by Alexandra for The Saker Blog
My son and I spent three weeks of July in Moscow and St-Petersburg and one week in Paris. We left Montreal in the evening of July 1 and arrived in Moscow in the evening of July 2 after a stop-over in Paris of a few hours. Our initial impression was that of a sprawling, bustling and fast-paced city.
When we stepped out of our accommodations the next day to visit the number one destination of foreign visitors – Red Square (a more accurate translation would be the Beautiful Square) – our initial impression was confirmed. Moscow is a locomotive – an engine running twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, a city that does not sleep. We found these open 24 hours a day: clothing stores, electronics stores, supermarkets, pharmacies, flower shops, nail salons (yes, that’s correct – nail salons!). It is very much a city developed by the Communists – many metro stations, monuments, streets and parks are named after Communist or Bolshevik “heroes”. The presence of this ideology is very palpable in many of the buildings around the city. There are also quite a few Imperial Russia buildings, but they are dwarfed by the sheer size of the Communist-era buildings (even if these old aristocratic palaces are quite large). Many of these palaces were converted to museums, foundation offices, government offices, or simply tourist attractions of a by-gone era. As is known, during the rapid industrialisation of the country, many people were housed in apartment buildings and this trend continues to this day – there are no individual houses within the city of Moscow, only apartment blocks of five or more floors.
To get around Moscow, we mostly took the metro and bus. A three-day pass which gives access to the metro, bus, tramways and elektrichka (commuter train) costs 438 rubles (about $9). The stations are clean (even the tracks) although the more central ones are a bit on the tired side, many steps quite used by the innumerable passengers; in some connecting tunnels between lines the pavement is uneven. All stations are announced in Russian and English. Wi-fi is available throughout the system, which is easy to access with your mobile phone. We purchased Russian SIM cards for less than 500 rubles (about $10) for 15 Gb for one month and it was not limited to the Moscow region only (no roaming charges). The metro trains are on time and so are the buses. Yandex metro maps are quite easy to use (free download). There are new stations opening up every year, but they are mostly on the periphery of the network and we did not see them, so no comments on those. Streets and sidewalks are washed every night (even if it rained that day) so in the morning, all is clean and fresh smelling. In the centre of town, the sidewalks are very wide and most of them are in excellent shape. Sidewalks outside the downtown area were decent, and little by little, they are repaired or completely redone. The streets have no potholes or cracks, so car and bus rides are quite smooth. The few times we took taxis, we ordered them through YandexTaxi (free app) – the app gives you the itinerary, price and choice of car. Drivers do not expect any tips.
Reaching the metro on our first day, we had to walk about a kilometre on the side of a very busy boulevard/5-lane highway with one lane reserved for buses. Traffic is fast and busy. Moscow (and St-Petersburg) has underground passages for crossing these numerous thoroughfares, which are well lit and clean. Cannot stop the flow of the traffic every 2 minutes when cars are speeding at over 100 km/h! A lot of luxury cars on the roads! Their equivalent of North American highways circle the city and have numerous wide Prospekts bringing traffic towards the centre.
Food was excellent. Prices were very reasonable. Grocery stores were always well stocked with local produce (all non-GMO), meats, and everything else one needs to prepare good meals. Restaurants also are affordable, and many cafés and fast-food joints had quite surprising quality fare.
Throughout our excursions we never felt threatened or unsafe. There were no homeless people with carts of their meager belongings roaming the city. There were no tent cities within Moscow or St-Petersburg. We saw only one drunk on a Saturday night when coming back to the apartment in Moscow and he was taken care of by his buddies.
We visited many parks, museums, historical buildings and churches, not only the tourist traps but also off the beaten path. Many fountains and monuments are dedicated to the Great Patriotic War and at least one that I saw to the 1905 Revolution. Restoration works on many historical buildings are ongoing. There are very long lines to visit museums and the entry prices are quite affordable for citizens of the Russian Federation (for example, a Russian citizen pays 100 rubles to visit St-Basil’s Cathedral whereas we paid 1000 rubles each, others were 700 rubles each).
Poklonnaya Gora or Park Pobeda (Victory Park) is dedicated to the Great Patriotic War, with one monument dedicated to the First World War (it is the only monument that I found in Moscow dedicated to this war) and one to the Afghan War. The Eternal Flame is at the back of the building. It is a massive park with the St. George and Dragon monument at the top of the walkway with the museum behind it. The building itself looks unimpressive, rather square and of a 1950s design (I’m not an architect so I wouldn’t know what that design is called, however it is not the Stalinist or Brutalist style, more like a copy of Art Deco). Once inside, one sees the massive expanse of the building. It is a tribute to the Red Army – its bloody setbacks to the final victory over the Nazi invaders. There are very well-done panoramas of the major battles (Dniepr, Kursk, Leningrad Siege, Berlin and others), complete with real tanks, machinery, guns and recreated sound. They have a reproduction of the base of the Reichstag with all the graffiti left by the Red Army soldiers of May 1945. The museum houses the books with all the names of the soldiers and civilians that died during the war. The museum had a few rooms dedicated to the Second Front for the 75th anniversary. I found it very soul-wrenching when one compares the numbers of the losses of the allied forces compared to the Soviet losses. It is difficult to fathom the suffering and sacrifices that the Russian people have endured but endure and prevail they did. What is most disgusting are the western allies who do not acknowledge these losses and prefer ignoring it – I guess 27,600,000 dead Russians are not worth much to them. The monument titled “Tragedy of Peoples” by the sculptor Z. Tsereteli, behind the main building was breathtaking in its conveyance of the suffering that was brought on the peoples of the Soviet Union.
In St-Petersburg, we did not take the bus or metro as the historic city offers so much to see on each corner and walking is the best way to enjoy the city. Streets and sidewalks were top notch! No litter on the sidewalks. The city itself is not as fast-paced as Moscow but has a nice lively feel to it. Of the three cities that we visited, St-Petersburg is by far our favourite.
The Hermitage Museum is a must-see National Treasure! Stunning would be a good descriptive. The building is History, is a museum piece itself. Long lines and long wait under pouring rain but well worth it. There is so much to see that one visit is not enough as I was talking with a gentleman in line and he told me it was his third visit. Palace Square is a lively meeting place and it serves as an outdoor music venue (we heard Pelageya giving her concert there), whether classical or popular. After one of our daily excursions, on our way back to the apartment, we passed, in front of the old Stock Exchange Building (being renovated), people of all ages, either dressed to the nines or casual, dancing Salsa to a DJ, celebrating the weekend. Russians are not the morose people that western cinema makes them out to be!
At the Peter and Paul Fortress on Rabbit Island (there is a story that is quite amusing and you will have to visit the city and take a tour to find out!) we visited the church were the Romanovs, starting with Peter the Great (excluding two monarchs that are buried in Moscow) and ending with the Nicolas II and his family (except Alexis and Anastasia) are buried.
