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Until 2018, I never went out Schengen Area. All of a sudden I decided to change that. Since then I left it four times, to add two destinations to my modest hall of fame: Monglia and Russia. I went to Mongolia only once, and to Russia four times. Of course it triggers curiosity of my friends and family. Some see it as a new passion, others as a kind of stubbornness…
But why Russia?
That’s a drawer-question. Open it, and you realize there are many others inside. What can be nice to see there, do they really have an interesting culture, why won’t you go elsewhere, what draws you there?
Dear member of human kind,
I won’t answer all of these questions. I hesitated defending the beauty and the cultural interest of what I saw in Russia. But I’m no art critic or historian. I spent merely two months there, am I really the best person to do that? I am really wondering. I am just an inhabitant of this planet we share. With this regard, I am both you and not you. I don’t know what you could find beautiful or worthy of interest. In a few months you will find my journey described in details on this same piece of web. You will have the opportunity to build your own ideas through my photos, my eyes… And I hope you will like doing so!
And that’s a bit my point… What may sound as a kind of stubbornness to go again to Russia is above all a succession of opportunities. I just took the chance without asking myself too many questions but the most important one: what do I want to do? Every time I went to Russia, it was simply because the answer lied there. The first time I wanted to leave for long and discover original places. I received a book from a crazy guy who rode 4 times from Brest to Vladivostok back an forth, and I spent all my holidays to make a part of the fifth edition. I knew I would be surprised many times, and I was. Another time it was a failed trip with a group I decided to transform in a series of interesting discoveries in solo mode… In that trip I discovered – among others – the capital of Chechnya, a bit less than 20 years after the war. I went again to Russia to spend two weeks with a friend in the country that fascinates him so much.
Discoveries and encounters. Only that. Of course you can live that at home too. It’s just that these four times the answer was somewhere else. Somewhere in Russia.
So yes this country means a lot to me now. I first saw its Siberian forests, after having spent one week in Mongolia, where trees are as numerous as the hair on the tonsure of a monk. A few minutes later, it was a lake as big as my native country. And then a string of hidden pearls. Of contrasts, of epic.
These are the words that summarizes best what is Russia to me. And epic and contrasting land. Which saw in the same century two revolutions who changed its face and the one of the world. Where I could go from luxury to poverty by just crossing the road. Where a chapel on the Transsiberian contemplates steppes, forests and humans. Where astounding distances give something majestic to the slow transformation of the landscapes. A country I was told full of prohibitions, and where I felt, above all, a freedom to go wherever I wanted. A country where I met people and smiles.
And in the end, isn’t it the most beautiful part of travel? Opening doors leading to unexplored realities and keep enough memories from there to make you want return there. Find friendships, some some of them ephemeral, other less. Get to know yourself in another way. Create a piece of yourself you leave elsewhere to better find it later.
