People of different inclinations populate this world – some are extroverts and some are introverts, some are chatty and some are reserved, some are distant and some are congenial. However, there is a topic for each one of us that could make us talk and open up even to strangers, albeit some people also require a considerable amount of alcohol in the process. Serving in the Red Army is probably one of the topics that can broach any Russian conversation even in the most awkward of circumstances. It is an especially juicy topic when chewed over amidst old classmates or friends gathered for a feast of smoked fish, beer, cigarettes, dirty fingers and vodka. Truth and passion mingle with outrage, hilarity, fear and caution, this is safely one of the most frequent topics save for “New Russians” and “Chechens”. Some enjoy relishing in the putrid, dusty and tiresome past with gleeful assurance of never having to repeat the experience, this privilege usually comes with extra age and pounds. Others approach the topic with trepidation of a parent figuring out a variety of ways to spare their golden heirs the prospects of unpleasant service. And yet many dissect the heroic past with the extra sharp scalpel of hindsight.
Talking about nearly universal hazing is totally OK. Here even the worst examples of the strict fraternity that is US Marines become bleak and selective. When reflecting on the first attempts by Soviets to attack the German war machine with cavalry, even the most senseless and brutal acts of the Vimy Ridge stand pale in comparison to the generals‘stupidity. When the word “food” comes into the picture, the grim tales of the Irish potato famine can hardly compete. In other words hold on to your seats as you are about to hear yet sordid another tale – I hope to find at least half of you in your seats at the end of this painful experiment.
Short History According to Posoukh
The Red Army takes its origins from the heap of metal, limbs and mouldy bread that used to form the glorious army the last Tsar took to fight the misguided and idiotic WWI. As the Tsarist army departed the barracks in the general direction of the hated Kaiser in 1914, it was a tight, coherent, relatively well-fed and well-dressed singing mass of humanity. When the Tsar was overthrown by the wave of discontent and desperation in the early 1917, the army had disintegrated into a heap of bedraggled, hungry and wounded anarchy that rotted in the insurmountable mud of the Eastern Front. The prospects of ending the hostilities overwhelmed any inkling of allegiance to just about the only form of tyranny known by the tragic Russian soul – the monarchy. Things got even juicier by the end of 1917 when the perpetual Russian desire for certainty gave way to the flip side of the monarchy – Bolshevism. In the first few months of the new regime, the army left suspended waiting for electrical charges to build up in the bloody conflict-ridden magnet that was Russia. Some of the army drifted to the Whites and Antanta (limited contingent of foreign anti-revolutionary forces represented by the US, England etc.) trying to strangle the newly birthed social experiment. More progressive and socially conscious folk lent their allegiance to the Soviets, while more adventurous and individualistic ones joined the Anarchist movement, or just joined packs of marauding bands that roamed the defenceless countryside in the uncertain turmoil of war communism with its basic lack of bread and vodka.
The forces throwing their allegiance behind the Soviets first congregated on the Western Front in February 1918. They closely averted their first test and near disaster for Lenin and the comrades that was Brest Letovsk. It is here near the Western frontier of now defunct Tsarist Empire where the German military onslaught on the “Workers” republic was stalled due only in part to a decent showing by the new forces behind the burgeoning Bolshevik regime. This stall and subsequent miraculous survival of the regime in Moscow was mostly due to other factors such as general German fatigue, their own domestic revolution (thank you Rosa Luxembourg) and Bolsheviks’ willingness to give in to territorial concessions. However, despite these less than glorious beginnings, the Soviet propaganda later portrayed these events as the definitive turn in the fortunes of the new regime, hence the selection of the official army birthday – February 23, 1918. This day is still celebrated quite lavishly, although the old Soviet glory has given way to lesser supplied and more diminutive version of an army, the Russian army.
The fortunes did indeed improved and by 1922, nearly all vestiges of the old Tsarist resistance were erased from the map of the old empire. Almost all intact except for few concessions given to perennially pesky and hardly profitable Finns, Poles, Estonians and other democratically inclined types, the empire was resurrected. From here on, the army grew and prospered in its new pride of the true defenders of workers’ freedoms. The top commanders were always on the short leash however, as Lenin, Stalin and cohorts always preferred the power of political propaganda prevailing over the general unpredictability of military interference. The force that is always liable to plague any empire if not properly governed. This had remained a comfortable balance until Stalin’s political blindness and his prodigious stubbornness nearly cost us all our country. You see, this wily tyrant refused to give in to the demands of the military to modernise in the mid 1930’s, i.e. switching from cavalry to tanks, from simple to automatic rifles etc. He feared the military power and decided to subdue the culprits using well-proven methods of mass repression, murder and intrigue. The army weakened, demoralised and gave way to the least deserving but certainly more loyal commanders. Its new “worth” was proven in the nearly disastrous Finnish campaign that cost Soviets almost all of their reputation, millions in material losses and many thousands of casualties. And all this for few kilometres of although strategic but still impassable and frozen swamp!
