Murmansk
I’m really excited to see this industrial Russian city above the Arctic circle. Only a century old, it was destroyed in the Second World War.
I’ve visited the Russian (well, Soviet originally) outpost towns of Barentsburg and Pyramiden in Svalbard, and I’m struck by the fact that although Murmansk is bigger, wealthier, more vibrant and cleaner than either there are so many similarities. The smells of strong cigarettes, coal smoke, cologne, sweat and earth. The buildings in the exact same slightly dilapidated state. The architecture, the vehicles, the detritus. The public art and the typography, even the layout of the streets.
Russia seems to me an exotic place, which can be surprising to some of us in Europe or North America because many Russians, at least in the west of the country, look just like us. But it seems a very different place culturally. I’m very happy to be here.
Tomorrow we travel to Atomflot to board a nuclear icebreaker bound for the North Pole.
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