Moscow, Moscow! I love you more, when I know that I might leave you. I escape your back courtyards, your homogeneous inhabitants, your chain bars and food outlets, your rivers and parks. I might miss your steely winters and tepid summertimes, and your cheeky babushkas, even your refreshingly naive kids. Maybe even your impregnable communications and quirkiness. You are gentler than your reputation for really only a few fearful lions rule your jungle. You are passive like your compatriots. Bent to shape by year upon year of tyrant after tyrant. Oh how you keep on choosing them! Will I miss you? Maybe just a bit. I’ll come back, and probably you’ll be the same. We met unsure of one another, we were never lovers but we part as friends. For now, до свидания
I wake before the alarm. Brush my teeth. Grab my things. Adieu ma cherie. Bisou, bisou! The uber delivers me to Sheremtyovo and it‘s all fairly normal bar the temperature check and obligatory mask. I get on a large steel tube with many Russians and we cross the skies to London. Something is grandly amiss in the capital. And the wider British psyche is so clearly damaged. The metroplois is running at maybe an eighth of it‘s usual capacity. And, everywhere masks are being worn. And signs are warning. And theirs is the stench of fear. What the fuck have they done to this once thriving place? Can it ever recover? I drop my Visa application with the Russians. No return for me otherwise. It goes well. And, once done, I just want to get out. Home beckons. It‘s been over 5 months. I am thoroughly ripped off by my trip to town.
So, back out to Heathrow. It is so very very quiet. The flight is how flying is now. Everyone wearing masks. You order your meal and make it last as long as possible… because of course you can‘t wear a mask when you eat or drink. I get to Zürich late. So, whole journey from Moscow without any real checks about the bat monkey virus or quarantines. All the news stories are basically sensationalism. All the government bravado just a front. I fall asleep on the train to Basel and get woken up by cleaner a good half an hour after we arrive. they think I‘m drunk. And so begins my three weeks in Switzerland. It goes by so so fast. I don‘t see so many people. Keep myself mostly to myself and get the jobs I need to do done. And, before long I‘m getting my Covid test to make the journey home.
Armed with a negative result I fly from Zürich. I need to use my result within 72 hours. Zürich airport is like a ghost town. I get there around 6 and there are only 5 flights left for the evening. I fly into a still fearful London leering through it‘s masks. But, three weeks later it feels a little livlier. It is late when I get my airbnb room. I am trying to work out the code for the door to the fat flabby slapping sounds of fucking from my neighbours. The next morning I walk to the Russian Visa Centre. London is still strange. Many shut up businesses. Some signs of dead businesses being renovated and turned over. Pheonixes planning a glorious rise from the ashes. A city this big cannot go on being this dead. But the British are sick, in their heads. It could be a while.
I catch a train out to the airport, and finally a plane back to Russia. The only health check I receive during the whole journey is upon entering Russia. A group of kids taking the paper forms we had to fill out on the plane. Paper forms? Really? The whole thing is a farce. So much fuss and so much disaster. And, when you look at the real raw statistics, it is all for nothing. A waste. A political front with no real conviction put in place to satisfy a terrified public. What has become of us? We are not sleeping. We are on life support.
If you really think it makes a difference. I want my promised hundred year plus. It‘s my basic human right. Otherwise what‘s all this hassle really for. I want my billion dollar yacht. My equality with the global elite. Equality: what every ape wants. While also wanting to beat all the other apes. I may go flying soon. Passing amongst the Earth‘s cowering masses, an unvaccinated judaeic angel of death spreading malcontent far more potent than any damned virus. It‘s in my head. It‘s in my head.
