russia: back to kazan

 

The first year I lived in Russia I visited Kazan with Bo and Claire. We visited in April, and to be honest, when we left we felt as if we'd seen everything. It was basically because of social media that I learned about quite a few more places to visit in and around Kazan that made me put it back on the list of places to visit in Russia. During our visit in April it was still cold and windy, so the chance to go back in summer made for an interesting contrast.

Kazan was my first night train and overnight stay trip during the pandemic. Yes, I was a bit scared, pretty much the entire time. There weren't as many options for trains, because not as many of them were running. There also weren't as many options for accomodation, but this time I was searching for a place just for me, not for three people.

When I booked my train tickets I put in the city name, then clicked on the best option. Without realizing it, my arrival train was scheduled to come into the train station in Kazan that we did not see last time. 

I was glad I looked at my ticket just before arrival time, as well as looking at the map to see where we were. If I hadn't done both of those, I would've missed my stop, whoops.

Like a number of cities in Russia, Kazan has two big train stations. Also like a number of cities in Russia, the stations in Kazan have several names, and it isn't always easy to figure out which one is being referred to. The signs on the fronts of the stations in Kazan say Kazan-1 and Kazan-2. But your ticket says something like Kazan glavny, or Kazan Vosstanie. In other words, there is no obvious connection with which station you need. Sigh.

My train arrived at Kazan-2, which is basically on the edge of Kazan. Since it was good weather (though already pretty hot at the early hour of 0800) I decided to walk into town. It was a long walk, but oh well. I got to see a big concrete wall with a profile of Lenin's head, which had the nifty propaganda slogan that translates to 'communism is inevitable.' Like most Americans, I giggled to myself at how 'accurate' that is currently.

As I kept going, I got to one of the more unique buildings in the city, the government acronym transliterates to ZAGS. 

It is labeled as a family and community center, and based on what I've seen in other cities, I think this is the government office where you register your marriage, and deal with other family related concerns.

To me, this ZAGS building looks like a giant cauldron on a big pedestal. On each corner there are 'dragons,' I think they are part of the city representatives. All in all, it is very eye catching, you can't help but wonder what you're seeing. It sits right on the river, there is a nice view of the kremlin on the other side of the river.

By this point I was already feeling dehydrated, and sweating up a storm, but still had at least 30 minutes more to walk to get to my accomodation. Crossing the bridge over the Kazan River felt like I was baking in the direct sun. Ugh.

I was thrilled when I finally got to my accomodation. There was no air con, but there were fans, and the moving air felt amazing. I took a couple hours to cool down, charge my electronics, and change clothes.

One of the reasons I came back to Kazan was to see a colourful religious spot a friend of mine had visited a couple years ago. I read my guidebook, where it was listed, I'm not sure why we missed it last time. Oh well. The bus going out to this church doesn't come as regularly as some of the other city buses, and there is no shade at the bus stop, but it was cheap and a direct ride, so I was okay with waiting a bit.

Everyone on the bus was wearing a mask, no one on the streets wore a mask. I'd just come from Moscow, where already less than half of the people using public transport were wearing masks, let alone wearing them correctly, so it was a big contrast.

The temple for all religions is unique, to say the least. The man who is building it wants it to be a place where anyone can come to worship. The best way to describe it is to say that each room is dedicated to a specific world religion, and decorated in the way that is typical for that faith.

There was a Buddhist area, an Orthodox Christian area, a Catholic area, an Egyptian area, and more. The building is not finished, though I'm not sure it will ever be finished. I don't know what the building schedule is for the current areas under construction.

As a photographer I loved it, because there was so much colour everywhere. Just after walking in the main entrance, (where you are 'encouraged' to give a 100 ruble donation,) there was a small area with stained glass, which is one of my loves in photography. I love trying to capture coloured light. There was a spiral staircase where one woman was having glamour photos taken. There was a big Buddha along one wall in another room.

