Belarus: Presidential Election Day Ends in Protests and Crackdown

Global Voices Online
Sunday, December 19, 2010

December 19, the 2010 presidential election day in Belarus, ended in mass protests, arrests and violent clashes with the riot police in Minsk, the capital of Belarus.

Aleksandr Lukashenko, who has served as the President of Belarus since July 1994, ran against nine opposition candidates, some of whom are now reported to have been attacked or arrested - or both. Thousands of people gathered in the center of Minsk to protest electoral fraud after the polls closed (some photos and video are here), but as they tried to storm the government headquarters and the central election commission building, they were soon dispersed by riot police. Dozens of protesters and a number of journalists, including a reporter and a photographer for the New York Times, were injured.

Problems with the internet and limited access to social media and opposition websites in Minsk were being reported throughout the day, too (see earlier GV updates by Alexey Sidorenko - here, here, and here). Evgeny Morozov (@evgenymorozov), who is currently in Belarus, tweeted that he couldn't "access anything using https." In another tweet, posted Sunday afternoon, he wrote:

I also hear that since access to Gmail in Belarus is blocked, opposition sites can't use their mailing lists

Still, citizen media reports were being filed before, during and after the events in the center of Minsk.

On Dec. 18, Dmitry Rastaev (LJ user rastaev) commented (RUS) on the supposedly voluntary "early voting" - in which "23% of the 7 million registered electors" had cast their votes, and which is often considered "an instrument of vote-rigging for authorities":

Talked with my [student] daughter [via ICQ] today, she said this: "In the dormitory, they are coming into the rooms with the Eviction Act and write down [the names of] all those who didn't vote early on this piece of paper, putting "for [creating insanitary conditions]" as the reason."

And in the meantime, [Lukashenko] and his clique are barking on the TV about "unacceptability of forcing [people] to vote early."

[...]

If on the 19th, this [bastardly] regime does not collapse, I don't even know... [...] To tolerate this filth and these jerks for five more years - it is physically impossible by now!!!

LJ user adelka posted this report (BEL) after she returned from the rally:

We are home, alive and in one piece.

[...]

My husband, his brother and I carried out a woman covered in blood, [she had a head injury], there were two ambulances behind the government building [...] - they were filled with people (6-8 injured people in each one), mainly women with head injuries [...]. They were breaking people into groups and chasing them into "pockets" - and there, they were throwing them on the ground and beating them. They were even beating underage girls - [...] beating them with their feet and sticks, and happily laughing as they did it. [...]

The feeling is that there's a junta and fascism in the country.

[...]

I'll tell you honestly, I was scared. But I'm happy that the regime fears me and I'm proud of those who was there [at the rally]. Forgive me, but it's hard [not to sound pompous] after what I've seen with my own eyes. [...]

LJ user aneta-spb, a St. Petersburg-based journalist who came to Minsk to cover the election, posted these updates (RUS) from the rally:

October Square, Minsk.

A lot of people on October Square, I'm in the crowd [...], and can't count [how many] because of this. [...] Most people are young, but there are enough mature people, and the elderly. People are calling their friends on the phone, inviting them to the square: "What are you afraid of, come over here, we can't live like this any longer."

Riot police are pushing the people from the square [...]

Fights with agents provocateurs had been provoked. Lots of riot police, a whole army [of them] - they are coming to the square from all directions, trying to push people out, but the people aren't leaving. [...]

First, the people occupied the center of Minsk, then, riot police and the army.

[...] But it was powerful. Very powerful. [...] Of course, it was a bit scary, too. [...] The Belarusians [did great, truly great]. I'm proud. And the main thing is that the people came out not for the leaders. Which proves one more time that the leaders are [not of primary importance].

LJ user dabrahost wrote this (RUS):

I totally agree with Natalya Radina via EURORADIO: "Lukashenko has declared a war on his own people."

From this, logically => his whole vertical - is in a state of war with the people => every official and cop deserves a Hague tribunal. EVERY OFFICIAL AND COP! Sooner or later, this will happen.

On Twitter, the #electby and #ploscha hashtags were and are being used on reports on the situation.

@euroradio (BEL):

Witnesses of the beating on the square: they were beating one guy, he fell, the riot police officer came back and [beat him some more, until he lost consciousness]. [...]

@Feveray (RUS):

[...] The snow on the square in front of the government headquarters is red.

@jkirchick (ENG):

For the record: Belarusian spetznatz are jackbooted thugs [...]

@chudentsov (RUS):

To stand between two columns of riot police as they are closing in on you, when you have only your smartphone as a weapon - isn't nice. My legs saved me. [...]

@lucysd (RUS):

For the first time I've seen how riot police are beating people with sticks... During our [Ukrainian] orange revolution [of 2004] everything was like in a kids' fairy tale compared to #electby

Russia: Notes on the Post-Election Protest Rallies

Global Voices Online
Tuesday, March 4, 2008

On Monday, riot police in Moscow arrested dozens of people who attempted to take part in an unauthorized post-election protest rally.

Marina Litvinovich (LJ user abstract2001, an aide to Garry Kasparov) was one of those who got detained. Here's part of what she wrote (RUS) following her release:

I'm home, yes.

Briefly: my arm is bruised, my glasses broken, I was upside down when they threw me into the riot police bus, [hit] my head on the stairs a bit. Not the best way to enter a bus.

Inside my bus [...] there were mainly those who got detained at McDonald's. Riot police burst into [the McDonald's] and snatched people out. They seized those who [had nothing to do with the rally], too. We had two underaged [schoolkids]. Also, God forgive me, there were two [members of the pro-Kremlin youth movement Nashi] on our bus. Nice kids, who quickly enough [received a political orientation] from other detainees ;) Well, and the situation [was as good as any political orientation], too... [...]

