Dec. 13 – Moscow

Today, I went west of the Moskva with no map. I had a place to stay, and plenty of time, so I could afford to get lost. I’m a connoisseur of intentional blundering rambles – it’s a way to guarantee you go off the beaten path. And besides, my objectives were hard to miss on the skyline.

I stepped off the Metro at Vorobevy Gory (Sparrow Hills). A wooded area on a steep embankment along the river, with its own ski jumping hills, the park’s sudden stillness excited me. Since leaving Vancouver, I had spent no time in a forest. The snow-covered paths were slippery, and I cautiously made my way up the slope to level ground and broad boulevards.

Above the trees, I could see the summit of my first destination; Moscow State University. Despite visual contact, it wasn’t close and I had to backtrack after entering a low-rise apartment complex cul-de-sac. MSU’s style is called “Stalinist Gothic”, and you don’t need a degree in architecture to imagine the grandiose brutality of such a structure. For nearly forty years, the University was once Europe’s tallest building. Its massive concrete wings reaching out, I could not get the whole edifice in one camera shot. I approached the front entrance, which had curiously few people around. Hoping to get a sense of campus life inside, I was turned away by two security guards who were only too pleased to wave me off with a “Turist? Nyet, nyet!” Walking off, I calculated it would take me about 15 minutes to stroll around MSU’s perimeter.

To the north were my next landmarks; a tall black obelisk alongside a spike-topped dome. More wandering in the generally correct direction. Through quiet apartment complexes where mothers pushed prams, across broad, busy avenues, and finally a secluded industrial area deserted enough to stop for a discreet pee. As I approached a railway yard, a pack of four stray dogs looked in my direction and started barking. I would not be able to outrun them, and kept going. I had recently heard that the best countermeasure to aggressive dogs is to, literally, bark like mad. Supposedly, this signals to the animal that you are dangerously unstable and should not be approached. But it turned out the dogs were greeting a canine friend behind me, and ran off to lick and sniff. And so we shall never know what would have happened had I let loose with a spittle-flecked doggie equivalent of “back off, bitches.”

Built on the hill where Napoleon waited in vain for Moscow’s surrender, the Great Patriotic War Museum pays homage to the U.S.S.R’s victory over Germany, which cost the lives of 27 million people of the Soviet Union. As befits the sacrifice, the place has an austere elegance. Polished marble and granite everywhere, making steps echo. Red and gold banners and carpets. The moving Hall of Remembrance, millions of bronze pendants hanging from the ceiling, representing tears. Dioramas, paintings and statues of soldiers in heroic, hawk-eyed poses. An endless array of artifacts; steel, wood, cloth, and paper relics of the war preserved behind glass. And as I walked at that measured, museum pace, I saw there were few visitors on a Tuesday afternoon. The exhibit attendants, older women mostly, loitered without much to do. I wondered what they thought about, sitting there for hours among vivid reminders of a shattered history.

It had started to snow as I exited the museum, heading past the eternal flame and the obelisk, onto the broad and long Park Pobedy (Victory Park). In keeping with the day’s martial theme, I had wanted to see the nearby panorama of the Battle of Borodino. But closed off with tarps and plywood, it was undergoing repairs in advance of next year’s bicentennial of the bloody 1812 battle that stalled the Grande Armee at Moscow’s gates. It was gloomy and the snowfall wasn’t pretty – soggy white precipitation that large, colorfully lit Christmas trees could not cheer up. I took the Metro home.