Carpe Diem #369, Yekaterinburg

Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

Today we enter the birth-town of Hilal, Yekaterinburg, and here it is were she is disappeared and Paulo is worried about her. He visits The Cathedral on the blood which is built on the spot were once the Ipatiev House stood. In that house the Tsarian Royal Family of Tsar Nicolas II were murdered by the Bolshevik Revolution.
It's said that in the Cathedral on the blood the spirits of the Royal Family still search for their lost jewelry which they wore at the time they were murdered. Paulo visits the Cathedral together with his translator and friend Yao. After their experience in the Cathedral ... they go on the street to beg for money and they recieve a lot of money. The Russian people of Yekaterinburg are very committed to the poor and needy in their city.

The TSR stays for two days in Yekaterinburg ... let us take a look into the city ...

The Railway station in Yekaterinburg

Yekaterinburg was founded in 1723 by Vasily Tatishchev and Georg Wilhelm de Gennin and named after Tsar Peter the Great's wife Catherine I (Yekaterina). The official date of the city's foundation is November 18, 1723. It was granted town status in 1796.
The city was one of Russia's first industrial cities, prompted at the start of the eighteenth century by decrees from the Tsar requiring the development in Yekaterinburg of metal-working businesses. The city was built, with extensive use of iron, to a regular square plan with iron works and residential buildings at the centre. These were surrounded by fortified walls, so that Yekaterinburg was at the same time both a manufacturing centre and a fortress at the frontier between Europe and Asia. It therefore found itself at the heart of Russia's strategy for further development of the entire Ural region. The so-called Siberian highway became operational in 1763 and placed the city on an increasingly important transit route, which led to its development as a focus of trade and commerce between east and west, and gave rise to the description of the city as the "window on Asia". With the growth in trade and the city's administrative importance, the ironworks became less critical, and the more important buildings were increasingly built using expensive stone. There was a proliferation of small manufacturing and trading businesses. In 1781 Russia's empress Catherine the Great nominated the city as the administrative centre for the wider region, which led to a further increase in the numbers of military and administrative personnel in the city.
In the early hours of the morning of July 17, 1918, Tsar Nicholas II, his wife Alexandra, and their children Grand Duchesses Olga, Tatyana, Maria, Anastasia, and Tsarevich Alexey were murdered by the Bolsheviks at the Ipatiev House in this city. Other members of the Romanov family were killed at Alapayevsk later the same day. On July 16, 1918 the Czechoslovak legions were closing on Yekaterinburg. The Bolsheviks executed the deposed imperial family, believing that the Czechoslovaks were on a mission to rescue them. Legions came less than a week after and captured the city.

In 1977, the Ipatiev House was demolished by order of Boris Yeltsin, to prevent it from being used as a rallying location for monarchists. He later became the first President of Russia and represented the people at the funeral of the former Tsar in 1998.
On the grounds of the former Ipatiev House a Cathedral was built.

After their experience with begging Yao and Paulo see Hilal again. She tells Paulo what she has experienced on the moment she and Paulo entered the 'Aleph' on the balcony of the TSR.

haunted cathedral
sacred place obscured by the tsar -
window to the past

Not a strong one, but ... well there were other things which needed my attention.

This episode will stay open for your submissions until January 9th 7.00 PM (CET) and I will post (I hope) later today our new Special episode in which another nice haiku of Alexey Andreyev will be published for your inspiration. Have fun, be inspired and share. And maybe ... visit my new weblog Carpe Diem Haiku Kai Special a nice new weblog for our special features.