Minsk - Soviet Timewarp

Hotel Planeta

Belarus was a difficult country to visit. I was on nodding terms with the Embassy in London before they finally granted me a visa. Direct flights are expensive but there’s a cheap backdoor entrance via budget airlines & a bus trip over the border from Lithuania. Minsk was the grey city at Belarus’s heart, frozen in a Soviet timewarp & a fascinating experience. I stayed at the Hotel Planeta, a town-edge monolith. Prowling the lobby were ladies in short skirts & heavy make-up, eager for eye contact. I slalomed through, head-down and ran for the lift. Later my room-phone rang and a female voice whispered unknown Russian. “Sorry?” I said, at which point she switched to English and suggested a “private relaxing massage”. She was one of the few people in Minsk who spoke good English. I declined her offer.

Belarus was almost completely destroyed in the second-world war, the whole country transformed into a vast battlefield. Minsk’s large Jewish population was squeezed into ghettos and then annihilated. City monuments reflect the horror and sadness; a straggling Auschwitz-bound line clinging to small suitcases & maternal tears for those who fell later in Afghanistan.

Trinity Suburb

The post-war city was rebuilt from scratch on Stalin’s watch, with wide boulevards & blockend murals of muscle-honed patriots. Everywhere there is concrete, grey & stained. Functional architecture drains the place of colour & I never saw a blue sky in Minsk. Only Trinity Suburb was different, a 1980s rebuild of the medieval old town where pastel shutters and decorated brickwork added an organic respite to the monochrome of Soviet Minsk. The tight string of streets looked more like the Belarus of Marc Chagall with gabled roofs and uneven cobbles and Trinity looked across the river to ribbons of green parkland.

I found Minsk oppressive at first, but then began to notice the welcome intrusion of human nature; traditional dancers harmonising folk ballads by the theatre, quirky sculptures decked with flowers and a wedding party spilling onto the streets drinking straight from bottles of Champanska.

Metro artwork

Belarus is one of the last dictatorships in Europe; ruled by a president elected with improbable majorities. Lenin still stood proudly outside Parliament and the KGB HQ was on the main shopping street. Even Lee Harvey Oswald made Minsk his home. The KGB bugged his apartment but couldn’t work out his motives & were as surprised as anyone when he changed the course of history. Belarus still leans towards Russia and turns subsidized gas imports into lucrative export capital. Iconic skyline vanity projects litter the suburbs creating construction jobs. No real freedom, no dissent, but work & a monthly paycheque. By day I walked the city until my calves ached but in the evenings, I rode the rattling metro lines in & out of Minsk with their spacerace tiling and starlit stations, picking up bread, cheese & fruit from local supermarkets at the end of the line. Wine was cheap & I stocked up on chewy reds from Georgia and crispy whites from Moldova.

New Library

Re-entering Lithuania, itself a former Soviet republic, was like discovering a new world of colour; Baroque churches; golden spires and the return of blue skies. The border crossing was a test of patience. Long waits in no-mans-land are common along the EU frontier but decontamination channels are solely the legacy of Chernobyl. The Soviet reactor was just inside the Ukrainian republic but Minsk lay directly upwind. Another legacy of Belarus’s unfortunate geography; stomped over by fighting armies and then poisoned by radiation from within.

Wine, Stalin & Tbilisi



Tbilisi

I headed to Tbilisi from Armenia, folded into the back of a bumpy minibus. My seat was a crate of watermelons & a toddler napped on my rucksack. I took a battered taxi to the old town, but walked the final stretch after the fuel warning light blinked on the dashboard & it spluttered to a halt. Tbilisi’s old town was both dustily atmospheric and falling to bits. I cleansed myself in one of the city’s communal baths, pummeled by an old man with giant soapy hands and headed to Gori to confront Georgia’s elephant in the room.

Gori is Stalin’s hometown, an hour’s shared-taxi journey in a brand new BMW from Tbilisi, the road skimming close to the Ossetian border. Rigid lines of rusty-red shacks studded the slopes; A refugee camp thrown together following Georgia’s latest skirmish with Mother Russia.



Man of Steel

Stalin’s boyhood home has been incongruously preserved in the centre of town, enclosed by classical columns and shielding a museum that told a story but never the whole truth. There was a sharp focus on WW2 [USSR’s Great Patriotic War] and Stalin’s achievements. After that it presented a web of spin & doctored photographs. Five year plans and collectivizations without the famines and Siberian labour camps. I bought a chapbook of Stalin’s boyhood poetry & a bottle of undrinkable sweet red wine. From Gori I headed to the Eastern town of Sighnaghi, the new epicentre of Georgian victiculture. The whole industry is undergoing a reboot after a Russian export blockcade had derailed it following Geogia’s succession. Stalin’s sweet-tooth influence has been supplemented by international recognition, particularly among the reds. Each label is transcribed by the gorgeously curly Georgian alphabet. However, in some lines naiviety triumphs & I couldn’t resist a bottle of Sparking Wine.
 

