The center point of India

The feeling that one gets in Nagpur is of space. Immense space with sprawling red coloured buildings with sloping red tiled roofs. All of them within large compounds where there would be a garden in front and trees all over the place. What buildings were they? The high court, the district court and the most mundane post office too, the collectors office, the municipal corporation and many more.

I am sure I would love to spend an entire morning trying to post an epistle to some far away land spending time within that post office dawdling amongst the flower beds and walk amongst the shady trees with their dense green foliage.

It would be  a brilliant life instead of standing in that simple modern post office where the queue would seem endless and where I would love to rush in ask "please give me this this this stamp", lick the stamp, affix it to that letter, post it into the non descript letter box and rush back into the waiting car.

Oh those glorious old days which still exist in a sleepy sprawling town called Nagpur.

The air seems fresh, the days laid back, time waits.

The markets are plentiful, as I drove past the wholesale market of Itwari, there seemed to be clothes spilling out of the shops, onto the pathways.

This is the cotton belt of India, which was known for its lovely hand loom textiles, which were made patiently by hand. It now seems to have given way to glitter and synthetic material, which makes life easy, as these  are easy to maintain. In the beginning when these clothes entered the market in the sixties, they used to be called wash and wear and drip dry clothes, and never seemed to fade or fray. Cotton clothes faded and died a natural death soon and so were expensive to maintain, but they could be recycled. 

The  one new evolution in Nagpur that I saw was that the great sprawling lands of the Empress mill which ruled the lives of many a Nagpurkar once upon a time, has now given way to the Empress mall. Instead of producing something, people are now only consuming. You go in quickly and buy a cup of coffee from a multinational, walk around and come back with no great feeling.

Just as it is said that a bull gets attracted by a red cloth, a mall meant chances of there being a book shop for me, so I entered a large book shop which said it was the biggest bookshop in Nagpur. I saw a sparsely populated book shop with more sales persons than customers. Shelves were placed far apart and there was lots of space asking to be filled with more book. I asked for a book on Nagpur. The salesman looked high and low while I walked around and in a period of half an hour came up with a roadmap tourist booklet costing me Rs. 60. The booklet was on Vidarbh and not exclusively on Nagpur. The entire shop could not come up with any book on Nagpur. He seemed bewildered with my request and said no one has ever asked for such a book. I told him now that I have asked for it, please find some books on Nagpur and stock them. Every place has a history, a culture, a heritage, why has no one written on it?  If someone has,  then why is the book not available in the book store? Maybe I have to look for a better bookshop with some antiquity and a seller with some love for books.

The vegetable market near the cotton market huge building had fresh, colorful vegetables beautifully displayed on the pavement.  The artistry in each vegetable vendor showed with the green, red, purple, native vegetables displayed distinctly,  quite colour coordinated. That I suppose is the love for your ware which you want to place artistically with pride and love.

My father used to tell us a story of an old lady who used to sit on the wayside to sell  fish. A young man who used to pass that way everyday would see her struggling to make her ends meet and the way she would haggle over the price of the fish with her customers. One day the man told her that he would buy all her fish at whatever price she quoted everyday as he would supply it to a huge fish monger in the city. The old woman thought hard for sometime and refused this generous offer. The young man was non plussed and said, "Why old mother, why do you not agree?"

 The old lady said, "Son, I love my work, I love meeting people, I love haggling as then people stop, talk, discuss the price of fish, they spend their time with me. I am pleased to strike a deal which gives my customer a look of pleasure and me a companion for some time. I build a relationship, spread satisfaction, and make an acquaintance. If you take away all my fish I will have nothing to do for the rest of my day and there will be no one who will stop by to chat with me."

The people touch, human interaction, is so  very important. We need to talk, chat, discuss and haggle and strike a deal which is always-always beneficial.

Nagpur has wide roads, dense foliage, walking pathways, content people, the zero milestone, which is the center point of India. My driver who was showing me around the city said, "madam this is the center of Nagpur".  I told him " No, this is the center of India".  He was delighted to know that. 

