To the West and back on the bus. Roads, houses, bridges and operation "Unthinkable 2"
Robert Penn Warren. "All the king's men"
When you wander, return home,
And the smoke of the Fatherland is sweet and pleasant to us!
(A. S. Griboedov "Woe from Wit")
Europe from the bus window (2019). So, I went to the West and came back from there. It is interesting and relax, and the world to see, and in recent years it has increasingly been a bus ride. Believe me, this is convenient. The bus is comfortable, the seats are soft, the tour is without night crossings, overnight is always in the hotel with a bath or shower, with a good breakfast in the morning and ... again on the road, and there every two hours a stop: tea, coffee, toilet or “bushes”. In short, everything that only a person needs. And a lot of things can be seen from the windows! And if nothing interesting is seen, you can relax and think and even write your thoughts in a notebook, which is especially convenient for me personally. After all, what you see can be compared, compared with previously known. In addition, you get a lot of interesting information, visiting museums, ancient fortresses, archaeological parks ...
This time the trip was especially long and interesting. Our bus with a charming and erudite guide Anya from the company Turtrans-Voyage traveled from Brest to Brest, passing through Poland, Germany, Belgium, France, Spain, Italy, Austria with a rest on the coast of Spain Costa Bravo in the town of Lloret de mar. We visited Warsaw, Berlin, Paris, Carcassonne, Nice, Monaco, Genoa, Venice and Vienna. By the way, the group was very motley. It was presented, one can say, almost all of Russia. There were people from Chukotka, Kamchatka, from Siberia, from Moscow, from Penza. And, most surprisingly, those who rode for the first time, almost did not appear. Everyone visited such bus trips two, three times, and some five, six, ten. That is, it is a popular form of recreation in Russia. At least for a certain part of its population.
The tour program was rich and interesting, but personally we, my wife and granddaughter, did not adhere to it and almost did not walk with everyone and did not go. We had our own routes, much more interesting both for us and, and I am absolutely sure of that, for the readers of “VO”. There will be a whole series of articles related to how history places we visited, and with a military theme.
Road, road, you know so much!
In the meantime, in the very first of the materials of this cycle we will consider ... the roads of Europe, the way they differ from our roads, the houses standing on either side of them, well, and to some extent we touch the people living in them.
Well, let's say this: everyone knows that the roads in the West, that is, in Europe, are good. However, they are good everywhere in different ways. For example, in Poland they today are no different from our federal highways. In any case, those that pass through my Penza from Moscow to Saratov and Chelyabinsk. Also, workers mow the grass on the sides of the road, scavenge, cover ... good!
What's the Difference? There are more noise protection walls, and all of them are new and made of plastic, including transparent ones, on which silhouettes of birds of prey are depicted, so that birds will not try to fly through them. All forests have a net fence. And in Poland, just like everywhere else, no one would even think to move out of the way. Grids everywhere! Not like ours, where anyone can easily stay on the side of a highway or move out of it and go looking for mushrooms. There is no such thing! But for the "fence" in the fields freely storks roam and roe grazing. There are a lot of storks in Poland. And in the fields, and on the roofs of houses, and on special pillars. The fact is that the stork's nest is not an easy construction and can weigh up to 400 kg! Imagine that you are here so much piled on the roof? Therefore, the Poles set up concrete pillars for storks with a platform at the top, where they make their nests.
Walls in Germany, France, Spain, Italy and Austria ... obviously set up a long time ago, so that many managed to grow with ivy. Materials - the most diverse, type, shape, colors, too. There are stone (!), There are wooden (!!), but more plastic. But they stretch and stretch ...
There are no unauthorized garbage heaps at congresses from the main road. We have them, in particular, at the turn to my dacha settlement in Chemodanovka, they meet constantly. True (rejoice those who see spots in the sun!), I saw one such garbage dump in Poland. One! But I have not seen anywhere else, so this is truly a unique case. It is a pity that I did not have time to photograph it!
