CLIMATE CHANGE

'If we really felt that people in Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Tuvalu and elsewhere were fully human, we'd never fly again'. Merrick Godhaven, Down to Earth

Click on the map for a better quality image

Some Facts and Figures from Christian Aid

At the current rate of carbon emissions, global average temperatures will rise 2°C by 2050 according to research by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Most experts agree that this increase is already signed, sealed and ready for delivery. Expected consequences include:

• The creation of 150 million environmental refugees – overwhelmingly in poor countries
• Acute water shortages for 1-3 billion people
• 30 million more people going hungry as agricultural yields go into recession across the globe
• Sea levels edging towards increases of up to 95cm by the end of the century, submerging 18% of Bangladesh.
• Warmer, wetter weather will see malaria, which currently kills up to 3 million people a year, spread to new territories – there is evidence that it has already encroached into previously cool highland areas of Rwanda and Tanzania.
• Christian Aid research, based on scientific predictions, reveals that 182 million people in sub-Saharan Africa alone could die of disease directly attributable to climate change by the end of the century.
• The UK’s Department for International Development predicts that the number of Africans at risk of coastal flooding will rise from 1 million in 1990 to 70 million by 2080.
• In Bangladesh, flood damage has become more extreme in the last 20 years. By 2100, predicted ocean rises threaten to submerge 18% of the country, creating 35 million environmental refugees.
• In east Africa, 11 million people were put at risk of hunger by years of unprecedented drought.

Climatic changes already are estimated to cause over 150,000 deaths annually. (WHO)

Tip of the iceberg. See the rest of it before it melts away completely here.

blessed britains

"The British are blessed. This is the greatest nation on earth."

so says Tony Bliar, so we should not believe him. Nuggets to prove he is lying as hard as only he knows how...

To see the blessed britains all at once, antarchically organised, try this page.

mad bad world

mad bad world nuggets...

See them all together here.

Note:

The difference between what is mad and bad, and what is merely mad is fairly arbitrary. In general, where there is evidence of human awareness and intention, it becomes mad and bad, as opposed to merely mad. But, for example, I have put environmental madness under mere madness - partly because there are some stunning examples of ill-logic on this issue, but also because people (in general) fail to look at the consequences of their environmental actions. It is arguable (and I would probably argue for it) that not to be looking is actually both insane, and also bad.

ISRAEL / PALESTINE

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See nuggets on the Israel / Palestine disaster here.

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40 Years of Occupation:

This is what the UN Security Council agreed in November 1967, after the Arab-Israeli 6-day war:

The Security Council;

Expressing its continuing concern with the grave situation in the Middle East,

Emphasizing the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war and the need to work for a just and lasting peace in which every State in the area can live in security...

1. Affirms that the fulfillment of Charter principles requires the establishment of a just and lasting peace in the Middle East which should include the application of both the following principles:

(i) Withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict;
(ii) Termination of all claims or states of belligerency...

From UN Resolution 242 (November 1967).

And this is what the occupied West Bank looks like, 40 years on:

Map taken from The Humanitarian Impact of the West Bank Barrier on Palestinian Communities (UNOCHA)

* * *

This is what the 4th Geneva Convention says about an occupying power and the land it occupies:

Convention (IV) relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War. Geneva, 12 August 1949.

The Occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.

From Article 49

And this is what East Jerusalem looks like, 40 years after the illegal occupation began.

• The faint green dotted line (the 'Green Line') represents the armistice line established after the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. Land to the right of the line was taken (illegally) by Israel in 1967, and is still occupied (illegally) today.
• The purple blobs on the map are new Israeli settlements - Jews only - built up since 1967 on occupied (and confiscated) land - despite the Security Council Resolution (and others), despite the Geneva Convention, and despite Israel's own agreement to freeze settlement building (eg under the Road Map and the Oslo accords).
• The orange line is the line of the criminal apartheid wall, condemned by the International Court of Justice.

This is what the international court said in its ruling (July 2004):

"The construction of the wall being built by Israel... in the occupied Palestinian Territory, including in and around East Jerusalem... [is] contrary to international law. Israel is under obligation... to dismantle forthwith the structure... [and] make reparation for all damage caused...”

International Court of Justice Ruling, July 9, 2004

* * *

The UK went to war in one part of the Middle East because (according to one version) Saddam Hussein refused to comply with international law. Yet we send trade and aid and weapons to another country of the Middle East, another violator of the law, to perpetuate another war and help the occupier build upon its gains.

Should we stop arming Israel while it builds on another people's land at gunpoint?

Apparently not:

We do not believe the current situation in the region would be improved by imposing an arms embargo on Israel.

From the UK Foreign Office website

VOICES FROM PALESTINE

Quotes about the daily struggles and indignities of life under the Occupation, from Palestinian communities and those working with them. See them all together here.

Pictures from Stop The Wall

deaths in israel / palestine since 1967

1,133 Israelis and an estimated 5,144 Palestinians (including 952 children) have been killed since September 2000. From UN data, the post-1967 avoidable mortality (excess mortality) in the Occupied Palestinian Territories totals 300,000 and the post-1967 under-5 infant mortality 183,000 (of which 90% has been avoidable) - as compared to 2,178 post-1967 Israeli terrorism deaths (Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs figures).

— Gideon Polya

Post-1967 Palestinian & Israeli deaths from occupation & violence

smugness-propping aid "experts"

Here is a small microcosm of how this madness works: A Palestinian town has a wall built surrounding it from all sides, making it impossible for previously prosperous farmers to access their land, patients to reach their doctors and children to reach their schools. Naturally, the town is devastated. That's when Europeans send in their conscience-assuaging, smugness-propping aid "experts" to "save" the town, in the process relieving Israel from having to deal with the consequences of its crimes. They provide the farmers with food to replace the food they could have produced themselves, and proceed with projects to teach Palestinians "alternative industries," "new business models," "good local governance," "participatory development," "creative educational techniques" and countless other meaningless prattle that the Palestinians would gladly give up for having the wall removed, an independent state and some sense of normalcy bestowed on their lives.

— Saifedean Ammous

EU hypocrisy on Palestine

mad world

The insane world outside antarchia...

See all nuggets together here.

Of course, a lot of the insanity is intentional - and then it becomes not merely mad, but mad and bad. The distinction is not always very clear.

remembrance and forgettance

This page is here because the Council of Europe (COE) asked for some 'background information' on Remembrance. 'Teaching Remembrance' is one of the Directorate of Education's pet projects, and one of the new themes for Compass, the Council's (so-called) human-rights-education manual.

In the end, given the focus of the COE, and their restrictions on questions termed 'political', I found it impossible to come up with anything anodyne enough to satisfy them. The main concern, after all, of the COE's Remembrance project is to '...recognise the uniqueness of the Shoah as the first deliberate attempt to exterminate a people on a global scale'. I found myself unable to agree with that either as a statement of fact, or as a priority in (human rights) education.

So these were some of the things that I would have liked to say about the artificial act of Remembrance, and about the artifice of acting out Remembrance while forgetting what is most important. This artifice I call Forgettance.

Nuggets can be found here.

The word itself is really a word for governments rather than for people: people remember, rather than engage in Remembrance (which always has a capital letter because it is more official and more hallowed). And Governments use Remembrance most judiciously to tell us what we should Remember, how we should Remember it, and what we should Forget...

Forget Fallujah. In fact, for trying to remember Fallujah, Maya Evans was arrested, convicted and charged.

Remember 9-11, constantly. Remember the Holocaust, and remember our war dead (but not those of other countries).

Forget Chechnya. Forget Palestine. Forget the Turkish Kurds. Forget the Chagos Islanders. Forget Dresden - and indeed, the victims of any 'allied' bombing runs.

Remember Kosovo (but judiciously). Do not remember that the 'ethnic cleansing' happened only after we rained bombs down on the Serbs. Do not remember the Krajina Serbs (or any of the other Serbian victims).

Forget Sharon, Suharto, Pinochet (judiciously), Karimov, Tudjman, Moi, Mobutu, and scores of others. Forget their victims. Forget Saddam Hussein until 1991.

From 1991, Remember Saddam and his victims, together with those of Mugabe (forgotten until the late 1990s, then vociferously Remembered). Remember Milosevic, Stalin and Hitler - this last at every opportunity to justify new wars.

Lessons worth Remembering

Of course, it is not really remembering past crimes that is important, but understanding and acknowledging them. And in fact, perhaps if we would finally understand and acknowledge the terrible things that we have done, then we might be allowed to lay them to rest, even to forget¹. I would almost say that then we would be well advised to put them aside, because only in that way could we - the human race - move on.

With the holocaust - which is the usual target for Remembrance - it seems that we are nowhere near the stage of understanding and acknowledgement. There have almost certainly been more words written about this terrible crime than any other, but still there are enormous areas where we simply fail to see. Here are four, for starters, with a few accompanying nuggets, which will increase as I manage to dig them out:

Acts of forgettance

1. Collaborators

   The first blind spot concerns the ease with which any one of us could become - and does become - an accomplice in terrible crimes, simply by not being aware of our own role, or not wanting to be aware of that role. The wars that we are waging today are only possible because the broad mass of the British and American people are blind to the victims, or for some other reason are prepared to let the crimes continue. One day these crimes will be seen for what they are, and will be placed alongside the acknowledged 'crimes against humanity'. Then maybe we shall acknowledge our own passive role in allowing them to happen - and the fact that nothing could have happened if the whole of the great British public had stood up against it.

   See Stanley Milgram's article 'Perils of Obedience' for the best account I know on this.

2. Other victims of the holocaust

   The second blind spot in our understanding is easier to identify, in theory it is easier to rectify, and for those reasons it is perhaps more shaming that 'we' have managed to do neither. We beat our breasts about the Holocaust, we make sure that Remembrance projects address that crime, above all others, and we constantly cite Hitler and the Nazi regime as proof that evil really exists. And yet, despite all that, we have not recognised properly, let alone compensated or begun to learn lessons from the fact that that regime, and its allies in crime, treated the Roma as a group at least as badly, and often more so, than they treated the Jews. Nor have we only failed to recognise, we continue to this day to exercise discrimination of the most demeaning and disgusting kind.

   If we are going to shout about some victims of the holocaust - and we should do - then we need to shout about them all. And if we really mind about the crimes that were committed by the fascists, then we need to understand the underlying attitudes which made society accept the crimes at that time, and to recognise those attitudes today - particularly when they can be seen within ourselves. See this page for nuggets, and this site if you are in any doubt that discrimination against the Roma is flourishing today.

3. Other holocausts

   The third blind spot concerns the numerous other holocausts which we remember far less well, either because the victims are at least in part our victims, or because they are less near to the European consciousness - both geographically and ethnically. Iraq and Afghanistan today offer the most obvious examples, with a possible three million² killed already in these two lands, as a direct result of our own government's actions. Others round the world get periodic attention, as long as the victims are victims of our enemies, and as long as they live in a part of the world that we covet.

