of marks and corrections, as well as a lot of marginal pictures (pretty good by the way!). That is how a masterpiece was creating… In a Russian bathhouse we saw a heavy iron walking stick which Pushkin always took with him for his walks to Trigorskoye to train his right hand. The reason was serious: just before his exile he called down the best duelist of his times Tolstoy “American” (he was called “American” after he behaved so bad on the ship crossing the ocean that the captain just put him ashore somewhere in Alaska).  We also saw a tub with iced water that Pushkin poured over himself every morning. He was a healthy man and if this horrible duel with French immigrant Dantes he would live a long life…

This museum was created long time ago, in the very beginning of 20^th century, but it was razed and burnt 4 times after it. When this territory was occupied by Germans in 1941, they saved a museum and even sent a woman, professor of history form Germany, to be a tour guide here. However, 3 years later, when they were retreating, they mined a Pushkin’s tomb and burnt down all buildings (even historic ones) here.

After visiting house and bathhouse we continued our tour in a wonderful park around with a lot of nice fancies: such as thorn coach, African pavilion in the garden, a magic grotto (used just as a cellar), “a solitude island” and many others. I was particularly impressed with the former house of Geichenko (a well-known president of the museum for 50 years who did a lot to restore it after World Second War): it was full of hand-made decorations and birdhouses so it looked like a house of a kind magician.

After lunch we went to town center of Pushkin Mountains where Max enjoyed an amazing playground “Lukomorie” (a wonderland described by Pushkin in his fairy tales) where every log revived and turned out into mermaids, dragons, a gold fish and other magic creatures. Suddenly the rain came down in torrents and we hid in our car. We decided to find a restaurant to have dinner, but the only restaurant we found was in a hotel “Friendship” and wasn’t really good. On our way back we met our local storks that live in a huge nest near our house and made wonderful pictures at sunset light.

Our sweet life at Pushkin Mountains

07.15.2013

Pictures:

http://www.slideboom.com/presentations/799802/Savkino-Mountain-or-Our-life-in-Pushkin-Mountains

Unfortunately, on Mondays museums are closed so we decided to visit a place which is always opened – Alexander Pushkin’s and his ancestors’ tombs in Sviatogorski Monastery. But to refresh in the morning we went swimming in river Sorotj. That was wonderful, because the day was hot, the sun was shining and the current in the middle of the river was pretty strong. 

After that we drove to a center of a small town Pushkin Mountains where a monastery is placed. Actually, the monastery itself is pretty small: tiny territory and only 20 people. Pushkin’s tomb is neat and beautiful right next to two old gravestones of his grand and great grandfathers are buried as well as his parents and his little brother Platon. Pushkin came here pretty often to visit his ancestors’ tombs. A church is unusually dark inside and has a lot of very old icons and you feel like at real home there. There is incredibly beautiful icon of the Virgin Hodigitria in a side chapel as well as a picture where the moment of its discovery on this hill by monastic elders is represented. I was impressed by different icons of Our Lady: some of them were so modern, some – very old, with different expressions on their faces, different looks, different techniques of painting. But all of them were so warm and attractive…

Passing the monastery main gates we noticed a booth were a woman was selling a monastery tea and “sbitenj” (something like “saloop” – a special hot alcoholic (could be non-alcoholic) Russian drink based on honey and different herbs) and local pasty. We tried all kinds of patties and my mom especially loved the ones with cabbage – she said they taste exactly the same as the patties her grandfather used to make.

After lunch at home my sister went to work as she had some urgent things to do and me, my dad and Max went to another ancient settlement Voronich where Pushkin was writing his famous historic drama “Boris Godunov” about a Russian tsar who killed a crown prince, little boy, to be a tsar himself.  Actually, there was a time when this settlement was a huge city, the second one by size after Pskov. There were about 50 churches in it and a lot of people. But the same Stephen Báthory destroyed and burnt the city completely and it never managed to revive. Now there is a new church of Saint George reconstructed on the place of old one, couple of old wooden building, a pile of stone cannonballs left after Stephen and an old cemetery with a basement of ancient church.