Triloki, my husband says "something happens to you when you visit Nagpur".  

I said, "True, some genes of some ancestors of mine remember those days gone by when people studied under lampposts and a young man named Narayan straight from a village named Kurul of Garhchiroli district, on his first visit to the huge town of Nagpur had asked innocently looking at the Palace theatre, "is this the palace of the Maharajah of Nagpur?" and his friend had laughed and said, " arre nahi re, this is a theatre where people buy a ticket to go and see a movie."

Those were the days my friend, those are the memories which make me see and enjoy Nagpur as perhaps no Nagpurwalla does.

 You have to go out of Nagpur and then look back upon the place.  It gives a different perspective.

COUNTRY ROADS....

Our house with the tall roof, once upon a time.

I recently visited my remote village which is actually back of the beyond. It is located in one of the most backward districts of the country. The district is known as Garhchiroli. My village is known as Kurul, that is how my father spelt it although I think that it should be spelt as Kurud as that is how it is pronounced.

Kurul to this day in 2016, does not have a railway station, the nearest railway station is at Wadsa which is six kilometres away. Wadsa now has broad gauge railway tracks but in the olden days it had only a narrow gauge railway track. My village  is now connected by a motorable road, and I am told that a bus does visit the village everyday. In olden days  the only mode of transport from the nearest railway station, was the bullock cart. 

I have memories of travelling in the bullock cart on a road which can best be described today as a roller coaster ride, as the road was very bumpy because the track was made only by the wheels of the bullock cart. My family owned different kinds of bullock carts, one was a "rengi", one was a covered cart and a few others too, the names of which are not known to me.

The Primary school about 10 years ago.

From that village where there was no electricity, no road, no Middle school too, my father understood the need for education. He went from Kurul to Wadsa, to Brahmapuri, to Nagpur and finally to London  to educate himself. He always got Merit scholarship from the British Government of India from Class eight onwards, as he always stood first in every class.  In 1949 after becoming an Engineer from London, he returned to India to serve his country.

The school today.

He was employed with the Government of India which had then started building a newly freed country. That is the reason that we, my two brothers and I went all over the country wherever daddy, who belonged to the prestigious Industrial Management Pool(IMP) got posted, from Hirakud dam in Orissa to Nagarjunasagar dam in A.P., Kotah in Rajasthan, Bhurkunda in Jharkhand, to Bailadila (Bastar)Iron ore project in Chattisgarh,  Kiriburu in Orissa to Panna Diamond Mines in M.P. We got an overdose of this vast country and learnt about the cuisine, the customs, traditions, language, culture, History and Geography of each place practically, always on the spot. The kind of education that we were exposed to is quite unbelievable and actually enviable.

Hats off to my father who accepted any challenge and posting willingly, and my ever ready mother who trudged along wherever my father went ungrudgingly. All of us siblings stayed in the nearest boarding schools and went home during holidays, as most of the places that my dad was posted to did not have good educational facility. With the limited resources that they had my parents had decided to invest in our education.

 Kurul therefore, remained  in our memory as the place that we belonged to. For a number of years my father always wrote the address of Kurul  as his permanent place of residence. I remember that place very well as we went there often as children, but the visits became less frequent after my grand parents died.

On my most recent visit, I found that the place has changed a lot. The road is metalled, the old school building is dilapidated, and no one except my own family members recognised me. 

This once upon a time was tiger land,  teak land, tendu land, and Mahua land. Now the Tadoba Tiger Reserve is just next door and Mahua trees still stand in our fields. So many tales had been told to me about this place by my father, that I could relate to a lot of landmarks that I saw.

As I stood on the land that my grandfather had bought, I looked as far as my eyes could see and I was told that it was all owned by my grand father. In the third generation, this land has now been split, yet it is still ours and remains in the family.

