Skolkovo

A day out to Skolkovo Innovation Centre - Moscow's answer to Silicon Valley. Really only the landmark building exists so far (by David Adjaye Architects), the Moscow School of Management, which is a weird cross between an airport and a conference centre. We were shown a surreal promo video, which not only offered some of Russia's 'crooks and thieves'* as examples for MBA students to follow, but also had interviews with past students on field trips saying such things as 'the chinese have slitty eyes'.



*What Alexander Navalny has famously called Putin's United Russia party

magic lorry?

I don't understand why there is a higher proportion of random and slightly weird things in Moscow, but there are. Even the trucks behave in mysterious ways. 

building, building everywhere

As I have mentioned before, there is currently so much building and renovation going on around this area, that the ongoing health-and-safety(not) theme is just too easy to illustrate, frighteningly so. I read an article recently about Tajiks, who make up a large percentage of the mainly immigrant building labourers. Tajikistan’s migration service reported that during the first eight months of 2011, the bodies of 603 Tajik gastarbeiters had been repatriated from Russia. Of these, reports James Brooke, 67 were attributed to “attacks by nationalist groups” - which is bad enough in itself - but which also means over 500 deaths on building sites in less than a year.


And today is Unity Day, a day off and a yearly excuse for Russia's nationalist extremists to march, reminding these Tajiks that their position in Moscow continues to be fragile in every way.

more balancing acts

This may appear as a simple case of standing on a chair (on scaffolding). But actually, the chair is also balanced on a low coffee table....

hanging about

I have already noted my street cleaning tools obsession. Now realise I have another one - the very common tendency to see people working on roofs/hanging from buildings/doing building work in extreme dangerous places and ways. In the winter this mainly involves scary ways of clearing snow, in the summer months it seems to cover window cleaning, gutter replacement and - for some strange reason - knocking holes out half way up 12 storey facades.

So, let me introduce you to our window-cleaner. 

(il)legal?

This post was going to be about the new Mayor's (rumoured) campaign to stop illegal street advertising in the city. But first I have to mention that - after a false spring - it has rained and snowed almost all weekend. The English language may have many different words for snow, sleet, hail etc; but this was mainly like what I can only call 'fast snow', a kind of thick, white, cold rain. Today we have grey skies and a more desultory snowfall, but it is still horrible. Thank you for listening.

As to outdoor advertising signs, I merely pass on a story doing the rounds - that people are just pretending to do up their apartment blocks, so they can get the money from the banners on scaffolding that result. And I say 'rumoured', because since Sergei Sobyanin hit town he seems to be aiming at putting a lot of space between his intentions and those of the previous incumbent Yury Luzhkov; also saying he is going to do something about the (impossible) traffic, stop knocking down old buildings and control new development better. We wait to see the outcomes.

so excited!

I can't believe this is actually true; pictured is the roof of our new building and I hear that there may be a plan to turn it into a skating rink this winter! Those of you who were around last year will know I spent a lot of time waxing lyrical about ice-skating in Moscow. And now I am going to get my own personal (well almost personal) skating rink...how good is that?

Will just need to not skate off the roof - only six storeys up....

upstairs

This is my new living room. I think I may be seeing a lot of my landlady, she keeps inviting me to eat in their flat upstairs, or dropping by with something. This evening had a very relaxed but long-winded filling in of the lease agreement with her, her husband and grown-up son. Very nice people. Food. More food. Much admiring of her flat, which is full of lovely and historic bric-a-brac. Much moving of the large black and white cat that spent most of its time lounging across the paperwork. Many attempts to persuade my (Russian translating) friend that she should get to know the landlady’s son better. And something I really enjoy – that like me these people tend to lounge around indoors in housecoats, track suits and other items very close to pyjamas. I have now been visited several times by the husband in his tracksuit and dressing gown. That, at least, makes me feel very at home.

new flat

Slept last night in the flat in borrowed bedding, so have been to collect my stuff from work and begun to make the place my own. The building is from the late 1920s, initially built as a hotel, and then converted into collective housing. Which I guess explains the huge stair landings. The landlady’s story, if I understand it correctly, is that her family owned the flat originally but were cultural intellectuals who were cleared out in the 30s to be replaced by poorer families, many living in each room. Then at some stage she and her parents were able to move back and so how she has both her own place and this one (she also seems to own some other apartments elsewhere for letting out.) Clearly an entrepreneur and a survivor; she and her husband – a chemical engineer – seem to have done all right for themselves. Like ex-council estates in London, the wider block appears to be inhabited by many different kinds of people, including a regular gathering of drunks on the stairs, who it must be said are perfectly friendly if a bit messy.

new

Familiar strangenesses are multiplying. Went immediately to view a flat that my Russian colleagues have found me (via many, many email exchanges of interiors/locations/prices). Prices seem to have shot up, although it may be of course that I demand to live relatively central. Anyway, this place is old and furnished traditionally, but in a fantastic location just minutes walk from work. The landlady and her husband live immediately upstairs, so initial discussions also involve soup. The plumbing is ancient and basic but the floors are wooden, the windows big, the rooms of a good size and the view green, so I like it. It is also very cold – being as we are in that transitional period with chillier, more autumnal weather but before the powers-that-be decide to turn on the heating. (Also they have left the windows open, which I later realize is to blow away the slight but all- pervading elderly smell.)

