NB! · Observations · Humour

Manvantara, or My Schedule for Today

NB! · Art · Museums · Heritage

Magnificent Vases from the Château de Fontainebleau

NB! · Coming Up · Interviews · Paris

Off to Paris, Urgently!

Off to Paris, urgently! A creative meeting with Yury Butusov is an excellent continuation of the touring production. He is one of the finest theatre directors in the country. There is so much one could ask him

NB! · Observations

A Careful Tread in Times of News Collapse

NB! · Architecture · Faith · Society · Paris

Pope Francis will not come to the reopening of Notre-Dame, but Donald Trump will

NB! · Archive · The East · Art · Books

Porteur de caljan: the hookah-bearer

Porteur de caljan: the hookah-bearer. From Cornelis de Bruijn's «Travels in Muscovy, Persia and India».

NB! · Observations · Humour

Every Time You Go New Year Shopping

NB! · Observations

I Hope It Is Not 2025

NB! · Art · People · Humour

Winter Salvador Dalí Reminds Us to Wrap Up Warm Before Leaving the House

Antique engraved panorama of Moscow with Kremlin walls and towers, houses, a river and trees in the foreground, captioned Moskow.

NB! · The East · Maps · Books · Moscow · Observations

Panorama of Moscow in the 1718 edition of Cornelis de Bruijn's travels

Panorama of Moscow from Cornelis de Bruijn's "Travels in Muscovy, Persia and India", in my 1718 edition. Incidentally, I have found my own house here.

A wooden block with built-in batteries and a circuit board is mounted on a pale round panel. The label describes a bug for furniture, USSR (KGB), 1970s.

NB!

Woodblock transmitter, a replica of a 1970s KGB bug, on museum display

NB! · Art · Nature