Vk valam people history events. Why do ufologists consider the island of Valaam an anomalous zone, and believers - a place of power. Living but not living

In the magazine "Profile" on November 41/6, 2006, I found an article "Schismatics" about the attitude of the highest hierarchs of the Russian Orthodox Church towards ordinary people. I am sending it to you.
Sincerely, Boris Fedorovich.

Soviet citizens came to live on the northern island of Valaam when the monks left. When they returned, it turned out that there was no more place for the laity here. Either to a monastery, regardless of faith, or away from the island.

The local population is about 300 people. Half of them live on the territory of the monastery complex - in apartments converted from former cells and utility rooms. Residents received orders for them from the state in the late 1940s, immediately after the monks left Valaam for Finland, forming the current New Valaam Monastery there. Then on the territory former monastery a home for disabled veterans of the Great Patriotic War was opened, kindergarten, school and hotel. When in 1989, while still in the Soviet Union, the question arose of restoring the church, the inhabitants of Valaam allowed five monks to come to the island and begin the revival of the monastery, which they had once abandoned. At the pier they were greeted with bread and salt...

Two years later, Boris Yeltsin paid a one-day visit to the island, and the president was so inspired by the monastic life that he decided to “restore historical justice” and handed over the monastic buildings to believers ... along with the laity living in them. Since then, according to some documents, the islanders live in municipal apartments, according to others, they illegally occupy monastic premises.

Change came immediately. The inhabitants of the monastery took Yeltsin's decree literally and began to force the islanders, regardless of religion, to live according to the Law of God. And the monastic charter is strict: it prohibits not only smoking, drinking alcohol and using contraceptives, but also fishing, picking mushrooms and berries, making fires in the forest, and much more.

Gradually, the brethren began to explore areas that had nothing to do with religion. For example, hunting. At one time, a special team was engaged in shooting moose, which are in abundance on Valaam, the moose went to school, a kindergarten and a local store. Recently, the clergy have taken over the responsibility for preparing the hunt, and the shooting has been transferred to ... VIP guests of the monastery.

Such come to Valaam constantly. For the last three years, Vladimir Putin has also been going there. A peculiar sign even appeared on the island: haymaking began - which means that the president will arrive. A few days before his arrival, all the greenery near the monastery is mowed so that no one takes refuge in it. True, the president himself, as he admitted many times, does not hunt. But there are others. Moreover, sometimes these “pilgrims” go out on a moose pretty drunk ...

For eviction

Indigenous people repeatedly tried to ask for help. But immediately after a letter was sent from the island to the presidential administration with a request to sort it out, the persecution of the laity began. The people of Valaam are sure that the letter fell into the hands of Father Superior Pankratius, who immediately began a policy of evicting the complainants. The natives were offered to either go to work in the monastery as cooks, laborers, builders - in this case, stay on the occupied area, or get out of the island. At the same time, the monks colorfully described the advantages of living in the monastery, recalled wealthy sponsors who make rich donations, including boats and cars.

The prospect of staying on the street frightened many. Crazed with fear, the people of Valaam went to the hegumen and asked for a job. But some residents chose to defend their rights in court. Soon they were labeled second-class people. Pilgrims point the finger at them, allegedly they are drunkards, parasites and atheists who did not want to live and work under the wing of the abbot. For the outcasts, the monastery, with the participation of the local administration, built a residential building on the mainland, in the small Karelian town of Sortavala.

Those who left the island soon repented, - says Sergey Nedoshivin, former deputy director of the Valaam Natural Park. - People who have spent their whole life on the island are not adapted to life on big land. They just have nothing to do there. In addition, Sortavala has the highest unemployment rate in the region, so many have decided to return to the island.

For the returnees and those who never left Valaam, life turned into hell. In court, one by one, are considered statements of claim with the personal signature of Abbot Pankratii. The abbot demands to oblige the natives to vacate the premises transferred to the monastery by Yeltsin's decree. The laity are invited to move out. No matter where.

If you don't leave, there will be no hospital

In July 2004, Vladimir Putin paid a one-day visit to Valaam. The then head of the administration, Sergei Grigoriev, told the president about the litigation on the island. The President promised to look into it.

Two months later, I was summoned by the authorities - the head of the Sortavala administration Sergey Ryzhkov - with a demand that I resign, - says Grigoriev. - As it turned out, Putin arranged a dispersal of the head of Karelia, Katanandov, and he, in turn, decided to get rid of me. If I persist, Katanandov will not give money for the construction of a hospital in Sortavala. I have resigned. Since then, on Valaam, all legal issues, up to registration, are decided by the abbot of the monastery. Recently, Lyudmila Pilipchuk, a resident of Valaam, had a daughter, but the girl is not registered on the mother's square, forcing her to leave the island.

Not so long ago, the people of Valaam made a new attempt to petition the president. “At the moment, all 300 inhabitants of the island, having state registration in houses that are not related to religious buildings, ended up in the fund of the religious organization of the monastery by collusion between the monastery authorities and the Karelian government,” the islanders write in their appeal to Putin. - We became citizens without rights ... Before they came, we lived in modern, developing and big Russia with the hope of justice, work and common sense, with faith in the future of our children on this earth, and now we find ourselves in an atmosphere of tsarism, with princelings, seizing power, business and property on the begged money from our state, oligarchs and big business.

The letter was signed by almost half of the inhabitants of Valaam. But this time, too, the paper disappeared on the way to the Kremlin...

Now, next to the dacha of Patriarch Alexy II, a VIP-hotel "Vladimirsky Skit" is being built. Construction is behind a fence and guarded. But the other object can be seen by everyone. Last year, the Pallada yacht, bought from the presidential administration and donated to the monastery by sponsors, moored at the St. Nicholas Skete. The media wrote more than once about the vessel, 31 meters long and worth $4 million. With the blessing of the patriarch, "Pallada" was renamed "The Tsaritsa", although the old letters have not yet been painted over. The yacht practically does not go to Ladoga, according to the novices who were on duty at the pier, VIP guests ride on it.

The last time the residents of Valaam turned to Putin was during a summer Internet conference, asking: “Why, in a country where the church is separated from the state, does the monastery oppress local residents in every possible way?” Alas, this question did not reach ...

