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Samara is the sixth largest city in Russia, and stands at the confluence of the Volga and Samara rivers. It has population of 1.25 million, and was called Kuybyshev between 1935 and 1991. Its factories played an important role in arming the defence forces of the USSR during the Second World War and after and for many years it was a closed city. Samara was also of importance in the Soviet and Russian space programmes. The Vostok rocket was assembled there, and the city’s part in space exploration is detailed in the Samara Cosmos Space Museum which opened in 2007.
This is a museum of modest size that nevertheless holds some of the key artefacts of the Soviet space programme, and enables visitors to share some of the experiences of astronauts. A P7 rocket outside the museum, dates from 1984, and was obsolete when it was installed on its plinth on 1 October 2001, the fortieth anniversary of the first manned flight. It is 68 m high and weighs more than 20 tons. There is a Soyuz space craft and another module that has actually been in space. Displays explain the development of rocket engines. Visitors gain some insights into life on a space craft, and in particular are able to sample space food, such as ‘cosmos borscht’.
Just in case you mistakenly heard that it was all ice and snow in Russia, take a peek at the Big Bikini Exposition. This is right on the river Moskva in Moscow!Moscow has been the capital of Russia for almost its entire history. The exception is during the period of the Russian Empire, which lasted from 1721 until the Russian Revolution 1917. For these two centuries the capital was St. Petersburg. The Russian Empire was the second largest contiguous Empire in world memory; only the Mongol Empire had been greater.Check out what's happening north of Mongolia these days, in ChitaAlthough you may not have heard of Sochi, on the Black Sea, they're building up quickly and hope to host the 2014 Olympics.Other periods of Russian history include the Tsardom of Russia, from Ivan IV to Peter the Great, and the Grand Duchy (14th-16th centuries).The earliest period of Russian history was ruled by the Novgorod Republic and Kievan Rus, which was the first Russian state dating back to 800AD in Kiev.Modern Russia remains one of the world's superpowers. They launched the earth's second satellite, called Sputnik 1, and were the first country to put a human being into orbit around earth. (The first one is called the Moon.)After the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991, Russia became a federal republic of 83 states.Text by Steve Smith.