Actually, there was a tiny road marked on our map leading directly to the settlement Voronich but either we didn’t find it or it doesn’t exist anymore and we went through a meadow, making a circle around a hill where a settlement is placed. Finally, we found a road on the top but it was closed with a sign that a place needs a reconstruction (it’s in “emergency state”) that’s why the access is limited. However we also found a high wooden steps leading to another museum mansion and park Trigorskoye which was an estate of Pushkin close friends and where he spent a lot of time. It’s so magical walking around these places when there is no tourists and almost no people at all. I made a lot of wonderful pictures there. For example, we saw a real stork strolling around a meadow and looking for frogs! I have never seen alive storks so close.

Park around a mansion is huge and wonderful, full of secrets and discoveries. One of a few places I got to remember from our last trip here with my mom was an “Onegin’s bench” (Onegin is a main character from the most famous Pushkin’s poem “Eugenie Onegin”, this poem had a lot in common with this estate – with people, nature and views). On this bench in a poem Onegin was explaining to Tatiana who was in love with him that he is not “the right one” for her. There was a “Tatiana’s path” in a park where (in a poem) she was walking and suffering from her love and composing a letter to Onegin.

Going back home from there we saw a lighting striking directly to the ground and a triple rainbow right in a few minutes after. Also we met a real fox that crossed a road right in front of our car. There were so many miracles in this wonderful Pushkin world…

In the very evening we went to the river again where my dad was imitating a crocodile and Max was contentedly screaming. Suddenly it began to rain but we enjoyed swimming under the rain a lot – it was an absolute happiness. We even didn’t change our clothes after swimming and just ran home in our swim suits. That was a lot of fun!

Pskov and First meeting with Pushkin Mountains

Pictures from these days:

http://www.slideboom.com/presentations/799697/Pskov%2C-second-day-and-first-meeting-with-Pushkin-Mountains

07.13.2013

We do so many things every day and get so much information that we feel like being already for a week here, though it has been only one day. For the second day we agreed to wake up early, contact each other (as me and Nastya were in the other hotel) and to go to spa complex all together. Me and Nastya woke up really early (at 7 am) and had breakfast at our hotel (as it was included in price). It was “Transit-Hotel”, so breakfast was corresponding to it: coffee tasted like dishwater and if you want cream with it you should pay. Though the food was ok, so we ate something at least. After breakfast we called our parents but they didn’t answer. We were surprised and impressed how early they woke up and went to swimming pool. When we got to their hotel by taxi we came directly to spa. However there weren’t our parents there. Confused we went up to their room and found them all … sleeping! My sister and me were pretty vexed because we might have slept one additional hour if we knew.

Our parents didn’t want to hurry so they sent to swimming pool us with Max again. After our parents and Max had breakfast, we all went to a city tour with a wonderful woman, professor of history in local college, who showed us tons of interesting things. We saw peculiarities of Pskov architectural school (special ornaments, bell gable etc.) and a prototype of a Cross of St. George (Russian decoration). Our guide showed us a place where Olga, future famous princess, take across the river on the boat her future husband prince Igor (she was a daughter of boatman) and a “hallway of death” between two wall circles around Kremlin, where enemies were caught in a trap because in this narrow hallway they couldn’t avoided stones and pitch thrown on their heads by inhabitants. We also visited a place, where Russian Democracy was born (actually even at that time it wasn’t really democracy because poor people and peasants didn’t have voices): in Boyar Democratic Pskov Republic on this place a popular assembly took place. We heard about ancient history: broken by Ivan the Terrible assembly bell (how the republic ended up) and “God’s fool” Nicolai who frightened Ivan the Terrible when showed him a piece of raw meat and said that tsar is going to “drink blood” in Pskov. This “God’s fool” saved Pskov because Ivan was pious and decided not destroying the city. After it an image of Nicolai was placed between images of saints in the sanctuary of Troitskii Temple in Kremlin. We heard also about later history of Pskov sky forces (famous Chernigovskaja division) and how people danced in a big hall of the Temple of Alexander Nevskii at Soviet times.  

After such informative trip we decided to refresh ourselves so we went to “Refectory Chamber” to have lunch where everything was just delicious. The funny thing is that names of all dishes were created by philologists in the ancient style so they were incredibly long and absolutely useless when you try to order (it was impossible to pronounce this set of complicated words). That’s why while ordering we were just saying key words like “your salad with venison” or “your pikeperch with cheese”. After some rest in our room we had a massage in spa. I had a Thai massage and it was pretty tangible (sometimes even painful) when you are pressed with feet, elbows and other strong parts of the body. However the relaxation was so deep that I seemed to fall asleep at some moment. In the evening we had dinner with my dad’s friend (who organized everything for us in Pskov) and his wife.