War of the Worlds

At the end of last year, hegumen of the Valaam Monastery, Bishop Pankraty of Trinity, was awarded the Man of the Year 2005 award in the nomination For the Restoration of the Spiritual Shrines of Russia. The last object of the laity has recently been transferred to the ownership of the monastery. Here are located the Winter Hotel, a school where 50 children study, a grocery store and apartments where about 60 families live. A new round of resettlement of the islanders to the mainland is inevitable. The liquidation of the school will expel families with children from the island. The rest, most likely, will try to evict by other methods.

Residents see a way out of the situation in the recognition of Valaam as an independent rural settlement and the election of a secular head of the island. After the resignation of Sergei Grigoriev, the President of Karelia, at the request of the patriarch, annexed Valaam to Sortavala, a city on the mainland, 43 km from Ladoga Lake. Now, in order to get a certificate, the islanders have to spend a day on the road, about a thousand rubles for a trip by water and five hundred for an overnight stay in a hotel on the mainland.

Alexander Shcherbakov, a resident of Valaam, found the order of the head of Karelia unlawful. He appealed to the Supreme Court of the Republic and won it. That is, the issue of local self-government on Valaam, in general, has already been resolved, but its decision at the legislative level is continually being postponed. On October 8, when the whole of Karelia elected local authorities, the residents of Valaam had the opportunity to only partially fulfill their civic duty by electing the head and council of Sortavala and deputies of the Legislative Assembly of Karelia. Without waiting for the election of the head of the island, the people of Valaam themselves formed an administration headed by Shcherbakov.

The head of the village administration on Valaam must be a layman, only such a person can protect the local population, Shcherbakov is sure. - As the head of the unauthorized administration, I can say that before the elections, all the power provided by the Constitution of the Russian Federation and the law on local self-government belongs to the residents of Valaam and the newly formed administration. I consider our actions justified, confirmation of this is the decision of the Supreme Court, which recognized the status of a rural settlement for Valaam.

The official authorities of Karelia, of course, did not recognize the powers of the new administration and appealed to law enforcement agencies with a statement about holding the participants accountable for the unlawful seizure of power. The FSB investigator spent 10 days on the island and refused to open a criminal case against the locals. A new date for elections will be set in December, but residents fear another attempt to derail them.

According to the law on suffrage, people in Karelia who have issued a temporary residence permit can take part in elections, - says Larisa Sudarikova, secretary of the Valaam election committee. - Only 300 people live on the island. It is enough to bring one ship with pilgrims, temporarily register them on the territory of the monastery and send them to vote for the desired candidate...

Tatiana Romashenkova

Indigenous islanders are not to be seen in their small homeland: do they interfere with tourism?

Russia has always dreamed of either a Bright Future or the Kingdom of God. Only, apparently, the carriers of bright ideas had “no luck” with the people. He always gets underfoot. Valaam Island in the middle Lake Ladoga as if created for "superfluous people". Harsh climate. rocky shores, overgrown with a stiff spruce beard. And most importantly - isolation from the rest of the world. This "Russian Athos" was famous for its severe monasticism. The monks, these suppliers of "opium for the people", clearly interfered with the builders of a brighter future. Therefore, in 1939 the monastery on Valaam was closed.

And, as they say, the monks, grabbing the iconostasis, fled across the ice to Finland. It would seem that now the path to the implementation of great ideas is open. But someone constantly interfered with the Soviet government.

After the war, Soviet cities were flooded with people who were lucky enough to survive at the front, but lost their arms and legs in the battles for their homeland. Home-made carts, on which human stumps scurried between the legs of passers-by, crutches and prostheses of war heroes spoiled the good looks of the bright socialist today. And then one day Soviet citizens woke up and did not hear the usual rumble of carts and the creak of prostheses. Disabled people were removed from the cities overnight. One of the places of their exile was the island of Valaam.

As a matter of fact, these events are known, recorded in the annals of history, which means that "what happened - then passed." Meanwhile, the expelled invalids took root on the island, took up housekeeping, created families, gave birth to children who had already grown up and gave birth to children themselves - real indigenous islanders. But some kind of fate is directly pursuing these families, as if the “extra person” gene is transmitted from parents to children. Today, when we are finally building a bright democratic future, the descendants of the expelled disabled again interfere with the Great Spiritual. By their simple physical presence on their native island.

Valaam is beauty, the equal of which must be sought...

The islanders lead a peculiar life. “Yes, the population has its own mentality or something. The seasonal nature of life,” said Alexander Sebin, the first deputy head of the local self-government of the Sortovalsky district of the Republic of Karelia, the very district to which the island of Valaam belongs, in a conversation with me. In summer, life is in full swing: vegetable gardens, fishing, construction works in the monastery, pilgrims. They remember that earlier the inhabitants had more than three dozen cows. But there were not enough hayfields, so they went to the neighboring islands for grass. And the scythe here is special - “pink salmon”. A kind of sickle, but six or seven times more. And they mow from left to right, from right to left, in order to get grass between the trees. But now either the ecology does not allow, or they have become lazy, but I have not seen a single cow on the island.

In winter, the Valaam dweller hibernates. “In the summer, grace is here,” says Valery Fedorovich Koltyrin, an islander. - And in the winter here, this is the second Solovki. The real ones." Severe winter finally cuts off the island from the mainland. There was a car with food on the ice across Ladoga - it failed. Okay, people jumped up. So it lies at the bottom. In winter, a helicopter flew to Valaam. Once a month.

The spirit of the times - there are two private shops on the island. In winter, they sell mainly canned food, they are also a snack, and, of course, there are no problems with the fact that they have a snack. If you didn’t “stomp” in the garden in the summer, then you won’t “dig” fresh for several months. And because of this, the winter for many islanders turns into a months-long binge. They say that time flies in this state - you won’t have time to blink, and you don’t care about frost.

The locals are accustomed to living their own way...

Drunkards on the island are also special - humble and hardworking. And that's why there is no crime situation here. Well, there, someone will dig up potatoes from a neighbor. And so silence and grace. “It is also difficult with young people here,” Valery Fedorovich sighs. - Some go to study, this is the most. But they return. Because they seem to be used to living away from the noise of the city. island system. Your way of life. And there - their own conditions, they do not like ... ".

Another feature of the character of the descendants thrown out of society on an island cut off from the world is that they compensate for their uselessness and loneliness with the habit of living not by themselves, but “with someone”. Previously, they were at the boarding school: someone in the role of a disabled person, someone as attendants. The boarding school had a subsidiary farm: a large pigsty, a chicken coop for ten thousand chickens, sheep and goats. Existence made sense. But in 1984, the boarding school was transferred to the mainland. And life on the island immediately began to decline.