Sighnaghi

Sighnaghi has been heavily restored and felt slightly staged, as if it had been scrubbed too hard. Close to the town was a stone chapel dedicated to the fourth century St Nino, where I submerged into the healing waters of a natural spring.

This incongruous mix of the ancient & the modern formed my overriding impression of Georgia; Early saints & modern bodegas; new BMWs & petrol-scrimping cabbies. Georgia is a beautiful & ancient country, shoving away from Soviet rule, but tearing away fragments as it does so. The overriding issue for Georgia is this; what can you do when your most famous son is Joseph Stalin?

Thrace & the Rhodopes

On the Eastern Thracian plain in modern day Bulgaria lies Plovdiv, a many-layered city spread across several hills & atop capricious plates. I stayed in the steep, cobbled old town which crumbles over the Soviet-designed modern centre. Visible underneath is a Roman city whose contours still define the modern street plan. A 1970s earthquake exposed a large amphitheatre and looking south from the top row of seats, the jagged Rhodope Mountains line the horizon, creating a natural border with Greece.

Deep within the Rhodope Mountains lies the Devil’s Throat, a cave complex where Orpheus descended into the underworld to rescue Eurydice only to look back and lose her forever. The mountain roads crawl up to modern ski resorts and dip down to dense wood-lined valleys. Scattered in the mountains are low-walled foundations and white stone burial chambers; remnants of the ancient land of the Thracians.

Plovdiv

I crisscrossed the valleys in a series of minibuses, bought Mursalski, an aphrodisiac tea & in the evenings, drank wine grown from Thracian vines. I stayed a night in Eliza’s Guesthouse in Trigrad, a village close to a roaring gorge and followed Orpheus’ footsteps into the underworld. Eliza cooked Rhodope Pie for me, a Bulgarian version of Tortilla Espanola, puffed with local potatoes and mountain herbs. She was in her fifties, a teacher, and her wrists were strung with red & white Martenitsa, awaiting the spring. We spoke about the Soviet era and her attitude was even-handed. Everyone had jobs & pensions but little freedom and the atmosphere was one of suspicion even in small villages. You had to constantly look over your shoulder.

Heading back to Plovdiv, I stopped off in the Rhodope foothills at the Monastery of Bachkovo. The monastic buildings are coloured with frescos & thick with incense, shielded by a perimeter of stone walls. My guidebook suggested an overnight stay was possible & I was intrigued. I’ve slept in caves & luxury Paradores, in castles and even a tent in my back garden in London, but never in a monastery.

“Do you speak English?” I asked a group of monks. No, they didn’t. “German?” they asked. I didn’t. “French?” Umm. I was given an interview with one of the Fathers in an oak-lined study. His French was far superior to mine but we found common ground and I left with a large iron key and a warning to be back by dusk when the monastery closes its doors to the outside world. I took the bus back to Plovdiv, buying bread and cheese & wine, hiding the bottle in my rucksack, unsure of Eastern Orthodox protocol regarding alcohol. It was red wine, at least.

The room was square & plain with polished wooden floors and a southern window onto the Rhodopes. I read Kapka Kassabova’s memoir of growing up in Soviet Bulgaria and ate a simple meal. The plumbing clunked a little but then settled down and quickly became noiseless. By late-evening the monastery was in complete darkness & the silence was total. There was nothing to do but go to bed. I was awoken by a cliché; a cockerel crowing from the monastery’s in-house menagerie. The best night’s sleep I’ve had since the children were born.

Rock in Vaduz

Vaduz is a neat village masquerading as a capital city and I stayed a night while hopping between Austria & Switzerland. Pricey business hotels lined the main street but cheaper accommodation lay just outside the centre and I was drawn in by a tall brick B&B sporting a wall of blinking flashbulbs. The manager of the pension was a little unwelcoming; “Rock band” he said glumly, and pointed to the floor.

Steps led down from the lobby to a door marked “DISCO BAR”. I asked for a top floor bedroom but still the percussion rattled my shutters. I couldn’t beat the noise so I joined it. Who knew Liechtenstein had an alternative rock scene? Well here it was, squashed loud & sweaty into the basement of my pension. Pierced Goths, tattooed metalheads and, incongruously, a smartly dressed 50 something couple were all shoehorned into this tight space.

A band, sounding like a Germanic Black Sabbath played forever. The singer wrapped himself around the microphone as the band ran through the usual rock clichés. They even had a stage-diver although there’s little danger in leaping from a foot high stage onto an empty dancefloor. After four unearned encores the band shuffled off. “Goodnight, Vaduz!” shouted the singer swaggering off in leather trousers and sunglasses. He headed directly over to the 50 somethings and gave them both a kiss, blowing his cool somewhat as they turned out to be his parents.

