January 28, 2016

Best Destinations of 2015


Best Destinations of 2015
Lake Bled, Slovenia taken by Jillian Schneeman

MIR Corporation – the name means "peace" and "world" in Russian – is an award-winning tour company that has been specializing in creative, culturally immersive small group, custom and private journeys along the Silk Route, the Trans-Siberian Railway, to Russia and beyond, since 1986. This article originally appeared on their blog

Mir shared their nine best Instagram photos from their fascinating destinations. We wanted to share them with you.

The “2015bestnine” includes these photos taken in Croatia, Slovenia, Turkey, LatviaChina, Kyrgyzstan and Russia:

  1. Krka waterfalls in Croatia
  2. Dubrovnik rooftops in Croatia 
  3. Lake Bled in Slovenia
  4. A cloudy day in Istanbul, Turkey 
  5. Lake Bled in Slovenia (another view)
  6. Sunrise in Riga, Latvia
  7. The Forbidden City in Beijing, China
  8. Yurt builder in Kyrgyzstan
  9. Winter wonderland in Suzdal, Russia

For a daily dose of more photos, follow Mir at mir_corporation. Be sure to like and share their photos via your smartphone, and also like Mir on Facebook, to check out what’s new and noteworthy in their fantastic destinations.

The cream of the Instagram crop.<br> Photographers Top Row: Martin Klimenta, Peter Guttman<br> Second Row: Jered Gorman, Jillian Schneeman, Peter Guttman<br> Third Row: Jake Smith, Vlad Ushakov, Jonathan Irish The cream of the Instagram crop.
Photographers – First Row: Martin Klimenta, Peter Guttman
Second Row: Jered Gorman, Jillian Schneeman, Peter Guttman
Third Row: Jake Smith, Vlad Ushakov, Jonathan Irish

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Some of Our Books

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Dostoyevsky Bilingual

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Bilingual series of short, lesser known, but highly significant works that show the traditional view of Dostoyevsky as a dour, intense, philosophical writer to be unnecessarily one-sided. 
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White Magic

White Magic

The thirteen tales in this volume – all written by Russian émigrés, writers who fled their native country in the early twentieth century – contain a fair dose of magic and mysticism, of terror and the supernatural. There are Petersburg revenants, grief-stricken avengers, Lithuanian vampires, flying skeletons, murders and duels, and even a ghostly Edgar Allen Poe.
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Woe From Wit (bilingual)

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Tolstoy Bilingual

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The Frogs Who Begged for a Tsar (bilingual)

The fables of Ivan Krylov are rich fonts of Russian cultural wisdom and experience – reading and understanding them is vital to grasping the Russian worldview. This new edition of 62 of Krylov’s tales presents them side-by-side in English and Russian. The wonderfully lyrical translations by Lydia Razran Stone are accompanied by original, whimsical color illustrations by Katya Korobkina.
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The Latchkey Murders

Senior Lieutenant Pavel Matyushkin is back on the case in this prequel to the popular mystery Murder at the Dacha, in which a serial killer is on the loose in Khrushchev’s Moscow...

The Moscow Eccentric
December 01, 2016

The Moscow Eccentric

Advance reviewers are calling this new translation "a coup" and "a remarkable achievement." This rediscovered gem of a novel by one of Russia's finest writers explores some of the thorniest issues of the early twentieth century.

At the Circus
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At the Circus

This wonderful novella by Alexander Kuprin tells the story of the wrestler Arbuzov and his battle against a renowned American wrestler. Rich in detail and characterization, At the Circus brims with excitement and life. You can smell the sawdust in the big top, see the vivid and colorful characters, sense the tension build as Arbuzov readies to face off against the American.

Bears in the Caviar
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Bears in the Caviar

Bears in the Caviar is a hilarious and insightful memoir by a diplomat who was “present at the creation” of US-Soviet relations. Charles Thayer headed off to Russia in 1933, calculating that if he could just learn Russian and be on the spot when the US and USSR established relations, he could make himself indispensable and start a career in the foreign service. Remarkably, he pulled it of.

Frogs Who Begged...
November 01, 2010

Frogs Who Begged...

The fables of Ivan Krylov are rich fonts of Russian cultural wisdom and experience – reading and understanding them is vital to grasping the Russian worldview. This new edition of 62 of Krylov’s tales presents them side-by-side in English and Russian. The wonderfully lyrical translations by Lydia Razran Stone are accompanied by original, whimsical color illustrations by Katya Korobkina.

White Magic
June 01, 2021

White Magic

The thirteen tales in this volume – all written by Russian émigrés, writers who fled their native country in the early twentieth century – contain a fair dose of magic and mysticism, of terror and the supernatural. There are Petersburg revenants, grief-stricken avengers, Lithuanian vampires, flying skeletons, murders and duels, and even a ghostly Edgar Allen Poe.

Survival Russian
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Survival Russian

Survival Russian is an intensely practical guide to conversational, colloquial and culture-rich Russian. It uses humor, current events and thematically-driven essays to deepen readers’ understanding of Russian language and culture. This enlarged Second Edition of Survival Russian includes over 90 essays and illuminates over 2000 invaluable Russian phrases and words.

Driving Down Russia's Spine
June 01, 2016

Driving Down Russia's Spine

The story of the epic Spine of Russia trip, intertwining fascinating subject profiles with digressions into historical and cultural themes relevant to understanding modern Russia. 

Murder and the Muse
December 12, 2016

Murder and the Muse

KGB Chief Andropov has tapped Matyushkin to solve a brazen jewel heist from Picasso’s wife at the posh Metropole Hotel. But when the case bleeds over into murder, machinations, and international intrigue, not everyone is eager to see where the clues might lead.

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