Dear CCI friends,
Dr. Glenn Rennels, an anesthesiologist from Palo Alto, CA , traveled with us to Russia in September. Knowing we wouldn’t have scheduled cultural tours, he took this trip in his own hands and purchased tickets for the Mariinsky Theater in St. Petersburg before leaving home. Glenn sleuthed around and came up with other personal interests he wanted to pursue, which you will see below. The most remarkable one was his intention to locate Andrei Nekrasov, Russia’s avant-garde dissident filmmaker. He did locate him and after a lengthy effort, we hosted Andrei for a fascinating evening in St. Petersburg. Glenn proved to us all that one can have both classical culture in addition to a full schedule of investigating and learning from Russians everyday. Granted it takes not needing much sleep!
Sharon Tennison
Center for Citizen Initiatives
St. Petersburg reminds me of Boston/Cambridge in Massachusetts:
• Rivers run through town, so you’re often crossing bridges.
• Historic buildings are everywhere.
• Major universities draw young people.
Meet professor of linguistics Ilya Utekin (tan coat) who I approached as he exited a lecture hall of St. Petersburg State University. Hearing my story — that I was on a pilgrimage to honor a legendary Russian mathematician named Markov — professor Utekin volunteered to chaperone me for a while. He took me to a campus museum and over lunch he explained Chomsky linguistic theory and Piaget linguistic theory. We talked a bit about politics, and about our families. His dad teaches pathophysiology, which is right up my alley as a doctor. I was extremely grateful to him for making an unplanned day so fulfilling. I plan to host Ilya in California someday soon.
The next day, a meeting was arranged with four students from St. Petersburg State University. They fielded our questions, and they asked some of their own.
These kids are very modern, keenly aware of the world in which we live. Like university students in the U.S., they are excited and hopeful, but still a bit uncertain about what they can actually achieve.
St. Petersburg is home to the Mariinsky Opera, Chorus and Orchestra. The Mariinsky Theater and Concert Hall are among the finest venues in the world. The artistic talent is the highest caliber. If you like music, opera, or ballet, you’ll have fun with the English-language pages at www.mariinsky.ru/en/.
Conductor Valery Gergiev (left) and pianist Daniil Trifonov (right) taking bows after performing a Beethoven Piano Concerto while we were in St. Petersburg.
Two years ago, Valery Gergiev took the Mariinsky Orchestra to the ancient city of Palmyra, Syria. ISIS had occupied Palmyra for years, but had finally been driven out. On the same stage where ISIS had videotaped beheadings of human beings, Gergiev led the Mariinsky Orchestra in a concert entitled ‘Pray for Palmyra’.
The Piskaryovskoye Memorial Cemetery honors St. Petersburg victims of the Nazis.
In 1941, the Nazis laid siege to this city, which was named Leningrad at that time. Their city was encircled by the Nazi army, and denied food, or fuel.
The siege lasted almost 900 days. Deaths totaled 1.5 million people, the vast majority of which were caused by starvation or freezing.
A Leningrad schoolgirl named Tanya Savichevaya recorded — on small paper pages — the sequential deaths of her sister, a grandmother, her brother, two uncles and finally her mother. The final entry reads, “Tanya is left alone.”
Our entire group met with Russian film director Andrei Nekrasov, in a St. Petersburg living room. Several of Nekrasov’s films were critical of the Russian government, and they earned pride-of-place among dissident art and literature. Nekrasov became something of a VIP in the European human rights community.
While editing his latest film, Nekrasov unintentionally stumbled across proof that a British billionaire was conducting fraud on the human rights community. That fraud became the storyline of a new film, which the billionaire is attempting to suppress.
The terrific new film can be seen at MagnitskyAct.com (see navigation icon in upper right of that web page). To us, Andrei spoke about his long track record as a dissident, and the bewildering experience of realizing that the Russian government is not always the villain in every story. This experience broadened Nekrasov, albeit painfully.
In St. Petersburg we also met with Suzanne Massie, an American author whose family background provided her — as a young woman — with a sophisticated understanding of Russia. During the 1980’s she carried back-channel communications between American president Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev.
Suzanne told stories worthy of James Bond: cat-and-mouse conversations with KGB officers, the whole shebang. After the Soviet Union dissolved, Suzanne Massie continued to visit Russia for extended stays. She speaks Russian fluently, she has many friends in Russia and her understanding of Russia is unrivaled. We asked questions for hours. Hours! She is 87 years old, but I saw no evidence of fatigue. Egads, I wish.
Dr. Glenn D. Rennels
Citizen Diplomat
September 2018