   Gideon Polya, in this article, provides a list of major holocausts over the last century which were not even mentioned in a recent US Resolution condemning holocaust denial. The list includes the following (in order of occurrence):

   The 1904-1907 German Namibian Genocide (the Herero population dropped from 80,000 to 15,000); the 1915-1918 Turkish Armenian Genocide (1 million victims – still denied by Turkey); the 1930-1933 Russian Ukrainian Genocide (5 million victims); the 1937-1945 Japanese invasion of China (35 million Chinese victims); the non-Jewish victims of the Nazi German World War 2 Holocaust – 20 million Soviet citizens, 6 million Poles (half of them Jewish), 1 million Serbs, 0.5 million other Yugoslavs and 0.5 million Roma (Gypsies); the man-made, 1943/44 British Bengali Holocaust (4 million victims – still largely written out of British history books); the 1947 Indian Partition (1 million victims); the 1994 Hutu Rwandan Genocide (1 million victims); the 1971 West Pakistani Bengali Holocaust (3 million victims, 80% male; 0.3 million women raped by the US-backed West Pakistan military); the 1965 Indonesian Genocide (1 million victims); the 1975-2000 Indonesian East Timorese Genocide (0.2 million victims out of a population of about 0.6 million); the US Indo-China war (13 million excess deaths); the post-1950 First World-driven Third World Holocaust (1.2 billion excess deaths, mainly in Africa, Asia and South America); and the post-1950 First World-driven Muslim Holocaust (0.6 billion excess deaths; mainly in Africa and Asia).

4. Palestine and the State of Israel

   And finally, the fourth blind spot, and the one that is hardest to speak about, precisely because we do remember (in some senses) the Nazi holocaust. The mere mention of the victims of the state of Israel is enough, in many people's eyes, to brand one as an anti-Semitist, but it is possibly the fear of being so accused that is most to blame for the unforgivable silence by the world on this issue.

   Nothing will ever justify or excuse the utterly barbaric treatment suffered by the Jews under the Nazis and others. But pitying those victims - and accusing their oppressors - should never be a reason for failing to look at and failing to pity the other victims around the world.

   So should we fail to look at and pity the victims of the State of Israel, just because that state is inhabited by many of the survivor-victims of fascism, and just because most of the victims of fascism were of the same ethnicity as those controlling the State of Israel's policies today? Only, surely, if we believe that ethnicity has any part to play in determining crimes against humanity. If it does not have any part to play - and of course I don't believe it does - then I cannot see why the question of ethnicity should be of any relevance at all. We are, after all, allowed to criticise Mugabe without being accused of being anti-Zimbabwean; and the press falls over itself to criticise the regimes in Venezuela and in Cuba, while - apparently - being pro-Venezuelan and Pro-Cuban. Where is the difference?

   On this page you can find a small fraction of the crimes that have been, and are still being committed against the Palestinian people. Nothing can ever justify or excuse the Nazi holocaust, but nor can anything justify or excuse what is happening in Palestine today - and has been happening for 60 years - at the hands of the Israeli state and with the compliance and active support of people and governments including my own.

"Look, you can do what you want, there is no way that you can erase it," he said about the ever-present images of death. "They may not be alive but they are there. They are there in the day, they are there in the morning. They are there at night when the sun sets. You can forget about forgetting - it's like a daily call card"

Eugene de Kock ('Prime Evil'), quoted in Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela's A Human Being Died that Night

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Notes

1

2

• 1. 1. The irony is that once we understand and acknowledge the terrible things that we have done - once we remember, in a genuine and worthwhile sense - we find it hard to forget. And then we have little need for 'Remembrance'.
• 2. 2.

LIFE IN STALIN'S RUSSIA

The extracts below are taken from a series of interviews in the Pskov region of Russia. Over the last year, school children between the ages of 12 and 16, from villages and towns in the region have been conducting interviews with pensioners, the last survivors of the Stalin era.

There has been a lot written about those who were actual victims of repression in the Stalin years. One of the ideas behind this project was to find out how those who were 'left behind' experienced and understood the events of this terrible period; and how the time between - including the collapse of the Soviet Union - has influenced this understanding and the memories. It was also to get a picture from rural Russia, where external influences and sources of information have been thinly spread - even over the last 10 years.

The Pskov region is in the north-west of Russia and borders two of the Baltic States and Belarus - so it was very much part of occupied Russia during the Second World War. Today it is one of the poorest regions in the Russian Federation. It is also heavily militarised and there is a strong strain of nationalism throughout the region, encouraged by the local (and national) authorities and now spreading to the school curriculum.

This was the first type of independent work that most of these children had carried out - and this sometimes comes across quite strongly in the interviews. The Russian originals can be found here, and I am slowly getting round to translating (parts of) them into English. Work in progress can be accessed here, or by clicking on the links below.

4,000 Roma gassed

On December 16th [1941], Himmler issued the order to have all Roma remaining in Europe deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau for extermination. On December 24th, Lohse gave the additional order that "The Gypsies should be given the same treatment as the Jews." At a party meeting on September 14th, 1942, Justice Minister Otto Thierack announced that "Jews and Gypsies must be unconditionally exterminated." On August 1st, 1944, four thousand Roma were gassed and cremated in a single action at Auschwitz-Birkenau, in what is remembered as Zigeunernacht.

— Ian Hancock

Genocide of the Roma

Ababkova, Liudmilla Illinichna

Velikie Luki, Pskov Region
5 January 2007

* * *

Let me tell you about my parents: my father was a military man, he was a Major and served throughout the Fatherland War, survived it. My mother was a kolkhoz worker. After the war, my father returned and they got married, then they left for Nizhny tagil. My father stayed in the army, served as a soldier, and we moved between various military bases. Each year I went to a new school, in a different town. My mother didn't work. I went to school in Germany, in Ukraine, in Sebezh.

Of course I particularly remember first starting school. I remember very clearly the time in Germany. School, technical college, I remember all of that. Then children.

How did people treat you in Germany?

Very well. The children were very friendly. They sent us all over the place, children from the military bases. But we were already quite old by then... And they didn't really like us, even then.

Never mind, we lived comfortably. Then we came back to Russia, came to Velikie Luki and lived there. What else do you want to ask me?

Tell us about the government... education, ideology.

Of course, particularly when Gagarin flew into space, that day I shall remember all my life. They gathered the whole school together, it was a very happy day. That was really something – something unforgettable. We were very proud that the first person in space was ours, was Russian.

We're particularly interested in the 1930s and 1940s – did your parents tell you anything about that time?

My grandfather fought in the Finnish war and the Fatherland war, but he didn't really tell us about it, didn't manage to tell us. My grandmother and mother were behind the enemy front, were surrounded but they were... loyal. Of course there was famine, but we survived. We had our allotments.

Did you know anything about collectivisation, de-kulakisation?

No-one among us was de-kulakised because I came from a simple family. We were all from one village – mother, father and my grandparents, so no-one suffered from that.

And what happened with religion at that time?

Religion was forbidden, we grew up and didn't believe in God. You could believe in your soul, but it was forbidden. In fact my grandmother was baptised and I was secretly baptised. My father was a communist, he forbade it, but my grandmother secretly had me baptised... My grandmother was very religious, she had icons. She was a strong believer.

In the village we always celebrated Easter and Christmas. Of course all the older generation were believers.

Could people change their place of residence or work?

No, from the village no-one could. To leave you had to get a passport. But my mother managed to leave because when my father returned from the war, she left with him, as his wife. Of course it was very difficult to leave. All our relations stayed in the village... My grandfather was a foreman in the kolkhoz all his life. Of course, that was all earlier. In the Soviet times, in every village there was something – in every village. In one a pig farm, in another cattle breeding, in another some sort of industry. It's only now that they've destroyed everything, sold off everything, it's all empty. Old people are dying off – you're still young. At that time of course it was a very lively life: holidays, of course, including religious ones we used to celebrate. The whole village would get together for Easter, Trinity – there were lots of people. But now of course it's not like that.

And were you not punished for celebrating Easter?

No, it was all quite peaceful really. In our village it was peaceful. Maybe in the large towns they were punished in some way.

And were there any punishments for being late for work?

Absolutely, yes! You couldn't be late. You got told off, and for being late there was always a punishment.

Did women do different work from men?

Women worked hard, of course. It's hard work nowadays, of course, but it was then. But there were lots of different firms and factories, so it was not so hard for women.

Did you know anything about the repression?

In our family, no-one suffered from the repression. My husband's grandfather was de-kulakised and my husband had relatives, but we had nothing, so I didn't hear anything, don't know anything.

Do you think that the repression had to happen?

I think there was no reason for it to happen. People lived, put down roots, and suddenly disappeared. Of course it didn't have to happen. It shouldn't have happened.

Who do you think was responsible for it happening?

Well that's hard for me to say.

Do you think it could have been avoided?

Of course, the people at the top... it could have been avoided. How could everyone have been guilty – mothers, wives – it shouldn't have been done.

What do you think when you compare today with those years?

You know, I compare the different periods: the years of Brezhnev were said to be a period of stagnation. But we lived through those years, and I want to say that it wasn't a period of stagnation. We were protected in some way. We were in some way sure about our future. We were secure. We always celebrated different holidays and meetings. It was all very friendly. And that time we all remember with great nostalgia, the time of Brezhnev.

But you didn't have freedom of speech?

We didn't really notice that – we didn't notice there was no freedom of speech. Of course, there were few products in the shops. But they lived well at that time in Leningrad and Moscow. They lived very well. And now it's more difficult. When they gave us an advance, we could travel to Leningrad, buy some food and live well on it. I remember when Stalin died, I remember how everyone cried. Of course I was only very young, I couldn't understand whether it was right or wrong. But people cried – everyone cried a lot...

What do you think about Stalin and Khrushev now?

About Stalin, I don't know. I just remember how people cried. I was young, but with Khrushev, I remember how – one of my first memories, I was still at school – people really suffered when he raised the price of butter, people really suffered.

And today... what's better, and what is worse?

It's worse. There's no work, nowhere to find work. It's terrible that people even have a good education, and there's nowhere for them to work. That's very bad. And we have a tiny pension, but never mind – we'll survive, what else can we do.

What do you think about young people today?

Very well... I like young people today, I think they are cleverer than we were. Of course, we read lots of books then, but now you have computers, now you have more possibilities. But young people in our day were good too.

You had the komsomol then

In our day it was all more organised, yes. We had more responsibility, we felt that very strongly. Now you need to pay for an education, that's very hard of course. Not all parents can afford that. In that sense, of course things are worse.

Tell us about the Komsomol... you used to be told to be a Pioneer – what if someone didn't want to be?

Well yes, they did try to push us into that, and it was very rare that someone refused – very rare. But they joined in any case. There were only a few single cases when someone refused.

What did you do in your spare time?

I loved to read, I read like a drunkard... read and read and read. I'm sorry that my children aren't like that: they love the television, the tape recorder. But our generation really loved books. Sometimes we had parties at school, but that was only very rarely. Mostly we read.

And your parents?

My parents... my father worked very hard, he was a military man. So he would go away and then come home only late at night. My mother was a housewife, I had no sisters or brothers, I'm an only child. My mother taught me how to knit, but I didn't really enjoy that. I can do needlework.

What do you particularly remember from your school days?

From my school days I remember when Gagarin flew into space. But particular events – well I visited various different places, went to new schools, and when you start a new school, you need to get used to it. All the children were unfamiliar – it was very difficult: I studied German, then I arrive at a new school, I learn French, and they teach English. You arrive and need to adapt yourself – that was very difficult for me of course. There we are.

Thank you very much

Thank you girls – I probably haven't helped you at all.

No, of course you have. What did you think about the church?

Everyone loved it, and I would have done – but I don't know. Because every time there was some holiday, they brought the prices down. Everyone waited for the holidays, everyone knew that the prices would be lowered, everyone was waiting, excited. Now, though, we wait for each New Year, and we wait for them to raise the prices. How are we to live? Of course, in that sense it was much better before. We worry that those times have gone. Then we weren't worried that there would be a war, we were calm, we were sure that everything was alright here, everything was quiet and peaceful.

What about the deficits?

Of course there were deficits, mostly in the rural regions. People from the whole country travelled to the large cities, to Leningrad. Of course they stood in queues, bought up enough for a whole month. Everyone did that. If you had to buy clothes – you go to Belarus, to Latvia. No-one went about without clothes! Now it's very difficult.