Our ancestral house has been broken down. That was the house which my father with his elder brother had helped in building. With their tiny little hands they would make small balls of mud  which would be carried to the place where the house was being built.Those balls of mud were used in the construction of the walls. All that labour, all that work has gone because time has taken its toll. 

That small kitchen where my grand mother made aambil( A soup made of Jowar-millet, during summer season) for the people as well as animals is no longer there. The cowshed called "gotha"where lovely cows, bullocks rested at night is now plain land where a garden grows. The beautiful arched massive gate with a latticed balcony is now non existent. This majestic gate with rooms on its first floor and a balcony was built with the money that my father sent from London. As a lone sentinel of those times is my grandfather's well which still stands steadfast in front of our house. 

"The old order changeth, yielding place to new", what happens to memories I wonder.... they remain, oh yes they remain, forever, they do not yield place to new. Our memory capacity is infinite, therefore we can keep adding to it.

My brothers and I have moved on in life, we do not have any rustic element in us, but then you cannot take Kurul away from any of us, we belong to Kurul and will always trace our ancestry there.

   

THE MOST BEAUTIFUL CITY IN EUROPE-ST. PETERSBURG.

MOSCOWSKY STATION

The person who came to receive us at the train station at St. Petersburg was our cab driver who was English speaking. He was a very friendly person and quite happy to describe the areas that we were passing through. Our hotel was reached quite quickly and to our surprise we found that the hotel had just a door on the  street. When we entered it we found that it was a boutique hotel. The place was cute, small and friendly. Our rooms were cozy, clean and comfortable.We had to wait for some time to gain entry to our rooms as we had arrived quite early in the morning, so we waited in the lounge which had a lovely little book shelf.

KRISTOFF

It rained the whole morning and we had no option but to rest in our rooms. After some rest, we bravely ventured out to explore our neighbourhood and were pleasantly surprised to find a street at the back of our hotel brimming with different restaurants offering a variety of cuisine. We walked up and down the street and settled for a bright looking welcoming restaurant which served Italian cuisine.

ITALIAN PLACE

It served us the most delicious food and the water that they served us was absolutely delightful. As the water was being prepared in front of us, I was quite fascinated by the work involved in its preparation. First water was poured into a jug, slices of lemon and lime were both put in the jug and crushed, with a strong wooden  spatula, sprigs of mint were added, a dash of Sprite was added, some crushed ice was added and lo and behold the water that was served to us was absolutely divine. It was much better than any mocktail that I had on a number of occasions. No one had recommended the restaurant to us and we had actually stumbled upon an excellent place. After lunch we again decided to walk in the rain with our umbrellas. Walking in the rain with an umbrella is a delightful experience and when there is no water logging, and no dirty water splashing, the walk is even better.

NEVA RIVER

The rain stopped soon and instead of a walk in the rain, we now set out to explore the city. St. Petersburg is situated on the banks of the river Neva at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea. It is the most westernised city of Russia and is also its cultural capital. Because of it being at 59 degrees latitude it is considered as one of the northern most cities in the world. Even the sun I think doesn't like to set over here, it shines brightly till 11pm and then is quickly back on the scene around 3.30 in the night.

THE GENERAL STAFF BUILDING

This city was established by Peter the Great in 1703, and was made the capital of the country which until then had been at Moscow. In 1918,  Moscow was again made the Capital with the end of the Romanov rule and the advent of the Soviet Union. This new city was named St. Petersburg in 1703, which was changed to Petrograd in 1914, so that any affiliation with the German word, "burg" could be avoided.  The name was  changed to Leningrad in 1924, and in 1991 it went back to square one and  the city was renamed St. Petersburg. Interesting to see how men in power kept  changing the name back and forth!

A number of cruises originating on the Baltic Sea at Scandinavia come up to St. Petersburg, therefore to cater to the tourists there were many sign boards in English and more people know and speak English here.

St. Petersburg is a beautiful city with aristocratic buildings all in a row. It had been proclaimed long ago that no building could be taller than the Winter Palace and all the houses were to be built in a row with no space in between them.

