School For Descendants Of Russian Nobility Opens In Moscow
Agence France Presse
A retro school of good manners for the descendants of the former Russian nobility is functioning in Moscow, former capital of the world proletariat.
The "Classic School" teaches the basics of etiquette, such as how to answer the telephone, how to introduce oneself, how to behave at a reception or at a picnic, or which utensils to use to eat the various courses at a dinner party and how to eat a banana.
The school's headmistress, Margarita Shemakhina, herself descended from the nobility, says her establishment wants to help Russia to break out of its "moral and spiritual backwater."
In the small classrooms decorated with ikons and portraits of the last tsar, Nicholas II, 30 children aged between five and 11 come every day to study. They are subject to the universal curriculum imposed throughout the Russian Federation, but they are also taught subjects that were discarded during the Soviet era -- religion, good manners and choreography.
"Russia needs a spiritual elite, that is the role of the nobility. Our generation was not given the chance of religious or moral instruction at school. When we found out this school was opening, we immediately enrollled our children," said a couple of parents who had arrived to collect their children after class. "They will be the generation of the future."
The Classic School has been installed in the building of the Assembly of the Russian Nobility (ARN) and its charter says its aim is to contribute to the "rebirth of lofty values, which were lost against our will."
The children receive instruction in the Russian Orthodox religion, read the Bible and start each day with a prayer in front of the classroom ikon.
Shemakhina said that as far as etiquette was concerned, the parents did not even know the basic rules. "Sometimes, the children teach their parents the elementary rules that were second nature to their forebears.
The teachers use textbooks of the old regime to teach history. "Modern textbooks tell lies. It is better to have textbooks which were studied by Pushkin, or the history of the Romanov dynasty," said Shemakhina.
The Classic School has been registered by the Russian education ministry, but receives no subsidy from the state.
Most schools in Russia are free, but families whose children attend the Classic School must pay 1,000 rubles (about 40 dollars) a month for the privilege.
"Even so, it is difficult to make ends meet at the end of the month," said Shemakhina. "We are looking for sponsors from abroad. In Russia, money is considered to be immoral," she said.
The ARN is hoping to enlarge the school to prepare its students for university more quickly.
The Russian nobility was decimated during the 1917 revolution and many of its members
emigrated. But the ARN says it has counted nearly 10,000 descendants of the nobility
still in Russia.
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