The Jewish History Center and Center Tolerance is amazing

---

Day 16

We started the day with a tour of some of the subway stations. In the 1950’s the government constructed magnificent subway stations as a way of showing the people what their country would be like at the end of the Revolution when the new world was ready. The stations are decorated with marble, chandeliers, statues, stained glass and mosaics and immaculate. 8 of the 15 million residents use the system on any work day. The comparison to our subways is unavoidable and our subways are dirty and unreliable. All the stations are immaculate.

On one of the train rides, we were approached by a young Russian man. He said he really liked the USA because of the NRA and our ability to buy guns. In Russia he said it was hard to even buy 1 clunky gun which is all that is allowed. I tried to explain that we have a murder rate that is much, much higher than other counties with better gun control rules, but he wasn’t buying it. I guess truth doesn’t matter here any more than it matters for lots of Americans.

After this part of the tour, we decided to skip the convent and go back to the Jewish Museum and Tolerance Center. I’m glad we did. I didn’t learn much but go to see a presentation of the history of the Jews in Russia from 17XX through today from a Russian perspective. The Great Patriotic War was glorified as it should be in that it was Russian that defeated the Nazis in Europe. They white-washed the role of Ukrainians in WWII but were very upfront about the pogroms around 1900 and the plight of the refuseniks. The museum was very interactive with much of the information available in English. For example, on one large round exhibit there were pictures of lots of different Jews and you could touch one and there was a pop-up showing you what happened to them as the Pale of Settlement ceased to exist and Jews became more integrated into Russian society. Come to think of it there wasn’t much on the Stalin purges that were especially harsh for Jews.

Right now, we are on a 4-hour train to St Petersburg and while we still have ½ to go, I’m caught up with my blog.

---