What about the Soviet films, how they showed the ideology... everything was wonderful. Do you agree with that?

Well today... of course, earlier we used to watch those films with such pleasure, we loved them, we used to think so. And now when you watch those films, you watch them with completely different eyes, because of course we didn't know everything then, they hid everything. Because everyone used to say 'It's all wonderful, we're moving forwards, only forwards.' Now when you look back on it, you wonder whether it was really like that. And the films of course seem naive now.

What did you feel when you learnt that it wasn't true?

Regret. Of course, regret.

And did your teachers talk about ideology with you?

No, I was lucky, we had good teachers. They didn't just tell us what was in the curriculum, they told us what was happening in the world. they tried to enlighten us a bit. Of course they never said anything against the ideology.

Do you think that the Soviet education was the best there is – did you believe that?

Yes, because you go out onto the street and everyone is reading newspapers, books. Really people read a huge amount: everyone, really everyone loved books. The television was very rare, if someone had a television. Yes, we used to go to the library, we couldn't live without books. Today it's not like that, there aren't so many people who read a lot, hardly any, but we used to read. The thing I think is a pity – I'm sorry that it will be so difficult for you to enter higher education.

Was your family affected by collectivisation? Were you taken into the kolkhoz?

Well when I was old enough, when I started to understand, first of all we already lived in Germany, so it didn't really affect us. But then when they took us to see my grandfather for the summer, they were already kolkhoz workers. I remember that, unfortunately.

Did he choose to go into the kolkhoz?

Yes, yes, yes. But he went through the Finnish war and the Fatherland war, he fought a lot and had lots of wounds. He believed in the ideology, he wasn't a communist, but he believed in the ideology.

And what were your dreams, your ideals, what about your parents'?

My dreams and wishes, unfortunately never came true. My mother fell ill and died very young, and my father sent me off to Kazakhstan to my mother's sister to study at the technical college, and I wanted to go to the Institute. But it happened that I had to leave. My aunt also abandoned me, went away, I was left alone. If my mother had lived, of course it would all have been different. There you go.

Thank you very much

Afanaseva, Ekaterina Aleksandrovna

Novosokolniki

January 2007

* * *

Today we're in the home of Ekaterina Aleksandrovna Afanaseva. We're from the school... we want to know about the history of our local region not from books, but from those who took part in in. We are interested in the periods before, during and immediately after the war...

I don't know – I've forgotten everything.

I mean, for example, how did people feel at that time? I mean – do you remember the 30s and 40s?

I got through the whole war, and what did God give me? Nothing. There were Germans, lots of them. They were holding Moscow, they were everywhere in Pskov as well.... And when they dropped bombs, we all lay down in trenches. There was a church next door to your house, just a bit further on, they were there for a long time. And we worked for the war, it was very hard.

And were you born in Novosokolniki? Who were your parents?

My parents lived not far from here, behind the forest, behind the school. When I got married, I used to go and visit them there. Father was a baker. His name was Aleksandr, my mother's was Tatiana. We had – mother had lots of children, 5 of us. Now two of my brothers are dead.

(They ask if she has any old photographs, then they asked about de-kulakisation, religion. Mostly she says she doesn't remember. Then they ask 'Can we photograph you?'

Oh children – no, don't do that!

Why not? We're going to write about you!

There were different people in power then, children. I talk badly, talk too much. Power was different then.

When the war started, did you used to go to church?

We went before the war, but when the war started, there was nowhere to go to.

You said the church was destroyed – do you know what happened to the priests?

No I don't know.

Were you baptised?

Of course I was! I'm baptised!

What did people do on festivals, holidays?

Walked, people walked at all the festivals. And then they ate well, better than now, and health was better. People went to church.

Did you have a passport during the war?

Of course I did! And there was one time when we had nowhere to live, and some people took us in – there were 7 of them in the family, just imagine that – 7 people, and we were 5. 5 of us, and Mama too, so 6 altogether. Then one old woman died, and there was typhus in the village – you know what that is. The Germans were in the village, they went right through our village. And whoever fell ill and died, they were taken off to the forest, they dug a huge pit, and everyone was thrown in there. From their family a small boy fell ill and then died. Everyone fell ill in the village, and then my mother and the woman we were living with, they started going round the village looking after people. I remember they put Mama in the corner, by the icon – I don't remember anything, didn't understand, but she lived. And then I started to get better slowly as well. Then we were put in the camp and we had to dig trenches. They sent us to the barracks – not barracks, tents. The beds were iron and we had to sleep on them. In the morning at 6 o'clock we were woken and we went off to work.

How long were you held in the camps?

I don't want to remember that. Some people sent me papers from Leningrad and I burnt them. I was there for about 3 months. Then our camp was destroyed. The camp was destroyed and we were caught and sent back again. And there was absolutely no work anywhere.

You spoke about your husband – tell us how you got married

We got married.. there were different sorts of men then, they were soldiers. Mama had 5 children, and then when our land was liberated, part of them went on further. They gave us 700 grammes of bread each, and soldiers got 900 grammes. That was alright for us, and alright for them. We ate while we moved. They bombed us. And Mama lived in a dug-out as well, with the lads – that's how they lived.

At work, were people punished for being late?

Not so much punished, but told off.

So for being late – that was very serious?

Very serious.

How long was a working day?

From 8 in the morning till 8 at night, and you take all your tools with you on the train. People used to carry everything, their spanners (kliuchi?) on their backs. I still have my labour book. (trudovaya knizhka)

Which were the most difficult years?

The war and after the war were difficult. There was famine. But it was fun: we used to get together and cook up anything.

If you compare those days with today, which is better and which is worse?

Well, children, it's good now. But it can be bad. Everyone's well fed now, overfed.

Was it hard with food products then?

Oh yes. Soldiers were given a small snack, and they had to work from 8 till 8. We marched on that. We marched on that and the military base – you know where that was? They've built a new one now, but there used to be another one. We marched, and we built that one, that was where we worked.

You built it yourselves?

Well – I mean we got everything ready and the soldiers did it, and we helped them get things ready. I was working there when I got married. Then the occupation ended. He was in the army, and we had nowhere to go after that.

But you married for love, didn't you?

I don't know.

Can you tell us what you think about Stalin himself?

Stalin... oh I don't remember. How many people died, grandfathers at the front, their children taken away. They sent everyone to the front, killed them.

Which events do you particularly remember?

Oh well – I was so glad when my father came home from the war. He was at the front. There were four of us – the fifth son died. And when my father came home, we could all celebrate. When he came home he could help us, and we all felt more cheerful.

Can you tell us what you think about today's young people?

Young people weren't like that in our day.

So they were very different?

Of course... I mean, they're not bad now, but not all of them. But then too – there were different sorts of people, everyone was different. Children today are very nice, good: some of them open the door for older people. They used to read more, but today people are different – rich, and they ought to read more. They have too much now. Only it's difficult: you have to pay so much for everything. I cry half the time.

Whose fault do you think it was – what happened?

When the war started – well who else, when Germany suddenly ...

You mean they started it

Of course. Germany struck us, invaded. There were so many wounded soldiers then. They were brought in wagons, and evacuees, and then back again.

Thank you so much for your time, for everything you have told us

Afanaseva, Tatiana Andreeva

Novosokolniki

21 March, 2007

Interviewed by: Nina Vasilevna and Olga Kapralova

* * *

...

Can you tell us who your parents were?

...
My parents were teachers in a primary school in the village.

Do you have any old photos of the years before the war...?

We have no photos because in 1955, the school where they were all kept burnt down. Everything my parents had – and my mother and father both had medals which they had received in the Great Fatherland War, and photographs – and everything else, it was all destroyed. And my grandmother, who might have had some photographs, she also lived through the occupation. Then my other grandparents, my mother's parents, they lived in the Rostov region of Ugodichi village, in Yaroslav oblast.

...
I lived in the village... and there was no church in the village because Old Believers lived there, but they used to get together for the big religious festivals, I remember that, in two houses, and they would take the service. They weren't priests really... they just managed to read the holy books which they had managed to keep, so that was the sort of religious service we used to have. And they conducted funerals and baptised children – that was what they used to do.

We are particularly interested in the 1930s and 1940s – what do you know about what happened in those years?

The thing is that my father told me what had happened to his family just before his death, about 2 years, or rather 8 years ago. He told me what had happened to his family in the 1930s, and my mother had told me before that. But to me, for example, it wasn't really clear... and only now, I understand what happened then, when history is being rewritten, in a completely different way. And we know that history was very much altered, embellished, particularly in the 1930s. My father told me that his parents – his father worked on the railways – the family was large, but when the revolution happened and they started giving away land, then he and my grandmother immediately went off to that region, that was in ..., that's where the land was. The land was very good and their children had already grown up, so the family was strong, hard-working, and they had a house by the side of a lake – a hutor, they called it. And since they worked so hard, they didn't need extra hands, and my grandmother said that lots of different things grew in the first year, and then in the second year. In other words, they had very good harvests and my grandfather, as he was allowed to at that time, was able to sell it. They already had 3 horses, a reaper, their own seeder, and lots of other things. And the father, or rather my grandfather, was already starting to think about how they could open a small tea-house at the crossroads, on the road between Leningrad and Kiev, with the money they had managed to save.

But then the 1930s arrived and my grandfather was called up before the village soviet, and there they asked him – as my father told me later – why he hadn't joined the kolkhoz. My father told me that his father was called up and they put a revolver on the table and said: 'you'd better be in the kolkhoz tomorrow, with all your animals and your whole family'. My grandfather went home. He was a sensible man and he got home, told his wife, and my grandmother was – well, she was very hard-working and she really minded, she'd put a lot of energy into that land. So of course she said that she didn't want to join the kolkhoz, and she set up a scene. Then grandfather said – go and get your things, we're going to load them up, and tomorrow we're going with our things and with the children. Grandmother started crying and went off to collect her things, everything she was going to hand over to the kolkhoz. Next day they took everything off, everything they had, and their horses and other things to the kolkhoz. But my grandfather, as he was really very clever, he said that they would join the kolkhoz, but his children wouldn't. So he sent off all his children – and he had 5 of them – he sent them off to study further. He could do that.

Uncle Petya was an excellent tractor mechanic and worked at MTS He sent my father off to study at the teacher training college, Aunt Nastya he sent off to medical school and only little Vera was left, and she lived through the occupation together with my grandmother. She was still very small... So that's it, that's what it was like. After the war, of course there was no-one left in the kolkhoz. Babushka was delighted, because all her children came home alive after the war – and little Vera was alive too. Well, but Uncle Petya did die about 5 or 6 years after the war ended. He had so many wounds.

How old were you at that time?

When?

At that time... you weren't born by then?

No – I was born in 1948. But my father told us all that just before he died. I was surprised that he had said nothing for so long, particularly as I thought of him as a very brave person, not afraid of anything. But it so happened that he only told us all that just before he died, just a few years ago. Just 2 years before his death he told us all that. And I learnt all that, and he said it was because... I can even say this, really ... perestroika had just started and he was already on a pension, he was very old already. And what happened was that there were only pensioners and old people left in the village and he went off to the village soviet, to the boss, and he asked if asked if they could sell them a horse, for the village, so that the old people could plough their gardens, fetch the hay, logs, go to the shop... him and another guy... and he couldn't manage to raise the cash on his own... and he told me all that...

Can you tell me what you know about collectivisation and de-kulakisation?