The 'roof' was fantastic as well, as there were domes and spirals and colour everywhere. I wouldn't mind going back another time, to have better lighting in regards to the sun, and to take a photo without other people around.

I had to wait just as long to catch the bus going back into the city, oh well.

The next sight I wanted to see was something I saw on social media. Government buildings in Russia seem to be on opposite sides of the architectural divide, never in the middle. They are either huge and boring and almost put you to sleep, or are super eye-catching and make you want to take heaps and heaps of photos. This building definitely fell on the eye-catching side of things.

I've seen several translations of the name, but I'm going to go with Palace of Agriculture as the name of this building. It is big, with a large set of stairs leading up to the main point of the building: a huge tree like sculpture. Call it a tree of life if you will. As expected, I wasn't the only one who wanted to take a photo with the building.

I don't know if it was because of the hot weather, or the pandemic, or a combination, or something else, but there weren't too many people taking photos at this building, and everyone seemed content to wait in an informal queue. Yahoo!

My original plan had been to go to an art museum after the Palace of Agriculture, but by the time I was done taking my photos, I was dehydrated and hot again. I was tired, and starting to feel hangry, so food ended up being next on my list. The place I wanted to go ended up not being open, so I ended up at a random cafe. As far as I could tell, indoor dining wasn't yet open in Kazan, so places were limited to the small outdoor seating areas.

I felt better after eating, so I wandered over to an area of town with man made lakes. There is a fountain in one end of one of the lakes, and you can rent paddle boats and rowboats. 

There were plenty of people taking advantage of the evening temperatures to spend time with family and friends. There are walking paths all the way around the lakes, it was really nice. I ended up seeing the sky go through the full rainbow of sunset colours, including the night light reflections on the lake water.

I slept well that night, after drinking a whole bunch of water. The next morning it took me a while to get going, which is typical of the second day of most of my trips.

Continuing my tradition of trying to see all the Lenin statues in cities I visit, my first intended sight this morning was a Lenin statue. When I finally got there (over an hour later, after taking a look at dunes along part of the river,) I found a statue covered in gold paint. (I feel like most of the time he is painted silver, so this was unusual.) On the pedestal under the statue there was a propaganda phrase, this one translates to 'proletarians of all the countries unite.' Another propaganda slogan that has aged well. ;)

After taking a photo with the statue, I walked to Park Pobedy, or Victory Park. Along the way I stopped in a grocery store, to get ice cream, water, and enjoy the air conditioning. At one corner of the park was the huge WW2 memorial I expect in every Russian city. This one was in both Kazakh and Russian, but had the normal eternal flame, wreaths, and names carved into plaques.

Not far from the WW2 memorial were a series of tanks and planes. There were kids climbing on a few of them, but not as many as I normally see. (Probably because it was hot, and the metal would be painful to touch.)

There was a small lake in the park, where you could rent paddleboats, some of which were shaped by swans. Very cute. I didn't do this, but maybe I should next time.

From there I walked back toward the tourist center of town. Getting there took a while, including me sitting on a bench in the shade for a bit. Despite drinking more water than the day before I could feel dehydration coming on again.

This was another long walk, going through Turkish square and crossing the same bridge as the day before. 

I went down to the boardwalk area between the kremlin and the river, most of which was closed. There were some cute little stalls that are probably fun when they're open, or have good food, but all of that was still closed due to the pandemic. After taking another break on a bench in shade, I went back to the same place for dinner at which I'd eaten the day before.

After eating I walked to the closest metro stop and rode to the northern end of the line. As I was at the last stop, I looked at the signage in the station that says what can be found outside each exit. I noticed one of the signs mentioned Lenin, so imagine how thrilled I was when I found a statue of Lenin I hadn't known about previously!

After that quick photo opportunity, I got back on the metro, then ran to my hostel where I picked up my bag and walked to the train station. Thankfully this train was scheduled to depart from Kazan 1, which is in the city center.

Another great visit to another great city :)