However, something happened that should have happened. Once, in late autumn, about seven monks landed on Valaam. The islanders greeted them wary: the owners are returning. The monks settled in distant sketes. Then other monks came and began to restore the monastery.

Life of the island now: there is everything - from trade to construction...

Society had to repay historical debts. Only the bargaining chip turned out to be the same - human destinies. “I don’t understand this question at all! - boils Valery Koltyrin. “How could it be conveyed along with people!” Well, no, serfdom has long been abolished. The problem is precisely that the church was transferred simply to the territory of the former monastery, “inner square”, “outer square” and other buildings. Meanwhile, these buildings were someone's home. Is it worth paying attention to such trifles when a great good deed is being done: the restoration of historical justice?

Thank God that we do not live in the time of Valaam disabled ancestors. The sun of humanism has already cast its first ray on our harsh northern region. The disabled were deported. Their children and grandchildren are being relocated. "Purely voluntary."

And how many good, smart arguments were immediately found! “These people do not live “with”, but at the expense of the monastery,” a young, intelligent Muscovite pilgrim told me, arguing the need to get rid of “this burden.” Frankly, I saw little logic in this. Indeed, there is no point in hiding the truth: out of the remaining five hundred indigenous people of Valaam, the percentage of people who drink is very high. A drunken islander does not go to rob. He has one light in the window - a monastery. He combs his hair with five fingers - and at the monastery gate: "Father, I need to work, earn money for bread."

Of course, many people come to Valaam to restore the monastery, they work for the glory of the Lord, for stew. But there are not enough workers. The father will bless the sinner: "For God's sake, go to work." A penny or two people will earn. “The bulk, especially on this side of the square, are generally not adapted to live in the city. At all! Koltyrin is sure. They can't live in the city! They're going to the dumps!"

Spaso-Preobrazhensky Monastery on the island of Valaam - the main attraction

Is it worth it for the sake of devastating the island to take on the soul a sin: to break human destinies? Or drinking man already can be deleted from our lives? So we cross out half the country in one fell swoop. “Somewhere everywhere it is clear that, first of all, it is necessary to resettle unnecessary people - such a word, perhaps, is not a good one,” says Alexander Sebin, deputy deputy of Sortal. “Here, on the mainland, of course, they are not really needed either: they most likely will not find work, they are used to living a kind of Valaam life.”

Another weighty argument was brought to me by Father Methodius. This black-haired handsome Macedonian is in charge of the reception of pilgrims in the monastery, read - tourists. Choosing his Russian words with care, Father Methodius complained about the large “turnover of personnel” in the monastery: “Because it is impossible for a monk to retire and even shut himself up.”

Sincerely sympathizing with deeply religious people, I proposed then to stop tourism to the holy island. But no sympathy was found. After all, both secular and ecclesiastical authorities associate the development of the island with tourism. Here everyone pulls the blanket over himself. The monastery even agrees to the presence of both young tourists and tourists, many of whom come in a very “blasphemous” form and behave far from always in accordance with the holy place. So why then all the fuss? A very obsessive thought creeps in: isn’t it necessary for tourists to urgently release the Valaam living space?

What will it be now new life in these old casemates?

There are arguments from the point of view of high philanthropy: well, they say, these islanders, in their cells with the conveniences on the street, suffer when they are given excellent apartments, water-gas-toilet, in the newest sortal panel. After all, life on the mainland is incomparably better! It can be seen that we have been muttering about love for the Motherland for so many years that we completely forgot the meaning of these words, and when we encountered this mysterious phenomenon, we were completely at a loss. Once upon a time, smart people came to my small village. They told us that my homeland is completely unpromising, that we have no electricity, gas and water, that we live hard, and therefore we must leave our homes. And then they drove us out of their homes like cockroaches, and drove us like stupid cattle with a big club into a brighter future ...

One Great Idea has gone down, other ideas are rising over the country, and the little tragedies of little people continue...

The topic is to be continued.

Nikolai NIKONOROV, Rossiyskaya Gazeta

In this part, I will talk about why Patriarch Kirill did not start acting in the film "Valaam"

"Halvah of Russia" or why Patriarch Kirill did not star in the film "Valaam"

Many people noticed that the head of the Valaam stauropegial monastery, Patriarch Kirill, did not appear in the film (!) Only once, for a couple of seconds, did he appear from behind the President. They ask themselves: why is Cyril not in the film?

I answer: everything is simple, no politics. Kirill, of course, likes to talk about his services to the Valaam monastery: either he will ask Putin for money for restoration, or he will order the pier to be cleared of old buildings, and the monument will be opened, and sketes, so, he ordered to build everywhere on the islands, and he indicated Pankratia with the inhabitants of the village to conduct "point work". But He didn't want to be in this movie., only sent Kondrashov a few "questions to the president" from his traditional rhetorical compendium, incl. about Lenin, about faith and about Finland.

I think that Cyril did not want to participate in the film, so that no one would think that he was involved in the activities of Pankraty, in arson and destruction, persecution of people and mockery of veterans and the people's memory of the Great Patriotic War. Kirill - Bishop "Western": St. Petersburg, Smolensk, Kaliningrad-Kenigsberg. The local clergy, descendants of Soviet veterans, were brought up on the holiness of the defenders of the motherland, and Kirill too.

And for Pankratia the Great Patriotic War- someone else's war. And the "Soviet clergy", judging by his interview, he strongly dislikes. He is an oriental man, from Dushanbe, where he received an architectural education, in an oriental way. Despotism of the Central Asian type, this cultural environment, left its mark on the personality of Pankratia. For the European northern Valaam, he is a random person.

But there is already a rumor in the media that he Putin's confessor! And his glorification of the president in this film breaks all records of sycophancy. Halva!"Halva of Russia"! It can become a new brand of the Valaam monastery import substitution, not like unprofitable monastery cheese, and not free red fish with caviar. They in the monastery, they say, have already overate.

We will also pay attention to the fact that according to Kondrashov, " Soviet authorities decided to close the Valaam Monastery". Why and who invented another nonsense? Isn't it Pankratius? It can be seen that the authors of the film no longer know who, how and for what place to bite.

The Soviet government, of course, did not close the monastery. It was an organization of the Finnish Orthodox Church, the property of the monastery was the property of this church. The monks, who after 1918 in the majority took Finnish citizenship, after the Winter Soviet-Finnish War in 1940, under the terms of the peace treaty, together with all the displaced Finns, moved deep into Finland beyond the new border.

