Punk bar

Currently, there is the "Arbat" shopping center here — the pinnacle of conformism and modern pop culture. But in the early 2000s, "Arbat" was an unfinished construction site. It was surrounded by a concrete fence. There was a hole in the fence. Near the fence, Penza's nonconformists usually hung out, mostly punks. Some played guitar for passersby, others just sat nearby. Everyone pooled money together and ran to Liberson Street to buy moonshine (ironically, the "Samko" brewery is located on the same street). Drinking openly on the city’s main street was already forbidden in the 2000s; you could be taken to the police, so the punks would dive through the hole and drink alcohol behind the fence. This place earned the nickname "punk bar."

Interestingly, just a block above, on the site of what is now another shopping center — "Vysshaya Liga" ("Major League") — representatives of another counterculture hung out: rappers.