We get up and drive into the boonies again. Our not so little mini bouncing along the not always smooth Russian roads and their unpredictable traffic. Six hours out and one pitstop: Kostroma. It‘s dark on arrival. In the morning everything feels kind of rushed and disorganised. We are 8. That kind of travelling is always shambolic. After a boat ride we end up driving to a place called Plyos. Covid is still causing restrictions in this little village so our lunch feels a little weird and I can sense the locals are a bit tense. It‘s picturesque. Our group splits. It’s been fun but thankfully we are left to ourselves. On the way out we stop at the weirdly named “Private Visit“ (Частный визит). If you ever pass this way go there. It‘s a charming and beautiful boutique hotel set in fantastical gardens with a quaint restaurant. Sadly we didn‘t have lunch there. Anyways. Back in Kostroma it‘s late when we arrive. So, next day we have a wander around. It‘s not as delapidated as some other towns I‘ve been to here. There‘s a nice market and some good cafes and restaurants. Normally it‘s probably full of tourists, but I think we shared it with the locals. That’s not to say it was very quiet. Then back in the car. Next stop Yaroslavl. It was once capital of Russia apparently. We walk a little. The centre is quaint. Worth a visit for sure. Seen it. Back in the car. We then drive to Rostov. It‘s not on the usual tourist route. Strangely we couldn‘t book anywhere here other than a kind of hostel place run by an alcoholic. I‘m sure Rostov has a few of those. Beautiful views of the lake and Kremlin And a certain charm, but it could do with a renovation or at least a damn thorough clean… it wasn‘t so cheap either. Anyway. You can kill a day around Rostov. And next day we did. If you want good food go to Hotel Bravis. It’s on the the edge of town but near a rather spectacular monastery. Russia has lots of spectacular monasteries. To be honest they can get a bit samey. I suppose you could say the same about any country. And that was it. Long drive home into the usual heavy Moscow traffic. Nice trip with a lot of impressions. I liked it.
Кострома / Плёс / Ярославль / Ростов – July 2020
Zeiss Superikonta A 530 / Portra 800 / Fomapan 400
An Ian Simpson record. His gentle charasmatic voice set over minimalist folk pop. I reviewed it nearly 18 years ago. The blink of an eye. And everything changes. Again and again. Different times now. Like my 5th life. They say a cat gets nine. A middle aged man wondering round Moscow with a camera. A voyeur. With but a few friends and little legacy, but good ones nonetheless. And I am settled in my sixth decade. How did that happen? And, are we awake? We citizens. We prisoners of our greater ideology. Or do we sleep in our fear. Perhaps I should go and throw molotov cocktails at random figures of authority. For surely silence is complicity. Give me a cause. Give me a cause!
I smashed my phone. Or so I thought. As I went down the stone stairs inside our building to go on my habitual midnight run through Gorky Park. The stairs are dimly lit. My phone fumbled clumsily out of my hands then flapped down screenside like a dead fish on a chopping board. I bought my phone cheap just over a year ago.
We have an ongoing battle – she and I.
I am anti apple. She isn‘t. She has had two phones in 8 years. I’ve had four. All cheap. One I lost in a Crimean Taxi near Yaltra. And one the battery was only a little too quick running out of charge. Another fell into the toilet. I actually still have it and it still works. Actually, I think that‘s the one with the battery problems. The current one has two sims. I need this just now having a foot in two countries.
And the current one is on it‘s second screen. It also has a dodgy power plug. Of course when I saw it had cracked, I asked myself, to repair or replace. I hate to lose an argument. I want a phone that can last forever! So, I spend all day looking for a new phone. I find rugged phones. You can drop them from great heights and even take them swimming. And, after too much online time, I find THE PHONE. I plan my great adventure to the outskirts of the Moscow Metropolis.
And, as I am about to go on this odyssey, I tell her. I had kept quiet about my phone breaking because of this running competition we have. She asks to see my phone and then strips off the cracked protective glass she had put on months ago without me noticing. The screen is completely intact.
Hmmmm….
Anyway, anyway. We went to a kiddies park. I travelled through town a little. I shot a film. The pictures don‘t always match the words folks.
Zeiss Superikonta A 530 (c.1937) / Kodak Portra 400
Moscow July 2020.
During lockdown we took a couple of trips up to Lake Seliger. It‘s about 5 hours from Moscow in the direction of St Petersburg. I haven‘t been out of Moscow very much since getting here a year and a half ago. But after these trips I can say it really is worth exploring rural Russia. Ostashkov / Осташков is the largest town by the lake. There isn‘t much else there other than some small villages and a large monastry (Nilo-Stolobenskaya Pustyn‘ / Нило-столобенская пустынь) which is something of a pilgramage site for orthodox christians.
