Sunbathing in Siberia (12 page)

Unfortunately, the riots gave the impression that the British had become so infected by greed they would resolve to become criminals in order to get the latest flat screen TV or mobile phone. On the surface it did indeed look that way, and I was embarrassed for Britain. What made it worse was the view that the people looting were the same people who lived on benefits, and were used to getting things for free. Almost everyone I spoke to in Krasnoyarsk at that time seemed to think that the UK had become infected by greed, and it was very hard for me to get them to look at the situation from a different perspective. What they did not know was how those people looting lived in a world where there were few job opportunities, where they could be dependent on benefits for a long time when they did not want to be, all the while being demonised for the simple fact that they had nothing to lose.

I explained that people receiving benefits legally were actually normal everyday folk, and that the welfare state was a very good thing. When I was growing up my mum had two jobs and my dad always worked, however as my parents didn't make enough money for a bigger house they'd had to sleep on the living room floor for twenty years. And though they worked full time, they had still needed to claim child benefit; which I can say without exaggeration, was a lifesaver. Even then my mother had to miss meals, because she couldn't afford to feed her children
and
herself. At the age of twelve, I went to study at Glan Ely High School. At the time it had the world's worst reputation; apparently everyone who left there either became a dole-ite or ended up in prison. As I had done reasonably well in Junior School I was expected to leave High School with decent grades and leave all the other students behind. What happened was the opposite. Every person who I knocked about with during those years went on to do well, that is until the financial meltdown of 2007, yet Ely is often spoken of as the part of Cardiff where scroungers live. Perhaps there are a couple of people there who cheat the system, but when you listen to the news you'd think half the population were greedy benefits cheats. I find it difficult to feel hostility to people who cheat the system at the bottom of the food chain anyway, because I've seen first-hand what goes on at the top.

I actually worked in a British bank for five years and was witness to serious banking malpractice. I saw how customers who complained were treated better and given compensation if they had a savings account; how people with small incomes were recklessly loaned huge mortgages that they could barely afford; in my view the system that was supposed to prevent over-lending was actually designed to allow people into amounting huge debts that some would obviously default on. All this, and yet the man who ran the bank was at the same time the deputy chairman of the Financial Services Authority. The procedure for complaining about malpractice was that you were supposed to relay any grievances to your boss, who would then speak to their boss and so on. But how can you discuss such problems when the very man at the top of the company is also at the top of the investigating organisation? That's why the riots happened. Because millionaires who steal millions get a slap on the wrist while poor folk go to prison for much less. The riots
were
caused by greed, but greed at the top of the food chain, not the bottom as it was widely depicted. This of course was news to Nastya who until that time had viewed the UK as a place much less corrupt than Russia.

Aeroflot Flight SU781. December 19
th
2011.
Moscow – Krasnoyarsk

When I had arrived back in the UK in August, after taking the National Express to Cardiff, I found myself in Wood Street just after 1 a.m. on a Wednesday night. I thought the streets would be quiet, but they weren't. Cardiff was teaming with drunks. There were people smashing bottles, fighting, spitting, and the obligatory drunken women asleep by the side of the road. It was ironic that, coming from the former USSR, I hadn't felt any fear for a whole month until I returned to my home city. I had arranged to stay at my friend Peter's for the night because he lives on the Taff Embankment. With my laptop bag slung over my shoulders, I dragged my heavy suitcase across the Wood Street Bridge. It was a huge comedown after such a lovely day in Moscow.

Arriving at Peter's house, I was dismayed to find he was asleep and hadn't left the key under the flowerpot as arranged. I banged the door for 30 minutes, loud enough to wake him, but quiet enough not to wake the whole street. He didn't wake up. After a few panicked phone calls I was rescued by my friend Torben, who lives close to the little Tesco further up Lansdowne Road. Not only did he get up to make a spare bed up for me, but he also made me breakfast and coffee. I woke the next day at 4 p.m. Good old Torben had gone to work, leaving me to sleep off my travel weariness. Before I left, I made sure to leave a bar of Soviet chocolate in his living room as a thank you. A small price to pay for such reliable friendship.

