Fingers chopped off and legs smashed in: The Moscow Metro

Published on November 13, 2013

Lifestyle

In Moscow, every­day life de­presses, de­lights and con­fuses me.  In this city of con­trasts, Ladas and Lim­ou­sines bounce to­gether, bru­tal grey con­crete blocks stand proudly be­side charm­ing onion dome churches and I am for­ever won­der­ing how peo­ple can be so cruel and so kind. Such op­po­sites are thrown into par­tic­u­larly stark re­lief in the metro, where starv­ing beg­gars swarm through gilded cav­erns.

un­der­ground Palaces for the pro­le­tariat

Stalin began the metro pro­ject in 1932, promis­ing spec­tac­u­lar sta­tions that would serve as 'un­der­ground palaces for the pro­le­tariat.' Com­muters are blessed with chan­de­liers, mo­saics, stat­ues and vast halls lined with bronze. The metro is a de­light to be­hold. How­ever, judg­ing from the hyp­no­tis­ing pro­ces­sion of long, life­less faces on the es­ca­la­tors, the nov­elty of these tem­ples has worn thin. The mo­ros­ity is at times over­whelm­ing. I used to try and cheer fel­low pas­sen­gers with warm smiles and un­der­stand­ing nods but this just fright­ened them or made them angry. Pas­sen­gers push pas­sen­gers around. They knock each other over and hurt each other with­out apol­o­gis­ing. The lifeblood of the city surges through these filthy tun­nels and sweeps away all in its path. Some­times this lifeblood is so sexy that I shed tears of lust.

Like all large metro sys­tems, it seems that the Moscow metro is pop­u­lated by car­i­ca­tures. I sup­pose that is the de­fault ob­ser­va­tion made by a brain in a densely pop­u­lated place of pass­ing. The eyes are over­whelmed by so many fleet­ing im­ages that the mind may only re­tain the truly grotesque ones. The reti­nas are burned with im­ages of boils and birth­marks leav­ing a lin­ger­ing sense of some­thing awful.

The metro ex­pe­ri­ence ac­cen­tu­ates the ex­tremes of human emo­tion. A flash of poor eti­quette - a push or a scowl - in­spires ex­plo­sions of rage. A scrap of ten­der­ness turns my heart into a quiv­er­ing jelly. Seven mil­lion peo­ple use the metro every­day. This tidal wave of con­scious­ness leaves a residue of ran­cour and rap­ture. Se­creted emo­tions cling to the tun­nels and ag­i­tate the spir­its of those who come after. You can­not be calm on the metro.

The sta­tion doors are one of the most in­ex­plic­a­ble ex­am­ples of human thought I have ever wit­nessed. The mon­strosi­ties weigh 200 kilos and swing freely on their hinges. They swing so fast and hard that you have to time your entry just right to avoid a bru­tal im­pact. If one hit your face, you would be bro­ken and could prob­a­bly die. In 2011 a girl got her fin­ger cut off. When it’s windy, old peo­ple, chil­dren and small peo­ple get trapped in­side be­cause the doors are too heavy for them.

In the rest of Eu­rope, when en­ter­ing the metro you put your ticket in, the gates open and through you go. In Moscow, there are no gates- just gaps. But you have to buy a ticket and put it in, be­cause oth­er­wise you trig­ger a cen­sor and rods shoot out and smash your legs. I saw it hap­pen to a man once and he was trapped in be­tween the rods in agony until the guard came over to re­lease him. The logic is sim­ple- tempt peo­ple into wrong doing so you can pun­ish them. This cru­elty and gloom can re­ally get quite in­fec­tious and I re­alised some­thing had to be done. At Rev­o­lu­tion Square (Ploshchad Rev­o­lut­sii) the  plat­forms are lined with a bizarre array of bronze stat­ues. A for­tu­nate bronze hound is sin­gled out for spe­cial at­ten­tion. Pass­ing com­muters grope him for good luck, rub­bing their claws on his nose and paws so that these parts gleam brightly. In No­vem­ber I fon­dled the hound and wished for a pleasant time on the metro. My wish was promptly granted.

Now my days pass in a warm furry haze

The first time I en­coun­tered a shuba (Russ­ian fur coat), I thought a bear had been re­leased into the metro. A great shim­mer­ing mass of fur wad­dled through the crowd ahead of me and onto a train. I gave chase, and when the crea­ture turned I saw not a bear, but a beau­ti­ful fur coat with a lady in­side it. The shubas soon bred, and by De­cem­ber Moscow was full of them. Travel on the metro be­came a sen­sual feast.

Shubas are the soft­est thing I have ever had the good for­tune to touch, and in rush hour op­por­tu­ni­ties for touch­ing are ample. As peo­ple crush into the car­riage I care­fully ma­noeu­vre to stand next to a shuba and rel­ish the silk­i­ness. Drop­ping some­thing on the floor of­fers the chance to dis­cretely rub your face down the whole length of a shuba, and then back up again. But more im­por­tantly the an­nual ap­pear­ance of the shuba changes the way peo­ple treat each other. The no­to­ri­ously cruel Russ­ian babushkas (old ladies) be­come re­mark­ably docile the mo­ment they don a fur coat. No more barg­ing and thrust­ing in tight places. No more snarling. The amor­phous masses gen­tly bump into each other and no­body seems to mind.

So now my metro jour­neys pass in a warm furry haze. The dan­ger and the gloom are still there, but they’re easy to ig­nore when you feel this happy.