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Englishman Married Twice in Russia in One Day

Mick & Olga Hart celebrate their 19th wedding anniversary in Svetlogorsk, Russia.

Published: 5 September 2020 ~ Englishman Married Twice in Russia in One Day

31 August 2020 was our wedding anniversary. Nineteen years together and never a cross word. At least, I used to think so until I learnt more Russian and discovered that what for years I had presumed to be my wife’s words of endearment were in fact expletives. How does it go? Ignorance is bliss.

To mark the occasion of my good fortune and her bad, I suggested that we take a trip to Svetlogorsk, the Baltic coast seaside resort, and retrace our steps in time. There, we would visit the church where we were married and call in at the hotel nearby, Starry Doktor (Old Doctor), where betwixt the two ceremonies, the first at the church and the second at the Russian equivalent of the UK’s registry office, we had, with our guests, stopped off for a pizza and something light to drink.

Olga, my wife, had wanted a church wedding but in Russia church weddings are not officially recognised by the State, which meant that we would need to be married twice on the same day: first in the church in Svetlogorsk and then at the registry office in Kaliningrad.

Before I could be married in the Russian Orthodox Church, it was necessary for me to attend an orthodox church to seek absolution for my sins.

As I was in England prior to the wedding, and living at that time in Bedford, I had to travel to the Orthodox church in Kensington, London, in order to honour the obligation that the Orthodox church required. On hearing about the purpose of my trip, some of my friends opined that I would be there for a very long time.

Today, 31 August 2020, the plan was to call in at Starry Doktor first, for an old-times’ sake pizza, and from there walk to the church.

As well as being our wedding anniversary, another anniversary of almost equal proportions was about to be enacted, which was that this would be the first time that I would eat something and drink beer in a restaurant, discounting one bottle outside a beachside café a few weeks back, since the coronavirus air-raid siren sounded, which for us was sometime in March this year.

Mick Hart Kaliningrad train station with regulation coronavirus mask — **The masked traveller**

We travelled by train, as we were in the mood to do so, equipped with regulation coronavirus face masks and antiseptic hand wipes, both of which became progressively useless as normal life took over.

It is difficult, if not perfectly ridiculous, wiping hands, wiping the top of bottles, wiping, for example, a sweet wrapper and in the process of doing so forgetting what order you are doing it in or whether you have done it at all. The best anyone can achieve in normal circumstances is to go through the motions and then give up.

Englishman married twice in russia in one day

Arriving in Svetlogorsk we found that the number of visitors, which after a very heavily subscribed summer season due to the Russian state’s incentive to boost domestic tourism in the wake of coronavirus restrictions, was at last diminishing. Autumn was on its way; holidays were over; school term was about to resume.

Nineteen years ago to the day, the weather had been superb. Mr Blue Sky had garbed himself in his best robes for the occasion and his friend, Mr Sun, although as bright as the proverbial new penny, had turned down the heat with respect to the presence of autumn.

Summer, like the madness of youth, was fading fast and as it ebbed away was being replaced by that distinctive autumnal tinge. In autumn the air becomes thinner and our senses more finely attuned, especially our sense of smell. Summer is the time of noise, laughter, exuberance; autumn the soft and mellow fragrance of yellow and auburn leaves, of mossy dampness and that enticing nip in the air that tells of winter’s imminence. It is the seasonal ante-chamber, the last stop for quiet reflection, before the cold embrace.

When we left for the coast by train this morning, it had just stopped raining, but upon our arrival in Svetlogorsk (I can hear Victor correcting me ‘Rauschen’) the sun had broken through and someone up there was being kind to us on our anniversary as the temperature was perfect. We are autumnal people.

We walked the short distance to Starry Doktor, and I was both pleased and discomfited to see that my favourite property, the old Mozart café, had at last been bought and was now being renovated. Whatever you do, please do not spoil this wonderful example of Gothic Rauschen, I heard myself whisper.

We passed the smallest antique shop in the world, thankfully not open today or we would have bound to have been in there buying something, and found ourselves opposite the newly constructed and open Hartman Hotel, a resplendent establishment if ever there was one, which, with its imposing vintage automobile swishly parked outside, is bound to give Svetlogorsk’s Grand Hotel and Hotel Rus a challenging run for their money.

