Red Wolves & White Knights

by Peter Kysel

  “Do you like opera?” Anna asked me one day over lunch. I responded to impress.

  “I enjoy the romantic stuff like Eugene Onegin by Tchaikovsky. I saw it at the National Theatre in Prague, where it had its international premiere. Its original performance was conducted by Tchaikovsky himself.” She looked surprised.

  “Maybe, you should see where Onegin had its world pre­miere.” I shrugged my shoulders

  “It’s impossible to get tickets for the Bolshoi Theatre at such short notice,”

  “I’ll try” I didn’t hear any further and forgot the conversation.

  #

  Daily Struggle

  The following day I skipped the lectures. I wanted to expe­rience the daily lives of local people. I left the hotel after breakfast, with a plan. I was going to shop and feed myself like a Muscovite and decided to buy a sandwich and coffee with my roubles. I discovered that there were no sandwich shops in the USSR. Undeterred, I adapted my challenge to the local conditions and set out to buy my own ingredients and make my own sandwich.

  In the chleb (bread) shop, I joined a queue. Having obtained a ticket, I moved to a second queue to pay for a loaf of bread. With this receipt, I then queued for a third time to pick up my purchase. Within twenty-five minutes of entering the shop, I had bought bread.

  I found another shop which sold salami and went through the same process. Finally, I found a coffee bar and after a long wait, I ordered.

  “Black coffee without sugar please.”

  I was told,

  “Not possible. We sell white coffee with sugar.”

  “Can you put the milk and sugar on the side?”

  “No”. Having spent almost two hours shopping, I had lost the will to argue and accepted a sweet milky coffee and left.

  Shopping in the USSR was a struggle. I was shocked by the hostility of shoppers and shop assistants alike. I observed even during the working day, shops are full. Labour produc­tivity must be low, if people are shopping instead of working. Muscovites were battle-scarred veterans. The challenge of obtaining a sandwich and coffee had exhausted me. After two decades of living in the decadent west, I have become too soft to survive here.

  I found a street bench and assembled my sandwich. I ate it and drank the coffee. They both tasted horrible. After a few bites, I dumped my purchases and went back to my five-star hotel. I ordered a sandwich and a cup of coffee which cost me the week’s salary of an average Russian. I felt defeated.

  #

  Onegin

  Two days later, Anna greeted me with a big smile when she arrived at the seminar, and whispered conspiratorially

  “I’ve managed to get two tickets for the Bolshoi, to see Eugene Onegin. Would you like to come?” It was clearly smarter to leave shopping in Moscow to the locals.

  “Great, if you join me for dinner before the show” Anna was an attractive woman and I was delighted to have her company for the evening. I was keen to meet ordinary Russians. She was the first person who agreed to meet me privately. I booked a table at the hotel, for a pre-theatre meal. Russian girls did not enjoy a good reputation in smart hotels, so I arranged to wait for Anna in the lobby, to avoid any problems. When she arrived, I took her straight to our table.

  Anna was dressed modestly, probably wearing her gradua­tion dress, and looked nervous. She sat very upright and was clearly uncomfortable in the luxurious surroundings. Our evening didn’t start well. I guessed she was thinking how her family could never afford to eat there. I broke the ice by suggesting that we treat our dinner as a business meeting.

  “We are working together, and you are helping me to learn about life in Moscow. Let me tell you first about my shop­ping experience” I told her about my attempt to buy a sand­wich, putting an amusing spin on it.

  “You see, I have no idea how to shop. I need help.” She began to relax when I added,

  “I assumed that Londoners were the best in the world at forming queues.”

  Anna responded, with a whiff of patriotism,

  “We are used to queueing for everything, not just for buses. Everyone here knows his place, and queue bargers are punished.” I nodded and recounted my experience.

  “I joined the salami queue in the wrong place and was rebuked by several people. I apologised and had to use all my charm to calm them down.” Anna smiled.