So the landlady show me the traditional trick of lighting the cooker, and putting bricks on the flames. And I can’t work out if this is weird or not.

that special something

Very aware that I am leaving Moscow next week and going back to London for most of the summer. Of course really excited to be seeing my daughter, relatives and friends, and to be spending a decent amount of time at home; but also find myself trying to pin down the things I will miss. Sometimes it feels as if Soviet times haven't really gone away, like when a tram goes by full of sleepy army recruits, or amid those stand-up picnics in the park, or walking through my 'typical' high-rise neighbourhood. Then there is the way the lifts tend to be sturdy but not smooth or quiet and all repairs haphazard rather than effective.

But there are also what seem to be truly contemporary moments; such as the glam young women in the highest heels, tightest shortest dresses, brightest colours and the most labelled accessories; or the extraordinary array of buildings under construction which cannot even be contained by the term 'eclectic' and have led me to think hard about what I mean when I say something is ugly. There is the energy of new cultural possibilities, of new things starting all the time, usually without warning, publicity or long lead-in times.

So, even though I don't want to reduce this place to simple stereotypes, I do seem to be trying to select a special something, that sums up my first (almost) year in this country and city. For which, all suggestions welcome....

getting a new angle on things

So the good news and bad news. The good news is that everyone was incredibly helpful, I have moved into my new place and it is big - the bed alone is the size of a small country - also everything very shiny and colourful. The bad news is that the old tenant is still moving her stuff out, quite haphazardly, as I write. Oh, and city traffic is completely paralysed by rehearsals for Victory Day (this happens next Sunday involving many tanks and dignitaries) so we have sat for a very long time in a taxi.

As you can see, a much plainer view - although I could spit on the Garage Centre of Contemporary Culture from here (if I wanted to, which I don't.)

Also not sure if the very large pink flurry bunny in the lounge, which has a strange look in its eyes, counts as good news or bad...

goodbye view!

The minor cheating, failure to make repairs and general all round low-level difficulties with my landlord's agent have finally blown up into a major row; after her failure to pay a phone bill which left me without internet for several days, the problem became how the flat is clearly perfect, and I am someone who breaks everything (non sequiturs being the hardest thing to deal with in any language). It is never a good idea to argue via a translator - not because he wasn't good, but because you can never have a really good shouting match or have the satisfaction of knowing you have scored even a single point. In fact, her increasingly litany of damages done by me, including many non-existent ones, led as expected to the possibility of calling the police, threats of arrest, locking me out of the flat, checking my papers and even deportation. All of this, of course, because she is planning to appropriate (well, steal is the more accurate word) my deposit.

The thing is, when you are used to the rule of law (however inadequate or problematic) it is hard to remember that in Moscow she could easily carry out her threats, through a simple bribe to a corrupt policeman. Which in turn is part of a bigger problem; when ordinary, civilised people, such as the people I work with, cannot make an impact on even a small injustice - for there is absolutely nothing to be done despite vague suggestions of involving lawyers. And that, in turn, makes it hard to believe, (in the way I am used to without thinking) in the possibility of having any effect on the world. This is sometimes called russian fatalism; but it is both more complex and more everyday than that. It makes it hard to plan, to have aims or ambitions, to believe you can have some control over present and future events, because it is proved again and again that things will most likely go wrong.... or at least strangely sideways.

All you can do in situations like these, is to try and respond well: and my colleagues are doing just that - being very helpful, sorting out a temporary home at short notice and helping me my stuff. Much appreciated.

Will be sorry to leave this place, not for its IKEA corporate look, but for the great location and the absolutely fabulous outlook on not just one but two Stalinist skyscrapers. Goodbye, view.

City bingo 5: actually, beyond a joke

Another relatively common sight - a disabled sticker prominently displayed in a completely incorrect situation (e.g. as here, with steps). What are they thinking? Also many, random, pavement markings in yellow, with no logic in any way connected to being visually impaired. As the guide book says, Moscow is not a place that makes things easy for disabled people.

Dvor in the Springtime!