 The houses were of  aristocrats and so were  palatial, large and beautiful. When the Bolsheviks came to power they allotted equal space to every individual and all these houses were filled with the proletariat who came to claim their share. 

WATCHING DR. ZHIVAGO.

One needs to revisit Dr. Zhivago the movie, to see what exactly happened during the Russian revolution. I did exactly that, on my flight back from Russia, I watched  Dr. Zhivago, and could visualise the scenes vis a vis the majestic houses. 
On our second day at St. Petersburg we took the inevitable

 "Hop on Hop off" bus which took us around the city. It is a smaller city than Moscow but is more beautiful. The river Neva is never far off, and like Venice one sees water almost everywhere, only one does not need gondolas to travel, as the roads are very well connected. 

WATER, WATER & CANALS

Peter the Great had designed the city on the pattern of Venice or Amsterdam with canals instead of streets. It will amaze you to know that there are 342 bridges of different sizes over canals and the river within the city. Peter wanted the people to move in boats during summer and when the river froze in winter to move in sledges. Bridges started getting built after Peter's death.

The city oozes an amazing display of character. I had been told that this is the most beautiful city of Europe, and I quite tend to agree with this statement. 

WINTER PALACE

We soon reached the Palace Square where the Winter palace of the Tsar is located. The massive Alexander Column which was built in 1834, of a red granite column which weighs 500 tons is at the centre of the Square. 

ALEXANDER COLUMN

The Hermitage and the Winter palace is massive. The Winter palace is now a great art museum. These buildings do justify the vastness of Russia.

ST. ISAAC'S CATHEDRAL

Our next stop was the  St. Isaacs Cathedral which  is huge, beautiful and grand. All that glitters in Russia is actually gold. Many churches have domes covered with gold. This Cathedral was quite awe inspiring as it was very big with a golden dome. 

ENTRANCE DOOR OF ST. ISAAC'S CATHEDRAL

The entrance door of the Cathedral is made of bronze and is patterned after the famous doors of San Giovanni of Florence. As one enters the Church one does not feel humbled, but one is awed by the grandeur and splendour of the interiors.  The vastness of the church and its artistic grandeur makes one feel proud of the people who built such places of worship.

No story is complete without a bit of suspense, and no journey is complete without an adventure. We therefore had a bit of suspense as well as adventure on this journey. When we got off at the St. Isaac's Cathedral, one of us who was not too well decided to stay on the bus, while seven of us disembarked.

As the stop was for fifteen minutes we tried to come back in time, but miscalculated the time by a minute. Two of us reached the bus as it was moving out of its bay, and asked the driver to wait as the others were on their way, but the Driver refused to stop and continued on his way as he was maintaining his punctuality. Our friend who was on the bus moved on and seven of us were left wondering about what was the next step to take and how were we to re unite. The instructions about what to do in such an eventuality had been given, but I guess none of us really remembered it. Nevertheless, we boarded the next bus and kept a look out for our friend, who we thought would have either gone on or got off at the next stop. The next stop was at a big crossing and the place was thronging with a lot of tourists, but the watchful eye of our group leader caught the missing friend, he ran down the steps and brought him back to the group. All's well that ends well, and in any case such adventures only help us to make  our fun trip story better.

CATHEDRAL OF SAVIOUR ON BLOOD

There is another multi coloured Church with onion shaped domes near the St. Isaac's Cathedral. This is called Cathedral of the Saviour on Blood. This church was built at the spot where Tsar Alexander II was killed by an anarchist. The Church was built by Tsar Alexander III and was funded by the Imperial family.The Church was designed on the patterns of the St. Basil's Cathedral in Moscow. Both these Cathedrals to me appear like the Turkish Dervish, with bulbous domes which have brilliant colourful stripes like candy sticks. They make me feel as if Aladdin will suddenly make his magical appearance from the sky in his flying carpet. Why on earth did religion have to come in? It could all just have remained like a beautiful dream come true with white stallions, flying dervish, billowing pyjamas, all converging on these multi coloured domes. 
The Tsar or Czar was the ruler of the biggest in size country and today all that I found was a Restaurant named Tsar with the photograph of the last ruler of this land who was brutally assassinated by the revolutionaries in 1917 at Ekaterinburg.If you did wonder what Tsar meant, well it is derived from the Latin title for the Roman emperors "Caesar". This term  was also used in Bulgaria and Serbia.