**Information board outside Starry Doktor Hotel, Svetlogorsk, Russia**

Starry Doktor, we were pleased to find, had not changed. And neither can it, as the information board outside the building denotes. There was no change inside either, not to the layout and décor or in the reception that we received, which was rather Soviet in kind.

“We’d like to order a pizza. Can we eat outside?”

“No”

“But we can order a pizza?”

“Yes.”

Olga looks through the menu.

“What sort of vegetarian pizzas do you have?”

“You will have to look.”

“OK. Can we have cheese and tomato?”

“We don’t do that. We do cheese with tomato paste.”

“OK. We will have that.”

“Which one do you want?”

“Cheese and tomato paste?”

“You need to look in the menu and tell me which one that is.”

Back to the menu.

“Margherita.”

Smiling and being ‘mine welcoming hostess’ was not apparently on the menu either and as we were the only patrons, we found ourselves acting in that strange way that one does in cafés and restaurants when the atmosphere is not quite to one’s liking, ie talking in low whispers. Nevertheless, this was all part of the traditional service and being us, odd, the nostalgic input was strangely appreciated.

When the pizza arrived it was not thin crust; it was very thin crust. If I did not already have a pocket handkerchief, I could have folded up a piece and used it as such. However, it was not without taste, and putting behind me almost all notions of misapprehension regarding coronavirus and drinking from a bar-room glass, my first beer for yonks on a licensed premises was greatly appreciated.

Starry Doktor Hotel historic Rauschen building — **Starry Doktor Hotel, Svetlogorsk, Russia; August 2020**

From Starry Doktor we walked the short distance to the small church where we had been married. On the way we were dismayed to find that one of our favourite houses had been swallowed up by a new, totally out of scale, brash ‘look how much wealth we’ve got’ refit. I could not be sure, but since our last visit in the spring of this year, it looked as though another gargantuan villa, again completely off the scale chart, had sprung up between the pine trees on the opposite side of the road.

“Will they ever stop building?” Olga grumbled.

Just for us, or so we would like to think, the weather was getting better by the hour. Our little red-brick church, resting on top of an eminence, with its three or four tiers of steps leading up to the entrance, peeped through the birch and pine trees; the sunlight peeped through them too, impressing the surface of the church with dainty twig and leaf patterns, whilst the sky above smiled bright and blue and the air about us blessed our senses with that first cool note of autumn.

**Svetlogorsk Church, Russia, August 2020**

If you were watching my words as moving images on a screen, we would now defer to the cinematographic technique where everything goes wavy, the implication being that we were going back in time. So let us do just that, and ripple away to the day of our wedding in August 2001.

Englishman married twice in russia in one day

On this day, 19 years ago, we were residing, with our wedding guests from England, at the Lazurny Bereg Hotel ~ alas, another victim of Svetlogorsk’s build ‘em big and build ‘em high development. Lazurny Bereg, which was a mid-sized building and a nice hotel with bags of character, has since been replaced by something high-rise. I am not sure whether the new-build is an apartment block or a block of flats for holiday lease ~ c’est la vie.

The church service was set for 11am, so it was breakfast at 9am, and togged up and ready to go by 10am, but first we had to run the gauntlet of a series of Russian games, pre-wedding reception frolics, which, to be quite frank, as I was as nervous as ~ you know the word ~ I could just as well have dispensed with.

My wife to be was being waited on by friends, who were helping with her make-up and dressing her in her wedding apparel ~ well, that’s what she told me they were doing? Meanwhile, at an appointed time, I was instructed to go to the front entrance of the hotel with my brother David and our friends from England, then, when the word was given, I was to enter the building and proceed upstairs to the first-floor hallway where our hotel room was situated.

The word was given and in we went. As soon as we reached the first flight of steps we were met by a delegation of my wife-to-be’s, Olga’s, friends. Two of these could speak English, otherwise the scenario would have been considerably more complex. As it was, we worked out fairly quickly the nature of the first game. Apparently, I was not allowed to see my fiancée unless I crossed the palms of those before us with rubles, ie I had to pay a levy!

After a great deal of banter about would you take a cheque or how about an IOU, I offered two and six, but the Russians were having none of it. We had to pay and pay in rubles.