Ostashkov must have been a real pearl when it was built in the 1800s. It has beautiful architecture in its centre and you can see that once it was a prosperous place. Years of communism and then the corrupt recent government have not been kind to it unfortunately. Russians don‘t really appreciate some of the cultural heritage they have. Which is strange given their strong nationalism. Most of the old buildings could easily disappear altogether if someone doesn‘t take action. Some have been renovated and are cared for. But the delapidation does add a special and unique atmosphere to the place. The lake itself is big and quite beautiful with some great areas of solitude and nature. There be bears here!
It looks like Russia is making moves to relax its ridiculous Visa program. Hopefully more tourists coming and their Euros/Dollars will motivate the locals into caring better for places like this.
I took some pictures on expired film. The black and white film (Ilford and AGFA) expired in the mid 80s and early 90s. The colour (Kodak Porta) expired around 2011. I used my Zeiss Superikonta A 530. A 4.5 by 6 folding camera made in the 1930s.
In Moscow we have been living in lockdown for nearly 3 months – and tomorrow they will lift most of the restrictions. I arrived here mid March and they locked Moscow down about a week later. It‘s been a strange ride.
I left a Switzerland quickly going into lockdown. It felt apocalyptic. I was on the last normal Moscow flight from Zürich. Geneva Moscow stayed open for another week. The airport felt fairly normal to be honest. Maybe a slight air of nervousness about people when it became difficult to social distance. Maybe a tenth of people were wearing masks. The flight was full. All returning Russians as far as I could see – apart from me. But normally the flight is like this.
When I got to Moscow I was expecting checks of some kind coming in. But there was nothing. I caught the train into town and while going down escalators to the metro managed to rip my arm open by slipping as I was going down the stairs. My backpack tipped my balance over as I ran. My hand was cut and bleeding and further up I had bloody trails from the metal escalator stairs embedded into my arm. I still have the marks now. It‘s nothing to do with lockdown of course. But it stuck in my mind and perhaps enhanced my feeling of vulnerability.
Over my first week back it was still possible to eat in restaurants, cafes and bars. They had socially distanced the tables in some places. I could still go to the photo shop that develops my films. It felt like a fragile normality. By this time Switzerland had largely closed down. And then on the Sunday night, the city closed the parks. I run through the park opposite our block every evening and I had to change my usual route. They also taped off all the children‘s playgrounds and benches in the streets. By Wednesday we were in full lockdown with all restaurants, cafes and bars shut. Forewarned I had a haircut the day before. The situation felt very dystopian. I felt angry and have the opinion the measures were pure folly and still feel that opinion now.
Moscow went very quiet that week and for several weeks afterwards. Technically, unless you were an essential worker, you would be fined for leaving the house. Digital QR codes were introduced that could be ordered online if you needed to go anywhere. We stayed mainly at home going out each day for a coffee and a croissant or to buy food. Our favourite cafe and some other places started doing takeaway. I still ran every night – just not my usual route. I saw plenty of police but they never bothered me. In fact unless I went up to the underground, which went from being a hub of activity to complete desertion, it was hard to notice anything was very different.
We live in a fairly posh part of Moscow and I think the police didn‘t bother enforcing so strongly here incase they pulled up someone connected to someone with influence and got themselves into trouble. On nice days people walked around quite freely and there were even queues at the places doing takeaway. Apparently the government had installed a facial recognition system which automatically sent out fines or caused a police response. I heard tales of it, but never saw evidence of it first hand.
We ordered the QR code and made a couple of drives for groceries to a big shopping centre a couple of miles away which had a large Auchan in it. It really felt like an adventure. The roads, normally packed, were definitely quieter. But Auchan was incredibly busy. I‘d seen empty shelf pictures from the UK. But here there was no sign of shortages or panic buying.
We were also up in the centre of town near red square once. It was eerily quiet. Almost nothing open and very few people in the street. And another day we travelled to one of the tall concrete block suburbs of Moscow to collect an official document we needed. Anyone who was in the street there was wearing a mask and gloves in total compliance with the government orders. And the office we visited checked your temperature on the way in. A lot of people live in these suburbs, but it was very quiet. So everyone was certainly sitting at home in the pokey little flats stacked high into the skies around us.