Sergei Davidis (LJ user blacky_sergei) wrote this (RUS) about the election and the Moscow rally:

Sad...

The election has made me sad somehow. Not because of Medvedev's victory - it was predictable. But because of the boldness and disrespect for law, which was evident in Moscow, for example. Shameless [falsifications], mass voting by dead souls, attempts to chase away and bribe the observers, refusal to accept complaints... followed by bold statements that there had been no complaints... All this with no real need for all this...

There are no rules that these jerks are prepared to respect, and it makes me feel helpless.

And then there's also the Dissenters' March today. It wasn't enough that these jerks hadn't approved it in a timely and lawful manner, it wasn't enough that they packed the whole neighborhood with cops. It wasn't enough that they were grabbing anyone who tried to chant or attracted too much media attention. But they were also seizing people who committed no violations whatsoever. Mikhail Kriger [LJ user kitaychonok_li was detained around 4:20 PM with no explanations given to him; he obeyed the police, as usual, even though their demands were unlawful. And in the evening, it became known that he was being accused of [resisting the police] and they wanted to subject him to administrative arrest. Since the cops were purposefully searching for him both at the protesters' gathering place and inside the buses carrying those already detained, it appears that they chose to punish him for an overly active position. He, for example, was one of those who initiated and took part in the single-person rallies in support of [Vasily Alexanyan], and then in support of [Natalya Morar].

And [LJ user dmitryhorse], along with other [members of AKM, the Vanguard of the Red Youth movement], was detained at the Chistyye Prudy McDonald's around 4:45 PM. In the protocol they wrote that he was marching along Chistoprudny Boulevard at 5:30 PM...

And there's practically no doubt that the courts would stamp these decisions, ignoring the witnesses' accounts... [...]

LJ user ilugru described (RUS) a march of his own - a one-person protest rally of sorts:

I left work earlier, but still too late to really take part in the event - by 5:50 PM they had detained nearly everyone they could detain, there was a hellish crowd of cops by Turgenevskaya [subway station], the remnants of the protesters and a crowd of journalists. I didn't encounter anyone I knew and decided to carry out a tiny individual march. Good thing [The New Times, a Russian-language weekly] had made a really good pre-election issue, which consisted mainly of pages full of slogans. I opened the page with the words "Vote or not, [you'll still get a male reproductive organ]..." and walked along Myasnitskaya St. towards Lubyanka, holding it close to me. I didn't run into riot police along the way, [regular] cops were looking intensely [at me], some were making steps towards me, but no one [really got me]. At the square near the Solovetsky Stone [Lubyanka], I saw a really amusing scene - hordes of cops were guarding all entrances to the square, which was occupied by six (!) people gloomily waving flags of the [pro-Kremlin Young Russia youth movement]. [...] I would give a lot to listen to the thoughts of the big riot police guys who had to stand along the perimeter, guarding these clowns.

In St. Petersburg, the post-election protest rally was an authorized one - and it actually did take place. One of the protesters, LJ user aneta_spb, wrote this (RUS) on her blog:

It was good. But not much. It's clear that in the nearest future we will not see tens of thousands of protesters. [...]

***

Links to some photos and a video from the Moscow and St. Petersburg rallies are in these earlier Global Voices posts: here, here, and here.

Russia: A St. Petersburger in Moscow

Global Voices Online
Friday, October 19, 2007

Russian bloggers are, of course, eagerly discussing the upcoming elections and other newsworthy political developments, but there's still plenty of room in the country's blogosphere for apolitical reflection. Below is one example.

Two days ago, during her visit to Moscow, LJ user aneta_spb (St. Petersburg journalist Svetlana Gavrilina) wrote this sketch (RUS) - and filed it from "the-street-named-after-I've-again-forgotten-who" in Kuzminki district of the Russian capital, where she is currently staying:

MOSCOW

The terrible thing they've got is their subway.

I used to have some grasp on this system, but I no longer understand anything. How can stations located side by side belong to different lines, why are the areas around turnstiles completely covered with pieces of paper, and sometimes, in the train cars, old newspapers are scattered around, and in general, when you've finally entered the subway, it doesn't necessarily mean that you're riding somewhere, because first, you have to run through a kilometer of some passes and escalators...

There are dogs walking inside the subway, and crows and doves flying around.

What's convenient here is that everywhere, on every corner, you can buy what you need - a pastry, cigarettes, socks, a t-shirt, lotion, etc. Of course, all this street trade results in total mud and suspicious individuals standing around, but if you just need a shirt, you can't run around the boutiques, right?..

Prices. Just like our own, or, perhaps, one or two rubles lower.

The people. There are many kind and unhappy ones. The girls at cafes are polite.

And - they are giving directions there now. Before, no one knew anything. Perhaps, it's because there are many "ponayekhavshiye" [newcomers, non-Muscovites] there now, who have to know the city well...

Absolutely crazy construction everywhere. As for parking, traffic, crossing the street, they are all kamikaze here, I think.

Many individuals with unmistakably edinorosskiye [United Russia, pro-Putin party] mugs. Yes, it's almost like it's written on their mugs, especially near some government offices.

Khrushchyoby [residential areas where most building were built under Nikita Khrushchev; khrushchyoba rhymes with and is a derivative of trushchyoba, a slum] - (I'm staying in one of them) - [they are just like anywhere else, nothing extraordinary].

I haven't seen a wholesome image of the city so far, but I haven't had too much time, and I was all nervous and sick yesterday, but it hasn't happened today, either.

All in all, there's not much to imitate for our city's imitators. But they do imitate anyway.

