Secondhand Time: The Last of the Soviets (76 page)

“…He was locked up when he was eighteen…This was still during Soviet times, he only ever knew Soviet life. Soviet people. Socialism. He has no idea what the country he’s living in is actually like. If he gets out, how is he going to deal with our new way of life? How will it hit him—he has no profession, his relatives have all turned their backs on him. And he’s an angry guy. One time in jail, he got in a fight with one of his fellow inmates and nearly ripped the guy’s throat out. Lena knows that she’d have to take him somewhere far away from people. She dreams of him becoming a logger. Living in the forest. As she puts it, among the trees and wordless beasts…”

“…More than once, she’s told me, ‘His eyes got so cold, it was like they were empty. One day, he’s going to kill me. I know what his eyes will be like when he’s killing me.’ And yet she’s drawn to him, that abyss sucks her in. Why? Haven’t I observed something similar in myself? The darkness pulls you in…”

“…The last time we saw each other, she said, ‘I don’t want to live! I can’t take it anymore!’ It seemed like she was in a coma, neither dead nor alive…”

—

We decided to go see Lena together. But suddenly, she’d disappeared. She didn’t respond to anything. There were rumors that she’d moved to a remote skete
^*5
and was living among drug addicts and people with AIDS…Many of those who live there take vows of silence.

*1
Nikolai Fedorov (1828–1906) was a thinker and philosopher nicknamed “the Russian Socrates.” He was the founder of Russian cosmism, which combined elements of the Eastern and Western philosophic traditions, and was also influenced by Russian Orthodoxy.

*2
Ephesians 5:33.

*3
A small island in Lake Novozero, in the region of Vologda.

*4
A quotation from Alexander Pushkin’s
Boris Godunov,
referring to the protagonist’s lingering guilt after ordering the murder of his young rivals to the throne.

*5
A Russian Orthodox hermit community.

A CHRONICLE OF EVENTS

On December 19, there was a presidential election in Belarus. No one was expecting a fair election, everyone knew the results ahead of time: President Lukashenko, who had run the country for the past sixteen years, would win again. They laugh at him in the global press, call him the potato dictator, but the reality is that he’s taken his own people hostage. Europe’s last dictator…He doesn’t hide his sympathies for Hitler, who wasn’t taken seriously himself for a long time; people called him “the little corporal” or “the Bohemian corporal.”

That evening, tens of thousands of people went out onto October Square, the main square in Minsk, to protest the fraudulent election. Demonstrators demanded the annulment of the announced results, and that new elections be held without Lukashenko as a candidate. This peaceful protest was brutally suppressed by special operations forces and riot police. The forests surrounding the capital were filled with troops prepared for battle…

A total of seven hundred demonstrators were arrested—including seven former presidential candidates who technically still had the right to immunity…

Ever since the election, the Belarusian secret police have been working around the clock. Political repressions have swept the nation: arrests, interrogations, searches. They come to people’s apartments, the editorial offices of opposition news outlets, human rights organizations; they confiscate computers and other office equipment. Many of the people being held at the jail on Okrestino Street or sitting in solitary KGB cells are facing four to fifteen years in prison for “organizing mass disorder” or “attempting to overthrow the government,” which is what today’s Belarusian government calls participating in a peaceful demonstration. Fearing persecution and the growing strength of the dictatorship, hundreds of people are fleeing the country…

From newspaper articles published between December 2010 and March 2011

A CHRONICLE OF FEELINGS

“We went for fun, it wasn’t serious.”

I’m not going to tell you my last name. I’m using my grandmother’s…I’m afraid, of course…Everyone expects to see heroes, but I’m no hero. I was never prepared to become one. In prison, all I thought about was my mother, about how she has a bad heart. What’s going to happen to her? Even if we win and they write about it in the history books, what about the tears of our loved ones? Their suffering? An idea is an incredibly powerful thing—it’s terrifying because its power is not material, you can’t measure it. There’s no measurement…It’s of a different kind of essence…It’s capable of making something more important to you than your own mother. Forcing you to choose. But you’re not ready…I now know what it means to walk into your room after the KGB has gone through your things, your books…After they’ve read your diary…[
She is silent.
] I was on my way to meet you when my mother called. I told her that I was meeting with a famous writer, and she broke down in tears. “Don’t say anything. Don’t tell any stories.” Only strangers support me—my relatives, the people closest to me, do not. But they do love me…

Before the protest…we were hanging out at the dormitory debating. About life in general and also the topic of the day: Who’s going to the protest and who isn’t. You want me to recall what we talked about, right? It went something like this…

“…Are you going to go?”