In the 50s of the last century, when we decided to be friends with the Poles, Stalin offered to build something in the capital to choose from. The Poles asked for the metro, but the leader preferred to donate this building, an almost exact copy of the “high-rise” building that stands in Moscow opposite the library of foreign literature named after Rudomino. Initially, it was called "The Palace of Culture and Science named after J. Stalin." Then just "Palace of Culture and Science." Then, after the demolition of the Berlin Wall, hotheads started talking about demolishing it. But ... talked and stopped. Today, this skyscraper plays the role of an office building and exhibition center, the headquarters of several companies and government agencies. It houses museums, cinemas, theaters, restaurants, bookstores, research institutes, swimming pools, exhibition spaces, and even the largest conference hall in Poland for 3000 people. Currently, the Palace of Culture and Science is one of the most famous and largest cultural exhibition centers in the country.
Energy saving in practice, not in words!
On both sides of the road, wind turbines of generators are already in Poland. And every year they are more and more. For example, in 2012, in Poland, I did not see them, only in France and in Spain, and now they are full of them! There are a lot of them in Germany, but in France you see a really fantastic picture: the mountains are lined up with rows of windmills and they all rotate, like giants waving their arms. Some are right next to the road and you can clearly see how huge they are. We have five such windmills only on the seashore near Zelenogradsk near Kaliningrad and ... everything. Maybe there is somewhere else? But along the roads to Saratov and Chelyabinsk, they certainly are not worth it, but this is cheap and clean energy.
Road houses
Houses. Last year, I already wrote that in Poland 90% of houses along roadsides are new. Built already after 1991, although old shacks are also found. But very seldom. Our proportion is slightly different, but ... I can say that it is noticeable as the number of newly built houses is growing in ever-increasing numbers. Quite a lot of settlements appeared from modern standard houses, both in the countryside and in the suburbs. A lot of obviously old three-window huts are already sheathed with siding, and the windows on them are completely new, plastic. And it is interesting that our “cottages” as a whole look more Polish.
There the houses are very miniature. Usually two stories high, they are scattered here and there, but mostly they go along the road. Some are very close to her, others are a little further away, but at the same time all the village houses surround ... the fields! Left and right, from all sides and even before the road. The Pole as if says by this very, that everything is mine ... around me! In our country where the fields are not clear, but behind the houses behind the fences there are vegetable gardens. There are no fences there. The fields are planted with wheat, which, by the way, is already harvested there, cabbage - the Poles eat a lot of cabbage and this explains, as they say, a small number of cancers, but apple orchards there are very large and again go straight to the road. Well, apples grow well in Poland and the Poles have taken advantage of this. A third of the harvest goes to the United States, a third to Europe, and a third went to Russia, but ... sanctions, so no longer goes. Naturally, it painfully hit the Polish peasants, but the politicians ... wiped off as always, with food they always and everything is fine, as well as with money.
The difference between Polish and our houses is not only in size. They have everything there ... tidied up. Nowhere are the “necessary boards” lying two years ago in the grass by the fence, there are no tire covers, and other “garbage”. And all the auxiliary buildings look clean and neat. There is no such thing, that half of the roof is from old slate, and half from roofing material. I also did not notice the squandered buildings, backed by a log. In general, here we still have to work on ourselves. Firstly, to give up the bad habit of “privatizing” any rubbish and storing it in the yard either ... at the dacha, and secondly, solve the problems of your home in the complex, and, of course, plant more flowers.
If you enter the Polish village, then there will definitely be a church. And new! Sometimes such architecture as the temple is not similar to it, but nonetheless. And all because Poland is a country of monoculture and mono-religion. 90% Catholics, and in fact, not in words. That is, they regularly attend Mass. Young people, however, are less religious. But the church is fighting for its souls, for example, it reduces the time of services, organizes various events that are interesting for young people.