“In February 1919, the start of a campaign to grant Finnish citizenship was announced in the monastery. In the spring, the first group of monks, headed by the abbot and members of the monastery board, filed a petition. Those who did not want to become Finnish subjects were given a residence permit by the authorities. According to the data on the expression of will, the number of residents in June 1920 was: 426 people, incl. 112 applied for Finnish citizenship, 206 wished to remain Russian citizens, 106 refused to make a choice.

In the 1930s, the brethren included:

(From the book: I.A. Smirnova, O.A. Yarovoy Valaam: under the flag of Finland. Petrozavodsk, 2001. P. 45)

The building of the multi-apartment residential building "Winter Hotel", where the Bosun's School was located, and then the House for the Invalids, the multi-apartment residential building and the village school were set on fire in three places May 1, 2016 during the Easter service. In that " the descent of the blessed Easter fire», holiday attribute, the monument building was destroyed, the school burned to the ground, people were deported.

Instead of a residential building and a village school, Pankraty is building a monastic "spiritual and educational center" of the Valaam Monastery. The monks are nervous. Very nervous.

But the authors of the film do not talk about such a manifestation of spirituality in Valaam.

"Faces of Zimka", a collective portrait of the inhabitants of the burned apartment building"Winter hotel"
village group VKontakte "Valaam: people, events, stories"

On Valaam, the long-term process of resettlement of local residents to the mainland turned into a sharp conflict between the monastery and the secular population. Those who do not want to leave the island are evicted by the monastery through the court. We went to Valaam to understand why people want to stay on the island and why there is no place for them there.

Monastic pier in Priozersk, on the shore of Lake Ladoga. The ship "Valaam", which has been on the move since 1965, carries a few pilgrims who have gathered on the island in late autumn.

“I come to Valaam almost every year to pray… There is such silence… I don’t know how to explain,” says a young Macedonian pilgrim from Germany.

Svetlana Strelnikova, who has been living on Valaam for 20 years, is traveling in a different direction - from the island. She does not want to go to the monastery church.

“From here I leave to pray in another temple or monastery. I went to Konevets, to a temple in St. Petersburg. There is a crisis here ... a terrible crisis,” Svetlana explains. Svetlana fails to concentrate and pray on the monastic island, which for several centuries has remained a center of pilgrimage for Orthodox believers. Interfere with "worldly passions" raging a stone's throw from the monastery.

Image caption The historical building - "Winter Hotel" - became the property of the monastery in 2006. The monastery immediately took care of recognizing "Zimka" as a non-residential building

Svetlana faces trial. They want to evict her from an apartment in an old four-story building, which is called here "Winter Hotel", or simply "Winter". Like almost all real estate in the archipelago, "Winter" belongs to the monastery. Like many of those evicted, Svetlana settled here long before the monastery became the owner of Zimka.

The company established by the monastery claims in the lawsuit that the apartments of Svetlana and other defendants are unfit for habitation. The plaintiff insists on relocation from her dilapidated apartment on the island to a "comfortable house" on the mainland in the city of Sortavala, the district of which Valaam has recently become.

Svetlana, for reasons incomprehensible to the monastic leadership, such an improvement living conditions resists.

Living but not living

The confrontation between the monastery leadership and those who do not want to leave Valaam has been going on for several years, but in recent months the struggle has become more fierce.

In September, the family of the historian Oleg Yarovoy and the guide Irina Smirnova, authors of books and scientific papers on the history and culture of the island of Valaam and the region, were evicted in their entirety. They were deprived of registration as non-residents on the island. “I am a candidate of sciences, I worked for two and a half years on presidential grants, the work involved traveling to other regions, participating in conferences. And the court decision says that I had to sit on Valaam and do science in my apartment,” says Oleg Yarovoy.

Irina Smirnova came to Valaam in the mid-1980s. At first she was a museum guide, then she collaborated with the "Pilgrimage Service" of the monastery, now she works as a private guide without the right to lead tourists around the monastery. Together with ex-husband Oleg Yarov, they write books and studies about Valaam. Next in line is another book about the landscape of the island and the Karelian-Finnish epic. But Irina fears that she will not be able to finish it, and if the island has to be left, she will be left without a job.

Irina and other dissenters see this as revenge for the active protests.

"(This) lawsuit appeared after Oleg's appeal to various authorities with a demand to resolve the situation with our family, evicted in 2008," says Filipp Muskevich, former head of the nature department of the liquidated Valaam Museum-Reserve.

Image caption The family of Philip Muskevich was evicted by the monastery for five years. All this time, the court was on the side of the inhabitants.

With Muskeviches, the process of eviction of residents through the court began. For almost 20 years, Philip lived in the Resurrection Skete - by local standards, on the other side of the island, but in fact - a five-minute drive from the Winter Hotel. When he came to Valaam from Tallinn, there was no monastery on the island yet. In 1989, Muskevich was settled there by the local authorities as a visiting specialist. Other families of the employees of your museum-reserve that existed at that time were also settled in a similar way.

But then the monastery came to the island and, having grown stronger, since 2003, for five years, he tried to evict the family through the court. But to no avail - the claims of the monastery, appealing to the Housing Code, were consistently rejected. However, in 2008 the monastery filed a lawsuit on new grounds, demanding that the Muskevichs be evicted from the refectory building of the Resurrection Skete as from a non-residential building. And the monastery suddenly won the case.

Muskeviches were taken out with bailiffs who accompanied Philip and his wife Lyudmila to the very pier. However, they continue to cling to this land and live in the room of a sympathetic family, in the same Winter Inn. It's crowded and cold in winter, but they don't leave. Moreover, they continue to be active - Philip helps the residents of Valaam who have not yet been evicted to fight for the right to stay on the island.

"I considered any options for alternative resettlement inside Valaam ... This is my native place. The aesthetic argument is very important. A wonderful, delightful place that I'm used to, which I know and which I love," says Philip Muskevich.

Almost none of the residents cling to these apartments. For most of them, the most important thing is to stay on Valaam, if not in this, then in some other accommodation. But this option is also unrealistic, they say in the monastery. Of the thousands of residents registered on the island in the early 80s, now only about a hundred remain with a permanent residence permit. And all of them are threatened with resettlement to the mainland.

Among them are the descendants of the workers of the House of Invalids, opened on the island after the Second World War, former employees of the liquidated museum-reserve, who received social housing in the 1980s and 90s, as well as employees of the existing Natural Park.

Disappeared village

At the dawn of the revival of the monastery, it was assumed that those who wished could stay on the island. This was the only possible legal option at that time - since, according to the law, resettlement should be carried out within the framework of one settlement.