Well, collectivisation went like that – that's what my father told me about his experience. And my mother, her father used to sell horses, but he was a clever man and he used to go to Moscow frequently... he managed somehow to sort things out, and as a result, he sold all his property and bought different valuables which, as far as I understand, he gave away to his children who were grown up by that time. When they came to take away his property, it turned out that he'd got nothing left – so he avoided it like that.

But my mother had to carry the can: she grew up and studied at the teacher training institute, and then she was sent off to the front in 1942. I said to Mama – 'But you wanted to go to the front, didn't you?', I was proud of that, but she said no, that she of course hadn't wanted to go, that it was very, very frightening... and she said that when the aeroplanes flew over, everyone rushed for the bomb shelter, everyone hid somewhere. And we had to shoot.

Were people able to change their place of residence at that time?

No... it was very difficult. I even remember in 1955, I knew everything by then.. well in the 1930s it was pretty much impossible, and even in 1955, in the villages, in the kolkhoz... we were teachers, so it didn't really concern me, but with the children I taught, when they finished school in the 8th class, they were 15, and their parents used to try to send them off somewhere, so that they could get a qualification from the town and somehow manage to stay there. But just in order to send them off to the town, even to study at the technical college, they couldn't leave because their parents had to get an official document a 'Departure' document which said they had permission to go and study in college.

And what about changing place of work, or was that forbidden?

Well for that you needed both time and the possibility to make the change... I don't remember how long the working day was but Mama told me how she was sent off for work experience while she was still at college and it was about 15 kilometres from the village. There was another girl there who worked with her, but she was a teacher, and they used to go home on days off... Mama came back, and so did that girl from another village... they were dropped back, or something. Anyway, she was late by 7 minutes for work, and after that she had to work 3 or 4 days for no pay. How she was supposed to live, no-one knows.

Do you know whether certain literature was forbidden at that time?

I do... I'll tell you. I've forgotten the writer but he wrote about Babi Yar [she says 'yad' – ie hell] and suddenly – off he went abroad, became a dissident. The book was excellent – patriotic, told about the Great Fatherland War – and suddenly they banned it. Then there was Solzhenitzyn's 'Last (sic) Day of Ivan Denisovich', I did manage to read that. A teacher of history had got hold of it and I wanted to read it, to find out why it had been banned. But I couldn't find it anywhere. Then she lent it to me.

Can you tell us about food products – were there things you couldn't get hold of?

Well first of all, people didn't have as much money as they do now. Maybe if you wanted to, even if there were deficits, you could get hold of things – but people didn't have the money or the possibility. But after the 1970s, things just got worse and worse.

Which period do you think was the most difficult?

I think that the period before the war was the most difficult for people, because they really didn't know what was coming, and I think that the repression – they could end up there at any moment, for whatever reason. Then by the end of the war, people had learnt to hold their tongues. In any case, they had been through such a terrible war that people felt completely different.

Did you know anything about the repression, and did it affect you or anyone you know?

Well, I told you – both my grandfathers were clever, and they didn't try to stand up to the authorities. I mean they couldn't go anywhere, but they realised that it was pointless to try to resist – so that's why it didn't affect us.

Do you think that the repression was justified?

I think that no-one has the right to take away a person's freedom, and what he earns for himself, he should be allowed to decide how to spend. And in general, people shouldn't have to be afraid, they should be free, be able to feel freedom.

And who do you think was guilty for what happened, in the war, for the destruction?

You know, I read a lot of literature and if I draw conclusions, it is that I think the war happened in order to get rid of a lot of people. When there was the famine, nothing was done to save them. Then collectivisation started... those people who were capable of working, they had large families – they went off quite calmly somewhere or other: right? And then they calmly disappeared. A huge number of good and healthy people were just destroyed. And my grandmother was terrified because she was in occupied territory, she was a prisoner near the town of Orlom. And she was delighted that all her children returned from the war alive.

What do you think about Stalin himself?

I can't think well of him: through his personal ambition, he destroyed a huge number of people.

What do you think if you compare life today, and life at that time?

It's always hard work, everywhere. Of course I don't like what's happening today – but even so.

Tell me, did you used to celebrate festivals, holidays?

First of all, the villages were very large – for example, there's a little book 'The Countryman's Calendar' which has all the different countryside festivals. Every village in turn would organise a fair, and young people would meet there to sing and dance. They would sell things, depending on the season. I even remember what it was like in our village – on the 21st September there would be a squeeze-box playing, of course no-one went to work on that day, even if it was Thursday or Wednesday, we still didn't work. We always celebrated the Trinity – everyone went to the cemetery, and that was always a day off.

Now tell us about love... how you got married, and everything

My grandmother married her husband and she always used to say that she didn't love him. And we were all amazed – how could grandmother say that! I didn't ask my grandfather – he died in 1941. But grandmother said she didn't love him. I asked – well why... of course, everyone asked her that question. And she said he stole me. She was 13 years old and very hard-working – everything she did with her hands was a triumph and the main thing was that you could count on one hand the number of things she couldn't do. And what she could do – well she really was an extraordinary woman. And they had a fine horse and I [sic] was walking along the road and there was some sort of celebration going on, and they caught her and off they went. But she tore herself free and ran away, but the snow was very deep and the horse was really fine, and they put her in the sledge and took her away. And in the village it was like this, that if you didn't spend the night at home, but spent it in some young man's company, then you had to marry him. Because it was a scandal, it was shaming for your parents and they would worry, and would anyway force you to get married. And they forced him to marry her, but he wanted to marry her – it was she that didn't want to. So that's how she came to live with him, for a long time, and they had lots of children – she gave birth to 8 children, of which 3 died in infancy and 5 were left.

Tell me – were you baptised?

Yes, I was baptised in Rostov, in Yaroslav oblast.

Can you tell us what you think about young people today?

I wouldn't say that young people are worse than they used to be. I worked in a school, I saw them, and I can't say they are any worse. The only thing that I don't like is that they seem to do everything very superficially. They don't try to go deeper. There is no self-education, no self-discipline – that doesn't seem to to be there in them.

When you went to school, was it far from home? What was it like?

The school I was in until the 4th class was a wonderful school. My parents worked there... Mama didn't work there because she was already on an invalid's allowance, but there was another teacher and my father worked in the school. The school was wonderful because my father was a really good teacher – he remembered everything, always asked about my health. Secondly, it was nice in school because it was a small one – about 30 in each class. When it was break time, we could play chase, hide-and-seek, and sometimes the break went on for a whole hour. It wasn't difficult, and he was a very inquisitive person himself – for example we could build a dam in the stream which was near the school. Everything was very peaceful, there didn't seem to be any aggressive children. There was no television, not everyone even had a radio at home. And then I went on to a 8-year school which was 4 kilometres away from the village and we had to walk there every day. By half past eight we had to be in school... we got up at half past seven, at eight we left the village and walked fairly quickly. And we walked through the forest, a group of us with the little ones behind and us in front. They didn't clean the roads so we had to do that ourselves – walking was hard work and there were wolves in the forest, so it was a bit scary as well.

Did your parents have passports?

My parents – grandmother was already quite old, she wasn't working any more and she lived in the village. But then she went to town and there they gave everyone passports.

Thank you so much for your time... there will be a book about the things you have told us, and an exhibition in the local museum. We will certainly invite you!

Andreeva, Antonina Evdokimovna

Lyadi, Pskov region
Nov. 2006

* * *

(Fragments of interview)

Could you introduce yourself, please?

I am Antonina Evdokimovna Andreeva, I am being interviewed by Natalya Sergeevna.

Antonina Evdokimovna, can you tell us who your parents were?

My parents farmed the land, so did my parents' parents.

We are particularly interested in the 1930s and 1940s. Can you tell us how old you were at that time? What do you remember about those years? What did your parents tell you about them?

I didn't really see that period: I was born in 1935. My parents told me that our family did not suffer from the repression.

What happened [in the 30s] with religion and with priests or church officials? What did people think about that, how did they behave?

My parents went to church, as usual, and behaved as normal in that, in everything.

Could people at that time change their place of work or residence?

At that time – well, people who worked in the town could.

And place of work?

You could change your place of work, people were free at that time.

Which events of that period had an influence on your life, on the life of your family?

Our family got on with working the land which belonged to it, just as normal, there were no changes.

Did you know anything at that time about the Stalinist repression?

No, I didn't know anything

...

Do you think it would have been possible to prevent what happened, do you think that we can avoid similar cases in the future ...?

You can avoid it if our government listens to the working classes

What are your impressions when you compare life at that time, with life today? Would you say that life was better / worse / more frightening / more free / more interesting...?

After the war, life was very difficult, because everything was destroyed after the war, and we had to eat grass (herbs?), we suffered everything, and now, of course, we eat bread. Of course life today is better.

What has improved, and what has got worse?

What's improved is that we are freer, and what is worse is that we get a tiny pension, of course for older people it's harder to live. And the prices go up with every day.

Can you remember the years of the Great Fatherland War? What do you remember about the fascist regime?

At that time, we lived in fear. Either it was the Germans chasing the partisans out of the villages, or it was the partisans chasing the Germans, and we were kept in fear the whole time.

Did the Soviet army help during the war years?

The Soviet army helped, ours was a Red Army family, my father was at the Front. They gave us 10 kilogrammes of flour for that.

What do you remember about your life after the war? How did people live after the war?

After the war I went to school, finished 4 classes and then I had to go out to work, since I wasn't able to feed myself and my parents. I went out to work from the age of 14, as we had to restore our own smallholding and the Kolkhoz, everything had been destroyed by the Germans. There was not a single house for 40 kilometres, so we had to build everything. Very few men returned from the War, so we had to – children of 14 years old, and women – we had to rebuild everything. Women ploughed the land themselves and worked their own land and the Kolkhoz fields, as there were no horses. It was so difficult for us to live and work and walk about half-starving. But what could we do – we couldn't do anything, we had to restore everything that had been destroyed.

...

Were there arrests after the Great Fatherland War?

There were arrests after the War. Anyone who didn't want to work, anyone who didn't fulfill the Plan, who stole things – they were all charged with criminal offences.

Anzel, Victor Vladimirovich

«I remember the 40s well. Payment in our kolkhoz was enough for one kilogramme of bread for a day's work. You can work it out for yourself, well, for example, a hard-working kolkhoznik could earn between 500 to 600 working-days per year. In other words, 500–600 working days' of bread is what you could earn in a year, and you'd have to work every day, that's one thing I remember very clearly, from my memories. Then as far as the organisation of the kolkhoz went – I was very young then, older women told me how that all happened in ..., maybe that would be interesting. In 1935, the kolkhoz was set up, and by that time there were already other kolkhozes, which had been organised more or less according to people's free choice, but kolkhoz... was organised by a Commissar called Kagan, who used to go into a house, put his pistol on the table, and then ask – 'Are you willing to join the kolkhoz?'. In 1932, the population of that village was 180 people, and in 1939 there were only 70 people in the village, in other words, before the war 110 people emigrated to Saint Petersburg, which had strong connections in the revolutionary years.

Other kolkhozes were organised in the same way at that time, for example according to my mother, not far from where we lived – it's Luzhskij region now, there was a settlement. There were 25 small population points ('khutors'), and in 1935 they were all forced into the kolkhoz, and the livestock too, into one place. But the tragedy of that kolkhoz was made even worse in 1937: well, in every family there was obviously a head of the family, a man... and 25 smallholdings got together in one kolkhoz. First of all the chairman of the kolkhoz went round at night time, knocking on the doors, and they took away the head of the household. So first of all they took 23 people, and then they took the head of the kolkhoz away as well, I mean – they didn't come back. Then it was made known that they'd been given 10 years each, without the right to correspond, and you can find them only in the records of Memorial. In other words, they were shot. And then that Estonian kolkhoz had another disaster, just like other Estonian settlements. They came and chopped down ('stropili'?) and ordered everyone to move to a new place, and as a result of that resettlement, my parents ended up in the village of Radolitsa in 1939, then in 1943, I was born. Well – you can say what you like, but it was those 'repressions' that helped me to be born.

