For some time, I’ve been slightly ambivalent toward graffiti though the idealist in me has always believed that in the long-run, reclaiming the urban environment might encourage the rise of a more radical political consciousness. As cities embrace gentrification and homogenization at an increasingly breakneck pace, the need to carve […]
As if the 2016 U.S. presidential election wasn’t contentious enough, Mexico stands to be no less divisive and ridden by controversy. Current front runner for the July 1st presidential contest, Andrés Manuel López Obrador (often simply known by the acronym AMLO), is a longtime fixture of the outsider political left, […]
To what extent will the festering matter of Crimea inflame east-west tensions and further contribute to a “new Cold War”? Late last year, I was invited to the Yalta European Strategy meeting (or YES), an annual Kyiv gathering of policymakers, experts and others. Ever since Russia militarily occupied Crimea in […]
Recently, in the process of reading about the Trump-Russia affair, the U.S. public also learned a bit about the inner politics of Ukraine’s power elite. As part of the larger investigation into foreign money streaming to Trump and his associates in advance of the 2016 election, special counsel Robert Mueller […]
One can scarcely read the news these days without coming across references to the threat of an imminent “new Cold War.” Gravely, experts warn of escalating tensions being ratcheted up as a result of western sanctions against the Kremlin, ongoing friction in Ukraine in addition to any number of other […]
The Kronstadt rebellion took place in March, 1921. Located on an island in the Gulf of Finland, Kronstadt is a naval fortress on an island in the Gulf of Finland which has served as the base of the Russian Baltic Fleet and to guard the city of St. Petersburg thirty-five […]
Despite the recent military conflict between Kyiv and Kremlin-backed separatists in the Donbas region, there are certain striking similarities between Russia and Ukraine. Take, for example, traditional rural life. In the Russian city of Novgorod, visitors may see a recreation of a traditional rural town. To the outside observer, Pyrohovo […]
From stained glass to sculpture, riding the Moscow metro evokes ties to the old Soviet Union.
Even as war rages in eastern Ukraine between Russian-backed separatists and Kyiv, commuters may take in the sight of supposedly bucolic Ukrainian life at Kievskaya, a Soviet-era metro stop in Moscow.
Traveling in the Moscow metro provides a keen reminder of old Soviet days. Take, for example, the Byelorusskaya metro station, where visitors may taken in vintage mosaics depicting Belorussians who are happy and content within the old Soviet state.