Never mind whether my wife was worth 200 rubles, about £1.30 at that time, unfortunately I was ruble-less in Russia. As luck would have it, my brother David’s wallet was better endowed than mine, and he handed over the requisite notes. He reminded me about a year ago, however, that I never did pay him back and that technically my wife was his, a subject on which I will say no more …

Having stumped up the cash, we were then escorted to the first-floor hall. Neatly laid out on a table in front of us were a series of family photographs featuring children. I was asked to guess which one was Olga. I think I was on the verge of getting it wrong when one of our friends blurted out the answer, who then shouted “David’s paid the money and I got the photo right, your claim [on my wife] is looking more dodgy by the minute!” This is what happens when you let Londoners come to your wedding!

Now it was time for Olga to emerge from the room in all her finery, but instead, the hotel door opened and there stood a large man dressed in women’s clothing. He gave me a Goliath hug, informing me as he did that if I did not pay a ‘ransom’ I would have to marry him instead. He would not have dared to suggest such a thing today, given England’s queer reputation! But back in 2001 things were not so very far gone.

Englishman Married Twice in Russia in One Day — **If only she’d have shaved!**

Once again it was down to my brother to make good with the rubles, who by this time was protesting that my lack of rubles was clearly a fix.

At last Olga appeared. She had decided to forsake the Russian trend for large, voluminous and pleated wedding dresses for something less ostentatious, and she looked lovely. Mind you, Andrew, the man in drag, was not a bad second.

It was only a short journey from the hotel to the church, but a mini-bus had been hired to get us there. As the church service was to be presided over by an Orthodox priest, who naturally would be speaking Russian, I had been given cues and, acting on these cues, instructed as to what my responses should be. So nothing could possibly go wrong, could it?

I love Orthodox churches. The richly painted and opulent icons together with the mist from and smell of wax candles intermingled with incense creates the most hallowed of atmospheres, and our church, although modest by big city standards, had an ethos all of its own.

Englishman married twice in Russia in one day

The ceremony required us to walk in circles at given points in the service and to have two people standing behind each of us holding gold-tone crowns above our heads. One of Olga’s friends did the honours for her, whilst my brother held the crown above me. He complained later that his arms had ached considerably and that the task had not been made easier by the tight fit of his jacket. If I said it once in those days, I had said it a hundred times: avoid cheap suits from Hepworths.

All things considered, the service went well. Yes, it was a pity that when the priest asked me if I had another wife as an impediment to getting married that I answered yes instead of no, but I think I got away with it!

Outside, after a good round of photographs, this was the point at which we walked across the road to Starry Doktor, where we congregated outside for a drink and a pizza. I stayed on non-alcoholic beverages as we had a heavy itinerary in front of us.

Pizza time was essentially a way of killing time. In Russia, as I mentioned earlier, church marriages are not officially recognised by the State, and in order to be officially married, to have the marriage registered, we had to travel into Kaliningrad and get married a second time at the official registry office.

Forty minutes later, a cavalcade of cars whisked us off to the city, about 25 miles away. It was quite impressive, even allowing for the gallows humour about fleets of black cars and funerals.

The registry office functioned from inside one of Kaliningrad’s big old concrete monoliths, which has since been given a face job, but back in those days it was a daunting sight, all weather-stained and pock marked.

From a small portico the entrance led into a hall of typical marble effect. We had first to cross this hall into one of the small offices at the far end and get ourselves ‘booked in’. However, my passport, which at that time I should have been carrying with me day and night, was back in Svetlogorsk in the hotel. This omission caused something of a bureaucratic crisis in spite of the fact that the young lady in the office had seen and spoken to me half a dozen times the previous week, when we had visited the offices to ask questions about procedure. Just as it was beginning to look as though we would all have to come back next month, the issue was finally resolved upon the discovery that I was carrying a photocopy of my passport, which was accepted under the circumstances, but only after I had received a jolly good telling off ~ pity I could not understand what the young lady was saying.

All sorted, we were then ushered into an adjoining room, an antechamber to where the main event would take place. This was the ‘red room’. Why? Because it was; the walls were maroon and the furniture reproduction Louis something, the rather loud nature of which caused one of my compatriots to draw parallels between it and a bordello. He should know, I thought.

Kaliningrad registry office in 2001 — **All looking amazed about something in Kaliningrad registry office’s ‘red room’ (31 August 2001)**

We ambled around in this room for about ten minutes before being called into the official wedding chamber. This was a vast room indeed, highly ornate but empty except for a table and chair at one end, above which hung a large example of the Russian coat of arms. At the centre of the desk stood a small Russian flag and behind it a large ledger, which was waiting for me and the witnesses to sign.