Then there's the fate of my mother: in 1934, my grandfather's family was 'de-kulakised'. My mother didn't even finish the 4th class at school, she was born in 1922, and in 1934 she finished the 4th class. They took everything, the family was forced out of the house – 'go – wherever'.

My grandfather sent his 2 daughters to his parents to look after the livestock for the khutor. And in 1935, my mother was still in that place... and in the spring, in April 1935, the whole family – my grandfather, grandmother, 4 children were sent off to the Urals, to the Perm region. But it didn't end there: in 1938, my grandfather and grandmother were shot, they worked at that time at the piloram, you know, as son of an evacuee. They were shot as political spies – you know, that Article 58.

As far as other aspects of life at that time were concerned, well I remember, for example, how difficult... that is – I was born into a kolkhoz, and from the first day I was counted as one of the members of the kolkhoz, then when the time came, later on, around the 50s or 60s, to study, you had to pass an exam to get into the institute, and then you got an official declaration from the institute to say that you had studied there. And after that, only on the 30th August 1961, when I was 18, then I was given the right to receive a passport. In the Pskov region, a passport for members of the kolkhoz was impossible to get, I can assure you of that. It's often said in the press that Khrushev gave the kolkhoz members passports. But it wasn't like that... a large number of the Karl Marx kolkhoz members received a passport only at the beginning of 1979 – that wasn't anything to do with the Khrushev 'thaw'. That was to do with the Yeltsin (sic) Declaration, which Brezhnev signed in 1975 and that meant he had to give everyone a passport in 1979.

Then about other things.. what can I say... well, for example, there's a lot of rubbish about deliberate 'sabotage' concerning livestock. I mean, sensible people have explained to me... yes, the number of livestock began to fall. It was all said to be a result of sabotage. What can you say: we're talking about war. A village was half burned down. The livestock was in the forest, the village was ready, the population was hiding in dug-outs, trenches – so there were no victims among the villagers. The only thing that died was a single butterfly!

Then when I was 2 weeks old, the house was burnt down where I was born, with all my nappies (??). I spent 2 days living in a hut with my parents. Of course we didn't die from starvation.

Then there's one other memory from my childhood, which makes you cry, perhaps. My friends, older than me, their fathers died or went to gaol. I had 2 friends like that. And I go round to see them and they're baking bread. They offer me some bread. I go home and ask 'why don't you bake lovely bread like my friends?' My Dad calls me an idiot and says 'you should try it round their place tomorrow!' In other words, they baked bread, but half the flour was made out of potato skins. So yes, it was warm, and you could eat it, but what else... Well, in theory, I mean it was wartime.

Maybe one more thing worth remembering – in the village these 70 people were called up to go to war. About the same number of evacuees were brought here, based here. Well to our credit, I can say that in my village not one evacuee died from hunger. That is, stuff was shared out. Not a lot, but it was shared. So that was a victory of the civilian population, we forget that 70 people saved maybe another 70 evacuees.

Then once we were playing with a small knife, and we lost it in a furrow and then when they carried out a search, because of us two people were sent to gaol, one of them for 3 years. Whose fault was it? The system. There we go, maybe I've missed something out. That's probably all.»

Bazoleva, Maria Nikolaeva

Novosokolniki

18 December, 2006

Interviewed by Nina Vasilevna and Anastasia Sushko.

* * *

This is Nina Vasilevna and Anastasia Sushko, we are at the home of Bazoleva, Maria Nikolaeva. Are you still sleeping?

I didn't sleep all night.

I see. We're here for the second time, you know... and we wondered if we could ask you some questions... Could you tell us whether you were born in Novosokolniki?

I was born in the village of Kruglikova, in this region... My parents worked the land. My father was Daryanov, Nikolaj Yakovlevich, my mother was Daryanova, Tatiana Dmitrievna. I have one brother, Ivan Nikolaevich, he lives in Otradnoe.

...
I was born in 1936, I was very young in the 1930s and 1940s. Well – I remember from my mother's stories that that was when there was de-kulakisation. But we weren't – there was nothing to be taken from us. We weren't completely starving, but we were quite poor. But my relatives were de-kulakised – I'm not sure which ones, but they were not distant relatives. They had their livestock taken, grain, everything they possessed.

Tell us which was the most difficult period

The war, and just after it. We were very young, and very hungry, we had nothing.

Can you tell us – did you go to church at all?

No, I never went. There was a church in the village, but it was burnt down in the war, vandalised, and I don't know what happened afterwards.

If you compare life then with what it is like now?

No – it wasn't really easier then – now perhaps it's a little easier: at least we do receive something, then it was nothing at all. My mother first received a pension of 8 rubles, but which year that was – it must have been after the war, maybe it was in the 1980s already, I don't know. I know she got 8 rubles to start with, then 12 rubles. Then when she died, they got 25 rubles each. She worked all the time in the kolkhoz, looked after the calves, grazed them and looked after them. She had to feed them, milk them, then we took it in turns. We got up at 4.00 am and either Mama or one of us went off to graze the cows.

Today people talk a lot about Stalin, in the newspapers and on television – what do you think, is it true what they say?

Well what do they say? They say bad things, do they?

Well... they praise him and they curse him

I wouldn't curse him, I started to work when he died. In March 1953, I went off to work at MTS. That's where they took us and sent us off to the kolkhoz.

So you have a positive view of Stalin?

No – not positive. He did nothing wrong to me. Everyone cried, was in mourning: 'what's going to happen now to the country? There's nothing left, no-one left'.

Did you know at the time about the Stalinist repression? Did you know that people suffered?

Well – I knew. They took people off to Siberia, sent them off, some people – only like that. I knew from my mother's stories. they used to talk about it, that's all, but in general, I didn't know anything about it.

And do you think that that was justified, was it right what they did?

Well, I don't know. If you're talking about the post-war period, maybe it was wrong to send them off. People didn't exactly say it themselves, that they wanted to go off and work for the Germans.

Tell us about those terrifying events, what did you feel at that time?

What did I feel – bad, of course. Felt that it wasn't right. Well, you know, and that treachery – why was that war necessary? Forcing us into that, and the Germans were all different: some of them arrived and they were kind, some marched from Novosokolniki to Nevel, marched past, then they bombed – but not the village. On the outskirts, on the marshes they dropped bombs. Then when they returned, that was when the war had already started. They marched from Belarus.

What do you think – could all of that have been avoided? Or was it as it should have been?

No – I don't know. We were left behind, old people and women. We had nothing to defend ourselves with, we were chased out of our houses and told to go off to the cows and live on bread. But there were frightening Germans too, there were frightening ones and there were humane ones, who showed us pity. Babushka slept on the stove, there wasn't anywhere else for her, we were afraid to go outside to the toilet, we went under the bed, my brother and I. He was 3, I was 5. We were afraid to go out in the street, specially when there was a commandant's office. They told us “schnell, schnell”, take your rags and get out of here, go to the hay loft. We lived in the hay loft with the cow. My mother fenced us off, she put the bed in there.

... then later on they sent us off all over the place, some went to Lithuania. We got there, we travelled the three of us – Mama, my brother and I. Our little house was bombed. We left the house and went off about 2 kilometres into the countryside, where my mother's grandmother and her sister lived. My mother's brother also went there – he came from Leningrad and stayed with us for the war, he was there for the whole war. Mama said 'if we're going to die, we might as well go together'. We cut up the cow, put the meat into barrels, and what things we had – the best things. You can't get everything on a sledge. I don't remember if we took the sledges to Lithuania or not, I don't remember, but I know that I walked behind the horse. Babushka was old, she and my brother rode, but I walked.

Then later on they put us into the goods wagon. We had a whole goods wagon for my family. On one side, the horse stood, and we were on the other side. But how we got back again, well I don't know. I didn't ask Mama who took us back again, I don't know. The Germans said to us – don't hide anything, take everything with you. They hid a lot of stuff in the forest, then later on dug up the piles, but didn't find anything.

Tell us what you think now about people's rights?

Well of course, all sorts of things happen. It's not really that people's rights are violated, of course it's difficult, hard to live and things are bad. I worked for over 50 years. I started work and didn't even have a passport. In 1953, in September, I think, there was an order for everyone to have a passport. And we were ordered as well, although we worked on the land – but we still counted as workers (kadres). We were so stupid then – anyway, what did we need a passport for? Where would we go with that!

But then we weren't able to leave. I worked for 4 years and then they transferred me – they didn't transfer everyone. But they took me from the kolkhoz at MTS to work on accounts at the factory shop, and I worked there for a long time. Then they transferred me to work as cashier. Then the bank ordered that no-one could enter the building without a passport. So I went home and I said to Mama 'I need a passport – where can I get that now?' We didn't need one before. Well, so I went off and got 2 bottles of samogon (vodka) – Mama bought them for a rouble each. There were no plastic bags of course – we put them in a string bag, wrapped them up in newspaper, and off I went to Chistyakov. He worked at the kolkhoz, so I went up to him. He asked me 'well what have you come to me for, you need a document from the kolkhoz. How can I let you go?'. And he just shrugs his shoulders. I said well I don't know – give me the documents, please. He's that sort of man: he says 'I can't, I'd have to get all the management together, no-one will let you go, you should have thought about it earlier'. So I started crying, and I left. I'd already worked enough to get one.

I used to go to the rural Soviet, I knew people there. So I went and found another chairman, a young man, and I went to him and he gave me the document. I went back to MTS with the documents, then I went to the police – and there they make a fuss about every sort of piece of paper. I submitted the documents and went back home, all happy. Then later on they said I could come and pick up my passport. I was shaking all over when I went to pick it up, but I got my passport, and I ran home, so delighted.

And at school I left after the 7th class.

Do you mind if we use what you have told us in our book?

I haven't told any lies. I just talked about myself, about my life.

So we can?

Of course you can.

Can we take a picture of you?

But my hair's all a mess!

Gorchakova, Luisa Vladimirovna

Velikie Luki

4 January, 2007

Interviewed by: Maria Lazareva, Iulia Gorbunova, Varvara Sergeeva

* * *

We are interviewing Luisa Gorchakova, 4th January, 2007. Could you tell us who your parents and grandparents were, please?

My grandmother was a cook... My grandmother had 13 children.

A large family!

13 children, yes. And my mother was a teacher of Russian language and literature, and my father was a construction engineer.

And their names?

Anna Ivanovna and Vladimir Vladimirovich. They were born there, in Siberia. Mama studied Russian at the.... My brother was born in 1935, my second brother in 1937 and I was born in 1938. That's it, there were three of us.

...
My grandparents studied at the same institute. Mama said that Papa courted her for a long time... look, you have lots of questions, I tell you what – Mama had no time to talk to us because she had to earn enough and bring up the 3 of us, and there was a 4th as well, a niece Rimma Antonovna. She was also a teacher of Russian and her father died in the war, then her mother died, so she lived with us. So there were 4 of us, and Mama had to bring us all up. She only had time for work, that's all she ever did, but she lived for a long time.

Did your grandmother talk to you about her life?

You know what – she didn't because she had 13 children and every day she had to go 30 kilometres, there and back.

To work?

