The previous installment of Husam’s travelogue can be found here.

In the early morning, I took a walk across St. Petersburg that would take me all day, crossing the waters, landing on islands, and visiting both well-known and lesser-know tourist sites, not to mention discovering hidden surprises that the city still had up its sleeve.

I started on Nevsky Prospect and went up over two bridges, each adorned with a different sculptural theme. I saw a lovely church built in a style very similar to that of St Basil’s Cathedral in Moscow! Hmmm… Wasn’t the original architect killed? – I wondered

I then quickly realized that St. Petersburg didn’t even exist when he was alive. Whatever his destiny was, he and his vibrant style were revived when the St. Petersburg church was built in the late nineteenth century.

This Church On Spilled Blood, as it is called, was built on the spot where on the first of March 1881, Czar Alexander II was assassinated. His successor commissioned a magnificent church to commemorate his father in the Russian revivalist style.

A park nearby lead me to the Arts Square, where the Russian Museum is located and another weird story of murder was played out in the beginning of the 1800’s. The Mikhaylovskiy Castle was built on orders of Paul I, who was obsessed with the possibility of assassination. The castle was surrounded by moats and draw bridges and supplied with secret underground passages to help in rescue. Alas, all those precautions were futile in the face of destiny, and he was murdered only 40 days after moving into his fortified haven!

At the moat I saw many young Russians throwing coins at small statue under one of the bridges nearby, driven by the belief that their wishes could be granted if their coin balanced itself on the statue without falling into the river Moyka, a tradition that has endured since since long ago. I didn’t try my luck; after all, what more can I wish for? Read More »

The previous parts of Husam’s travelogue are as follows: part I, II, and III. Enjoy.

The sun graced Moscow with its presence on my fourth day in town, and so I therefore decided to stay outdoors and visit the open-air memorial known as Park Pobedy (“pobeda” means “victory” in Russian).

This place commemorates what the Russians refer to as the Great Fatherland War, or what we call the Second World War.

The vast open passage to the memorial park is absolutely breathtaking:

There are rows and rows of water fountains gushing dramatically upward and a giant obelisque piercing the air, topped with sculptures of angels of peace.

There is the sense of beauty here, and violence; violence that remains in Russian memory.

Inside the park are various exhibitions showcasing tanks, fighter airplanes and jets, battleships, cannons and all types of heavy and light weaponry of the war. The exhibits are scattered beside ponds and forest groves. Here, fountains bristle with golden sunrays and falling leaves. Attached to all this are places of worship representing all three Abrahamic religions as a way to pay respect to the millions of different soldiers, those who joined hands during the defense of their shared Homeland.

Following this dramatic excursion, I went to the Kievsky Train Station and proceeded towards the house of Leo Tolstoy, a place not to be missed by literary buffs arriving in Moscow. I then crossed the river on a magnificent glass bridge and walked towards the famous Gorky Park (listen for a mention of it in the Scorpions’ “Wind of Change”).

Close by, there is another peculiar park, this one dedicated to fallen monuments. Some call it the “statue cemetery” as it also now home to many sculptures that were neglected or removed from their podiums after the fall of communism. This is a haunting (if not haunted) place.

There I was able to get a very close look at the modern statue of Peter the Great commemorating one of his many feats (this one, I believe, is dedicated to his establishment of the Russian navy). Walking along the river, I reached a pedestrian-only area that leads to the prestigious Zamoskvoreche neighborhood and the famous Triyatkov Gallery. To reach the gallery I had to cross the river again over a small bridge, this one planted with metal trees bearing fruits that looked, to my eyes, like locks. I was initially bewildered by this. Read More »

Read part one of Husam’s travelogue here.

The second day in Russia started out gloomy too, yet it was significantly brightened up by my friend Dzera, who works in the fashion industry. Together we scouted Tverskaya, another fashionable location in downtown Moscow, walking past famous locations such as Café Pushkin and past neighborhoods with beautiful Arte Moderne houses. There we saw the Gorky House Museum that was built about a hundred years ago.

We also saw the world famous Bolshoi Theater (still closed for restoration then) and the Moscow conservatory. We did some shopping for chocolates in the elegant Yeliseev food hall. After this lengthy walk we opted to visit one of the most important artistic landmarks in Moscow: the Pushkin Fine Arts Museum.

I was overwhelmed with the variety of exhibits spanning thousands of years of human civilization in art, sculpture, and painting. The Greeks, Romans, even ancient Egyptians and Mesopotamians were represented. Large life-size reproductions of famous classical sculpture or temples were done faithfully. Slowly, from room to room, I was taken through different epochs and generations of painters and paintings: Dutch, Italian, Russian and more. Seeking rest from all the exuberance, we walked out of the museum to find a café near the river, but as soon as we were out I was distracted by the huge cathedral nearby and couldn’t resist dragging my tired body towards it.

This was the visit’s recurring theme: Whenever I decided to have a rest I found something else to feast my eyes on and struggled to reach it, like travelers in the desert struggling to reach that mirage of water. Yet in my case, there were no mirages, just more and more hidden treasures. Read More »