Though, there are ideas that could be borrowed - like, a flower bed here and there, flowers.

Below are some comments to this post:

lxe:

I haven't seen a wholesome image of the city so far

There's no such thing. [Moscow is an] archipelago.

aneta_spb:

I don't know, I used to sense it before. Even if it's an archipelago.

avla:

[...] It's a big village [...].

aneta_spb:

Yeah. With weird street names. Saw a Komissariatsky Pereulok [Commissariat Lane] yesterday. I mean, we have weird names, too [in St. Petersburg], but mainly [on the outskirts], while Komissariatsky is in the very center [of Moscow]!

(I remember in St. Petersburg-Leningrad, there was Ulitsa Krasnogo Elektrika [Red Electrician Street], and it was always making me laugh, because I, somehow, could very vividly imagine this red electrician...)

vika33:

everywhere, on every corner, you can buy what you need

Aha, Sveta, I've noticed this, too. And there are public bathrooms at every corner. :)

And in the subway - and only there, though not at every station - there's wonderful Mexican fast food. :)

And a great Zoo. :)

So Moscow does have certain advantages. ;)

aneta_spb:

I've got enough of the Zoo in the political reality :-))) [...]

Russia: Opposition Rally in St. Petersburg

Global Voices Online
Saturday, March 3, 2007

A surprisingly large opposition rally took place in St. Petersburg Saturday: a few thousand people, old and young (some came with their children, even), broke through police cordons and marched along Nevskiy Prospekt, the city's main avenue; dozens were hurt in clashes with riot police, and dozens ended up detained. Two opposition leaders - Garry Kasparov and Mikhail Kasyanov - spoke to the crowd; the third one - Eduard Limonov of the National Bolshevik Party - got arrested before the rally began. Some of the rally's slogans - "Russia Without Putin" and "This is Our City" - reflected the dual nature of the protest: as Mr. Kasyanov said (RUS), "residents of St. Petersburg are facing not only federal problems, but a huge number of issues directly related to the life of the city." St. Petersburg governor Valentina Matviyenko called the rally "a provocation" and stated that its organisers "came from Moscow, accompanied by 120 young extremist protestors."

Here's some of what LJ user aneta_spb (a St. Petersburg journalist of Belarusian descent) wrote (RUS) about the rally:

In this case, I don't care what flags people were carrying. What's important is that the most popular slogan - the one that everyone supported - was: "This is our city!"

Some deja vu, isn't it, residents of Minsk and other compatriots-Belarusians?

It was very interesting there. Take the second attempt of the march towards Nevskiy! The first time we moved forward, they dispersed the column and detained a few dozen people. So what? We went the second time and broke through. The riot police cordon was broken FOUR TIMES. Anemic St. Peterburgians, suffering from avitaminosis, from old men to redhaired artistically-bohemian-looking young women - they were marching on those well-fed (but, as it turned out, poorly trained) people in uniform. [...] I'm proud of St. Petersburg. [...]

And some more, from another post (RUS) by aneta_spb:

No, really, nothing like this had ever happened before - people marching on the riot police. Even in August 1991, when the police appeared, people at first began to run away, but they were stopped by the announcement that the police were on our side. Here everyone knew for sure that the police were being led against us - but it didn't scare them. [...]

Another St. Petersburg journalist - LJ user shavu - has posted photos from the rally (many of them rather blurry - because they were taken on the run). There are eight installments, and here's the title of the first one:

The cradle of the three revolutions has swung again. It was fun and frightening.

Below are the links to the remaining seven photo posts by shavu:

http://shavu.livejournal.com/440849.html
http://shavu.livejournal.com/441125.html
http://shavu.livejournal.com/441489.html
http://shavu.livejournal.com/441796.html
http://shavu.livejournal.com/442008.html
http://shavu.livejournal.com/442136.html
http://shavu.livejournal.com/442617.html

Russia, Belarus: "Gazilla"

Global Voices Online
Saturday, December 30, 2006

There's a distinct sense of deja vu this New Year's Eve: Gazprom, Russia's largest (and state-controlled) company and the world's biggest extractor of natural gas, is in the spotlight again, both locally (due to an ambitious and controversial construction project in St. Petersburg) and internationally (due to a dispute over prices and control of a pipeline in Belarus, very similar to the Russia-Ukraine gas dispute exactly a year ago).

Quite a few Russian bloggers have posted this banner on their blogs, linking to a flash game that was created by St. Petersburg branch of the Yabloko Party:



The monster hulking over St. Petersburg's Smolny Cathedral isn't Godzilla. It is Gazilla, and it represents Gazprom, and its name, allegedly, was coined by LJ user alexvert a year ago (according to LJ user aneta_spb (RUS)).

Gazilla/Gazprom is planning to build a 300-meter-tall glass tower (dubbed “the corn on the cob”), which would change its color up to 10 times per day, depending on the position of the sun, and soar a few times higher than any of St. Petersburg's famous landmarks (including the Smolny Cathedral, located right across the Neva River from the proposed construction site). Gazprom City is the skyscraper project's official name (gazoskryob - "gas-scraper" - instead of neboskryob, as one Russian newspaper jokingly misnamed it (RUS)). It is expected to be finished by 2016.



Obviously, many consider the project a threat to the historic landscape. The latest protest rally took place Dec. 28 at Malaya Sadovaya St. in St. Petersburg: the protesters brought canned corn with them and constructed a mock tower; LJ user consultantphoto has a few photos from the rally.

