Russia: Day Four - Plyos / Privolzhsk

Breakfast - today two hard-boiled eggs and oatmeal - is again in the Common Room, which has the TV on.  And it’s tuned to an English-speaking news channel - possibly the BBC - for some inexplicable reason.  (Remember, this is just a year and a bit after Russia’s re-annexation of Crimea.)
       For some reason Olga, sitting across the table from me, says “America has landed in Europe.”, that it’s put tanks in Poland and the Baltic States.  I explain as diplomatically as I can that if that’s so, it may be in reaction to Crimea.  She is displeased and leaves.  Ghislaine, who - although French - knows Russia well, warns me, “You won’t find a Russian who doesn’t defend Russia.”  All this because talks on Crimea start in Paris today.  I hope there’s not a storm on the horizon among us.
       This reminds me of what Nikolaï said yesterday about taboo topics for conversation in Russia:  politics and religion, to which I had replied that it’s the same in the States.  But this is an argument I didn’t start.

After a day of staying put, today is a day full of destinations.
       First off is Krasna Privolzhsk, to a silverware and jewelry outlet for the city's factory.  The minute we step in the door I see an amazing peacock made of gilded silver with blue and green stones.  What a lot of work went into making that!  I settle for something more transportable:  silver jewelry for my family for Christmas, even though it’s still only June.
       Then it’s back in the bus and off to the Privolzhska Cultural Center.  Outside are a group to greet us, girls in long braids, men and women in traditional dress, an accordion and a tambourine... quite the welcome.  I wonder how long they’ve been waiting.  We’re offered a fancy brioche-type bread that you dip in a little dish of salt, the traditional way to greet guests in rural Russia.  And then the directress, Elena, invites us in.
       We’re treated to rooms full of drawings by children - again of World War II for the anniversary - and a display of old Soviet posters.  Then we’re taken into a room with a forest scene painted on the end wall and a wax figure of a Soviet soldier seated in front of it.  Elena explains about the war years at considerable length and suddenly the wax figure jumps up and starts to talk, telling the story of a soldier’s life - in Russian, of course.  He had sat for so long without moving or blinking that some of us nearly jump out of our skin!
       We go into another room furnished like a typical peasant interior.  We disguise ourselves in traditional Russian clothes and Elena chooses Olga to play the mistress of the house and Jacques to be her husband.  A handsome couple.  Olga washes the dishes while Jacques irons, both the old-fashioned way.  Then the musical instruments come out and I grab some wooden spoons and show my skill at musical spoons.  (David Rosen would be so proud.)
     After that, it’s outside - still in traditional dress.  There’s dancing and singing.  And a pillow game that’s a bit like Duck Duck Goose where you sit in a circle and someone with a pillow puts it behind you and you have to kiss them.  Of course Paul decides to slip me the pillow, “one American to another”.  Vladimir and Jacques are challenged to show their masculinity by hammering a nail into a log; Real Men can evidently do it in one hit.  Then the Russians form an honor guard for us to walk under and it’s back inside, where we take off the disguises.
       As a final activity, we are taken to the  arts-and-crafts room where we’re all given a square of fabric, some cotton stuffing and a few pieces of yarn and shown how to tie it all up into a little Russian dolly.  (Mine isn’t a hearty success and comes undone gradually in my suitcase.)
       As we leave, each and every one of us is given a goodie bag:  a T-shirt, a notepad, a pen and a magnet.  That’s a big investment for such a modest place and we’re all sincerely touched.

It’s off to the thermal baths under a bright blue sky and billowing clouds.  Can you call them thermal baths if the water is ice cold?  No wimpy hot springs here, just pure water from the depths of the Earth.  The icy depths.  It all comes out of a holy fountain, and is then piped to two Lincoln Log bath-houses - one for men and one for women.  Some of us decide to try it, skinny-dipping into the cold water.  I decide to walk around and watch the children - all boys - swimming in the lily-padded stream it all probably flows into.

Duly braced by the plunge or warmed by the sun, we’re off again to lunch at St. Nikolski convent in Privolzhsk.  It’s going to be a late lunch, given all we’ve done so far, but they’ve dutifully waited for us, as everyone seems to do all day every day, each place wanting to show us everything they can, making us gradually later and later.
       We’re treated to a hearty lunch - actually the best meal we have anywhere - as the girls’ choir serenades us in their little crocheted caps.  (One of them turns pale and looks as if she’s about to faint, but is told to soldier through.) Reverend Mother Anatolia, the abbess, has sad pale-blue eyes and wears a head-to-toe habit not so very different from a chador, but the yards of black cloth can’t hide the fact that she perhaps enjoys these earthly culinary delights a bit too much, unlike the thin choir girls, some of whom we catch licking the jelly dishes later as we pass the kitchen.

       After lunch we’re shown around the classrooms and meet some of the teachers, including the English teacher.  (Have I been ratted out?  Is my cover blown?)  The alphabet poster is the replica - in Cyrillic - of the ones of my childhood in America, or of my children’s in France.  In the arts room, there’s an “aquarium” with colorful origami fish and frogs.  And suddenly I see a portrait which is recognizably the last Tsar of All the Russias, Nikolaï II.  I know this is the Convent of St. Nikolski but I was assuming that was a saint and not a late tsar.  Perhaps the name does double duty.
       Once again my thoughts go back to Father Igor’s simple country church and its many icons that outlived the Communist years unscathed.... and the Communist regime itself.   Here at St. NikolskI Convent, there is religion and the tsar, somewhat as if those middle years never happened.  But this convent is very unlike Father Igor’s heart-felt little church, which I prefer by far.
       As our bus drives off, I wonder what these pale, thin girls will become.  We see them now outdoors, not in their strict white choir uniform but in colorful street clothes.  Who are they?  Are they orphans?  Are they here just for an education?  Are they being trained to become nuns?  I wish them well, especially the very pale one in her mismatched top and kilt, whom my heart has adopted.


Enough of the visits.  Back to Plyos.  A musical show awaits us on a terrace overlooking the Volga.  A very blonde vocalist in a bright red embroidered traditional dress sings Russian ballads, accompanied by two men on different zither-y instruments.  Her voice is almost operatic.  The trio came all the way from Ivanovo, an hour away, just for us.

       Dinner is served on the terrace after the performance.  It’s very frugal, which is just what we need after the late banquet at the convent.  The only down-side is the mosquitoes, and there are plenty, yet another similarity with northern Michigan.
       Then it’s off to bed at our comfortable motel, which is starting to feel like home by this third and final night.
       Once again, so much for the brain to sift through as we sleep.

Russia: Day Three, Part Two

After lunch we climb back up the hill, all the better to help digest those potatoes, and make ourselves a bit more presentable.  Because we’re going to tea at the home of a real prince.
  A friend of the Prince comes to guide our bus.  His name is Nikolaï and he’s a photographer who once lived and worked in Morocco.  Extremely friendly and proficient in French, he will travel with us tomorrow as well.
  Prince Andreï Borissovitch Fitse-Lanskoï, whom we shall now just call Andreï, also speaks French because he lived in France.  As a matter of fact, I believe he was born there. He’s too young to have been born in Russia pre-1917; his family surely fled the new-born Soviet régime.  And France was good to him; he worked in the upper echelons of the French civil service system.
  Andreï introduces us to his second wife, a Russian woman he met when he decided not so long ago to move back.  She shows us around the house, which was built 185 years ago.  That may be old compared to my house in Ann Arbor, built in 1950, but my artist’s studio in Paris was built in 1870 so I’m used to old homes.  The Lanskoï home is all wood and lovingly decorated.



  Madame has set out a lovely spread for us in the garden.  There’s champagne, but also strong tea in a silver samovar.  And plenty of canapes and cakes to eat.  Our Michel opens the champagne and pours while Aude slices and serves the cake. Conversations fuse in all directions and in many languages.  I find myself speaking with Nikolaï mostly, us both being interested in photography. These people are warm and welcoming, and we all feel at home, royal title or not.
  Then a Russian Orthodox priest appears and Vladimir teases me that they’ve called him to come re-baptize me.  Actually Father Igor has come to meet us all and join in the fun and the goodies.  He offers to take us all to see his church, built in 1672, and the French contingent jumps at the chance; the Russians stay behind with Madame.

After a short ride past fields and houses, we enter a tiny, visibly poor village.  At its edge stands a church in sore need of work, which is what it’s now getting.  The restoration has revealed even older vestiges underneath, foundations with vaulted arches.  Inside, the brick walls are still whitewashed, but the ceiling exposes worn red brick and thick white mortar holding it all together, with some help from The Good Lord.
       Father Igor is very proud of his church, and rightfully so.  What amazes me is all the icons.  So many of them for such a small country church!  And we can get right up and personal with them, even touch them if we want, which isn’t the case elsewhere we’ve been or will go.  Quite a few of the icons - and there are many of them - are in solid silver frames elaborately and intricately decorated.  Handiworks of incredible mastery.  I wonder who made them.  Someone local or were they a gift from well beyond this little village?  During the Communist period, the church was closed but the icons were left inside.  Everyone knew they were there, and poor as they were, no one stole them.  Or damaged them out of atheistic scorn.  “The countryside still believed and protected,” Father Igor explains when I ask how that was possible.  It also explains the sudden explosion of religiosity after perestroïka.  Vladimir adds a quote from Pushkin: “Without the church, there would be no Russia”.

        The building may be in need of care, but the cemetery that wraps around three sides of the church is carefully tended, with flowers and flowering shrubs abundant.  There are many graves but no one remembers who is buried where, except for those graves with headstones.
       This is the closest I feel I get to understanding Russia during the entire trip.

