4 December 2024 ~ Russia Day in Kaliningrad Honours Past and Present
RUSSIA DAY has been celebrated annually on 12 June since 1992. It is the national holiday of the Russian Federation, originally and officially known as the Declaration of State Sovereignty of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR), but that was a bit of a mouthful, even for Russians, so mercifully it was changed in 1998, so that even I can say it.
The idea that the Russian calendar is dominated by celebrations is not entirely misleading if you factor in everything from music, film, theatre, food, famous people to winter. However, Russia has no more public holidays than most other countries ~ eight, I believe.
Just like Bank Holidays in the UK, most public offices and schools are closed on 12th June. It’s a national day off, with events taking place throughout the country.
It’s also a chance for Russians to revisit, remind themselves of and celebrate all things Russian.
For some people, older people, those who were brought up in the USSR, the day has different significances. For those who bemoan the loss of the Soviet Union, it is a day of fond, if not sad, remembrance; for those who answer ‘No’ to my question, “Do you miss the Soviet Union?”, it is a day to celebrate pre-Soviet history, the Russia of the here and now and/or the Russia of the future.
Without mastery of the crystal ball to preview destiny, at least two of these time periods coalesced in Kaliningrad’s 2024 Russian Day festival. Held in the attractive grass and meandering paved precincts bordering Königsberg’s Upper Pond, Russian culture and its past were brought evocatively to life in colourful costumed pageants, tableau vivant and displays of living history. Craft stalls of a multifarious nature plied their trade in traditional hand-made Russian goods, augmented by the up to date and novel to attract the eyes of children and appeal to less retrospective types.
Also at hand was costume and fine jewellery, which, If you failed to keep your navigational wits about you, could eventually end up on the hands, around the wrists and upon the neck of your wife or girlfriend.
“Look, over there! [away from the jewellery stalls]. There’s a very interesting, er, what do you call it, thingymajig.”
June, like most other months of the year, can be temperamental (I knew a girl called June once. Heaven knows why they christened her that, they would better have called her December.), but I am pleased to say that on the twelth day of this June, the clouds rolled back in the heavens, the sun came out to join us and Russia Day in Kaliningrad was a gala day to remember.
The English are told to celebrate everybody else’s culture (hint almost everybody else’s!) Unfortunately, the English, what’s left of us, have no such state-ordained or government-supported equivalent to Russia Day; in fact, quite the opposite. We are encouraged to celebrate Black History Month. (I’m sure they would like to extend this to Black History 12 months, which they are doing anyway via the TV commercials.) Headlines in the liberal press exhort us to learn about everyone else, all except ourselves: “What you should know about Ramadan and Eid” “What you should know about Diwali” and “What you shouldn’t know about any of your own Christian festivals, coz it don’t matter!”
St Patrick’s Day is a public holiday for the Irish, but St George’s Day (the Patron Saint of England) is hardly recognised anymore and deliberately suppressed by the left, who are afraid that it could remind the English of their ancestral history, and thus consolidate their cultural identity, which they, the left, have for some time now been working hard to eradicate.
One black activist operating in the UK has put it on record that in his opinion the English do not deserve a day off to celebrate its culture. I should imagine that the English feel that they don’t deserve him.
Hopefully, Farage and Reform will change all that in the very near future! 👍
Updated 23 October 2023 | published 6 April 2023 ~ Sir Francis Drake an English Pub in Kaliningrad
“Would you like to go to an English pub?” Asked in England, this would be a completely pointless question should it be directed at me; but asked in Russia’s Kaliningrad 22 years ago, when the city was little more than a one-bar town, I was waiting for the punchline.
In 2001, going out for a drink in Kaliningrad meant either calling in at the subterranean snooker bar at the front of the Kaliningrad Hotel (big hotel; the only one) or taking a table in one of two restaurants that were lingering on from Soviet times. So, it was hardly surprising when Olga asked me, would I like to go to an English pub, I thought the question a trick one.
It was the name of this English pub that put me to rights: in the UK we have King’s Arms (we don’t know which king); Richard III (found under a carpark in Asian Leicester); the Lord Nelson (not yet suffered the ignominy of having his statue tossed into the drink by loony leftist agitators); we even had Jack the Ripper once, until, at the behest of the feminist mafia, the original name Ten Bells was obsequiously reinstated. And yet, whilst a whole host of famous-named pubs spring readily to mind, such as the Black Rod in Basingstoke and the Big Black Cochrane in Shepherd’s Bush, sometimes referred to as the BBC, I cannot recall ever frequenting a Sir Francis Drake in England.
Sir Francis Drake in Kaliningrad
In the small, secluded outpost of Russia, the Sir Francis Drake established itself as the first of Kaliningrad’s English-themed pubs. It occupied, and still does occupy, a fairly non-descript building in a built-up area some distance removed both from the old town centre, the district once dominated by the Kaliningrad Hotel, and its more typical town-centre successor: the area in, around and containing Victory Square.
The Sir Francis Drake locale is an unlikely place for an English pub or any pub for that matter. It brings back memories of streets in London excluded from exploratory pub-crawls as possible places of ill repute ~ assumed publess, therefore pointless.
Mick and Olga Hart in the Sir Francis Drake English-theme pub, Kaliningrad 2001
Thus, if on my maiden journey to the Sir Francis, I had expected to find something approximating to a typical English hostelry, which I didn’t, I would have been disappointed. Nevertheless, the owners of the Sir Francis Drake had shown good sense in singling out their establishment and attesting to its themed credentials by erecting by its courtyard gate a proper, hanging English pub sign complete with full-length portrait of the famous man himself, the eponymous Sir Francis in all his 16th century glory. That sign, and what a tremendous sign it was, has long since gone, replaced by a less traditional but self-explanatory clipart-type image, depicting a foaming tankard of beer.
Mixed fortunes
The Sir Francis Drake, as might be expected, has passed through various hands since the days when my English brogues first pitter-pattered across its threshold, and its changing fortunes tend to reflect the grasp successive owners have had of what it is that makes an English pub successful and how best to replicate that success.
For example, shortly after my first visit to the Sir Francis Drake, the bar’s courtyard, a small, paved drinking area or hard-surfaced patio adjacent to the entrance, acquired chairs and tables at which, on days when the weather was clement, people would sit and drink. Fast forward two or three years, and all had gone to seed: half a dozen rusting metal chairs around a wonky table completely spattered with bird shit huddled under a ragged canopy, which was dirty and leaked profusely in more than several places but was good at dragging mosquitoes in during the height of summer, did little to boost the passing trade, which simply kept on passing.
Within the bar, the fairly formal atmosphere that once had dwelt there with noble intent, but which in itself was as like to anything lurking in an English pub as nothing is to something, had packed its bags and gone, fled, vamoosed, hurried away, leaving in its wake a tired and tawdry desolate feeling, a non-existent menu and a middle-aged lady behind the bar unarguably more accustomed to propping herself on her elbow and dragging on a fag than she was to serving customers. She pulled me a pint of beer (Good Heavens, it was Charlie Wells!) and rustled me up a bowl of soup: I drank my beer; ate the soup; and left.
It was to coin a phrase one of those “I am going outside and may be gone for some time,” moments, and thus it came to pass; until many years later fate decided to bring me back from Kaliningrad’s blizzard of bars.
The rediscovery of the Sir Francis Drake coincided with house hunting. We were looking for a property to buy and whilst engaged in this quest had set up camp in a rented flat nearby.
The nearest watering hole to our place of rest was a small craft-beer bar, a new concept to Kaliningrad that had just begun to be trialled. It was a superbly spartan venue but had more beers than a bootleggers’ lock-up. Serving food would have spoilt its image, but to entice my wife to remain in a bar until they kicked me out, I had to ensure that my usual pub diet, which was normally limited to crisps and peanuts, could cunningly be augmented by something approaching a proper meal. Women can be the strangest of creatures.
The closest bar to the foodless establishment was the Sir Francis Drake, and although our last encounter was enough to make us shy away, that the outside area was again presentable and since through its large arched windows a thriving clientele could be seen eating as well as drinking, we decided to bury the hatchet. (That’s an age-old expression, in case you’re wondering, not an ancient Königsberg ritual.)