When it came to the crucial moment, the placing of the ring upon Olga’s finger, the music that was playing in the background was intercepted by the Beatles singing, of all things, ‘Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away …’ This, obviously, set the British guests rocking in the aisles, whilst Olga’s two female friends cried bitterly, not inspired by the romance of the moment but by the inconsolable belief that they were losing a friend forever, who, once married, would be whistled off to degenerate England never to be seen or heard of again.

From the ring and Paul McCartney, it was off to the front desk. I took up my position on the seat in front of the ledger and to the solemn refrain of the Russian national anthem, which thundered around the room, duly signed my name in the book. Olga then followed and the witnesses came forwarded and scribbled their monicas in the space allocated for this purpose.

The music changed to something full of glad tidings and amid the congratulations that we were well and truly spliced, and the kisses and kind words (Clive, my London friend, “Well, you’ve done it now!”) large bunches of flowers appeared and at last a tray of alcoholic beverages.

Outside, under the portico, the tradition of throwing the bride’s bouquet mirrored that in England and was caught by one of our English friends.

Now, all the official gubbings done and the church service completed, you would have thought that we would be off to the reception ~ not so. First, we had to honour the tradition of being driven around the city, a trip culminating in a visit to Kaliningrad’s principle Soviet war monument, where, in front of the eternal flame and at the steps of the commemorative obelisk, we would pay our respects with flowers.

The photographs that were taken here are among some of the most potent and memorable of that day and also reveal how lucky we had been with the weather.

Before joining our other guests at the reception venue, we had one last call to make. This was for wedding photographs to be taken outside of Königsberg Cathedral and in the pillared vestibule containing the grave of Immanuel Kant, the German philosopher.

You can be sure that by the time we arrived at the reception hall, I was ready for a drink! But there were yet two more Russian wedding traditions that had to be observed before we could indulge.

The first was biting the loaf. Both my wife and I were assigned to this task, one after the other, the idea being that he or she who took the biggest bite would be awarded the role of dominant marriage partner. Olga went first and, always up for a challenge, I followed making sure that I took a massive bite. Whilst everyone was congratulating me on having taken the biggest bite, as with most things marital I had bitten off more than I could chew. Fortunately, the next act involved gulping back a glass of wine, which saved me from choking on the bread, and then we chucked our glasses over our shoulders and into the street behind us. One glass broke and the other glass bounced, but I never did ask what the symbolic significance of this was.

Our reception was held at what was then known as The Cabana Club, a restaurant/café bar with a Latin American theme. It was a good choice, an attractive venue equipped with three large rooms. One room served as the wedding reception area, the other as a dance hall and the one at the back a very large and quiet lounge, with comfy seats and soft music.

Mick & Olga Hart's wedding reception at The Cabana Club, Kaliningrad, Russia, 2001 — **Mick & Olga Hart’s wedding reception at The Cabana Club, Kaliningrad, Russia, 2001**

Alas, The Cabana is no more. It appears as if the building has been parcelled off. If I am not mistaken, a portion of the premises is now occupied by a small bar frequented by students and young folk, but as the interior of this latter bar is rather small, the rest of the old Cabana Club must have been subdivided for other purposes.

The reception

In essence, Russian wedding reception rooms are not so very different in configuration from their English counterparts. A table is placed at the head of the room for the bride, groom and other officiating ceremony members and the guests occupy either a chain of tables leading from the principal along both sides of the room or, as in our case, owing to the shape of the room, are dotted about here and there in groups. I believe there had been the usual head scratching about who should be sat with whom, and some license extended to unusual combinations, but at the end of the day concord was achieved.

One departure from British formality is that whereas in the UK it is customary for the best man and groom to speechify, in Russia everyone has a go. The food is served, and each guest in turn interrupts the eating process by standing up and delivering a speech as a precursor to toasting the newly wedded couple. Another significant difference is that whereas British tradition swerves heavily towards the jocular, speeches typically embroidered with satirical tales of lurid happenings from the stag night before and often inter-sprinkled with a ribald confetti of innuendos and smut, Russian speeches are characteristically deep and philosophical, well-meaning and sincere. They are also very long and made longer in our case as those guests who were bi-lingual acted as translators for their Russian companions so that we, the British contingent, could understand the sentiments expressed.

