Cherry season

The arrival of the first batch of fresh cherries created a bit of a logjam at the entrance of the new Alye Parusa one day earlier this month. Several crates of chereshnya from Turkey and Greece had been dropped just past the metal detectors, and folks were picking through them with great care and enthusiasm. Granted, there is a logjam there most of the time -- the store assumes that because they have so much space that everyone can just go ahead and take a gigantic cart, regardless of what they are actually going to buy. No small carts, certainly no baskets, just the shopping cart equivalent of Hummers.

Since I’m still a cautious shopper here, I watched as one cagey old babushka dug around among the boxes and took from the one she did when she was done. They were very good. A few weeks later, we were treated when the first vishnya from Russia arrived. These are completely different creatures, though they look just like familiar black cherries. They are more tart, and taste rather like berries. This is a photo, by the way, of Olga’s hand snatching away yet another cherry as we enjoyed a pre-dinner snack. You have to be very quick if you want any when Olga is around.

In America we are quite alienated from our food supplies because we have air-shipped fruits from all corners of the earth arriving freshly waxed at Stop n’ Shop everyday. You start to loose track with the seasons when this happens. But you really see it here. I remember during our last visit here in summer 2005 when the watermelons all arrived, as if at once. For a few days, every road crossing had a giant bin of arbus for sale.

Around the neighborhood: summer solstice edition

I often forget just how far north Moscow is, thanks to the jet stream or whatever atmospheric quirk that make it habitable up here. We are on the 55th parallel (Williamstown is at the 42nd), which is about level with the middle of Labrador, or just north of Ketchikan, Alaska. While we don’t have the White Nights like in St. Petersburg, there are only about five hours or so of perfect nighttime here this time of year.

A few nights ago, after we got Mila to sleep, Olga and I went for an evening walk. We took these photos at about 10:30 p.m.

Tsoi lives

I’ve long thought that more Americans could dig Kino, despite the language gap. The most important Russian rock band of the 80s were a mix of post-punk social criticism and New Wave aesthetics, all seen with the eyes and charm of regular Russian kids hanging around their yard. And today, if rock star fate hadn’t intervened, their charismatic leader, Viktor Robertovich Tsoi, would have turned only 45.

Unlike official Moscow, the home base of all the state-sanctioned pop crap, Leningrad had a true rock culture. Kino came out of that underground scene, performing in semi-legal venues and people’s apartments. Parts of their style suggests that the Iron Curtain was more porous than westerners think it was. They seem to have picked up pieces of what was happening in the west, but were isolated enough to retain all the attitudes of their time and place. Guitarists Yuri Kasparyan and Igor Tikhomirov looked like refugees from Joy Division or the Smiths or some other northern English band. Drummer Georgi Guryanov, who played standing up, seems like a character in a Dadaist play. And there was Tsoi, who has become by far the most iconic Russian rock star. And I hate to admit it, but the fact that he became so considering his father was Korean gives me hope that Russians may not be as deeply racist as I sometimes fear.

Their first album was released in 1982, 45, and became an underground hit. There is really nothing political about the first songs, and in many ways they touch on familiar rock themes: girls, your friends, worrying about your future, feeling alienated, etc. What made them dangerous to the established order is that underlying it all is the keen awareness that life in the Soviet Union was boring. And as anyone who remembers their teenage years with any lucidity can tell you, that’s dangerous stuff.

With time the message became clearer, especially once Glasnost got underway in the mid-80s. By then, they were popular enough to have a run at the “voice of a generation” title. And they were up for it. Their anthemic single from 1986, “Peremen” (Change) was the right song at the right hour. The narrative of the song is subtle to the point of abstraction, but the explosive tension is unmistakable… (apologies on the translation)

Electric lights continue into the day,
And the box of matches is empty,
But in the kitchen is the deep blue flower-flame of gas.
The cigarettes are in our hand, and the tea is on the table.
This system is simple: there’s nothing more,
It’s all up to us.