The bar’s interior had not, and has not, hardly changed a jot since I first clapped eyes on it in May 2001, which is all to the good, since in the UK so many pubs, particularly village pubs, have suffered to have their original appearance, and with it original atmosphere, systematically destroyed by the boardroom boys in suits; those little-minded £-men, whose vandalism ironically demonstrates the feeble knowledge they have of how to sustain a pub and make it pay, an ignorance only equalled by their utter lack of consideration for conservation and history. One day it might just dawn on them that the two go hand in hand. The Philistinism by which they run, and by which they ruin their pubs, is only matched in idiocy by the quick-change con men masquerading as interior designers, whose cack-handed, ill-conceived and badly applied cosmetic surgery scars and robs each pub they touch of the richness of its unique character, charm and personality. The result for the pub is certain death, albeit sometimes a lingering one.
Kaliningrad’s Sir Francis Drake is not steeped in antiquity and thus has less to fear than those that are, but its continuity of almost three decades is something of a novelty, something to be proud of, especially in an age that boasts that the attention span of your average phone junkie is Dwarf from the North in stature and Liz Truss in longevity.
Limited by its size (referring now to the Sir Francis Drake, not the Midget Beyond the Midlands) as much if not more by the props at its disposable, nevertheless, with its heavy portcullis-type doors, panelled walls and dark wood beams, the bar continues to cultivate a pleasing and passable, if not strictly genuine, impression of a traditional English tavern or something that could or should be, and we’d like it no less if it was.
Now, if the Sir Francis Drake had been a genuine English pub, that is to say located in England, it would no doubt have got off to a reasonable start, but inexplicably over time, with no respect for theme or atmosphere, it would be out with the conforming styles and in with the girly-wirly lilacs, other pithy boutique pastels, a mish-mash of pale wood furniture raised on big block legs, inconvenient high-backed seats and, just for good ludicrous measure, a bar looking more out of place than anything that your imagination, even without an addiction to Gold Label and pickled eggs, could conceivably contrive.
I have personally witnessed, back in my days as a beer magazine and pub-guide editor, bars constructed of oak dating to the nineteenth century and period pieces from the 1950s manufactured in plywood kitsch, torn away and replaced with nasty pallid harlequin bricks or MDF veneer, materials which, even devoid of taste, you would not wish on an outside bog in Wigan, let alone install in a pub in Wigan or anywhere else for that matter.
So ten out of ten for the Sir Francis Drake for retaining its integrity and for showing the Brits that it can be done.
Less ten out ten, however, for not repelling the TV invasion. If the UK’s Sir Francis could see off the Spanish fleet whilst playing a game of bowls, thus consigning Spain to a fate of idle siesta-prone work-shies, surely Kaliningrad’s Sir Francis could have thwarted the millennial plot to inundate every last drinking establishment with an armada of flat-screen TVs. (We are talking tellies, not transvestites (which to your way of thinking is the lesser of these two modern evils?)
In all fairness, bars, wherever they may be, need to do whatever they can to bring the punters in. Nowhere is that more crucial than in the beleaguered pubs of England, which sadly in more recent decades have fallen foul of a political class that puts ethnics first and tradition last (But what of the Conservatives? What are they conserving? The answer is themselves.)
The Sir Francis Drake hasn’t much space, not enough in fact to swing a Spaniard in, but it has done what it can to cram as many people as possible into the space it’s got. In 2018 and 2019, at a time when we frequented it most, getting a seat on the off chance was a risky business indeed. Whether that is the case today, I cannot really affirm, since, at the time of writing the Sir Francis Drake is under new management, making its present popularity difficult to assess, whereas its erstwhile popularity was never in any doubt: want a table? Book in advance. So, book we always did, and just to play it safe we booked in April of this year.
The best tables in the joint, hence those that are snapped up first, occupy two elevated platforms on either side of the entrance. They cater simultaneously to two innate desires: the need to be seen and whence to see from ~ an exhibitionists’ and voyeurs’ dream hermaphrodite in fulfilment.
The 2018/2019 management, who probably threw in the beer towel during the mask-wearing coronavirus years, were without question, Sir Francis Drake’s most loyal and its most trusted friends.
Throughout their tenure they maintained and retained the integrity of the historic premise, even down to preserving the framed and glazed biographical timeline of the life of Sir Francis Drake, an absorbing document in many ways and one that inevitably showcases the achievement for which he is best remembered, the annihilation of the Spanish fleet, a military-geo-political triumph that paved the way for Britain becoming the greatest naval power on Earth and in the fullness of time the greatest empire.
No less spectacularly, the same management also introduced a revolving selection of imported beers and lagers, authentic tasty pub-grub served by tasty female bar staff and young blokes behind the bar who looked as if they knew their stuff probably because they did. It’s amazing how many don’t.
Whilst all the other important fixtures and attractions remain intact, sadly Sir Francis Drake’s superb bar staff and their faithful if rather cliquey friends, who were the mainstay of the clientele, have, like the remnants of the Spanish navy, long since drifted away. People come and people go, but legends live on regardless.
The last time that I raised my glass in the legendary Sir Francis Drake, September 2023 was drawing to a close. At that time, the menus, both food and drink menus, left over from the previous management were looking somewhat jaded. The beers advertised did not match the available brands, and the foodies who were with me voiced similar reservations with regard to the dishes advertised and the quality of the meals. The service was good, however, and the folks behind the bar efficient, warm and friendly. Thus, the latest report for Sir Francis Drake, which reads nothing like anything that has ever been written about its eponymous hero, is: ‘Has the ability … could do better … look forward to improvements …” Or have I simply taken these words from a long succession of my old school reports?
Let’s not search for the answer. In the Mick Hart Guide to Kaliningrad’s Bars, the Sir Francis Drake still rates highly ~ seven out of ten at least!
Epilogue
There is no question that the honour of laying the last word of this post should have gone to Sir Francis Drake himself, but, unfortunately, he is unavailable for comment.
Suspecting treachery among the UK’s ruling classes (yet again), I urged him to make all haste to Dover and there play bowls as he did before in Plymouth. If anyone can stem the French Armada and save us from the migrant hoards, Sir Francis is that man. But he must not tarry in his God-given task.
For even as we speak, the UK’s woke-finder generals are busy rewriting slave-trade history, liking and wanting nothing more than to besmirch and depose our national hero as an excuse for the great unwashed to tear his statue from its plinth and toss it into PC Pond. Then they will take each of the pubs that they say his name dishonours and rebrand them in the language of Woke. On t’other side of Hadrian’s Wall, it will be Humza Yousaf King of Kilts, and way down south in London town, Sound-as-a-Pound Sadiq Khan, that Diamond Asian Cockney Geezer. Cuh, would you Adam and Eve it! Is it any wonder that Sir Francis Drake cried “Bowls!” and hurried off to Russia?
Mick Hart stars in his own Soviet version of Guns and Poses
Published: 5 March 2023 ~ Men’s Day in Kaliningrad Brings out the Soviet Guns
Every year, on the 23rdof February, Russia celebrates what is officially known as Defender of the Fatherland Day. Originally called Red Army Day, it was granted public-holiday status in recognition of the Red Army’s 1918 inauguration during the Russian Civil War. Known thereafter as the Day of the Red Army and the Navy, and later the Soviet Army and Navy Day, following the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, the holiday was given its current name by Russian President Vladimir Putin.
At state level, the day honours the patriotism and sacrifices made by Russia’s military veterans. A formal ceremony is held in Moscow and in other Russian cities, with daytime parades and processions and evening concerts and firework displays. At national level, custom has morphed the day into a time when women honour their menfolk ~ not only military men but all men. Presents are given by Russian women to husbands/boyfriends, fathers, sons, brothers and also to male work colleagues, turning Defender of the Fatherland Day into the better known generic name of “Men’s Day”.
In the UK, liberals encourage ethnics to spit at our troops, not serve them in corner shops and berate them for wearing their uniforms in public. Transgenderism is rife and misandry encouraged. But the one thing that the UK does have that Russia doesn’t is Gay Pride Month …
Men’s Day in Kaliningrad Soviet Exhibition
Russia’s Men’s Day plays host to a variety of events, and this year we were invited to attend a display of Soviet militaria at the Kaliningrad Retro Car Club’s HQ, a former aircraft parts repository of historic Luftwaffe origin.
