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LITERARY CAFE
| ART GALLERY
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PLACES
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The black velvet veil of the night exscinded the St. John Hospital off the day fuss, full of pilgrims' babbling, silverware clanking and moaning of the wounded. The flickering flame of an oil lamp cast dim light onto the faces of two companions, still keeping stone vaultings and walls of the wide chamber in utter darkness. Their raiments, red woolen robes, featuring very tight sleeves symbolizing social engagement abdication, and white linen octagonal crosses on the chest — sings of chastity — indicated that their wearers belonged to the Knights Hospitallers of the St.John Order of Jerusalem.
 Alamut castle, the residence of Hasan-i Sabbah, was once a mountain fortress located in the central Alborz Mountains south of the Caspian Sea close to Gazor Khan near Qazvin Province, about 100 km from present-day Tehran in Iran. Only ruins remain of this fortress today.
Nevsky Prospekt is the main street in the city of St Petersburg.
This morning turtle-like traffic of the Nevskiy prospect definitely provided the most favorable conditions for philosophic wonderings. When Alexander’s old Mercedes came to a halt in the dead jam of cars right in front of a shining ‘Baskin Robbins’ outdoor sign, it seemed to him, that the center of Petersburg looked somewhat unreal, almost like virtual. It looked like a black-and-white photo that had been heavily treated in the Photoshop. And now pretentious a way too much artificial images kept flashing on cars’ windows, as if those were computer screens. Nobody remembered about the real life anymore, everyone was just childishly happy with newly painted pictures.
The State Hermitage is a museum of art and culture situated in Saint Petersburg, Russia.
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Saint Petersburg. Inzhenerniy castle. The monument of emperor Pavel the First.
...  Spetskhran (an abbreviation for "Special Storage Section") were limited access collections and archival reserves in libraries and archives of the Soviet Union, as part of the system of censorship in the Soviet Union.
Till 1917 the Order’s archive, including the minutes of the Order’s Secret Council, had been kept in Zimniy palace; and as for the relics — they had been kept in Ivanopavlovskiy cathedral. In 1917 the relics were taken to Estonia and later to Denmark. The minutes, along with other documents from the Order’s archive, had been kept in Zimniy palace, which was converted into Hermitage, right up to 1923…In fact, in 1983 the minutes were in the rare manuscripts department of KGB’s Special Storage in the Lenin’s library building. 
Literary Cafe. Saint-Petersburg. The corner of Nevsky Prospect and the Moika.
It is authentically known that it was the last cafe called in by the great Russian poet Alexander Pushkin just before his fatal duel in the evening of January 27, 1837. Many famous Russian writers such as Dostoyevsky, Chernyshevsky and others, composed here plots of their works sipping coffee and eating cakes. Every day you can enjoy live classic music and Russian romances in the evening.
 Palazzo Malta, is the more important of the two headquarters of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta, a religious order of the Roman Catholic Church. It is located in Via dei Condotti 68 in Rome, Italy.
Two people met in a room, situated in the far part of the Malthusian Order residence on via Condotti, 68. Not only did this room differ from other residence premises in its view from the window: instead of Roman hills panorama one could see only a part of a high stone wall. Instead of the strict and slightly pompous luxury, which is so typical for Rome; this room was furnished in a modest office style: chrome-plated tubes furniture, a computer, fax and telex. The steel door with a combination lock featured no nameboard. These two men, the Keeper and the Controller, were no less functional. Their nominal positions didn’t match the work they were doing; and most of the Order’s members had no idea of their existence. |