Expedition The Spine of Russia

Scandinavian colonists appeared on the shores of Lake Ladoga in the middle of the 8th century AD, a couple of centuries before the Slavs. Natives from Northern Europe founded a settlement, which later became known as the city of Staraya Ladoga. It was an important trading point on the way "from the Varangians to the Greeks", as evidenced by the beads and coins found here, dated to the first millennium. Rurik, as we learned, arrived here in 862 and made Staraya Ladoga his capital. From here he moved to Novgorod, and then to Kyiv, and his descendants laid the foundation for the ancient state of Kievan Rus.

Text: Paul Richardson, Nadezhda Grebennikova Photo: Mikhail Mordasov, Nikon D810, 35/1.4

(Total 18 photos)

We examined the fortress and the city center, and then drove a dozen kilometers from Staraya Ladoga to Novaya Ladoga. There we went into the forge: smoky, dimly lit, with wires hanging from the ceiling and piles of crumpled metal - a real photographer's dream. The master himself, Leonid Baluev, is a good-natured and endearing person. He is taciturn, it is felt that he is holding back, although he is ready to tell more. “Normally, people don’t tend to dislike each other,” Baluev said when talking about tensions in international relations these days. — Several Ukrainians work with us, and we get along well. No swearing or reproaches - everything is fine.

I noticed that the world is a complex thing. “What the world is is easy to explain,” he replied. “Everything was described long ago and very accurately – in the Bible.”

There are two troubles in Russia - fools and roads. I recalled this often-cited witticism near St. Petersburg, when our car was winding and tossing up on a country road, consisting mainly of potholes and, to a lesser extent, of asphalt. Poor Kukisvumchorr! (We named the third member of our expedition Kukisvumchorr, the VW Polo, which takes us on and off the road).

We were getting to a man who might have been a fool. Ataman of the St. Petersburg Cossack Society is trying to build a Cossack farm somewhere in the wilderness near St. Petersburg. There, the chieftain erected a monument to Vladimir Putin - the Russian leader appears in the form of a Roman emperor. The unveiling of the monument took place this year and provoked an avalanche of foreign journalists, who were punished for their curiosity by an exhausting road.

However, Andrei Polyakov is not a fool at all. Yes, he is with his cockroaches in his head, as is the case, for example, with modern apologists for the idea of a flat Earth. Or those who advocate the theory that Barack Obama was born outside the United States, which deprives him of the right to be president.

Polyakov has his own thing: we had a rather tough argument on the subject of Alaska. He insisted that there was no documentary evidence that Russia actually sold Alaska to America and that America paid the bill. “I read this on the Internet,” he admitted after I told him bluntly that I had seen with my own eyes a genuine canceled check issued by Congress in payment for Alaska.

Yakov Somov is a generator of energy and enthusiasm. A stocky blond with rich, shoulder-length hair, a mustache and a goatee, wearing a T-shirt that says Live Long and Prosper (“Live Long and Prosper”). He has found his life's work and is succeeding in it. We are located in the famous St. Petersburg Lyceum No. 239, whose list of graduates includes a fantastic number of well-known mathematicians, techies and humanities.

We get to Somov's studio by passing through the main entrance of the Lyceum building. Under his roof, Yakov and his wife Alexandra Skorodumova have been creating Lectorium, the largest online course system in Russia (MOOC - Massive Online Open Course), for seven years. MOOC is an innovation in the field of higher education, a learning platform where tens of thousands of students can listen to the lectures of one teacher. They study in a mode convenient for them, try themselves in different disciplines and learn their own capabilities.

To date, Lectorium has created forty scientific courses - from biodynamics to art history, from mathematics to engineering. The archive now contains about 3,200 lectures, all of which are available online. Forever. And free.

Have I already said that Somov is a man-fire? He had to make a lot of effort to stand still for five minutes while they take his portrait. Fortunately, Michael worked quickly.

At the end of the second day of our stay in St. Petersburg, we sat in a cozy bar on the 18th floor of the Azimut Hotel and admired the breathtaking panorama of the city over a glass of tea. Literally. Tea was prepared for us by tea sommelier Valeria Miloslavskaya. The company she works for (Tea Ine Chai) sells black, red, green, white, herbal and alcoholic teas that are prepared in the intricate yet meditative Chinese way.

Valeria is a third-year student studying business management, she took special courses for a year to become a tea sommelier. She prepared wonderful jasmine tea for us, while showing us how to properly heat the kettle so as not to shock the tea leaves. She brewed tea by pouring: she poured a little boiling water into a glass vessel and, covering it with a lid, shook it to mix, and then poured the drink into another teapot. And so it was repeated six or seven times. The first portion was poured out - the tea was thus prepared and purified. The second infusion reveals the smell, the third reveals the taste, the fourth reveals the benefits, and so on.

A very relaxing way to end a long Petersburg day. Golden sparks of the setting northern sun flickered in glass cups filled with excellent jasmine tea.