A young builder of socialism looks different from a decadent swine

This is a poster in a museum in Prague with that caption. What makes the swine so decadent? Not only is he reading but he is wearing a cowboy hat. This apparently comes from the popularity of country and western music among tramps and drifters in pre-communist Czechoslovakia. On a similar subject this is a poster in the same museum for the band Plastic People of the Universe. People who saw the horrible Tom Stoppard play Rock and Roll would be familiar with them.
In the 1970s the government cracked down on the subversive counter culture that grew up around them and they were banned. The movement to defend them led to Charter 77 and the rise of dissidents like Vaclav Havel.

This all raises the question that if the movement against communism was all about being a misfit and a long haired freak then why do all the kids in post communist Czech Republic look like this?

Well actually you forgot about Poland

I spent a few days in Warsaw. This is the old town which had to be completely rebuilt after the failed 1944 uprising against the Nazis when it was reduced to rubble.
Since I've been on this subject, here is a monument to the partisans that died in the uprising. First, you can tell how they care more than the Russians because they bring flowers. Clearly the Russians don't care about partisans as they patiently waited as the Nazis crushed the uprising. Also any Polish, or Italian, or Yugoslav (or Russian for that matter) partisans that they did get their hands on they usually sent to death camps for having been polluted by the west.

I will say that the Russians were the only ones to put women in their monuments as fighters and not just grieving for men like here. That shows the different ideas about women in Catholic countries like Poland or Italy. However, Russia is the one place I've been to where men won't sit on trains or buses if women are standing. This, of course, is great because it means more seats for men who don't obey that rule.

Here is the only piece of the Warsaw Ghetto wall that is still remaining. I had to double check this because when I got there I couldn't believe it was just part of someone's yard and not a monument, but this is it. On the other side they've got a plaque.
This is an exhibit in the Warsaw uprising museum (not to be confused with the 1943 Warsaw ghetto uprising) on Wladyslaw Szpilman who is played by Adrian Brody in the Pianist.
After Warsaw was destroyed following the uprising, a few people like him lived in the rubble. They called them the Warsaw Robinsons like Robinson Crusoe.
Oddly, speaking of Russians, the most popular Pierogi is called the Ruskie. It has cheese and potato and sometimes like here a little bacon. That really is the best, eventhough I did have the ones with lentils, or cabbage, or buckwheat groats, or dried mushrooms. I found it interesting that they don't always give you sour cream like in the U.S. They do put fried onions, melted butter, or bacon bits on top.

As to why this variety is called Ruskie, I don't know. The pierogi itself must have come from China as it is a dumpling. It probably would have reached eastern europe then through mongol control of Russia. But why potato and cheese is called Russian, I don't know.

The seven bridges of Kaliningrad

I made a brief stop in Kaliningrad before going to Poland, and the only thing I will mention about it is this nerdy math problem. Some total nerd wants me to talk about it so I gave in to her badgering.

Kaliningrad used to have seven bridges, only two remain. The problem is could you walk through the city and cross over all seven of them (completely, not half way and then retreating) only once. They were laid out like this.

This problem was first solved by the Swiss Mathmatician Leonhard Euler.

Why am I calling it Kaliningrad and not Konigsberg its original name? Well, unlike Leningrad, it is still named after Mikhail Kalinin.
This is despite the fact that Kalinin was one of the most loyal Stalinists. He even allowed is own wife to be arrested and sent to a labor camp. She was thrown naked into a freezing cellar, beaten and forced to change her testimony that she was a rightist spy. (I would never do this to kendra.) Anyway, it is better than naming a city after a king.

Leningrad on the other hand

This mosaic of Lenin, while not an artistic achievement, at least is in the Finland Station, where Lenin returned to Russia from Switzerland in a sealed boxcar in April of 1917.

Here is a statue of Lenin outside the Smolny Instutitute, a 19th century palace for the "Society for the Education of Noble Maidens" which served as the Bolshevick headquarters during the revolution. These images are fine because they are historical. To have a mosaic of tractors harvesting wheat in a moscow subway is just dumb.

Now, more importantly, what do they eat in Leningrad.

Pickles and anything pickled.
Honey
more fresh soft cheese

all types of fruit compotes to mix with the soft cheese in Blintzes.
Those pictures were taken in a large indoor market. But the best markets are when indivual women (or sometimes men) from the countryside set up on a sidewalk with a few sprigs of dill, maybe a head of garlic, or I even saw as little as one pint of blueberries.
That is the modern Leningrad. If you wonder why I'm not calling it St. Petersburg, it is mostly so you don't think I'm in Florida, but also because of Vsevolod Pudovkin's 1927 film classic.
I must make a quick comment here. One of my MANY readers might find this story interesting. In Poland workers don't wear shirts in the heat. Today while walking around Warsaw (I am a bit behind on blogging) I saw four young male construction workers building a sidewalk topless. I really wanted to photograph this to have on my blog and please a loyal reader. However, I felt that if they saw me cross the street and come after them with my camera I might be in a bit of trouble. This story is absolutely true and I apologize.

Moscow

Many of you could have guessed that part of the reason for the theme of this blog is that I am going to Eastern Europe this summer, specifically Russia, so there is ample opportunity to blog about communism. Of course, that isn't really the reason, as more sophisticated readers would know (not my students because they are dumb). In any case now I'm in Moscow so you would think I would go crazy with the communist images.

