R u s s i a

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the Brown Bear is the symbol of Russia; photo by Simm in public domain at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Medved_mzoo.jpg

basic Timeline:

1552-56 … Ivan the Terrible establishes Russian rule by stopping Asian invadors.
1689 -1725 … Peter the Great tries to reform the administration.
1818 … … Napoleon invades Russia and is defeated.
1914 … Russia fights against Germany alongside Britain and France in WWI.
1917… …  The Revolution led by Vladimir Lenin takes control of the government.
1922 … Russia joins the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics  under Joseph Stalin.
1941- 1945 … … Hitler invades Russia and is defeated.

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In the  late Middle Ages Russia began to define its borders against the Asian invaders.

Ivan the Terrible

Ivan IV is known as Ivan the Terrible. He lived from 1530  to 1584. During his reign Russia expanded at the rate of 130  square kilometers a day (says Wikipedia).

At the time, until recently and maybe right up to the present time, those who lived off some sort of government job lived well. The rest had to make do any which way.

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In Eisenstein’s stellar film you see the people lining up all across the plain to approach Ivan IV with their plea.

The legends and fairy tales portray the Zars as the gentle and wise benefactors.

The photos are from
http://www.uoregon.edu/~kimball/images/I-4%20by%20Cherkasov%20Nxi.jpg

and the one below is from http://sovietmovies.blogspot.com/2008/08/sergei-eisenstein-ivan-terrible-part.html

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19th century: the French invasion

When Napoleon invaded Russia, he came with “an army of 120,000 men and 40,000 horses and needed 850 carts just to carry a single day’s food and forage. Powder and shot for the artillery, medical care for the sick and wounded, tents and other supplies required many more.” –

From the NYT presentation of Dominic Lieven’s “Russia Against Napoleon”.

The orange curve represents Napoleon’s advancing army starting out with 400,000 men. The black curve shows Napoleon’s army turning back and reaching Lithouania with 4,000 men. –

The chart is at http://www.historywiz.com/russianinvasion.htm

On the Russian cavalry in Napoleon’s war http://napoleonistyka.atspace.com/Russian_cavalry.htm

Below, the French retreating, by Prianishnikov in public domain at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Prianishnikov_1812.jpg

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Lenin and Stalin: according to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Lenin_and_stalin.jpg this photo may be fake and its copyright situation hard to ascertain..

20th century: The German invasion

The Russian president Stalin had killed his military leaders because they belonged to aristocratic families.

His plan was to allow Hitler’s armies advance deep into Russia in summer and to let them freeze and die in winter. This strategy had destroyed Napoleon’s armies and it destroyed Hitler’s at the cost of many million lives.

Map of WWII death in Europe

according to Putzger.

When the Germans started to retreat, the Russians advanced against them and surrounded them at the city of Stalingrad.

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Panorama view of Stalingrad at war

The caption says that this was “the battle for the factory”.

The photo is by Georgi Zelma. Its copyright status is unknown as explained at http://bg.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%A4%D0%B0%D0%B9%D0%BB:Stalingrad_battle_for_the_factory.jpg.

Подбитый и севший на вынужденную немецкий истребитель Мессершмитт Bf.109 в центре Сталинграда [2] — A German  Messerschmitt Bf.109 in the center of Stalingrad — The photo is from http://waralbum.ru/

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20th century post war Russia

1948 … … The Russians try to block access to Berlin. The US air force supplies the city’s 2 000 000 inhabitants with food and water as long as the blockade lasted. The photo shows children on the WWII  ruins of their houses watching a plane arriving.

1956 … … Nikita Khrushchev becomes leader and denounces Stalin’s brutality. He was visited by US president Nixon. They both went to see the exhibition of an American kitchen.

Khrushchev says he doesn¡t believe that most Americans own a kitchen like that, and you see Nixon correct him.

The iconic “Kitchen Debate” and the “Airlift” photos and their stories are at http://iconicphotos.wordpress.com/

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1985 … Mikhail Gorbachev tries to put through an all-out reform called Perestroika. Before he resigned or was thrown out, he once was arrested at his own dacha, though only for a short time.

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1990 … … Yeltsin becomes president.  The Communist party was strong, and its opposition grew.  The photo is  licensed under the CC Attribution 3.0 Unported license and attributed to www.kremlin.ru

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Yeltsin orders the tanks to attack Parliament. The photo by Rs4life07 is at http://callofduty.wikia.com/wiki/File:Rasstrel.jpg under aGNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2

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1991 … … The  Soviet Union is dissolved.
1999 … … Yeltsin resigns.
2000 … … Putin is elected president.

Putin: they gave him a little tiger as a present. He is known to sponsor  some tiger protection association.

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Languages

In Russia there are 160 ethnic groups speaking 100 languages.

The map is from the Siberian Light.

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Lifestyle

Below is the forest in Siberia. About 70% of Siberia’s people live in cities. Most city people live in apartments. Many people in rural areas live in log houses. Novosibirsk is the largest city in Siberia, with a population of about 1.5 million.

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There are reindeer and sledges further north, in Arkangelsk.

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The palace square in Saint Petersburg; photo at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:PalaceSquare.JPG placed into public domain by its author, Виталий Быстров = Vitali Vistrov.

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The Kremlin by NVO under a CC Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Kremlin_27.06.2008_01.jpg —

The cathedral of Saint Basile: doesn’t it look like straight out of a fairy tale? It is 450 years old, as a contemporary of Europe’s baroque churches that were just as ornate, though in a very different way.

Notice that in spite of their rocky recent  history, they seem to have kept their crosses and stars on the spires of their churches.

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It is called an onion top, but it is shaped more like a turnip. Some are made of wood and gilded. It is the historic center of Nizhny Novgorod with its church and further up the walls of its Kremlin.

The photo is from Novgorod. Gorod is Russian for city. It is by Vmenkov under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 unported license at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:C0315-NN-Kremlin-seen-from-Kanavino-Bridge.jpg

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The Kazan church.

The photo is by Maarten and licensed under  a CC  Attribution 2.0 Generic license at http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a5/Kazan_church.jpg

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They are built completely of wood.
The original photo  is by MatthiasKabel published under a CC Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported  license at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Kizhi_churches.jpg

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The Russian fairy tales are the greatest in the world, and they are as strange as those buildings. Some Westerners are afraid to do Russian because of the alphabet called Cyrillic, but that is easy to learn.

According to tradition the alphabet was invented by two Saints, Cyril and Methodius, who went to Russia as missionaries more than 1100 years ago.

The letters look a little confusing at first, but you put that with some little phrase list on your breakfast table  and have it around for a while, also at the office, and it is just like as crossword puzzle:

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At “Petersburg city” you would find a good and more complete list : petersburgcity.com

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The last word is kuknya which is a kitchen.

The drawing is by Gring from an Assimil Russian course.

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And, finally, a map:

It was hard to find a map. I wonder whether there is some truth in the story that under Communism the Government issued only faulty or distorted maps to prevent people from trying to run away.

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Postscript January 19, 2011

I forgot the writers, probably the Western world’s most influential great writers, Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky.

Has to be a separate post.

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Postscript October 18, 2011

from The Guardian: The Russian Winter

The mayor spends his time dreaming up snow-fighting schemes. In 2009 he proposed deploying jets to the skies outside Moscow to disperse snow-heavy clouds.
Every year it’s a disaster.

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Putin and Berlusconi.  –  In the past, a coat was so expensive that it became an awful status symbol. If you are poor, you wear rabbit. Or cat?

The picture is part of a photo report on Berlusconi at http://internacional.elpais.com/internacional/2011/11/11/album/1321017481_513392.html

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