She worked as a cook for a local landlord... She had lots of work, the only thing I remember is that she got my mother a job. She went to see them and managed to fix herself up as a servant – they had lots of children. So she washed the floor, she's washing and they throw some coins at her. She picked one up, but the other disappeared somewhere. And she goes on washing, clearing up, and she finds the second coin, picks it up and puts it on the table. And then later on he comes up to my grandmother and says 'Ooh, how honest your Niura is! I deliberately threw down some coins to see if she would take them or not'. And it was very difficult...

What was particularly difficult?

Difficult because there were lots of children and they all had to be given food and drink. Then when my grandmother had 10 children, her husband died, and she married my grandfather. Then my mother... he married my grandmother and then Mama and Uncle Lesha arrived, and then one more from him, from my grandfather.

And what do you remember from your own childhood? What did you do?

We played lapta [?????? ? ?????, ? ????????]... we particularly loved playing Cossack-bandits. Then we did skipping, we had dolls, but Babushka made them. You know, she drew the eyes on, made them out of fabric.

Did you have any animals?

When I lived in Yakutsk, yes. My grandfather had a horse – but you know, winter was only 2 months long. It was very hot there but the good thing was that there were lots of fruits, berries – lots and lots. Sorrel, onion, cranberry, red bilberry. Mama used to go out and then she taught all of us. And my grandmother made butter and baked pies, we made our own pelmeni. There was lots of storage space and we all used to make pelmeni, the older ones and the little ones – and then they were put in there. I remember that from when I was young. Then we had a cow, horse – it looks like we weren't really poor, since I don't say much about that. That's what they say – it looks like we were rich. But I say no, we lived like that, through our own hard work, we never had any potatoes. Only dry potato. I could never get used to potatoes – you ask my husband. I say to him 'heat up some kasha, and something else' and he asks 'what no potatoes?' But we never had any. Then my grandfather looked, looked... then the war, and we went off to the Ukraine. And we had a cow and he used to make hay. My grandfather slept there, and he caught cold and died, and then we sold the house and went off to Yakutsk. We went by ship to start with, then we climbed onto a military train and travelled the rest of the way. And in the morning I wake up and Mama's not there, she's gone to work. When she gets back in the evening I'm already asleep. So what can Mama have told me?

What can you tell us about life in Siberia and Ukraine?

Well what can I say... when we arrived I was 8 or 9. I only know that when we travelled about after the war, everywhere was chaos, destroyed. My grandmother married my grandfather – he was... he was exiled. To start with he went to prison, had to serve his term.

Do you know why he was exiled?

Well someone... and then we didn't bother to try to find out why. I asked what it was for and they told me that a bad person did it. So that's how he was exiled to Siberia.

Tell me which holidays you used to celebrate

Lots... New Year... we used to wait for our presents, everyone gave presents, and my grandmother and grandfather were there, Mama was there too. And we'd get dressed up, we did all that. We had a big Christmas tree, right up to the ceiling, and we sang songs 'In the forest a pine tree grew', I still remember it today.

And when Mama was a teacher, you know, I had 2 brothers ... and I would write and have no mistakes at all and they – well they loved mathematics. I couldn't do maths at all, but for Russian I always got a 4 or 5. I remember we would do dictation and Mama always gave me 5 and she would give them 2. 'You should be ashamed... two older brothers and look at your dictation. Take an example from your sister!' And I didn't even know the text, hadn't done that at school, but see how well I knew Russian language. But then I have one engineer, he lives in Moscow now, and the second is an artistic director, he lives and works in Kiev. I got married at 21 to a metal worker () from Pskov.

Did you meet him in Ukraine?

Yes, he was in the army there. He's not a pilot but – how is it... he served in the airforce in Kiev and they sent him to Grebenka, and that's where I lived. That's how we met – my friend introduced him to me, she worked as a telephonist and she introduced me to Vladimir, and he took me off to Novosokolniki. In 1968 I got married, we had an expensive wedding. He was 24.

Did you used to celebrate religious holidays?

You know... I'm soon going to be 69, but Mama wouldn't allow me to.

Was your mother not baptised?

No, she wasn't, she didn't allow it because Mama didn't want it. Mama never went into a church. Babushka always celebrated religious festivals and she went to church. She was a very good cook, a really wonderful cook – she would make varenniki with honey, that sort of thing. But Mama didn't go, because that was not allowed. Grandmother went to church though. I've got 2 sons, the oldest one is baptised and the second one also.

Was there a church in your neighbourhood?

I don't remember that – I was only 8 or 9 years old. No – maybe I did go. But in Irkutsk, there there was a church and my grandmother used to go there. She had all 13 of her children baptised and my mother was baptised as well. You see I don't understand, ??look I'll put my glasses on... see there were holidays, people went to the cemetery.

What about collectivisation and de-kulakisation – did that affect you?

I don't think so.

//But you said your grandmother had worked as a cook for some landowner. All the landowners were de-kulakised, sent off to the kolkhozes.

That was before the war, and there was nothing there. I used to walk 30 kilometres there and 30 kilometres back. She died when she was 83, she had a heart made out of stone, my mother died at 69 – that's her daughter for you. And babushka died at 83, she lived even longer. She had a tumour. But she always said that she worked for a landowner, but she wanted to work closer to home – but he wouldn't let her. And then of course it worried ?????????? her that she had lots of children. The only thing he did, he checked out my mother to see if she was honest or not. He didn't even know that he'd dropped that coin, but she found it and put it on the table. And he didn't expect that. Because she was from a simple family, with lots of children, so she should have taken the money for herself – but she would never, never take touch it, never take it.

So – I finished at teacher training college and worked in a nursery school in Novosokolniki for 37 years. They did modelling, sculpture there, drawing, story time. You see I ended up in a very good nursery school – one of the best – and we used to do modelling out of snow. See, it's New Year soon... it's terrible what a winter this is...

But in those days – a snowy winter! Next to us there was a railway line, and just imagine – the children would take their skates, collect lots of snow, and we would make sculptures of Father Christmas and Snow White. Then the 3 bears and Snow White, 3 bears and a hare, an elephant, fox – we sculpted all of that out of snow. I did so much sculpting! I learned how to sculpt. And I taught my children everything – drawing, sculpting. I was a railway worker, but I worked 37 years in a nursery school, sculpting, and I loved to draw.

See – and I've got 3 grandaughters and a grandson. One of them, she's already 24, she's married, the second grand-daughter is studying at the railway institute, the third... and the fourth, my little grandson Sergunchik.

You know – it was very difficult then, very very difficult.

Did you enjoy your school, learning in school?

I did. I particularly like geography Russian language, but I didn't like maths. I liked physics, didn't like algebra.

Did you enjoy history?

Not particularly.

How did they teach it?

We had a very good teacher, Valentina Ivanovna. We learnt about all the party congresses – and that was important then.

Were you a Pioneer?

I was, yes, and I was in the Komsomol.

Were you a member of the Party?

No I wasn't.

Why not?

You know – I just wasn't. I think I wasn't really good enough, I don't know why... but I was asked to be in it. I wasn't good enough. Mama really wanted me to join – I went to see her in the holidays and she said that's wonderful – you're going to be in the Party! But I didn't really want to. There were all those Party meetings and so on.

What did you think when the Soviet Union fell apart?

Well how can I say this... of course, very sorry. You know, in Brezhnev's time we lived very well, whatever he was like. I couldn't believe it... I'd worked in a nursery school and I had a tiny pension – I earned just 2300, and I'd worked for 43 years. 37 of those I'd been in charge of children – and then I didn't have enough. You know what – I asked them why I had such a tiny pension and they said, you know what they said? They said you didn't work 40 years. I said ok, fine, and I went and worked as a cleaner in a shop nearby, and I worked for 7 years there as a cleaner. I can't just sit still. I think we lived much better in Brezhnev's time. We had some sort of hope, we had dreams. And even when we got our salary – oh girls, if I had 5 rubles left over, that was a lot then! I was rich: 5 rubles I had!

You say it was good in Brezhnev's time – do you remember anything about the Stalin years?

I don't particularly remember anything. I just remember when he died, I remember that they left us all and we sat in the classroom, and then they asked us to stand up and we all went off and we cried, we mourned, because Stalin had died.

What did your parents tell you about it? Did they talk about it?

You know, I can't really say anything about that. Of course, Mam? ?????? ... everyone wondered how we would manage now without him.

Did you know anything about the repression?

No – you know, only what I've seen in films.

Did your mother say nothing about that?

My mother-in-law was not very well educated, no-one said anything to me. Maybe they told me something, but I don't remember now. They even brought me a book 'Kremlin Wives' about Molotov... Mama was always bringing it to me and saying 'read that, girlie'. You start reading it and ...wow! Could it be true? I read it all in one go. Very interesting it was, very.

Do you think that it was true, what was in those books?

I think it was partly true. You know, when we watch a film part of it's true, and part of it is exaggerated, isn't it.

And when you watch films about those times, what do you think? Why did it all happen?

You know, what can I say... part of it's true and part of it's a load of rubbish. I think they exaggerate. Maybe they wanted to show us that this is how it was – there were very few films before, you know. We loved to read. We believed all of it, and maybe that was right. Oh how I loved Korchagin! But I don't like all this – I don't like it that they show films where there's one murder after another, blood all over the place, all of that. And even the repression... I've got lots of books now, lots and lots. If I watched a film, I would buy a book afterwards – but you know, we were very poor then. It was fun, believe me, Mama made dresses for me... I loved the colour lilac and she made me a lilac dress. Oh girls, I was so pleased with that dress ??????????? Everyone used to say – look how fashionable Luisa is! Mama took a piece out of her dress, a small piece that had been torn off and she made it up into a dress for me. And it was so stylish, with pockets.. pockets everywhere, and everyone was so happy. We were fashionable!

What can you say about whether things have got better or worse? Was it more interesting then, or more difficult for you?

Oh no – our time was still better, everyone enjoyed themselves, sang songs. No no-one sings. We danced, walzes, tango... Our time – for me, it was very good. For you, of course it's the past. But you know what my grandsons said 'Granny – we love you, you're our special Granny – but we like the way we live'. I loved my time, but my grandsons, they like theirs.

Miliushenkov, Vasily Filippovich

Pskov region

23 November, 2006

Could you tell us your date of birth and who your parents and grandparents were, please?

26th April, 1932. My grandparents – I don't remember. Well of course they worked the land. Worked in the fields, cut the hay, cleared the land.

We're interested in the 1930s and 1940s, what do you remember about that period?

Well I was born in 1932. I was 9 years old during the war.

And what do you remember about those years?

Well until the war, we lived a normal life, that's what it seems to me. Earned enough money, we had bread, potatoes – and then the war started.

So there was no problem with famine?

No, none of that.

What about the de-kulakisation and collectivisation?

No – it was in 1935 that people started to join the kolkhoz. I don't know. I didn't see anything else.

So your parents didn't tell you anything about de-kulakisation?

No. We lived in the countryside. There were those smallholdings... and later on they shot them all. Yes, so there was that.

What was the name of your village?

Urdaki.

So you don't remember anything about collectivisation?

I don't remember. I saw real collectivisation only in the cinema. But apart from that, no.

So your parents really told you nothing about it?

Well my parents were kolkhozniki

What about totalitarianism, the Stalin regime? Did that affect your family at all, or maybe someone you knew?

Totalitarianism – no, it didn't.

What do you think about the repression at that time – did you know anything about that?

Well – only about Stalin's repression? There wasn't any of that. We had one person who went to prison – Pavel – and he sang songs about Stalin. They gave him 5 years.

So they gave him 5 years for singing songs about Stalin?

Well – he sang a serenade.

Sort of comical?

Well, yes. Everyone was like that... and then that was it. He wasn't there any more. But that was just before the war. After the war he'd already done his time.

