Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
into Pripyat from the south was lined with bushes speckled with small white blossoms, the
air thick with the smell of flowers. The vista opened up as we reached the center of town,
allowing a view of the buildings around us. Dennis and I clambered out in the middle of an
intersection, and Nikolai motored off down a side road to find a nice spot to sit and drink
the beer he'd bought earlier.
The day was hot and sunny. The ghostly city surrounded us, the buildings of downtown
looming up from behind scattered poplar trees. Behind us rose a ten-story apartment block.
Its pink and white plaster facade was falling off in patches, revealing the rough brickwork
of the walls underneath. More apartment blocks stood along the road to the left, some of
them crowned with large, Soviet hammer-and-sickle insignia that must once have lit up at
night.
We walked toward the town plaza, following a path that had once been a sidewalk but
was now a buckling concrete track invaded by weeds and grass. Dennis lit a cigarette and
looked up as he took a long drag. A gentle breeze pushed a herd of little clouds across the
sky. Birds flitted by.
The plaza was bordered on three sides by large buildings. To the right, a defunct
neon sign announced the Hotel Polissia, seven stories of square, gaping windows. From
where we stood, more than twenty years of looting and abandonment had not significantly
worsened the stark, unforgiving aspect of the hotel's architecture. A few hardy shrubs even
peeked from among the freestanding letters of the roof sign. It's amazing where things will
grow when people stop all their weeding.
Between drags on his cigarette, Dennis answered my questions with the jaded economy
of someone who had been to this spot a thousand times. “What's that?” I said, pointing at
the building to the left of the hotel.
“Culture palace,” he said.
“What's a culture palace?”
“Discos.” Another drag. “Movies.”
To our left was a blocky building with a sign reading
PECTOPAH
. Using my nascent Cyril-
lic, I decoded this as
RESTAURANT.
I pointed to a low-slung gallery that jutted from its side.
“What was there?”
Dennis looked up and removed the cigarette from his mouth.
“Shops.”
The plaza where we stood was gradually surrendering itself to shrubs and moss. Vegeta-
tion spilled over its borders and crept along its seams. A set of low, crumbling stairs led up