And all of this is paying off. Nowhere in Poland, unlike France, I didn’t see blacks, and indeed migrants from “hot countries” looking for an easy life in comfortable Europe. They do not take root here somehow ...
Tell me who your friend is and I will tell you who you are!
By the way, our bus belonged to a Polish company, and its drivers were Poles who knew Russian well. We talked and found out one interesting thing noticed by them for many trips: it turns out that almost every tour in the bus (and 50 people load it) always comes across one, or even two or three tourists from Russia with Polish roots. Well, my “Polish roots” should be considered relative, because I wear the name of my stepfather, not my own father. But in any case, this is significant. Yes, and our haplogroups and Polish are Slavic more than 50%, that is, the Poles are our closest relatives, and not just the neighbors. And we ought to be friends with them, and not to conflict, to have on our side, and not on the side of our opponents. Is it so difficult for our leadership to achieve this? Do not know how? So let them learn, damn it! We don’t have a lot of potential allies of real Europeans, something we are increasingly trying to get into Asia, the mentality of which we don’t know and do not understand, to the Middle East (even that г gaddychnik ’), and even to Africa. But this remark is so ... had a word.
The roads in Germany did not rush to my eyes, although there were more wind turbines along them. But in Belgium, unlike in all other countries, there were also lanterns along the highway. And at night it was as bright as day. In all other countries, the highway was not covered at night.
Houses are old, but here Niva fat
Rural houses in France, and in Italy too, were away from the road and everyone, as one, looked ... old. Old walls, old roof tiles. But they looked clean and neat. But here the grounds around just caused a feeling of envy. How does that say? "Obese fields", yes ?! So here they are really fat. Cut through the mass of canals, so water cannons work everywhere, watering garden crops and even vineyards. Apple trees are all covered with cloth nets. In Poland - to protect against birds, but in France ... also from hail. Surprisingly, here it is very large. Every plot of land is occupied by crops, there are practically no wastelands with thistle thickets.
Road through the Alps: mountains and tunnels
But the best in this regard is Italy and Austria. There ... if this is not a very steep mountain, but a hill, then you will surely see the crops. The houses also stand on the hills, on unnaturally green lawns, where unnaturally spotted cows graze. The picture is simply bucolistic. Wheat also grows on the slopes of the hills and its ... clean combines! In Italy, the canals are everywhere and they hit jet cannons.
I speak at a stop to an elderly Italian who spoke good English: “You have good roads!” He told me: “I also built Mussolini!” I told him: “When the American writer Mark Twain visited Italy, he said that“ God created Italy as conceived by Michelangelo. " But it was not your historical monuments that impressed him, but the Milan railway station and beautiful roads. ” He told me: “Well ... under Mussolini they were especially built a lot ...” “And for that you hung him upside down?” “They were partisans, communists. One could expect everything from them! ”N-yes, such is the historical memory of the people ... I remember the roads and Mussolini, Mussolini and the war - somehow not very.
But the road through the Alps tells us first of all about the enormous industriousness of local residents and building art. Starting from Monaco, highways increasingly go into tunnels, sometimes very long. On the left is the mountain, on the right is the mountain, at the bottom of the gorge and, nevertheless, to the slope of the mountain, which is actually sheer, a tall bridge is docked, abutting in two holes extending into the rock tunnels. How did they all build it? How was heavy equipment delivered here? And if only there would be one such tunnel, but there are dozens of them. Dozens!
Ecological bridges and bridges for the disabled
And the main highway cross the "ecological bridges". Bridges are not for people, but for animals! Since all forests are fenced and animals cannot cross the highway, crossings over roads have been built for them. Soil is poured there and trees and bushes grow, and the beast walks along them back and forth. And there are many such bridges. Not one or two shows for the sake of! There are many pedestrian bridges, not only with stairs, but also with elevators. People with disabilities can use them, but healthy citizens are not ordered. Convenient, whatever you say. And no one is afraid that they will break. Well, about what all this has to do with the immediate content of Military Review, we will talk next time.
To be continued ...
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