In Russia a lot of people have a second home. It‘s called the Dacha. It‘s a bit like an allotment in the UK. Normally it‘s a rudimentary building set in a small garden. But they can also be quite sophisticated, very comfortable luxurious houses in a park. I find this phenomenon very strange. The government allowed QR codes for people wanting to visit their Dachas. So, we took advantage of it three times, renting an AirBNB by a lake five hours drive out of Moscow. It was very beautiful and a something new in my Russia experience. This far out, apart from closed restaurants and bars, it really was very hard to notice the lockdown. Hardly anybody wore masks and life appeared to be continuing normally. It was a good break for us to clear our mainly house bound heads and reset a bit. We found the small cafes in the monasteries were open. Of course we took advantage. It felt like an amazing treat.
There were quite a few strange inconsistencies reported during lockdown. The QR codes caused massive queues at the Metros for the first couple of days until they decided to abandon checking them at the Metro entrance. One day they decided to allow all massage parlours and beauty shops to open. But the mayor said you could be fined for going. Putin also declared the lockdown as a national period of non working. Like some kind of holiday.
Flatbound I try to record new music, but find surprisingly little time to do it. It‘s hard for me working on music when I am with people. I need to disappear into my zone for at least 3 hours at a time. I have managed to at least start the next record with one song put down and another nearly finished. I tried to make croissants. But they were more like something between a doughy blob and shortbread. I have had some success with my resolution to do free standing handstands though. I need a wall next to me for security, but a quarter of the time I am pulling them off without it. I just need to get up to nearly 100% then I can start doing them away from the wall. And I have kept taking pictures on film: around the flat; in the neighbourhood; on our escapes. I managed to get the colour chemistry to develop them too.
And, so life has been thus for nearly three months. Putin has an important constitutional change that the people must vote on. His approval rating is dropping to it‘s lowest ever in his 20 years in power. So, suddenly, even though all the evidence points to no real easing up of Corona reinfections, they have lifted most of the restrictions and presented a clear plan for lifting the rest of the measures. I‘m happy. I find the lockdown illogical and more damaging than the virus. I don‘t want to explain my logic behind that here though. Just to throw a little light on how life has been during these strange weeks of lockdown for me here in Russia.
I still ache to go on a long solo road trip in my MGB, but at least the lockdown has finally lifted. We can breathe a little easier. The Moscow summer has started too and its people are out in the streets. In two weeks we can even eat dinner in a restaurant. We plan to go straight to Hachapuri. Things will feel normal. I can‘t leave yet. I need to be sure I can get a Visa which lets me back in again before I can leave. So the road trip must wait.
Here’s a small selection of my film photos from the time. Taken on a Contax T, a Olympus XA, a Bessa R2S and my favourite: the Zeiss Superikonta A 530.
Sheremetova Airport, empty shortly before lockdown
Metro shortly before lockdown
Metro before Lockdown
Metro, shortly before lockdown
Metro, shortly before lockdown
Moscow cafe, just before lockdown. Tables socially distanced.
Shortly before lockdown, busy streets.
Hamovniki Moscow, shortly before Lockdown
Snowy Hamovniki Moscow, Lockdown
Moscow Hamovniki benches blocked off, Lockdown
Our local grocery store was rather quiet during lockdown suprisingly. The larger Auchan was packed. I should have taken a photo.
Workies not quite socially distancing, Hamovniki Moscow, Lockdown
Moscow Mitino, Lockdown
Moscow street during lockdown. Normally jammed.
Wet Streets Hamovniki Moscow, Lockdown
Towards Gagarinski from Hamovniki Moscow, Lockdown
One of the few mask wearers Hamovniki Moscow, Lockdown
Typical Russian with his plastic bag, Hamovniki Moscow, Lockdown
Hungry Pigeons after my croissant, Hamovniki Moscow, Lockdown
Me by the river, Hamovniki Moscow, Lockdown
Moscow Business Centre, Lockdown
Wet and bumpy road to Seliger
House by Lake Seliger
Fisherman’s Armchair, Lake Seliger
Birds Lake Seliger
Lake Seliger
Woman half in half out at the monastry near Pereslavl-Zalesskiy
Ladas parked in Pereslavl-Zalesskiy
Birds at the lake by Pereslavl-Zalesskiy
By the lake at Pereslavl-Zalesskiy
My recording gear
Our back yard Hamovniki Moscow, Lockdown
Colourful women, Hamovniki Moscow, Lockdown
Hints of summer Hamovniki Moscow, Lockdown
Inside my MG… now sitting in a garage the last 3 months 3000 miles away….
Where is Gordypops? 