The only other building open at the Fortress was the Prison. It was quite interesting to see the different members of the revolutionary movements in Imperial Russia mentioned – starting with the Narodnaya Volya and ending with the anarchist, Bolshevik and Menshevik parties and their revolutionaries and the cells that they have occupied in that prison up to the revolution. After the October Revolution, it was the opposite. The jailers became the prisoners and the prisoners the jailers. Many clergy, politicians, aristocrats, intellectuals occupied the same cells as those that overthrew their government before being executed. The State Museum on Red Square also covered the revolution of 1917 as this museum covers up to the fall of the Russian Empire.
We also visited the Artillery Museum in St-Petersburg. This museum is dedicated to the artillery developments of the Russian Imperial Army as well as the Red Army from the founding of the city to the present day and has many artefacts dating back to the 18th century and earlier (Swedish, Saxon, Polish, Turkish, British cannons and many others are on display outside the main building).
Something must be said about Russian museums. They are more than just collections of artefacts. They are a vivid and living reminder of sacrifices made by the Russian people and the difficulties that the country faced throughout the ages. It was very interesting and quite moving to see at the museum dedicated to the Great Patriotic War a young mother telling about the war to her 4 or 5-year-old daughter, about the horrors of that war and at the Artillery Museum a young father with his two young sons teaching them about the different guns, explaining the calibers and ranges of the different types of canons but also about what war means. This knowledge is passed on from one generation to the next and there is no doubt that the next generation will respect the sacrifice that their ancestors made. These museum lessons are much more genuine in their teachings than a once-a-year show of appreciation of the sacrifices made by the long dead soldiers (November 11 comes to mind and the dwindling numbers of people knowing what the true meaning of that day is and even less showing up at the ceremonies).
Taxis drivers were interesting people to talk to since they see and meet a lot of people and one can have a very interesting conversation on different levels. A few of them know that the West is not what it pretends to be, so they prefer to stay in the country to built it, but some were seriously contemplating leaving, preferably to Europe or Canada. Here are a few contrasts: a saleslady in a clothing store has friends that moved to Spain and are very happy to be there and wished she could leave but had obligations so was not able to do so; a young attendant at the Federation Tower, desperate to leave to anywhere; a young man, working as a taxi driver between jobs, having traveled to a few places outside of Russia, seeing that the West is not what it’s cracked up to be, prefers to stay in Russia; an old taxi driver that lived in the US and came back to Russia because he found it too hard and dangerous to live in the US; a grand-mother concerned that her daughter, having moved to Paris, does not teach her young daughter any Russian but only French and the child cannot communicate with her grand-parents.
Tourism is not a very big industry in Russia. Most of the tourism industry is oriented towards its own population. Attendants in any public venue, be it the metro, restaurants, shops, clothing stores, grocery stores, museums, have very limited English, never mind any other language. The fact that the metro stations are announced in Russian and English is due to the World Cup 2018. Peterhof, an absolute gem, does not have any audio guides in English or French or German or Spanish and yet, there are quite a few tourists from these countries visiting. They do not have bilingual museum tour guides either. There are a few professional tour guides in both Moscow and St-Petersburg that offer services in other languages, naturally for a price and they must be privately booked in advance. Most museums will have audio-guides in different languages but not official museum tour guides. The famous babushka attendants in museums are quite present and they do have eagle eyes!
Religious life in Russia is on the rise and it is the older generations, the babushki, that bring children to church. When we were in St-Basil’s, there was an a capella choir singing prayers and the acoustics of the building gave them an ephemeral quality, but the few Russians that were there did not show any reaction to it, it’s as if they did not know or understand what the singing meant. On the other hand, there was a very long line to see the relics of a saint in Christ the Saviour Cathedral (we were ushered so quickly through the line that I didn’t have time to find out who the saint was). Many people light candles in churches (even in those that are turned into museums such as St-Isaac’s Cathedral). Speaking with some restaurant attendants, many have a Lenten menu throughout the year and are quite popular.
It was with heavy hearts that we left Moscow to fly towards our last destination.
Paris is an old city, full of tourists, immigrants and refugees. Unfortunately, I found that it is no longer a city of the French. I heard more Arabic, various African dialects, Spanish, Italian, other languages that I did not recognise, British English, Australian English and mostly American English and the latter by far the loudest, the most visible tourists in the city (they behave as if the city belongs to them). French was the language that I heard the least. The shop attendants that we spoke with, didn’t seem to be very concerned about this “invasion”, on the contrary they seemed to welcome it. My son called Paris “the McDonald’s of tourist destinations”. How apt!
The streets were dirty, it smelled urine in many places (during the heatwave the smell was unbearable) especially the metro, excrement on the streets (animal), on quays (animal and human), on the steps to the Sacré-Coeur Cathedral (animal) – is there anything sacred anymore? People smoking everywhere, regardless if children were present or not, cigarette butts everywhere. The few street cleaners that we saw were doing their job in a very nonchalant manner. In the evenings, the brasseries were full of people drinking and smoking. The metro (a five-day bus and metro pass cost us 37€) on certain stops advises passengers to be careful of pickpockets. The metro is equipped at certain stations with anti-suicide gates. We saw quite a few homeless people (not necessarily immigrants, legal or otherwise) in the various arrondissements that we visited.
The parks are oases of much needed peace and tranquility and they are quite beautiful (our favourite was the Parc des Buttes-Chaumond as it gave us a nice view of the city). Tourists are quite well served with most signage in 5 languages (French, English, German, Spanish and Italian) (not the languages that I most heard on the streets). The Marais district is quite interesting as it is the area that was least touched by the Hausmann reforms of the XIXth century. It was interesting to see medieval houses and the narrow streets. Food in general was very average and quite expensive. Is it the tourism fatigue that makes it so? In the end, we were quite happy to leave the city.
I was disappointed with its general appearance – elegant and shabby at the same time, fast-paced but in a frenzy, Old World but with a complex, of wanting to be like the New World, accommodating to immigration but at the same time not really wanting the immigrants, borderline schizophrenic. La ville lumière should stay French and not try to be something else.
Russia is a world of its own. It is a country that is slowly opening to the rest of the world. I say slowly because of the bureaucratic procedures to get visas for many countries (Canadians can get a visa for only 30 days, whereas the US for 3 years); there are agreements with countries (unfortunately not with Canada because of our politicians) for simplified procedures and the implementation of electronic visas, and these changes take time to take full effect. There are many business and development opportunities. But then, it takes a special talent to see these opportunities. But for those that do, Russia is the future. Emigration should be simplified and made easier, especially for those that have Russian roots, that still speak the language, that understand that life is different and very well may be more difficult for some than in the West but are still willing to take on the challenge.
Many Russians are still enamoured with the West but what will be their reaction when their ideal is no longer? Will they wake up and realise that their country is much better than what the West has to offer? Presently, life in Canada is easier than in France (my oldest daughter spent six months as a student exchange in Paris and she found it difficult because of the noise, the cost of living and the smells), and it certainly is much better than in the US. And it is easier than in Russia but for how much longer? The economies of the West are not what the authorities claim to be. How long can nations survive on threats, wars and theft to prop up their failing economies? Time is on Russia’s side.