Image caption “They (representatives of the monastery) are very hostile towards the residents also because the residents are trying to sue and defend their rights, and in the canons of the monastery such behavior is at least unacceptable,” says MHG expert Sergei Shimovolos.

However, now the eviction from the island is not against the law. Because in the mid-2000s, Valaam ceased to be an independent territorial unit. Self-government was abolished there and the island became ... the urban area of ​​​​Sortavala, which is 40 km away, on the northern shore of Lake Ladoga.

Experts of the Moscow Helsinki Group, who analyzed this conflict, believe that the liquidation of self-government was carried out illegally and made local residents virtually powerless.

For this, according to the MHG, the "appeal" of the residents of the village of Valaam was used, a protocol was prepared general meeting residents of the settlement dated February 13, 2005, "which was attended by 47 people". However, no one found out the opinion of the majority of the inhabitants of the village, local residents themselves confirm.

The most important violation is the violation of the right to local self-government. The settlement was liquidated illegally, by falsifying documents allegedly of some kind of general gathering. So this meeting did not take place Sergey Shimovolos, MHG expert

“The most important violation is the violation of the right to local self-government. The settlement was liquidated illegally, by falsifying documents allegedly of some kind of general gathering. So this gathering did not take place,” says MHG expert Sergei Shimovolos.

Christian Eviction

Not all of those who have lived here for the past half century objected to leaving. Many agreed to apartments originally offered by the monastery in Petrozavodsk. The family of one of the residents of "Winter", Lyudmila, got as many as three small apartments - for her mother, adult daughter and for her with her husband and minor child. Most of the family has already moved, however, Lyudmila constantly postpones her departure from Valaam. He says that it is very difficult to find a job in Petrozavodsk.

But few people were offered apartments in the regional capital. Initially, the monastery carefully resettled the inhabitants, but after the liquidation of local government, the patient search for a compromise was replaced by a tough approach.

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Although the monastery still talks about the voluntary nature of the resettlement and the "Christian" attitude towards the secular population of the island, it becomes clear from the statements of the hierarchs of the Russian Orthodox Church that the inhabitants have no choice. Appealing to the housing legislation to local residents, representatives of the monastery firmly.

Residents wrote letters to the President of Russia, the Patriarch, the Ombudsman of Karelia, asking them to protect their right to stay on the island, but most of these letters remained unanswered. In September, after the last letter to the patriarch, the company SENT LLC (Real Estate and Territory Exploitation Service), founded by the monastery and managing the monastery's real estate on the island, filed lawsuits against nine more residents of Zimnaya.

Many Valamians, including those who have not yet been affected by the resettlement, took this turn of events as a challenge and filed a counterclaim challenging the recognition of their apartments in the Winter Hotel as unfit for habitation. The first hearing on the lawsuit was postponed, a new one will be held in mid-November.

Sergey Shimovolos from the MHG says that in the whole story with the eviction of local residents, there is a juggling with the rule of law. "Both the old and the new Housing Code did not allow the recognition or transfer of residential premises to non-residential premises without the resettlement of residents. In particular, Article 22 of the Housing Code of the Russian Federation dated December 29, 2004 No. 188-FZ does not allow the transfer of residential premises if citizens use it "in place permanent residence", he says.

Ekaterina Baglaeva, a lawyer at the Yukov & Partners bar, admits that formally, at this stage, the actions of the monastery look legitimate. However, she also points to a certain conflict, which calls into question the legality of the actions of the monastery. Yes, on the one hand, residents cannot appeal to the housing code while in a room that is recognized as non-residential. “However, on the same basis, it is worth doubting the indication of SENT LLC that this building is non-residential. After all, people live there and, moreover, they have long been registered in this building at their permanent place of residence,” says Ekaterina Baglaeva.

Athos, but not the one

Image caption "Northern Athos", but with thousands of tourists of both sexes - this is how the monastery authorities see Valaam

“Of course, we consider the coexistence of a monastery and a secular settlement as a temporary phenomenon and strive to ensure that Valaam again becomes northern Athos,” Bishop Pankraty, abbot of the Valaam Monastery of the Transfiguration of the Savior, said four years ago in an interview with Direct Investments.

The inhabitants do not understand how they can interfere with the monks and why they cannot be left on the island.

“Nothing prevents a small community of the secular population from coexisting with the monastery here. Let’s say, a settlement at the monastery. Here it would be very easy to resolve the situation - to create a program taking into account the balance of interests, dialogue, mutual understanding,” Philip Muskevich reflects.

There used to be a village, and there was no monastery. Now it is a monastery with an ever-increasing brethren. That is, there are more and more monks, thank God. Today there are more than 200 of them. This figure will increase. Vera Skobeleva, director of SENT LLC

It's impossible, Vera Skobeleva, the head of SENT LLC, is sure. Skobeleva argues that over the past thirty years, the demographic situation on the island has changed significantly.

"There used to be a village and there was no monastery. Now it is a monastery with an ever-increasing brethren. That is, there are more and more monks, thank God. Today there are more than 200 of them. This figure will increase. So what? How? We send monks to the mainland , and on Valaam we are making a village?" Vera Skobleva says.

The locals do not agree and say that the number of monks not only does not grow, but actually does not change over the past years.

The premises vacated from local residents, as Valaam residents notice, are occupied by builders and employees of the commercial structures of the monastery. And there are many of them: Pilgrimage Service LLC works with pilgrims and tourists, Valaam Service LLC manages the fleet of passenger and cargo ships. To conduct trade on the island, LLC "Valaam - service" was created, and the already mentioned "SENT" - services for the communal services of the village.

Image caption The monastery relies on "shift workers". During the season, their number exceeds the number of monks and local residents combined

The number of "shift workers" in the season, according to local residents, significantly exceeds the number of local residents and monks combined. Most temporary workers come from neighboring countries - Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova, as well as from Romania. And even at the beginning of November, the surroundings of the monastery are filled with the roar of jackhammers and the rumbling of bulldozers, which is by no means conducive to appeasement.

The fact that the monastery intends to hire "shift workers" was also mentioned by Bishop Pankraty.

“We hope that in a few years Valaam will be mainly populated by monks. The people who work here at the power plant, fire station, forestry, hospital will work on a rotational basis, having homes and families on the mainland,” the bishop said about the plans of the monastery. Pankraty.

Why the shift workers arrange the monastery more than the indigenous people, the hierarch did not explain.

