Moscow to Yekaterinburg
Russia
Our comfortable four-berth sleeping compartment was nominally second-class, though it was much the same as a ‘soft sleeper’ on a Chinese train and offered the same opportunity for a close encounter with complete strangers. On our journeys in China we have sometimes had interesting travelling companions, sometimes companions with whom no communication was possible beyond a smile but we have never encountered a problem. There were to be no problems for us on the Trans-Siberian, either. We shared our compartment to Yekaterinburg with Erling, a retired Danish police officer travelling to Vladivostok for the fun of it. He spoke excellent English and was a most genial companion.
On Russian trains much depends on the provadnitza, the woman (and they are all women) in charge of the carriage. The modern style provadnitza understands that she works in a service industry and looks after her passengers. Not all are of the modern style, but our first provadnitza could not have been more helpful; smiling cheerfully, she fetched an English menu from the dining car and then brought dinner to our compartment. When we departed she seemed more than reasonably delighted with a very modest tip and hugs were exchanged.
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| Comfortable sleeping compartment - and Erling's knees |
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| Villages of wooden houses |
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| Russia with Yekaterinburg enclosed in a red rectangle |
Yekaterinburg: Introduction
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| Yekaterinburg |
Yekaterinburg is an industrial city of just over a million people standing on the boundary between Europe and Asia. It is a fine example of the ambivalence with which Russians are coping with their past.
The Church of the Blood, Yekaterinburg
After the revolution Tsar Nicholas II and his family were imprisoned here in the house of military engineer Nikolai Ipatiev. In July 1918 they were murdered on orders from the local commander, General Sverdlov. In 1977 the Ipatiev House was destroyed amid fears that it might provide a rallying point for royalist dissidents. Its destruction was ordered by local party chief, Boris Yeltsin, who would play a major part in dismantling the Soviet Union become Russian president. Today Nicholas II has been declared a saint and ‘The Church of the Blood’, dedicated to the Romanov family, has been built on the site. |
| The Church of the Blood, Yekaterinburg |
Women are expected to dress conservatively in Russian Orthodox churches, while outside the trend is to make the most of Yekaterinburg’s brief summer by wearing as little as possible. In the entrance to the ‘Church of the Blood’ our guide Maryana, a slim dyed-blonde with very long legs and very short shorts disappeared into a stall to borrow some appropriate clothing. She returned looking like a little old lady in a long dark skirt with a black shawl draped over her head and wrapped round her shoulders.
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| Exhibition of photographs of the Romanovs Church of the Blood, Yekaterinburg |
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| The Church of the Blood and the Urals Young Communists monument, Yekaterinburg |
Yekaterinburg's Soviet Past
Stranger yet, on a nearby bridge the city proudly displays the Lenin medal it received for being a model Soviet city and.....
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| Yekaterinburg, a model Soviet city |
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| General Sverdlov Yekaterinburg was renamed Sverdlosk between 1924-1991 |
The city is twisting itself in knots as it tries to express regret for the gruesome murders while holding true to its revolutionary past. And the recent past holds its demons, too; walking to the ‘Church of the Blood’ we had passed the war memorial for the ill-fated Russian adventure in Afghanistan 1979-89. It is a striking monument, and, perhaps, a warning about our own ongoing involvement.
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| Afghan war memorial, Yekaterinburg |
The Graves of the Romanovs, near Yekaterinburg
Next day our driver Dennis (‘I’ve got two cars in case one breaks down’) took us out of town and into the forest. Seven newly built wooden churches, one for each member of the family, cluster round the mineshaft where their bodies were dumped - there is no church for their family doctor or the three servants who died with them. It was raining and water dripped from the trees. Inside the buildings smelled of new wood, whilst outside there were the dark, musky odours of wet forest. There were few people about and the churches were largely empty, though the small crowd in the one church where a service was being held emerged for a procession amid much showering of holy water. |
| Stations of the Cross Procession Romanov graves, Yekaterinburg |
It should have been impressive, but the churches seemed too cute to be taken seriously. It was difficult to shake off the belief that the design for the largest was based on a Walt Disney cartoon train.
