When I boarded the plane, I was lucky to get a window seat. As the motors turned over, I watched the MVD agent walk back into the terminal now that I was “safely” on my way. This was the first time I had ever flown, and as we hurtled down the runway I felt a pounding in my heart, then a ripple of cold knots down my spine as the plane rose from the ground. I leaned back hard in the seat and shut my eyes, trying not to move a muscle; I could feel the drumming of the motors in my head until my ears popped.
When the motors slacked off somewhat, and the plane seemed to level out, I looked out the window—a magnificent sight! Stretching away below us was the severe North, with snow everywhere and mountain peaks standing out in harsh, sharp silhouettes against the brilliant white. There was no shrubbery to be seen, nothing but the vast, unchanging white and the raw similarity. I gazed in true awe at the scene, then closed my eyes again and leaned back in the seat, hoping the uneasiness at the base of my stomach would disappear.
As we flew on, I could actually feel the change in climate and at Krasnoyarsk, for the first time in twelve years, I experienced the warm softness of a spring day. It was almost like moving in a dream. The trip from Krasnoyarsk to Dudinka had taken over two weeks in the hold of the Stalin twelve years ago; it had taken only four hours to fly back.
The terminal here, unlike the little whitewashed barrack at Nadiezda Airport, was an imposing structure of brick and glass, with gleaming stairways and huge counters. I was carrying two suitcases—my Mass kit and vestments were in one—and the day was so warm that I was soon perspiring in my winter clothes. In front of the airport terminal I hailed a taxi. According to my instructions, I was to stay at the Hotel Syever until I reported to MVD headquarters, so to the Hotel Syever I went.
South from the airport, past the hill called Pokrovka (Our Lady’s Veil), Stalin Boulevard, the main street of Krasnoyarsk, goes all the way to the railroad station of the Trans-Siberian Railroad at the south end of town, then curves around Nikolayevka, a residential suburb on a hill overlooking the Yenisei to the west. Across the river, on the Pravi Biereg (Right Bank) is the industrial section of the city. Paralleling Stalin Boulevard is another broad avenue, called Lenin Avenue, and the Hotel Syever is on this, just about midtown. It is a six-story building of dark yellow—almost orange—stucco, lined to resemble stone blocks. Two blocks away from the Syever is the city hall, on Stalin Boulevard, as are most of the main buildings of Krasnoyarsk.
When I asked the girl at the desk of the Syever for a room, she immediately wanted to know where I was from. “From the north (syever),” I said. “Let me see your certificate,” was her answer. I gave her my documents, plus the stub of my plane ticket—and a letter from the police in Norilsk. She asked all sorts of questions before she finally filed my passport in the desk, as is the custom, and gave me the key to Room 213. The price was 15 rubles ($1.50) per day if the room was single, or 12 rubles per day if I shared it with someone else.
It was about 6 P.M., and I hadn’t had anything to eat since breakfast. The hotel restaurant, however, was closed for remodeling, so I went outside, looked around for the street with the heaviest traffic, and headed in that direction. The weather was extremely mild, almost balmy; I took my time looking for a good restaurant, just enjoying the stroll. A few blocks past the post office, near the corner of Stalin Boulevard, I found a fashionable place called the “Yenisei.” The menu was impressive in its variety, and I picked out a salad, some chicken soup instead of the usual schi (cabbage soup), beef stroganov with french fries for the main course, served with a garnitura of vegetables (beans) and dressing, plus dessert. The whole thing cost me 15 rubles. I ate leisurely, watching the crowd around me, for I had nowhere to go and knew no one in the city.
After dinner, I strolled toward the post office, looking at the shop windows along Stalin Boulevard. On the spur of the moment, I stepped into the post office and wrote a letter to my sisters in the United States, telling them of my move—unexpected, but perhaps not final—and of receiving their last letters. Afterward, I asked for MVD headquarters and learned it was only a block away. I walked over there, but it was closed, so I walked back at last to the Hotel Syever.
