Glorious Victories of Russian Arms

There is nothing so subject to the inconstancy of fortune as war.

~Miguel de Cervantes

On Saturday, I went to the Donskoy Monastery. Prince Dmitri Donskoy encamped here across the river from a huge Tartar army bent on sacking Moscow. In the morning, he discovered that the Tartars had broken camp during the night and slipped away. To this day, no one knows why. Dmitri was pretty grateful regardless of the reason, and ordered a monastery built on the spot. To the continual credit of whatever force he attributed the victory to – the Tartars never again came that close to Moscow. That’s what I call Mojo.

The monastery has always had a strong connection with the military. In fact, on the grounds today are several remnants of the armored division that the church donated to the war effort in WWII. Mighty noble move, helping out the soviet regime that was pretty intent on crushing religion in Russia.

That’s Donskoy’s other claim to fame – final resting place of the Patriarch Tikhon. Tikhon was head of the Russian Orthodox Church during the Bolshevik Revolution – a particularly bad time to be a Christian leader. He was hounded out of Moscow to the Monastery, where the Bolsheviks seized him during a bloody siege. Long story short – he joined a long line of martyrs for the faith. There’s a wonderful fresco of his story in the gatehouse tunnel entering the monastery.

Anyway, it’s a beautiful place in that partially dilapidated, ramshackle Russian way. There’s a cemetery surrounding the cathedral that’s a jumble of impressive headstones commemorating impressive personages. Despite my mid-Saturday visit on a sunny, warm day I was the only non-Russian anywhere near Donskoy. No tour buses, no chattering tourists wandering through the church. Kind of refreshing, really, given the summer tourist season.

On my way back to the Metro, I passed through a little street market where I noticed a booth selling knives. My kitchen is only sparingly fitted out, which means all I have is a paring knife. The vendor was a kindly older woman. She explained that the knives were from Brazil. But she assured me that they were made by Germans who lived in Brazil. Now, knife-making would seem to me to be a relatively low-tech endeavor that pretty much any post-stone age society would have the means to master. But apparently, just being from Brazil wasn’t enough to vouchsafe the quality of such a product. It also had to be made by those exacting craftsmen the Germans.

Well, I wasn’t really sure she had just said “Germans”. So, in what came across as a skeptical tone of voice, I asked “Germans?” She replied “Yes, Germans. Anyway, I’ll give you a 10 ruble discount on every knife you buy.” Cool. Finally my weak language skills worked to my advantage.

The next day, similarly warm and sunny, I headed to Victory Park – a large complex jointly mourning and celebrating WWII. There’s a large square, a huge obelisk, and a statue of St. George slaying a dragon made of Nazi symbols.

The centerpiece is an enormous, luxurious museum. There’s an exhaustive display of memorabilia of all aspects of the war. There are impressive dioramas of all the major battles of the war. But most incredible are some of the memorial aspects of this building. A darkened hallway with 24 spot lit glass cases. In each, there are tomes of the names of the dead from given regions in the Soviet Union. Each case has a tally printed on it. I couldn’t keep up with the math – I had to read an exhibit that explained that they had stopped counting somewhere around 25 million names. They’re pretty sure its more. At the end of that hall is a hushed, darkened room containing a pieta like statue of the Mother Land mourning her fallen sons.

Even more impressive is the Hall of Glory – a huge vaulted room with the names of all the “Heroes of the Soviet Union” – analogous to our Medal of Honor - inscribed on the wall. In the center is a massive sculpture of a warrior with his helmet and olive branches in one hand, the other pointed to the heavens. Its impressive – and the sight of Russia’s most solemn military ceremonies. A real temple to the suffering of the people.

I sat at a café outside and had a beer. I also had “sooHARiki”, a traditional snack with beer. The word means “dry ones”. Essentially, they’re croutons. Well, not essentially – that’s exactly what they are. Except with russian-style flavors – I had caviar flavored croutons with my beer. Ahhh, lunch.