Monuments, Saint Petersburg

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May 9 is Victory Day in Russia.

It is the national equivalent to Memorial Day and Independence Day in the US -- but much more deeply celebrated. It is the date the Great War ended. And Saint Petersburg honors it. The day before I came across a band on a flat bed truck with re-enactors wearing Great War Russian military uniforms carrying old weapons who were dancing in the park.

On May 9 I watched the big ceremony from Red Square, Moscow on TV. A precision parade of Russian military might. I was fortunate to have my girlfriend translate the running color commentary for me.


After that: Piskaryovskoye Cemetary -- site of the anonymous graves of just some of those who died during the Siege of Leningrad (the former name of Saint Petersburg).

Stretched out over 10 or more acres were 186 mass common graves, each of which was 25 yards x 15 yards with a total of 420,000 civilians and 50,000 soldiers who had died and been buried without name (out of a total of 1.5 million from the City who died during the most lethal siege of a major city in modern history).

There is virtually no family in Saint Petersburg who had not had people in their family who died.

I used a zoom to capture this family coming to remember.

Peter Faberge was hired in Russia by the Czar to create godl easter eggs and they became ever associated with the Russian imperial eggs. They became famed all over the world.

In 1842 Gustav Fabergé opened a jewelry shop at Bolschaya Morskaya Street in St. Petersburg. The building still bears his name but it is no longer faberge.

Faberge Square was built by Metro Ladozhskaya. The statue of Faberge stands at 8 Faberge Square in front of a huge jewelry center. Inside the center you can find some modern faberge eggs and a lot of gold from all over Russia for sale.

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Famous tree also called European Larch (Larix decidua)for ship building, the first national forest by Peter the Great is near Roschino for the purpose of growing Larch.

The Lintula Larch Forest, is one of the most famous cultivated forests in northern Europe and it became part of the Unesco's World Heritage list in 1991.

The forest is 3 Kilometers from the center of Roschino and 63 km north-west of St Petersburg.
It was established in 1738 by order of Peter the Great to supply the Russian fleet with timber for shipbuilding.
Ferdinand Gabriel Fockel, a German forest expert, established the oldest stands in 1738–1750 with seed from the Province of Arkhangelsk.
Since then the area of the forest has expanded and now the total area of larch stands is 55.9 ha; 23.5 ha of the “old stands” established in 1738–1851 still remain.
The Lintula larch (Siberian Larch) stands were famous for their high yield and supplied wood for ship builidng since Peter the Great.

Nikolai Gogol wrote a well-known story called "The Nose" where the protagonist wakes to find his nose missing and wandering the city.

If you happen to be walking near Sennaya Ploschad you might look up and see
a wall-mounted statue called "Major Kovalyov's Nose" based on the Gogol story about a mis-placed now :)

The nose was erected in 1994 during of the "Zolotoi Ostap" festival of humor and satire.
It weighs about 100 kg and was reported missing in 2002, just like in the book! As of 2007 it is still there :)

After you see the Bronze Horseman, the most famous monument to Peter the Great, you can look for Mikhail Shemyakin's statue of Peter the Great.

Abstract and not so flattering, it may be hard to recognize at first.

You can go up to the czar and ask for a palace or even sit on his lap like Santa Claus, but don't expect anything but a cold touch :)

Shemyakin is an American sculptor of Russian roots presents the "alter ego" of Peter the Great. His abstract statue is in stark contrast to tradional realism in monuments and has stirred some controversy.

There are two Lomonosov Monument statues.
One full body statue is at the Academy of Sciences where he taught.
This bust is on Lomonosov square along the Fontanka River a few blocks west from Nevsky Prospect.

The small statue of a Siskin bird on the Fontanka River is one of the newer monuments inSt. Petersburg, installed in 1994.
It is said taht if you can drop a coin onto the siskin's perch you will be given your wish or some good luck :)
It must work, because there is often a crowd tossing coins!

On Kamennyi Island you can see Kamennoostrovsky Palace, the country house of Pavel I. The building was built in 1776-1784. It is the place where the last Polish king Stanislav August Ponyatovsky lived while in 1797-1801. Then it became the residence of Elena Pavlovna, the sister of Aleksander I, the Russian Emperor. Her guest here often was the famous Russian poet Aleksander Pushkin.