ST. PETERSBURG (dpa) – On Nevsky Prospect, the magnificent avenue in St Petersburg, the pavements are being ripped up. Many of the city’s splendid palaces are surrounded in scaffolding. Masons, painters and other specialists are in great demand, because St. Petersburg is sprucing itself up for its 300th anniversary in 2003.
Baroque splendour alongside socialist grey, exclusive boutiques alongside old ladies selling vegetables on the street, new openness and old secrecy – St. Petersburg is a city of contradictions.Nevsky Prospect is a microcosm of these incongruities. Designer fashion labels Prada and Valentino have long been at home here.“Under the Czars, this house was a women’s fashion boutique that was nicknamed ‘husbands’ death’ because of its high prices,” explained our interpreter Natasha.The name is not out of place today. The new generation of designer shops are well beyond most people’s budgets. “We buy our clothes second hand,” said Natasha.Yeliseyev’s delicatessen at No. 56 Nevsky Prospect has been called the most beautiful food hall in Europe because of its lavish Art Nouveau decor.But local people are not queuing outside: 1.2 million of the city’s 4.7 million inhabitants are pensioners and the material losers of the huge social upheaval of recent years.Just two metro stops from the Nevsky, at Vladimirskaya Station, you can find normal St. Petersburg life at the Kusneshny Ryok market hall. Meat and sausage on ice-cold marble slabs, cabbages and peaches piled up into pyramids await buyers.Fat ladies working the stalls offer pickled gherkins, Caucasian traders try to attract buyers with cheeky banter. “Here you will get good value for your money,” said Natasha.Nearby the market is the house in which the writer Fyodor Dostoyevsky lived until his death in 1881. Just a few doors down lived composer Peter Tchaikovsky who also died in St. Petersburg.The view into the house opposite, home to a duchess, is said to have provided the inspiration for the title character of one of his operas.One side of the Grand Hotel Europe, one of the most traditional and splendid hotels in the city, also faces onto the Nevsky Prospect. At the end of 1991 it was reopened by the Kempinski Hotels and Resorts chain.The five-star hotel offers a “White Days” special in winter when a double room for three nights costs around 500 U.S. dollars (573 euros). But those travelling on a smaller budget can get an impression of the old luxury of St. Petersburg simply by taking tea in the hotel lobby.The nearby Museum of the Arctic and Antarctic at Uliza Marata 24a, near the Mayakovskaya metro station, is a very different world of socialist realism. Time seems to have stood still here. The museum attendants wear grey uniforms and run a strict regime.The exhibition gives the impression the Poles were discovered by Soviet scientists alone. Yet the museum that opened in 1937 has a special charm, not least because it is housed in a former church.Most of the churches in St. Petersburg belong to the state, including the Kazansky Cathedral on the Nevsky and the Church of Christ’s Resurrection at Griboyedov Canal 2a – the only church in the city with onion domes.City founder Peter the Great expressly forbade these “Russian” domes.The Church of Christ’s Resurrection was built in 1883 on the site on which Czar Alexander II had been murdered two years previously. Like all churches, museums and theatres here, the entrance fees are much higher for foreigners than for Russians.The contradictions of St. Petersburg are unlikely to have been ironed out by 300th anniversary next year. But by then the city will undoubtedly have a new look. Around two billion U.S. dollars (2.3 million euros) are being invested by the state and private donors in the infrastructure this year.The plans include extending the airport and building new roads, said Ludmilla Botkina, deputy chairman of the Committee for Tourism in St. Petersburg. The celebrations will continue throughout the year and will include concerts, exhibitions and cultural festivals.Information on the Internet: http://www.city-guide.spb.ru