As for the Gazilla flash game, one is supposed to throw apples at the creature, and this isn't a surprising choice of the weapon, since Yabloko, the name of the party that has made the game, translates as "apple." Here's one blogger's comment on it (LJ user oleg-kozyrev, RUS):

I can't help but support this

St. Pete's Yabloko folks have created a fun thing. I like it when people choose a creative approach. Everyone must've heard by now about the Gazprom-monster that they want to erect [in St. Petersburg] and thus turn the culture capital into the capital of culturelessness. So I'm making my micro-contribution into the noble cause of preserving St. Pete [by promoting the Gazilla game]. Moscow that's been killed is more than enough for us. Hopefully, they'll leave St. Pete alone.

[...]

***

Just like Ukraine a year ago, Belarus is preparing for a New Year's Day gas supply cutoff: so far, there seems to be no sign of resolution in the dispute that, among other things, threatens the delivery of gas to Europe.

Up until now, Belarus paid $47 per 1,000 cubic meters; if this close ally of Russia gives in to the price hike demanded by Gazprom, it will be paying $105 per 1,000 cubic meters.

Aleksandr Lukashenko, considered by many "Europe's last dictator," is reported to have accused Gazprom of blackmail.

Opposition leader and former presidential candidate Aleksandr Milinkevich, on the other hand, said in an interview with the Gazprom-owned Radio Echo of Moscow that he "understood [Gazprom's] position and considered it normal" (RUS).

LJ user sadovnikov has called Milinkevich "a traitor" (RUS).

LJ user aneta_spb - a Belarus native living in St. Petersburg - weighs in (RUS) on what appear to be rather desperate political somersaults performed by Belarusian politicians as they find themselves face to face with Gazilla:

I hope my fellow-countrymen Belarusians would forgive me, but I don't like how many oppositioners are close to depicting Gazilla white and fluffy, as they are accusing [Aleksandr Lukashenko] of having failed to negotiate with Gazprom.

For the first time in my life, I almost agree with [Lukashenko].

He's a jerk, of course. But this inflated monster Gazprom is now just trying to grab as much as it can while it is still able to. Gas supplies are coming to an end. New fields haven't been explored. Equipment is worn down. Soon, they'll be transporting abroad all that remains of the gas, and there'll be a little bit for [Moscow] and whatever remains from that - for St. Petersburg.

They are already "investing in real estate" - and want to build their phallos [Gazprom City] using St. Pete money (my money, too, that is).

What would the Russian countryside do? Nothing. They'll have to live without gas. Well, as most of them live already.

[...]

Russia: A Letter to Putin

Global Voices Online
Sunday, December 10, 2006

It's a letter-writing season in Russia.

LJ user yashin posted an appeal (translated here) to the judge who had given a harsh sentence to an activist for placing a banner saying “Putin, go away on your own” on Hotel Rossiya in Moscow.

LJ user aneta_spb has come up with a letter (RUS) to president Vladimir Putin himself, and for a while, it was one of the highest-ranked posts at the Yangex Blogs portal. Below is a rough translation:

Here, I've written a letter to the president.

Gospodin [Mr.] Putin!

Or, Gospodin President of [the Russian Federation].

I, a rank-and-file citizen of the Russian Federation, Gavrilina Svetlana Dmitrievna, have started writing this letter to you and became puzzled right away.

For some reason, addressing you the way I did is considered impolite. The polite way is "Vladimir Vladimirovich." Or "[dear] respected Vladimir Vladimirovich." This takes aback right away. Because I can use the first name and patronymic to address an uncle twice removed or an old high school teacher, etc. But when I'm writing to the head of the state - that is, to a person who is not related to me in any way personally, but is placed in this position by the will of the people and lives on the people's money, and I'm part of this people (even though I didn't vote for this character)... In Great Britain, I wouldn't write "dear Tony," right, or in the States, "dear George"? And in the times of the Czar, so beloved by many of your brothers-in-arms, they didn't write "Nikolay Aleksandrovich" or "Aleksandr Nikolaevich" - but "Your Majesty" or "Sovereign." Title, function...

In any case, there is something in the word gospodin... But we're talking about a form of address here - wouldn't fit to call you tovarishch [comrade], right?..

Whatever, done with the addressing part, sort of. Now, on to the essence.

As I've stated above, I didn't vote for you. But it absolutely doesn't matter. Let's have flies and cutlets separately. Those who vote or not, those who [make big money] or not, those who [get their salaries from the state budget] or work for private [entities] or for themselves - in any case, we are the tax-payers. We buy a loaf of bread - [and pay a value-added tax]. And if not a loaf of bread, then a piece of meat, [clothing], a fridge, a tram ticket, a cell phone operator's services... Everyone has the right to vote or not vote. Because we are all humans, alive, and for now it is not up to you to deprive us of the right to live and breathe.

Anyway, since you've been installed into your position on our money, I'm writing you. Because in a normal country, it would have been enough for me to address a municipal elected official with the issues I'm concerned about. But [you know] what a farce has the so-called local self-government turned into.

[...] I actually this that you impressed the great Russia with, above all, your pure, St. Petersburg, pronunciation, without hek-ing and ok-ing, after all the previous Leonid Ilyichs [Brezhnev], Yeltsins and [Chernomyrdins]... Though, at one point, [Andropov] conquered many weak souls with the same thing, too. Ah well, [I digress] again.

Here's why I'm writing to you. I find you annoying. Not really you, the person, but all this disgusting pharisaism, improprieties and the lies that literally get under one's skin - and everywhere, there's corruption of society worse than during the Soviet times.

I live in the city of St. Petersburg, at [Okhta].