When I returned to my room, I found the lights on and another guest already there, a young buyer from Kalinin, near Moscow. We sat and chatted for a while, then about ten o’clock we went down to the lobby to watch TV. The picture wasn’t very clear, and the evening movie was on. For the most part, Soviet television runs only during the evening hours. Here in Krasnoyarsk, for instance, it ran every day from 5 P.M. until 11 P.M. The first programs were for children, the next was generally on science or industry, then a program of news and talks on politics or the economy, followed by a program of dances or music and, finally, a movie or play. There were no commercials. When the movie ended at 11:00, we went into the bar and had a beer, then finally walked upstairs to bed.
At nine o’clock the next morning, I walked leisurely over to MVD headquarters. I asked for the chief; he wasn’t there. Finally, I cornered one of the agents as he came out of an office, told him why I was here, and showed him my documents from the American Embassy. He looked them over, then told me to go to a building which he pointed out across the courtyard. That turned out to be OVIR (Office for Foreign Visas).
Inside, there was quite a crowd. I stood in line, reading all the signs, beginning to feel just a bit anxious to know what the answer would be to my request to go to Moscow. Then a secretary came out to tell us the official in charge was busy; he wouldn’t be able to see anyone for the next three hours. The line dissolved in disgust. I was a little disgusted myself, so I told the girl I had some very important matters to settle and had been directed here by the MVD. She asked me what it was all about; I showed her my documents, plus the letter from the Embassy in Moscow. She looked startled, then told me to wait. She came back in a few minutes to tell me the official in charge would see me the first thing next morning.
As I turned to go, though, the secretary asked me to step into her office for a minute. She was a small young woman, with chestnut hair and finely chiseled features. In her office, she began to speak almost in whispers. “Are you really from America?” she asked. I told her I was. She asked me then how I had gotten here, what of my family in America, and so forth. Finally, she said softly and a little sadly, “They won’t let you go.” “It’s not my idea,” I said. “I’m here because the Embassy sent me. It’s the Embassy they have to deal with, not me.” “No matter,” she said, “they won’t let you go.”
The next morning, I arrived at OVIR before 8 A.M. There were already people in line ahead of me. At 9 A.M., business began for the day and the young secretary called my name first. As I entered the office, she sat at a desk beside the official, a balding, gloomy man with rimless glasses and a chunky face, somewhere in his fifties. The secretary gave me a knowing look. I greeted the official and got a grunt in return. He glanced through my documents, but he couldn’t read the English letter from the Embassy and went into the next room with it. When he came out, he said nothing to me but mumbled a few words to the secretary. She came over to me with a handful of blanks and official forms; the official kept my papers. The girl asked me to fill out the blanks at one of the tables in the waiting room; if I had any trouble, she added, she would be glad to help.
By this time, the waiting room was crowded with people of all nationalities—Mongolians, Chinese, Japanese, Lithuanians, Poles—all trying to get exit visas. At the table next to me sat an old man, perhaps in his seventies, almost completely bald, his skin all wrinkled. With him at the table was a young woman in her forties whom I took to be his daughter. I didn’t pay much attention, though, but went to work filling out the forms. I finished one and put it aside. The old man unabashedly leaned over and read it. When I looked up, he asked me if I was Polish. I said yes. He told me rather proudly that he could speak Polish, although he was a Lithuanian; then he began to chat on about his life and his hopes of returning to Lithuania. He
introduced the young woman as his second wife and told me about his children, now married, and especially about his youngest son of whom he was exceptionally proud because he was studying in the Medical Institute at Krasnoyarsk. I was beginning to get a little annoyed.
He told me, finally, that he was a Catholic, then asked if I were. I admitted I was. He asked me if I knew any priests. I tried to find out what he had in mind, but finally I told him I was a priest. At that he became quite animated: “That’s what we need, a priest! We have a parish here, a fine one, but two weeks ago our priest, Father Janos, a Lithuanian priest of the Latin rite, died suddenly. The people came in for Mass one morning and found him dead on the floor of his room next to the sacristy.” The old man was excited. He invited me to his home to meet the parishioners; I told him I couldn’t promise anything until I knew what Moscow would say to my request for an exit visa. He was downcast at that. Then he asked me to come and see him if I decided to stay in Krasnoyarsk. I promised I would.
