Even by Russian standards Moscow is a whopping big place. With a population of more than 10 million people and a written history that goes back almost a thousand years the city sprawls across 879 square kilometres of the East-European plain. The land is flat and, perhaps because it offers no natural barriers to expansion, the city has grown outward rather than up. The few high-rises scattered across its skyline stand in splendid isolation among an expanse of square, functional, six- and eight-storey stone buildings. From its beginning as a hunting lodge on the Moskva River it grew into a fortified city or Kremlin, which is still the geographical and cultural heart of modern Moscow. Over the centuries the city expanded outward and, like the growth rings of a giant tree, its succession of ring roads define the various stages of its growth from the 12 th century to the present.
It took two solid hours for our bus to get from the airport to our ship at the River Terminal in Moscow. “You were lucky,” Tanya told us as we made our way aboard the Kirov. “It’s a holiday. Everyone has gone to their dachas in the country so there’s not much traffic. It’s a good time to see Moscow.”
Tanya, an energetic woman in her 60s, grew up in Moscow, lived through the Soviet era, witnessed the collapse of communism, and adapted to life in the modern Russian Federation. She will be one of our guides during our three days in Moscow. Three days! It would take at least three years to even begin to see Moscow. Faced with 2,500 historical monuments, 70 museums, 50 theatres and countless cultural and educational institutes we obviously had to make some hard choices. But, with some help from Tanya and fellow guide Victoria, we elected to spend a full day at the Kremlin ( Pique Aug. 14 issue), a morning at the Kolmenskoe royal estate, an afternoon at the State Tretyakov Gallery, an evening at a performance of Russian folk music, and a full day just poking around the city with Tanya and getting her perspective on life in Russia’s capital city.
“Moscow is the largest city in Europe” Tanya tells us as we head out one of the four-lane freeways on our way to Kolmenskoe. “The official census is 10.4 million but there are at least another five million non-registered people living here. And they don’t come for the weather,” she adds, “nine months of expectations and three months of disappointment. They come for work. Moscow is a city of job opportunities and people are leaving small towns and farms to move here. But Moscow is expensive — $6,000 a square metre for a small walk-up flat.”
We make our way through the centre of town where the streets are lined with elaborately carved stone facades of 15 th century Baroque style buildings. Farther out the architecture reflects the Classical period, the Revivalist style of Old Russia and finally the 18 th and 19th century zone of mixed industry and high-rise apartment buildings. But a surprising amount of green space remains. Buildings like Moscow University and parks dedicated to Russian heroes (Dolgoruky, Pushkin, Lenin) are surrounded by immaculate gardens and usually include fountains, statues, and benches.
“During the Soviet era,” Tanya tells us ”many of the old buildings were destroyed and replaced by government ministries and apartment buildings. This is one of the ‘Khrushchev Slums.’” The road is lined with drab five storey apartment buildings — identical brown square boxes with hardly any space between.
“Khrushchev was a clever but unsophisticated romantic,” Tanya continues. “He replaced the old houses of the rich with these.” She shrugs and shakes her head. “The flats are tiny — no privacy, and no elevators. It was part of his plan to keep the population fit. Of course the new apartment buildings have elevators and the flats are larger.”
I was curious about a huge area of sprawling shacks. “Those are garages left over from that era,” Tanya explains. “Not many people had cars then but those who did were not allowed to park at their apartments. Many of the official garage areas are so far out that people had to walk from their car to a metro station and take a tram home.”
How things have changed! The entrance to Kolomenskoe is grid locked with tourist busses and the cars of holidaying Moscovites. We queue up and follow Tanya into a different world. The four square kilometre park on the banks of the Moskva River was once a royal estate, the exclusive playground of the czars. At its centre the magnificent white spire of the Ascension Church stands 62 metres high. It was built in 1530 to commemorate the long-awaited birth of an heir to the throne and, while young Ivan IV was growing up, it served as the family’s summer church. The ill-tempered lad assumed the throne at age three, crowned himself czar of all the Russians at age 13, and went on to earn the title of Ivan the Terrible who, shortly before his death, killed his own son and heir in a fit of rage.
During our afternoon tour through the State Tretyakov Gallery we stood in front of the famous painting by Ilya Repin — a repentant Ivan the Terrible holding the body of his dying son. It’s just one of more than 100,000 works of art displayed in the gallery whose 62 rooms trace the history of Russian art from 11 th century, pre-Mongol icons to the start of the Soviet era. From its beginning in 1856 as the private collection of merchant Pavel Tretyakov the gallery has grown into a world-famous treasury of Russian Fine Arts. We could have spent days there — but in Moscow art and elegance turn up in the most unlikely places.
The best way to get around Moscow is on the metro, whose cavernous underground galleries look more like palace halls than subway stations. Built to double as air raid shelters, they are among the deepest and probably the most ornate train platforms in the world. Faced with polished marble and lit by sparkling chandeliers, each station features frescos and mosaics on a different theme of Russian history and culture. And while the art may not compare with that in the Tretyakov Gallery the gleaming marble halls lack nothing in elegance. After descending a steep, seemingly bottomless escalator and stepping off onto the shiny marble tiles of a station I overheard a woman with a broad British accent — “Look George, there’s no gum on the floor.” That says a lot about the pride that Moscovites take in their city. And the Metro is not just a showpiece. Every 40 seconds a sleek electric train rolls silently up to the platform and on an average day the system moves over nine million people to and from work.
On our way to the folk concert in Tretyakov Hall, our final evening in Moscow, we pass a monumental statue of Peter the Great. Standing atop a bronze high-rigger in the middle of the Moskva River he looks more like Christopher Columbus than a Russian czar, but the statue is certainly an eye catcher.
Farther downstream we cross a footbridge where a wedding party has gathered around a large metal tree festooned with hundreds of padlocks. Together the white-gowned bride and her groom snap another lock onto the tree and secure their everlasting love by throwing the key into the river. “It’s a very old custom here in Russia.” Tanya tells us as we walk past several street musicians on our way to the theatre.
The concert by talented young musicians on traditional instruments is a spellbinding performance of Russian music — a memorable end to our three-day glimpse of Moscow.