The exhibition was organised and delivered by a group of Soviet history enthusiasts/re-enactors.
On display were documents and printed ephemera relating to WWI and Soviet uniforms from both WWII and postwar periods. To generate the spirit of the occasion and to provide the public with a better idea of the look, style and fit of the uniforms, each re-enactor was dressed either in an officer’s or other ranks’ uniform and most were equipped with combat gear.
De-activated antique guns
The mainstay of the exhibition was a display of small arms, predominantly WWII in character, ranging from handguns to tripod-mounted machine guns. The cache was diverse and impressive and included within the Soviet mix were weapons of German origin. All of the guns displayed were deactivated collector’s pieces.
Although I have handled an extensive variety of classic vintage firearms thanks to my early and enduring interest in all things historic and later in my role as a dealer in militaria, some of the guns in today’s exposition fell into the category of ‘known but not encountered’ and others had eluded me.
The Browning automatic, which was the standard sidearm in WWII for both Allied and Axis forces, was an old friend: it was one of the handguns I have actually fired.
The semi-automatic Mauser, whose production dates to the 1870s, is one of the most distinctively profiled and therefore easily recognisable handguns of all time. The copy on today’s menu was interesting in that it could be fitted with a hardwood stock, a useful accessory upgrading its stability to that of a short rifle and being hollow in part it doubles as a storage case or holster.
Another familiar gun, and one that I have also fired, is the PPSH. The PPSH-41, a submachine gun instantly identifiable by its high-capacity drum magazine ~ 71 rounds when fully loaded ~ was one of the Soviet army’s most widely used infantry weapons. An icon of the period, it features extensively in photographic depictions of Soviet soldiers in battle, is often incorporated into figural war monuments and regularly appears on commemorative badges. Weighing around 12 pounds (5.45 kg), full magazine included, the first reaction of the inexperienced gun user on picking up the PPSH is usually how heavy it feels. It is without doubt a weighty specimen, but, unless you are a seasoned gun user, all guns when first encountered seem surprisingly heavy and also surprisingly clunky.
Although in many respects the Soviet PPSH bests the M1A1 U.S. Thompson, on the UK shooting range some years ago I felt less comfortable firing the PPSH than I did the Thompson. Weight for weight, there is not much difference, but the absence of a pistol grip or side grips on the PPSH means that the weapon has to be held with the supporting hand behind the drum or by cupping the drum itself, a necessity which I personally found impinged upon its accuracy. That said, the PPSH drum mag with its superior load capacity is compensation enough in any realistic performance-related comparison of these two iconic weapons.
Mention iconic firearms in the context of Soviet history and the buzzword is likely to be not the PPSH or the Mosin-Nagant but, yes, you’ve got it, the Kalashnikov. No Soviet firearms exhibition would be worth its salt without the presence of this gun, a weapon universally revered for its outstanding reliability under conditions of an adverse nature and a gun which ticks almost every box, if not ticks every box, as best in its class in the assault rifle category.
Used the world over, the Kalashnikov was and continues to be one of the most popular weapons ever produced. No serious gun collector would regard his collection complete without one. Today’s exposition featured two AK versions, fixed wood and folding-stock variants. We sold both types, deactivated of course, through our UK vintage/militaria emporium.
Another old favourite, which whenever I see it reminds me of the times we spent with the UK re-enacting group, the Soviet 2nd Guards Rifles Division, was the Degtyaryov machine gun. The Degtyaryov, DP-27/DP-28, was the standard light machine gun of the Soviet military in WWII. The large rotating drum magazine mounted on the top of the gun shaped its unique appearance, inspiring Soviet soldiers to nickname it the ‘record player’.
The Makarov pistol, or PM as it is known, which in 1951 became the Soviet military’s standard sidearm, is, in its definitive form, so well-known and accessible that the sight of one is unlikely to rock the gun community’s world, but you never can tell with guns what variants are out there; specific demand and experimentation are capable of producing the most unusual hybrid version of otherwise commonplace guns. Take the example displayed today. This version of the ubiquitous semi-automatic Makarov had undergone a modification that makes it look as incongruous as a woman’s body defaced with tats.
In details of proportion, the erstwhile small firearm seems to have taken leave of its senses. Strapped beneath its pistol grip is a drum magazine every bit as big and as chunky as the one that is used by the PPSH. However, as wild, whacky and clumsy as it appears, and although the variant was never widely produced, for a while at least this ambitious conversion was heralded as a useful addition to Russia’s law-enforcement armoury, since it enabled officers carrying shields who only had one hand with which to hold their gun to sustain fire over longer periods before needing to reload.
Today’s small arms cache in the old Luftwaffe building was a window on the world of Soviet weaponry. From my point of view, having handled a fair amount of military weapons over a lifetime’s interest in all things history, some were old acquaintances but others took their place in the never-ending learning curve ~ the converted Makarov is a case in point. The past is littered with revelations waiting for someone to pick them up. There is always something new to discover, always something new to learn and the joy of both never grow old. It is one of the enduring delights of the antique/vintage scene.
Soviet Uniforms
The uniforms displayed also brought back memories of our vintage shop and the re-enactments that we took part in as members of the 2nd Guards group.
As I believe I mentioned in a previous post, re-enactment is a serious historical business. Everything has to be just so, an exact replica of what it was like back in the 1940s. Considerable time and effort is diligently expended in researching and getting the uniforms right and in allocating to those uniforms the correct insignia worn and where and how it was worn. Anything less than perfect is sure to be met with a stern rebuke from the re-enactment group’s leaders and spark derision in those who purport to know more than you do about such important details, one’s group peers especially and, more embarrassingly, military veterans.
At first sight, the Soviet uniform looks pretty basic, and it was. At the time the Second World War broke out It hadn’t changed much since the First World War. It certainly does not compare with the rigid formality of British wartime uniforms and the flash, Hollywood modernity of their American counterparts, whose uniforms and equipment had a certain style all of their own. But what the Soviet uniform lacks in formality and also in panache it more than makes up for in functionality, being lightweight, durable and easy to wear.
As a re-enactor and military clothes dealer, I have worn the uniforms of both Allied and Axis forces, both officers’ and other ranks’, and if I had to sum up each country’s uniform using one definitive word for each, my choice of words would be: American, ‘stylish’; British, ‘itchy’; Soviet, ‘comfortable’.
When re-enacting, the only bone I had to pick with the Soviet uniform was the inclusion of fresh, white, linen neck-liners, which have to be changed and sewn with irritating regularity into the underside of the tunic collar. As an actor on a film set, someone does this for you. It is altogether different when you have to do it yourself: for example, when cold and bleary eyed after a night beneath the rainy skies with only your canvas poncho for protection. Warning: Re-enactment is a serious business.
Men’s Day in Kaliningrad
The reals stars of the Soviet military display held at the Kaliningrad Retro Car Club HQ were the guns, but it would be inexcusably remiss of me if I was to leave the show without giving credit where credit is due for one of the best collections of Soviet gas masks that I have ever seen exhibited at a militaria event.
The impressive collection was the inspiration and work of a young bloke called Valordia. He confided in me that the official requirement of wearing masks during the coronavirus scare had added impetus to his collecting zeal and that during those two surreal years he had substituted cloth masks for gas masks from his collection. Good for him! I thought. I often tried to be different, too, by wearing my mask around my knee. It’s never been the same knee since. It seems to wheeze a little!
Valordia’s gas-mask collection begins with a fairly basic item from WWI, extends through the interwar years, encompasses WWII and finally comes to rest with a state-of-the-art modern mask, modelled by last years’ model (and some) me. In case you didn’t want to recognise me, there I am in the photo, standing as large as life and twice as beautiful in my designer gas mask next to Valordia. This mask has some interesting gimmicks, such as interchangeable this and that’s, and also features a drinking tube for the wearer to take in liquid refreshments (Mine’s a pint of Landlord, please.) whilst remaining safely enveloped in rubber.
