English Russia » Daily selected things from Russia and ex USSR countries. Published In English.

Categories History, Photos, Russian Art, Russian People, Society

When I studied in a Soviet elementary school, I recall with how much importance Lenin was treated. A flawless semi-deity that incarnated in a human body that possessed multiple talents, protected the poor and hated any type of injustice in the world. That was the Lenin in my eyes at that time. I was taught that he was one of the smartest and fairest people in the history of the world. We had special mentionings of him throughout our education, which included books about the school boy, Vladimir (Lenin), and poems about

Lenin, and even our junior level Communist insignia which school boys wore carried a portrait of the young leader as well, right inside the bright small red star badge I was so proud of. I couldn't dare to have a bad thought about Lenin, and sincerely believed in his purity. Now, there are multiple Lenin relics stacked in a village hut called the "Museum of Communist Party". Figures of Lenin are next to the dirt road - a thing I don't think anyone could dare to do in earlier times.

Categories Photos, Technology

Copper wire production is a beautiful and loud process. We are going to trace it

from the start to the finish in the shops of the "Russian copper company".

Categories Culture, Photos

Images from the Russian state library, built between 1928 and 1958. The library

complex has six buildings, including a nineteen-storey, book storage warehouse.

Categories Culture, History, Photos, Russian People, Society

Saint-Petersburg in the early 2000s in the photographs of Igor Stomakhin. This is not about glamour, politics or the architectural beauty

of the northern Russian capital. Just some moments of an ordinary life, the good and bad of our society a dozen years ago.

Categories History, Photos, Russian People, Technology

The Buryats are people of Russia and Mongolia, numbered around 400,000 during the last census. They used to live in yurts - mobile round homes that could travel with them, and once they find a new place to stay, they set up in a matter of some hours. Usually the yurts were made of skins or felt and wooden planks. They might be in some way similar to native Indian teepees, but more rounded and

larger. However, besides Nomadic Buryats there were ones that decided to stay in one chosen place for longer, and because of this they built more permanent houses. But the round form was probably still preferred, and they didn't want to build more traditional square or rectangular shaped dwellings, so their dwellings got eight corners and looked somewhat similar to yurts.

Categories Photos, Russian People

Now in Donetsk, Eastern Ukraine, people have gathered to ask for a referendum on joining Russia. Some brought Russian flags, some held the portraits of Yanukovich - the president of Ukraine who fled to Russia and published a memorandum yesterday calling for people to demand more referendums on the fate of their regions. Some people were holding banners with more mundane

demands like "Give us back Russian TV channels" as a few days ago the court in Ukraine banned the broadcasting of the main Russian TV stations. Donetsk has almost one million people living in it and 48% of them are Russian. However it doesn't look to me that this gathering was too large, some reports say that around two thousand people were present.

Categories Funny, History, Other, Photos, Russian Art, Russian People

I have here a collection of vintage Russian circus posters and wonder if other are as interested in them as I am. In my opinion, in the Soviet past the circuses could be sort of little islands of freedom, especially in the early Soviet years. They offered entertainment (and entertainments were controlled by the state, at the time), they travelled to different cities (and wandering around without a fixed place of residence was considered a crime, as far as I recall). I tried to research a

little, and it seems that there are more people sharing the same opinion - like Olga Sviblova, the head of the art and multimedia museum in Moscow, quoted as saying that "Circus and sports were the only two spots in Soviet 1930s that had freedom". And so the vintage Russian circus posters to me look different to most of the other Soviet posters - both propaganda and advertisement. I find the circus posters much more vivid and real in detail. So here they are:

Categories Funny, Photos, Russian People, Society

I think that in Russia most people believe that basically Moscow is much better in terms of quality of life when compared to the rest of the country. I believe it's sort of normal to think that people in Moscow have higher salaries, better roads, get better healthcare, have the biggest stores, buy world recognized luxury brands, etc. Such people might

be surprised to learn that even in Moscow there are places like the place in these photos. Like some magical circle, the part of Moscow with 386 people is enclosed by triple circular rows of railways. Built in 1932 to be used as a test site, the trains cut the settlement out of the outer world and out of the rest of Moscow.

Categories Funny, Photos, Russian army, Russian People, Society

Today, an air force drill started in Karelia, 250 km east of Finland. Reportedly, air force jets and teams have arrived from four regions of Russia. The drill is planned to be conducted during

both the day and the night. The official defense department statement says that the main region of the drill would be Ladoga lake, which is on the border with Europe and Finland.

Categories Photos, Russian army, Russian Food, Russian People

Here are photographs of an official army field ration. The package is shielded with aluminum foil to prevent spoilage for

longer. Total calorie count is 4287 calories, and it weighs 1.7 kilos (or around 3 pounds). What's inside? Let's see.

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