All in all, we traveled over 15,000 kilometres, walked close to 300 kilometres during our journey. We saw people living and celebrating, we saw splendor and decay, we saw Man’s achievements in technology, construction and art. And it was a beautiful experience! Will I go back to Moscow or St-Petersburg? In a heartbeat! To Paris? I will seriously think about it. My son only dreams of moving to Russia; luckily, he has a better chance of achieving his goal than many people because of his language skills and business acumen and I will gladly send him off to Russia to build his life and succeed.
Mini-bio: my father was born in the Soviet Union to a Cossack family in the city of Uralsk (presently in Kazakhstan) and my mother was born in Serbia to a former Russian Imperial Navy Cadet and a Serbian mother whose ship was pledged to the Serbian King after the end of the civil war. Both grandfathers fought on the White side during the civil war, but one was captured by the Red Army thugs in 1921 (the Red Army acquired its legitimacy during the Great Patriotic War, during the civil war up until the German invasion it was a bunch of thugs killing for no good reason, as per my father’s recollections) and sent to prison and threatened with execution but managed to survive and evacuated with the German retreat in 1944 with his family. Both families ended up in Argentina before emigrating to Canada and the US.
Thank you for an excellent review! I would gladly emigrate to Russia if I were 40 years younger and spoke the language. But I’m at 83 years, monolingual in English. Sad.
Enjoyed reading this.
he Red Army acquired its legitimacy during the Great Patriotic War, during the civil war up until the German invasion it was a bunch of thugs killing for no good reason
I seldom post here, but my suggestion to the author to update oneself a bit on this “a bunch of thugs”, especially when the same bunch of thugs fought Japanese Imperialists at Khalhin-Gol, not to mention the fact that the Red Army had many more, vastly more, former Tzarist officers than the White movement. One wonders why. It seems the retreat with Nazis didn’t go without consequences.. This is not to mention this teeny-weeny fact of those “thugs” fighting those wonderful islamists in 1920-s and 1930s aka Basmachi–proud parents of what is largely known today as mujaheddin.
Also the ‘white army’ was financed and supported by the British, the Americans, and their allies, if my memory serves me correctly.
Also the ‘white army’ was financed and supported by the British, the Americans, and their allies, if my memory serves me correctly.
Correct, this is not to mention the fact that the “White Army” consisted of several “armies” led by different leaders and often had contradicting aims. Nothing new here, Vlasov and his ROA were financed by some significant segments of White immigration and, of course, Third Reich. Solzhenitsyn was particularly enamored with Vlasov and ROA.
AM, correct. UK imported all the slave armies with them, one of them being Greek to fight the communists. The saddest thing is that English bankers (City of London and the rest of the gang) financed Lenin. But, hey who cares as long we make money, while the others bleed and fall into deeper debt. BTW, didn’t Lenin receive a Rolls Royce from the British-Royals as gift for good behavior? That Rolls is in the Museum in Moscow, as far as I know.
The saddest thing is that English bankers (City of London and the rest of the gang) financed Lenin.
Not really. There are some facts of Lenin being used “vtemnuyu” (in the dark, useful idiot mode) by Germans and some money were also involved. But if anything else both Britain and France were profoundly interested in keeping Russia in the war. Why would they finance Lenin when Entente was financing Kerensky for a precise reason he followed Franco-British war aims, which resulted, inevitably, in the catastrophe of Kerensky’s Offensive and further demoralizing of Russian Army, which was (together with Russia) was bled white by then anyway.
”BTW, didn’t Lenin receive a Rolls Royce from the British-Royals as gift for good behavior?”
Never heard about that. Would only have made any sense in case it was the British who sent Lenin home to Russia from Switzerland and/or if Lenin was capitulating to the West’s mercenaries.
It begs the question also whether Lenin really would put his life at risk for a pesky Rolls Royce. Gossip is fun, sure, but it has absolutely no place in understanding world history.
I watched a video of Russian museums, this is where they showed the Rolls. It may be on Youtube, but I am not sure now. The video was also about the military muscle Poland had in XVII AD by the use of their heavy horse mounted hussars https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_hussars (Husarzy in Polish). The video was actually Russian and talked about the troubles Poles gave to Russia and maybe it was there where they talked about Poland taking advantage of the turmoil in Russia during the Revolution and forcing Lenin’s hand into surrendering some lands, which were taken back after WWII.
I looked around and it seems the Brits are saying that Lenin had nine Rolls-Royces.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/4706414/Lenin-and-his-nine-Rolls-Royces.html
Youtube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OT2WR6Hs6vA
Nice picture from the museum
http://atxcarpics.com/lenins-rolls-royce
Anyway, you can find more on the subject, as some people get a real kick to “look at this commie leader driving a Rolls”.
”I looked around and it seems the Brits are saying that Lenin had nine Rolls-Royces.”
Saaay, now that settles it (not). Lenin still not impressed, judging by the outcome of Russia’s civil war. Might have helped had the Brits tossed in some booze and prostitutes.
Published in Pravda, they say>the letter providing the apology so as to decide what army to join… I cannot read the Russian…so this is offered with that caveat. The idea seem to me to be, hey, listen, governments come and go, but permiting a foreign invasions is simply not on…therefore…join the Red Army…the army that defends the people and the country. Anyway they say Mr B’s letter made a difference. And he provided a great example to patriots world-wide, of all nations.
Here is a quote (in Russian) from general Brusilov’s letter in Pravda in 1920: 23 мая 1920 года в «Правде» был напечатан, пожалуй, самый знаменитый документ, составленный Брусиловым лично — воззвание «Ко всем бывшим офицерам, где бы они ни находились». В нем бывший Верховный главнокомандующий русской армией призывал: «В этот критический исторический момент нашей народной жизни мы, ваши старшие боевые товарищи, обращаемся к вашим чувствам любви и преданности к родине и взываем к вам с настоятельной просьбой забыть все обиды, кто бы и где бы их вам ни нанес, и добровольно идти с полным самоотвержением и охотой в Красную Армию, на фронт или в тыл, куда бы правительство Советской Рабоче-Крестьянской России вас ни назначило, и служить там не за страх, а за совесть, дабы своей честной службой, не жалея жизни, отстоять во что бы то ни стало дорогую нам Россию и не допустить ее расхищения, ибо в последнем случае она безвозвратно может пропасть, и тогда наши потомки будут нас справедливо проклинать и правильно обвинять за то, что мы из-за эгоистических чувств классовой борьбы не использовали своих боевых знаний и опыта, забыли свой родной русский народ и загубили свою матушку-Россию».