I see. And what do you think about that? You probably know that in other towns there was repression, that people suffered?

I don't know.

Maybe you heard something about it after the war?

During collectivisation, my aunt's husband – he didn't want to join the kolkhoz. I don't know what happened. They took him away and he didn't appear again. Disappeared. Well, that was when the Stalinist repression was.

...

Do you remember anything about the war?

About the war? Well I remember how they took my father off to the town, and then after a while the Germans started to retreat. Then my father came back... then I didn't see him again.

He died, did he?

No – most likely he didn't die.

Where were you during the war?

At home, in the village. Everyone was evacuated – or rather, they left of their own accord, but my mother was sick. There were six of us.

What about the Germans – did they get to your village?

The Germans were here, but they didn't behave particularly badly. I remember they marched for a whole day to get to our village, they reached us.

What was life like during the war?

What was it like? Well there was a famine. Our hens were stolen, the pigs were killed.

Can you tell us what you think now about the repression? Was it necessary?

No, of course not. How could it be necessary. Of course I'm against it.

So you don't think it was justified?

I don't

Do you think it could have been avoided?

Well I don't know – of course it could have been.

How?

So that they didn't take you, you mean?

Well, so that the repression didn't happen at all

You had to keep quiet, say nothing. Then you stayed in one piece.

But lots of people kept quiet, everyone was afraid. What did you think of Stalin himself? Were you afraid of him or did you respect him?

You know, I'll tell you. I served in the army for 3 years during Stalin's time. In the army it was good in those days. Now they kill people. What sort of an army is that.

And what about Stalin?

Of course everyone was afraid of him. When Stalin died, I was still in the army and the Lieutenant came to us and said 'take off your hats, Stalin is dead'.

What was the reaction of most people?

Well most people did react; in the army it was all quite calm. ????????? ????

So there weren't strong feelings in the army?

No, no.

Tell us what you think when you compare life today, and life at that time? Which was better?

Well – what can I say. I'm not used to it yet. Things get better and better. But I didn't agree with it all before.

So you think...?

It's harder now.

Life was easier then?

Of course it was.

Do you think anything has improved?

No. For us, for poor people, it's just got worse. I have a pension of 3,000 roubles: what do you think – that I want to start working again?

What about the deficits before – today there's everything in the shops

Well – there used to be long queues in the shops for kolbasa (salami) – but we queued, didn't we.

And was it not problematic that you couldn't say whatever you liked?

I wasn't prevented then: I always say what I say, and they didn't take me away before, and they don't take me away today.

Can you tell us a bit more about your time in the army?

In the army.

Yes, well what was different – can you tell us that?

In 1961 I joined the army. There was the same work there as on the smallholdings. That's all.

What about school? Can you tell us about that?

I finished my education. Well – we didn't go to school during the war. In 1945 I left school after the 7th year.

When you were in the army, was there such a thing as 'dedovshina' (abuse of younger conscripts)?

When I was in the army, that concept did not exist. I'm amazed by what happens today – there used to be none of that. There were rumours, but nothing like that.

Yes – as far as I know, it appeared in the 1980s. It was already happening when democratisation started.

Yes we call them democrats. What on earth is that then?

After the army what did you do?

I worked at the airport until I retired.

And during the war, since you were in occupied territory, you could have been refused employment – I mean, you might not be trusted

Well yes, they might not employ you.

Were there any particular difficulties?

No, I was employed by the state.

So you think that the state at that time looked after people better, that you had more social security.

Yes. In terms of accommodation, and in terms of schooling – you got a good education. Now, if you fall ill – you go off and die somewhere. What on earth is that.

Do you think that it had an effect on people that the Soviet Union was behind the Iron Curtain, that it was isolated from western society, from European countries?

Well that's what people say. But I don't know.

It didn't really affect society?

No.

What about forbidden literature?

We could get it if we wanted to, we just hid it.

So there was really nothing particularly shocking in your lifetime?

No.

Perhaps one of your acquaintances told you something about the repression?

No. There's not even the kolkhoz now. It's all been divided up and abandoned. The land is empty. Nothing's as it should be.

You think it was better then?

Yes, for me it was better then... But my children think the opposite.

We've forgotten one thing: can you tell us about religion?

Well, you know, at the beginning maybe some people believed in God. But I wasn't baptised and never believed. Some people might have thought there was a God, but no-one did anything or said anything.

So people didn't hide the fact... but were there people who went to church secretly?

No, they didn't go.

Were they allowed to?

Of course – go if you want. They even baptised their children.

What about during the war?

People weren't thinking about church then. We were dying from starvation after the war.

What about – in some places the churches were destroyed, vandalised, or made into dance clubs

I don't know. The church here stood as it has always stood.

Were you in the (communist) party?

No I wasn't... I was in the komsomol.

What else... So in general, your life has been comfortable, and you are glad to have lived much of it in the Soviet Union?

I lived in the Soviet Union and I would be happy to live in it again.

Pavel Adelgejm

Pavel Adelgejm

Pskov

Year of birth: 1938

Interviewed by Nastya Mikshevich, Liuba Ploshednova, Anya Mihailusova, Nadezhda Egorovna

4th February, 2007

---

Tell us about your parents please.

Well: my grandfather... I think I should start from there. My grandfather was German, he lived I don't know when – either during Ekaterina the Great's reign or in Peter the Great's, but he came to live in Russia. His roots can be traced back to the Baltics... 3 books exist about his surname. Even Walter Scott, in Ivanhoe, and – what was it called – 'The Lazy Cavalier'. There were obviously roots in different countries – you can find them in France too. The names are slightly changed, they would have been...

Well, anyway, my grandfather lived in Russia, and he was educated abroad as an engineer. A good education, evidently, because he built a whole lot of factories not far from Kiev. There was a china factory, and in Glukhovtsi a sugar factory and one where icons were made. There were lots of them. Then when the Revolution happened – he stayed on as Director of the factory for another 10 years after 1917. In 1927 – 1928 he was asked to set up the same factory in Vilnius, and he did that – as chief engineer in both places, and then later on as the Director of both factories.

Then in 1938, he decided to visit his family, because they had stayed behind in Kiev, on Rejtarskij St. They were living in very squashed conditions: there were only 2 rooms left from the original house. In one of the rooms lived a housemaid and her daughter, and in the other our grandmother lived. When he came back, the housemaid informed on him,and they took him away, and then after 2 months, after Epiphany, they gave a service for him. They'd delivered a package for him, you see, and they just returned his things and said he had died. So that was the fate of one of my grandfathers – he died. My grandmother, after that, and when the war started, she decided to leave the country. Of course she wasn't able to go anywhere at all. She fell very ill and ended up in a small shack, and in the yard by that shack she passed away.

That was on my father's side, and then on my mother's side my grandfather was Nikanor Pilaev. He studied at the military academy and was a colonel in the Tsar's army, but his fate ended after the Revolution. And my grandmother lived in Moscow.

So now about my father: all children of the repressed were taken up by strangers and given into slavery. They had no right to study in higher educational institutions, and they were deprived of lots of other civil rights as well. But he was a very talented person, he was a poet – he wrote lots of poetry. But his life was cut short at an early age: he wasn't even 30.

I remember I went to a meeting – a round table – at the history department, and I looked out all the old documents. I prepared photographs, and then when I went home again, I put everything back where it should be (he shows some photographs). My father wasn't able to study further, although he wanted to be an engineer as well, like his father. They refused him – they refused him at the entrance exam. The only place he was able to study was at the Studio Simonova, at the Vakhtang Theatre. He qualified at the theatrical institute, and that was where he met my mother. They got married there. Then they left for the town of Ivanovo, and he became Director of the regional theatre company.

In Ivanovo, when the war started, they arrested them – 15 of them were arrested, accused of espionage and treason. Out of the 15, 5 were shot. Then after some years, when things started to come apart, it turned out that except for the statements that they had made themselves, there was no basis at all for the accusations. Only what they had blurted out themselves – and they said what they did for perfectly understandable reasons. The first time they were questioned, they answered normally. But then from the second time onwards, they started to cover themselves with whatever they could think of, put up smoke screens. Then when the whole thing unwound – particularly because all the documents of the German secret service were revealed – and my mother was sent to prison, and I was left alone. I was just 2 1/2 by then. I ended up in a children's home, then we were exiled to Kazakhstan. We lived there until 1953, until Stalin died – there were enormous numbers of people settled there, huge numbers of de-kulakised people. My mother was released later on.

My wife had a completely different fate. Quite opposite. Her grandfather fought at the front, and strange though it may seem, he got through the whole war and returned home without even a wound. But his 3 sons died at the front.

Can you tell us anything about the 1930s and 1940s?

I was only born in 1938, so I can't tell you anything about that. But about the 1940s...-

When you were in the children's home, did you keep your name and surname?

Of course.

How did people treat you there?

There were lots of children like that. Then I entered the Kiev-Pechersky Monastery – I was a lay-brother there. After that I went into the seminary, studied there for 3 years, and then they didn't exactly ban me, but asked me to leave. Then I went off to Tashkent, worked there and built a cathedral – although at that time it was forbidden. I was imprisoned for anti-soviet activities. One of my classmates from the Seminary wrote an official complaint about me to the Committee for State Security, saying that I had refused to sing the Soviet national anthem. The fact is that at that time, that anthem was forbidden: it wasn't just at the seminary that people didn't sing it, but even in the politburo. We were meant to study all members of the Party, know everything about them and in every detail. I was sent to prison in 1969. I spent a year in an underground cell, then I was sent off to a prison camp. I was in 4 different camps...

Then later on, they started to rehabilitate people: they rehabilitated my grandfather, my father, mother, and then they overturned my conviction, according to the criteria for rehabilitation. Now they need to rehabilitate my son, as the child of someone who was repressed.

Children of the repressed – that's a terrible thing, because it can even be felt in school, in the way people behaved. I was completely indifferent to Soviet power: I didn't share its outlook and felt no love towards it at all. In general, you should never love the state, you can only love the fatherland. Soviet ideology always connected those two concepts, but in fact it had in mind the state. We were under the impression that we should love the state. Soviet power treated us as enemies – not because of something we had done, but because according to its own psychology, if someone's parents had been murdered, their family destroyed, then that person would be bitter, angry, full of malice. But this is where they were mistaken: we bore no malice, because we were Christians. For Christians, revenge is a sin. We had a peaceful attitude towards the state, a human relationship towards it.

What did you know about de-kulakisation and about collectivisation?

The thing is – I not only knew about it, but I saw and heard those people. My wife could tell you more about de-kulakisation than I can. Her family was not a rich one. They had 3 horses, some land, and grandfather built the house with his own hands. It was a large family. The village was a small one, with a population of 15,000. They wanted grandfather to join the kolkhoz but he refused, categorically. And he said categorically, that no-one from his family was going anywhere.

They took the ropes away – they wove these themselves. They took the horses, the plough... They took everything, and left them with nothing. Then during Khruschev's time – in general, strange things happened at that time. They took the plough and ploughed the land around the house. They couldn't have even one small seed-bed: they had to go and work in the kolkhoz. In front of every house there were large areas of land which couldn't be used. The land stood empty for many, many years. That's what an interesting government we had. You could respect it, or you could laugh at it. In fact, at the time, we used to joke that that was the only form of our relation with the authorities.

Can you tell us about religion?