It’s food for thought, but the accessorising capability of this mask stands it in good stead for nomination as the Gates/Davos prototype ~ the first live-in coronavirus and other nasty man-made-diseases facemask, a must-have accessory for the globalist’s reset future. With a built-in smartphone as standard, which I think we can safely assume it would have, proud wearers will continue to be urged to post their selfies to social media, thus preserving social media’s ongoing cloning affect. The beauty of the mask will be that even more than ever none of your ‘friends’ will know who you are and what you really are, which when assessed at its most fundamental level is what social media is all about: a world of revolving masks in a hall of revolving mirrors. The ‘Like’ tickers and back-slappers will function as before, seeing nothing and knowing less, there mutual appreciation assured as they woo each other with fulsome comments about how young and lovely each of them look hidden behind their filters. Don’t mock! It could happen. It could be a win-win situation, for those who are steadily losing.
But I digress: In an age when everything and everybody seems smartarsephoned, it is reassuring to discover that there are others in the world who share your ardent belief that there is no time like the past, and reassuring again when the other parties concerned are considerably younger than yourself. Keep up the good work, chaps!
Whilst my response to the Soviet exhibition was one of unreserved enjoyment, I completely understand why some people cannot understand why guns, old or new, should be a source of fascination. Unlike my youngest brother, who holds several medals and trophies for marksmanship in most small-arms categories, I do not. It is true that in my youth, I would occasionally run around armed in the middle of the night, not I hasten to add in an urban setting but for the perfectly reasonable purpose of poaching his lordship’s estate. In my dotage, however, guns, have taken their place among the many varied man-made objects invested with an intrinsic ability to stimulate appreciation for their craftsmanship, aesthetics and historic interest alone. And yet, despite such commendable sensibilities and the reservations from which they stem, come the day of the exhibition I could not resist the alpha temptation to pick up and tote a sawn-off or two. Both the shotgun and the rifle, even with modified barrels and stocks, were surprisingly tactile and disturbingly balanced.
Disturbingly unbalanced is the expression on my face captured in the photo where I am holding one of these guns. In that photograph I seem to have achieved a curious manly man hybrid somewhere between Clint Eastward and Bop Hope, either that or my pants are too tight.
Looking at my photo (above), I think we can safely conclude that a manly image is not so easily come by as convention would have us believe, even when its Man’s Day and even when you are holding a gun. But you’ve got to admire Squint Westwood’s brass and, if only as an act of charity, give me six out of ten for trying.
Published: 25 December 2022 ~ Kaliningrad Retro Car Club in a Festive Mood
A big thank you to Inara and Arthur for inviting me to the Kaliningrad Retro Car Club end-of-year party last night and to the members of the club for making me feel so welcome and for creating a night to remember. It was especially fortuitous for me that the party coincided with the 24th December, Christmas Eve in the UK.
Apprehension at the outset that the venue for the party, the old Luftwaffe spare-parts building, would be brass-monkey cold was largely unfounded. Improvised heating using one of those gas-fired space appliances worked far better than I anticipated, and as for the cold it could not compete with, this encouraged those who like and want to dance to do just that; their jumping and jiving around proving to be an excellent way of generating the auxiliary heat that we needed.
Kaliningrad Retro Car Club party
The car club’s chef had prepared various nourishing dishes, the warm ones claiming a decisive victory for mission Keep the Cold at Bay, and generous proportions of vodka, cognac and cognac liqueurs, toasts galore and the warmth of the company present ~ particularly the latter ~ all did their sterling bit to stave off the winter temperatures.
It was heartening and appropriate that Father Frost (Father Christmas) should drop by to assist in the festivities and to doll out seasonal presents, and I was especially pleased with the car quiz that proved to me once and for all that when it comes to taking part in quizzes I could do much worse than not take part.
It did occur to me, too late, of course, that to show my appreciation for an excellent evening, I could have volunteered to help clean up the venue the following day, a sort of Christmas Day treat for my conscience, but as the idea refused to catch up with me until the time for action had passed, I will have to think of something else.
One positive thing that I could do is to reiterate my offer to the president of the club, which is to donate a rather fine door to the Luftwaffe building that we have secreted in our garage. I think that it would look very nice and would attest to its functionality hanging on two or three hinges where the hole in the wall to the toilet is. I am nothing if not inventive.
Above: Kaliningrad Retro Car Club members
Above:First Aid for anyone who complains about the cold ~ Vaccine Vodka. And the Retro Car Club’s resident nurse. She has a heart of gold and a lovely bedside manner
Above:Father Frost drops by
Above:Mick Hart with a pint in his hand and Lenin looking over his shoulder
Above:Olga Hart with a kind and friendly fairy behind her
Above: What is it … don’t be rude?! I’m talking about the object I am holding! It is, in fact, a napkin holder made out of vilkee and lorshkee ~ that’s forks and spoons to you!
Above: Us with a Christmas tree made by children out of coloured cloth and sponge
Above:The entertainment. A class act, an unusual feature of which was the levelling of the guitar on JImi Hendrix’s head
Above:A highly detailed model display of theRoad of Life, the Siege of Leningrad, WWII
Published: 8 December 2022 ~ Badger Club Kaliningrad a Bohemian Night on the Tiles
My wife, Olga, went to a concert recently (see the photos below). I know exactly how my eloquent and highbrow musician friend in the UK will respond when he attempts to equate ‘concert’ with the images from that evening: “WTF?! Let’s go there!”
Now I am not the world’s most mainstream guy, but I have to admit when I saw the photos and heard an account of the evening, which did not happen until the following day because my wife rolled back at some ungodly hour in the morning, they made me feel positively ~ as the American author Henry James might say ~ ‘Ground into the mill of the conventional’.
It is not clear from the photographs whether the establishment is cavernous, but it certainly looks covenous ~ all that dim lighting, candles, hanging masks, dolls, natural-wood sculptures, enchanting (and possibly enchanted, Gothicised cabinets), and, moreover, wild and whacky costumery! Right up my surrealist street!
The top hat and tailed gentleman, the owner of the club, Aleksandr Smirnov, is obviously a ‘quick-change’ expert ~ one minute impresario, the next an updated rock-star figure from the minds of the Brothers Grimm. He, I am told, is a chimney sweep, only he isn’t, he is an accomplished and original artist who produces highly detailed bronzed relief plaques (apologies if I am slightly less than accurate, but I am having to base my opinion on mobile phone snaps) and, as you will see from the photographs, is also a bit of a wizard in the costume creation department. That’s him in the photo with his chopper in his hand. I’ve never seen one as big as that before; and me having been active in the antiques and militaria trade!
Choppers aside, this particular evening was dedicated to accomplished musicians and good music: There was a soulful and original indie art-folk band, Sfeno, first-rate singer guitarist and a young lady violinist, a virtuoso of her craft, who was on the fiddle a lot that evening. Vodka was not rationed, people got up and jived and my wife, much to her great surprise, if not unalloyed delight, was both chatted up and propositioned, which is always good for the ego (I’ve lost count of the number of times that the same has happened to me (you wish!)). The location, in fact the whole evening, was so spellbinding that it reduced Harry Potter to as much comparative magic as a meeting of the Women’s Institute at the local village-hall on a wet afternoon in the 1930s.
Never one to moralise, even when occasion justifies, whilst all this frivolity was going on in Kaliningrad’s answer to Alice’s Wonderland, I was at home with the cat, genning up on Königsberg and the history of East Prussia by reading (both the cat and I) that excellent publication Legends of the Amber Land, by Andrey Kropotkin.
Although I must say, with my wife rolling in at some unseemly hour of the morning ~ we won’t say when! ~ I would have been quite within my conjugal rights had I demanded of her, “And what time do you call this then!?” or have cast myself in the role of the heavy-handed Victorian husband, with “Why, you dirty stop-out.” But I contented myself with the elevating thought that if I have learnt one thing and one thing only in my brief visit to this muddled world, it is reflected in my born-again status as a stay-at-home Captain Sensible. Stout fellow that I assuredly am: resisting the lure of the bright lights nightlife in order to set the perfect example of how people of a certain age are expected to, and should, behave.
Thus, by the time my wife had sneaked in from her evening of ‘reasonable refreshments’ ~ making it difficult to imagine that she had been brought up in the social climate of anti-decadent Soviet-Russia! ~ I had read my book, patted the cat, drunk my cup of cocoa and with teddy tucked snugly under my arm had taken myself to bed: zzzzzzzzz.