Here is a letter (in English) from general brusilov’s letter in headlines in 1920: 23 may 1920 in the ” truth ” was printed, perhaps the most famous document compiled by brusilovym in person – appeal ” to all To former officers, wherever they are “. the former Supreme Commander of the Russian army has called: ” at this critical historical moment of our people’s lives we, your senior combat comrades, turn to your feelings of love and devotion to your homeland and call upon you with An urgent request to forget all grievances, whoever and wherever they are, and willingly go with full samootverženiem and hunting in the red army, to the front or to the rear, wherever the government of the Soviet Peasant-peasant Russia you are appointed and serve not there For Fear, and for the conscience of his honest service, to spare no life, to defend whatever Russia is dear to us and to prevent it from being embezzlement, for in the latter case it will irrevocably disappear, and then our descendants will be rightly cursed and It’s right to accuse us of having selfish feelings of the class struggle not using our combat skills and experience, forgotten our native Russian people and destroyed their mother Russia “.
Moscow and St. Petersburg sound quite nice though. You are right about Paris though.
that “thugs” line also unpleasantly jumped into my eye. the author’s grandparents (and probably parents as well) seem to have had quite a heavy anti-Soviet bias.
Reply to jim of olym /trip-diary-july-in-russia-and-france/#comment-704325 and
Andrei Martyanov (aka SmoothieX12) /trip-diary-july-in-russia-and-france/#comment-704336.
I share Andrei Martynov’s distaste for the lady tourist’s remarks about a «bunch of thugs killing for no good reason». There are ill-disciplined scumbags in all walks of life and any army can contain elements capable of bestial and unmanly acts. The war crimes and horror stories which followed in the wake of the invasions of Poland and the USSR contrast starkly with most German behaviour in France and are matched by the mass rape of German women and massacres perpetrated by first and second line troops and units of the Red Army who ‘liberated’ the Third Reich and were clearly much the worse for wear ie battle fatigue, drink and Soviet propaganda. I dislike using wikipedia but the article below gives a broad account of the conduct of Allied soldiers in 1944-1945. Mary Louise Roberts and E&R provide evidence of just what the US war machine was capable.
Rape during the occupation of Germany https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_during_the_occupation_of_Germany.
Review of Mary Louise Roberts, What Soldiers Do : Sex and the American GI in World War II France, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2013, in Studia Politica, vol. XVI, no. 1, 2016, pp. 159-161 https://www.academia.edu/30772396/Review_of_Mary_Louise_Roberts_What_Soldiers_Do_Sex_and_the_American_GI_in_World_War_II_France_University_of_Chicago_Press_Chicago_2013_in_Studia_Politica_vol._XVI_no._1_2016_pp._159-161
D-Day, 6 juin 1944 : l’Empire américain envahit la France Destruction des villes normandes, viols de masse, vive la “libération” !
https://www.egaliteetreconciliation.fr/D-Day-6-juin-1944-l-Empire-americain-envahit-la-France-55014.html 6 juin 2019.
Cf, also In ‘Eisenhower’s Death Camps’: A U.S. Prison Guard’s Story By wmw_admin on May 4, 2007 Martin Brech – 2002
http://www.thetruthseeker.co.uk/?p=235 Source: Reprinted from The Journal of Historical Review, vol. 10, no. 2, pp. 161-166.
Allied War Crimes 1941-1950 By wmw_admin on August 26, 2006 http://www.thetruthseeker.co.uk/?p=236.
I have no quarrel with the general tone of this piece on Western decadence and the upbeat character of Russian civilization, thanks to Vladimir Putin and his team. I’ve lived in France for the past 40 years and have watched its steady decline from Mitterand onwards, as the gap widened between rich and poor and the social safety net was removed and as Sarkozy, Holland and Macron aligned their policies with those of Thatcher and Blair. Christopher Lasch’s last posthumous work gives a good account of how this came about in the USA:
The Revolt of the Elites : And the Betrayal of Democracy Christopher Lasch W. W. Norton & Company, ISBN 9780393313710.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Lasch#The_Revolt_of_the_Elites:_And_the_Betrayal_of_Democracy#.
Analysis by Lucien Cerise on ‘social engineering and neuro-piracy’ and Nicolas Bourgoin on the adoption by EU police forces of globalized counter insurgency policing techniques is worth the effort :
Lucien Cerise à Carhaix : « Le piratage des cerveaux passe essentiellement par les médias du pouvoir » [Interview] 20/03/2019
https://www.breizh-info.com/2019/03/20/114647/lucien-cerise-carhaix-communication-strategique-ingenierie-sociale.
Lucien Cerise : La gauche liberticide : https://www.kontrekulture.com/video/la-gauche-liberticide
Lucien Cerise : La gauche liberticide Part 1 : https://youtu.be/tgPZHgwOWGQ Aug 21, 2015 ER LILLE 5.39K subscribers
Lucien Cerise : La gauche liberticide Part 2 : https://youtu.be/U9L9dleU4s0 Aug 21, 2015 ER LILLE 5.39K subscribers
https://www.kontrekulture.com/produit/neuro-pirates-reflexions-sur-l-ingenierie-sociale
Neuro-pirates : réflexion sur l’ingénierie sociale https://www.kontrekulture.com/produit/neuro-pirates-reflexions-sur-l-ingenierie-sociale
Nicolas Bougoin : La Révolution sécuritaire (1976-2012), Nîmes, Editions Champ social, coll. «Questions de société», 2013, 210 p., ISBN : 978-2-35371-305-9 https://journals.openedition.org/lectures/11077 | https://bourgoinblog.wordpress.com/category/la-revolution-securitaire/.
I haven’t seen London – where I was born just after WWII – for well over 60 years. Yet my distant memories of that already foetid ‘Slough of Despond’ suggests to me that the situation there today is even more deplorable that the picture that is justly painted of the French capital. But life in la France d’en bas, la France périphérique is light years away from what you experience in les beaux quartiers of the cities – Paris, Marseilles, Bordeaux, Lyon, Nantes, Toulouse which have had their poorer populations ‘surgically removed’, but where property development and financial speculation take their toll of the nation’s once beautiful architectural heritage.
The tourist lady claims to have visited places off the beaten track. But to be fair, with her airline tickets in her handbag, she cannot be expected to slum it in places where millions of poor, downtrodden Europeans, Asians, Americans, Africans and Australasians eke out a miserable existence as the global oligarchy with their offshore assets hatch further plots to privatize more of the world and cleanse the planet of 90% of its population :
The Wireless take-down of America–Can it be stopped ? A secret war is now being waged against the American masses using ultra high-tech wireless technologies.By Preston James, Ph.D -October 6, 2019 https://www.veteranstoday.com/2019/10/06/the-wireless-take-down-of-america-can-it-be-stopped/.
How the Geoengineering Scam Began : Turning Geophysical Warfare Into “Environmental Protection” By Carol Duff, MSN, BA, RN – September 24, 2019
https://www.veteranstoday.com/2019/09/24/how-the-geoengineering-scam-began-turning-geophysical-warfare-into-environmental-protection/. How the Geoengineering Scam began by turning Geophysical Warfare into “Protection of Environment”! Article written by Enkidu Gilgamesh – Vidéos : JFK Forecasts Weather Control at 1961 UN General Assembly 4 juin 2016 https://youtu.be/5EOnHgL0aEc Rafihe Kutcattiz akkoyin – 1963 Weather Modification Speech President John F Kennedy8 352 vues •17 févr. 2017 https://youtu.be/64zNbv_fm3M Weather Modification Speech (The year they cancelled the project Artificial Contrail Generator) https://vk.com/onealearth – André Nadeau.