Yet at the same time, Stalin unwittingly stepped into the carefully planned trap of the Non-Aggression Pact with Hitler, which Stalin saw as an ultimate political opportunity to cement his personal hold on power even at the expense of the growing Nazi threat. The timing was not in his favour, as his political “genius” broke to pieces in just two years when he faced Hitler at the Moscow’s doorsteps in the ice cold and blustery winter of 1941. Facing the impending disaster, the hauled up dictator was forced to recognise the need to shore up his military strength by summoning fallen out of favour but thankfully still alive generals headed by the genius of Zhukov. These guys put aside their personal pride, at the point of a gun mind you, and reasserted the control of the military for the sake of the country and the world. The rest is known, as the Third Reich faced its ultimate doom at the hands of the Allies led by the Soviet Union. Contrary to some popular Western myths, the Soviets were the ones who bore the brunt of the horrible warfare with the most casualties and material losses. Following the war, the Red Army was at its height buttressed by awe and reputation unsurpassed from the times of Napoleon, with its generals decorated and revered, and with its technology boasting the latest achievements including a nascent nuclear arsenal.
Now the battlefield shifted from the bunkers and field tents to Kremlin, Whitehall and White House. The bitter odour of war, briefly assuaged by the sweet taste of victory and peace, was turning sour and unwelcome once again. The cruelty of war and warmth of peace was giving way to the acidity of iron. The game became political, rational and rife with ever-increasing stakes of mutual destruction. Generals were no longer needed, as engineers and rocket scientists were ushered as the next set of altar boys at the solemn mass of international politics.
The generals were sent to a cold war exile, while the army left to stagnate under the rudderless yoke of the Soviet leadership and its failing vision. Even the saviour and the people’s darling Zhukov did not escape a demotion to a lowly southern region to bide time, write memoirs and plan for a quiet retirement. Long gone were the idealistic days of the new vision inspired by fresh and idealistic regime. Forgotten the struggles and hope of the post-war years, and even the glorious days of the German defeat barely remembered, left just about only in the hearts and minds of the veterans and much less on the current agenda of the army rotting at its core. Few attempts at reasserting itself in times of the Soviet leadership changes in the 50s and 60s did not bring much awaited revival. With Brezhnev firmly in power (1964-1982), the whole country settled into a dreary morass of moral an ideological emptiness. Apart from few key and all-important areas in rocketry and air force, the army experienced further disintegration of its currency, as now the very pride and glory of Soviet power was avoided like plague by just about any draftee. The prospect of spending the best years of one’s life in the miserable barracks with frequent physical and psychological abuse had become very dreary prospect indeed. No pride, no inspiration – now just about everyone went in the army with the same level of enthusiasm as a criminal would go to serve a sentence. An inability to summon a basic level of positivism was a critical part of the Soviet downfall in their misadventure in Afghanistan – one of the last attempts to rehabilitate the Soviet ideology in the open armed conflict. The mudzhahadeen had the belief and ideology, stirred and fed by the generous American effort, while the Soviets were exhausted, morally and physically, with nothing to gain but a hope to get out of that hell alive just to see another day of normal, or nearly so, life.
This failure was not the last, as the ghost of the Red Army still persists at the core of its still living offspring – the Russian military. The inability to douse the ongoing Chechen conflict is a glaring testament to the political as well as military failure of the current occupants of Kremlin; the failure that is overcome with emptiness and an apparent lack of direction. The failure that requires a change of ideology and fresh air of genuine optimism that is in such a short supply in the eyes of perpetually sceptical Russian audience. Similar struggles have haunted the American military in the wake of the Vietnam conflict, as well as in the current Iraq engagement. The latter one produced a huge plunge in the moral and the very sustainability of the professional military thanks to the absence of candour emanating from the highest seats of military command and political power in Washington. More than gullible and heavily self-reflective Americans at times like these require a genuine effort at truth… The Red Army during its last gasps of the 1980s needed much more than Glasnost and Perestroika, it needed a fundamental change in direction that never came. Despite a short flirtation with freedom fighting for the sake of the people during the military putsch of 1991, the Red Army could not even stop the avoidable – the death of the Soviet Union.
