weekend in a small town

 We went to Dmitrov for the Pancake week a few weeks ago. Actually, we planned a trip to Kolomna, a lovely town in the opposite direction, but Dmitrov was much closer. It was quite a "blind date", because we knew nothing about the town - but we weren't disappointed. 
 

Inside the Dmitrov Kremlin we saw a crowd of around 50 guys, in self-made armour. They looked as though they had just robbed a local history museum. We thought that they were just showing off their stuff...
  
...when they started fighting in earnest. I just saw pikes and swords in the air (no arrows this time, lucky us!) - and people kept falling on the ground. As we later found, one guy got a broken spine, one lost a finger and others did away with minor cuts. Nobody got excited about it - as though things like that happened there every day.
  
 
When a person falls on the ground, he is considered dead and takes no more beating. An acquaintance of mine said he took part in these fights - and their group had a reputation of mad warriors. Their favourite tac was to use shields as a spring-board and jump onto their opponents. I wonder, what would happen if one of the pikemen raised his pike and hit a jumper in the balls?
Okay. Outside the Kremlin music was playing and people were dancing.

  
And guess what the orchestra on stage were playing? Michael Jackson, of course, no kidding!
 
And because it's a small town, everything died out around 7 p.m. People just packed up, vodka stalls got closed, and the streets were empty. Looks like a different world, and it's just a 40 mins drive from Moscow.