That's a question it's hard to answer briefly. Beginning with Lenin – all the documents have been made available by now – the authorities in charge of the country made it their aim to eliminate the church completely. But despite the fearful, iron will of the state, it was still unable to deal with religion. In other words: history repeated itself. The Roman state had tried to eliminate Christianity – there were thousands of martyrs. They died, but their blood turned out to be the seeds of Christianity, and that iron state cracked, it became a Christian one. Then exactly the same happened with the Soviet state. It seemed that everything had been reduced to nothing: in Russia there were 80,000 cathedrals, and only 150 remained by the beginning of the war. The five-year period which was to end with the start of the war was even called the 'Godless Five-Year Plan'. By 1941, the church should have been uprooted in its entirety, but instead – the war began. Stalin turned to the country and said 'Brothers and Sisters...' In other words, he spoke for the first time in the language of Christianity. He was very alarmed in the month of October, very scared. In that manner, when the war ended, the church began to be revived.

But there was terrible legislation concerning the Church. There was a revival of spirituality, of the clergy, but among them more than 300,000 were eliminated for 'insubordination'. From every generation of priests, I think they all went to the prison camps.

After the Great Fatherland War, a completely different era began (1947 – 1949). Stalin began to rely for help on the Orthodox Church, he tried to build relations with it. Until the death of Stalin, relations between the Church and State were quite tolerable. But from 1953, very many people had to turn away from religion, from being Christened. This would begin and end very suddenly, because different people would come to power with a different set of aims objectives. So it's hard to explain it all in the same way. But in general, they were all inclined towards atheism. Of course, there wouldn't have been any fuss about Christians if they could have worshiped idols or emperors, but Christians will worship only God. In Brezhnev and Khrushchev's time the situation with the Church was very difficult. And when Gorbachev started talking about some sort of rights and freedoms, this sounded very strange to me – completely unbelievable. Then the 'thaw' began (this was about 1988) and continued until 1992. Then again we began to feel the pressure.

And now this apparent flourishing of the church, all this building of cathedrals is quite unnecessary. There are some places where there is no church at all, where people have been starved of the church's words, of christianity. In Pskov, though, we have a different situation: we have 30,000 churches for 700,000 people. This is the only Russian town with such an enormous number of churches – not Moscow, not Saint Petersburg, but right here in Pskov!

Can you tell us whether people at that time were able to change their place of residence, or of work?

Not everyone. Many people didn't want to get a passport, and it turned out that the passport is the only way to live a normal life. The entire rural population was without passports. In the cities people could move from one town to another, and there was no problem with that. Well – in Moscow you needed a propiska, and in Saint Petersburg, but for the other towns, you could move between them freely. But of course – times were different, and there were different epochs. As far as the villages were concerned, everyone there was tied, bonded. Take my life, for example: when I met my future wife, it took us 3 days to register our marriage, and just because they wouldn't give her a passport straight away. They just delayed it, just for a while. Then later on she joined the Komsomol, so that she could leave the village on one of their permits. Boys could get passports after they had served in the army, and girls by joining the Komsomol. People from the villages began to try desperately to leave – for anywhere they could – just in order to escape. Later on it became unbelievably difficult.

But the thing is that I was very young then – I don't really remember. Then during Khrushchev's time I was a priest and I lived a life of religion. If you compare the state of the Church then and now, then I would say it was better in Khrushchev's time. The unfortunate times joined us together. I could go to the Bishop and tell him everything that was worrying me, and he would listen to me with his full attention. But now there is none of that: he lives in a world where there are no moral demands, and is wholly unconcerned with theological matters. In religious life today there is commerce, there is politics. Religious life, unfortunately, has lost a great deal. On the outside, the churches are decorated, painted; but on the inside we are losing our spiritual life.Before, when I was a priest in Karagand, religious services were forbidden, and we all used to gather in some house or another at around 10.00, and we would pray until 5.00 in the morning. All together. In Tashkent, the same thing happened: there was an intense spiritual life in the cathedral.

When did you decide you wanted to be a Priest?

I just happened on a wonderful church community, and I used to travel there regularly. There was a wonderful Father there – he was renowned. So there was – I mean it was forbidden to give religious services, forbidden to preach, but we used to meet in different houses every evening. Somewhere around 10.00 the service would begin, and around 5.00 it ended.

He wasn't very old – about 58, I think. He would read the service all night. At 5.00 in the morning it would end, and we would drink cups of tea, then obviously we all went to sleep – and he would go on to another house. And I remember one little house...

Where else did you serve as a priest?

I was in Koroleva. I had my own parish - unofficial, of course - and officially I served in Pskov... There wasn't a church, there was a small benefice, a community of about 25 people.

Can you tell us what you think when you compare life in those days with today?

You know – there used to be a joke about new times – 'We live like dogs: the chain is longer than it was, but everyone steals from everyone else, and it isn't clear who to bark at'. Of course – today we

live in a mad bazaar, and soon life will be terrifying. In those days there was order, but no-one had the right to express his opinion. Everyone was well-fed, clothed and shoes on their feet. But everyone looks at it in a different way. In our day, we needed books – and they didn't just sit on the shelves, we read them, and read them, all night long. Literature was rare: we had to snap it up, and people were ready to give whatever was needed to get it. My wife typed out whole books of Akhmatova, Tsvetaeva, Ivanov, Lewis – everything that was forbidden.

Thank you – you have answered all our questions!

My pleasure.

Volkova, Ekaterina Ivanovna

Pskov Region

We're particularly interested in the 1930s and 1940s

Well – what did we have at that time... there was the Soviet government... we were OK ('zhili')

Did the political situation have any impact on your life?

On my personal life?

(Someone in the background says 'well go on – tell them about the 1930s. Tell them how you worked on the kolkhoz, then you left, why you left)

I was here till 1933, then I left, because there was no-one to do the work. There was grandfather, we didn't have a father, there were 3 of us and we lived here – grandfather, grandmother... up until 1930, even up till 1933. Then Sasha's son, his brother left, the land was no good, and they didn't have enough for a loaf of bread. We weren't too worried about loaves of bread, we lived a very modest life. So anyway, Vika's father left, then my brother left, then I left in 1933. I went off to the town, but you couldn't get registered anywhere, and I didn't really have any official documents from here.

Well I worked as a maid, I worked... I was already 18, had my passport by then and I worked as a housemaid. I had to feed the child, wash nappies – I was 18 years old.

So that's how I managed, then in the summer I arrived here, and the kolkhozes had already been set up. There were 2 kolkhozes and we used to go to the other one, because we'd given up our horse to the kolkhoz and they were making money on our horse, and we had nothing. Grandfather was old, so was grandmother, mama too, and I worked all summer and so did my friends. So we used to go off there. We earned enough over the summer, they still didn't really give us any documents, so we left for the town... Well I worked in the college, a friend fixed that up for me. So I worked from 1934 – 1939, then I got married to one of the students. It was a military college. Then the war... the war. And in 1939 we went to Poland, just when we got married, in 1939 in Poland, my husband was called up. He was an officer. We didn't live in occupied Russia – we were evacuated. My husband was sent from one place to another – he was a soldier, you see. Then I came back home – no, not home, I forgot. I came back to where we'd lived the first time, to the Kirov region. Then I had a son, and we were evacuated with my son, then he died. And my husband came back from the hospital, and we had to get ready to go again. Yes, I mean my son had died, we had to work. All young people worked then, all of them, and no-one – no, everyone worked, and I had to. And I had just... well I finished my course and worked. I worked for 3 years, it was all like that... and then life...

Did you know anything about the repression?

What?

Did you know about repression?

Me – no, nothing.

It didn't affect you?

Not us, no. We weren't aware of that, of repression. But we were, as people say, we were a hard working family, we were, like they say, a peasant family. I grew up in a peasant family... I lived here, on this plot of land, like they say, we had a house. The Germans were here, but we weren't aware of repression, not in any way.

What happened with religion at that time?

Religion was our life then, up intil 1930. And the school was very good, and the teachers... All young people went to evening service in the church, particularly on the big festivals. Then we sang in the choir, there were nuns there. They sang, and we did, the young people. We had robes and white shawls. Then they destroyed the monastery, I don't know who did it, how it was done. But some of the nuns stayed, those who were locals... there was even... my grandmother's sister, Tatiana, then there was Danilova – you know, the locals. And the nuns taught us, we used to get together. There weren't any clubs, we used to get together .. one day in our house, next day in the neighbour's, and we learnt from them. They didn't teach us anything bad – they taught us how to sow, needlework.

So the girls and I, we were taught how to iron, to sow ???????, to knit – that was all the nuns, they were good with their hands. And there was a little house, it's not there now, and we used to go over there. That's what they did, so it was fine, we didn't see anything we shouldn't. True – we didn't get a pension, because new people came into power... Mama didn't get one, although there were 3 of us. My brother was 4, second brother was 2, then I was born. Papa was at the front. So I grew up with grandmother, grandmother, and Mama, and we worked at home. We had our own bit of land, and we worked right from when we were tiny. Whatever we could do.

So you did what you could. That was what it was like, like that. Then later on a completely different life began.

And what do you think has changed for the better, or for the worse?

I don't know – it didn't really concern me. It doesn't concern me... we live, how we live, and I'm old enough now for nothing really to matter. But you know, we didn't used to drive around in cars, now people go everywhere in cars. I think that's bad – we went everywhere by foot, we walked everywhere. Someone came to see me and he starts saying ooh Aunt Katya! You walked to school! And I say, yes, I walked to school, we all used to walk, everything by foot. Babushka lived near the Serebryanka, Mama used to walk 20 kilometres to see her. Without any difficulty we used to walk, we didn't even feel it. Maybe we were stronger then, people now are much weaker, not so tough.

(laughing) Yes. And can you tell us about an important event in your life?

Well .. what was important for me. An important event happened during the war. My husband was an officer and I used to travel with him. But then I had a child and he was sent off to the front, to Poland. Then the war started, and I didn't hear anything from him at all, not for 3 years. He didn't know where I was and I didn't know where he was. Then in 1943, my little boy had already died, and I'd finished studying, because I had to work of course. I'd been evacuated, I had nothing for my feet, no shoes – well, boots I had, and a coat. I was an evacuee with my child and we had one suitcase, nothing at all apart from that. And then suddenly they called me from the hospital, I was the caretaker, I remember that day – it was Red Army Day. And they called me, and I left the house, where we lived in a flat. And I asked 'what's happened... what's happened to my husband?' I didn't know anything, you see. And she said 'It's not about your husband – it's your husband!' And I burst into tears. That was a big event.

And I ran, I said 'Aleksandr – Sasha!' because we hadn't know anything about each other, not for 3 years. It had been such a terrible war – and then this... this happened. I'm feeling all nervous from this ... everyone asked me what's happened? What happened? Has there been a death? No, no – not a death... my husband, they say. So what are you crying for! What am I crying for? It's all so unexpected. I hadn't even imagined it.

So there you are. There's an event. We met, and we lived together for 63 years.

What helped you to get through the difficult patches? How did you manage?

What helped me – that we need to live, need to live, need to work. That's how I managed. We didn't chase after new clothes. We wore what there was.

Thank you very much

war crimes

'Too bad Khadafi's infant daughter died, one columnist wrote. Too bad, he said, but that's the game of war. Well, if that's the game, then let's get the hell out of it, because it is poisoning us morally, and not solving any problem. It is only continuing and escalating the endless cycle of retaliation which will one day, if we don't kick our habits, kill us all.'

Howard Zinn, in Terrorism over Tripoli

• See this page for all nuggets on crimes of war1, or use the headings in the list below for specific topics.
• See the war laws page for some of the legal documents relating to war (including definitions of 'crimes of peace' and the International Criminal Court's list of 'crimes of war').

• 1. A sloppy, non-legal use of the term 'war crimes', which I use to cover all criminal acts connected with war. Technically (according to the Nuremberg Charter) war crimes are violations of the laws or customs of war.