Saint Petersburg is an ancient city with many remnants of its glorious past on display in its historic center. While I soaked in all of its beauty, I imagined the members of the imperial court, artists, and ordinary citizens that walk around the own city for inspiration, for respite from their worries, and to remind themselves the world is still beautiful despite its crumbling state.
Museum of memories
A museum is an imperfect microcosm of a vibrant past, a display of the best and the beautiful or in some cases, the tragic and the worst. Saint Petersburg’s palaces are now museums and are vessels for priceless paintings of tsars, tsarinas, princesses, princes, and European masters of a bygone era. In these you’ll find pieces of furniture made of the sturdiest wood, beds with colorful beddings, marble posts, elaborate tapestries, chandeliers, and portraits of the royal family occupying almost every room and passageway.
Whether it’s the Winter Palace, or Peterhof Palace, people queued to see the royalty’s opulent lifestyle. For a moment, they live the life they can’t have; the framed memories offer temporary escape from daily routines.
After Saint Petersburg’s nostalgic perspective, I set my sights on the city’s daily hustle and bustle. As I wove in and out of the city’s serpentine roads and canals, I saw some of life’s many constants; traffic, obnoxious drivers, never ending road constructions, graffiti, and wayward pedestrians that walked home or to nowhere in particular. These don’t exactly fit the definition of beauty. However, I still observed them with a watchful eye.
As the sea of faceless people passed me, I remembered my friend Ekaterina or Katia (a common Russian name) and her mother, whom both resides in Saint Petersburg, but I met them in Kazan. Katia sees the things I saw daily; the mishmash of organized chaos merged at the confluence of roads and metro stations.
I caught a stranger or two glancing at the Winter Palace or at the detailed statues carved into buildings, and the electric wires and ugly posts didn’t seem to bother them. Maybe the city’s ordinary and beautiful things inspire them or maybe those moments are just brief distractions?
The profane, profound and holy
Like many countries and cities in Europe, Christianity is in full display in Saint Petersburg. The colorful spires of the Russian Orthodox Church and the baroque-inspired architecture dot the cityscape. Fyodor Dostoyevsky lived in this city, the deeply religious and conflicted man whose novels Crime and Punishment and The Brothers Karamozov focused on the redemption of the soul. However, the rise of the Soviets led to the rapid spread of secularism, leaving some Russians to believe but hardly practice the religious teachings regularly. Churches here also serve as elaborate museums. Inside its walls are stunning mosaics depicting biblical stories of life, death, and resurrection.
For some it is easy to call something by its name: beauty, truth, love, hope. For the rest, some things are difficult to say for the idea is simply too beautiful, or reality isn’t as lovely with scars, blemishes, unwanted histories and disappointments under its skin. It disagrees. And yet, it knows your name and calls you by it, even when you don’t want it to.
I remembered the dark-haired-brown-eyed woman who asked me to take her picture with the Stroganov Palace in the background, a tourist in her own country. The conversation was brief: it was all small talk, and it didn’t go any deeper, no meaning of life questions. I took her photo and we parted ways. I asked my friend Katia if we could meet before I left for Yaroslavl, and she said yes. Maybe this time the city wouldn’t feel so anonymous.
The city’s in-betweens
I missed my train bound for Yaroslavl after running as fast as I could to catch it. I was right there, but the ticket lady decided to close the door. I returned to the counter, managed to get a refund, and waited for the metro train so I could return to my accommodation. As I boarded, four guys crammed into the entrance squishing me between them, then alighted before the train left. I then realized my wallet was missing; pickpockets, another of life’s constants.
After filing a police report at the station, I got my wallet back minus some cards and all of my cash. Luckily, they didn’t take my debit card. The policeman told me to make another report but I couldn’t find the other station after wandering around, so I gave up, returned to the metro station and took my things.
What made a city beautiful? I let this question linger as I planned my next move. I wanted an answer, something I could touch, feel or experience. However, I was too tired and stressed. These thoughts slipped away as I called a few friends. None of them answered. I called again until someone finally answered.
Image credits: Joshua Berida