    |
It’s over sixty years since the local population was brutally expelled from Konigsberg. Technically it was known as democide, something rather broader than genocide, since Poles and Lithuanians were packed off along with the Germans. So what’s happening now could be called domicide – the removal of the old houses. Every time I visit Svetlogorsk, there’s [...] Hotel Europe is St Petersburg’s foremost Grand Old Hotel, though you might not care to know what it was like when it was Grand New. St Petersburg’s winters are both wind and bone-chilling. So for turn of the century tourists, winter brought a welcome relief from the summer lice, fleas and flies, which swarmed [...]
This week, planning permission for Gazprom’s proposed Okhta Tower reached the beatings and arrests stage. There’s been ongoing controversy since 2006 but now Limonov’s people and Yabloko are lining up alongside the conservationists. Scuffles guaranteed. Quick recap: almost no-one has a good word to say about the Gazprom Tower. The Director of the Hermitage thinks it’s [...] Vitebsky Voksal was the first proper railway station in Russia, allowing Nicholas 1 to chug between St. Petersburg and the palace at Tsarkoe Selo. It was rebuilt in 1901 at a time when art nouveau, which Russians call modern style, was all the rage. Up until the revolution, extravagance was quite OK and the station has a bit [...] Bob Atchison’s history sites are well worth a click. Especially if you like to go, ‘hmmm I never knew that’. ‘St Petersburg In 1900‘ turns up a lot of trivia, in particular about St Peterburg’s most misunderstood church. It might look 16th century but it was brand spanking new back in 1900. At the time, locals found [...] |
    
 |
|
Copyright © 2010 St Petersblurb - All Rights Reserved |
||
