I (Josh- for some reason my computer does not recognize me as a blog poster anymore, hmmm I'll think about that later.) Regardless I went to Novgorod for a couple of days with a friend this week and I was quite surprised at how friendly the people were in a much smaller town here in Northwest Russia.
At the World War Two memorial they had a tank, so I could not resist a photo op.
This is a city/ state government building, it is quite impressive.
At the end of a walking bridge in the center of town was a statue of this footloose and quite inappropriately dressed (for the weather) young woman. Speaking of inappropriate, this day was the first day since December that it had been above freezing, and the River (the Volkov river) was NOT frozen. The river in Saint Petersburg which is much closer to the Baltic sea and should be warmer then this inland river is frozen solid and has been for months. The relative lack of ice in this river was quite disturbing.
In one of the many Churches in this town (this town is almost 1000 years older than St Petersburg, which means a whole lot of time to build lots of churches) the creation story was painted on the wall. I loved the painting depicting the Adam having to go to work once they were kicked out of the Garden.
In 1862 the Czar (I think Alexander II but don't quote me on that) commissioned this statue to commemorate the 1000 years of Russia, as in 862 the first prince of Russia (Prince Rurik) began to rule in Novgorod. For comparison St Petersburg was not founded until around the 840th year of Russian history.
2 comments:
Alan used to live in Novgorod. He liked it much better than Moscow...
Jen, there is a certain small town feel to it, which is enjoyable compared to the big city hustle and bustle. I can see why Alan liked it more than the Moscow lifestyle
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