With all this conversation, it took me more than two hours to fill out my forms. When I had finished, I took them back to the official, who told me it would be three months at the earliest before an answer to my application came from Moscow. As he was putting the papers in order and handing back my documents, he said suddenly: “I want to tell you outright that you’ll never see America! And there’ll be no life for you here in Russia, either—just like the old White Russians who still survive around here!”
I was startled by his openly antagonistic attitude, but I said nothing. I took my documents from him, slipped them in my coat pocket, and walked over to the post office. There, just for formality’s sake, I wrote an account of the whole proceedings to the American Embassy, notifying them that I had applied here in Krasnoyarsk for an exit visa as they requested.
It was late in the afternoon when I got back to the hotel. The young buyer was there and told me he’d finished his job. He was leaving for Moscow the next day, so he invited me out for a “farewell dinner.” During the meal, he waxed eloquent over his deals and I told him my progress—or, rather, lack of progress—with OVIR. Finally, I told him I thought I’d buy a ticket to Moscow, too. I had been thinking about it all afternoon, and I couldn’t see any reason why I shouldn’t go to the Embassy in Moscow while I still had my passport, my documents, and the opportunity. He lifted his glass and laughed: “That’s the way! Strike while the iron is hot—while you’ve got the documents!”
After breakfast next morning, still determined, I went to the airline office and bought a ticket for Moscow. It cost me 780 rubles ($78) and there was no trouble, but the earliest reservation I could get was for a flight two days later. Then, since I had nothing to do and was in no particular hurry, I went to a little garden behind the hotel and sat on a bench in the warm air, just soaking up sunshine and watching the children at play.
The next day, too, I simply relaxed. I went from store to store for a little leisurely shopping but, as in Norilsk, although the stores looked full, the things I really wanted they didn’t have, or at least they didn’t have it in the size or quality I wanted. So I spent a few more hours that afternoon in the hotel garden, feeling more relaxed and lazy than I had in a long time. My work in Norilsk had been more of a drain on me than I had been willing to admit, especially the last two weeks, and I was glad of this opportunity to get some rest. The next morning, I went to the airline office to check on my ticket. Everything was confirmed for that afternoon. When I returned to the hotel, though, the girl at the desk said, “Go to the manager’s office right away.” The manager told me to report immediately to the militia; they had been phoning all morning. I suspected some trouble, so I didn’t hurry. At MVD headquarters, however, no one seemed to know much about it; I was bounced from office to office until I finally ended up with the chief.
He knew what it was all about. As soon as he heard my name, he said, “You’re going to Moscow, huh?” “Yes,” I said, “I have a ticket and I confirmed it this morning.” “Well, you go right back to the airline and cancel that ticket. After that, you come back and see me!”
The chief was emphatic, so there was nothing to do but go back to the airline and cancel the ticket. They didn’t want to do it: the flight was all arranged and it was too late to cancel. “Look,” I said, “I’m not doing this of my own accord. This is an order from the MVD.” The clerk looked startled, then asked me to step into the director’s office. The director was a woman of about forty, solid and severe. I told her the story, but she still didn’t want to cancel the ticket. Finally, I suggested she call the MVD. She did. When she hung up, she very quietly wrote out an order for cancellation and refund—minus 10 percent for the cancellation.
When I reported back to the MVD office, the chief told me flatly I was going to stay in Krasnoyarsk. We didn’t discuss it; he wasn’t interested in any discussion. He suggested that I find a place to live quickly, then come back to register with his office. He also suggested that I try to stay out of “trouble” from now on.