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| Is it a church? Is it a train? Romanov burial site, Yekateriburg |
After lunch we visited the line marking the boundary between Europe and Asia. The boundary follows the watershed of the Ural Mountains, but as the mountains peter out well north of Yekaterinburg the positioning of the line in the flat local landscape is somewhat arbitrary. It seems they want to develop this site as a tourist attraction, but they have hardly started yet.
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| Sometimes I feel we are on different continents |
Memorial to Stalin's Victims, near Yekaterinburg
Close by, the construction of a new road led to the discovery of unmarked graves. The road builders had stumbled upon the last resting place of some thirty thousand victims of Stalin’s purges. Here, at least, the Russians have faced up to their past appropriately and the resulting memorial park is dignified and moving.
Close by, the construction of a new road led to the discovery of unmarked graves. The road builders had stumbled upon the last resting place of some thirty thousand victims of Stalin’s purges. Here, at least, the Russians have faced up to their past appropriately and the resulting memorial park is dignified and moving.
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| The victims of Josef Stalin |
Dealings with Real Russians, Yekaterinburg
Our hotel was an example of the new entrepreneurial Russia. One floor of what seemed to be an office block had been converted into a comfortable boutique hotel – not that anyone would know, there was no sign outside. We breakfasted in the block’s communal cafeteria - an unreconstructed soviet canteen. The buffet had no knives and only one cup when we arrived. We pointed this out to the woman in charge. Her look said ‘What do you expect me to do about it?’ We persevered with our pointing. It took some time, but eventually she scowled, shrugged her shoulders and fetched what was required. Just because a Russian is paid to perform a service, you should not expect them to do it willingly, and certainly not with a smile.But the Russians are a warm hearted people and small acts of random kindness are not uncommon. As our cutlery arrived the security man from the front door came in bearing a pot of homemade jam. We had nodded and smiled at him as he pressed his button to let us in and out and he recognised us, came over to our table and insisted we shared his jam. Damson and blueberry, it was, and very good too.
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| Lenin, Yekaterinburg Even in post Soviet times most cities still have a statue of Lenin |
Jam apart, eating in Yekaterinburg was hearty, rather than elegant. The first lunchtime we sat outside a café in the city centre, studied the menu and eventually deciphered the word ‘shashlik.’ We enjoyed a kebab in a spicy tomato sauce. That evening we found a more up-market restaurant. The sight of foreigners struggling with a menu in a language they do not speak in an alphabet they can barely read, often prompts restaurant managers to send over their youngest waitress – because she is studying English at school. Sometimes the only English they have mastered is the embarrassed giggle, but in this case a charming young lady helped us choose very reasonably priced starters of chicken and salmon salad, and a satisfying main course of beef with rice.
After our sojourn in the forest, Maryana was charged with finding ‘typical local food’. We were mildly surprised when she took us to a supermarket cafeteria, but have to acknowledge that ‘herrings in a blanket,’ is a traditional Russian favourite. Fish with beetroot and sour cream does not sound appetizing to the English ear, and the colours were a little alarming, but once you have slurped your way through a portion straight from its plastic supermarket packaging, its virtues become obvious. Comfort food is comfort food, in any language.
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| Central Yekaterinburg |
Our ‘rabbit’ turned out to be liver, served with a schooner of raspberry coulis. Liver and raspberry sounds even worse than herring and beetroot, but there was enough acidity in the coulis to make the dish surprisingly successful, though too filling for a starter. For our main course we were each served a slab of pig the size of a house brick. We wrapped one in a napkin, dropping it into Lynne’s handbag for tomorrow’s picnic, and shared the other. Even that was more than we could eat.
At 3.15 the following morning Dennis came to drive us back to Sverdlovsk station, where the 03.51 train eventually turned up at half past four. We crept into our compartment, stowed our luggage and tried to sort out our bedding in the dark, anxious not to disturb our roommates – after all we were going to have to live with them for the next 54 hours.
The Trans-Siberian Railway
Part 10:With the Mongolian Nomads
Part 11 Ulan Bator