Serving the Motherland – Fist Steps
My personal experiences and those of my friends predominantly belong to the last period of disintegration and chaos in the ranks of the military. My relationship with the army started in the junior high years when we were just in mid teens.
As noted, the army had become an odious beast that was avoided by just about everyone who faced a prospect of draft – just about the sole tool of recruitment, as the stream of volunteers had been dry practically since the last days of the Great War. Now, when I say avoided – I primarily refer to the soldier draft, as the service for officers was much less painful and at times even desired as many officers either stayed on after their obligatory term and countless many even enrolled into military colleges to become military men for life. Nobody wanted to be a fool even in the Soviet masquerade – so, how did not one get drafted as an officer? First of all, you needed to enrol into an institute of higher learning and pray that during the time in school the soldier draft pipelines are full and you get a chance to finish your education that usually included a military component. This component qualified you as being eligible for the officer draft. That is precisely how my father served as a military doctor as opposed to the whipping boy experience of yours truly. If you have a bachelor’s degree you could avoid the service altogether, as the demand for officers was always less brisk than for the perennial cannon fodder - soldiers.
Now, enrolling into colleges and universities was not necessarily a simple task in the easiest of times. It only got worse when the demographics and Soviet military needs were stacked up in your favour. In the earlier 1980s such fortunate confluence of circumstances appeared ever less likely, as the baby boom of the post war era gave way to the lower birth rates of my generation coupled with increasing military needs in part due to the Afghan war. So the higher education avoidance option was basically out of question.
The next best thing was to become rather sick. Not totally sick mind you, as no one relished the prospect of spending much time in and around medical establishments in the ripe and busy age of eighteen. Everyone wanted to become just a little sick, enough to be disqualified for service. The wily Soviet military smelled the rat earlier on and instituted mandatory annual medical check-ups for all boys of the age fourteen and higher. We thought they cared about our health. No luck cowboy what they really cared about were their quotas. They checked everything including your epidermis in the most sensitive of places. Most of us did not seem to mind as a free day from school was always welcome. Girls were not as lucky.
This system was vigilant, efficient and precise even in the pre-computer bureaucracy of the lethargic Soviet state. The economy could have been in shambles, the social values and ideals could have been fraying around the edges but the military draft worked like a Swiss clock. To be disqualified from service by the military medical people one needed to be really sick and many connected a parent got busy conjuring up a nefarious multitude of illnesses that had befallen their beloved offspring. Suddenly, scores of my friends and acquaintances were stricken with the most grievous but never too apparent symptoms. This was never discussed but secretly envied, as such certifiable non-draft worthy cases most frequently occurred in the families of well positioned bureaucrats that counted among some of my closest friends. It did not seem fair but as old as the world. So we, simple folk, proceeded through life eating bologna sausages while others found solace in caviar and salami.
The last two grades in the high school also contained a military class requirement – for everyone including the girls. After all in the high-tension state of the raging cold war the total military preparedness was a virtue that transcended genders. These classes were a little painful at times – you know, just a little too much discipline for ADD stricken teenagers. An old retired major with a very funny sounding paternal name of Ageyevich was an exemplary military man of straight posture, impeccable dress and cheap cologne. The latter example proved useful as his wafts of wilted roses ended up serving well in beating the acrid stings of boot polish that used to overwhelm the overcrowded barracks.
The first order of any morning inspection was your dress and haircut. Short haircuts were not in vogue then as the AC/DC was all the rage. Coming up to grade nine just about all of us grew long horrible looking mullets complemented by frayed jeans shorts and ripped T-shirts. Yes, the West and its evil influences were not far away thanks to the local black market and short-wave radio. I basked in pro-western enthusiasms and was ready for anything but a confrontation with Ageyevich. And yet, loathing to shear my carefully grown main I, like many others, risked a rebuke by showing up at the first class jut as we were.
Luck was not on our side that day and the nearest barber got busy quickly on that warm day in early September – bye-bye my golden locks…
Ageyevich did not tolerate dissent, especially when questions of hairstyle and general sloppiness were involved. His morning routines were ruthless and always in accompaniment of his low and menacing voice. Always curt in his summary fashions Ageyevich had a gift to remind everyone how it was like to stand in front of an execution squad – all you future killers and embezzlers be aware!
