Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Cultural Note 2: On architecture as a symbol of power

Meet Stalin's lost daughter. A grandiose, magnanimous, visually intimidating structure located strategically in Warsaw's City Center and in front of the main train station. The grandiosity of the building had a very powerful symbolic purpose: remind the Polish people during communist times "we are big, we are powerful, and we are here to stay" as my friend Pawel elegantly put it.

He told me that Stalin ordered the construction of 7 identical buildings of this kind in Moscow, and probably with the same symbolic connotations. These buildings are known as the 7 daughters of Stalin. . There are daughters of Stalin in every major city that were part of the Soviet Union or its circles of influence. In Warsaw, the locals call it "The Lost Daughter of Stalin"

I bet your Lonely Planet Guide didn't offer this information! The value of sight seeing with the locals

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