“…No. They’ll kick me out of university and force me to join the army. Have me running around with a machine gun.”

“…If I get kicked out, my father will make me get married immediately.”

“…Enough talk, it’s time to do something. If everyone is too afraid…”

“…You want me to turn into Che Guevara?” (Those were the words of my ex-boyfriend. More about him later.)

“…It’s a breath of freedom…”

“…I’m going because I’m sick of living under a dictatorship. They consider us mindless beasts.”

“…I for one am no hero. I want to finish school, read books.”

“…You know what they say about
sovoks:
they’re as mean as dogs and silent as fish.”

“…I’m the little man, I have no power over anything. I never vote.”

“…Well, I’m a revolutionary…I have to go…Revolution is cool!”

“…So what are your revolutionary ideals? You think that the bright new future is capitalism? Glory to the Latin American revolution!”

“…When I was sixteen, I was really hard on my parents, they were always afraid of something because of my father’s career. I thought they were dumb. We knew what’s up. We’ll be on the streets! We’ll tell them what we really think! Now I’m just like them, a conformist. A real conformist. According to Darwin’s theory, it’s not the strongest who survive, but those who are the best adapted to their environment. Average people are the ones who survive and carry on the human race.”

“…Going means being a fool, and not going is even worse.”

“…Who told you sheep that revolution means progress? I’m for evolution.”

“…Whites, Reds…I don’t give a shit about any of it!”

“…I’m a revolutionary…”

“…It’s hopeless! The war machines will show up full of boys in uniform, you’ll get hit over the head with a club, and that’s how the story ends. The authorities need to maintain their iron grip.”

“…Go fuck yourself, Comrade Mauser.
^*1
I never promised anyone I’d be a revolutionary. I want to graduate from university and start my business.”

“…Mind blown!”

“…Fear is an illness…”

—

We went for fun, it wasn’t serious. We were laughing, singing. All of us were really into each other that day, everyone was so excited. Some people walked with posters, others with guitars. Our other friends would call us and tell us what they were saying online, keeping us in the loop…That’s how we learned that the courtyards downtown were filled with military vehicles, soldiers, and police. That troops were surrounding the city…We believed it, but at the same time, we didn’t. Our mood changed from moment to moment, but there was no fear. Fear had completely evaporated. First of all, look at how many people came—there were tens of thousands! All kinds of people. There had never been so many of us before. I can’t remember ever seeing that many people…And second of all, we were at home. This was our city. Our country. Our rights are clearly laid out in the constitution: freedom of assembly, protests, demonstrations, rallies…freedom of speech…There are laws! We’re the first generation that’s never been scared. Never been flogged. Never been shot at. So what if they put us in jail for fifteen days? That’s nothing! Something to write about in your blog. We can’t let the authorities believe we’re just a flock of sheep that blindly follows the shepherd! That we have TVs for brains. Just in case, I had a mug with me, because I’d heard that in jail there’s only one mug for every ten people. I’d also brought an extra warm sweater and two apples. Walking along, we took lots of pictures, we wanted to remember that day. We were wearing Christmas masks and had these funny light-up bunny ears…Toys made in China. Christmas was right around the corner, it was snowing…What a beautiful night! I didn’t see a single drunk person. If anyone spotted a can of beer, it was immediately taken away and poured out. We noticed this guy on the roof of a building: “Check it out, a sniper! A sniper!” That really got us going. We waved to him: “Come down! Jump!” It was so cool. Before, I’d been apathetic about politics, I never thought that there could be feelings like this and that I could experience them. The only thing that comes close is music. Music is everything, it’s irreplaceable. But this was incredible. There was a woman walking next to me—why didn’t I ask her last name? You could have written about her. I was busy with other things—having fun, it was all so new to me. This woman was marching with her son who looked to be about twelve. A school kid. A police colonel noticed her and started yelling at her through his megaphone, practically swearing, calling her a bad mother. Saying she’s crazy. And everyone started applauding her and her son. It happened spontaneously, no one planned it. That’s so important to me…so important to know about…because we’re always embarrassed. The Ukrainians had the Orange Revolution, the Georgians had the Rose Revolution. But people laugh at us, calling Minsk a communist capital, the last dictatorship in Europe. Now I can at least be proud of the fact that we went out there. We hadn’t been too afraid. That’s what’s most important…the most important thing…