Medical horror : Genetic sequencing of common vaccine finds entire male human genome from aborted human baby… “a complete individual genome” with abnormal, modified genes… 560 genes linked to cancer, abnormal DNA, genetic “modification” of potentially hazardous genes, yet mandated to be injected into every child … Friday, October 04, 2019 by: Mike Adams https://www.naturalnews.com/2019-10-04-medical-horror-genetic-sequencing-vaccines-mrc-5-cancer-genes-modified.html.
Finally there are doubtless important pockets of real poverty in many places within the Russian Federation outside of Moscow and Saint Petersburg – population centres designed to showcase Russia to the outside world.
I dislike using wikipedia
yet you still use it. Per mass rapes (granted you never heard of Professor Rzhezhevsky nor are acquainted with publications of Russian archives and memoirs) but around 4100 Red Army servicemen were court martialed for rape of German women, around 800 of them were executed, including on the spot. Obviously. considering western audience’s lack of grasp of scales and peculiarities of math, it is totally expected that many buy this 2 million German women “raped” BS, concocted in deep recesses of British propaganda machine and spread by the so called military “historian” Anthony Beevor, who, obviously, slept on all lectures in math and statistics in his Alma Mater in Sandhurst. But then again, in the world where 100 000 000 Soviets perished in GULAG anything is possible. Anything, except average Western Joe (or Jane) “poster” admitting that they know dick either about WW II and warfare or Russia’s history.
Some of us, including me, are well aware of the massive propaganda spread about Soviet Union. The propaganda is not limited to Russia, although Russia gets the lions share of it, but I will say this. My father and I only talked, man to man, once, the year before he passed on. He and I ended up sitting on a bench in the little park in front of my house as my maid, Miss Dora, kept us in Weissen and cigars until dawn, a good twelve hours after she should have been at her home. During that deep and wide conversation he finally asked me and I finally asked him what we did in the wars. As the Weissen took hold he was honest in what he saw, what he did, what he saw done. He was 101 Airborne and jumped the night before D Day. Yeah yeah, I know what ‘the books’ say but he clearly said he jumped well before midnight the day before, and he should know. He also told me his regiment was destroyed, totally destroyed, in the week after D Day.
The Old Man clearly told me of the pillage his unit did after Bastogne as they got in to Germany. He said pillage, rape and murder was not only common but generally neither recorded nor punished, and that was qualified with unless it was the black service troops who sometimes followed close on the fighting, if they did such things, the wrath of God came down upon them and punishments were draconian. I did not have the bad manners to ask him if he did such things, there are some things men never ask of each other, nor did he have the bad manners to ask me. I will say, though, that there was not a single ‘souvenir’ from the war in his house, nor is there one in my house…..beyond our memories, and his are gone forever.
Auslander
The Old Man clearly told me of the pillage his unit did after Bastogne as they got in to Germany.
There was a lot of it on both Red Army and Allies side–it was regrettable, but Ike left a remarkable note in his diary after he visited Ohrdruf concentration camp, he was a changed man after that, and wrote about his burning hatred for Germany. Yet, it was Stalin’s prophetic: Hitlers come and go, Germany (in other iteration Germans) remains(c). Now, Axis turned all occupied territories of historic Russia in one huge concentration and labor camp. Nazis knew what they did to USSR, that is why the fought as crazy on the Eastern Front.
Getting away from statistics, one can read in in many accounts of war’s end in Germany, including personal memoirs (such as in Frauen: Women Under the Third Reich), how many women were raped and how the fear of rape by Russian soldiers drove many to take to the road fleeing west. However, I have also read and seen accounts of the incidents of horrific rape and additional abuse of Russian women (e.g., dismemberment and disfiguration after rape) by invading German soldiers.
The issue simply cannot be taken out of context and turned into a fight over numbers. And I believe it should not be weaponized in the service of some ideological ax grinding.
http://www.franciscogoya.com/disasters-of-war.jsp
One to me poignant aspect of the sufferings of German civilians, including German women who were raped and civilians who lost their lives in the heartless crime-against-humanitiy firebombing of German cities—esp. cities where the Allies knew that throngs of refugees from the east had gathered, such as Dresden— is that for many decades after the end of the war the German people were so deeply imbued with a sense of guilt for the war that they accepted that they *deserved* whatever was done to them and their cities by the Allies. I believe Thomas Bernhard has written about this aspect of the postwar German psyche.
It also cannot be gainsaid that after the enormity of the the Third Reich’s crime against the USSR it is easy to understand the spirit of vengeance that surely animated Russian soldiers as they penetrated the heart of their now defenseless enemy.. Women were the nearest recipients at hand of this mortal fury. They were rounded up and raped en masse. Humiliation and degradation and physical abuse fo women are satisfying forms of revenge to many. I expect that my grandmother, who survived the war in Berlin, was subjected to this “initiation” into the new order.
If anyone is curioius about the actual “face” of rape—if anyone thinks it is a version of sex—here are a few photos:
http://english.alarabiya.net/en/features/2018/03/11/PICTURES-The-largest-mass-rape-in-history.html
https://www.google.com/search?q=WW2+rape+of+Russian+women&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjx5evLrY3lAhWtuVkKHZZqCdw4KBD8BQgRKAE&biw=865&bih=518#imgrc=tBQEVTZzxdRC5M:
It must be noted that a google search for “WW2 rape of Russian Women” returned virtually no hits. On the second page I found this:
https://ww2gravestone.com/sexuality-german-soldiers-ww2/
So one is left to infer that Google is slanted to deny info on rape of Russian women during WW2. Or that rapes of Russian women by Wehrmacht soldiers did not occur . . . That is very unlikely.
Katherine
However, I have also read and seen accounts of the incidents of horrific rape and additional abuse of Russian women (e.g., dismemberment and disfiguration after rape) by invading German soldiers.
Really? The hell you say, Germans raped and killed Soviet civilians. This cannot be true at all, it is all Soviet propaganda. I though more than 16 million of Soviet civilians died in GULAG, not from deliberate genocide, rape, starvation, mass executions by Axis which Russians all invented to cover them damn Russkies raping 200 000 000 German women and eating 2 billion German babies. And 1.5 million Leningraders (500 000+ of them buried at Piskaryovsloe Cemetery) starved to death, and totally raped and executed Voronezh by Hungarian troops, hence unwritten order for Red Army–NO Hungarian POWs, all executed on the spot. And all those subhuman Slavic slaves shipped as cattle to Reich–all that, including children’s concentration camps, such as Salaspils, all that is a figment of Russian imagination. And then, indeed, some puny teeny-weeny 27 million dead in 4 years of the most devastating war in human history. Just 27 million of “incidents”. Just a collateral damage from introduction of noble ideas of One Thousand Reich. Read my lips–these numbers and scale of atrocities “are beyond the grasp of western mind”(c) Yet, somehow Red Army executed or imprisoned its rapists. How many SS were executed for raping and killing those dirty Slavs? Good luck finding numbers.
