The Alphabet

 

Whatever we learn, or at least some of it, goes with us; it never gets completely lost.  I've realized that when visiting Moscow, a few years ago.

In the higher grade of elementary school, in communist Romania,  we started  to learn russian  as a second language. It was  difficult for us, native speakers of a romance language (romanian) because of  russian's Cyrillic script as opposed to the Latin script.   Besides, our teacher was young and inexperienced, so the teaching was not very productive.

teacher of russian holding bouquet of flowers (my head touching it).

Years later, I managed to remember only a few random russian words,  but I did remember well  the alphabet. The knowledge of the alphabet was of tremendous help to me in two places in Moscow: the stunning Metro (reading the names of the stations), and the famous Novodevichi cemetery where all the 'Who's Who' of Russia were buried (reading the names on the headstones).

T-shirt with the map of the metro stations. It's made of fine cotton,
 

(The signs  everywhere in the city were in russian only, which made it very difficult for a tourist without a guide or group to find his way around).

After visiting the tombstones of politicians (Khruschev, Yeltsin), of writers (Chechkov, Gogol), composers (Shostakovitch), ballet dancer (Galina Ulanova), wives of Stalin and Gurbachev (Nadhezda, Raisa), violonist (David Oistreich), opera singer (Shaleapin) and others, I approached a small group of tourists in a corner I was about to explore on my own.

Yeltsin's  headstone; it catches the eye with its unusual shape and colors.

 

ballet dancer Galina Ulanova's tombstone

It turned out, the group I approached  was  israeli . While listening to the guide's explanations  (in hebrew),  I got the strange feeling he didn't know any russian. I was probably right, as he pointed to a headstone and said ;'here liesTupolev' (aircraft designer, the designer of the famous Tupolev  russian military bombers). 'No, I found myself intervening, Tupolev  lies next; have a look at the name on the stone'. There was silence in the air, and I felt badly about it.

Obviously, the guide could  not read russian.  I could....due to those rather boring russian lessons in elementary school. lol.

 

 

 

 

Live Danger in a Dead Place.

Several months ago I got attacked by ...a plant. It happened while I was on my way out of the cemetery. My skirt touched a shrub near one of the graves and all of a sudden its fruit opened up sending tens of needles into the lower part of my body. I won't go into details; I'll just say that it was pure Hell.

I know, of course, about the existence of plants whose exterior is covered by thorns or needles, but this was something else. No warning whatsoever of the concealed weapon. I was so shocked and in pain that I wasn't able to even take a decent look at the shrub. A month later I came back to the 'scene of crime' to search for it and take a picture so that I could start some inquiries, but I wasn't successful. I couldn't remember the exact place and shape of the 'villain'.

I'm not familiar with the regulations and restrictions, if any, regarding plants in a cemetery. I think in this particular cemetery there's usually no soil for planting near the headstones, so people bring all kinds of trees/shrubs/flowers, in pots of various shapes and sizes, and place them near the gravestone of their beloved trying to make beautiful the resting place of the dead and pleasurable the visits of the living.

I kept quiet about the incident. I felt it was a kind of punishment from Above for choosing the short way among the graves and thus disturbing the peace of the dead, instead of taking the normal path. I don't know why I haven't used the paved path. Probably, it's the nasty child in me, that resides in everyone, making us , at times, behave badly and do stupid things.

I should have complained to the manager of the cemetery about the shrub, demanding an explanation of their policy as to the sort of plants allowed in the cemetery, but I didn't. I guess I was still uncomfortable with my behaviour, and I was too glad that no lasting harm was done to me.