07.14.2013

Today we finally got our final destination – Pushkin Mountains where we rented the first floor of a wonderful house. It’s terrific, it’s absolutely terrific. First of all it looks outside and inside exactly like old wooden museum houses of Pushkin’s family estates Mikhailovskoe and Trigorskoye. Outside it has wooden carved window frames decorated with traditional figures and ornaments. Inside it has three huge rooms with walls covered with beautiful fabric instead of wallpapers, with flax and cotton curtains and bedspreads, with knitted pillowcases and “old” furniture. Plus there are all necessary facilities for comfortable life: dishwashing and washing machines, heated floor in the bathroom etc.  In short words, heavens. Everyone was happy and we had lunch right on the terrace.

After lunch we left mom to relax at home and went to explore new roads. We live on the territory of Pushkin National Park, in the village Savkino, which includes only 4 houses. During the tour in Mikhailovskoye a guide told us that this village nearly became Pushkin’s property: he wanted to buy it, but its owner demanded such a crazy big price that Pushkin didn’t buy it. So our house is places near a site of ancient settlement Savkino Mountain where till 16^th century was a small town. At 16^th century Polish king Stephen Báthory destroyed everything here with fire and sword. Now there is a small chapel there on the place of old temple which was burned by Stephen troops, couple of old stone crosses and a famous stone where you can see the inscription that this temple was found by a priest Sabas was. Also from this hill you can enjoy one of the tremendous Pushkin Mountains views that create so much inspiration.

We went down to the river Sorotj, where we found a great place to swim and a tiny spring with icy water. After that we explores a road through the forest that leads to Mikhailovkoye, Pushkin’s family patrimony. Alexander Pushkin used this road around the lake Malenets and through a beautiful, fragrant forest tons of times when he was walking to his friend’s estate Trigorskoye. Tender whistling of forest birds, shy tiny flowers, seas of fern and warm bushy aspen brunches. A small picturesque lake Malenets where live ducks with big families, old wind mill and sometimes a long-necked swam. 

As it was Monday, most museums were closed so we just walked around park Mikhailovskoye, found oats, potato and wheat in the garden, sat on the “flower stairs”, touched a toy cannon (“pushka” in Russian – connected with an etymology of last name Pushkin) and were caught in the rain. Overall, our walk passed perfectly, as the whole day actually. A wonderful dinner with delicious port wine was a great final of our day.

P.S. I forgot to say that we also have our own black and white cat: we feed her and she sleeps on my mom’s shoes. 

Pskov. How to organize great family trip?

12.07.2013

Pictures of the first day are here:

http://www.slideboom.com/presentations/798019/Pskov%2C-first-day

Family trips require careful preparations and planning. Last summer we had a great journey to Ural Mountains, crossing a famous border between Europe and Asia. So this year we decided to continue exploring our country and went to Pskov, very nice, beautiful and incredibly cozy city on very north-west of Russia, almost on the border with Estonia, Latvia and Belarus. We were arguing about the transport to go there: my sister was for a car because you are more independent but my mum didn’t accept anything but the train as it’s more comfortable. On one hand, my parents were right: you can move, lie, sleep in a train, on the other side, our train was horrible. To be more accurate, our coach was really bad, because it was an old dirty car without any air conditioner, with “side places” (means that there were 56 people in one stuffy and dusty car). Also the conductors didn’t care about anything, even about being polite. Add to this a lot of stops and a long stop in Novgorod where we opened a window to breath and got tons of huge mosquitos that bit my sister and my mum so that the whole week after they had huge red itching spots. We slept brokenly 3-4 hours at the utmost cause the train arrived at 7 am.

Fortunately, the bad part of trip was over with that: my dad has a friend in Pskov and his driver met us at the station and drove to our parent’s spa-hotel “Pozdnoev’s yard”. I and my sister lived in the other hotel but actually spent only nights there. “Pozdnoev’s yard” met all our expectations: besides delicious breakfast and comfortable rooms and service, till 10 am guests of the hotel had free entrance to spa complex (swimming pool with a lot of water massaging devices and Jacuzzi, sauna and Turkish bath, Charcot's douche etc.). By the way, my favorite part was a special shower where you can chose different options: “tropical rain” (warm drizzling rain from the top and bird singing), “waterfall”(pretty cold stream from the top and from sides and water sounds) or “storm” (lightning, thunder and heavy rain from the top and from sides). My parents were too tired to go anywhere so it was me and my sister with my nephew to experience this spa our first day. After it we all had a wonderful buffet breakfast with a lot of options and my dad went to pick up a car that his friend gave us. My sister with her sun and me went to explore a road to Pskov Kremlin.