  “You Westerners are good at being charming and relaxed. This behaviour isn’t common here. We have harder lives.” She paused and added,

  “People with power give orders here. Even the shop assistants.” Her comment reminded me of my youth in Czechoslovakia and I told her. Over dinner, Anna talked about her family. She lived with her parents in a modern one bedroom flat in an apartment block in central Moscow.

  “We are lucky in that we only share a kitchen and a bath­room with one other family.” The concept of shared kitch­ens was new to me. I wondered if the others in the flat were her relatives.

  “No, most flats are built with shared kitchens. Families are expected to watch each other and report anything unusual to the sekretny sotrudnik (KGB informer) in the block.”

  “What sort of things would your neighbours report?”

  “When my father brought home a bunch of bananas he was interrogated, because our neighbours had reported him.”

  “Did you hate your neighbours for it?”

  “No, because if they had not reported the bananas, they would be in trouble.”

  “How much do you miss not having privacy?” I wondered, taken aback by this institutionalised snooping. Svetlana sighed and just waved her arms in the air as if there was no answer to that question. I called a waiter, signed the bill and we left the restaurant to walk to the theatre.

  The building was marked with the insignia of the Soviet state and its logos of the golden hammer and sickle and five-pointed red stars. During the performance I thought about our conversation.

  Russians must be damaged by the crazy culture forced on them over the past seventy years. It’ ll take generations to return to normality. I should be prepared for unexpected reactions here.

  As a refugee I used to have nightmares which scared me for years. I hoped that they would not return after this brief but vivid experience of life in Moscow.

  After the opera we walked onto Teatralnaya Square. I noticed several traders selling tins of caviar to the theatre crowd.

  #

  Caviar

  “I think I’ll buy some caviar as a souvenir,” I said to Anna and went to haggle with the traders. The black market trader took my money and whispered,

  “Be careful, if she doesn’t ask you for money, she is KGB.” I just nodded, startled.

  When I returned to Anna, she said, “You are in trouble. When you pulled out your wallet to pay, everyone in the square saw that you had several hundred dollars. You know it’s illegal to pay in dollars.” I grunted, slowly realising the implications.

  “You will either be mugged right here in the square or arrested by the police for using dollars to buy stolen goods.” It was no good telling her that informally everyone used dollars in Moscow and that traders refused to take roubles. I swore at myself for stupidly setting myself up as a target.

  Anna had told me of two dangers. It flashed through my head that if she was a KGB plant, she could blackmail me too. I was a married foreign banker. I had been out with a young girl and made an illegal transaction. They could easily drum up a jail sentence for this. By this time, I was sweating. The evening was a lesson not to be forgotten. I stood there, not knowing what to do next. She took charge.

  “Kiss me now,” Anna said firmly, cuddling up to me. I was apprehensive and looked over her shoulder for a possible photographer. Anna whispered,

  “Don’t say goodbye. When I let go of you, turn around and sprint across the square to the Metropol. Don’t leave the hotel again tonight. Everyone in the square is watching us.”

  “What about you?” I asked, impressed by her resolute approach. She was far more stre
etwise than I was.

  “I’ll be OK. Everybody can see that I’m Russian and they’ll think I go out with foreigners for money. They’ll ignore me.” I calmed down a bit and noticed that she smelled vaguely of boiled cabbage and cheap perfume. She kissed me on the cheek and pushed me away, slightly.

  I took the hint, turned and ran across the square stopping only when I was safely inside the hotel. Anna didn’t ask for money. Was the trader right? Shall I test her?”

  #

  Metropol Hotel

  The Metropol was the best-known hotel in Moscow. It was built in the opulent art nouveau style in 1900, as the most modern hotel in Russia. After the Bolshevik revolution it became a base for the new government.

  When I discovered its historic links, I thought it would be amusing to ask for the suite reserved for the leader, Vladimir Ilyich Lenin. I managed to get it. His rooms did not retain any traces of him. The writing table looked antique, so I pretended that it was used by Lenin. I patted the wood and addressed him.

