Еду в Магадан

Before I start a blog devoted especially to Magadan, or even create a website, because this place deserves it, let me write a small introduction to my new stage of life.

Magadan is my home town...or city...I always doubt if I should call it a town or a city, since it is relatively small (100 000 ppl) but at the same time it is a capital of a state.

So, anyway, Magadan is the place where I grew up, finished school in 2003 and since then I visited it twice, the last time was in January 2006.

Now, after almost 6 years of not seeing my beloved city, I am finally going back!!! I am going to Magadan!!

Ok, if you have not seen it on the map yet, you should. Otherwise you will not understand anything. The thing is - Russia is a very big country. And if you want to get to Magadan, the only way for you to do it is by plane, since there is no railway, not even road to get there.

And by plane it would take you 8 hours from Moscow. And the price for the ticket, depending on the season, equals or even exceeds the price for a return ticket to Brazil!

So it took me 6 years to go back...

I swear there are so many amazing things about Magadan that I will share with you later. But now I just want to tell about my love to that place.

Today, when I received confirmation about the booking of the ticket, of course I started crying. I hadn't even had a doubt about that. And then, as I start realizing it little by little, some memories come back to me.

I warn you, I will be very emotional in this post. If you are ok with it, continue reading:) if not, may be you should wait for a more constructive

Anyway, let me explain.

I don't know what magic this city has, but I have never met people from other cities feeling the same way we, people from Magadan, feel about our city.

I was not born there, I came to live in Magadan when I was 7. By the age of 10, I remember, I was totally in love with the city. Every summer my family used to go for a couple of months "to the continent" - that's how people from Magadan call the rest of Russia (ask me why? we are not even an island, but I guess it's due to the isolation the city has from the rest of Russia). And every summer I used to miss Magadan terribly. The flights back home were ones of the happiest moments of my life! Every time we landed in Magadan, my eyes were full of tears...And I remember myself saying: "I just want to come back and cover that land in kisses!" I was missing the land! I missed friends and school, and my exciting life there, for sure. But most of all I was always terribly missing that land!!!

And even now, when almost all of my friends have left the city and nothing is the same anymore, I am overwhelmed by happiness because I am gonna step on that land...If you have ever felt this way, you will understand me. If not, I really wish you to feel it one day.

It is the beauty, it is the magic, it is the incredible energy Magadan has that works like a magnet for people's hearts. You may leave Magadan, but your heart will always be there. Like, without any exaggeration!

Have you ever though of writing a song about your city? People in Magadan do it yearly, if not monthly. Like, sooooo many songs!!!

A couple of years ago I tried searching for songs with the name 'Magadan' in vkontakte.ru (Russian social network). I found around 2500 results. It means that 2500 times people added a song that has Magadan in its title to their playlist (2-3 years ago). Then I decided to check the same for our capital, Moscow. I got about 5000 results.... Moscow has more than 10 mln people, Magadan has 100 thousands... and a much lower percentage of them use Internet than people in Moscow. And still we got half of Moscow results...and this, not including the songs about Magadan which don't have the word Magadan as a title (and there are many).

Let me finish my post here...later I will give some other interesting facts about Magadan.

You can enjoy some pictures below: