Marveling at the Metro

To avoid the rather unpleasant weather outside this Sunday I explored some of Moscow’s inside venues. Namely the world famous architecture in the Moscow Metro. On line number 5 (circle line) there are some of the most beautiful metro stations you will ever hope to see.  My personal recommendation, if you have about 45 minutes to an hour to spare, is to see all of them on the ring. But the best ones (in my humble opinion) are:

• Kievskaya (киевская) – Lots of impressive murals outlining historical events of Russian-Ukrainian friendship
• Novoslobodskaya (Новослободская) – Here there is beautiful stained glass and a huge mural about peace on one end of the platform
• Komsomolskaya (Комсомольская) – This one was the most impressive for me, after seeing some ‘average’ stations with just marble and statues this blew me away! Make sure you look up…

Other notable stations that are not on the ring but deserve a visit are Mayakovskaya (make sure to look up here as well), Novokuznetskaya (the marble benches here came from the first Church of Christ the Saviour – that Stalin demolished) and Ploshchad Revolyutsii.

The reason I don’t have that many photos of the gorgeous metro on my blog is because it is not allowed to take photos in the metro. There are many police patrolling the station. Since the invention of the camera phone I was able to snap a few inconspicuous shots, as there are lots of people talking on their phones or waiting for friends.

One final comment on the metro. While most of the metro is spotless and quite clean compared to other cities. The trains themselves on the circle are rather dirty. Since the trains just go round and round there are many undesirables stinking up the metro cars. So short trips on this line are preferable!

Other venues visited on this day trip, included the Moscow City Historical Museum and the best part of the day the Andrei Sakharov Museum. The Moscow City Historical Museum is not the most English-friendly place I’ve been too so far. Luckily I could speak to the cashier in Russian and read some of the exhibits. For English only tourists I would recommend seeing the State History museum instead, as there is English services available and about half of the material in this museum is quite similar. The only thing that is worth seeing is the 19th to pre-revolutionary Moscow section in Hall Two. There are lots of nice costumes, oil paintings and objects from Tsarist Russia to look at (even if you don’t speak Russian) Luckily with an ISIC card you get in for free, although regular admission is only 50r ($3).

A better museum to visit, although slightly off the beaten track is the Andrei Sakharov Museum. It is a human rights and anti-war museum. The museum was named after and founded by Andrei Sakharov, a Russian scientist and dissident. There is English material available, and the staff are quite friendly. Best of all is the photographic material and artifacts from the Soviet period. Right now, in addition to the permanent exhibits, there is an exhibit on Chechnya with breathtaking photos from 2005. An added bonus is that the museum is free! 

Look for my next rambling from Russia later this week, continuing the reviews of Russian recipes.