“The hell you say, Germans raped and killed Soviet civilians. This cannot be true at all, it is all Soviet propaganda. ”
Huh?
I’m sorry, I cannot follow your argument, if sarcasm (I think it is sarcasm—not sure) is an argument.
You link your free-floating fury to a sentence I wrote whose point I am quite sure you have missed.
Your own comment was specifically about rape but now you are flying off in all directions about every crime committed by the Germans, I guess, and Soviet propaganda (what does this have to do with what I wrote?).
What is the thrust or point of your attack? What are you accusing me of?
Could it be my German DNA?
Yes, I guess it is.
OK. Leb wohl!
Katherine
What are you accusing me of?
Of that:
Getting away from statistics
Usually this is where any discussion on WW II should stop.
Geting away from statistics”
That is not the sentence you cited.
I know you!.
You always switch your ground when challenged.
As for “that is where any discussion of WWII should stop”
This means: Any discussion of WWII is only about statistics.
(Um I think this may mean: your statistics)
This is nonsense.
And, I reject your attempt to define the terms in which I or anyone else can discuss mass rape, or any other aspect of anything!!
Please, please do not respond!
Please, ignore me. Thanks.
Katherine
Second reply to Andrei Martyanov (aka SmoothieX12) on October 08, 2019 · at 12:16 pm EST/EDT /trip-diary-july-in-russia-and-france/#comment-704603
Sir … I drafted my response in all good faith, The swiftness and sourness of your reaction from somebody who says “I seldom post here”, gives me pause for thought. For all its faults, the wikipedia article refers nonetheless to the account by Russian historian Oleg Rzheshevsky whom you quote. Your remarks suggest a pitbull-like need to attack anybody who may dare imply the slightest criticism of the Soviet Union during WWII and which was as much subject to the will of political expediency as any of the nations then at war. As evinced by the reactions of Washington and London to news of the NKVD massacre in the Katyn forest. All political establishments can afford to hire their prospective gatekeepers. Groomed at Winchester College and Sandhurst, Anthony Beevor is not my cup of tea. With his Irish Catholic origins, his tutor at Sandhurst, John Keegan, displays a greater capacity to think outside the box, as indeed did a much earlier historian, AJP Taylor who was never afraid to speak his mind.
Yet neither of these men can hold a candle to those who have stood up for the right to free speech as historical revisionists and who have suffered more than their fair share of slings and arrows – including exhorbitant fines and heavy prison sentences – ie the type of opprobium which traditionally rabbis foisted upon Jews deemed heretical or overly dissident. Treated as pariahs and social outcasts, Uriel da Costa, Juan de Prado and Baruch Spinoza all tragically underwent the process known as herem. As does political scientist Norman Finkelstein author of The Holocaust Industry : Reflections on the Exploitation of Jewish Suffering 304 pages Editeur : Verso ; Édition : Reprint (2015). It is a fate which befalls a number of non-Jews, notably militant French comedian Dieudonné M’Bala M’Bala and civic-nationalist and anti-Zionist intellectual Alain Soral as well as an otherwise world renowned historian and investigator of the stature and probity of David Irving who revealed to the world how Roosevelt, Morgenthau et al. connived with the drunken Churchill and his Germanophobic sidekick Lord Cherwell to mass murder civilians in Dresden and Hamburg and elsewhere in Europe where vast areas were ‘strategically bombed’. Not to mention the late lamented Robert Faurisson who also exposed the spirit of vae victis animating the Nuremburg ‘show trials’ reproducing the same travesty of justice as what Versailles achieved in 1919, leading to an estimated 80 million more deaths from war and war-related disease and famine. Physically attacked at least 8 times by Holocaust Enforcer thugs – attacks which durably impaired his health – with his impeccable scholarship and concern for and uncompromising commitment to ‘exactitude’, he demonstrated the logistical impossibility of much of what is alleged to have happened at Auschwitz and other concentration camps in German occupied Europe.
The Remarkable Historiography Of David Irving Ron Unz • June 4, 2018 • 1,700 Words • 580 comments • reply
http://www.unz.com/announcement/the-remarkable-historiography-of-david-irving/.
Gilad Atzmon rencontre Robert Faurisson – 10 juin 2014 KontreKulture Follow Le jazzman et essayiste britannique Gilad Atzmon a rencontré le professeur Robert Faurisson chez lui, à Vichy, le 10 juin 2014, pour un entretien inédit sur son travail d’historien et les persécutions qui ont jalonné sa carrière. https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2e7359. A meeting conducted in English with French subtitles.
The campaign by the French government, mass media and influential organizations to silence the Franco-Cameroonese humorist Dieudonné M’Bala M’Bala continues to expose a radical split in perception within the French population. The official “mobilization” against the standup comedian, first called for by Interior Minister Manuel Valls at a ruling Socialist Party gathering last summer, portrays the entertainer as a dangerous anti-Semitic rabble rouser, whose “quenelle”* gesture is interpreted as a “Nazi salute in reverse”. For his fans and supporters, those accusations are false and absurd. The most significant result of the Dieudonné uproar so far is probably the dawning realization, among more and more people, that the “Shoah”, or Holocaust, functions as the semi-official State Religion of France. January 24, 2014 Blasphemy in Secular France by Diana Johnstone https://www.counterpunch.org/2014/01/24/blasphemy-in-secular-france/.
American Radical – Les procès de Norman Finkelstein https://youtu.be/yvoSvbZT8Ws
565 views •Jun 9, 2018 Les Mutins de Pangée1.3K subscribers
Jacques Attali’s Message To The Gentiles: “Sovereignism” Is Anti-Semitism & A Jewish-Muslim Alliance Must Shut It Down
Guillaume Durocher • October 8, 2019 • 1,500 Words • 21 Comments • reply http://www.unz.com/gdurocher/jacques-attalis-message-to-the-gentiles-sovereignism-is-anti-semitism-a-jewish-muslim-alliance-must-shut-it-down/.
Alain Soral Sentenced to 2 Years Jail for Sharing “Gilets-Jaunes” Anti-Rothschild Rap Video He Could Pay Over €170,000 in Fines and Compensation Guillaume Durocher • September 26, 2019 • 800 Words • 261 Comments • reply
http://www.unz.com/gdurocher/alain-soral-sentenced-to-2-years-jail-for-sharing-gilets-jaunes-anti-rothschild-rap-video/.