“I already spoke with Vladyka (Bishop Pankraty) about this and with the housekeeper: listen, why do you hire workers on a rotational basis when we have a working population? Why don’t you give them work? After all, this is a local resident who will work and will be responsible for our work! No, they say, it’s more convenient for us to work here on a rotational basis, "says Sergei Grigoriev, deputy of the city council of the city of Sortavala, also a resident of Valaam, also registered in the Winter Hotel.

According to the deputy, some of the locals manage to get a job in the monastic commercial structures, but the monastery basically does not hire the majority of residents with a permanent residence permit. As Sergei Grigoriev is sure, it is precisely because of their permanent residence in Valaam.

Who is stubborn - go to Valaam

In modern consciousness, the word "Valaam" is associated with the monastery. But the idea that the island "for centuries" was exclusively monastic - a myth, notes Irina Smirnova.

“The monastery was formed at the end of the 14th century, when there was already a settlement here. It was the time of the development of the Northern Ladoga region by the Karelians. In the 17th century, when it was the territory of Sweden, there were also Karelian settlements, estates, and in the 18th century the monastery returned,” says she.

Image copyright RIA Novosti Image caption According to historical sources, the monastery existed on Valaam for a little over 300 years...

As an instructive example of the successful coexistence of the monastery and the secular population, almost all the inhabitants of Valaam, who know the history of the island, recall the "Finnish period".

"It was the 1920s and 30s, when the Grand Duchy of Finland gained independence. There was a Finnish military garrison here, because it was a border area and Finnish military families lived here, with children. By the way, they lived in the Winter Hotel. Here the premises were The other part of the building housed tourists: in the 1920s and 1930s it was a very large tourist center,” says Irina Smirnova.

According to local residents, there is no enmity between them and the monks even now, despite the conflict with the leadership of the monastery. They even have something in common. The monks like to remember the pre-revolutionary proverb: "Who is experienced - go to Optina, and who is stubborn - go to Valaam." The second part of the proverb could be fully attributed by the locals to themselves.

“No one, not a single local resident, no matter what conditions he was placed in, spoke out aggressively against the Russian Orthodox Church, not a single one. Moreover, more than half of the local residents are Orthodox, baptized and go to church,” says Sergei Grigoriev. Although some, having become witnesses of "worldly passions" in the fence of the monastery, are disappointed.

Museum historian Varvara Sergeeva, great-granddaughter of the repressed in the 1930s. deacon, says that he can no longer pray in churches on Valaam - he leaves for St. Petersburg to confess and take communion. She has been living on Valaam since 1988, after the closing of the museum she took up needlework - she sews bags that are very popular among pilgrims. The monastery refuses to take items for sale from Varvara, preferring local items from its wholesale suppliers from the mainland.

"Just a Ghetto"

Image caption Svtelana Strelnikova says that the beauty and spirit of the island saves from everyday disorder

Svetlana Strelnikova, although she also cannot pray in churches on Valaam, does not want to leave the island.

“One has only to go to the forest to be like, and you understand what you are fighting for. The forest, by the way, is also so spoiled, so much forest has been cut down ... Because I didn’t come here for some kind of money, apartments. I just liked Here are such living conditions - that's how long I lived here, I thought: "Lord, if I lived in the city, I would probably hang myself from such living conditions," says Svetlana Strelnikova.

Conditions are not normal. In the dark corridors of the Winter Inn filled with chests and cupboards, cats are in charge. Against the background of walls with peeling paint in some places, semi-domestic animals exacerbate the feeling of dilapidation.

The building itself is in a terrible state. The way people maintain corridors and stairs is just a ghetto Vera Skobeleva, director of SENT LLC

The apartments have small windows, stove heating supplemented by electric heaters. There are makeshift partitions, makeshift kitchens and self-installed bathrooms.

Such uncomfortable by city standards apartments were two decades ago, when museum workers were placed in the "Winter Hotel". Then the apartments were considered suitable for living. Without overhaul two decades have passed, the ancient building and laid back in Soviet time communications are shattered. And so the monastery authorities received a technical opinion on the unsuitability of the building for habitation.

"The building itself is in a terrible state. The way people maintain corridors and stairs is just a ghetto," Vera Skobeleva, head of SENT LLC, is indignant.

Residents claim that they repeatedly offered the monastery to repair the building and were ready to help to do this. The monastery has already begun the restoration of the outer contour of the "Winter", but with the expectation of other needs.

“This is a monument of federal significance, it is being restored with adaptation to its original use. And it is impossible to comply with sanitary and building standards for residential premises there. This is a hotel complex,” Vera Skobeleva explains.

very serious business

In the same four-story building, directly above the apartments declared unfit for habitation, there are two monastery hotels. There, a very modest room in terms of amenities costs an average of 3.5-4 thousand rubles per night. The same stove heating and electric heater, shower, tiny window.

The monastery needs hotels. During the season - from May to October - 100-140 thousand pilgrims come to the island - almost a thousand people a day. The three monastery hotels on the island can accommodate just over 100 tourists. The avenue of the Pilgrimage Service has about two dozen tourist programs designed for different budgets.

Despite the repeated repetition by the hierarchs of the Russian Orthodox Church of the formula "Valaam is northern Athos," no one is going to limit the flow of tourists-pilgrims to the monastic island in the near future.

Image caption Vera Skobeleva, head of the monastic LLC SENT, is categorical: Valaam residents cannot stay on the island

"We must be aware that Valaam feeds the entire Sortavala region. This is the tourism business, hotels, travel, Finns come here, come here from all over Russia, from abroad, from America, from England, all of Europe travels here. Then It is clear that this is a very serious business, it brings serious income to Karelia," Vera Skobeleva explains.

After the renovation of the Winter Hotel building is completed, it is planned to create a spiritual and educational center there, which will include a museum of modern icons with exhibition halls and a school of Orthodox chanting, icon painting, lecture halls, and a pilgrimage center.

According to the official version, the current resettlement of residents is connected exclusively with the restoration of the federal monument - that is, the Winter Hotel - for the celebration of the 100th anniversary of the Republic of Karelia.

“Right now, for example, federal money has been spent on restoration, and people live there ... The money needs to be spent. They (the residents) are slowing us down for at least half a year with all the courts in mastering federal money. But the monastery has to wait until all this is decided,” - complains the press secretary of Bishop Pankratia Mikhail Shishkov.

