Cucumbers and Fighter Jets

You never know what you are going to find when you wander Russian roads. A few years ago, I was in Moscow and looking to fill an empty day with an interesting outing to somewhere outside the capital. On the recommendation of our history editor, Tamara Eidelman, I set out for Kolomna and Zaraysk.

It was a bright, sunny day and the drive was slow-going and uneventful. Then, about 125 kilometers southeast of Moscow, we drove through the quiet town (population 32,000) of Lukhovitsy.

Oops.

After World War II, Lukhovitsy had been transformed into a major center for Soviet aeronautical and defense production, home of the massive Moscow Aviation Factory, where, among other things, MiG jets were built. Had I driven down these roads in the Soviet era, in all likelihood I would have been arrested as a spy. But, then again, back then it would have been near impossible to rent a South Korean compact and then hire a driver to take me to Kolomna by way of a secret military town.

Of course, Lukhovitsy is no longer a closed city. They do still build MiGs here, and there is a MiG-23 installed in the town as a monument. Yet, when we drove through the center of town, all we saw was a huge cucumber on a pedestal – a memorial to the famous Lukhovitsy cucumber. On the monument, if one were to stop (we did not), you could read: “Огурцу-кормильцу от благодарных луховичан” (loosely translated: “From Grateful Lukhovitsians to the Cucumber- Sustainer”). Apparently the quality of Lukhovitsian cucumbers is widely renowned throughout Moscow region and, indeed, all of Russia. Lukhovitsian cucumbers are cucumber-lovers’ cucumbers.

Perhaps because of the cucumbers (or maybe simply because it rhymes so nicely), there is a famous, ironic Russian proverb: “Есть в России три столицы — Москва, Рязань и Луховицы” (“In Russia there are three capitals: Moscow, Ryazan and Lukhovitsy”; in another version, Ryazan becomes Piter). Unfortunately, in our haste to get to Kolomna, we missed the fact that Lukhovitsy had a Cucumber Museum (well, a large room, anyway). Nonetheless, Kolomna is a truly beautiful, well-preserved town (and Zaraysk is beautiful as well – an ancient town with Russia’s smallest kremlin), and well worth the long drive.

Yet at the time, the Pastille Museum did not yet exist. Which is a shame, because it would have been wonderful to wander that quiet river town while munching on pastilles. Or even cucumbers.

As Lada Bakal writes in her story on the Pastille Museum (page 28), efforts to preserve Russia’s “intangible” heritage are on the rise. This signals a rising pride in things local people care about, rather than things they are told to care about. In this light, it is rather appropriate that in this issue our three more “serious, historical” features (Georgia, Riviera Russians and timepieces) are sandwiched between two very mouth-watering stories related to Russian cuisine. And this sandwich presents a rich mix of ideas and topics, ranging from international politics to epidemiology, from train travel to the history of time, from spices and apples to Stalin’s death mask.

And that’s just the feature stories…

Enjoy your summer, and this issue. See you in the fall!