I've just returned, tired, thirsty and on foot, from the office after having dinner with my ducky. We ate a simple dinner at OGI, a basement restaurant tucked into the upscale complex on Tretyakovsky Passage intersecting with Nikolskaya Ulitsa. One of our favourite hangouts, OGI is part of a chain of intellectual hangouts that stick to the same formula of low-priced meals in a simple but Bohemian interior that features a bookshop, all running on a 24-hour schedule. While its sister establishments - Cafe Bilingua, Project OGI, Cafe OGI and Pir OGI - are located more or less in quiet or small side streets, OGI stands out as unusually demokratichny in this gravely pafosny milieu, better known for such novy russky-frequented shops as D&G, Versace, and Bentley.
Before that, I attended an academic meeting at Room 204 in the Institute of Asian and African Studies, organised by the Nusantara Society. Nusantara is a portmanteau word from Old Javanese that means "archipelago"; accordingly the society promotes the languages and cultures of the people who populate the Malay archipelago, including the countries of Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines. It called a special gathering to commemorate an anniversary my country is celebrating in its relations with Russia.
While it was good to finally meet up with a number of luminaries in the field, the aging pioneers put up an anemic show, coming ill-prepared and speaking off-the-cuff. The new generation of students actually acquitted themselves better, not just for their energy and youth, but for their heartfelt enthusiasm and interest.
After the meeting, Natasha told me about the day's tragedy earlier at the main campus of the Moscow State University. She said two students died and at least four people were hurt in a fire that broke out at 5 am in a dormitory on the 12th floor of the university's 26-floor central building. According to a BBC report, Yevgeny Serebrennikov, deputy head of the Emergency Situations Ministry, said that 1,500 people were evacuated.
Although the cause of the fire in the Stalin-era building, one of Moscow's most conspicuous landmarks, remained unclear, I couldn't help but somehow think of the anniversary of Hitler's birthday just yesterday. A similar fire at a five-storey students' dormitory of the People's Friendship University (formerly Patrice Lumumba) in November 2003, which killed 42 people and injured more than 200 people from 34 countries, is a sad reminder that foreign and mainly non-white students suffer heavily from racial discrimination in Russia. While the conflagration itself was believed to have been caused by an electrical malfunction, the firefighters were criticised for their sluggish response and allegations of extortion or racial preference. Russia has a high rate of fire deaths, totaling around 18,000 a year. Experts say fire fatalities have skyrocketed since the end of the Soviet Union, in part because of lower public vigilance and a disregard for safety standards. The age of Russia's buildings also plays a role: Many older buildings have wood partitions between the floors that help fires spread rapidly.
(The university was founded in 1960 and named Patrice Lumumba People's Friendship University in honor of the post-colonial Congo's first prime minister; its name was changed in 1992. Its aim was to offer a strict Marxist curriculum to students from developing nations.)
(It served as a showcase of Soviet patronage of the Third World, receiving generous state subsidies, but declined after the 1991 Soviet collapse as government funding dried up. But the university has continued to attract students from impoverished with its low tuition — medical school tuition runs US$1,200 a year.)
On the way back home, I noticed that Sultanna Frantsuzova has set up a small boutique on my street. (I wrote a blog entry about a fashion show of hers I attended in late summer 2005.) Since that entry the designer has become more visible and celebrated more openly for her unfailingly stylish and affordable designs. Do I still want to move out?
* * *
Before that, I attended an academic meeting at Room 204 in the Institute of Asian and African Studies, organised by the Nusantara Society. Nusantara is a portmanteau word from Old Javanese that means "archipelago"; accordingly the society promotes the languages and cultures of the people who populate the Malay archipelago, including the countries of Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines. It called a special gathering to commemorate an anniversary my country is celebrating in its relations with Russia.
While it was good to finally meet up with a number of luminaries in the field, the aging pioneers put up an anemic show, coming ill-prepared and speaking off-the-cuff. The new generation of students actually acquitted themselves better, not just for their energy and youth, but for their heartfelt enthusiasm and interest.
* * *
After the meeting, Natasha told me about the day's tragedy earlier at the main campus of the Moscow State University. She said two students died and at least four people were hurt in a fire that broke out at 5 am in a dormitory on the 12th floor of the university's 26-floor central building. According to a BBC report, Yevgeny Serebrennikov, deputy head of the Emergency Situations Ministry, said that 1,500 people were evacuated.
Although the cause of the fire in the Stalin-era building, one of Moscow's most conspicuous landmarks, remained unclear, I couldn't help but somehow think of the anniversary of Hitler's birthday just yesterday. A similar fire at a five-storey students' dormitory of the People's Friendship University (formerly Patrice Lumumba) in November 2003, which killed 42 people and injured more than 200 people from 34 countries, is a sad reminder that foreign and mainly non-white students suffer heavily from racial discrimination in Russia. While the conflagration itself was believed to have been caused by an electrical malfunction, the firefighters were criticised for their sluggish response and allegations of extortion or racial preference. Russia has a high rate of fire deaths, totaling around 18,000 a year. Experts say fire fatalities have skyrocketed since the end of the Soviet Union, in part because of lower public vigilance and a disregard for safety standards. The age of Russia's buildings also plays a role: Many older buildings have wood partitions between the floors that help fires spread rapidly.
(The university was founded in 1960 and named Patrice Lumumba People's Friendship University in honor of the post-colonial Congo's first prime minister; its name was changed in 1992. Its aim was to offer a strict Marxist curriculum to students from developing nations.)
(It served as a showcase of Soviet patronage of the Third World, receiving generous state subsidies, but declined after the 1991 Soviet collapse as government funding dried up. But the university has continued to attract students from impoverished with its low tuition — medical school tuition runs US$1,200 a year.)
* * *
On the way back home, I noticed that Sultanna Frantsuzova has set up a small boutique on my street. (I wrote a blog entry about a fashion show of hers I attended in late summer 2005.) Since that entry the designer has become more visible and celebrated more openly for her unfailingly stylish and affordable designs. Do I still want to move out?
