Russian Nesting Doll

I am not sure why I have never photographed one of the Russian nesting dolls that I brought back from Russia two decades ago until now.  They have lots of bright, cheerful colors and are just an all-around unique subject for photographs.Ru

TBT: Soviet Lunch Lady - 1994

I took this photograph in February 1994 in a small Russian city called Volzhskiy.  Even though the Soviet Union had ceased to exist two years earlier, Volzhskiy was truly a Soviet city and felt more Soviet than many of the other places I visited in Russia.  The city did not come into existence until more than three decades after the 1917 October Revolution.  Situated on the bank of the Volga River opposite the city that once was Stalingrad, it served as a fallback point and staging area for Soviet troops during the Second World War.  However, even after the war it took several years for a more permanent settlement to grow into a city.  The construction of a giant hydroelectric dam across the Volga and the navigation lock system brought people here for the long run.  Volzhskiy was remote enough that by the time I arrived, only one other foreigner, an Italian telecommunication consultant, had ever visited the community.  It seemed as if the Soviet Union was still somewhat alive there with Communist Party slogans still emblazoned on buildings, many appearing to have been painted within a short time before I had arrived.

This lunch lady fit perfectly in this only-barely-post-Soviet setting - feeding the first generation of Russians in seven decades to taste freedom using her tough Soviet-era lunch lady techniques.  During the winter months she made everyone that ate in the school lunchroom, adults included, eat several cloves of raw garlic each day in an attempt to make us healthier.

Throwback Thursday - Russian Market 1994

I am not one for all of the internet fads like "Throwback Thursday" and any other series of words that are shortened and to which a "hashtag" has been added.  However, I came across two of my most favorite photographs from Russia a while back and scanned the negatives.  I knew that I wanted to post them someday, but sort of forgot about them for a while.  I had them in a folder in my photo editing program and noticed them again the other day.  They were both taken on the same day in February 1994 in a small town in Russia called Volzhskiy.  The photograph above is one of my favorite photographs of all the hundreds of thousands I have taken over the decades.  I have always mused that it would be the one photograph that I would submit to National Geographic, if the magazine ever came calling for my work.  The picture below is one that makes me wonder where those boys are today, two decades later.  The followed me around while I was at the market, because they thought I was an American journalist.

Make It Count

I photographed these abacus beads the other night at the Gunnisonville School.  Someday I need to learn how to use an abacus.  The store clerks and merchants in Russia when I lived there in 1993-94 still used abacuses to calculate change, many times eschewing the cash register next to them that would calculate it automatically.  It impressed me how quickly they could figure large number by counting those simple beads.