Exactly like the previous time I returned to Britain, I was sad, lonely, and desperately clawing at whatever jobs I could find. By day I was either labouring, privately editing homework of literary students at Glamorgan University, doing poetry readings whenever they were offered, or working as a stage assistant in Chapter Arts Centre. By night I was either at my dad's house or my mum's but then Nastya would still phone me every day which, if I'm honest, made things worse. The separation was only bearable if I worked long hours and didn't think of my situation.

By November, we still had no plan for the future. There seemed nothing for it but to return to Krasnoyarsk. I applied for a Russian tourist visa in early November, the forty-five day rule still applied and so I couldn't book my flights until mid to late November. Fortunately I had worked so much since August that I had plenty of money. I had never been to Russia in the winter. It wasn't going to be like spring where I got away with wearing long socks, jeans and a jumper, and there was definitely no need to pack the shorts I had bought in summer. This time I needed serious gear. I spent the last week of November shopping online for arctic gloves, an elasticated neck wrap, thermals and plenty of cheap long-sleeved t-shirts. Proper winter jackets cost a fortune in the UK, and I didn't know for sure if they would be good enough for -30 °C. After much indecision I ended up not buying one.

This was going to be our first European Christmas together, so I had to busy myself with buying gifts. On my previous trip I had taken a variety of chocolates with me, including every kind of chocolate bar made by Cadbury, and one or two Terry's Chocolate Oranges. Nastya had fallen in love with the Chocolate Oranges, and because she hadn't had Wispa or Crunchie bars since Soviet times, she had begged me to bring more. When I left the UK, my suitcase was 19 kilos (1 kilo off my limit): 12 kilos of clothes; 7 kilos chocolate. It felt strange to be in possession of so many Chocolate Oranges. When I was a kid, my dad had used the salad container in the fridge as his own personal storage space for all things forbidden to children. Being a curious little boy, I had a peek in there from time to time. It was always filled with Chocolate Oranges. Because of this I associated them with my dad and avoided them when I got older, because they were ‘for adults'. It had been drummed into me from a very young age that my parents liked to have their own sweet things, which were somehow superior to the chocolates we ate as kids. With a bag full of forbidden adult candy I felt like I was stealing from my father in some way, and exporting to Russia something that was rightfully his.

The journey couldn't have gone smoother. I arrived at Heathrow on time, even though I had stayed up getting blotto with Torben the night before. In the past I had been able to stay at Peter's house for a few hours, before waking up and walking for a few short minutes to Wood Street where the buses left from. This wasn't possible any more as Peter had some work issues and couldn't afford to be disturbed or receive guests. I needed a new accomplice. Someone who lived near the station and who wouldn't mind me crashing at their place from 10 p.m. to 4 a.m. I didn't have to wait long before I was rescued once again by Torben, who not only didn't mind helping me but seemed to enjoy it. The only major difference was that when I stayed at Torben's, he insisted on us getting totally rat-arsed while singing songs badly until I had to leave.

From Heathrow I flew to Moscow, waited until late evening, caught my connecting flight, and was passing over the Ural Mountains just as the sun was coming up. The morning began with sun beams striking the tops of the Urals while eating chicken, roast potatoes and gravy with the obligatory small slice of bread. It was one of life's perfect moments. Though Siberia is famous for being one of the coldest places on Earth, it was hard for me to conceive the reality of what I was heading for, having only experienced Russia in spring and summer. I couldn't wait to see Nastya again, and I was excited to see how happy my bag of oranges would make her; however I wasn't really looking forward to being holed up in the apartment for another month. In summer we had had the option of sleeping at the dacha, which broke up the monotony of being stuck in the apartment so long.