Then a much more straightforward chorus:

‘Change!’ our heart demands.
‘Change!’ our eyes demand.
In our laughter and in our tears
And in the pulse of our veins.
“Change!’ We’re waiting for change.

Here’s the song from a legendary June 1990 show at Luzhniki Stadium in Moscow, just two months before he died in a car crash in Latvia (those prone to motion sickness are forewarned about the 80s a/v club camerawork!).



They produced a remarkable number of albums in a few short years. They tackled social problems, personal entanglements, and their sound was all over the map -- from the early shuffling rhythms of their underground albums, to the New Wave synth-heavy later stuff. Throughout was Tsoi’s singular voice.

They got some attention in the West. Robert Christgau in the Village Voice gave them a B+ for their album “Gruppa Krovi":

Just Russian new wavers, their translated lyrics unobtrusively poetic, alienated by habit, politically aware, resigned. But Victor Tsoi's solidly constructed tunes have a droll charm that's fresh if not new, and to an English speaker, the physical peculiarities of his talky voice, which saunters along as if a low baritone is the natural human pitch, seem made for the offhand gutturals and sardonic rhythms of his native tongue.

The title track of that album is a thinly veiled broadside against the war in Afghanistan, about going off to a fight you want no part of, with your blood type and serial number stitched on your sleeve like an invitation to fate. Here's an early performance of the song:



Good old-fashioned “Rock n’ Roll” has made an awful lot of hay through the generations by affecting an outlaw pose. Truth is that whenever the law got involved it was usually the artists' own damn fault. But even in the waning days of the Soviet Union being in a rock band or going to a show invited trouble. It was, actually, the real thing. And it is a scandalously hilarious that Vladimir Putin and Sergei Ivanov, both career spooks before becoming politicians, have claimed they were Beatles fans all along.

There is something about Kino that slays that kind of cynicism. I think there is a law here that whenever four or more Russian teenagers meet in a yard on a warm evening, one of them must produce a guitar and they all must start singing. I’ve been surprised at the number of times I’ve heard kids warbling out Kino tunes. If American kids had the ability to concentrate on any such communal activity anymore, what they would sing?

Bloomsday!

And why is this day unlike every other? Here's an editorial I wrote for last year's Bloomsday.

Russian Teen Age Riot

Just when I had written off this year’s concert offerings in Moscow, I saw something that got my hopes up. It looked like this year would offer nothing more exciting than Ozzy Osbourne, Aerosmith, My Chemical Romance, and George Michael. So imagine how excited I was to see on a billboard along Petrovski Bulvar that Sonic Youth are playing June 19 at ‘B1 Maximum.’

But I can’t go. Sure, I could leave Olga home with the baby for just one night, but I went to the club’s website and discovered to my horror that the cheapest tickets were about $60. The VIP seats start at $240, and the “Super VIP” tickets will set you back a full grand.

Now, I can’t blame the kids of Sonic Youth for being greedy. Kim Gordon and Thurston Moore live in Northampton now, and I remember back in February they played a benefit show at the Academy of Music for arts education in the Greenfield public schools, or some other noble and not very glamorous cause. So I’m sure they don’t have anything to do with it. Maybe it’s a Moscow thing as this is a very big city – tickets the night before in St. Pete are only $39. Besides, Evanescence is coming a week later, and the cheap seats then are $88.

But these surprising prices have sparked speculation within the family. I insist this is another example of the polarization of wealth here, as the rich lead increasingly parallel and disconnected lives from the vast majority. I predict that soon the elite won’t just park their black SUV on the damn sidewalk wherever the hell they like, but will take to zipping around in helicopters like they do in Sao Paolo. Olga suggests the reason is more mundane and less Marxist – that the prices are a matter of the very different priorities Russians place on what they pay for. As I understand her argument (she’s a professional social scientist, so the nuances may have zipped over my head. I invite her to clarify in the comments below.) Russians are used to paying 20 cents for a loaf of bread, and to paying less for beer than for Coke. But it comes with a trade-off. To this day most people only eat in restaurants when somebody gets married, and see no reason to own more clothing than they could wear in a fortnight (granted, clothing is really expensive here for some reason). So for luxury items – things from the West, theater tickets, stuff that is out of the ordinary – a certain class of people are prepared to pay a little more.