Have you ever had the feeling that you are missing out on something?🤔
Aleksandr Smirnov introduces singer guitarist Andrey BerenevOlga Hart withAleksandr SmirnovOlga Hart in the Badger clubBand Sfeno performingAndrey BerenevOlga Hart surrounded by the esotericOlga Hart with vintage oil lamp and fantasy fairy tale furniture made by ‘Chimney Sweep’ Aleksandr SmirnovInara looking hornyConfronted with a large chopper
Aleksandr Smirnov By all accounts*, Aleksandr (Chimney Sweep) Smirnov is an artist, costume designer and consummate wizard at conjuring up interior design of a distinctly unusual and exotic nature.
Able to work with all kinds of material, including wood and metal, much of what you see in the photographs in terms of fixtures and fittings are said to have been made by his hand, the same hand that has orchestrated the natural, historical and decorative elements that set apart the club’s interior from any other you may have encountered. The syncopated fairy tale feel that you get from all of this is no coincidence. A little fairy tells me that he writes fairy tales as well. *Дом трубочиста или выходные в сказке (turbopages.org)
The Badger club, Kaliningrad The Badger club has a dedicated clientele who value not only the décor and entertainment but speak with great warmth and affection about the club’s welcoming ethos and its friendly, inviting atmosphere. Why not go and see for yourself? You may just become a regular in the process?!
Links to bars, restaurants to visit in Kaliningrad
A kind, charming, thought-provoking and sentimental animation
Published: 2 December 2022 ~ Hedgehog in the Fog seen in Kaliningrad
Before setting off to London/Bedford England last month, we were walking back from a coffee in the café gardens (Soul Garden) by the Upper Pond, Kaliningrad, when we were thrilled to discover that some artistic person or other had painted the perfect impression of the star (Yorshik) from the famous 1970s’ animation, Hedgehog in the Fog. Normally, or abnormally, depending upon your personal prejudice, I am unable to accept painted or spray-canned text or images plastered on public or private property as anything else but what it truly is ~ a brazen example of vandalism. But, as with most things in life, exceptions to the rule exist, and this, I have to admit, is as true of graffiti as it is of anything else, providing that you want it to be.
Hedgehog in the Fog is a highly acclaimed Soviet-Russian multiple award-winning animated film. It was written by Sergei Grigoryevich Kozlov [Серге́й Григо́рьевич Козло́в] and animated and directed by Yuri Norstein [Ю́рий Норште́йн]. It is both an animation and intellectual masterpiece, capable of myriad interpretations, but whose ultimate message is as simple as it is sublime as is it sentimental: that we all need someone in this world with whom we can count the stars.
Once seen never forgotten, the majority of Russians would recognise Yorshik’s likeness instantly, certainly as unmistakeably as they would the stars of such classic Soviet films as Irony of Fate and Office Romance.
The portrait was also discovered and recognised by Kaliningrad’s administration department, and before we left for England, I caught sight of a media report in which the administration was asking the public to cast their vote ~ with the proviso that the paint used was harmless to the tree ~ on whether the image should be removed or be allowed to remain.
Since I have not walked that part of Kaliningrad recently, I have no idea what the fate of Yorshik might be, although I for one would hope that when the votes were counted, they favoured Yorshik’s continued presence.
Not only does the composition capture Yorshik’s appearance perfectly, but the artist has also located him within a beautiful blue graduated background, where he shares space romantically with twinkling stars and fairies.
Whether Yorshik has survived or not, if the artist would like to contact me, I have a canvas, an interior wall, which is just crying out for this work of art to be replicated!
Hedgehog in the Fog (Yorshik) painted on a tree in Kaliningrad
Hedgehog in the Fog is a Soviet-Russian animated film about a hedgehog (Yorshik) who sets off on foot to visit his friend, a bear cub (Meeshka), and finds himself lost in the fog. As in folklore, fairy tales and fantasy and in Gothic and psychological suspense genres, fog as a literary/cinematographic device is typically employed in the film to deviate objective reality, turning the world as we know it ~ or think we do! ~ into a claustrophobic and distorted realm where the heightened possibility of supernatural occurrences amplifies the vicissitudes encountered in everyday life.
In this state of altered consciousness, Yorshik’s imagination supersedes logic, creating a new and unnerving reality in which, for example, an owl and white horse ~ one commonplace the other rare but possible ~ take on puzzling and sinister shades of meaning.
When Yorshik stumbles into the river he assumes that he will drown, but carried along by the current he relaxes into his situation, resigning himself to the journey wherever it may take him.
His ordeal culminates when a mysterious submersible benefactor, a ‘Someone’ as the subtitles tells us, lifts him onto his back and conveys him safely to the water’s edge.
Once on dry land, Yorshik hears his friend, Meeshka, calling out to him through the fog and by following the direction of his friend’s cries the two are at last united.
Hedgehog in the Fog is a simple story, but one which arguably manages to achieve what no other comparable animation has in its simultaneous creation of an atmosphere of dread tempered by quiescence. The kinetic tempo has a lot to do with this, as does the steady, hushed and neutral tone of the omniscient narrator, but the fundamental appeal of the film and the extent to which it engages us lies in its ‘seen through the eyes of a child’s perspective’, its lilting dream-like quality and its effortless ability to invoke and mirror the childhood world which we all once inhabited, with its troublesome symbols and shadows, its half-open doors to what, where and who, its many unanswered questions and its never completely understood what may lie within and beyond.
In following the classic tradition of all that is best in fantasy motion pictures ~ The Haunting (original version), Night of the Hunter and, with one or two exceptions, the complete canon of Hitchcock’s works ~ the key to Hedgehog in the Fog’s allure is that just below the surface of fairy tale enchantment it taps profoundly and incisively into our childhood psyche.
It calls upon the fog and the river for their habitual literary symbolism: the first for its incarnation of a supernatural milieu where anything is possible, the second for its depiction of life as a predetermined current against whose superior will we are powerless to resist, and it besets the journey with downstream dangers, credible menace, innate fears and the almost tangible presence of death. All the things that we learn about living as we are hurried along by the current of life.
The still frames from Hedgehog in the Fog are every bit as resoundingly emotive as the narrative in flux. Single static images such as the looming face of the owl, the white horse, apparition-like and luminescent, the bewildered expression on Yorshik’s face and, most memorable of all, the concluding frames of the film where the re-united Yorshik and Meeshka sit on the log together, with their jam, tea and samovar and the scent from the burning juniper twigs, counting the stars in the heavens, are each and every one blissfully indelible.
Hedgehog in the Fog works, even for we adults, not only because the artwork, the cinematography, pace and timbre are as spot on as they can be, but because the overarching feel of the film is unashamedly affectionate and applaudably sentimental.
However unnerving the fog may be, the narrator takes us by the hand and, like the dreamy river of life upon which the hapless Yorshik floats, albeit with philosophical tranquility, he leads us reassuringly from opening credits to heartfelt conclusion.
If you have the samovar, the juniper twigs and the raspberry jam, all you need to count the stars ~ as the stars are always above you ~ is the log on which to sit and that special someone next to you for whom those stars shine as brightly and mean the same to them as they do for you.
1927 Bootleggers’ Cadillac stars in Last Tango in Kaliningrad
Published: 22 February 2022 ~ 1927 Bootleggers’ Cadillac is the Star in Kaliningrad Film
A couple of days agoI wrote a post in which I recounted a recent interview about a forthcoming film in which I play the part of a wartime MI6 officer. Within that post I practised humility by confessing that the only reason I was interviewed and not the star of the film was because cars can’t talk, and even if it could we would have never got it up the steps and into the studio ofBaltic Plus radio.
The star of the film Last Tango in Konigsberg, conceived and written by journalist, author, historian and screenplay writer Yury Grozmani, is a 1927 Cadillac.
Apparently, this particular model was designed for use as an ambulance, but the elongated, tall and rectangular shape of the body made it highly suitable for servicing hotels, representational functions in embassies and consulates and the final ride to the graveyard.
The current owner of the vehicle, a Mr Ivan Zverev, is a well-known collector. In addition to the Cadillac, he owns an excellent collection of household items from the German era and the Soviet period and is the founder and creator of the historical museum in the village of Nizovie, Guryevsky district, Kaliningrad Oblast.