Bonus : Zionist Editing of Wikipedia https://youtu.be/gpXCII0HPhE 3 164 vues •6 juin 2018 If Americans Knew 13,3 k abonnés A workshop teaching Zionists how to edit Wikipedia pages to be more favorable towards Israel. This is just one of many Israeli projects to manipulate Wikipedia, social media, and the Internet in general. See our video on this, “Israel’s Internet Censorship War,” at https://youtu.be/Vqhi16iikxk – The video is based on an in-depth exposé on the subject: https://iakn.us/2Ixc6LC – The speaker in the video is Naftali Bennet, a high tech millionaire and a right-wing Israeli minister close to the settler movement.
Here Come the Polocaust Deniers October 05, 2019 by Gilad Atzmon https://gilad.online/writings/2019/10/5/here-come-the-polocaust-deniers.
Finally with SITREP: Ecuador on the brink of civil war ? /sitrep-ecuador-on-the-brink-of-civil-war/ and France and Britain on the threshold of a period of yet more strife, maybe we should cast our thoughts to subjects other than the diary of a tourist and consider just who are pulling the strings of this policy of austerity and identity politics to liquefy society and govern by chaos.
“Your remarks suggest a pitbull-like need to attack anybody ”
The “sourness” of Martyanov’s retorts is all too predictable.
I have experienced it elsewhere.
To an extent that I hesitate to post a comment anywhere in his neighborhood!
Because IMO aviolates a guideline of this blog which is that one discourses respectfully and courteously with others.
Perhaps the blogmeister could point out to Martyanov offlist that despite his I am sure undeniable expertise in his field, basic manners are never out of place.
Especially on the battlefield of ideas.
Katherine
Which ideas are you presenting?
This needs to be heard (and even seen in videos) by all Americans, I think after which, the people would begin to question their gvt, what has the so called greatest nation done at great expense, to have so little to show for it?
How would they feel if Russia had to bail out the corruption of Americas past? This would be an embarrassment the likes of which would be hard to stomach for many.
Excellent description and account of Russia!
Moscow (and Petersburg) are some of the most beautiful cities in the world, with extremely moving historical and cultural charrm. I would go back there in a heart beat under different circumstances in my life.
Thank you!
Thank you Alexandra for this delightful article. I grew up in Paris, and this city that I used to love so much is now unfortunately lost and ruined. I keep a very fond memory of living in Montreal, but it is going down the same path. I am now preparing to move to Russia to be among my people once and for all, as I can’t stand the degenerate West anymore. Things are turning for the worst incredibly quickly. I believe Russia is the best place to be while the End of Times unravel.
I’m also from Montreal, with a similar background and travelled to France and Russia, with my wife and children, last summer; Paris, Moscow, St-Petersburg, Kaliningrad, and many smaller cities. Very similar impressions. Thank you for this article!
…and next week a thrilling narrative by Chrystia freeland about her father escaping the red thugs and retreating with the “germans”…
This was a really nice read Alexandra, thanks. Right now am in a grungy, albeit, rapidly gentrifying suburb in Melbourne, and the smell of urine, along with rubbish on the ground is quite noticeable. Such a contrast with Moscow!
I enjoy reading pieces like this because it gives a first hand perspective of other people’s and cultures, especially when Russia has been constantly demonised as ‘The Bogeyman’ in the West’s completely fake media.
My philosophy is we are all human beings regardless of our ethnicity, religion, race or whether we’re pagans, Anarchists or fundamentalist Christians.
I fully agree with you that the despicable whitewashing of Russia’s role and immense sacrifice in WW2 by the slime stenographers is utterly contemptible and disgusting. But that’s what they’re there for. Thanks.
Thank you for this very very nice and beautiful report to use Trumpspeak. Your ancestors probably held grudge against the USSR and Russia but you came to visit.
Thank you for sharing this thoughtful review.
Well, while I liked your article I would like to make one point or two. 20 years ago my cousin went to visit Canada he also had a 30 day visit, and then when he applied for extension for extension, he receive another 30 days and was told that he has to leave before those 30 days expire. This is what happens to legal visitors.
On the other note, my was talking to some friend of hers and was told that one has no problem getting in to Canada if one has $120,000 in one’s pocket and claims intention to start some business. Or just claim refugee status. Ah, one more thing did you know that Toronto is not a white city anymore? Just like London and many other cities in “multi-tulti” countries controlled by the likes of Soros and his NWO Globalists.
I am french and living Paris.
And I visited Russia last year.
I share your opinion.
Paris has become a stinking place.
Too expensive and too difficult to live for the average family. Surrounded by suburbs with majority Arabic Muslim and African Black Population.
Known figures related to genetic illness diagnosis in hospital put the average birth in France from people with non European ethnic origin at 75% in Paris area and surrounding.
40% in France Globally.
France as in the imagination in other countries, does not exist anymore. That situation is irreversible and will only accentuate in the future.
A progressist motto is “le vivre ensemble” meaning “the living together”.
It is heard and everywhere from schools with papers provided to parents to talk shows.
That motto is IMHO distatefull. As it translates the absence of shared destiny.
Population of different origins are not asked to share history or identity or common destiny.
They are only required to only “live together”.
That is the sum total of the empty French Political project. Please “live together” without murdering each other…
Truly France has become a non country.
It is dissolving.
And has already ceased to exist.
Even if it is not official yet and there are still sole remains.
Whereas when I visited Russia, one seems at peace with his/her neibourgh and still share the same destiny.
As said by other posts here.
If one look for peace one needs to be in Russia in coming difficult decades.
Anonymous
Yes, you are right. France is, alas, dissolving. I visited Paris in 1971 with my parents and younger brother, the Eiffel Tower being, of course, the chief attraction. Back in 1971 Paris was a French city, made up of French people. Now I am watching videos of Paris and cannot believe what is going on. Immigrants were and are accepted as if they wanted to assimilate, the last thing they would do. They want the French to assimilate to their ways. Remarkable.
And yes, Russia is the future. Russia has one advantage over the West, and that’s incredible patience. What is Putin doing ? He is building up the infrastructure, quietly and efficiently. About two years ago I read a comment from a reader who stated that she met French lady who emigrated to Russia from Paris, as she could not accept any more of what was happening to her country. This trend will increase with the passage of time.
As for Russians, some are still overwhelmed by the mentality from the communist period, when everybody thought that the West was paradise. Russians are now waking up, realizing what is going on. They will wake up even more when the West faces Judgement Day, unable to postpone paying it’s debts. Russia was “lucky” in having Yeltsin and liberal economics. The people subsequently realized that what they got was wealth for the few and poverty for the majority. This they cannot forget, a point which keep’s Putin in power. Unfortunately Ukraine did not go through this process, the people in 2014 foolishly believing that they would get a Western standard of living, as they understood it. What they got was oligarchs and the plunder of the country. Now the bulk of the population regret’s that coup d’etat of 2014.
Finally, I would like to close my comment with what one analyst stated some years back. In 19th century USA, there was saying which went like this:”Go West young man”. Soon a time will come when a similar saying will emerge:”Go East young man”. This is a clear reference to Russia. It’s going that way.
