Stroking a bat and shaking hands with a bear – Theo’s blog

It’s not surprising that when we first arrived, without a hitch, in Southern Russia, we wondered for a moment if we were in some kind of artificial “Truman Show” set designed to enchant and deceive gullible western visitors with its loveliness. But it turned out it was just how it was.  Gentle streets and a mixed bunch of ordinary people, much like people everywhere, but leaning more towards kindness and consideration than some of the places we’ve been. And, in South Ossetia at least, tidiness, civic pride, and well-stocked shops that belied the negative expectations I’d somehow built up around “Russia”.  

For a moment in Vladikavkaz, at the beautiful but modest “Hostel Stanislavsky”, (named after the Russian theatre director who gave us the modern acting method), I seriously wondered if the alternative news propaganda was all true:  Russia was an enlightened paradise and Putin, a humane anti-fascist saviour.  It took an over-friendly 30-something guy approaching us on the street, with a wide smile and an evangelical glint in his eyes, to break the euphoric spell of my first impressions.

“ How do you like our country?  How do like us Russians?  Ukraine say we are aggressive angry people – but Russia is all about love!  Russians love EVERYBODY!  Yes, yes, we love everyone!”

OK comrade. Let’s keep it real.  Russians are human, just like me.

And the Russian State is just as inhuman as any other state in the world when it pursues self-interest at the expense of peoples lives.  But yes, I was loving South Ossetia.

Leaving Vladikavkaz on a bus heading north to Astrakhan, we passed through Chechnya and Grozny – names that rung a bell I’d prefer not to hear.  All signs of the nightmare shelling and “counter-insurgency” operations 20 years earlier now erased by glossy new-builds. The moslem-majority state was clearly poorer than Ossetia, though blessed with charming gilded mosques and many monumental portraits of Chechnya’s “Father Of The People” Ramzan Kadyrov, a close ally to the all-Russian president and equally renowned for his gentle tolerance of political opponents and LGB citizens.

At a Chechen road-stop we faced a massive portrait of a young Russian army “martyr”,  his young life pointlessly snuffed-out, one way or another, in the sunflower fields of Ukraine.  I cried a bit when a handsome Russian lad of fighting age climbed onto the bus with his kit bag.  Another working class boy whose fate was in the lap of the careless cowardly rich, but whose family will want to believe is a hero.

I understand the paradox of kind-hearted decent people who tolerate or even support the actions of a corrupted state, (although many more young Russians we met oppose the current war).  Once our sons or brothers or friends are sent to the frontline and fighting for their lives, the resolve of universal brotherhood quickly collapses, however unjust the cause.  We’ll gladly buy into any belief that helps to justify our desire for their victorious return. I saw the same patriotic fog befuddle the brains of socialist dockyard workers in Plymouth when Thatcher sent British boys to kill or be killed in the Falklands.  Russians are no different.

And I also understand, now I’ve been there, that Russia is a world to itself, as are America or Europe.  A massive world of many peoples with a common language and a massive history. I’m not surprised they might resent the demeaning western view of them.  I was disappointed though that I seemed to hear more English-language music than native. Perhaps the minibus and taxi cab drivers were showing courtesy to three westerners by playing the shallowest crappiest genre of western pop-dance tracks, but those that played interminably round and round as we crossed the interminably flat and featureless steppe from Chechnya to Astrakhan may finally seed a Seize the Day pop hit!

“Don’t you ever ever ever say you’ll go away baby get up and dance yeah party party let’s dance all night and let your body move baby I just wanna make love to you til the morning light yeah and I will never ever ever let you go no let the rhythm take control believe in your dreams no one can stop me now I’m sorry that I let you down girl, I promise I promise I will never ever hurt you no woo-oo-oo yeah”…

It was too short a stay to find out much, but so many people we met went out of their way to be generous and helpful, it was a real antidote to the divisive racist crap about Russians I’ve grown up with.  As far as me and cities go, Astrakhan was pleasant enough – mixed up modern and primitive ramshackle (and friends will know, I’m more at home with primitive ramshackle). 

When an ageing former MIG fighter-jet pilot, showing the ladies how to deal with a panicking bat trapped in our hotel lobby, bravely batted it to the ground and moved in to stomp it, I had to swear loudly and step in forcibly to rescue the beautiful unconscious little creature. I carried it outside, scared it was a gonner.  It slowly stirred enough to climb onto the bark of a tree and turn upside down. I stroked it, praying it wouldn’t die and as me and Shannon turned to get some water, it recovered and flew off to join its mate.

Back in the hotel me and the big man made it up with a handshake and a hug and he gestured to compliment me on my big heart.  I think he was a bit the worst for vodka, though to be frank, we didn’t see many people drinking at all – another misconception.

Our permitted stay of just 3 days was all too brief.   As we left for Kazakhstan from the spatious Soviet-era city station, I was still afloat in general feelings of goodwill and revelation, until our late-night passport check near the border escalated into something more scary. Singled out and summoned alone to a carriage compartment with 2 plain clothes state agents  I was suddenly clueless where things were going.  I was thankful for the times I’ve spent under arrest for environmental action – it helped me centre myself and present a pleasant, calm and sympathetic face to these two men who “ just needed to ask a few questions”.  Even though I had nothing to hide, rationally or irrationally I was worried that this might just be the first step into some extended procedural nightmare of removal from the train, detention, allegation, fit-up, and consular officials. Such things do happen. But happily not to me.

The good-cop of the pair, who gave his name as “Pavel”, was decent enough but thorough, and I had to carefully detail for him every aspect of our journey from Britain to there, interrupted frequently while him and his blank-faced colleague had phone calls liberally sprinkled with the word “Ukraine”, and perused a handwritten list.  Seems they were looking for someone or something on that train, but after looking through our phones they decided it wasn’t me, Shannon or Rosa.

“I’m sorry” Pavel said, “but you understand – with the situation – I must protect my country”.   I said I understood and shook his hand.  

Back in the bunk of our sleeper cabin, my body shook with delayed relief as we rolled out of Russia just before our visas expired. It would have been a shame to end our journey there.

Stanislavsky advised his actors to imagine how their characters would behave “in the given conditions” of the play they were in.  It’s good advice for life. If we understand the given conditions well enough, I think we can forgive and understand all human behaviours.  And Russians are no different, it seems to me.