Catching the bus from Dilijan to Vanadzor

I bought my ticket and sat outside the small bus station in Dilijan. This pretty Armenian spa town quietly markets itself as Little Switzerland & is perched high in the green hills, far away from the dusty earthquake-battered capital, Yerevan. It was the final bus of the day and the sun was dipping into the horizon. It was also twenty minutes late and the driver, in a bid to recover time, accelerated past the terminal. I stood up, flapping my arms around. Two staff from the bus station came out, also flapping their arms & then disappeared back into the station. The bus turned a corner and left town. If I didn’t get to Vanadzor, I couldn’t get to Tbilisi in Georgia. If I couldn’t get to Tbilisi, I couldn’t get home to London. I was travel-stained & tired. So, I did what I always do in situations of utter hopelessness. I kicked my rucksack.

Concrete Beauty

But then the two bus station employees reappeared & ushered me into a mud-splattered minivan. We raced off in pursuit, running red lights and leaning on the horn to scatter the traffic.  Luckily our target was an old American school bus and we glimpsed its taillights a mile out of town, crawling up an incline in first gear. The minivan shunted past and drew to an abrupt stop in front of the startled driver. There followed a further series of arm signals until the bus door hissed open and I climbed the steps waving my ticket and pointing back to the town trying to explain the situation in the absence of shared language.

 

After this unlikely start, the bus inched up a narrow ridge riding above the beautiful villages belonging to the Molokans. Rejecting orthodoxy, the Molokans are an ultra-conservative group who face away from the modern world and live in steep green valley settlements like Fioletovo.

The bus crunched through the narrow passes with the valley spread out below; patterned by hayricks and smoking chimneys & populated by men on horseback and women in black headscarves. Lilac dusk dropped across the valley and as the light diminished and the senses readjusted, the tang of woodsmoke drifted into the bus and I slept the final miles into Vanadzor. This is how I will always remember Armenia; a beautiful journey made possible by a spontaneous act of kindness.

Lake Ohrid, Macedonia

I took a stroll on my first morning around the rim of Lake Ohrid, photographing the sun as it filtered through the reeds. A local fisherman, fluent in English and pushy in business, tried to sell me a 50 euro boat ride to Albania. I thanked him and kept walking.

Around the headland the path dipped to the rocks below and a controlled stumble brought into view a half-moon of sharp white stones; a hidden beach! I came back each morning, slowly building a tan.

Ohrid’s beauty is characterized by a single church; St. John Kaneo; set high above the lakefront. The spare beauty of this 13th century church & the power of its position have made the site famous across the Balkans. I walked this way just after dawn, in the heat of the day and then in twilight, just to see the church and lake in different lights.

I bumped into the Ohrid fisherman again. “Albania, 40 euros” he said. I spread my arms in a “why would I wish to leave here” gesture. “No problem” he smiled and I brushed past.

Ohrid was a tourist hotspot but also an architectural town. Layers of history were woven into the fabric of the place; A classical amphitheatre, Byzantine churches, an Ottoman bazaar. On the waterfront were pizzerias, ice-cream parlours and tourist tat shops. The Cyrillic language developed in Ohrid but since Yugoslavia broke up the young people have schooled themselves in English and spoke it better than I did.

I stayed longer than I intended, relaxing on my beach, planning the next step to Kosovo and enjoying the lazy days. On my final night, I photographed the church in moonlight and headed home to pack. A recognizable figure barred my path. This time it was 30 euros, “final offer.” “I really don’t want to go to Albania” I pleaded.

Pristina Newborn

The Republic of Kosova isn't universally recognized but it winked at me from across the Macedonian border and represented the final piece of my Yugoslavian jigsaw.

I boarded an old diesel bus which crunched up the hill from Skopje, joined at the border by KFOR-trained dogs, who sniffed and snapped at my rucksack but found nothing more dangerous than dirty underwear.

My highly visible Kosovan passport stamp virtually rules out any further visits to Serbia, it's non-acceptance of the succession territory pivotal to the Serbian Government. So be it, Belgrade. Once into Kosovan territory, the green border hills looked stunning and alive in the November sunshine.

The bus dropped to a dusty plateau, a countrywide construction site as Kosovo rebuilds. The capital, Pristina was a typical Balkan mixture of Ottoman market and Soviet slab-blocks. I walked through graffiti heavy streets as traffic noise competed with the call to prayer and followed Bill Clinton Boulevard, flanked by giant posters of Tony Blair; "Leader, Friend, Hero". You won't see these in England. In the centre of town sits the National Library, a boxy defensive building, dressed with chainmail. Perhaps the weight of history has forced Kosovans to protect their literature or maybe it's just another architectural adventure in post-modernism from central planning.

Although never too far from a bullet-scored wall or a weed-filled plot of blasted masonry, Pristina was full of life. Half of its population is under 25. The cafes and bars were full of smart teenagers, talking into phones on borrowed mobile networks and able to flip to fluent English in an instant. A concrete sculpture spells it out; NEWBORN. Pristina is finding a new voice and the young carry it.