To hear our tour guide tell it, Peter the Great was a
visionary. He foresaw St. Petersburg as a destination for tourists, a “Venice
of the North,” and a jewel to rival the many western capitals he’d visited. So,
Peter built his palace there – she never mentioned he had to steal the land
from Sweden first – and he began digging canals all over the place. I don’t
think she bothered to tell us canals make much more sense in southern Italy
than in places that are well below freezing several months of the year. But I
suspect her dialog was as carefully restricted as the rest of our visit. Another
thing the guide didn’t mention was the wildly unpopular taxation the Tsar
enforced to make Petrograd happen. One of these was a tax on beards, along with
forcibly shaving – in public – anyone who refused to pay. Maybe the visionary
foresaw lots of Russians with clean-shaven faces.
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