I visited Viborg at the beginning of December in Russia. Once that town belonged to Finland. Actually Viborg was established by Sweden because they built the castle in 1293. It belonged to Sweden for over 400 years. Peter the Great conquered the town in 1710. The Russian time started. The rest of the country (the eastern part of Sweden) was conquered about 100 years later.
Soon Viborg and the other eastern areas were united as a Finnish area which had the autonomy in Russia. Finland as a nation was created. People spoke Finnish or Swedish. So it was in Viborg. After the revolution in Russia Finland declared the independence in 1917. There was no longer Russia as a neighbor but the Soviet Union. Viborg was the growing town and it was the second biggest town in Finland when the winter war started (the second world war) with the population of almost 200 000. After the war it was lost to the Soviet Union as some other areas. About 220 000 people escaped to the other areas in Finland. My mother was one of them. She was about 20 years and had studied art at the Viborg art school.
It was lovely to walk at the streets that my mother had walked. I visited the art museum and school. Nowadays the town is populated by Russians but its roots are Swedish and Finnish.
