Lenin lives (and lives… and lives…) in the Antarctic

I’ve seen a lot of Lenin’s over the course of my travels through the former USSR, from the Lenin my mom remembers standing in downtown Vilnius (now residing in Grutas Park open-air monument and sculpture museum) to the gigantic striding Lenin behind the National Museum in Bishkek Kyrgyzstan. He was moved from in front of the museum to make room for Independence Square. Now he stands overlooking the American University, making his usual grand gesture of benevolence.

However, by far the strangest place he’s turned up is in Antarctica where a plastic bust of the man himself was discovered by explorers in 2007. He stands proudly at the site of an old Soviet base at the South Pole of Inaccessibility. Made from plastic, the Lenin has stood there since 1958 and is, by all reports, in pretty good shape. The man is simply eternal.

Anyways, as soon as the South Pole of Inaccessibility Tourism Association and BIA get their act together I’m positive he’ll be fenced in and farmed out as a prime tourist attraction.

Tags: abandoned, communism, kitsch, Lenin, relic, Soviet, Soviet history, tourism, USSR