Our program includes the revival of the Valaam Monastery. In fact, it is not a revival, not a repair, but a new construction - they are building a new one. Sergei Grigoriev, resident of Valaam

To speed up the process, according to local residents, different methods. In August, for example, after a meeting on drawing lots for housing on the mainland, electricity and water supply were cut off in the apartments of local residents for several days. Shutdowns affected only those who are threatened with resettlement.

Impossible building

"It is impossible to stay on Valaam, because there is no opportunity to build new premises, because within the central estate and the entire archipelago is closed for new construction. New construction provides only sketes, temples, chapels. These are not the premises in which citizens are supposed to live" - explains Vera Skobeleva.

In the morning, the sound of a drill wakes up the guests in the hotel cell. In the absence of crowds of tourists, visitors to the island are haunted by construction noise.

Image caption Such a picturesque place was chosen for the construction of another "remake" - the Kazan Skete

"According to our program, the revival of the Valaam Monastery is underway. In fact, it is not a revival, not a repair, but new construction - they are building a new one. There are residences on the islands. Here we have built a residence for Alexy the Second - St. Vladimir Skete - he rested there Kirill interceded - he did not like this residence - they built him a residence on Bayonne Island (Valaam archipelago), on which nothing can be built at all, because this is a protected area, a specially protected area, "says Sergey Grigoriev.

Indeed, it is now protected especially. Previously, for locals and tourists it was a favorite place for fishing, now, according to the stories of tourists, everyone approaching the island is met by heavily armed guards.

On the island of Valaam itself, in an unusually picturesque place, the Kazan Skete is being built. "A remake," says local resident Victor, a native of Valaam, contemptuously. Victor, who "knows every corner of Valaam", does not like the new buildings - it's a pity the forest cut down at the construction site. "Why are they here? These buildings have never been here," Victor says.

An unfinished remake crypt sticks out next to the remake temple overlooking the granite shore. It was intended for a major donor from Ukraine - Anton Klymenko, who died in Egypt on vacation, brother of the Minister of Revenue and Duties in the government of Viktor Yanukovych. Brick parallelepiped, similar to the entrance to an underground tunnel. But it stands empty - for some reason, the benefactor was not even buried here, but at the historic Igumensky cemetery, where something much more massive, similar to a chapel, is being erected.

Image caption Builders are working to perpetuate the memory of the brother of a Ukrainian official and a major donor

Nearby are the graves of four abbots of the monastery. None of them can compete in terms of monumentality with the burial of the donor. Even the grave of Abbot Damaskin, who is called the main builder of Valaam, is under a standard, human-sized tombstone.

In 1992, with the liquidation of the state museum-reserve, Valaam, as noted in the MHG, lost the status of a specially protected area. In 1999, a Natural Park was created on Valaam, whose employees often turn out to be helpless if a monastery turns out to be a violator of the rules.

"Remakes" are being built at an accelerated pace on the islands of the Valaam archipelago, in fact, with the blessing of the patriarch, who last summer called for the construction of a skete on each still "uninhabited" Valaam island.

Shortly after this statement by the Primate of the Russian Orthodox Church, on Oboronny Island (Valaam Archipelago), where the construction of the Mannerheim Line remained until recently, a large-scale construction was launched, which began without carrying out the necessary environmental expertise. Ecologists raised the alarm: large-scale construction is taking place in a particularly valuable natural area of ​​the park, in close proximity to places where the Ladoga seal listed in the Red Book accumulates on haulouts. The authorities responded to Greenpeace's request about the legality of the construction with a great delay: an administrative case was opened, construction continues.

Valaam for VIP

Image caption According to the Russian Orthodox Church, buildings for VIPs do not violate the historical appearance of the island

"It is impossible to make a settlement somewhere. Around the forest of the first category. And any infrastructure that will be created as a separate settlement will violate the actual historical appearance that is fixed here. That is, almost all buildings on the territory of the Valaam archipelago are historical or cult", - Vera Skobeleva tells us.

Even if we leave aside the tomb for the brother of a former official, there are frankly secular buildings on the island.

Next to St. Vladimir's Skete (also a remake of the 2000s with a name characteristic of the era) there are two large wooden cottages. One of them is called by the locals Putin's residence, the other is a VIP-bath.

According to the official version, the mysterious houses near the remake skete are hotels for VIP guests. Next to the trees are brand new residential buildings, near which the excavator is famously working. "They are building for servants, probably," says a local resident accompanying us.

You can build, but not for living. Modern sketes, modern buildings are being built there - we must leave something in our century Mikhail Shishkov, press secretary of Bishop Pankraty

The construction of either residences or VIP hotels does not bother the representatives of the monastery. After all, formally a VIP-hotel and houses for servants are not living quarters. "You see, everyone wants permanent registration on Valaam. It was carried out outside the law, and in violation of the Constitution and the Housing Code. It is possible to build, but not for living. Modern monasteries, modern structures are being built there - we must leave something in our century" - Patiently explains the reasons for the construction boom, the representative of the hegumen Mikhail Shishkov.

In the 19th century, when the modern ensemble of the Valaam Spaso-Preobrazhensky Monastery was being built, Russian emperors Alexander I and Alexander II loved to visit the island. You will not find their "residences" or dachas - the reigning persons lived in two cells near the gate church of the Apostles Peter and Paul at the monastery gates.

Image copyright RIA Novosti Image caption The island fell in love with Russian President Vladimir Putin

The current head of state also likes to come to Valaam - according to the official version, in order to "focus on the main thing." The locals remember how once "to focus" on the island he came with Silvio Berlusconi.

Among the main donors for the restoration of monuments and the construction of remakes is the Charitable Foundation of Elena and Gennady Timchenko.

This year, the monastery received 358 million rubles to "strengthen the unity of the nation" and create a spiritual and educational center.

Dead end. Plywood

Now all the residents of the "Winter" are being offered virtually no alternative - a house in Sortavala. For those who cannot imagine life without Vallam nature, wind, waves and pines, his very address is like a mockery. Plywood dead end, 7A.

Only two people came to the drawing of lots for 18 apartments in the new house, and even those later refused. Apartments in a dead end are inclined by Valaam residents in every way - mainly from the stories of others: new house few have seen. Sergei Grigoriev is one of those.

Image caption The monastery believes that they are offering the people of Valaam an excellent alternative - a house in Plywood Dead End

“In fact, this is what they did: they took an industrial building at an ordinary production site - there were workshops, then there was an office - they repaired it, made 18 apartments there - no balconies, no loggias, ceilings - 3.20, heating - electric. Everyone understands, of course, that it’s unbearable to live in such conditions, because when the heating is electric and the ceilings are 3.20, then there’s not enough money to heat this room,” says Grigoriev.