According to Mr Zverev, bootleggers used the Cadillac to transport illegal alcoholic beverages during the prohibition era in the United States, which possibly explains the presence of several bullet holes in the cabin and the body of the vehicle.
I have it on good authority that the bootleggers had just such a car in Billy Wilder’s famous film, Some Like it Hot.
Technical spec Make: Cadillac Series: 314 (One of the ‘Superlux’ models) Manufacture: Cadillac Motor Car Co, Michigan, USA Date of manufacture: 31 December 1927 Engine configuration: V8 Engine size: 5173cc Engine power: 80hp
Published: 8 November 2021 ~ Restoring the Polessk Brewery in the Kaliningrad Region
The former East Prussian province of Kaliningrad, known today as Kaliningrad Oblast, is a territory rich in history. It is a cultural treasure trove of historically overlooked, essentially undiscovered and time-abandoned places and buildings. Even if its immense restoration and development potential is realised, it is as yet largely untapped, waiting patiently for the overdue arrival of the curatorial entrepreneurs who will restore, rebuild and conserve it for generations to come.
Above:Labiau coat of arms
Among the many instances of this long-awaited rehabilitation is the small town of Polessk, known in German times as Labiau. Located approximately 50 kilometres northeast of Kaliningrad on a long, recently resurfaced, tract of road, Polessk debuts as a tired, run-down and struggling municipality. There are sporadic instances of once regal buildings and the two small municipal parks form welcome green oases, but mirages in an urban desert waiting with weary buildings for the miracle to come merely serve to ask the question when?
It is not just for any old reason that Lenin, standing alone on his plinth, looks out across the deserted concrete plateau where homage once was paid to him, preferring these days to fix his eyes on the waterways beyond rather than look behind and be reminded of Boris the proletariat bodger, with his concrete blocks, two sheets of asbestos and bucket of cement.
And yet you instinctively know, or feel, from the moment you cross the railway line, which is the threshold of the town, to the point at which you meet the canal and river, that this is a town that deserves much more, that it could be so much better!
The Deyma River, an offshoot of the Pregolya, and the Polessk Canal, which links the Pregolya and Neman Rivers, form a natural boundary at one end of the town as the railway does the other. To the north lies the 625-square-mile Curonian Lagoon, a haven of biodiversity and a coastal habitat of unaffected beauty. In essence, Polessk is a gateway to a multi-faceted cultural region steeped in historic significance, blessed with natural beauty and profusely invested with ecological importance.
It is also home to Labiau Castle, described on the internet as an ‘historical landmark’, but which in its present-day condition looks more like a beggar waiting for the feast than deserving of the grandiloquent title which speaks of better days. Alas, both castle and Lenin’s statue occupy the same proximity, somewhere in the space between the power and the dream.
The few who belong to the exclusive Polessk club, those who have actually visited the town and who may have even stepped inside of what remains of Labiau castle, are less likely to be aware of the presence of another historic building that is tucked away obscurely behind the backstreets of Polessk.
This building, a former German brewery of mid-nineteenth century origin, is currently the recipient of an ambitious restoration project that is rescuing it from oblivion and progressing its renaissance to a working brewery and museum.
Restoring the Polessk Brewery in the Kaliningrad Region
Invited to attend an open day and tour of the brewery, I felt particularly privileged. The excursion embodied three of my major interests and by default principal weaknesses: social history, historic architecture and ~ yes, you’ve guessed it ~ beer!
At the risk of repeating myself, Polessk is by no means a large town. Nevertheless, its compact nature does not make it any easier to locate the brewery, which is hidden away behind a cluster of average Soviet flats on an expanse of ground at the end of a side street.
These flats, or to be more precise, their blandness, do the brewery no disservice. By screening it from view they ensure that the first encounter with the building is considerably more dramatic than it otherwise would be.
Admittedly, whilst zig zagging between the flats, the sight of a balcony strung with socks and pants is, to put it mildly, a disarming one, but take heart! ~ just when it seems that all is lost, the scene suddenly opens up to reveal a view that is guaranteed to set the pulse racing of anyone who is infatuated with social and economic history.
There stands before you a wonderful Red Brick neo-Gothic edifice, astonishing in its turreted and towered simulation, atmospherically magnetic, beloved in recognition of the beer it must have produced and will, with a little bit more than a gentle nudge and a shove, soon be producing again.
Star-struck, I recall the profound reaction and words of my Uncle Son, who was a builder, when he first clapped eyes on Norwich Castle: “How did they get that ‘stun’ up there!” he said. And with the same degree of wonder, as I stared transfixed at the brewery’s magnitude, made all the more awesome by the thankful absence of the Soviet predilection for pre-cast concrete, I whispered to myself, “How did they get those bricks up there?”
At this moment, I was reflecting on the buildings pseudo-Gothic tower ~ one of the most awesome chimneys that I have ever encountered. Not that I am a stranger to tall chimneys, having lived in English counties where the skyline was dominated by rows of them belonging to the brickworks. But the brewery’s chimney, being rectangular rather than cylindrical in form, and its solitary presence, gives its ground-to-skyline taper a singularly novel and striking effect.
The dynamic of the front of the building depends for its impact on the complexity in shape, size and angularity of the contrasting component parts: the tall tapering chimney, the rectangular tower with its curious knop, currently under scaffolding, and the lower sloped-roof structures. The accentuated Gothic arches within which the windows are set and, in some instances, embroidered with decorative brickwork, possess a dramatic personality of their own but seen together their inverse graduation makes this already tall building seem loftier still.
The window configurations, concomitant decorative detail and structural elements project an industrial power that is best appreciated from the prospect of the end elevation (shame about that Soviet blockhouse knocked up at ground level in con blocks and cement) and from close and awe-struck scrutiny of the far side of the building. From this perspective the viewer receives a first-class rendition of the intrinsic importance of arches in Brick Gothic formations, here creating a dynamic uniformity in which contrast plays its subtle part across the horizontal plane and within the vertical sections.
If you look carefully at the photographs of what is effectively the back of the building you will see that approximately 50 per cent of its interior is already a beneficiary of restorative work. New double-glazed windows have taken the place of the old and through them a glimpse of smart walls and retro lighting emerges.
Arched configuration of windows , Polessk Brewery
The original entrance to the brewery appears to have been through one of two doors that open, front and back, into the same traversing corridor, but the restoration has seen fit to provide a grander approach, using a two-tiered wrought iron staircase that leads to large glass doors cunningly inserted into one of the first-floor window arches.
Entrance to Polessk Brewery
First impressions count, and the two that spring to mind on the other side of the front door is overwhelmingly spacious and infinitely solid. Next comes the detail, which feeds into the first two.
The ceiling and upper storeys of this vast reception room rest on a series of three double H-beams that span the room’s width. They are raised on prodigious, iron, load-bearing columns fastened where they meet with bold connection plates bolted one into the other. These, and the visible undersides of the H-beams that travel the length of the ceiling are finished in a suitably industrial-looking matt red-oxide paint. Between the sunken ceiling beams the intervening space is arched, each arch resembling the convex half of a separated tube, so that taken as a whole the ceiling adopts an undulating character, each lengthwise arch the equidistance of the other.
In one corner of the room, suspended from the ceiling, hangs a large triangular-shaped grain funnel, studded with rivets and finished in the same red-brown paint as the beams. Diametrically opposite, on the other side of the room, a giant wood-burning furnace is at work, roaring fiercely away. It is more than capable of keeping the vast room, already operating as a tourist information centre and ear-marked for expansion in this role, at a pleasurable ambient temperature.
Connoisseurs of nineteenth-century Brick Gothic architecture will enjoy the contrast in the construction principles and materials used on the first and second floors.
The second floor, which is accessed via a short, curved, boxed-in staircase, trades its metal industrial credentials for a more medieval wood construction, substituting the iron vertical supports of the preceding floor for great rectangular posts with offshoot branches to the beams that cross above them. No wonder then that the burly brewer who occupies the second floor is a larger than life-sized wooden carving!
