More Cruise Info from our Babooshka

Nain just sent me more up-to-date information on our tour in Moscow. Bec, I have rented the Russian Ark thanks to your recommendation. Here is Nain's message:


More up to date on Moscow.

On our Day 2 after we have visited the Kremlin and Armouries museums. You have
two options , either the 1) Pushin Museum or 2) the Novododevichy convent and
Monastery.

1) The Pushin has nothing to do with the author/poet but is a fine Arts Gallery
with a world famout collection of French Impressionist paintings
equal to the Hermitage in St Petersburg. It also has marvelous collections of ancient Roman and Greek pieces(some from Troy) plus Rennaisance artists such as Rubens and Rembrant. You will also see Icons and Byzantine art but will have to pace yourselves as it is a huge place.

2) the Novodevichy monastery and convent. (1524) This is situaed in a
suburb of Moscow. The walls are red and white crennellated walls with
golden domes and a huge five- domed cathedral built in 1525. (it is full of history which you may want to look up in google) In a near- by cemetry, you will find the tombs of the famous authors Checkhov and Gogol. The composers Shostokovich and Scriabin are also buried here.

Just seen The Ark!

Okay i just watched the movie (see my previous post) and it is wonderful! Weird and wonderful. You don't want to blink because the scene never ends! The camerawork is amazing (its the longest shot in Cinema history) and the characters are bizarre. It glides through various points in Russian history and gives you a taste for a sort of Russian magical realism. The last seven minutes are incredible - as the guests are exiting the ball - my favourite part. Try and rent this ladies, you won't be disappointed!

Film about the Hermitage

Hi guys, there is a film i've been meaning to see, and now that we're going to Russia, want to see more than ever. It is called 'Russian Ark' and is a movie filmed entirely at The Hermitage Palace. The amazing thing is that the film is an unedited 90minute sequence filmed with Steadicam (a type of camera where you can move around and follow action smoothly). The film is about a ghost walking through the Hermitage and seeing different scenes from the palace's history. 33 rooms of the palace are featured in the film. I want to see it for the production value (this idea of a 90minute contiuous shot is quite something - apparently it took only 4 takes to get it right) and also for historical interest!

One critic, Roger Ebert wrote about the film: "Apart from anything else, this is one of the best-sustained ideas I have ever seen on the screen....The effect of the unbroken flow of images is uncanny. If cinema is sometimes dreamlike, then every edit is an awakening. Russian Ark spins a daydream made of centuries."

Sounds cool hey? Watch the trailer at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J--TDEHizVA

BOAT STOPS

We travel along the Volga Baltic waterways through what are known as the Golden Ring cities and towns then through the two largest lakes in Europe called Onega and Ladoga. We embark in Moscow and end up in St Petersburg.

Day 1) Moscow transfer to the ship . EMBAR.CATION on MS Tolstoy
Day 2) City tour, Red Square and Metro. Visit the Tretiakaov Gallery then Optional Moscow by night
Day 3) Kremlin and Armoury Museum. Optional Pushkin Museum or Novodedvichy Monastery . Leave Moscow and sail up river to UGLICH.
Day 4) UGLICH . This is an ancient town on the Volga 136 miles North of Moscow. We take a city tour.
Day 5) KOSTROMA . another ancient city with the famous wooden architecture museum.
Day 6) YAROSLAVL 155 miles M of Moscow. An old walled city
Day 7) GORITSKY a typical peaceful farming village Medieval.
Famous monasteries associated with Ivan the terrible Built around 1391. These monasteries are known as one of the seven wonders of Russia s.We are now on the tributary of the Volga called the river Skeksna. A lot of history is associated here with Ivan the terrible.
Day 8) KIZHI At the northern end of Lake Onega Near St petersburg. A town known for it preservation of Russia’s wooden architecture . 14 Century coplete wooden churches were built on the island of Kizhi
Day 9) MANDROGUI A reconstructed Russian village built to illustrate the life –style and traditions of Russia’s past. Artists and craft people from all over Russia live here producing the famous Matryoshka dolls and ceramics . (The Vodka museum is a must)!!!!
Day 10) St PETERSBURG City tour, an evening ballet performance at the Hermitage Theatre.
Day 11) St PETERSBURG tour of the Hermitage . Evening folklore dancing and show
Day 12) ST PETERSBURG An excursion to the Palace of Peter the Great (Peterhof) on the gulf of Finland about 20miles north of St Petersburg.
Day 13) DISEMBARK

