Syktyvkar

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Some historical info about Syktyvkar

Syktyvkar (Russian: Сыктывка́р, Komi: Сыктывкар) is the capital of the Komi Republic located in northwestern Russia, 1298 kilometers northeast of Moscow. The Komi Republic is the size of France and has a population of about one million. Syktyvkar, with a population of 232,961 (in 2009), is the administrative, scientific and educational center of the Republic. It has its own ballet, theater, opera and symphony. The city is located on the Sysola River, which is the origin of its former name Ust-Sysolsk. The city's current name comes from Syktyv, the Komi name for river Sysola, plus kar, which in Komi means "town". The city (same as the province) has two official languages: Komi and Russian.

It was mentioned for the first time in 1586 as Ust-Sysolsk and later was granted city status by Catherine the Great in 1780, and then became the capital of the autonomous Komi oblast ( type of administrative division). The majority of the population at that time were merchants and peasants. The main occupations of the inhabitants were agriculture, cattle-breeding, hunting, fishing, and trade. It has retained its position as the Komi capital since that point.

By the beginning of the 20th century, the population had grown to 6000 people. The tsarist government made the Komi region a place of political exile.

In 1921 Ust-Sysolsk was given the status of administrative centre of the newly-formed Komi Autonomous Soviet Republic. In 1930 it was renamed to Syktyvkar. In 1936, Syktyvkar became the capital of the Komi Republic.

The city is served by Syktyvkar Airport and Syktyvkar Southwest airfield.

Places to visit

The oldest museum of the Republic of Komi, the National Museum, was founded in Ust-Sysolsk in 1911. Nowadays, the National Museum has departments of history, nature, ethnography and literature with each of them exhibiting their collections in the separate buildings with no more than 10 minutes of walk in between.

The National Gallery was founded in Syktyvkar in 1943. Currently it houses 4 permanent exhibitions: Christian art, Russian art of XVIII to beginning of XX centuries, Russian Avant-garde of 1910s and 1920s, Foreign art of XVII-XX centuries, Art of Komi Republic. It also welcomes exhibitions from different museum of the country.

In 1930 Victor Savin, a poet, playwright, stage manager and actor, founded the Drama theatre of the Republic of Komi and the theatre still carries his name. Nowadays this theatre is one of centers of spiritual and artistic culture of all people who live in the republic. Plays of Nicolai Diakonov, Vasili Lecanov, Alexandre Larev and other are familiar to everybody who knows the history of Komi culture.

The Theatre of Opera and Ballet began its history in 1958.

The National Library numbers 2.5 million volumes, including books in Komi, Russian and some foreign languages.

Syktyvkar State University was founded in 1972 and has over 3,500 full-time students and 250 faculty members. There are also 9 more places of a higher education as well as a branch of Russian Academy of Science where 1050 of researches are working in a fields of biology, geology, social sciences, physiology, history, chemistry and mathematics.

Lumber and woodcrafts are the city's largest industries. In the 1960s a large timber-processing plant was built on Syktyvkar’s northern outskirts, producing paper, pulp, hardboard, and plywood.

The city is served by Syktyvkar Airport and Syktyvkar Southwest airfield.

My impression about Syktyvkar

First of all, this visit was very time limited and we concentrated on the old part of town in the center of Syktyvkar. Due to the weather we did not go and visit the forests and beaches that are nearby as originally planned. That's going to be hopefully covered when we visit next time. Therefore my experience is by far not extensive enough to paint a full picture of this city but I believe I got a glimpse of what Syktyvkar is like.

When visiting Syktyvkar, it is difficult to imagine that so many people live there. It still feels more like walking around in a village than in a city. Everything you need in your daily life like supermarkets, post office, banks etc. are in walking distance. As a result I found that indeed most of the people do walk rather than drive and that traffic at the locations that I saw was very light.

There are little shops everywhere and also street vendors that sell their produce or freshly caught fish right on the street. The city has quite a mix of old and new buildings. There are wood houses still in use that were originally only intended for temporary housing some 80 years ago. Between the old houses, modern condominiums have already been built and other new developments are going on in quite a few locations. From the hotel also places were visible outside town that have been built up with large single family houses not too long time ago. I was told that there are quite a few gated communities being developed for people who do not want to live in the center of town but literally out there in the greens - and there is a lot of green around Syktyvkar!! :)

Supermarkets carry pretty much the same things like the western ones. I even saw a number of familiar brands. It was even a little bit disappointing that there were not more new things waiting to be discovered. After all a place so far away should be a bit more exotic, no? :) Imported produce was very expensive but there were more than enough local options available in which case you got way more for your money.

When we were shopping for a little pocket camera we encountered a shop close to our hotel that tried to price each and every part of the usual content of a common camera box separately ("base price is the price of the camera, then you need a battery, a charger cable and the ribbon to hang it from your wrist etc."). Obviously, it was common sense to check with another shop before falling for that one. We were right and in an electronics shop close to the tall shopping center we bought the whole camera package in its original box for roughly half the price that other guy wanted. Well I guess he found it was worth a try.

Strangely, a big proportion of female sales clerks I have seen in this city were behaving a bit odd when interacting with customers. I could not make up my mind whether it was arrogance or severe boredom mixed with a low interest to be of assistance to customers. The big exemption was the staff at the Avalon Hotel and also at the Post office on Stefanovska Square, who were very professional and customer friendly.

Interestingly, male staff was courteous and helpful. I honestly have no idea why there is such a big difference but it was without a doubt noticeable. I heard quite a few different explanations for that already but since I cannot know any of them to be the actual reason, I don't feel that it would be right to put them here.

We were getting around town either by walking, since everything is pretty close together or by taxi when it was raining heavily. Within the town center (basically the built up area of the city) the rate was fixed at 60 rubles (about 2 USD) per taxi and that would be the rate without luggage. For luggage usually an extra fee starting at 20 rubles was being charged. Taxis are booked via the phone and the price is given during the booking.

Tips might or might not be accepted. Don't be offended if your tip gets refused, it's just not as widely accepted in Russia as for instance in Europe or North-America.

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