Mandylion Church, 17th c

Tonight we’re invited to dinner at Anna’s.  She’s the person housing the others in our party.  It’s a small home, much too small for the eight people sleeping there.  And with only one bathroom.  But Anna has roofed in her terrace and made it into a large gazebo where tables have been set up and food laid out. Soup for a starter and then some of those smoked fish we saw being sold by the river this morning.  One fish for each, but most share one between two of us.  Vlad, who always walks around with a plastic bag, stuffs one whole fish in it and takes it up to his room.  Perhaps he wakes up hungry in the night; he has a healthy appetite and there’s a lot of him to keep fed.
  Ursula and I are feeling a bit tired and in need of some quiet time, so we get directions to walk back to the motel, down old roads bordered by towering trees.  As it’s late June, the sun is just now setting and the birds are making that chuckling kind of song they make when settling down for the night.  But our guardian angel Nikolaï won’t hear of it, whips out his keys and drives us back, ever the gentleman.
       Another full day, complete with a Russian prince.  Literally a royal welcome.

Russia: Day Three, Part One

View of Plyos and the Volga from Cathedral Hill

Our rooms at the Motel are very nice and each of us has his or her own.  There’s plenty of hot water in the bathroom for showers, and the soap is lily-of-the-valley scented, which is always a plus to me. There’s also a fan to turn on in the heat of the day (it is June, after all) and - oh miracle! - screens on the windows to keep out the fierce hordes of blood-hungry Cossack mosquitoes.  The television gets six channels, all in Russian...  which offers me the strange experience of watching Sponge Bob in Russian. And there are thick curtains on the windows, because at this time of year, sunrise is around 4 a.m.!
  Our breakfast menu serves up spam (a nod to Monty Python) and crêpes, which are delicious (the crêpes, that is).   Then our two groups - Motelers and Annamites (those staying at Anna's) - meet up by a church being repaired (one of many across the countryside) and it’s off to discover Plyos.

As we’re staying put today, a bit of information on our base camp town should be wedged in here.
  Plyos is called the Pearl of the Volga, and I’d have a hard time arguing with that.  It’s of manageable size for visitors - population 3,200 - quiet enough for those seeking a restful break, and in one of the most striking settings possible, with the Volga, Russia’s longest river, flowing by.  Back in the 12th century, the city was ransacked by both the Mongols and the Tatars but was rebuilt each time.  Now, as is the case in areas of Paris, any new construction must respect the historical character of the town. This has protected its rural aspect... and probably is why it’s a destination for many of Russia’s rich-and-rising in search of country homes.
  Local folklore has it that Plyos merchants bribed the authorities so they wouldn’t run the railroad through their town, fearing the commercial competition would bankrupt them.  And so when the railroad opened between the nearby regional cities in 1871, it didn’t pass through Plyos.  That reminds me of the bourgeois French city of Auxerre that similarly refused right of passage to the French railroad, deeming it too demeaning.
  In the late 19th century, Plyos became an artist’s retreat, and is still viewed as “Russia’s Switzerland” because of the beauty of the countryside.  Isaak Levitan, Russia’s most celebrated landscape artist, found inspiration here in the summers of 1888 to 1890.  Playwright Anton Chekhov commented that Plyos “put a smile in Levitan’s paintings”.  But Chekhov also angered the married artist by depicting Levitan’s love life in Plyos with his mistress in his short story “The Grasshopper”.

Church of the Resurrection

On the way down the hill into town I buy some beaded jewelry from an elderly lady selling her handicrafts in the park that Ursula and I discovered - before any others - last night.   We pass many art students painting the landscape below.  And then in the final curve, a magnificent golden-domed church appears, silhouetted against the trees.  We’re told that, although not a rich town, Plyos is beloved of ex-President Medvedev and he has seen to the restoration of this particular church, which now deserves its name: the Church of the Resurrection.
  We’re headed down the street along the river to the Levitan Museum, past shops and cafés and stands, one of which sells freshly smoked fish of all sorts and sizes.  We also pass a funeral, which is quite different from funerals I’ve known in France or the States.  The coffin is in the street, still open, and the dearly departed wrapped in a white sheet.  There’s none of the asepticizing I’m used to; it’s much closer to nature.
  The museum is in the home Isaak Levitan rented during his painting forays here.  We are shown around the downstairs rooms, where his paintings are hung on all the walls.  And we get an explanation in Russian and in French.  Very thorough.  I preferred seeing the artist’s furnished rooms upstairs, complete down to hair brushes and towels.  As if Levitan had just stepped out to paint by the Volga.

Afterwards we walk through the backstreets - each house with its garden - to a restaurant with what appears to me to be a Tyrolean air about it.  And it is indeed a biergarten.  We sit for a while on the terrace over a beer, juice or apéritif, then go upstairs to eat.  The stair railing is decorated with fish just like the smoked ones we saw earlier at the woman’s stand, but these are made out of wrought iron.  As are the coat hangers.
  And then we turn the corner into the dining room to discover... a tree growing out of the floor and right up to the rafters, which are themselves huge!  The bar has been built around it and decorations added to the tree trunk and main branches to make it seem as if it has leaves.  Quite amazing.