Novgorod

Well, the leaving of Yaroslavl and the train ride to St. Petersburg and the 5 hours after our arrival in Petersburg all occurred. But they are better left unmentioned. So, at 4:45 Thursday afternoon we left on the electrichka from St. Petersburg to Novgorod. I think we were the only people in the electrichka station who did not scream at the ticket sellers for not selling them tickets at special discounts of one kind or another. Both we and the ticket sellers seemed satisfied with the half price we received for our student IDs. The elecrichka ride was mainly notable for being very long (5 hours) and including many, many drunken Russians. And a babushka who talked to me for a long time in a muttered monologue, most of which I could not hear or understand. But the tale seemed to be fairly tragic, involving all sorts of relatives abandoning their children and being left by their husbands and preparing for careers that were useless as soon as the Soviet Union collapsed. I think every woman in Russia over the age of 30 has been left by at least one husband. Or left by the father of her unborn child without ever being married.

Novgorod is pretty, in an austere way. The churches are white and tall, and if they have domes they are pale silver and gold. The streets are wide with birch trees on the sides and very few people. It still seems to carry some of the sadness of being sacked by Muscovite princes and Swedish armies so often and then torn apart by the Germans in WWII, after its early glory days- founded by Rurik himself, the first Russian city, ruled by Alexander Nevsky, the northern capital of Kievan Rus’, then the proud, independent republic ruled by that governing body whose name I’ve forgotten but whose bell was so important.

This morning Abby and I had a delicious breakfast from our lavishly appointed larder, transported here from Yaroslavl- bread and spreadable cheese, to be precise. Then we went to the Kremlin, which is called Detinyets, as we all know from the audio files included with that king among textbooks, Russian Now! For Students and Instructors. Actually anyone having listened to the appropriate Russian Now! audio files will already feel familiar enough with Novgorod not to need to be reading this blog post right now. We have seen, I am almost certain, the very lake on which Kostya and Vova said hello to Lara and on which they went ice skating with so little success, the very museum that Nadezhda Alexandrovna pointed out to the clueless tourist on her tour, the very bench on which that one old guy read in the paper about that one babushka advertising to change apartments, the very school in which Svetya asked Kostya if he loved Group Avia and in which Vova was scolded for drawing noses in class instead of listening to a lecture about Gogol, etc. It’s pretty exciting.

So, yeah, Detinyets. We saw Sofiski Sobor (Church of the Holy Wisdom), of which my main impression was that it was very dark inside. But it was mentioned in Russian Now! so I was happy. It was fairly impressive, actually, and there was a stern gold-robed batushka striding about looking like a priest in the service of an ancient sun cult of some kind. Then we went to the Detinyets’ museum, which had the most militant guard babushkas ever. Downstairs, in the history section, I learned that medieval Novgorodian soldiers had really funny pointed helmets, that I would have had as much trouble opening ancient Novgorodian locks as I do with modern Russian ones, and that standing too close to the glass in an attempt to read the informational plaques behind it will get you yelled at by the guard babushkas. Upstairs were the icons. I felt bad for spending so long looking at the icons, of which I’m sure Abby tired after about 3, but later she told me that she had entertained herself by trying to find places to stand where the guard babushkas couldn’t see both of us at once. I agree that this would be a very fun activity. These babushkas were very, very concerned if one of us was out of sight, and would constantly shift positions as to gain the optimal vantage point. The icons were stern and simple, as unlike as possible from the Yaroslavl ones I thought. Even in the ‘descent into Hades’ icons, in which people generally look pretty cheerful to be being pulled out of Hell by Christ surfing down on it broken gates, shattered locks and keys raining down before him, everyone looked like they had a stomachache. There was also the most angry-looking Old Testament Trinity ever. The angels were distantly unpleased with whatever Abraham had just placed before them. The icons weren’t really all angry, though, of course, and the severity of style is often very pleasing.

When we left a blizzard of sorts had begun. We walked out past the 1000th Birthday of Russian memorial, out the Detinyets gates, and over the long bridge over the icy Volkov River. It was very, very cold and snowy, with wind whipping all around. It made for a very dramatic approach to the old church a few blocks away on the other side of the river, where the only surviving frescoes by Theophanes the Greek cover the walls. This was really the best part of the day, by far. The entrance to the church involved opening many huge, wooden doors with big iron rings. And then the old woman at the ticket desk was very friendly, and didn’t act like it was annoying that they had to go turn on the lights in the sanctuary for us. And then we were the only people in the huge, cavernous sanctuary, with the alter and everything removed, just the ancient, faded, partially destroyed frescoes covering the walls and the numerous arches and domes. It was so awesome. I especially liked the little, enigmatic six-winged cherubim at the top of the arch over every window. Every one was different.

The rest of the afternoon we walked around looking for a cafe that served both tea and cheap food (ended up eating bread and cheese (I know, the variety of our diet is amazing, but we try to vary it with Snickers bars) as the only customers other than a wedding party), going to the train station to see about getting home tomorrow, buying some apples and a huge bag of crackers for dinner tonight and breakfast tomorrow. We needed something to put our condensed milk on. My attempts last night to eat canned corn with condensed milk were not that successful, especially as we don’t have spoons.

Dec. 29
Arrived back in St. Petersburg. The big news is that our hostel (“Crazy Duck”) has free cheese. Cheese other than the soft spreadable kind is beyond our budget, so this is exciting. There is also free yoghurt. This means that, taking into account the condensed milk and spreadable cheese on which we lived in Novgorod, we live entirely on dairy products and crackers. At least there’s a chainik here; we were in a state of constant discomfort in Novgorod due to absence of tea. Our Russian-trained tea radars were in overdrive. About to go walk about on Nevski Prospect. Oorah.