The house is located on the territory of a meat-packing plant that once operated in Sortavala. The residents of Valaam, who are threatened with resettlement, claim that in the immediate vicinity there was once a cattle burial ground. They say that behind the new cladding of the building, rotten walls of silicate brick. They speak confidently, and yet - "behind the eyes", we could not see with the naked eye all the listed shortcomings. But that doesn't mean they can't be.

What is there to fight for? For a cell?! house guard in Sortavala

The three-story house sheathed in yellow-burgundy siding with a bright playground looks like a stranger - on the one hand, shacks of the "private sector" blackened with age, on the other - the remains and fragments of the industrial zone. Before our arrival, the "heating" was turned on in the apartments on the first floor - those same electric heaters. In several rooms, the wallpaper had peeled off the walls because of the dampness. But these are trifles.

"Yes, these are mansions! Come in and live! If I were offered such housing ... And I have two children and I rent a room, I pay 8 thousand every month - and I don’t complain," a native of Sortavala, a young security guard who was assigned to guard the house, is outraged before the tenants move in.

Image caption Is the sense of beauty available to monastic officials, Philip Muskevich asks this question

In Sortavala - unemployment and 800 people on the waiting list for social housing. People have been waiting in line for housing for many years. Therefore, the young man believes that the inhabitants of Valaam are "showing off." He himself works out "watches" on Valaam during the season. We are wondering if there, on Valaam, is there something worth fighting for?

“But what is there to fight for? For a cell?!”, the Sortavala member looks at us with bewilderment.

This man and Philip Muskevich, who defends his right to Valaam, seem to speak different languages.

"Why, when they talk about the movement of residents, they compare only meters, the characteristics of SanPiN, without taking into account the fact that people on Valaam do not just live in their apartments? They primarily live on this beautiful island. For monks, who should be at least in romantics to some extent, it should be clear that it is this phenomenality of Valaam that attracts people," says Muskevich.

Valaam is a beautiful monastery, a monastery on the islands. The famous monastic economy is maintained on Valaam. Pilgrims often come here. In this article you will find photos of Valaam, information and facts about the holy island, monks, ascetics, history, past and present of this amazing place.

Photos of Valaam and facts

On September 24, the Church celebrates the transfer of relics St. Sergius and Herman of Valaam. What do we know about them and about the monastery they founded? Why and why were their relics transferred?

1. Valaam - a monastery on the islands

3. Saints Sergius and Herman of Valaam - saints without life

The founders of the monastery, St. Sergius and Herman, the Wonderworkers of Valaam, did not leave us their lives. Only brief mentions in chronicles and ancient manuscripts have survived. But St. Sergius and Herman never left their brotherhood. For a thousand years they continue to testify to their invisible presence, guarding the Valaam monastery with their prayerful intercession. Many miracles and healings are given according to the faith of those who ask for the prayerful intercession of St. Sergius and Herman. These miracles continue to this day.

In the monastery archive, now located in Finland, in the New Valaam Monastery, a collection of “Miracles of St. Sergius and Herman” has been preserved.

4. Balaam: attempts at blasphemy are punishable here

In 1611, the monastery was ravaged by the Swedes, and Swedish colonists lived on the island. In 1685, during the reign of the Grand Dukes John Alekseevich and Peter Alekseevich, the Swedes wanted to dig up the relics of the saints and abuse them, but the Lord soon sent them “a great illness and relaxation of the members”, so they were afraid and a chapel was built over their relics.

In 1163 the holy relics were temporarily transferred to Novgorod. In 1182, when the danger had passed, the monks transferred the holy relics of their heavenly intercessors back to Valaam. Fearing an insult to the shrine, they cut a grave deep in the rock and hid the holy relics of the saints in it, where they still remain “under a bushel”. In memory of the return of the holy relics to the Valaam monastery, a church festival is held annually on September 11/24.

5. The calendar issue also affected Valaam

After the October Revolution in 1917, Finland gained independence. Valaam ended up on its territory, which saved the monastery for a while. From November 1918 the monastery was under the jurisdiction of the Finnish Orthodox Church, which became autonomous and passed into the jurisdiction of the Church of Constantinople. In difficult political conditions, in order not to be branded as “Russian”, the Finnish Church sought to actively carry out reforms, emphasizing its independence. She switched to a new (Gregorian) calendar style and Western Paschalia, not recognized by other Orthodox Churches.

In September 1925, during a visit to Valaam by Bishop Herman (Aav), who headed the Finnish Church, the final demand was made to accept the new style. A significant part of the brethren refused to co-serve with him and the Greek Metropolitan Germanos, striving to adhere to church canons. The persecution began. A number of monks had to return to certain death in the USSR, some moved to Serbia. Exiled monks brought the traditions of Balaam to different countries world: France, USA, Morocco, Germany.

In 1946, it came under the jurisdiction of the Russian Orthodox Church and the old (Julian) church calendar was again adopted.

6. Valaam - the lamp of Finland

In Lutheran Finland, Valaam continued to be a lamp in the 1920s and 1930s Orthodox faith. Here annual congresses of the clergy from 35 parishes in Finland were held. The magazine "Morning Dawn" and books were published. Since 1926, in the Peter and Paul Church, Hieromonk Isaac began to perform regular services in Finnish. There was an orphanage school for 30 boys, the poor and orphans in the Resurrection Skete, and a “kinovia” school for Karelian boys. In the temples, continuous reading of the Psalter was performed with the commemoration of the dead and the living.

7. There is a farm on Valaam…

In 1882, a model mechanized farm for 70 cattle was built six kilometers west of the monastery. The barn was built with separate sections for each animal, taking into account the terrain, making it easier to enter the barn. To the vast glacier from the shore of the lake there was a 32 m long railroad with a crane. With its help, dairy products were loaded onto a boat and taken to the monastery. Food cooked in boilers was also delivered along the rails, water was taken from the water supply.

8. ... and watermelons and melons grow!

In the 19th century, there were beautiful gardens on Valaam. At least 60 varieties of apple trees were bred, the harvest was up to 50 tons. For dinner, the brethren served up to 80 kg of freshly picked berries: currants, gooseberries, raspberries. Watermelons weighing about 8 kg, melons - 3 kg, pumpkins - about 33 kg ripened in greenhouses. And this despite the fact that the average temperature in July is +17°!