  I met you in the mausoleum. Your make up was dreadful. You looked like a zombie. They should grant you peace and bury you. Lenin died in 1924.

  That night, after the incident in Teartralnaya Square, I felt restless and in need of some company to calm me down. After a quick shower, I went downstairs to the Shalyapin Bar for a drink. It was almost empty, but after few minutes I was joined by an American banker. He perched on the bar stool next to me and introduced himself.

  “Hi, I am Bill.” We decided to share a drink and I told him about my experience outside the Bolshoi Theatre and my stupidity.

  “You might have lost a girlfriend, but at least you have kept your cash and clothes,” laughed my new companion.

  #

  American Banker

  “I did something even more stupid,” Bill was ready to trump my story.

  “I forgot to book a limousine from Sheremetyevo airport into the city. When I came out of the arrival hall, I grabbed a waiting taxi.”

  “And the taxi driver robbed you?!” I added, expecting a confirmation. All foreigners were potential targets in Russia in the early nineties.

  “You bet. On our way to the city, the driver turned off the road and into a field. He stopped the car and swung around with a gun in his hand. He told me that my luggage was already his, because I had put it in his boot. He asked for my wallet and told me to take off my suit and my shoes and leave them on the rear seat.”

  I quietly signalled the barman to bring another two vodkas and Bill continued.

  “There I was, in my shirt, underpants and socks standing in a muddy field, while the taxi driver was going through my wallet. Just before he drove off, I managed to ask him for the Amex card.”

  “That was great presence of mind,” I said, “and did he?”

  “I told him that the card only worked with my finger­print. He looked at me, but handed me the card and drove off.” Bill knocked back his vodka and added,

  “He probably didn’t have a knife on him to cut off my fingers.” I followed his lead, drunk my vodka and motioned to the barman for two more drinks.

  “So, you hitchhiked in your underpants to the Metropol Hotel?”

  “I got a lift quite quickly before I froze.”

  “We are visible targets. We are here to be robbed.” I sighed, shocked by his story. Bill nodded.

  “The natives don’t bother to be friendly. It’s hard to find anybody one can trust.”

  “Western rules don’t apply in Moscow.” I had made a pretty obvious comment, but Bill just nodded

  “Even using local fixers who know the rules, I expect we’ll still be conned.” I was becoming so tired and dis­heartened that I couldn’t find anything positive to add. Bill concluded,

  “My colleagues call it a bandit country. Let’s have another drink. We are both lucky to have escaped tonight.” We toasted our luck and parted. I was curious.

  This is the wild east. Soviet rules are gone, and Western rules don’t apply. What rules do apply in a bandit country?

  #

  Swan Lake

  The telephone rang in my room.

  “It’s Michael here, shall we get together?”

  “Great to hear from you, come over and let’s have dinner in the Europeiski restaurant, here at the hotel.”

  “I love Russian ballet,” enthused Michael, when he arrived at the restaurant,

  “It’s my new passion, apart from photography.”

  “How do you like Russia?”

  “I was mugged and when I reported the mugging to the police, they pretended not to understand my Russian.”

  “As a fluent Russian speaker and a charming Englishman, you should be able to get on with them better than anyone else”

  “Sometimes I do.”

  ‘What about your new interest in ballet?” I asked, returning to his opening remarks

  “I love Swan Lake. I have seen twenty-two performances since I arrived in Moscow.” I thought that Michael had gone mad and didn’t quite know how to respond, so I said cautiously,

  “Do you think you should, perhaps, find some other interests?”

  “No, you see I have fallen in love with the third swan from the left. I always buy the same seat. I send her flowers after every performance and I’m hoping that one day she’ll notice me.” The young man was clearly in love.

