As I was flying back in the plane I asked myself what have I learned about Moscow?
Right away my mind was full of impressions, experiences, stories, history, etc.
I tried to sort out most the fundamental knowledge about Moscow in specific. First of all throughout the program I realized that Moscow is very different from the rest of Russia. One can learn about Russia through Moscow, but impossible to learn about Moscow through Russia. It is a city with its unique mentality and characteristic.
The main stages that I can fix in the development of Moscow start by the Muscovite Principality, then the Mongol invasion, then the czarist and imperial Russia, the Napoleonic invasion, freedom from serfdom, period of industrialization, revolutions, communism and the current post-communist period. These are the main historic periods that have impacted the city of Moscow.
In this journal entry I will write about my observations of the impact of communism and post-communism on the city's architecture. The communist era, itself, has few stages in the Moscow’s architecture. It is easy to tell the difference in buildings from Stalin’s epoch and the Khrushev era. The buildings of the Stalin era are mostly built for the nomenclature; they are built from yellow brick and are big and beautiful. The buildings of Khrushev era are square and plain with poor quality. The buildings of the 70s and 80s don’t have much differentiation, they are high-rises that are plain and at times with ugly balconies. The post communist era had added new sub-urban territory to Moscow that much resemble to typical western suburban neighborhoods. It has also added typical modern high-tech style buildings that have added a new face to the multi faced Moscow.
It is safe to say that major shaping of the city took place during the communist era. It is the building of main roads, subway, which is one of the most efficient and complex in the world and unique due to its architectural value. In other words, Moscow’s subway has stations that are equivalent to a museum of Soviet history and legacy. One can wonder why the Soviets have built their subway in such way? It was very costly during that period and yet they had to create something to differ from other world cities. I find that it is a true Russian-Moscow quality to show off magnitude from the rest of non Russians or non-Moscovites. It is an inferiority that occured due to historical backwardness.
I should also mention that large amount of monuments were erected throughout the city to enhance the communist presence. The most popular one is the Lenin’s monument, which nowadays can be found rarely in the city. Currently, the majority of the Soviet monuments can be found in the park behind the Kremlin. Presently the city has numerous monuments dedicated to most random purposes. Starting from the gigantic monument to Peter the Great (I think that a monument to Peter the Great belongs only to St. Petersburg even though he had done a lot for Moscow too) with a mistake (one of the flags of the ship that he stands on has a wrong emblem) and continuing with monuments to fairy tale heroes in Alexandrovsky park ( I found that some of the heroes did not even belong to Russian fairly tales).
I guess I understood why I relate Moscow to the city of my childhood. When I look at buildings in my hometown, I see more than buildings, by looking closely I recognize the history that is behind it. The same phenomenon started to happen in Moscow. I learned to read the city of Moscow by looking at its streets, buildings and monuments. I learned its history through its architecture. I am very happy that I have spent part of my summer walking on the streets of a city that has become part of me, part of Moscow has become forever mine.
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