And here, they are going to dig a tunnel and build a skyscraper. Your faithful [...] [Valentina Ivanovna Matviyenko], has once again totally ignored the city residents' protest. [...] They are going to worsen the people's life quality, which is already not too good. I'm sorry, but I don't believe that you aren't aware of it. One reason [I don't believe it] is because you haven't yet refuted the rumors that for a while, after you've installed the "successor," you're planning to have some rest at the post of [Gazprom]'s head...

This is really interesting. Excuse me, are you an expert in gas extraction? A professional? Or is there a putsch going on now, invisible to the world, when this Gazprom is basically seizing power in the country? While the majority of the villages are not equipped to receive gas?

Do you know what people are talking about? They are saying that the government's goal is to just destroy the population, because they don't need so many people to serve the pipe... Some people, out of stupidity, see [non-Russians] behind it, others see "the hand of America," but despite this, people do have intuition.

You know, I left the big politics a long time ago. I'm not interested in the party hustle, I'm a modest person and have never been too interested in my own career. And if they didn't try to get me right by the door of my own apartment, I'd be quietly reading good books and listening to good music.

But I'm annoyed by the billboards at the St. Petersburg-Moscow highway: [UNITED RUSSIA] TOGETHER WITH THE PRESIDENT! ([I'm annoyed] because it's like "Long live the [CPSU]!") I don't like it when there's a public transportation paralysis in my favorite city. I don't like it when [towns and villages] in the European part of the Russian Federation are cut off from the civilized world - roads are broken down, phone connection is terrible, and there is no internet whatsoever... I don't like the disgusting bootlicking in the media. Do you really think that people pray to you as they do in front of an icon? If every type of official has your portrait in his study, it doesn't mean that your portraits hang in people's homes... If you find one idiot like this, I think all the central media would show up and do stories...

Do you think that people pile up in big cities voluntarily? Deprive themselves of fresh air and nature? Look into the federal laws that you've signed - and then you'll understand why only thanks to autostores [...] there's still some life out there... And the money being thrown into the construction of the tunnel and Gazprom-City would suffice, for example, to build a new bridge in Veliky Novgorod and to mend the roads in the north-west...

I understand perfectly well that all my questions and exclamations are rhetorical. [...] Because [...] in the first years of your rule, I was still trying to find a compromise... And thus I learned all the mechanisms and the style of your regime.

...And also, your rhetoric drives me mad. The theme of the "czar" and "master" is being beaten into the country's conscience. [...]

Things like this don't end well, I'd like to remind you. [...]

Anyway, leave us alone with your Gazprom. You're a person of age [Putin is 54]. Lenin was already a "dedushka" [old man] at your age. It's time to think of your soul.

I end this halfway through. Please note that I haven't used the words "democracy," "human rights," "free enterprise," etc. Because it's not nice to use the words unfamiliar to the person you're talking to.

Here are a couple comments:

mgtverskoy: Svetlana, "dedushka" Lenin didn't survive to this age. He died before turning 54, and VVP has already passed that.

Are we sending this by regular mail?

aneta_spb: I emailed it. Would be too much honor to bother about an envelope.

[...]

lgdanko: You are wonderful in your genuine naivete or naive ingenuousness. I'll distribute this. Even if the Colonel [Putin] doesn't read it - let the people read it.

Belarus: Memories of the Soviet Past

Global Voices Online
Tuesday, June 6, 2006



LJ user aneta_spb, a St. Petersburg journalist, is posting vignettes with her memories of the Soviet years (RUS). Here's why:

As a result of heated discussions...

... on whether life in the USSR was good or bad...

I've decided to reminisce for myself. This will include memories about myself, my way of thinking and my perceptions - from that time.

In the USSR, I've spent my whole childhood, my whole youth and part of my maturity.

Additionally, I come from a family that has barely benefited from socialism - no free apartment (not even today), not even a motorcycle - and I'm not even talking about a car. I wasn't born in one of the capital cities - but 20 km from a regional center. My parents are from peasants, they are teachers. Didn't drink, didn't smoke. [...]

aneta_spb spent her childhood in the westernmost corner of the Soviet Union, at the Polish-Soviet border in western Belarus. Below is some of what she remembers of religion, Soviet rituals - such as the Little Octobrist and the Young Pioneer Organizations - and of everyday life (RUS):

Easter was always beautiful, and it [contributed to my multiple personality]. Also, there were two Easters, and people celebrated both - the "Russian" [Orthodox] Easter and the "Polish" [Catholic] one. For the Willow [Palm] Sundays people carried willow branches decorated with paper flowers. The flowers were homemade, of goffered paper, and I really wanted to learn how to make them, and I did learn it.

When bread vanished from the stores, people began to bake it by themselves. And for Easter, they invited you to their homes and treated you to this bread and white buns with poppy seed. We didn't have that at home. Mama used to always yell at father: "They all know how to steal, and you don't!"

And I used to really like the Polish girls. Even for school holidays (in elementary school only; they weren't allowed to later), they weren't wearing the octobrist-pioneer uniform, "white top-black bottom" - but had those amazing colorful outfits on, embroidered with sparkles and beads, or simply embroidered... I learned later that when papa had just begun teaching at school and the children had been sworn in as pioneers - they came without their [red] ties the following day. "But you are the Soviet children!" - "We aren't Soviet children, we are Polish children." But I don't remember any of it. Everyone wore ties and starlets.

Those starlets. For a long time, I thought that the octobrist star featured ... [poet Aleksandr] Pushkin as a child. Because [Vladimir] Lenin was bold...

Accidentally, I learned that they meant Volodya Ulyanov [Lenin].

Stars were of two types: made of aluminum and painted over - and the cooler ones, made of transparent red plastic with a built-in tiny photo of a boy with curly hair. [...]