Just to show that the weather has definitely improved....(actually not sure this works; meant to illustrate beautiful bright sunlight!)

The best constructivist building in Moscow

Got to see the inside of what is probably the most famous Soviet constructivist building in the world - Narkomfin.  Designed by Moisei Ginsburg in the 1920s, this housing block was meant to aid the transition  towards communism, by combining a mixture of privatised flats (with kitchens) and ones only containing space for sleeping and studying, with all other facilities organised collectively.  It was also an early example of architectural modernism - with double height spaces, long horizontal windows and white walls - some of which the more reknowned French architect Le Corbusier nicked for his own modernist housing masterpiece Unite D'Habitation. 

Narkomfin has been badly neglected and is in very poor condition. However, some flats are occupied - left over from the privatisation of housing that took place through the early part of the 1990s. The property developer MIAN has also bought many flats, intending to develop a converted scheme for housing, but is being affected by the financial crisis and the usual legal stalemates. This has left the building - unloved for most of the Soviet period - in a kind of (typically Russian) limbo. 

These days it is very hard to get inside Narkomfin. The few remaining tenants are both angry and anxious; they called the police when we visited, uncertain about our reason for being there (even though we were with representatives from Alexey Ginsburg - architect grandson of Moisei - who MIAN have employed to design the improvements; and of Moskonstruct who are a Russian-Italian campaigning organisation.) It is also crumbling and in a state - rubbish from squatters (now cleared out by MIAN); plaster peeling off the walls, and windows broken and stained. But the overall glory of the vision can still be seen - a very clever weaving together of double height living spaces with single height bedrooms, bathrooms and (yes) kitchens; interlocked into a clean whole, with lots of light and - considering the restrictions of both economy and politics in the 1920s Soviet Union - spacious.

The truth is, though, nobody is holding their breath about the building surviving. Along with MAPS, another group which is trying to save some of the best bits of Moscow's architectural heritage,  Moskonstruct seem pretty fatalistic about their chances, when up against current development pressures, corruption, and the known preference of Moscow's mayor Yuri Luzkhov for the new.

Sign Moskonstruct's petition to save Narkomfin here.

Another highspot

Went on a great walking tour last weekend with a group called MosMania. It was slightly complicated (and long) because it involved first having to join the official Moscow State University (MSU) tour which was very long-winded and 'official'; and then sneaking off after to see things from a student's perspective (the people who took us around are/were students at the university).

The reasons for going to MSU is that it is one of Stalin's skyscrapers (constructed in the 1950s and without much change from those days), and it is located on Sparrow Hills, so with great views over the city.

There was also the student Autumn Ball in progress, so we were surrounded by young people in dinner jackets and shiny ballgowns, practicing their dancing, talking on their mobile phones, waiting anxiously for partners; all of which added to the particular character of the place. Amazing soviet classical detailing (built by prisoners - both returning Russian prisoners of war from Germany and low-grade political prisoners) plus old-fashioned lecture halls and seminar rooms, with the kind of wooden desks which suggest Victorian Board Schools; and then a huge basement of facilities, including a swimming pool, and accommodation (which we didn't see) for 6,000 students on site - a whole self-contained world in fact.

And the same old mix of Soviet, contemporary, elegant, decrepit or just plain weird bits and pieces that I have mentioned before.

Building works...

Following the extremely heavy rain on Monday, more bits of plaster and other miscellaneous stuff is coming off some of the older buildings, all dealt with in the usual distracted and un-bothered manner. .On my way to work is a perfect example - a few repairs are going on here, but what I love is the lash-up protection to passers-by, particularly an impromptu bus-shelter, thrown up out of misc. sticks and now covered in bent corrugated metal sheets.

And right in the line of fire - fine for crumbling plaster, but ready to collapse completely if any major lump of blockwork should feel like leaving home.

Missing hotel

Walked down past Red Square and over the river yesterday, and finally noticed that the hotel was missing! Meaning the enormous Hotel Russia which I remember from my last visit 30 years ago as a massive, ugly and somehow typically Soviet solution to providing temporary accommodation for various delegates, trade unionists and other miscellaneous visitors from across the Union and occasionally beyond; each endless corridor of identical doors patrolled by an unsmiling babushka in charge of a samovar, from whom I never managed to extract a single cup of tea.

One of my friends said that it was just demolished without any notice: the stories are that the KGB had various equipment there they didn't want found (other buildings in the immediate vicinity of the Kremlin have disappeared in similar fashion.) Well, it was definitely hideous, but then Moscow is not rich in hotels. And doesn't seem that interested in developing the tourist industry - as you will know if you have attempted the process of getting a tourist visa.

If you want to see what the Hotel Russia looked like and the demolition, go to EnglishRussia.