We stood there, us and them. Face to face. One kind of people pitted against the other. It was a strange sight…One side had posters and portraits, and the other side was in full military regalia, with shields and clubs. These burly guys! Broad-shouldered hunks! Were they really about to start beating us? Beating me? They were my age, my peers, my admirers. Literally! There were boys I knew from my village among them, of course they were there. A lot of people from our village who went to Minsk ended up in the police, Kolka Latushka, Alik Kaznacheyev…regular guys. No different from us, except that they were in uniform. Were they really going to advance on us? It was hard to believe, impossible…We laughed and teased them. Tried to provoke them: “Are you boys really about to fight the people?” As the snow kept falling and falling. Then suddenly, it was kind of like a parade…There was an order: “Disperse the crowd! Hold ranks!” My mind couldn’t adjust to the reality, not right away…It seemed impossible…“Disperse the crowd…” For a few moments, everything went totally silent. And then, the pounding shields…the rhythmic banging of the shields…They moved on us…advancing in ranks, banging their clubs against their shields like hunters chasing a wild animal. Their prey. They kept coming, and coming, and coming. I’ve never seen that many soldiers in my whole life, only on TV. Later, the boys in my village told me that they teach them that “the worst that can happen is if you start seeing the demonstrators as human beings.” They train them like dogs. [
She is silent.
] Screaming, sobbing…People crying, “They’re beating me! They’re beating me!” I saw them beat people. And I must say it looked like they were enjoying it. Like they were doing it with pleasure. Great pleasure. I will always remember this: They took great pleasure in beating people…Like it was just another training exercise…A girl squealed, “What do you think you’re doing, you animal!” She had this really high voice. It broke off. I was so terrified, I had to close my eyes for a moment. In my white coat and white hat, I stood rooted to the spot. All in white.

“Face down in the snow, bitch!”

A police van is an amazing machine. That was the first time I’d ever seen one. It’s this special vehicle for transporting the arrested. It’s all covered in steel. “Face down in the snow, bitch! One move and I’ll kill you!” I lay there on the asphalt…I wasn’t alone, all of my friends were down there with me…My mind went blank…no thoughts…The only real sensation was the cold. Kicking and prodding us with their clubs, they pulled us to our feet and shoved us into the police van. The guys got the worst of it, they’d go for their crotches: “Get his balls, get his balls! Hit him in the mouth!” “Break his bones!” “Beat the shit out of them!” They beat us, philosophizing along the way: “Fuck your revolution!” “How many dollars did you sell out your Motherland for, you piece of shit?” According to those in the know, a police van is two by five meters, intended for twenty people maximum. But they crammed more than fifty of us into a single vehicle. Asthmatics and anyone with a heart condition, hold on tight! “No looking out the window! Heads down!” Profanities, obscenities…Because of us “half-baked dipshits” that “sold out to the Yankees,” they missed the football match that day. They’d kept them locked in covered trucks all day. Under tarps. They’d had to piss in plastic bags and condoms. When they were finally released, they came out hungry and full of rage. Maybe deep down they weren’t such bad people, but they did the work of executioners. Really, they looked like normal guys. Minor cogs in a big machine. They’re not the ones who decide whether or not to beat us, they just do the beating…First they beat us and then they think about what they’ve done, or maybe they don’t. [
She is silent.
] We drove around for a really long time, going forward then turning around and going back. Where were they taking us? We were completely in the dark. When they opened the doors and we asked, “Where are you taking us?” they said, “Kuropaty.” A mass grave for the victims of Stalin’s repressions. Just a little bit of sadistic humor. They drove us around the city for a long time because the jails were all chock full. We ended up spending the night in the police van. It was twenty degrees below zero and there we were, locked in a metal box. [
She is silent.
] I should hate them. But I don’t want to hate anyone. I’m not ready for that.