Russia: G8 Security and Domestic Issues

Global Voices Online
Friday, June 9, 2006

Domestic politics seems to somewhat interfere with the attempts of St. Petersburg police to provide security for the upcoming G8 Summit (July 15-17). LJ user aneta_spb, a journalist, retells a friend's story (RUS):

There's been much noise in the [state-funded] mass media about pre-Summit security, about fighting xenophobes, fascists and [skinheads]... Arrests have already been made because of this, apartments have been checked. Just in case, they do check-ups at random apartments - cops show up, check registraiton papers and if there are young people in there, they are being interrogated on the subject of their belonging to the "extremist" organizations...

But today they came to an anti-fascist activist (who is no longer 20, far from it), or, to be more precise, to her elderly parents, and told them that their daughter was on the extremists list, that she was against the existing regime...

The parents responded cleverly - can't one be against the government in this country or what?

They promised to the parents to keep their daughter under surveillance. [...]

LJ user domohozjayka responds with a joke:

- Who is it?
- It's us, the cops.
- What do you want?
- To talk.
- How many of you are there?
- Two.
- Well, why don't you two talk to each other?

Later, domohozjayka adds three more possible ways of dealing with the police, of her own creation:

[...]

1
- Who is it?
- Please open the door.
- I wasn't asking for advice on what to do. I was asking who's there.

2
- Who's there?
- Open up, it's the police.
- Oy, no, I'm scared, I don't know you.
- Look into the peephole - I'm wearing uniform.
- Oy, but I don't know you in uniform, either.

3
- Who's there?
- Open up, it's the police.
- It's a mistake, I didn't call the police.
- No, you didn't. I've come by myself.
- It's the wrong apartment.
(what follows is too long and boring)

A few comments later, LJ user shavu posts a wonderful excerpt (RUS) from Sergei Dovlatov's story about how he was always ready for visits from the Soviet police - thanks to a local drunk who used to warn him.

***

This almost cosy image of a 1970s Soviet kitchen - with homegrown dissidents telling political jokes and reading banned literature - is suddenly interrupted, however, by aneta_spb's proactive journalistic approach:

I'm getting in touch with various cops. Press service is demanding that I send them a written request (ha-ha). But we'll choose another path. I've fished out phones of several deputy heads of district police departments. Now, while I'm going to the clinic to solve my son's problems, I'll think of how it'd be easier to get info for the story. Because if I introduce myself as a journalist, they wouldn't tell me anything and let me bypass the press service.

Russia: Stories From a St. Petersburg Hospital

Global Voices Online
Thursday, May 4, 2006

LJ user aneta-spb, a St. Petersburg journalist of Belarusian descent, is busy taking care of her 21-year-old son now, who is in the hospital with a broken spine. Below is the translation of some of aneta-spb's hospital notes (RUS) - taken in the city that, among other things, will be hosting a G8 Summit July 15-17.

Both aneta_spb and her son were in Minsk during the presidential election and the protests that followed, and she covered much of it on her blog and in other media.

April 30, 2006:

A person who was safe and sound after the March 19-25 events in Minsk, stumbles on a flat spot in St. Petersburg and gets a spine trauma. [...]

He is in Maximilianovskaya [hospital], and it's necessary to visit him. Not that I'm needed there all the time - he gets tired himself, gets sleepy. So sad - he couldn't wait for spring and now he'll have to spend two weeks lying on his back and then two weeks lying on his stomach... This is what we've been told, though there's only been one x-ray done and a doctor on duty looked at it then, on Friday evening. Saturday, Sunday, Monday - there'll be no doctor. I don't understand how this can be - a spinal injury, three days is too long!

I made cutlets yesterday and went to visit him.

This is not the worst hospital. It doesn't stink in the room, at least...

A room for five people, one bed's empty. Gloomy men of various ages lie either with broken legs suspended or simply on their backs. In the room for those who can't move, there's no bell to summon the personnel. The door is wide open and this is understandable. First, to yell and be heard in case something happens (this, I guess, is problematic, however - the post is far away and the nurses' room is all the way around the corner); second, it works like air conditioning. No way to open the window - because they can't move. And because one bed is underneath the window and the person there can catch a cold.

Mityay has just recovered from a severe cold, he has running nose and cough, and it hurts him to cough. I went to ask the nurse for some nasal drops and [a cough medicine]. I was ready to pay for this "service." But they don't have any drops or syrups. They also don't have any camphora alcohol to prevent bedsores. But I've got it with me. As well as a cup, a spoon, toilet paper (thank God, they have sheets - in the children's hospital [...] they once made us bring that, too).

[...]

What shocked me. I used to be a nurse in the neurosurgery department. [...] Beds were the same, bedside tables were as inconvenient, there was the same lack of everything. Including the personnel - people worked in two places at the same time. But... In the mornings we were going from room to room (pardon me for being prosaic) with a jar of water with manganese solution [...], washed the patients, wiped them to prevent bedsores. Nurses didn't relax at work, to smoke a quick cigarette in the bathroom was considered luck and rest. No one was giving me tips [...], but my patients' relatives, on departure, often gave me chocolates, sometimes a can of caviar, flowers - and I used to take it because it wasn't a bribe, it was real gratitude.

And here...

Still, while I worked in neurosurgery, I was also an intern in what's now called Mariinka. They had a different approach there. They didn't preoccupy themselves with bed sheets, for example. In Polenova we used to wash sheets at night (there were paralyzed people there, defecating right underneath themselves). In Kuibyshevka their principle was - if there are no clean sheets, they can do without clean sheets.

But now, I think, idleness has been given a complete carte blanche. No funding, small salaries - so they can sit around and do nothing. No funding - they can do without camphora alcohol and without doctors on weekends...