But I remain somewhat baffled. I simply refuse to believe that enough regular Russians have ever heard of Sonic Youth, let alone develop enough of a liking for them to drop a huge chunk of money to go see them. They only people that are going to this show are the same ones that would find another way to blow $60 that night. I just hope in my heart that Kim, Thurston and the gang don’t succumb to what I call the “Heroic Visitor to Russia” syndrome, in which you think you’re doing something more heroic than you are. They are not reaching through the Iron Curtain to touch the hearts and minds of Russia’s youth. And unless you are Metallica or the Scorpions, you missed your chance and all you can do now is play your songs to the privileged children of a new feudal elite.

Of course, I could be wrong.

Whose 'nuclear sword' is stronger?

With the latest round of east-west tension, it feels like 1987 all over again. And Komsomolskaya Pravda has helpfully provided a “tale of the tape” to consider “whose nuclear sword is stronger.” After all, a lot can happen in 20 years.

They were able to find a photo of Putin in fighter pilot gear, which makes me disappointed that the KP editors couldn’t find Bush’s legendary “Mission Accomplished” action wear. By the way, their caption makes fun of Bush for not knowing how to ride a bicycle. That makes me wonder whether our nationalist yellow press is going to leave A-Rod and his strippers alone long enough to refute these demeaning insults.

Hopefully no one is listening to the neocons anymore, after how their last adventure in preemptive war against a rogue state alleged to have weapons of mass destruction turned out. Some of these tables could give them the wrong idea: right now the U.S. appears to have the lead, and could easily win give or take a few million civilians. Of course, as former Bush chief of staff – and UMass honorary degree recipient – Andy Card once said, always best to unroll new products in the fall.

Makes me long to be safe at home in Williamstown with Sterling Clark’s Renoirs.

Advice for parents...

A public service message reminding parents not to let their kids just run out into the darn street. From a Russian insurance company.

Central Telegraph, June 3

I had to send a few faxes back to the States in the past few days, and though there is certainly an easier way to do it, I decided to go all the way down to the Central Telegraph building downtown. This gigantic building opened in 1929, and dominates one corner of Tverskaya Street, Moscow’s Broadway. It is just a few block north of the Kremlin.

For decades, this was the only place to get a telegraph, a letter, or a phone call into or out of the USSR, and as a public space it is just as you would imagine: imposing and designed to make you feel insignificant. But I personally have an odd affinity for Soviet architecture. Many buildings from this time are very close to the cutting edge of design in the early twentieth-century (especially the constructivist Iszvestia Building a little further north on Pushkinskaya, though it is hard to tell anymore through the thick layer of billboards now encrusted on it). Central Telegraph is not the best example, but it is impressively overwhelming and pompous, if not inspiring or uplifting. And it is easier to like it now that the ideology that informs it is gone, just like it is easier to dig Mayan pyramids now that people are no longer climbing them to cut the still-beating hearts out of prisoners to make offerings to the gods.

The place always reminds me of a story Daniel Schorr told in his autobiography, Staying Tuned. He was the CBS bureau chief in Moscow for awhile during the Khrushchev years. The only way to get your stories back to the West was to type them up, bring them to the censors department at the Central Telegraph building, and stick it through a slot. A few minutes later, your copy would be spat out another slot with all the redactions and ‘corrections’ scribbled on it. You then took that paper to the telegraph office where it would be sent west. It didn’t take long for the foreign correspondents to notice that different censors behind that wall did their jobs very differently. Things that one would black out would go through untouched by another. So the correspondents tried to unlock what the censors schedule was by using specific phrases and remembering what time they went in to figure out when the ‘easier’ censors were working.

Today, the Telegraph remains imposing on the outside, but the rest is a little more mundane. The main entrance leads you to a simple ‘Pochta’ not much different than any other except that it is open much more. In the lobby there is a pharmacy and a small jewelry shop. And like every other public way or shopping space, there is a shop that sells cellphones (Seriously, how many cellphones does the average Russian buy every year?)

