Томск [Tomsk] has a population of half a million and is located in Siberia, but since Siberia is a big place one is quite in the right to ask – where exactly? North-east of Novosibirsk by five hours by commute train, to be precise, the city is seated two hours north of the Trans-Siberian railroad route along the river Томь [Tom’]. Founded already in 1604, it is one of the oldest towns of Siberia, and it has the oldest university of the region – Томский государственный университет – which has protected a strong tradition of scientific studies for over 130 years now. In the city there are six more universities, and this has earned it the nickname of “Siberian Athens”, and it is estimated that every fourth inhabitant in one way or another is enrolled in academic courses. In many ways Tomsk resembles another, though more Western, Siberian town – Tobolsk. Both of them were ‘centers’ of exile, Tobolsk in the 19th century and Tomsk in the 20th, and because of this influx of intellectuals and other well educated people from European parts of Russia, they have both – after the terror died out, that is – enjoyed a rise in both scholarly and as well as artistic spheres to set them apart from other remote cities. This is something that can be felt straight away upon arrival to a Siberian town – whether or not it was a place for shuffling exiles to their points of destination – or, if not scientifically proved yet, it is at least my opinion. Yekaterinburg or Novosibirsk both have more of a ‘worker’ feel to them, because they were created to be industrial centers, where as Tobolsk and Tomsk both have a certain ‘sensitive’ air about them due to the intellectual activities that went on there despite of all the hardships. Needless to say, I fell in love with Tomsk as soon as I arrive last Sunday and stayed one day longer than necessary only because I liked it so much. Though now is neither the time nor the place to tell you why – maybe some other time [or read my private blog!] – but I’d like to talk about something else that has to do with Tomsk today, about Томский мемориальный музей истории политических репрессий «Следственная тюрьма НКВД» (филиал Томского областного краеведческого музея) [Tomsk Memorial Museum of History of Political Repressions “Investigatory Prison of the NKVD” (branch of Tomsk Regional Museum)] located in the very heart of the city.

In February this year I visited the GULAG museum of Perm-36, located in an actual former camp two hours of north of Perm, and just about a couple of weeks ago I came across the following article: «Это самый реальный музей…» [This is the realest museum…]. Before reading this I didn’t know that there existed such a museum in Tomsk, though I knew that I was going there for «Смотр научных и творческих работ иностранных студентов, обучающихся в российских вузах 2008» [Review of scientific and artistic works by foreign students studying in Russian universities 2008], and of course I wasn’t planning on missing out on such a chance to get to know a little bit more about Russia’s past. Perhaps my fascination with the dark side of the Soviet Union has more to do with my fascination for the dark side of things in general (after all, I’m majoring in Dostoevsky!) than with anything else. I like to visit museums, and I especially like visiting museums that put ordinary life into perspective. Many things surprised me while at this particular museum in Tomsk – for example, entry only costs 30 rubles! – but most of all when one of those accompanying me there told me that the building was turned into apartments after the prison was closed down. I coulnd’t help but to ask myself two questions, first: Who would want to live here? And secondly: But maybe they didn’t know?

The first guest of honor to visit the museum was none other than the Nobel Prize awarded writer Alexander Solzhenitsyn who went there even before it was officially open to the public, in 1994. He wrote a short note for the museum, which is now hanging on one of the walls: «Томскому музею политической истории ХХ века. Радостно ваше начинание, восстановление страшных деталей коммунистического прошлого» [To Tomsk Museum of 20th century political history. Your delightful project, the restoration of horrible details of the communistic past].

Perhaps someone reading this will pose the question – why? Why do I visit these museums? Why do I care so much about this aspect of Russian history? Because there is so much more to this country, so much more to this people, and despite all of these terrible pages in the thick book of Russia’s past, it’s only one side of the story. And yet I think it is so important. Why? I mean, it’s not like it’s my people or my country or my past – I was hardly even born yet when it all started to unfold. And yet I can’t let it go. Perhaps it has to do with what I’ve heard from Russians themselves about this part of their country – that they don’t know much about it. When I was in Perm I met people there who had never heard about Perm-36 (and this wasn’t kids, but adults). The people with whom I went to the NKVD museum in Tomsk were both well educated adults, but none of them had been to the museum before. While at the museum I posed the rhetorical question: “What would Russia have been like now had this never happened?” and the girl standing next to me answered: “We wouldn’t be here… or at least not I. My grandmother worked as a secretary at such investigatory hearings…” After this we were both silent for a while and looked at each other – then we looked away and the silence continued. There are many questions that can be posed about Russia past and present, but none of them really matter – what’s important is the future Russia and those questions concerning that which we are sometimes not brave enough to ask.

For more information about museums like this one in Russia visit Russian Sites of Conscience Network.