At first we wanted to walk at the bank of the very beautiful river Velikaja ("Great") to enjoy the view, but unfortunately the whole bank was under reconstruction so we chose a busy central street Sovetskaya (called Great in the past) which led us directly to Kremlin. Sun was shining, it has become warmer outside, it was a true summer and we bought ice-cream, sat on the bench and realized that we didn’t want to go anywhere. We were sitting near a sculptural circle of niches each of them was inhabited with a small funny dwarf except one where Max (my nephew) was hiding.

After that we went to an information center where a nice girl with hair shaved above the ears told us everything about tours, boats and other touristic services of Pskov. At that moment our parents arrived by the car and we all were trying to persuade Max who was jumping and running among ruins of old churches and other buildings of ancient Dovmontov Town near Kremlin to go to an exhibition.  It was an old Departmental Chamber which impressed with size and number of papers and records of management of 16-18^th centuries written by a copybook hand (with a feather and ink!). Feathers, old stamps, scrolls and old chests, candlesticks and huge heavy copper keys – everything created an immersion into a busy work of government clerks, departments and governors of provinces. How did they manage to write with such beautiful handwriting while having so much paper work? Definitely, an exhibition was worth our efforts of climbing incredibly high steps to the Chamber. We also checked an exhibition of cold steel arm of 16-18^th centuries where we found a lot of interesting details of good-looking tall Russian warriors and German knights: chain armour of very delicate netting, swords too heavy to lift, neat Turkish sabres and helmets. Max even tried to lift a mace but it was too “adult”.

After exhibitions we decided to have some fresh air and to go down the river by boat for a one-hour trip. We had to wait for it and then to fight to get on the boat as there were 2 numerous teenage football teams (they came for some competition to Pskov from different cities) who also wanted to have a boat trip. Though the trip was great. First of all, views were even better if not equal to all European landscapes. Secondly, the weather was sunny and joyous and kids were surprisingly nice and polite. We waved to everyone swimming, diving and marrying on the bank and fed gulls and always hungry football players with bread. At the end of the trip Max fell asleep and we went back to our hotel for a dinner.

In our hotel “Pozdnoev’s yard” there are four “chambers” (restaurants): “Coffee Chamber”, “Pie Chamber”, “Beer chamber” and “Refectory” (plus a “Wine Cellar”). We decided to start from “Coffee Chamber” (where actually you could have a full dinner) which made us happy with delicious food and interesting interior in French style of aristocratic living-rooms of Peter the Great times. However we didn’t like service there.

For an evening we had tickets to an open-air theater just near the ruins of Dovmontov Town (around Kremlin walls) – Pskov Drama Theater showed us “Pskov girl” (a famous drama play). It was a great play that impressed us so much that Max even burst into tears when a main character Olga, a girl from Pskov, is killing herself after Ivan the Terrible killed her fiancée. We got a great pleasure not only because of wonderful acting but also because of possibilities of open-air theater: real horses, round dances, true old costumes made us “living” with characters on the grass just in front of us. Full of emotions and impressions we went to our hotel beds. 

How to have fun when you are without internet at coutry-house?

Good question when you are somewhere in the middle of the forest without a lot of people around and without internet access...

1) You can color the world around with the most bright colors:

My work. Took reeeeally long time....

My sister's work.

2) Try graffiti style! (P.S. It turned out to be so hard that now I'm sure that you have to be a great master and a skillful painter to make even small pictures)

3) To hang everywhere in the house the phrase "Welcome" in 10 different languages (in the list are Italian, Turkish, Spanish, German, French, Finish and others)

4) To play ping-pong during the whole day

5) To draw nice pictures with your 5-years-old nephew just on the steps

6) To create your own rainbow

7) To play with forest dwarfs on your fireplace...

Trip to Saint Petersburg

Pictures from my trip to Saint Petersburg after my graduation

http://www.slideboom.com/presentations/791285/Saint-Petersburg