Brentwood School - Brentwoodian 2020

During the first week of the 2019 Michaelmas half-term, the History and Performing Arts departments ran the first trip to Russia visiting St Petersburg and Moscow. The trip was attended by pupils from the Fourth, Fifth and Lower Sixth forms resulting in an incredible mix of knowledge and allowing for friendships to form across year groups. The trip began with an early flight to Frankfurt from London Heathrow where we transferred to arrive in St Petersburg in the afternoon. We instantly got acquainted with our tour guide for our stay there, Irina. On the coach to our first hotel, Irina told us about the history of the city; the tsars who lived there, their children and their murders. We also began learning about the 1905 and 1917 revolutions which both began in St Petersburg. Once we had settled into our rooms, which were much nicer than anticipated, we got a good night’s sleep to prepare ourselves for the jam-packed three days we were spending in the city. St Petersburg is an extremely beautiful city and I feel as though I can speak for everyone on the trip when I say that I was sad when the time came to leave. We enjoyed a coach tour around the city with Irina telling us all about the local history; these facts came into play later for Ms Fuller’s end-of-the- day quizzes. We stopped at many locations including the Church of the Spilled Blood, St Isaac’s Cathedral and the River Neva. Our first museum tour was of the Artillery Museum which showcased weaponry from the reign of Ivan the Terrible all the way through to ICBMs and anti-aircraft guns; as a History student I found this very interesting. The highlight of this tour was learning that one of the cannons on display was loaded. Moscow We got the chance to explore the world of Russian lunch food that day. Personally, I enjoyed the savory pancakes, however my absolute favourite part of the day was seeing the Winter Palace and getting the chance to go to the Hermitage of which Irina gave us a guided tour. We went into all five buildings learning about its history and the many artifacts it holds. These include, but are not limited to: Rembrandt’s final painting ‘The Prodigal Son’, one of only two Michelangelo sculptures outside of Italy, two paintings by da Vinci, Raphael’s ‘Madonna with Beardless Joseph’ and an unwrapped mummy; I am unashamed to admit that I alone took over 300 photographs inside the museum. Our second day in St Petersburg brought us into 20th century Russian history with our trip to the Peter and Paul Fortress; this is a prison where political prisoners were held during the 1905 revolution and where some of the Tsars of Russia are buried. We got to see the room where Nicholas II and his family’s bones are kept and the tombs of Peter the Great as well as Catherine the Great. In the actual prison, we visited the cells of Lenin’s brother and the cell of Trotsky, another moment I am unashamed to say made me extremely excited. The experience in the Peter and Paul Fortress solidified for me the merit of this trip. Learning about how people were imprisoned in a classroom is one thing, but when you can actually go and see the cell in which they were kept, it provides an entirely new perspective to the facts and figures in a textbook that is unrivaled in its ability to connect people with the history that they are learning. After the visit to the fortress we went to the Museum of Political History and, again, this museum provided a perspective of modern political history that we could not have grasped anywhere other than in the country it comes from. St Petersburg