the Seagull

Gwyn, Nain and I are going to the Toronto Ballet's performance of the Seagull today, so I thought I might write on it.
The Seagull was one of many plays written by Anton Chekhov (who was by the way born on Jan.29th, the day between my birthday and Gwyn's!). Checkhov was also a doctor and practiced throughout his writing career calling medicine his lawful wife and literature his mistress. He was
born in this house in the south of Russia where his physically abusive dad ran a grocery store and his mom told great stories of her travels all over Russia with her own father who was a cloth merchant. Chekhov's dad went bankrupt and fled to Moscow where the family lived in poverty, but Chekhov stayed behind.
Chekhov paid for his own education by catching and selling goldfinches, selling sketches to the newspaper and tutoring.
He started to read and have many love affairs. Finally he went to Moscow to rejoin his family and go to Medical school. He started to write and made more money at that then medicine where he would treat the poor for free. After successes he bought a small country estate south of moscow where he set up schools, firestations and medical relief for peasants around the area. This is a picture of him at the estate where he wrote the Seagull in a
little cabin amongst a cherry orchard. He met his wife during rehearsals for the Seagull and married her because she could fulfill his request of a partner: let her be like the moon and not live in my sky everyday. They lived mostly apart. One day when the two of them were travelling back from a spa in the Black Forest in Germany, Chekhov sat up very straight and said very loud (in German, though he didn't really speak it): "Ich sterbe" - "I'm dying." A doctor came running, gave him an injection and a glass of champagne which Chekhov took and smiled at his wife and said "I haven't had champagne for a long time", downed the glass and died. They transported his body back to Moscow in a freezer train meant to transport oysters.

And now, the ballet we are going to in one hour, the Seagull, here is the gist:
Famous actress Arkadina (A) arrives with her lover Trigorin (T) at old dying brother's estate. A's son, Konstantin (K) writes a play that star Nina (N) and performs it for his mother and guests. His mother thinks his work is ridiculous and laughs at it while K storms off. K is in love with N and gives her a dead sea gull to proove it - one that he shot. N is confused and shows it to T who makes up a story of a girl who lives by the sea shore and who is as free and as happy as a seagull until a man comes around and ruins her life out of boredom like this seagull here. For some reason N is now drawn to T and devotes herself to him before he and A leave the estate. N is running away to become an actress and her and T plan to meet in Moscow. K shoots himself in the head, but misses and spends most of Act 3 with a bandage wrapped around his skull. N and T live together in Moscow for a bit until T abandons her to go back to A. 2 years later everyone is reunited at the estate b/c A's brother is dying and they all play bingo in the parlour until K shoots himself, for real this time and is dead.

When this play premiered in St.Petersburgh on Oct.17, 1896 the audience booed and the actress playing Nina lost her voice. Two years later it was put on by Stanislavski and blew everyone away. Time will tell what we three think of it ballet-styles....

Wow Nain ! Looks like a beauuutiful Cruise.

http://www.exclusivetours.ca/index.asp?sec=rc&nav=russia&prod=russia1

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Thanks Gwynie! sounds like a fun book. I would love to tackle some Tolstoy and really should before our trip, just need to find a quicker read than War and Peace!

By the way gals, i'm hoping to buy a film camera before next summer partly because i want to film this trip! xxx

Verdict on the Night Watch

So I just finished reading the book - and immediately watched the movie The Night Watch that I had downloaded on my computer. I have to admit, both the book and the movie are definitely kind of silly. But I really enjoyed the pure cheese of the plot - and it definitely puts you into a Russian frame of mind - seems like a violent culture.

The Night Watch - by Sergei Lukyanenko

Fantastic! I can now contribute to our wonderful Russian blog -Thanks Meggie. So I thought I would bring the literary discussion down a notch with my latest book purchase - a Russian fantasy novel called The Night Watch (one in trilogy also including the Day Watch and the Twilight Watch). I ordered in on Amazon after a friend recommended it to me (it arrived all the way out here in Tadoussac in only 4 days!) and I am almost as enthralled as in the last Harry Potter. Apparently, it is one of the latest big hit novels in Russia (with the younger generations), and it was recently made into a very popular action movie, which I am going to try and download. I would describe it as a cross between a Russian Philip Pullman (Golden Compass) and the movie the Matrix. Sounds good eh? Can't say that the writing style is top-notch, but the imagination is there and boy, is it ever full of suspense. In the pile of books beside my bed, I also have one called Natasha's Dance - A Cultural History of Russia. It seems a little more dense, but readable. I think I might give it a whirl when I feel more academically motivated. I will finish with a question: Russian uses a different alphabet? Who knew?

Ok i'm going to kick-start this blog. I've just finished reading 'Pale Fire' by Vladimir Nabokov (who might be my favourite author). He has an amazing way of writing, i think in part because he is writing in English, but not originally from England, he is Russian. He experiments and has more fun with English than a native author might. Russia doesn't feature too heavily in the book, although he does imagine a place called 'Zembla' some far northern kingdom which i suppose he envisages being above Russia somewhere. He's really a wonderful author. My favourite book ever is Lolita - by Nabokov, again not really featuring Russia, but he wrote his first nine novels in Russian which have since been translated and perhaps they might be interesting to read. I think i remember Nain saying she loved his book 'Ada' which is high on my list to read. It isn't set in Russia or the earth we know - its set in an alternate world (!)

Another Russian book which I've read and really does give you a sense of Russia is 'The Master and Margarita' by Bulgakov. Its full of Soviet Union cultural and intellectual references. A little heavy going at times, but really fascinating and i think would provide an interesting insight into the country.

pree VYETST va vats

Our babooshka (Nain) has decided to take her sheyst (6) kooklas (dolls) to Russia in August 2009! This is a site for all of us to get excited and educated about our voyage. Let's brush up on our Russian, delve into the literature, culture, history and art of the country. Share your discoveries on anything from environment to politics, eating to popular past-times. This trip is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, so let's take it by the yaichkas and get the most out of this experience! FYI 'yaichka' = 'testicle.' See!! We're already learning!