Travelling to Tomsk

Several weeks ago I was watching an interview with Alexey Ivanov, the writer, during which he expressed some thoughts about the role of Siberia in the development of Russia and I remembered that almost a year ago I had gone to Tomsk for a work trip and still hadn’t written anything about it.

It was my first trip to Siberia, one of the most mysterious places on the Earth,especially for foreigners. Tomsk is situated 2800 kilometers from Moscow and it is the farthest away place I have ever visited in Russia.

My first impression was very lovely because after a 4 hour flight Tomsk Airport, which is named Bogashevo, met me with my favourite cafe Julius Meinl. After I had grabbed a cup of coffee and a 30 minute taxi ride I was checked into a hotel called Souz and then went to the office.

I was pleasantly surprised that the Tomsk department has a better office with more free space and more light than the central office, though frankly speaking it is not a challenge. The atmosphere here was nice and quiet, and very welcoming. I find it as a rule that colleagues, at least in the IT domain,are mostly friendlier and closer to each other in the provinces than in the capital. This is not because people in Moscow are greedy and angry, it is not true of course, I think it is because people spend so much time commuting here in Moscow that they do not have enough time to hang around in the office with colleagues. While in Tomsk they even play games until late at night in the office.

I spent five days there. Every day I had a walk around the city. I cannot say that there are many sights to see , but I liked it there. The center of Tomsk is composed of buildings mostly not taller than five stories and some of them are old wooden structures with a few being older than one hundred years. The latter are very beautiful but a lot of them were worn out. I hope that the locals will save at least a part of the architectural monument they inherited.

New multistory houses had a nice appearance and each building looks different, especially compared to the Moscow region, where most new buildings look alike. I also noticed that Tomichs love to have panoramic windows even though they live in a very cold climate.

Unfortunately the city’s face had a big scar. It is the embankment of the Tom River, which was in abysmal conditions.

The city looked calm but alive. I found that people are mostly cheerful here and it looked like they respect their city and treat it well. Every evening I went to some cafe or restaurant to have a meal, and I did not see any inappropriate behaviour.

Whole Tomsk, the people, the streets and the buildings looked self-sufficient. A beautiful place where old architecture lives beside modern. I wish Tomsk will become bigger and the embankment will be mended. Finishing from what I started I want to say what I think about the role of Siberia in the development of Russia. I’m certain that the next advance of Russia will begin in Siberia, not in Moscow. So for me it is a dream to have a prosperous democratic Siberia at the heart of Russia.