Among our guests was Sam Simkin, esteemed poet of the Kaliningrad region, and, of course, our dear friend Victor Ryabinin, artist-historian. I can see him now, peeping out from behind a picture that he had painted especially for us, delivering his speech with customary sincerity and humility. His presence was, as always, a source of warmth and reassurance. Sam Simkin presented us with a landmark book which both he and Victor Ryabinin had composed, The Poetry of Eastern Prussia.

Many guest speeches later, the dreaded moment arrived when I had to perform my speech. The content of this speech had been a bone of contention for months. I had to produce something which Olga could translate effectively to the Russian contingent, but the idiomatic nature of my speech and its typical recourse to innuendo made it difficult in this respect, and there had also been some controversy between Olga and myself about the tone of the piece.

The props that I would be using had also fallen under the critical spotlight: there was a doctored image of President Putin and the then Mayor of Kaliningrad with caption saying something about British invaders, a photocopy of one of our British wedding guests wearing a German helmet and, the pièce de résistance, a pair of hole-ridden and ragged Y-fronts. Whilst I had no doubt that the turn and tenor of my speech would have gone down well at a wedding party in Rushden, England, I was not entirely convinced, given the criticism aforehand, that it would be as well received, or for that matter understood, in Kaliningrad 2001.

Go for it! So I did. But all the way through I felt that I was on very shaky ground! In the event, I pulled it off ~ and I am not just talking about the underpants ~ better than I could have hoped for, but I was glad when it was over.

It really was time now to sit back and just get drunk, but Russian wedding parties are not like that. Before we could even think about relaxing in the traditional sense, we had a whole afternoon of games to contend with.

I will not go into detail about all of these, but restrict my comments to two. One had me wrapped in a blindfold. In front of me sat a row of ladies on stools with their legs crossed. My job was to walk down the line and fondle each of their knees and by this process, whilst blindfolded, identify my wife. I was not complaining and, yes, I did get it right!

Knee feeling in Kalingrad, Russia. Mick & Olga Hart's wedding — **The knee-feeling game: Mick & Olga Hart’s wedding, Kaliningrad, Russia 2001**

The second game was one we had played when we first came to Kaliningrad in 2000, at a New Year’s Day party. This game is one which we later exported to England and used to good effect at some of our own parties.

It goes like this. Three or more male players have a long piece of string attached to their trouser belts. Attached to the end of each string is a banana. Lined up in front of the players are three empty matchboxes. On the word ‘Go!’, all of the men have to thrust their hips in order to swing their bananas. As their bananas make contact with the matchboxes, the boxes begin to move. Each player has to move his matchbox in this way, the winner being the first to propel his matchbox over the finishing line by the powerful thrust of his hips and the decisive way he handles his banana.

David Hart prepares his for the 'banana game': Mick & Olga Hart's wedding, Kaliningrad, Russia, 2001 — **David Hart prepares his for the ‘banana game’: Mick & Olga Hart’s wedding, Kaliningrad, Russia, 2001**

To this day, the controversy persist over who won the contest and who cheated. In the final analysis, I think we agreed to compromise. The summation was that whilst the Russians may have had the biggest bananas, the British contingent had the best hip movements.

Cue wavy lines across the final image.

That was 19 years ago. This was not the first time we had returned to the little church on top of the hill in Svetlogosrk, but it was possibly the first time we had made the definitive connection between our wedding and the life we have had together since. The first time we had returned on the day of our anniversary.

We stood before the lectern where we had stood 19 years ago. We had a cuddle and kiss and Olga took the mandatory photographs for her Facebook account. And then we lit two candles and placed them in the sand-filled stand in front of one of the icons.

“Let us say thanks to God for each other, for the times we have had and hopefully have to come,” says Olga.

We also said thanks for all the experiences we had shared and for the people we had met along the way, including thanks for Victor ~ especially for Victor.

Outside, the sky was blue, the sun was radiant. It was a glorious day in Svetlogorsk (‘Rauschen, Mike’), as perfect as the day on which we had been married.

