Buran: Whatever Happened to You?

Remem­ber one of the most remark­able mas­ter­pieces of Soviet engi­neer­ing? Despite only hav­ing made one flight, it is still con­tinue to fas­ci­nate peo­ple across the globe — and She still intends to con­tinue doing so…

buran as ir 500x354 Buran: Whatever Happened to You?

The beauty of the beast

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The Wall: the Unaccounted Tragedies.

As pre­vi­ously stated by George Orwell, war is peace. So when Wal­ter Ulbricht, the Leader of the Ger­man Social­ist Unity Party, on June 15, 1961 said: “No one has the inten­tion of build­ing the wall!”, it took only about two months for the con­struc­tion to begin. The run­down state of the East­ern part was forc­ing peo­ple to flee in the search of bet­ter lives in the West of Ger­many: in the first six months of the year 1961, about 150 000 peo­ple left their houses. How­ever, more stayed — and so the Wall did not only sep­a­rate the city — it cut fam­i­lies in halves.

1 500x333 The Wall: the Unaccounted Tragedies.

On the morn­ing of August 13, 1961 the Berlini­ans woke up to the first layer of bricks being erected.

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An Old Curiosity Shop: The Museum of Soviet Life

Ear­lier this year, a unique in its pecu­liar­ity museum was opened in Novosi­birsk, the Siber­ian cap­i­tal of Rus­sia. Pri­vately owned, this museum offers an insight into the days long gone, yet long­ing to be remem­bered: a col­lec­tion of the Soviet every­day arti­facts; sim­ple things that still matter.

Please wel­come our new author Maria Yukhi­menko, who has vis­ited this place and and pre­pared this report exclu­sively for the realussr readers.

DSC 0208 499x334 An Old Curiosity Shop: The Museum of Soviet Life

The USSR Museum: the facade.

The museum occu­pies a 1917 villa and is opened by appoint­ment only. The story goes that a long time ago this build­ing was used as an NKVD head­quar­ters (the KGB pre­de­ces­sor, that is). Well, it cer­tainly feels like it – the atmos­phere is gloomy enough: dark rooms, high stud ceil­ings, squeaky wooden floors.

How­ever, it turns out to have quite a bit of character…

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