We had so far not eaten at any Indian restaurant in Russia, so when we saw Tandoor on the sea front near the St. Issac's Cathedral, we decided to walk in. The owner is from Delhi and the employees were from Bihar. All the men of our group were closely associated with Bihar having studied at Birla Institute of Technology which was then in Bihar.  I too have close association with Hazaribagh, Mount Carmel School and Ranchi Women's College, so we felt very much at home and settled down to have a great evening. The food was very good and the ambience was excellent too.
I need to take a break now and will return soon with the final episode about ballet and Peterhof.
To be continued....

 

MOSCOW VISIT PART 2

HOP ON HOP OFF

In Moscow on day two of our trip, we took the "Hop on Hop off" bus. The ticket was valid for two days and also included the boat cruise.The hop on hop off bus has two routes, number one and number two. One takes us to the outer circle and two takes us to the inner circle of the city 

I had always pictured Russia as a very cold land with people always in great coats and fur hats, totally clad to ward off the bitter cold weather with only their eyes visible, as the warm mufflers would have their face also partially covered. I was therefore pleasantly surprised to find that they do have a summer. The sun was bright and shining in full glory, the sky was as blue as one would expect a sky blue colour to be. A couple of white clouds were there, just to let us know for sure that clouds are meant to enhance the beauty of the clear blue sky. As it is Moscow is at 55 degrees north and I always think that the north is any day colder than the south, being closer to the North Pole. We all had our dainty umbrellas up against the scorching bright sun as the rays came directly at us without any atmospheric pollution.  

The bus journey was lovely, the amount of English that one heard on the bus was reassuring. Channel two had the guide speaking in English and describing the different sights as we passed them. It is always a good idea to go to the top of the bus and try and grab the front seats. The view is good and one gets good pictures of everything. The bus took us around the lovely Summer Garden, the Red Square, the Moscow University. We took our first halt at Sparrow Hill which from 1935 to 1999 was known as Lenin Hill. This hill is the highest place in Moscow and one gets a good view of the 1980 Olympic Stadium, as well as the Moscow River. The Moscow University was founded in 1755, and was near the Red Square originally.

OLYMPIC STADIUM

NEW SKYSCRAPERS

RIVER MOSCOW

 The new building of the University was built in 1953, when Joseph Stalin  had ordered seven huge tiered neoclassical towers to be built around the city.  It was built using Gulag labour. It is interesting to note that Stalin had said that Moscow lacked skyscrapers and therefore  these skyscrapers must be built so that when people from the west came, they would see the development around the city. These skyscrapers were  termed as "Seven Sisters", however now the term  is neither used nor understood by the local population as Muscovites call them Vysotki or Stalinskie Vysotki which  means Stalin's high-rises or Stalinist skyscrapers. They were built between 1947 and 1953. 

MOSCOW UNIVERSITY

At the Sparrow Hill  there were a number of people dressed up as old time aristocrats waiting to pose  for a picture for a small fee. We were least interested in such pictures and so did not even find out the price.

KREMLIN TO LEFT

After Sparrow Hill we took our next stop at The Red Square. We went along the Moscow River to our right and the walls of the Kremlin to our left.  

BOLSHOI THEATRE

On the drive to Red Square we saw the Bolshoi Theatre and then we visited the great GUM store. GUM is the abbreviation of Glavnyi ('main')Universalnyi Magazin,  which means Main Universal Store. Catherine II the Great had commissioned Giacomo Quarenghi, a Neoclassical architect from Italy, to design a huge trade center along the east side of Red Square. The existing structure was built to replace the previous trading rows that had been there since long. 