  “If I were you, I would deliver the flowers personally and ask her out.” Michael seemed shy. After a bottle of Crimean wine, he became resolute.

  “Ok, I will.” Two days later he called again.

  “I delivered the flowers and Tatiana agreed to meet me. Over coffee, she asked me not to send her any more flowers and refused to see me again, saying that I was too young to be her sugar daddy.” Before I had a chance to apologise for my advice, Michael added,

  “Thanks to you, I am now cured of my obsession with ballerinas and I don’t need to see Swan Lake ever again. I’ll find other interests.”

  “I was so impressed by your devotion. Are you sure that you wouldn’t like to transfer your attention to the fourth swan from the left?”

  “Don’t be so silly. I am not in love with swans,” laughed Michael. Reflecting on his story, I felt slightly ashamed. Ballet was one of the few bright spots in this bleak city, allowing the audience to escape for a few hours. The other was the Metropol Hotel, cosseting its guests from the grim reality outside.

  Conscious of my promise to his parents, I suggested a walk along the banks of the Moskva River to Red Square. Michael sensed my concerns. When we reached the Embankment, he offered his reassurance.

  “I haven’t spoken to anyone about our family. Nobody here has referred to it either.” I was relieved, but still concerned

  “Please don’t try to search for your ancestors. The Russians are obliged to report all their contacts with foreigners to the police. They even have to inform the police which books or magazines we read.” Michael nodded and I asked him,

  “How do you feel about your Russian family? Are you impressed by them?”

  #

  Great-Grandmother Natasha

  “My great-grandmother Natasha is my favourite. Natasha was a pretty girl, with flexible morals, determined to improve her social status by taking on lovers. She was born into a middle-class family in Moscow and married her first husband, a pianist, Sergei Mamontov at the age of twen­ty-two. They had a daughter Natalia. Within three years she divorced Sergei and married her lover, a guards officer, Lieutenant Vladimir Wulfert. Her next lover was her second husband’s commanding officer, the grand duke Mikhail Alexandrovich. Natasha forced her husband Wulfert to divorce her, by becoming pregnant by the grand duke. The lovers’ son, Gyorgy Mikhailovich was born on 24th July 1910.” I interrupted him.

  “Slow down, too much information, I can’t absorb it all.”

  “It’s quite simple. By the time my great-grandmother was thirty, she had had two husbands and two children. She kept lovers throughout her married life.” I didn’t know
how to respond. Michael laughed and went on,

  “Natasha was a formidable woman. She forced the Orthodox Church and Tsar Nicholas II to falsify the birth and divorce certificates, in order to establish the grand duke’s paternity of Gyorgy. In reality, her son was born while she was still married to her second husband, Vladimir Wulfert. Grand duke Mikhail gave Vladimir two hundred thousand roubles and a cushy job in the Kremlin, to agree to the divorce and to renounce his paternity. Natasha then married grand duke Mikhail.” It was all too much for me, but Michael carried on regardless.

  “When Natasha’s third husband, grand duke Mikhail was given command of the Tartar cavalry and went to war, Natasha took another grand duke as her lover. Dimitri Pavlovich was eleven years younger than her.” We both laughed helplessly at Natasha’s astounding progress and I recanted,

  “So, this middle-class girl from Moscow, had one grand duke as her husband and another as her lover?”

  “Yes. She was the most remarkable woman. I would have loved to meet her.”

  “So, would I. You’ll have to explain this in more detail another time. What happened to Natasha after she escaped from Russia?”

  “She was brought to England by the British navy and reunited with her children and the young lover, grand duke Dimitri. Dimitri moved to Paris and Natasha followed him, leaving her children in England. When they realised that neither of them had much money, Dimitri left her and mar­ried an American heiress.

  “Natasha’s luck had run out. She was forty-seven years old and never found another husband. Her son Gyorgy died and her daughter Natalia ignored her. She spent the rest of her life on handouts from other emigrés and died in poverty in Paris in 1952.”