The Citadel

Kazan is home to the largest minority population in all of Russia, the Tartars. Because of this, Kazan is the capitol of the Tartarstan Republic. Like the Buryat, the Tartars were part of the great Mongol Empire at one point despite being descendants of the Turkic people. When the Golden Horde moved back toward Mongolia as the empire fell apart, the Tartars stayed. Today, they reside all over Russia, but their population is concentrated in Kazan. The Tartar population is largely Muslim as well, which is why Kazan has a good number of mosques.

Mosque.

The Kremlin is by far the most prominent site in Kazan, and it is the first one we have run into. It is home to the Kul Sharif Mosque and the Annunciation Cathedral. It was deemed a Unesco World Heritage site in 2000. Kremlin in this case is not the polit bureau. A kreml is a citadel or fortress that was built to protect traders from bandits and nomadic raiders. The Central Kremlin, when capitalized, refers to the government, and most of the buildings inside the kreml these days are government related.

The Kazan Kremlin is a very popular tourist site these days, and is the central point in all of Kazan. All the roads in the old city lead to the Kremlin. This includes a nice pedestrian street, Baumana. Here there are various restaurants, bars, cafes, shopping centers, stores, and banks. We ate at a very, very busy and very, very large cafe called “Dom Chai”, or “Tea House”. It was two floors and four rooms of people all eating lunch.

Kazan is also home to Lenin State University. They have a statue of a young Lenin running off to class. The funny thing, is that Lenin never finished his studies; he was expelled for revolutionary activities.

Young Lenin, but still Lenin (again).

Last, but not least, we saw our first McDonald's of the trip. We went 26 days before finally seeing the golden arches. It was really kind of nice not seeing them for so long. It kind of acts as a signal that we are entering the more international/European part of Russia. It also proves that McDonald's is not yet everywhere!

The golden arches.