The store is a virtual garden with a fountain in the centre. Near the fountain there was a long line of people waiting for ice cream, therefore we also stood in the line and bought an ice cream for 50 Roubles each. Just near by was another ice cream vendor selling his ware at 100 roubles per ice cream cone and there was not a single person at his shop. It has suddenly occurred to me that this could be a good ploy to attract customers. If you have a kiosk selling ice cream at some price, and have some one else close by selling a similar product at double the price, customers will rush to you, and at the end of the day you both can share the proceeds.

BENCH

There are plenty of benches to sit on inside as well as outside the GUM, All these benches had been painted very colourfully, perhaps by children, may be for a cause.  Lenin's tomb is also on Red Square and one can go inside and pay one's respect.

THE FOYER

We then moved on to see the Evropeisky Mall which is near the Kievskaya Metro Station. The mall had a lovely entrance and more than the shopping we had a great time taking photographs of the lovely foyer. None of us had eyes or wish to buy anything from the shops.

ON THE CRUISE

 After that we went on our river cruise and saw the city on both sides of the river. 

MONUMENT OF PETER THE GREAT

The monument of Peter the great, looks more like a pirate ship. It was a beautiful day and the sun after shining brightly   for half the day, hid behind clouds, therefore, the boat ride became quite enjoyable. 

MAINTENANCE WORK AT THE FOUNTAIN AT ALEXANDER GARDEN

ALEXANDER GARDEN

Moscow has a lot of beautiful gardens and there is a lot of greenery all around. Alexander park near the Red Square has the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier  with an eternal flame  burning. It was  created in 1967, and contains the body of a soldier who fell during the Great Patriotic War at  kilometer 41 marker of Leningradskoe Shosse, the nearest point the forces of Nazi Germany penetrated towards Moscow. On the day that we visited Alexander park, there was a commemorative parade for the Unknown Soldier, and so we could see the ceremony. 

A CEREMONIAL FUNCTION

TOMB OF UNKNOWN SOLDIER

Post Number One, where the honor sentinels stand on guard, used to be located in front of Lenin's Mausoleum, but was moved to the Tomb of The Unknown Soldier in the 1990s. 
The middle section of the upper garden at Alexander Park contains a false ruined grotto. The garden's cast iron gate and grille were designed to commemorate the Russian victories over Napoleon, and  rocks at the grotto are rubble from buildings destroyed during the French occupation of Moscow. In front of the grotto is an obelisk erected on July 10 1914, a year after the tercentenary of the Romanov dynasty was celebrated. The monument was made of granite from Finland and listed all of the Romanov Tsars and had the coats of arms of the Russian provinces. Four years later, in 1918 the dynasty was gone, and the Bolsheviks  as per Lenin's directive on monumental propaganda, removed the Imperial Eagle, and re-carved the monument with a list of 19 socialist and communist philosophers and political leaders, personally approved by Lenin. 

DOUBLE HEADED EAGLE OF ROMONOVS.

As I have said earlier, history is written by the victors and rulers, there is therefore now a discussion to remove Lenin's obelisk and reinstall an obelisk duplicating the original.

BEAUTIFUL PAINTINGS.

I once again talk of St. Basil's Cathedral, the most beautiful and colourful onion domed Cathedral, as I find it very interesting when adjectives such as Ivan the terrible, are added to the names of mighty rulers. 

PAINTING ON WALLS

The nine churches which form the Cathedral have beautiful alters and colourful paintings on its walls. Each Church is different. When we visited there was a choir and scripture reading going on in one of the churches. Each church is connected to the next in a labyrinth. The Cathedral does not seem to have absolute symmetry, in fact it gives the feeling of beautiful domes rising freely and blending with each other harmoniously. There does not appear to be strictness in its composition. Although I am told that the structure is symmetrical when viewed from the side of the Kremlin, I prefer to think of the Cathedral as a free and flowing Church not constructed to strict perfection, may be because Russia was such a strait jacketed regimen where laughing too was controlled at one time. Even today people do not give the cheerful smile and say hello to a perfect stranger, as one finds in USA. It is said that during the era of Stalin there was a proposal to demolish the St. Basil's Cathedral as it was obstructing the clear space of the Red square. Wiser sense prevailed and the Cathedral remained. 