As I walked out of his office, I kept wondering how they could have found out about the plane ticket so quickly. I even began to suspect that the young buyer from Kalinin might have told them of my decision to go to Moscow. Then I remembered that there is an MVD agent at the airports and train stations, whose job it is to check the registers and ticket sales daily, and I realized there wasn’t much chance of my going anywhere unless the MVD permitted it.
When I got back to the hotel, I wrote a postal card to Pranas, the old Lithuanian I had met in the offices of OVIR. He came to my hotel the next day and, after we talked for a while, he invited me to come with him and meet some of the other parishioners. I went to his apartment for supper, in a little suburb across the Yenisei. While we were still eating, members of the old parish began dropping in, one by one, overjoyed to have a priest among them again. There was one other priest in town, they said, a Ukrainian named Father Honofri, who lived just up the street. They had asked him to take over the parish, but he was under close surveillance and refused to risk a public Mass. I told them I’d be happy to take over the parish, and that I would say Mass next morning here in Pranas’ house.
Many of them came the next morning for Mass, and after breakfast I set out with them to see what the parish was like. It was in Nikolayevka, back across the river, so we caught a local train to Krasnoyarsk, then took a bus up the hill to Nikolayevka. We went first to a little house on the crest of the hill, built so close to the edge of the road that the buses caused every furnishing in the house to rattle as they swept by. Here I met Rosa, a tall, stately, and gracious lady in her forties, one of the parish leaders. In a few moments, her house was full of parishioners who crowded around to tell me how God had answered their prayers in sending a priest, and how much work there was to be done.
The church itself was about five blocks from Rosa’s. It was a big, one-story, barrack-like building and the whole inside was the chapel, a long, high-ceilinged room which could accommodate more than 200 people. It had a beautifully carved altar, stations of the cross along the walls, and a confessional to one side, for all the world like a parish church anywhere. There was a sacristy behind the altar, and beyond the sacristy a room for the priest to live in. I was delighted with the place and wanted to move in right away. The parishioners, however, didn’t want me to live there; they were afraid something might happen to me, too, as had happened to Father Janos—although no one could say specifically just what had “happened” to Father Janos. Finally, though, they dissuaded me. We made arrangements for Sunday Mass then, and I agreed to live at Rosa’s.
The next morning, Pranas and I took my things to Rosa’s place. I wasn’t there an hour before the people of the parish were bringing gifts: eggs, homemade jam, cheese, butter, meat—enough food to last us for a month. That evening, Rosa, her mother, and I entertained callers far into the night. Sunday morning, I was at church by seven o’clock. Mass wasn’t scheduled until nine, but already the church was nearly full. Mo
st of the people wanted to go to confession. By nine o’clock, the lines in front of my confessional just kept growing. I was still hearing confessions at ten o’clock and finally, around 10:30, I said Mass.
Most of the people here at Nikolayevka were Lithuanians, so I said Mass in the Latin rite, but it was a High Mass and the people sang beautifully. There were many, many Communions at the Mass, and following it we had Benediction. Then, after that, even on that first Sunday, I had eight or ten baptisms and made arrangements for more during the week, as well as for visiting the sick and instructing some of the children for First Communion. Before I finished and returned to Rosa’s, it was late afternoon.
Thus began a busy week of priestly duties, and I kept adding “extras” as I went around the “parish.” But Thursday afternoon, when Rosa was at work and I was at home with her mother, I heard the dog begin to bark suddenly. I went out to see what was the trouble—and there was a young militiaman. “Here we go again,” I thought. He asked first of all to see my passport. After that, he asked if I didn’t know I was supposed to register with the MVD within three days of my arrival in the city. According to their records, I wasn’t registered for this house. Actually, he was a friendly lad, this young militiaman, and he told me to register soon or “they’ll be after you.”
The next day, Rosa went to the passport office to register me as a boarder in her house. They wouldn’t accept her word; they told her I’d have to register myself. Rosa was angry and so was I when she told me. “Where is this place?” I said. Rosa gave me her “house book,” and I went down to the office. I filled out the necessary forms and took them over to the two girls at the counter.
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