And the bedside table! A person who can't move will not be able to reach for its drawer to get what he needs!

Not long ago, our healthcare officials were saying on the radio that hospitals have all the medicines and if something's not available, the hospital will reimburse the patient's relatives if they bring a receipt...

I would have hung [those officials] on the first tree - or placed them in this [hospital] room...

But for now I have to work on Mityay's recovery. I feel helpless - what can I do - there's no doctor till May 2...

May 1, 2006 (1):

In the Soviet time, I was an in-patient at the traumatology department [...]. In general, the hospital was no better. A drunk doctor, lazy nurses. In our room for people who couldn't move, an old woman with a broken hip died - she had bedsores, she rarely had visitors, it smelled bad in the room. The old woman lied dead for a few hours before my classmates came to visit me and went looking for the staff. I wanted to smoke very much, and when I did light up under the blanket, the other old women said, "Go on smoking, daughter, let there be human smell in here at least..."

[...]

Now we are told to bring not just our own cup but a SPOON, too. Why? Because if they were giving their own spoons, they'd have to WASH them afterwards. And now, theoretically, it's the patient's visitors who are doing this. But visitors aren't staying 24 hours in [the traumatology department] - the patients here aren't recovering from strokes... Relatives come at dinner time - and wash the spoon. And it'll stay unwashed for breakfast and for lunch.

[...]

May 1, 2006 (2) - in this entry, aneta_spb has posted pictures of her son and others in the hospital:

This is a hospital in the center of St. Petersburg. [...] The patients' sad faces - and it's not a hospice, it's people with broken legs or backs... Bedpan and a cup with urine test - next to the food products.

And the orange balloon that Mityay is blowing - it's not a revolutionary project. It's a recommendation of my Belarusian sister (she, of course, meant balloons of any color, but I didn't find the blue ones in nearby stores and bought some orange): it's necessary to blow balloons or rubber toys to ventilate the lungs to avoid hypostatic pneumonia.

[...]

May 2, 2006:

AN EXAMPLE OF HOSPITAL [SURREALISM]

Yesterday, a male nurse, a pretty active one, by the way - he even enters rooms and advises relatives on what medicines to buy [the hospital does not provide medicines] - he said an amazing thing. I asked why [female] nurses wore dirty shirts over white robes and visited patients only if, according to these very nurses, "they pooped on themselves or called." The male nurse said, "They are our golden reserves! If she quits, do you expect me to empty bedpans?.." (I think that this "golden reserve" - aged over 60 - can be easily intimidated by a perspective of losing her job.)

But here's what's really funny. He showed me a guy from our room and said: "He calls me at my post from his cell phone if he needs a nurse, and I go and look for the nurse, and then she takes away his bedpan..."

This is something, people. To call a stationary phone from your cell phone - you're spending your money on it (in addition to all other hospital expenses). The way it works: you call this male nurse from your cell. He looks for the nurse in a dirty shirt who sleeps or eats peacefully in some corner...

[...]

Thank you all for moral support.

Here's a moving story, by the way. Azerbaijanis from a store in our building basically forced me to take a carton of juice and dessert - for Mitya: "Such a good boy, here is from us to him. How can it be: some drunk fool falls and doesn't get hurt at all, and to the good ones such trouble happens..."

Belarus: Protest Stories and Conversations

Global Voices Online
Thursday, March 23, 2006

For the past four evenings, thousands of people have been gathering at Kastrychnitskaya (Oktyabrskaya) Square in Minsk, Belarus, to protest the fraudulent presidential election, demand a new vote and support the opposition. The crowd thins as the night arrives, but a few hundred young activists stay on in a small 'tent city' by the huge skating rink, braving the brutal weather and trying the regime's patience. The state-owned media either ignore or misrepresent the protest, and much of the virtual discussion takes place in Belarusian LiveJournal communities. Some of these conversations are translated below.


"Lukashenko to the Hague" - by Eugene Grabkin

LJ user Eugene Grabkin posts his photos from the protest and is wondering in the minsk_by LJ community (RUS) whether it is somehow possible for him to get a press card:

I could even provide photos later. ;) Because people are asking where I'm from and what I'm doing?.. And what if I'm from the [state-owned Belarusian TV]?..;)))))

Here's a recommendation (RUS) he's received:

sanitarro: Make one yourself, write PRESSA on it, minsk_by and your nickname :)

it'll protect you from the people, I guess :)))

though it may get the cops interested :)

but do write your nickname, to avoid an entrapment where a cop gets himself a similar card, but if there's an unknown nickname on it or an unknown face over a known nickname, it's easier to sort it out :)

anysyst: Yeah, write this on it: Journalist working for the largest Internet publication www.livejournal.com

***

Posted by LJ user alisunya (RUS):

I was there yesterday evening. I've never seen so many real People, sunny, sincere, fearless. Thank you for being the way you are!!!

My friend stayed there till morning. Between 6 and 7 am, she and nine more people (2 guys and 7 girls) were going to the subway station Oktyabrskaya [...]. Riot police were following them, then asked them all to go into a police room at the station. My friend and two other girls merged with the people standing in the line for subway tokens, but the rest got detained. [...]

***

Posted by LJ user l-u-f-t (BEL):

People in the tent city [...] need water and gas burners. If any of you can help, please do. It's better not to bring the stuff over, but to throw it out of the car windows. It's safer that way. THEY ARE HOLDING ON THERE FOR ALL OF US!

***

Posted by LJ user aneta_spb (RUS):

To Belarusian friends

I'm three hours away from Minsk today and here's what I think.

