7 things I LOVE about Russia

We've heard a lot of bad stuff about Russia in the news recently, but it doesn't really matter to me what the Russian government may or may not be doing. There are just certain things about Russia that I really like, and here are seven of them:

1) The Cyrillic alphabet

I love the Cyrillic alphabet, used in Russia and other countries, because it's different enough from the Latin alphabet to be cool, but it's similar enough to have the same styles and fonts applied to it as the Latin and Greek alphabets. Many of the letters are similar to Greek ones, because it is related to the Greek alphabet, the connection being the Orthodox Church - it's complicated but it is named after St Cyril, a 10th-Century Greek missionary.

2) St Basil's Cathedral

It's almost ridiculous, but so colourful and magical - it looks like if you licked it it would taste sweet like pryaniki (gingerbread), except the green bits, which would obviously taste like, well... basil I guess ;o) But seriously, Red Square wouldn't be the same without St Basil's, just as Russia wouldn't be the same without all its other wonderful churches. By the way, St Basil's no longer functions as a church but houses a museum.

3) Russian winter hats (ushanki)

These hats must be essential for surviving the Russian winter. Why do I love them? I suppose it brings to mind big, tough Russia that can take a proper, harsh winter, unlike England, which almost shuts down after a few snowflakes have settled. I think they also look nice, especially with the earflaps flapped up inside, as in the picture below on the right.

4) Soviet-era architecture

I don't mean the rows of identical concrete tower blocks that we tend to associate with Communism - I mean the earlier, good stuff like the soaring Socialist-Realist skyscrapers and the Moscow Metro.` I'm no fan of Stalin (after all, for a while he was playing with the idea of demolishing St Basil's!), but the architecture under his rule was quite monumental and impressive, in my opinion.

Moscow State University, main building	Red Army Theatre, Moscow
Kiyovskaya station, Moscow Metro	Elektrozavodskaya station, Moscow Metro

5) Matryoshka dolls

Also known as Russian dolls, they are a late 19th-century adaptation of Chinese boxes, fitting one inside another inside another, and so on... I wish this went on forever, but realistically it has to stop or they'd be microscopic! There are other versions too, like Russian and Soviet leaders, which became popular in the late 1980's as a kind of joke.

The original set of dolls by Zvyozdochkin and Malyutin, 1892	Putin, Yeltsin, Gorbachev, Brezhnev, Khrushchev, Stalin, Lenin, and some tiny Tsars

6) Russian cars

I know the reputation of Russian cars is not exactly up there with Ferrari or even Volkswagen, and I know some Russian cars are not so Russian after all, like the VAZ (Lada) 2101/FIAT 124, but for some reason I love old Russian cars - they were relatively unknown in the West (except Ladas, which were very popular in the UK and I remember them), they were simple and rugged and were mostly not at all posh (I don't really like posh things). Actually, I'm not an expert on Russian cars - I just like them, so here are some pictures.

Vladimir Putin looking at his 1972 Zaporozhets (Ukrainian actually)	Lada Niva/VAZ-2121
GAZ Volga 31029 looks like a cross between an 80's Mercedes S-Class and a Morris Marina!	Much nicer looks - a much earlier GAZ Volga 21

7) Russian (and Soviet) aircraft

Well, I like aircraft from all over the world; British, American, French, Japanese, German, as well as Russian. As one of the two superpowers, the USSR made some awesome and wonderful contributions to aviation. I don't want to get into the history or politics of the Cold War or weapons, but you've got to admit, planes like the MiG-29, Tupolev Tu-144 and Antonov An-225 Mriya (well, strictly that's Ukrainian) were and still are pretty impressive.

It's Concorde, right? Wrong. Tupolev Tu-144.	Antonov An-225 'Mriya' ('Dream') carrying Buran, the Soviet space shuttle that flew only once in 1986.

...and below, we have a video of the Russian-made Mil Mi-26, the biggest helicopter in the world, lifting up a CHINOOK like it were a toy helicopter - and amazingly it has ONE - giant - rotor!