There is a story I love telling about me visiting St Petersburg in late August of 2002. I and Daniel had just returned after a month in Manchester back to Russia (it was the first year of our marriage), and that day we were walking down the Nevsky Prospekt towards the Senate. Now, in the middle of the Senate Square (between the Senate and the Hermitage) there is the Alexander Column: a stupendous monument commemorating the victory in the 1812 War. I love entering the Square via the Senate Arch, i.e. from Nevsky Prospekt side, because then you walk straight into the open space in the centre of which is the Column, with the Hermitage as the backdrop. This is how we were walking. I was eagerly anticipating his awe when he’d see the Square and the Column, and I was preparing him for this, so he was full of expectations. When we stepped under the Arch my paeans grew even more eloquent, and as I was waxing lyrical about the route and the monuments we were about to see, I was saying: “You will see it now, just another step, and one more, and now…”
… and then we found ourselves in the Senate Square that looked like it was raided by the UFO, half of the pavement blocks were standing upright. The city was getting ready to celebrate St Petersburg’s 300th anniversary in 2003. As if this was not enough, the Alexander Column was covered in scaffolding to its very top. Thankfully, Daniel didn’t let this disappoint him, although he’d surely prefer to see the monuments he’d listened to for about 15 minutes.
And this afternoon I found the photo below in one of my unimates‘ blog. In the photo we see Gorokhovaya Street in the centre of St Petersburg. In the background is the golden spire of the Admiralty building, commemorated in one of Alexander Pushkin’s poems. In the foreground, however, are the roadworks. The whole picture looks quite terrifying and claustrophobic. I instantly thought of it as a Raskolnikov’s room, narrow and loaded with rubbish.
Gorokhovaya Street is very close to my heart for another reason. In 2000 when I attended a conference at the University of Saint Petersburg and also researched at the library for 2 weeks, I brought with me a skirt suit (for the conference) and jeans and a couple of sweaters (for all other days). It was the turn of November and December, and it was getting very frosty. I and my colleagues went there by a night train where I somehow managed to break the zipper in my jeans. As I wouldn’t see myself in the worst dream walking up and down the wintery St Petersburg’s streets in a skirt and on high hills, I had to take the jeans to a clothes repair studio. The studio I managed to find was in Gorokhovaya St. If I tell you that the street had had a very Dickensian feel about it, you will be able to picture it: it was half-lit, the pedestrian path was extremely narrow, covered in ice, and with a lot of holes. Considering I was walking in heels, I thought it was a miracle that I didn’t break my neck there.
11 years later there are roadworks in Gorokhovaya Street. More holes, I suspect. I’d like to think there are also more streetlights there now, but I cannot be sure.