 NEW KAZAN CATHEDRAL

There is another Church on the side of The GUM Store. That is called the Kazan Cathedral which was originally built in  1625, destroyed in 1936 under Stalin's regime and rebuilt in 1993 by Moscow city branch of the All Russian Society for Historic Preservation and Cultural Organisation. Obviously it was the end of state sponsored atheism.  

MONUMENT TO CONQUERORS OF SPACE

The Space Museum is another must see place. As one approaches the Museum, one can see a steel monument,called Monument to the Conquerors of Space  which shows the trajectory of a rocket launching. 

BASE OF THE MONUMENT

It is rather difficult to locate the entrance to the museum. Not knowing Russian we ended up like total illiterates asking every guard on duty the direction to the ticket counter. We eventually did find it and saw the museum which is quite educative and interesting, as one could see the place where a cosmonaut worked, ate and slept, as well as the toilet that he used, 

WORK STATION & UPRIGHT SLEEPING CHAMBER.

TOILET

The history of space conquest was vividly described. If all the pictures and items were marked in English, it would have been better.
Next day we went to see the Armoury Museum at Moscow. This is located near the Alexander Garden in Red Square. Here again there was the eternal hunt to locate the Museum, then there was the formidable queue to buy the tickets in the blistering sun without any shade in sight. The men were brave and stood in the line, we decided to stay in the shade and wait. 

BEAUTIFUL KIOSKS

We therefore missed the opportunity to see all the treasures of the museum, as we thought the Armoury museum may house only articles connected with war. Some of us decided to see the lovely kiosks selling Russian Souvenirs instead. There was "Matrioshka" the famous wooden doll, the Babushka which is a triangular scarf, the lovely blue ware, and the red cut glass.  For buying souvenirs these kiosks are good and bargaining is quite acceptable.

NIKULIN CIRCUS

THE INDIAN FINALE

We went to see the most famous Nikulin Circus.What is interesting is that tickets were not available over the net, and one had to go to the venue in advance to buy the tickets, which we could get outside the ticket counter only at a premium price! The circus was amazing and should not be missed at all. The grand finale were acts performed on Indian Bollywood music. Elephants and humans performed to perfection and none of us could stop clapping and singing with our favourite songs which we were hearing in a foreign circus on foreign soil.  

 

ACROSS MOSCOW STATION BY NIGHT

Moscow by night is a delight to watch. Every building is lit up and one feels as though they are power surplus.

THE RED ARROW TRAIN

MOSCOW STATION

After spending four days in Moscow we left  for St. Petersburg by the night train. The station is beautiful from the outside and functional from the inside. There is no concept of coolie, so one has to carry one's bags till the train. On the side of the stairs there are rails on which one can pull one's luggage up. Thankfully most signages were bilingual therefore one could locate one's platform without much problem. In the station there is ample seating so one can sit and wait for the arrival of the train. We were greeted outside our compartment by a smartly dressed hostess, who checked our passports and helped us in as there was a gap between the train and the platform and it was rather tricky to carry one's bag and one's own self into the compartment. The train was beautifully furnished with red and white heavy curtains. There was a box under each seat where one could stow away a suitcase. The duvet cover, pillow cover and sheet were clean and fresh. The toilets were very clean and well equipped. As our train was to leave at midnight and arrive at St. Petersburg in the morning, they had laid out the breakfast in packets. For extra tea and coffee they charged us.

Arrival at St. Petersburg was on the dot and our taxi driver was standing right in front of our compartment. The first impression of the city was that it is an old city. It was evident that more tourists arrived in St. Petersburg from the fact that there was a lot of English on boards.

To be continued.

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