The only thing reaching here are the rumors of "some people rallying over there." Not all people have Internet access, and those who do may not be in touch with those who've never seen it. My friends are intelligent people and they are against Luka[shenko], but they are pessimists and lack information. I stopped over and gave them the news - that's good; someone else would go elsewhere, too, but that's not enough. It's necessary that everyone knows about the events. If there are local activists, they should busy themselves with spreading the information. [...]

A discussion follows (RUS):

egils: My Internet informs me that there'a a zero chance to overthrow Luka this time [...]. First, there should be a prominent opposition figure to rally with and only then will it be possible to "orangize" [apelsinstvovat', refers to Ukraine's Orange Revolution].

shavu: no, one has to rebel always. that's the only way. when you lose - continue working. and for now, nothing's been lost yet.

[...]

the poles protested in 1954, 1968, 1970, 1980 (and this doesn't include "lesser" strikes, demonstrations and rallies) and they didn't succeed until 1989.

that's the right path shown by John Paul II

egils: Well, they could afford it in Poland. Because they always had mass opposition there: you throw some to jail, others will come. And who will replace them in Belarus?

shavu: the new ones will come. and if they don't, it means that Lukashenko has indeed been elected by the whole people. that's it.

***

Andrei Khrapavitski, a Belarusian blogger living in the United States, has translated two "Maidan stories" (RUS) and posted them on his site:

[LJ user alexan3]

For all day long, our food supplies were refilled by women and men, including seniors. People helped in every way they could – money, candies, medicines, tea, clothes, blankets. Especially touching was an old woman of about 65 years of age, who hardly hobbled with a walking stick, but she brought us her homemade bread and disposable plates. She handed us her gifts with tears in her eyes, saying, “Thank you, my dear, thank you. Thank you for not being afraid. We are with you. We will support you.” At this sentimental moment, I felt like crying. Such genuine kindness is keeping us warm more than some slogan shouting. People started bringing food in private autos and cabs. But cops got an order and aligned their people along the street. They worked quickly and efficiently. A cab drives in and stops, the door opens, and before a passenger manages to get out, two cops jump in, and the car drives off in an unknown direction. Possibly, to feed the president’s administration. Soon bus #100 quitted stopping here. The vermin had changed the bus’s route, what was comparable to the melting of ice in blockaded Leningrad. But somehow people managed to bring in food, water…

[LJ user bullochka]

I am writing these lines on March 22 at 0:48. Of the past 24 hours, two were when I had an opportunity to sleep. An hour and a half ago, I was released from a police station. So far I don’t know where my brother was who carried products to the campers. Maybe, they are still there, on October Square, joined in a circle, hand in hand, to protect the camp by their own bodies. -10 degrees Celsius of frost is crawling down on Minsk. The reinforcement won’t come. No one will be able to get through the cordons of the riot police, KGB agents, blocking all access to the square. Nobody will be able to bring them hot tea or a sleeping-bag. I’ve understood this a couple of hours ago out of my own experience.

***

A seemingly innocent request from LJ user Jahor Shumski, elicits this discussion (BEL, RUS):

shumski: Dear drivers! Please support our defiant spirit: honk as you pass Oktyabrskaya Square in the morning. This truly elevates our mood.

anysyst: It's risky... They can fine you, for "making noise within city limits." You should warn people about what they are getting themselves into.

shumski: In the evening, every second car is honking. Maybe it's time to stop being afraid of your own shadow?

arina_skripka: I agree! Almost everyone's being fined. In the evening, there are too many cars for the traffic police to figure out who was honking, but in the morning, they do it right away, no questions... Unjustified risk (imho)

pavietra: I'm ready to donate money for fines, if necessary!

kong_en_ge: There's no fine for it. Warning in the worst-case scenario - read the administrative violations codex.

finder_bel: A question: How to attach a blue ribbon to the car so that it's visible and doesn't contradict the driving rules?

kende_r: I've seen cars with ribbons on their antennas today.

***

Ivan Lenin of Rush-Mush has translated a summary post (RUS) by LJ user lipski who has been providing regular updates from Oktyabrskaya Square since the very first day of the protest:

The Belarusian Maidan [Maidan means 'square' in Ukranian, referring to the Orange revolution - IL] has not won, but failed. From the very beginning, March the 19th. Yes, some people have got rid of fear. Yes, there was mass action that Minsk hasn't seen in a long while. Yes, it hasn't been suppressed. BUT. It wasn't supressed not because anyone is afraid of EU sanctions, but because there wasn't a need to supress it. Such development demonstrates the weakness of the opposition and plays into the regime's hand. "Maidan" as it is right now, is good for the official TV's picture. It's turned into an instrument of the regime's propaganda, not the opposition's campaign. "Maidan" is happening not because of its defenders' heroism (no irony here), but thatnks to the goodwill of the regime. The tent camp could be taken out tonight, nicely and quietly, when there are 200 people in there, just like they took out the first tent on the square. And I'm almost positive that that wouldn't cause an explosion of protests or international sanctions.

As four days have passed, we see no political dynamics. The protests are dying down. With each day, there are fewer and fewer people. On monday, there were 7-8 thousands, yesterday - 3,500 to 4,000, and today - around three. The same tendency as in fall 2004. There is no plan, no action, no palpable goals, no organization. The situation can only be rescued by a mass action on March 25th, but it doesn't look like it's being seriously prepared.

In my view, it's wrong to identify the events in Minsk with Maida, as many people do. A better analogy would be "Ukraine without Kuchma", which didn't succeed, but became a foundation for the Orange revolution. After the "Minsk maidan", what has to follow is organizational work, if the opposition wants to accomplish something, and is psychologically prepared to take power into its hands and to take charge.