On this floor, as with the previous one, there are a series of history boards, all of which are designed and presented to professional museum standards. Not that my elementary grasp of the written Russian language enabled me to educate myself as much as I would have liked, but I did glean some information both from the boards and from the various relics and artefacts scattered around the rooms.
The second storey also contains a large circular grain tank that would have fed into the hopper on the other side of the ceiling. This great metal tub studded with rivets is as impressive as it is solid as it is tactile!
A part-completed staircase and a large hole in the floor above provides an excellent viewing platform and vista from and through which to gaze up into the rafters. The beam construction is truly magnificent here and in remarkably good condition considering the age of the wood and the long period for which the building was unused, untended and deteriorating. I believe I am right in saying that when completed this section of the building is where the brewery museum will be housed.
Restoring the Polessk Brewery in the Kaliningrad Region
Although an attic-man myself, basements and cellars do possess a certain Jene sais quoi.
From an architectural and atmospheric standpoint, the cellars of 19th century breweries are fascinating places. It is in these underground chambers that the rather tedious task of throwing grain across the cellar floor with wooden shovels and then spreading it about with rakes was undertaken in the pursuit of procuring germination prior to drying and milling. The cellars of the Polessk brewery may not have been the most salubrious environment in which to work for long periods when the plant was up and running, but architecturally their vaulted ceilings are superb examples of mid-19th century Gothic style, a specific feature of which was the use of iron columns as opposed to stone or brick supports.
To access the cellar it is necessary to descend the lower half of the curved stairs that runs from the first to second floor. It brings you out into the corridor that I referred to earlier, which runs the width of the building. The corridor marks the point where one half of the building’s interior restoration nears completion and the other is work in progress. The ‘in progress’ 50 per cent gives an accurate idea of how much work has been accomplished so far and how much devotion, planning, blood, sweat, tears and sheer hard graft is yet to be undertaken before the standard of finish in this half of the building will equal that displayed in the other. Not so much as a round of applause, please, as a medal, I think, is needed!
Above: More work to be done. Any volunteers?!
History of Polessk Brewery
Anyone whose Russian is better than mine which, like 50% of the Polessk brewery, is every day ‘work in progress’ for me, should encounter little difficulty in harvesting all the detailed information that they could wish for about the history of the brewery, from its inception to the present day, from the biographical story boards distributed around the building. But to give you a leg up, here is a succinct outline of that history:
Labiau brewery, which changed names several times during its productive years, was founded and built in 1840 by oneAlbert Blankenstein. The business was a family-run concern and, after his father’s death, was inherited by Albert junior (as the Americans would say), who embarked on a complete reconstruction programme and thereafter increased the range and productivity of the plant’s output.
Soon the brewery was producing about 5,000 litres of beer a day, mostly dark lager but also a light variety known as Labian March Beer, as well as a selection of non-alcoholic beverages.
Unlike many other breweries in the region, Labiau brewery’s fate was not sealed by the outcome of the Second World War. The Soviets decided to restore, modernise it and leave the day-to-day creation of beer in the hands of a German brewer.
By February 1946, beer was flowing from the brewery again under the direction of Lieutenant Colonel Nikolai Novovi, its first Soviet director. By all accounts the colonel was a hard task master, who had no qualms about disciplining his workforce, the majority of which were German. Not only did he dismiss three Germans for skiving off work, but he also sent them up before a disciplinary tribunal.
Germans not dismissed and sent to disciplinary tribunals continued to work at the brewery until October 1948, when they became casualties of the mass expulsion of Germans from the region.
The last Soviet brewer to work at the plant was one Mikhail Myasoedov, who had learnt his trade since 1946 in breweries based in the Caucasus. As competent as he no doubt was, his tenure of the brewery was short lived. The post, which he took up in 1954, was, two years later, surplus to requirement owing to a large brewery opening in Kaliningrad. In consequence, lager production ceased in Polessk in 1957, although for a short while afterwards the plant continued to produce fruit juice drinks, lemonades and wines made from berries.
The man who is making it work
The inspiration and driving force behind the renovation and preservation of Labiau brewery is Alexander Natalich. Never forgetting that first impressions count and that the eyes are the windows to the soul, Alexander Natalich comes across as a man with a genuine love of history and a passion for his restoration project, in fact, his family’s restoration projects.
To date, the Natalich family have successfully restored a school in Ilyichevka, close to Polessk, a former Polessk printing house, which now serves as Alexander’s office, and a kindergarten, which its original owners abandoned before it could be completed. And now there is the brewery.
With a track record of this calibre, it is hardly surprising that Alexander is often asked whether his next project will be Labiau Castle, to which he wryly, but no doubt accurately, replies that what he has taken on so far could keep him occupied for the rest of his life.
The future of Polessk and the region
It may seem that Alexander and his family have cast themselves unofficially in the role of Polessk’s (Labiau’s) cultural saviours. If so, Alex has a good teacher. It was his mother, Inessa Savelyevna Natalich, who restored the old German school in the village of Ilyichevo, district of Polessk, to heritage standard. And whilst no one could blame her son for thinking that he will have his work cut out restoring the brewery, further light is shed on his ‘enough work to last me the rest of my life’ remark in that the brewery is seen as the focal point of a more extensive project, which encompasses turning the brewery grounds into parkland, cutting back the wetland reeds that are choking the Deyma River and opening up a boat station, the intention being to run a sight-seeing shuttle service to and from Zalivino Lighthouse, which is a renovation success story in its own right!
Epilogue
Intentionally or not, Alexander Natalich, his family and band of volunteers, are putting Polessk and its corner of the East Prussian region back on the historical map. There is incredible potential for sensitive tourism in Polessk, where history meets nature. Inessa Savelyevna Natalich’s German school, Alexander’s restored printing works and kindergarten, Labiau Castle, Lenin on his plinth, Eagle Bridge, river boat rides, Zalivino Lighthouse and enough natural coastline and man-made waterways to explore, enjoy, photograph, sketch and paint than I have drunk beer in a lifetime (I’ll have to think about that one!) ~ oh, and don’t forget the brewery. I can’t wait for it to open!
Diary of a Self-isolator: Day 608 [2 November 2021]
Published: 2 November 2021~Old Tin Buckets & QR Codes
So I said to my wife, “No, I don’t think so. I’ve got better things to do this morning.”
But she looked so disappointed that I relented, saying, five minutes later, “OK, I will walk with you to the market.”
“You don’t have to, unless you want to,” she quickly said ~ a little too quickly for my liking.
I know when I’m not wanted.
I remember hearing my mother and father quarreling when I was about six months old, blaming each other, arguing about whose fault it was. I have no idea what they were arguing about, but when I got to the age of five I suspected something was wrong when I came home from school one day and found some sandwiches, a bottle of pop and a map to Katmandu in a travelling bag on the doorstep.
Never one to take a hint, I knew that my wife really wanted me to walk to the market with her today, so I swiftly replied, “Well, if you really want me to come with you, I will.”
Apart from knowing when I’m not wanted ~ it gets easier as you get older ~ I needed to buy myself a new atchkee. No, not ‘latch key’. Atchkee is the phonetic spelling for spectacles in Russian. Isn’t my Russian improving! I am a two-pairs spectacles man. I like to have one pair so that I can find the other.
This was a great excuse for being a nuisance, so I got ready, tried not to look at the cat, who always looks sour at us when he sees that we are leaving the house, and off we went, on foot, to the central market.
“Ee by gum,” I might say, if I was from Up North in England, “but it were a grand day.” Here we were at the end of October, underneath a bright blue sky and the sun right up there where it is supposed to be.
We stopped off for a coffee at the top of the Lower Pond, risked the public Portaloos and then made our way to the market from there.
Being Saturday, and good weather, the second-hand and collectables market was in full swing.
When it was our business to buy and sell, we always had an excuse to buy, now all we could say was, ‘we’ll just have a quick look’. And then leave an hour later barely able to carry what we had bought.
Today was no exception. That’s willpower for you!
During the course of not buying anything we got to talking to one of the market men, who was not wrapping something up for us because we hadn’t just bought it.
“Good thing about outside markets,” said I, no doubt saying something entirely different in Russian, such as “Would you like me to pay twice as much for that item that we really should not be buying?” It must have been something like this, because when I checked he had short-changed us.