Thanks for the tour, Alexandra. I wonder about those Russians who are so anxious to live in the west or want to make Russia like the west. They need to read and think carefully on your description of Paris. This could also be many U.S. cities. While Canadian cities are likely not as bad we are on track to follow them. Mention of the loudest people in Paris being ‘the exceptional people’, as if they owned the place, along with the suicide gates seems like a metaphor of what the west really has become. You want to live in the west and live like us? Welcome to death!
If I was younger Russia would be my wish to move to. At 65, living in a tiny cabin in rural, central Ontario, I guess I’m not doing too badly. I’d rather live here, as humble as it is, than live in a big city.
Excellent article and an erudite take on the differences in culture between Russia and France. The first, and only voluntary, time I was in France was in summer of ’62 when my father took me for a visit. I was young then, quite young, but had read rather more than a bit of France and what a shining beacon of light and culture Paris was. What a surprise, and an eye opener. It was exactly as you described albeit minus the huge influx of non French now living in that berg. The Old Man and I could not wait to get out of there and head a little east.
I have lived in Russia since summer of 2006. Your description of Moskau and Leningrad…oops, St. Petersburg… is spot on for most of Russia. Our city was administered by Kiev for a long time, but it never lost it’s Russian flavor and culture, nor did it lose it’s yearning to become ‘Russian’ again during the 25 years of orcs.
There are plenty of problems anywhere you go, but for the foreseeable future Russia is the up and coming culture as I watch from afar the culture that raised me and to an extent educated me slowly spiral down in to nothingness, rotting from inside. Problem is not too many years ago Russia was in that death spiral, too, and it’s only by the Grace of God that President Putin became what he is, actually always was, and he alone has managed to reverse that dance macabre and change Mat Rossiya to a vibrant, living and growing culture.
On the other hand, emigration to Russia is very difficult, and I’ll qualify that with unless you have heavy pockets and/or a skill that Russia not only needs but can use. Ergo, the flood of ’emigrants’, read migrants, who were allowed to destroy what was left of ‘Olde Europe’ will never be allowed to come to Russia and destroy her. Period.
Auslander
Author
An Incident On Simonka paperback edition. https://www.amazon.com/dp/1696160715 NATO Is Invited To Leave Sevastopol, One Way Or The Other.
Never The Last One https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00ZGCY8KK A deep look in to Russia, her culture and her Armed Forces, in essence a look at the emergence of Russian Federation. Available in paperback within days.
Wonderful reportage.
Certainly reinforces my wish to make an extended visit to Russia.
Are there any travel agents here who can arrange a trip for Saker commenters???
Starting with a Russian language boot camp for a week in a nice hotel on the shore of a lake or maybe in Socchi. Or, on the Black Sea shore of Crimea. To learn how to say please and thank you!
Katherine
“Emigration should be simplified and made easier,”
Absolutely no, no, no. It should be made even difficult to emigrate to Russia. Mother Russia should be shielded from mass immigration and degenerate West and Westerners.
@Prospeller
Isn’t gay parades, gender-fluid garbage plus Avogadro’s number of infallible Western ultra-super-duper revolutionaries precisely what Russia needs? Please do reconsider :-D
On November 1 this year Russia simplifies, by introducing the law, dramatically, the obtaining of Russia’s green cards (with further citizenship) for carriers of Russian language and culture, and Russians who were born in the USSR–a long-long overdue decision.
Mother Russia should be shielded from mass immigration and degenerate West and Westerners
Westerners will and are already immigrating to Russia, and those are not your Eurocreeps, be them Boers or Germans, especially Russian Germans and native East Germans many of who are considering of immigrating to Russia. For many Western people Russia will become a refuge.
Alexandra’s most vivid account of contemporary Paris instantly reminds one of what Maxim Gorky wrote to his wife about Petrograd in 1917:
”This is no longer a capital, it is a cesspool. No one works, the streets are filthy, there are piles of stinking rubbish in the courtyard, it hurts me to say how bad things have become.”
Maybe Alexandra should come to terms with the fact that what she refers to as a ’bunch of thugs killing for no good reason’ (the Red Army):
a) purged Russia of the filth and squalor of degenerate aristocracy and its foreign backers
b) in view of (a) killed for excellent reasons
Bottom line: The prospects for the future of the Russians as opposed to what’s in store for the Euro-trash speak for themselves.
I enjoyed very much reading this article. I´ll quote this:
“It was very interesting and quite moving to see at the museum dedicated to the Great Patriotic War a young mother telling about the war to her 4 or 5-year-old daughter, about the horrors of that war and at the Artillery Museum a young father with his two young sons teaching them about the different guns, explaining the calibers and ranges of the different types of canons but also about what war means. This knowledge is passed on from one generation to the next and there is no doubt that the next generation will respect the sacrifice that their ancestors made.”
This was very touching to me, and that´s why I will repeat until get tired: “-Don´t mess with the Russians..!”
Many thanks..!
(…BTW, I´m Argentine, and an Eternal Lover from this people… :) )
People from Eastern Europe are obsessed with the West and the Western quality of life.
People from Russia and Eastern Europe unfortunately have a deep-rooted inferiority complex. They think they have to go to the West, they believe paradise is waiting for them there.
The Russian government must raise living standards, salaries and pensions. This is the only way for people to stop looking at the West as the promised land. If the Russian government does not do it, everything that they have achieved so far will be useless.
People generally have short memory and not many remember what happened in Russia during 1990s. Especially young generations do not know and do not care.
They want high life standard NOW and it is impossible to explain to them that it is not possible or whatever.
Putin and Russian government are in the crossroads now. They have to do something till 2030 if they want to prevent after them somebody to come to power and sell Russia to the Western oligarchy again under excuse of establishing so-called democracy and with great promises of beautiful life standard if they sell Russia to the West.
We know how that turned to be in 1990s. And it can happen again. I hope that Putin know that.
Western criminals know what they are doing when trying to contain Russia and to stop its development. It is long term strategy.
@Bosnian Croat
You are correct that the memories of the horrible 1990s in Russia fade. Fortunately, cynical as it may sound, this is made up for by the stunning success story of Poroshenko’s and Mr. Greenclown’s Ukraine, further improving that country’s ”image” by bona fide Nazi scum. Ukraine went from being the most industrialized part of the USSR to a fourth or fifth world country. This is playing out on a daily basis.
http://springtimeofnations.blogspot.com/2014/04/donetsk-rebels-novorossiya-fits-russian.html?m=1
Hope your trip is goong well.! I realise this piece is by Roth but given you are crossing Europe thoughts on changeability in the years to come of state borders may be do something worth considering.!
Thanks, Alexandra!
On the Moscow churches, we were there five years ago and did the usual tour of them, such as Christ the Savior. What struck me was all the young men doing the rounds of the icons, kneeling, crossing themselves, etc. Also, how many locals were in the churches at seemingly all hours during the week.
Glad to hear that the attractive metro stations now have English announcements. Five years ago the station signs were in Cyrillic while the guide books were in an English version of the Russian text, which didn’t help.