The Streets of Moscow
IN a ten days' visit it is impossible to learn much about the internal life of a city so strange as Moscow, particularly if one cannot speak a word of Russian.
But it is possible, even without the assistance of an interpreter, to observe the life going on in the streets. The snow had melted only a week before I arrived, and the streets still showed signs of the recent thaw. They were rough and muddy, sometimes cobbled, sometimes sandy and sometimes with a sound stone surface.
There is an excellent service of small single-deck electric trams and an original method of travelling in them. One gets in at the back of the tram, buys a ticket, costing generally eight copecks (about 10.), then one pushes one's way through the always crowded tram, and alights at one's destination from the front of the car.
This leaves no opportunity to read the evening paper or the latest detective story, but the method saves time and confusion. At stopping places one sometimes sees beggars and newspaper boys plying their trades in the trams ; for instance, on the first occasion that I travelled alone by tram, without an interpreter, a friendly news- paper boy tried to relieve my loneliness by selling me an illustrated paper with a photograph of Charlie Chaplin on it. Many routes have a service of very comfortable Leyland 'buses, while there are also some Russian-built 'buses on the streets. There are a - certain number of taxis available in the chief centres of the city. Or, if you prefer it, you can, of course, hire an izvoshchik, after striking a bargain with the driver about the fare. One is well advised to pay about half what he demands. But Moscow is not a large city and most people walk when they have not far to go. The pavements are crowded with people.
On many of the streets are sold barrels of"apples, buckets of apples soaked in vinegar, and baskets of oranges, carried on the heads of broad-shouldered, thick-set women. Newspaper, stationery, chocolate, or cigarette kiosks are plentiful. Sometimes you see a woman with several gay-coloured aprons hung round her neck,' dis- playing rather crude but original designs, and it was friendly to see bunches of kingcups and wood anemones being sold in the streets. The shop windows are unpre- tentiously decorated, though when I was there, in some of them were still exhibited photographs of the Com- missars draped in red, a relic of the May 1st celebrations.
There are large State, Co-operative and Municipal shops, which correspond to our Army and Navy Stores or Sel- fridge's, where you can buy anything you want from caviar to Caucasian belts. I shopped in one of them, called Gum, opening out of Red Square: Most of the shops are rather crowded. The necessities of life, and in particular food, are, as far as I could tell, cheaper than in England ; for instance, the best butter costs about 1r3. 10d. a pound, lump sugar costs about 51-d., good toilet soap is about 3d. a tablet. But luxuries, particu- larly imported • goods, are very expensive. I happened to see in a chemist's shop a box of Coty powder, for which we should pay 2s. 6d., priced at 22s., and Russian face powder was sold at from 8s. to 10s. per box ; foreign silk stockings cost from a £1 to 30s. a pair, and an inferior Russian make ' from 7s. a pair. Cakes, biscuits, and sweets are delicious, in fact, most Russian food is very- good and excellently cooked. But perhaps the most interesting shop in Moscow, for visitors at any rate, is the Peasants' Shop. To this centre peasants from every district bring their handicraft work and receive special orders for further work. It is a delightful place, full of the most exquisite embroidery, lace, lacquer work, pottery,- homespun linen, and wooden toys, bowls, ash- trays, &c., in gay colours and attractive designs at very reasonable prices.
There are still a- few privately owned shops but they do not seem to do a large proportion of the total trade of the town. The market, whose heyday is on Sunday, is a private enterprise where those who have still retained their love of bargaining can get their fill of it..
-The general -impression of the people walking about the streets can perhaps be compared to that made by Saturday evening shoppers in a small English "country town. It is, at any rate externally, a classless society which you see in Moscow ; there are no smartly dressed women and well-tailored men—one man looks as rich or as poor as another. On the whole, the women wear rather dull and unattractive European clothes, generally without hats or with bright Caucasian scarves around their heads. They are rarely made-up, but many of them use lipsticks. I saw comparatively few shingled heads. Hairdressers in Moscow are supposed to be peculiarly successful at dying hair red. There are cer- tainly many Titian heads in Moscow, but whether they are the genuine Georgian tint or a Moscow imitation I could not tell. The men are more exotic in appear- ance, with their high-necked blue, black or embroidered linen shirts, their knee breeches and high Caucasian boots. Some wear leather or astrakan coats and caps or little velvet skull caps embroidered with wreaths of flowers. Everybody now wears boots or shoes. It was surprising to see, the children running about the streets in jolly blue-striped bathing dresses, playing hop-scotch as in Chelsea. The people look ordinarily clean and tidy, and very healthy and happy ; they go about their business with smiling faces ; everyone seems to be very busy, for the time ffies in Moscow. Nobody stares at one or seems to be surprised at anything.
But the colour of Moscow is not to be found in its inhabitants, but in the very stones of which it is built. It is a symphony of colour ; rose brick walls, pale or glittering golden domes and cupolas, weathered-jade roofs, brilliant emerald grass, red-painted Government buildings, new slate-coloured offices, Labour Palaces, and the gleaming waters of the Moskva. The Kremlin is a eity, in itself, encircled by fantastic walls and crowned with white palaces. Here one feels is ancient Russia. Moscow is unlike any city in the world. No imagination
Previous page