**Mick & Olga Hart outside the church where they were married in 2001. Photo taken 31 August 2020. Svetlogorsk (Rauschen) Russia, the Kaliningrad region.**

Svetlogorsk to Kaliningrad by Train

28 December 2000

There are a plethora of travel guides out there on the internet that like to make sweeping statements about Russian people, as if the people of the largest country in the world can be whittled down to fit ~ like a misconceived square peg into the round hole of consolation. After much negative stereotyping, these articles tend to intimate that in spite of what you have heard, when you meet them Russian people are not so bad after all. It is suggested that they come across as brusque, even rude, but, guess what! ~ when you get to know them they are just as superb and wonderful as any English, German or American person. And what is more, despite having been brought up cooking behind an Iron Curtain, their food is no less delicious.

Related: Exploring Svetlogorsk

Armed then with this image of a bear with sandwiches, we had not the slightest misgiving or uncharitable apprehension that later today we would have the extraordinary experience of meeting and dining with Olga’s mum.

Previous article: Exploring Svetlogorsk

Svetlogorsk to Kaliningrad by Train

First, we had to get to Kaliningrad, because remember, Dear Reader, Olga had been so concerned that her English visitors would baulk at the imperfections there that she had taken the precaution of squirreling them away in the coastal resort of Svetlogorsk, had installed them in the Hotel Russ, where everything was obvious and the fitness centre was minus its wheel.

Yesterday, we had travelled by taxi from Kaliningrad to Svetlogorsk, but today, whether to save money or merely to be brave, Olga suggested that we go by train.

We had returned to the Russ from our afternoon drink in the bar, which had no toilet, got changed ~ rugged ourselves up ~ trudged our way back through the new fall of snow, it was snowing as we did so, to arrive at Svetlogorsk’s railway station just as dusk was gathering. We were right on time: a big, old solid lump of a train was making its way ponderously along the track to where we stood at the end of the line.

Svetlogorsk to Kaliningrad by Train — Trains waiting at Svetlogorsk Station, December 2000

Quickly ~ as quick as it was possible with conditions as they were ~ we hurried along the length of the platform, passing this beast of a train’s bull-nose front until we reached the first carriage door. Unlike British trains where, in getting on and off, you are constantly advised to ‘mind the gap’, here it was a case of mind the small, narrow, rusty iron steps up which you have to teeter if you want to get inside. As the doors were shut when we arrived, there was no small amount of dexterity involved in ascending, balancing and opening them, but teamwork won the day, and before you could say ‘arse over head’ we were on board and, a few seconds later, on boards. Through no fault of a well-illuminated carriage we could have been forgiven for believing that British vandalism had arrived in Russia at last, but it soon dawned on me, with the cold comfort of a Cold War documentary, that Western decadence would simply not be countenanced, that there really were not any cushions or padding upon the seats, just two long rows of slat-back wooden benches.

I ignored what I thought was my brother saying something like “who’s going to pick the splinters out” and made my way to the seat at the other end of the carriage. There may not have been neon lights above our heads saying ‘Look at us, we’re foreigners’, but the inhabitants of the carriage were gawping at us all the same.

They continued to gawp, as if all were one, even though it necessitated some backward craning on their part, whilst we found that we could not hear each other speak below the sound of our peculiar whispering. Fortunately, unlike Max Bygraves, the train never lingered longer, for, with a sickening, unannounced jolt, which took the audience as much by surprise as it had us, wrenching their heads in the other direction, we and the hulking train lurched clumsily out of the station.

Within a few moments of rolling along we had to admit to each other that although the seats had looked hard, cold, hostile and uninviting they were all that and more besides. There was no heat in the carriage; a couple of young scruffy looking blokes were taking it in turns to drain a bottle of vodka; two old babushkas, who simply could not refrain from turning their heads every now and then, gave us a withering stare; a gnarled old man, his coat pulled up over his ears, rocked back and forth with the rhythm of the train, one minute asleep, one minute not; and almost everyone without exception was dragging on a fag, ~ not that this bothered us, tobacco smoking had not quite yet become the wretched victim of self-proclaimed health zealots. I cannot remember whether we lit up or not, but we most likely did. Brother Joss always had a packet of roll-ups with him in those days, and besides, the complete and utter absence of any detectable heating system made striking the match appealing.

Svetlogorsk to Kaliningrad by Train: Tickets Pashalsta!

I was just wondering when and how we would pay for this magic carpet ride, when a fierce-looking babushka armed with a large leather handbag waved that secret weapon menacingly in our direction and snarled something at us, which might have meant anything, such as ‘Hand over your roll-ups’. Such was her fierce demeanour that we would have quite willingly handed over anything had not Olga, taking money out of her purse and passing it to the handbag waver, received in exchange three slips of paper. Ahhh, so these were our tickets to ride.

