Visit to Russia II HISTORY REVIVED IN MODERN CITIES

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 28833, 2 March 1959, Page 10

Visit to Russia II HISTORY REVIVED IN MODERN CITIES

[Bv JULIUS HOGBBN, president of recently returned from a Moscow, Leningrad, 280 miles to the north, and Kiev, 430 miles south-west, were the three cities we visited—Moscow the capital, Leningrad, which as St. Petersburg was the Tsarist capital, and Kiev, an ancient capital of tile former Eastern Slav State. Moscow is the metropolis, the city of Russia with its ancient buildings of Byzantine beauty, its huge modern -buildings mostly lacking beauty, its wide streets, its monuments and statues, its parks, its complete lack of litter, its book shops and stalls, its traffic above and below ground and its Red Square. The Red Square is an oblong, certainly not a square, with a length of over half a mile and a width of under 200 yards. But the shape matters little; it is still the most important place in all the Russias. It borders on the Kremlin; Tsars paraded there;, revolutionary battles were fought there; it is the setting for the huge parades celebrating , Russian national days; and at one end of it is a round stone platform pointed out to us as having been used in the past for the chopping off of beads. Beyond this chopping-block stands St Basil’s Cathedral, with its onion-shaped tower tops, one small glided onion topping the tallest tower, two partly peeled larger onion? with green and yellow and green and white stripes, two smaller plainer onions and two whose pimpled surfaces look more like pineapples, and colour everywhere, red, pink, yellow and white.

Cathedrals in Ancient Glory St Basil’s is at one end of the Red Square. One long side of it is bordered by the Kremlin, a stately old building—seen at its best from across the river—and its cathedrals, Armoury and lovely

the Auckland Festioal Society, who cultural visit to Russia.) gardens. We visited two of ths three Kremlin cathedrals, the Uspensky (the Cathedral of the Assumption) and the Archangelswy. Like all the cathedrals we visited in Russia they have been restored to all their ancient glory. In the Armoury are displayed the treasures of the Tsars and the aristocracy, thousands of millions of roubles worth of gold plate, silver, jewels of amazing size and beauty, porcelain and china, carved ivory throne, a throne inlaid with jewels and precious stones, an Eastern throne which appears to consist mostly of diamonds, royal and ecclesiastical robes, coaches and carriages, armour, jewelled swords, and goodness knows what else. There seemed to be acres of it No wonder there was a revolution; and the treasures of the Tsars are guarded and gazed at by the revolutionaries. The longest queues in Moscow were those waiting to enter the Red Square Mausoleum to pay homage to Lenin and Stalin—--15,000 visitors a day. I was impressed by the crowds, but not by the preserved leaders. The Red Square has traffic entering and leaving from six or seven different directions. The traffic police carry batons which they wave and twiddle, obviously in Russian as they were fully understood by local motorists, but were incomprehensible to mere New Zealanders. Planning for Future Traffic Traffic in Moscow is considerable and has changed rapidly; 15 months ago the ratio of cars to buses was estimated as one to five; now that is reversed. Moscow traffic would block the streets of any New Zealand city, but not in Moscow where the streets are planned for the traffic of years ahead. The principal shopping centre, Gorky street, is over 60 yards in width and it is not the widest. And the streets are clean, as are the pavements; not a sign of-litter anywhere, only the fallen leaves, cleared away by the birch brooms of the sweepers, men as well as wonpen. To travel from Moscow to Leningrad is to leave a mixture of styles and an impression of vast size for a city impressive for its beauty. Leningrad is a city of palaces and bridges, of large parklike squares and graceful buildings. In the Hermitage, Leningrad has one of the greatest art galleries in the world. The design and artistic standards in the beautiful theatres and concert halls are high. The streets are as wide as in Moscow. There are fewer tourists and the standard of living appeared to be higher, so that a visitor to Russia who had time to visit only one city might well prefer Leningrad.

Pride 'in History The Russian pride in history was most noticeable in Leningrad in the St. Peter and Paul Cathedral where-aze the tombs of th* Tsars—and on the tomb of Peter the Great a bouquet of fresh flowers. In what was the summer palace of Catherine the Great, we found the damage done by the Germans by bombardment, by looting, and by vandalism being repaired and restored so that it will again be exactly -as it was in Catherine’s day, Millions of roubles are being spent in Russia on the complete restoration of historic buildings. From Leningrad to Kiev, the capital of the Ukraine and the .most beautiful of the cities we visited—a city bombarded, ravaged and occupied by the Germans—it is now restored to leave little evidence of war and restored so that the new buildings, except the unattractive official ones, conform to the beautiful tradition of the Ukrainian baroque architecture. The streets are all tree-lined; there are very many extensive parks, those dedroyed by the Germans having .been replanted with 10-year-old drees. The city overlooks and extends beyond the Dnieper river with its attractive river beaches.. | Kiev is a provincial city, but a great and bcautif 1 i one. It has a literature and drama of its own, its own lac luage differing somewhat from R issian. Among its historic buildi igs the Sophia Cathedral occupies pride of place. The Ukrainian! are cheerful, friendly and heft*. In Moscow and Leningrad th ire are orderly queues for buses; ip Kiev when a bus stops the e is a goodnatured scrum. I vas hoisted into one bus by two i mple Ukrainian women behind me if our selectors want scrum pracl ice for the All Black forwards, hey might import a few Ukri Inian Amazons. In a 40-minute walk in Kiev, however, I saw n ore pretty girls than I saw anywhere—and the only one who sp >ke to me was a great-grandmot ler, so that it hardly mattered hat I could not understand a wolf of Ukrainian. (To be C. ntinued)