The Kremlin. Philip and I now expect there to be a kremlin in a city in the same way we once expected there to be clean tap water. A 'kremlin' (or in Russian, 'krem-l') is a 'citadel or walled centre' found in Russian cities and they were historically administrative and religious centres, sort of a tiny city within a city. The most famous one obviously is in Moscow but other important Russian cities have still preserved theirs – in fact, the kremlin in Kazan is a UNESCO world heritage site (the Russians were clearly proud of this and presumably that's why they got the word 'UNESCO' engraved all over it.. slightly missing the point maybe, but never mind).
The interesting thing about the Kazan Kremlin is that by far the most striking building is a mosque. Well, all the cathedrals in Russia have the trademark Sultan-of-Arabia-style onion domes and so arguably they all look a bit mosque-y (not my finest observation but whatever) but the real mosques had a very different quality. Still obviously treasured buildings, but much simpler. Apart from the one in the Kremlin though, which looked like the Soviet era, the Disney corporation and Islam had decided to share headquarters and while in theory they all agreed on 'GIGANTIC PALACE' they had all ultimately been forced to make some stylistic compromises.
I liked it! Philip did not. But the Annunciation Cathedral and the Syuyumbike Tower were pretty spectacular too, and it was a windy day, sun lowering, dark clouds rolling across the sky = ideal epic photo shoot conditions. I was delighted. We haven't had epic photo shoot conditions since we climbed Kilimanjaro and I couldn't really appreciate it then because of minor irritations like the fact that there was no oxygen and my brain was shutting down.
The unexpected cathedral. I don't know what this one was called or even really where it was (note to self: never write for travel guides) but during a Sunday morning walk around the city we followed an increasingly shabby road and ended up quite far out of the centre in what looked like a huge construction site where nothing was actually being built – and right in the middle of it was this:
We walked up some stone steps that appeared to lead to nowhere in particular but were ideally placed for a better view, and stood on a platform with an old Tatar man who was standing so still that it looked like he'd been posited there by a tour operator to make Tatarstan look more authentic. And we met a gorgeous stray cat, which kept nudging my boots with its face and winding itself around my legs. Stroked it, looked out over the cathedral and the big mess that surrounded it, and felt very peaceful. You know, in that stroking-a-cat-and-looking-at-an-unexpected-cathedral-from-a-height sort of way.
National Museum of the Republic of Tatarstan. The building itself was beautiful 19th century affair, much like so many of the buildings in Kazan, which give the city a crumbly Venetian sense of once being magnificent and prosperous and now tragically.. not. With a judiciously-employed money injection from the government and a bit of a tidy-up tourists would be flocking to Kazan in droves and the Lonely Planet would be referring to it as the Salzburg of the North, or whatever. At the moment though, it's a bit seedy.
Anyway, back to the museum. For a museum where all the information is written in either Cyrillic or Tatar (Tatar being the equivalent of Welsh, in that signs etc. are written in both languages in a kind of pointed way) it was surprisingly interesting! Mostly because they showed you examples of national dress through the ages and I loved what the women wore. Particularly stunning was a 17th century shin-length pleated fringe skirt and velvet waistcoat in baby pink and wine - so hot right now. There was also a small but fantastic collection of Russian art tucked away on the top floor, which alone would have made the trip worthwhile.
So yes, some wonderful things to do. But equally importantly, definitely do NOT:
Book tickets to a jazz concert called 'L.O.V.E.' because you can't find tickets for the opera or ballet. The lead singer of the band will be drunk (apparently very common at local concerts in the provinces, no matter how prestigious the concert hall), he will swagger about as if he is the next Frank Sinatra even though he has less charisma than a paper clip, or a.. pencil sharpener (yes I am writing this at work and casting about my desk for inspiration - fail) and no matter what note he tries to sing he will always hit the same one. Bad times. Luckily he let his hugely talented backing singers do a couple of acapella arrangements and they were so good it was almost worth going. And I always enjoy watching elderly Russian women knock back pre-concert vodka shots at the theatre bars. If Philip makes me go to any more jazz events I will start doing the same. No really.
Use the toilets in the shopping centre. Again, Kilimanjaro springs to mind. Except that was waaaaay up a mountain in Tanzania, and this was in a self-professed European city of culture. And just.. how can a shopping centre with an Ecco and cafes serving freshly squeezed apple and carrot juice also have a long-drop? How?
Go for longer than three days. We arrived on Thursday night and by lunchtime on Sunday, it was definitely time to leave. It started to freak us out after a while, the combination of familiarity and strangeness, trying to understand how and why it was like Western Europe but not, and like Russia but not, and sort of Asian but not. The novelty of it wears off when you realise that you're about to get on a plane, not to straightforward old England where you can reflect on everything and have a mug of Ovaltine, but to equally complicated Moscow, which is also like Western Europe but not, and like the rest of Russia but not, and admittedly not at all like Asia, but you're still just as embroiled as ever and the word 'Ovaltine' means about as much as 'accountability' or 'public enquiry' or 'road safety' or 'reasonably-priced, non fur-trimmed item of clothing' and for some reason everyone thinks that sushi is the height of sophistication à la the eighties and that mullets are the height of cool à la never.
And that was our weekend in Kazan, and another tour-de-force blog post from me. I keep meaning to make them shorter and more punchy like Philip's and totally failing.