In spite of the excitement, Kaliningrad seemed an age away. The old engine and its ‘ready for retirement long ago’ rolling stock, rocked, swayed, groaned and complained every snowbound inch of the way. The undernourished light cast a yellow shroud over the carriage windows through which nothing could be seen except darkness and small rivers of snow, which stretched out across the opaque expanse and collected in miniature drifts along the lower edge of the sills. It was a long journey; a hard-on-your bum journey; and a very cold journey; but we got there in the end ~ we actually made it.

The No Frills Travel Company operated from a station which was not in the least different from what you would expect: it seemed that no expense had been spared in reinforced concrete and metal struts.

We alighted, a little undignified, from the steep, narrow and rickety steps, onto a slab. A bitter wind was channeling through the yawning end of the station canopy and what signs there were to tell us how to escape from it were all, of course, in Russian. As this was Olga’s home town, she did know the way, and although nothing softening or unremitting greeted us in the station’s concrete underside, simply evading the wind’s cutting edge was consolation enough.

We were now passing along the same subterranean passages that we had traversed yesterday when we arrived in Kaliningrad, from which we would cross the vast rectangular concourse, and out through one of a number of wonderfully arched Gothic doors. We had done this, and were now standing, ankle deep in snow, on the perimeter of that vast concrete plain where yesterday my senses had been so seductively stimulated by a scene so typically Soviet.

This evening, however, there were no shoveling soldiers and all but one lonely taxi driver. All was quiet on the Eastern Front.

Fortunately, we had done our bit with public transport for the time being and were now all together looking out for Olga’s friend, the man who was going to meet us. We did not have long to wait.

Antiques & collectables

Andrew was a big man; you could not make out his features as he had a muffler over the lower half of his face and a woolly hat pulled firmly down on his head. He shook our hands warmly, exchanged a few short words with Olga, laughed and embraced us and then beckoned for us to follow. Olga had confided my love of history and antiques to him and he was now leading us to an antique and collectables shop some few yards away on the edge of the station carpark.

The antique shop was located in a large room in one of the relatively few remaining original Königsberg buildings. Access was gained by passing through a large, heavy, metal studded door, on the other side of which was a veritable cornucopia of Soviet and pre-Soviet Königsberg relics ~ I’ve stopped short of claiming that it was Aladdin’s Cave, as Aladdin would most likely have found it difficult to get a visa here and is most likely on his way to England as we speak in the back of a Co-op lorry.

I shall not dwell on all the goodies I was interested in here, or what I would have liked to have bought. In a couple of days’, we would return to this shop and make three or four purchases. Suffice it to say, that for someone who had spent a lifetime involved with antiques and curios this was a place far beyond Aladdin and his half-brother Ali Barber (since arrested in Rochdale).

We were actually on our way to Olga’s mums, but our driver, Andrew, had been asked by Olga to wheel us around via Königsberg Cathedral, at this time one of the few historic buildings to have been given the green light for restoration.

Königsberg Cathedral

Konigsberg Cathedral — Königsberg Cathedral (this photo taken in winter 2004)

As we drove, I remember passing by a great concrete monolith, softened by and shrouded in snow, and thinking to myself, what on earth is that? (I was later to learn it was the ‘House of the Soviets’). But the soon-to-hove-into view Gothic turret, high perpendicular gables and broad sweeping roof of Königsberg Cathedral erased all other sentiments, save for that inspired by the sublime scene in front of me. Now when I look back on my first impression of Königsberg Cathedral, its haunting profile sketched against a whiteboard of snow, I gain some insight into the extent to which already the dark and troubled past of this place had begun to draw me in. But whilst the vast silhouette stamped its indelible mark, my recollections of the interior of Königsberg Cathedral in the year 2000 are vague to say the least. I was entranced by my first view of the external edifice but wrote very little in my diary about what lay behind the great oak doors. I mention renovation work to various wall monuments and note that it was not possible at that time to venture further than the ground floor, but much more than this I did not register, although the impression I have is that unlike today the doors opened into one very large rectangular room in which seating and other appurtenances seemed to be at a minimum.

And that, strangely enough, is all that I can recall of Königsberg Cathedral on the inside; whilst the memory of its outside has never let go of me … and never let me go.