Blog.Atmospheres.be

We slept in the Godzillas Hostel for a fair price according to several people. We payed the amount of 20 Euro for a night of sleep. Not that I needed a hotel, holiday for me is adventure and a sleeping place is good when I’m protected from rain and annoying people. We arrived at Godzilla only around 9:30 PM after a long train and metro transit through Moscow. The problem are not the distances but the Cyrillic characters that drive you nuts. Luckily we had Wieland and Sara and their better than good notions of the Russian language. The metro looks fabulous with all their reminiscences to the ancient Communist Stalinist epoch. But so does the city. It is an enormous clash between the history of communism and the raising capitalism. Buildings are rising everywhere, people are in a hurry, the streets are large compared to European norms, publicity is all over the place. But it’s really nice to walk around in a city of this proportion with this enormous contradiction between now and before.

In the morning of the second day we woke up around 9. We all said we would wake early to see a maximum of Moscow but our lazy asses won the dispute. I didn’t even set my alarm,Wieland set his one at 7:30 if I remember well, but he disarmed it 10 minutes before it started to ring. A good choice. This long sleeping would become a tradition in the rest of the journey but more details later.

First stop this morning, Chokkolatta, a kind of bar, restaurant that was opened early in the morning. With a bunch of nice breakfasts, although I couldn’t read the Russian. Had a nice “English” breakfast, the only English about it was the porridge but it was nice and above all heavy in all terms. It filled my stomach with a nice load of gravity. Allthough it wasn’t that much…(1)

We decided to walk towards the center of the city again (after our late night excursion on the red square yesterday evening).

You can see our itinerary for this day here. The numbers on the map match the numbers near some pictures.

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On the road to Lubyanka square we met this Tajik woman with her baby begging for money. After I gave her some money a smile appeared on her face and the baby’s face. (2)

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The FSB (Federal Security Service) (Russian: ФСБ, Федера́льная слу́жба безопа́сности; Federalnaya Sluzhba Bezopasnosti) is a domestic state security agency of the Russian Federation and the main successor of the Soviet Cheka, NKVD, and KGB. Its headquarters are in Lubyanka Square.(3)

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A little disorientation after seeing the former KGB building.

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The Holy Trinity Church in Nikitniky.(4)

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I guess a new member of the Stones…I wonder what this wet spot in front of the publicity means…(5)

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St-Basils cathedral again but with some more light.(6)

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From the Moskvoretski bridge we had a spectacular view on the Moskva, the Kremlin and the Red Square. Every direction had something to offer.

Kremlin (Russian: Кремль, IPA: [krʲɛmlʲ]) is the Russian word for “fortress”, “citadel”, or “castle” and refers to any major fortified central complex found in historical Russian cities. This word is often used to refer to the best known one, the Moscow Kremlin, or the government that is based there. Outside Russia, the name “Kremlin” is sometimes mistakenly thought of as being Saint Basil’s Cathedral because of its distinctive shape, although this is not a part of the Moscow Kremlin.

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Click on the image underneath for a bigger image…

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Something wet again…

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The Lenin Mausoleum. We weren’t able to visit, due to closed doors.

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Two old friends looking for their time…

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Red Gates Administrative Building (8)

Designed by Alexey Dushkin of the Moscow Metro fame, this mixed-use block of 11-storey buildings is crowned with a slim tower (total height 133 meters, 24 levels).

In this case, cryotechnology was indeed used for the escalator tunnels connecting the building with the Krasniye Vorota subway station. The building’s frame was erected deliberately tilted to one side; when the frozen soil thawed, it settled down – although not enough for a perfect horizontal level. Then the builders warmed the soil by pumping hot water; this worked too well, the structure slightly over-reacted, tilting to the opposite side (well within tolerance).

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Moscow State University, Vorobyovy Gory

Boris Iofan made a mistake placing his draft skyscraper right on the edge of Vorobyovy Gory. The site was a potential landslide hazard. He made a worse mistake by insisting on his decision and was promptly replaced by Lev Rudnev, a 53-year-old rising star of Stalin’s establishment. Rudnev had already built high-profile edifices like the 1932-1937 Frunze Military Academy and the 1947 Marshals’ Apartments (Sadovaya-Kudrinskaya, 28), which earned the highest credits of the Party.

Lev Rudnev set the building 800 meters away from the cliff. The opening ceremony was followed by less glorious events – building camps for Gulag laborers, mostly German prisoners of war. A so-called Site-560 (Строительство-560), run by Gulag, supervised the workforce that reached 14,290. When the structure was completed, some inmates were relocated and sealed-off inside the 24th and 25th levels. A story, anecdotal or true, exists about inmates who tried to escape the tower on self-made plywood gliders. Another anecdotal story asserts that the MGU foundation requires permanent freezing (otherwise it will slide into the river) and the basement is occupied by huge cryo freezer. Actually, foundation is stable, and a ‘freezer’ is an ordinary centralised air conditioner.

The main tower, which consumed over 40,000 metric tons of steel, was inaugurated September 1, 1953.

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In the neighbourhood of the Kremlin…

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The Cathedral of Christ the Saviour (Russian: Хра́м Христа́ Спаси́теля) is the tallest Eastern Orthodox Church in the world. It is situated in Moscow, on the bank of the Moskva River, a few blocks west of the Kremlin.

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This seems like a one way ticket to heaven. Don’t ask me why this pedestrian crossing ends somewhere in the middle of 10 cars. We survived…

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Kotelnicheskaya Embankment Building is one of seven Stalinist skyscrapers laid down in September, 1947 and completed in 1952, designed by Dmitry Chechylin (then Chief Architect of Moscow) and Andrei Rostkovsky. Main tower has 32 levels (including mechanical floors) and is 176 meters tall.

The building also incorporates a 9-story apartment block facing Moskva River, designed by the same architects in 1938 and completed in 1940. Originally build in stern early Stalinist style, with wet stucco wall finishes, it was re-finished in terra-cotta panels in line with the main tower and acquired ornate pseudo-Gothic crowns over its 12-story raised corners and center tower. By the end of World War II, the side wing was converted to multi-family kommunalka housing, in a contrast to the planned elite status of the main tower.

Main tower, of conventional steel frame structural type, has a hexagonal cross-section with three side wings (18-story, including two mechanical floors). While it is not exceptionally tall or massive, the “upward surge” of five stepped-up layers, from a flat 9-story side wing to the spire, produce a visual image of a far superior structure. The structure hides behind itself a so-called “Shvivaya Gorka”, a hill with historical architecture and a maze of steeply inclined streets. Chechulin was initially criticized for complete disregard of this area, but his bureaucratic influence brushed off any criticisms. (10)

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Getting ready for lift off to Inta. (12)

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You can see our itinerary for this day here. The numbers on the map match the numbers near some pictures.

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