Arrival Day

by Peter Bogyo

It has been 42 years since I was last in Russia, during my senior year at Yale.  Only then it was called the Soviet Union. What a difference those years have made.

One of the first things that struck me when we exited from customs into the arrival hall of the beautiful and modern Domodedovo Airport was the proliferation of commercial ads all around the hall, like the ads on the inside of a American baseball field or an ice rink- KFC in particular was advertised everywhere, which was not what I was expecting!

Moscow seems much, much more prosperous than I recall from 1977, although I have been advised that Moscow is its own special world, and what one sees here should not be taken as true for all of Russia.  Before all else, I was impressed by the number of, and variety of automobiles all around- Mercedes, BMWs, Audis, and Hondas, to name just a few.  During my first visit, cars were a rarity, and almost exclusively of Russian make.  With their proliferation came one of the most impressive traffic jams I have seen in a long time- it took an hour and a half to come from the airport into the city center. All along the route were advertising signs rotating on a loop- for example, KFC again, but also Mövenpick, McDonalds, Pan Quotidian. One had the feeling Muscovites had plenty of discretionary money to spend and enjoyed a comfortable, consumerist lifestyle.

For our first three nights here, the Ministry of Culture is putting us up at the luxurious Marriot Tverskaya Hotel, and it is big treat, much different from what I recalled of our housing from the ’70. A delicious and expansive breakfast buffet, for example, with everything one could imagine including a custom made omelette station and plenty of fresh fruit. I think our future digs at Formula Za Rulem will be much more basic!

Taking advantage of a free evening, I had prebooked tickets to the Bolshoi that first evening. The ballet was on, and they were offering a Russian ballet, called “A Legend of Love” that I had never heard of, by the acclaimed Azerbaijani composer Arif Malikov. It was playing in the old Historic Theater, which I was anxious to experience.  It did not disappoint- a grand and ornate auditorium with spectacular crystal chandeliers, plush red fabric and six tiers of gold gilt fronted boxes. The traffic jam to the hotel was so bad that we barely had time to check in, wash our faces, and race out to make the curtain- again, traffic was still so bad we made it, panting, with seven minutes to spare!  Not having had any time for dinner beforehand, we were advised during one of the two intermissions to visit the restaurant/bar on the top floor, where we feasted on salami and salmon sandwiches and other delicacies.  Caviar and champagne was also offered, but not in our budget.

The Bolshoi, by Peter Bogyo

The pure classical dancing of the principals was exquisite, but, ironically, was interspersed with corps de ballet numbers that seemed quite kitschy, almost campy, by contrast. Part of the plot involved our hero being exiled to the mountains and being tasked with the seemingly impossible job of bringing water back to his village below. Of course he succeeds, and we were told by the patron sitting next to us that Stalin had embraced this work as a fine example of a public irrigation project that had succeeded!

It was a beautiful evening, and we decided to walk back to the hotel, which turned out to be much further than we had realized.  It was now about 10:30 PM on a Friday night, but the avenues were well lit, and thronged with people.  Also, many stores were still open and doing a thriving business! We stopped in a grocery store, very well stocked, and bought a bottle of sparkling water for our hotel. All in all, a very exciting start to our Russian adventure. We felt as if we had dived right in.