I will say that they have shown up the Italians in honoring antifascist partisans. The gun that woman has is much scarier than anything that guy in Parma had. However, I don't much care for the communist imagery here.

It's everywhere, like in this subway stop. It isn't that beer ad I'm complaining about. That has a lot more significance for these people than Lenin's head. This stuff doesn't have anything to do with history and was just put up in the 1950s to rally the people around some sort of crude nationalism (which I guess is why it is still there). Therefore I will talk about rice pilaf.

The Uzbeks call it Plov and it is something of a national dish in many places in this part of the world. I have had it in East Africa and South Asia by the name Pulau or Pilau. All it means is that the rice is first partially cooked, and then cooked with other ingredients (although even that doesn't necessarily have to be true I understand). This keeps the rice from sticking together. The key is this heavy pot called a Kazan. Apparently only men cook this dish because of the weight of the pot. The russian variety has a ton of carrots, lamb, and what I was relieved were not hard boiled eggs but whole heads of garlic. They serve it with a cabbage salad and some thick gravy. I could not tell if this guy was Uzbek or what. There were a lot of central asians (and east asians) working at this market where he was so it could be that this is Uzbek and not Russian. However, I hear the Uzbek variety has a lot of cumin, which this did not have.

Here is a picture of me in photoshopped into Red Square so you know I'm actually here and not just on my couch in East Harlem.

Glory to Latvian cinema?

Since I've been on the subject of film, did you know that Sergie Eisenstein was born in Riga?
His father Mikhail is Latvia's most famous art nouveau architect.
Here is some of his (rather ugly) work.
Now, I have to confess I am talking about this because I don't know anything about Latvian food.

They eat fish.
and soft cheeses
and chocolate when they are taking a break from cutting up meat with an ax.
and Lingonberries?!!
I feel betrayed. Those things in Sweden didn't look like the Lingonberries I had on my meatballs. So what does this mean? They don't eat lingonberries in Sweden and do in Latvia, or it is lingonberry season in Latvia but not in Swedan. Or, I don't know what a lingonberry looks like.

No the whole country does not smell like Cinnabon

Unfortunately. Because this is what I thought would be the case after getting off the train and smelling the overwhelming smell coming first from 7-11 of all places. They do have cinnamon buns or kannelbullar everywhere though.
As you can see they aren't covered in icing like we like them. They just have those flakes of crusty sugar. They also have a much more intense cinnamon flavor which is nice.

They love their coffee here and having them together is the tradition, not necessarily eating them after you shop for furniture. These pictures must have been taken on different days. In any case, this proves that all my stereotypes about Swedish culture are true.

OMG. Now really all of them are true. If anyone has any preconceived notions of the baltic countries please let me know. I would hate to go there with an open mind and just experience their culture for myself.

In fairness to Kendra after that last post about Summer with Monica, if her life with me were a film it would probably be this one.

Or would it be more like this?

I'm sure everyone is waiting for commentary about Swedish socialism. I don't have much, but I don't want to leave you unsatisfied. This is from an exhibit about he Vikings. Apparently the Swedish socialist movement used the history of democracy in Viking society to argue for universal male suffrage at the turn of the last century. In Norse clan society free peasants elected an assembly called the Thing. The history of the Thing electing chieftains and kings separates Scandinavia from southern feudal Europe which had the leftover authoritarian tradition of the Roman Empire.

Where are the lingonberries?

Before getting to my discussion of Swedish food, I must make a quick aside. On my flight over here I saw this movie.
It is Ingmar Bergman's Summer With Monika. This is the story of my life which should be called Summer With Kendra.

This is a farmers market in Stockholm. It looks like one anywhere. Since it is July it is full of raspberries and strawberries. I don't see any lingonberries. I guess that is what I get when all of my understanding of a country's culture comes from a few crude stereotypes picked up at IHOP. How can I ever see Sweden for what it is and get pass my silly misconceptions.

Wait. There they are. That is a nice big bucket full. I guess IHOP can teach us a lot. My next quest will be to find cinnamon rolls like at IKEA. That shouldn't be too hard because I smelled them baking at least three times before I even made it to my hotel room yesterday morning.

Parma and Northern Italy

Most of us know it for its cheese but Parma is a very nice university town. This is the university. Notice the bound and dead body in the background.

So they take pride in their partisans in Northern Italy. This is a monument to those who died fighting fascism in "Red Bologna" (omg I hope I didn't give anything away there).

The most recent victims died in August of 1980 in the waiting room of this train station. Eighty people were killed by right wing extremists here. This may be getting boring for some of you who prefer to get back to the food. Here, this is also red.
That is steak "florentine" at a place called Da Burde in Florence. The reason it is prepared rare is that Tuscan wines tend to be tannic and you need the juices to counteract the desalivating effect of the wine. When Jackie asked for it cooked more the waiter misunderstood her and said he couldn't served it any less cooked. He then said sometimes rubes from Rome or Milan come in and ask for it well done. We then had a laugh at their expense.

Here is Jackie in Trieste, formerly of the Austro-Hungarian empire, showing that Italian food is very diverse.
That is pork covered in horseradish served with sauerkraut and beer. Might as well be Germany.

One last food pick for fans of Jackie. This is Tortellini in Brodo and Strozzapreti in Bologna. Strozzapret means "priest choker." Whatever the fable you want to believe for the origins of the name, let's just chalk it up to the politics of red Bologna.

For those of you who think fascist bombings and choking priests are boring, I will try to dig deep for inspiration for the next post.