Stalin exile and Kirov people

In our way to Perm, we decided to visit the small town where Stalin was exiliated until the revolution, accused of robbery and conspiring against the Tzar. It is a very small house, and he shared with one mother and her children.

 

House protected by the Soviet Union

It’s 300 rubbles per person to get in, but with our student cards, we get a reduced price. It’s really a living room and that’s it. There is also a book only in Russian that explains his time on the house and the preparation of the revolution.

 

Stalin looks defiant to the police in the picture of the capture

Before leaving the town, we bought ice cream and yogurt. We ate them in the surface of the frozen river at -10º C. It is not a bad idea to eat ice cream at that temperature: you hand remains clean because it isn’t melting.

 

Soviet ice cream

The road to arrive and leave the town is fully covered on snow, and we had to cross a frozen river. There is a floating bridge crossed by trucks and the locals. Not many polish cars over there.

 

Floating bridge

We realised our assumption: it’s better to drive on the snow than to drive in the frozen asphalt, just be very careful with the brake and the steering. Nice driving moments. But we saw we will not arrive to Perm, so we decided to change our sleeping destination, we decide to stay at Kirov. It takes more than 6 hours to arrive.

 

Road singing

When we arrived to Kirov, another small city, with many museums, we met Jana, our couch host, she came with his boyfriend, and we went not to his home, but to her friend’s home, who finally host us. They are between 20 and 25 years old, and they are so friendly to host us and spend the night with us sharing our stories. The entire group make a long walk in the town, explaining all the interesting places on it, the museum, the university (where they all study), another museum, Main Square with Lenin statue, many churches and different bars. We have spoken about movies, football, Russian cars, and Kirov story. Great night, good beers.

Kirov meeting committee

Everybody we have found until now is so great, we can’t believe it.

The Shine, Kotlas version

 

Searching for bears

Mixed road feelings to Kotlas: sometimes the road is not so bad, and sometimes the road is the frozen hell. Kotlas is the northern city we will be, and it can be noticed by the white forest. Temperature is not so cold because of the good weather, sun is shining.

 

White everywhere

At 7pm we arrive to the city of Russian Father Frost, Santa Claus or the way you want to call it. We don’t stop, it’s late and we want to arrive to the house where we have the couch, 50 km away. But we receive a call, Svetlana, our Couch Host. She was in the town, and she saw us. We stopped and we meet her and her ten years old daughter, and a friend of them, who speaks English. We decide to visit the Father Frost Theme Park.

Classy entrance

  

It’s close to the closing time, and the guys in the entrance say is too late to visit Santa. But they tell there is a guy from Spain that comes here to visit him. Waw! They come from Spain? Here? What? So they call Santa and he will wait for us. Santa is a good guy after all, he has thousands elfs working for him all the year without any holidays and work contract, but Santa appreciates the long distance travel to visit him.

We have to run on the ice just to arrive before Father Frost leaves (where?). We enter to the wood building, it’s warm, nice and with some black disco lights. Our white things on the clothes are shinning. He speaks only in Russian and thanks our visit. He is good with the protocol stuff. We’d token some pictures with him and we visited the rest of the museum/exposition of Father Frost.

 

Meeting with the Honourable Majesty Father Frost

The exposition is… so simple, or really speaking, low quality. It has an aura between sordid and decadent. But in this an isolated area, there are not so many cool things to see, so it works for the children. And we are told that is a very popular place in Russia: all the train tickets for Night Year Eve are sold out two months before, just in one day. Also Putin was here:

It’s in Russia, made by Russian people, for Russian people. So they are proud of it. The rest doesn’t matter. Just a place to be happy with the kids. And the same for the rest of things. They know the low quality of the environment (roads, houses, museums, …), but it doesn’t matters, it works.

After the Theme Park, we travelled to Kotlas, 40 minutes to do the 50 km, probably it’s bad road but is fully covered on snow. Svetlana’s home is an old house. Made by Stalin, for people. They were designed to be temporal wood houses, until the concrete buildings arrive. But they are still on use. They have to improve and repair everything in the house all the time, it’s falling apart. Not a living place, more a surviving place. Reparations are expensive, and the money is not abundant. Despite of everything, the kindness is infinite. We had a very good dinner, and sang some Russian songs. Then the day was over. Or not.

Svetlana lives with her daughter, but is not divorced; the husband sometimes sleeps in the house, sometimes in the mistress house. Normal stuff. And Svetlana didn’t tell to their husband about us, and when he realised she was not alone in the home, he was not happy. Not at all. So he went to sleep to the other house, but we feel unquiet, because he was really drunk, and he was really big. On the midnight, when we are all sleeping, the Husband knock the door: once, twice. Again. We were awake for the noise, but nobody opens. Knock again. Finally, the husband opens the door and entereed to the house. He checked if everything was OK (also known as: Svetlana is sleeping alone and the two travellers are in one separate room), smashed some furniture with his food, and left again. After we tranquilised ourselves, we slept again in our room.

Next morning, great breakfast with Svetlana and her daughter. No comments about the smashed furniture. Everything is fine. This is Russia she told. Everybody is very kind, but when men get drunk, they are angry and dangerous. Don’t mess with an angry drunk husband.

The knowledge for that night was: no more couch surf with families.

Vologda 35

After a few kilometres of Saint Petersburg the roads are getting worse. The Real Russia begins. The road ‘till Vologda is full of pot holes and the low temperatures and the ice doesn’t help.

 

Road full of dancing ice

After 9 or 10 hours we arrived to Vologda, small and nice city. This type of city looks nicer than the big ones. You can find everything in an easier way, there’s not important traffic jams.

 

Vologda

It was 22^nd of February, the day before the celebration day for Red Army, so everybody is preparing for celebrating it next day. Everybody is happy. We found Russlan home quite fast, he comes out to help us with the bags. His home is nice and warm. One living room one sofa, one TV, and the kitchen hasn’t have any separation wall, and one toilet. No more rooms. Living room, in Russian homes means LIVING room. We will sleep in the worst sofa/bed ever, but that’s OK, we are so tired because of the long way.

Russlan called his friends, we meet Sergei, who was, like all the people that we have meet, very open and friendly. Some jokes and beers and then, Sergei told us he is part of the family of the most famous Russian Cosmonaut, Uri Gagarin.

Then, a little walk on the night to visit the city. We walked on the river, because it’s frozen. When the winter comes, a new big flat road comes to the city. This river is used for the kids to play, to ski, and to make the baptism.

 

Baptism “pile”

Russlan explained us he was baptised some years ago. The process consists on wait in the long queue, because there are a lot of people who want to be baptised. They are waiting only with a swim cloth, and when the turn is arrived, they go to the water by the stairs and they submerge three times. Then all their sins are over. Where is the problem? It is done in winter at -35º C. Russlan wait for 3 hours till his turn, only with a swim cloth. After that, he was several weeks with problems in his fingers.

One other thing that may be surprising is that all are already married and already divorced. They are 27 years old, and were married at ~20s. They live fast, don’t hesitate on taking decisions, it’s the usual way.

After one short and surreal night, hearing several ring tones, we were wake up by one girl, who gets in the house, and begin to clean and prepare the breakfast. Later we were told that the girl was the wife of one of Russlan friends, and she will prepare the food for the 23^rd celebration day. It’s the way it works. She entered to the house, saw two strangers sleeping in the couch, introduce herself and begin to work. Fast and easy going!

We visited the town with Russlan as a tour guide, and we say good bye to him and his friends. They were really nice.

 

On the way to Kotlas