Summer at the Dacha

In August the dacha had been a totally different place to what I had glimpsed at Easter. For a start, there was a lot more greenery, and in place of the last snowfalls of spring there were lots of flowers, butterflies and various foodstuffs growing in the garden. Like many dacha owners, Nastya's parents prefer to grow their own vegetables when they've got the chance. When Boris isn't out in the taiga, the dacha is his favourite place in the entire world. As well as vegetables and fruits, he also spends a lot of time cultivating patches of herbs from which he makes energy drinks and medicines. He seemed to have a great knowledge of the properties of each plant. Some of which he taught himself, but many things would have been handed down from his parents.

Food preparation is the same at the dacha but as there is a lack of running water, it's not so easy to wash the dishes well. Sometimes I watched in horror as chopping boards used to cut meat were simply rinsed with a bit of cold water and put away again. I often got a bad stomach. When I was ill, Boris gave me little vials of medicine to drink; but if I was really ill he would give me some bark to chew on from some tree at the end of the garden. I can't say whether I was actually cured by this or if I was simply distracted by the acrid taste in my mouth.

When Nataliya Petrovna wasn't chopping meats or watering the crops in the garden, she spent a lot of time pickling things in jars. Siberians are very fond of the mushrooms that grow wild and locally but much prefer them pickled, as they do their cabbage. The balcony at the apartment was often full of jars of pickled things that would then be saved for winter. I often felt, as I watched Nataliya Petrovna pick through buckets of mushrooms and drop them into their relative jars, that I was alive inside Gogol's story of Afanasy Ivanovich and Pulkheria Ivanovna. Had Nataliya Petrovna had a cat, and had it gone missing, I am sure she would have interpreted this as some sort of mystic sign like the one Pulkheria Ivanovna did in Gogol's story. When they were bickering, as they often did, they also reminded me of Urgl and Engywook from
The Neverending Story
,
with Boris as Engywook looking up from his mixed herbs on the table, with eyes magnified through his goggles, exclaiming he had invented some kind of new fantastical remedy.

Many times during that period, Nataliya Petrovna would ask me to fetch her something or other from the garden so we could have it for supper. It was strange for me, having to take a knife and cut free a few tomatoes, or dig up a few potatoes, because I had come from a world where everything we ate was bought in a supermarket. When I wanted to drink tea, Nastya would say ‘Well go to the garden and get some then'. This sometimes left me confused. Although I understood what I needed to do, the instruction, though logical, was so alien to me that I became rooted to the spot.

With no plumbing at the dacha, more primitive methods are employed to wash, and clean teeth. At the end of each day, the bucket of slops from under the sink would be full of water, vegetable peelings, and soap bubbles. This then has to be taken to the end of the garden, and poured into a home-made trough full of soil and worms. As I wasn't much use when it came to growing things it became my responsibility to make sure this was done.

Visiting the toilet is also something that needs to be done outside. Most dachas have a small outhouse at the end of the garden – a wooden seat, on a wooden plinth, with basic shelter. All the offerings to nature fall through the hole in the seat, into a specially dug chamber in the ground. This pit of poops can be a bit pongy in the summer and attracts more than a few flies, which in turn attract spiders. I tried avoiding this place at first, which was of course impossible.

To get water, someone has either to fill up bottles at the apartment and drive them to the dacha, or go to the fresh water generator near the local lake. Though our dacha had a large square tank filled with lake water, we obviously couldn't drink it. Without many responsibilities, I often volunteered to fetch the water from the generator using a little wooden cart with bicycle wheels Boris had made specially. To get there I had to drag this contraption along dacha roads, which are so full of potholes that it caused my cart to lean precariously, sometimes next to parked cars. Another obstacle: the pipes on the roads. These pipes were the very ones that carried lake water to our steel box in the garden. Whoever laid them hadn't bothered with attempting to bury them, which meant they were driven over by cars and carts every day.