That sorted, I continued: “Good thing about outside markets, you don’t need ‘Oo Er’ codes.”
“QR codes!” my wife corrected me impatiently, as she bought herself a pair of boots that she didn’t need.
“QR codes!” repeated the market man solemnly, with a sorry shake of his head. “It’s bad business and bad for business. You can’t go anywhere without them now.”
“Niet!” I agreed, looking all proud at myself for saying it in such a Russian-sounding way, which enabled him to sneak in with, “But if you do not have a QR code, there is another way of getting access to bars, shops and restaurants.”
My ears pricked up at this intelligence, or was it because someone walking by had laughed, as if they knew what I didn’t?
I was too intrigued to be diverted: “How is that?” I asked
“Tin buckets!” replied the market man, with stabilised conviction.
“Tin, er …?”
“Like this!” the market man infilled.
And there, in front of me, where it hadn’t been a moment ago, was this large tin bucket.
Old fort, old fart & a tin bucket (thanks to my brother for this caption)
As tin buckets go, it was quite the bobby dazzler.
It was one of those vintage enamel jobs; a pale, in fact, with a cream exterior and a trim around the rim.
“If you don’t yet have your QR code,” the market man continued to solemnise, “all you need is a tin bucket and, as you say in England, Fanny’s your uncle.”
Well, there is nothing LGBTQITOTHER about that, I had to admit.
“OK,” I said curiously, “I’m listening.”
There was Olga in the background, sticking to her non-purchasing guns, busily buying something else.
“That’s it really. Just say at the door, ‘I haven’t received my QR codes yet, but I do have a tin bucket’.”
I am telling you this just in case you are wondering why I have photos in this post of me walking around Kaliningrad with an old tin bucket. (That’s not a nice thing to say about your wife!)
The next stop was the city’s central market, where I bought a pair of specs, better to see my tin bucket with.
I needed to confirm that I really had bought that old tin bucket and that it wasn’t, after all, a figment of my stupidity.
“Ahh, you are British!” the spectacle seller exclaimed.
“No, English,” I corrected him. “Anyone and everyone can be ‘British’. All you need is to arrive illegally on a small boat, and a couple of months later they give you a piece of paper with ‘you’re British’ written on it.”
Now I had my new specs on, I could see that approximately 75 per cent of the market had been rendered inoperable. Many of the shutters were down, and I could read the ‘closed’ signs that were Sellotaped to them, stating that they would remain closed for the ‘non-working week’. If coronavirus turned up here in the next seven days, it would be sorely disappointed.
Spot the old bucket
Nevertheless, by the time we had exited the market at the end where the spanking brand-new shopping centre has been built, my bucket was getting heavier.
I put it down for a rest, on the pavement, directly outside of the new shopping centre entrance, thus giving myself a commanding view of the row upon row of plate-glass doors, behind which sat shops that still had nothing inside of them. Obviously, no chances were being taken. Should the thousands of square metres of space remain empty, the risk of non-mask wearers and QR fiddlers entering the building would be considerably reduced. In addition, the spanking shopping-centre was surrounded by a large impenetrable fence, creating a 20 metre no-go zone between itself and the pavement. A red-brick fortress had also been built just across the road, so that any attempt to cross the minefield between the pavement and shopping centre, if not thwarted by the mines and patrolling Alsatian dogs, would be repelled by a volley of arrows, or something closely resembling them, fired from the slits in the fortress wall. In particularly demanding circumstances, for example when everything in the shops that had nothing in them was half price, thus attracting the crowds, I would have thought that backup, in the form of mobile dart vans stationed close to the entrance, would be advisable. But who am I to say? Confucius say, “Man with tin bucket talks out of his elbow!” Confusion says, “Man with elbow talks out of his tin buttock.” (The last sentence is sponsored by The Cryptogram and Sudoku Society.)
A lesser person would have been intimidated by fantasies of this nature, but not I. I had a tin bucket and, in case I haven’t divulged this already, that same tin bucket contained a green leather jacket, which I did not buy from the second-hand market, and a jar of homemade horseradish sauce, which I had not bought from the city market.
Old Tin Buckets & QR Codes
The bucket was as heavy as my heart as we parked ourselves on one of the seats outside a once-often visited watering hole, Flame. We were waiting for a taxi.
We had not long been sitting there, when I began to develop a jealousy complex. Staring back at us from the large glass windows were our own reflections. What were they doing in the bar without QR codes? It was then that I noticed that my reflection had an old tin bucket with him. What a coincidence, it was not dissimilar to mine. I recalled the wisdom of the man on the market who had sold me the bucket; his tale about old tin buckets having parity with QR codes for gaining access to cafes and restaurants.
However, before I could put his advice to the test, our taxi arrived. We said farewell to our reflections and hopped inside the vehicle. Our taxi driver, who was a stickler for rules, did insist that our bucket wear a mask for the duration of the journey. Stout fellow!
Although the taxi driver never asked, I was unable to say whether or not we managed to gain access to anywhere using our tin bucket in case the authorities find out and proceed to confiscate every tin bucket in Christendom.
The taxi driver did want to know what we were going to use that old tin bucket for, but I was not about to divulge my secret to him.
Give me a week two and I will divulge it to you. Although there will be a small charge for the privilege.
You can ‘read all about it!’ ~ as they say ~ in Mick Hart’s Guide to Homemade Vaccines.
Published: 30 August 2021 ~ A Memorial Garden for Victor Ryabinin
The idea to create our own, modest memorial garden to Victor Ryabinin came to us when we were deliberating on what name to give to the dacha. My wife, Olga, said that she wanted to name it ‘Boat with Flowers House’ after one of Victor’s paintings, which was also used as an illustration for the front cover of his and Sam Simkin’s book on East Prussian poetry.
Victor Ryabinin’s ‘Boat with Flowers’, shown here as the front-cover design for his and Sam Simkin’s book on East Prussian Poetry
We already felt obliged, motivated by our sensibility for history and heritage, to renovate the statue that stands in our garden. The statue is that of a fisherman. We did not put him there and neither did the Germans. In German times the dacha was the village hall, but in the Soviet era it became a hostelry for fishermen. Now it is a place where Olga plays houses and gardens, and I drink beer that I have bought from the local shop. And although I believe that a statue of me with a pint glass in my hand would be something that Nigel Farage would approve of, as the fisherman was there first, there he should remain.
The statue is Captain Codpiece. That is not his real name, of course, but one that has been bestowed upon him by my brother. I don’t think Codpiece minds. He knows we respect him, and he has certainly benefitted from our recent ministrations.
A Memorial Garden for Victor Ryabinin
I started the ball rolling by removing the moss, most of which had gathered on the plinth of the statue, and cleaned the flaking concrete from it, then some chaps from the village, whose building skills are far superior to mine, reconstructed the plinth using wooden planks for shuttering and pouring fresh concrete into the mould.
The statue with its new plinth under construction
Last week, our friend Chilikin, artist and conservationist, drank beer and vodka with me, and he also gave Codpiece the once over with a wire brush before saturating him in a transparent sealing compound, which will also act as a base substrate for the paint job that is to follow. In Soviet times, the statute was bright silver; the paint acted as a weather-shield, but it also transformed the concrete man into something resembling a metallised robot. Times change, and as the silver has worn off and with it the sheen of dubious taste, we have decided to act on Chilikin’s advice and go for a mottled bronze. The ‘distressed’ look will preserve antiquity, and a fresh coat of paint will give the statue a new lease of life.
Valordia Chilikin restoring the statue of the fisherman
Whilst Codpiece will stand tall, literally head and shoulders above the ensemble, iconic to the composition will be the boat we acquired some weeks previously, which will be used to recreate Victor’s Boat with Flowers.
Mick Hart applying preservative to the boat that will be used in Victor Ryabinin’s memorial garden
A memorial plaque has been commissioned and is in the process of being made. Next week we hope to find a suitable boulder on which to mount the plaque.
If we adhere to our timetable and complete the garden by mid-September, there is talk in the air of commemorating the event with a private gathering of clans. The occasion, I have been told, will not be black or white tie, but all attendees will be expected to wear some kind of hippy dress that backdates them to the 1960s. Codpiece was erected in the 1960s, so somehow it only seems right.