I keep thinking about this this weekend. On Sunday our broadband internet connection blacked out, which is one way to make you appreciate how connected we are here, even in an ordinary residential neighborhood outside the center of town. Everyday I can check the Red Sox scores, read British newspapers, and spend awhile watching YouTube when I get homesick. It reminds you how no matter how bleak or weird things are around here, they were much worse not so long ago.

Shchuka's Glorious Opening

With some friends over and in need of a place to have a quick lunch with a pair of small children, we decided to run out to the Food Court at the “Shchuka” Shopping-Entertainment Complex. But today was too important for our brand new monument to gentrification than for merely feeding and selling things to riffraff like us. Indeed, we had our camera with us, but I don’t think that images could really do justice to the scene. The main entrance was blocked off, beneath a huge gate that said “Kind Welcome!” There was a stage set up nearby blaring techno-pop – specifically that “Relax” song by Mika, which seems so popular among Europeans this summer. Mall employees were tricked out in various pirate costumes – even though pikes are river fish, the Shchuka complex has chosen to adopt a nautical theme for its branding effort. And everywhere you looked were the sure signs that some civic event is afoot in Russia: there was approximately one police officer for every three or so people milling around. And each of them was wearing their dress jackets, not just the puffy blouses they prefer on usual patrol. One of the officers helpfully told us that the complex was closed except for those with a pass. Ah. Indeed, today was the Grand Opening. At another entrance a line of dignitaries and a marching band were waiting (a marching band). Apparently, the big cheese himself, Mayor Yuri Luzhkov, was due to arrive at any moment to cut a ribbon or whatever. Despite being turned away from today’s festivities, Shchuka has actually been open for about a week now and we’ve been through a few times. In short, it is a mall, like almost any other in the West. The differences are in the details: the air conditioning was broken, and nearly all the shops sell nothing but expensive Eurotrash junk – you know, $300 Italian shoes that look like they were made for overgrown elves, flimsy blouses with random English, French, or Italian words on them. For my family’s purposes, the place is completely useless. Except it has a pretty decent Food Court. It is, of course, expensive, but it has a Sbarro’s and a Teremok and a, heh, “Pasta la Vista.” The people who shop at the Shchuka – and everytime I’ve been through it has been close to mobbed – generally look like what might be the emerging middle class. You see fewer people wearing clothes that would make westerners laugh, and the young people seem to have taken to Mallrat-ism quite naturally. You even see kids skateboarding in the parking lot. The real highlight is on the ground floor, an edifice that almost completely captures the redundancy, exclusion, and waste of modern Russian life. The new Alye Parusa (“Red Sail”) supermarket is down there, just about 200 yards across the tram tracks from the old Alye Parusa, which looks like it is going to stay open. The new one, as we would say in America, has its own zip code. For the most part, it sells much the same stuff as across the way, except much much more of it. And all the frozen goods, and there are a lot, are stored in giant, open, freezers that line the store and make it feel almost air conditioned. Clearly, this is a country confident that it has enough natural gas and nuclear generated electricity to last generations. One of the four walls is the checkout, and there are more counter attendants in their silly nautical themed outfits than the store could possibly need to pay. It highlights the weirdness of having to buy things around here. Most groceries and supermarkets are sad little affairs. Impossibly cramped and hot, full of dry goods and whatever was dumped off the wholesaler's truck that week, and a handful of very underpaid and very mean cashiers who growl at you if you hand them a bill that will make them count out too much change. At the other end of the spectrum, you have this gleaming temple of consumption, abundance, and showy excess. There is very little in between. I used to go out of my way to go to the Old Alye Parusa, which is almost western in its pricing, just because it was as close as I could remember to being an American supermarket – and it is the only place around here to find Worcestershire Sauce and capers and other western niceties I took for granted. The new place makes me feel lost, forlorn, and poor. I feel like in my few weeks here, we already zipped straight through the neighborhood’s middle class moment.