It did not end there as his inspections were always regular and thorough. I would never forget one time when he decided to closely observe one of my friends – Kolya. Kolya had a nice set of very straight, very blond worthy of the best Swedish traditions hair. Once when it was long Kolya sought to avoid a deportation to the barber, as he had carefully combed and prepped his malleable strands behind his ears. To anyone with less experience this arrangement would look as neat as the best of Dr. Phil, but not to Ageyevich. Pacing briskly through the ranks his steps ceased abruptly sending a chilling thud through everyone’s heart. All craned to see what was in store next. Ageyevich’s face suddenly broke up in an unexpectedly sadistic personification of a smile as he gleefully commenced probing Kolya’s hair with expertly strokes originating from behind the ear of his hopeless victim. Few short seconds later the verdict was in with loose long strands of hair hanging in the most shameful and scruffy fashion from the Red Army point of view. Had Kolya been born a Hassidic Jew he would have been exemplary alas he had not. From then on the local barber was Kolya’s favourite hangout.
Similar inspections of dress were just as damning – should a non-regulation tie or a shirt be worn - beware you all deviants! Once done with the inspection, we usually proceeded into the class that was conducted with solemnity of Orthodox Church services and useless safety meetings at work. The most exciting part of the course was occasional trips to the shooting range for riffle practices. Oh yes, we did not have to go very far as the shooting range was incidentally located right in the school basement - I guess Soviets always planned for contingencies…
At the end of our two-year course we were treated to a live AK-47 target shooting at a countryside range. I distinctly remember that sunny spring day as we played soccer on a local and almost grassy pitch awaiting our turns taking deadly aim at some well thrashed cardboard targets. The deafening noise and violent reverberations of the convulsing killing implements were the most surprising. Since it was a test in target, and not mass, shooting, an instructor soldier was assigned to each of us to ensure that our bullets went exclusively in the intended direction with no temptation to settle high school rivalries in a Columbine manner. In the States they just sell these easy killing things under the guise of the Second Amendment and then wonder why they experience such high rates of firearm deaths. As you see even the decadent Soviets appeared more sensible in this contentious arena. I bet there is much to be said about efficiencies of a dictatorial state, maybe later, as every soccer game and target shooting outing eventually had to come to an end. I was turning seventeen, just one year away from the inevitable experience of the mini Gulag ahead.
Serving the Motherland – Caught!
The first year of university was winding down and I was expecting to be getting summons to the local recruiting station any day now. The life was about to stop and nearly lose all of its meaning as I saw it. Most of the days were spent in the hazy stupor that lifted only for a few seconds of reprieve following daily mail pickup. “Not today!”– what a relief, one more day of mindless freedom. Some indulged in partying and alcohol, I indulged in the recently found passion – running and working out. I had already lost about thirty pounds in the last five months and could make a chin-up for the first time in my life. I was even slightly overdoing it with the weight-loosing bit, as I struggled through my runs in sweaters and windbreaks even on the warmest of days. This obsession with weight loss was to ultimately prove useful later on. For now in the midst of mind numbing exercise routines I even delighted in such wild fantasies as being lost in the massive recruiting annals. “Maybe they just forgot about me”. That was not to be, my dear state did not forget one of its most ungrateful sons - one dreadful day it eventually came! Upon its receipt, I attempted the last looser trick, the simplest in the rule book. I pretended not to have received the hated summons in the first place.
To make matters more plausible, I arranged an urgent holiday dash to the deep and refreshing blues of the Black Sea. I suddenly felt a need for a shot at bumming at a Crimean beach without “anyone” knowing my whereabouts, the whereabouts where even my mother was lost for an answer. Special caution was to be attributed to any uniformed strangers that might have a gall to show up at my doors. While this last ditch effort at anonymity did delay the inevitable, but it did not prevent it. One day my mother’s pleas of ignorance fell on the deaf ears of a wily draft officer, as he gave her an ultimatum of either my imminent appearance or jail. I weighted my chances and the army service came out ahead – apparently I still had some semblance of a brain left, just in time where it was needed the least – the army. Few days later I stood in front of the recruiting office with the whole bunch of other poor sobs.
When one fails to avoid the soldier service either due to bad demographics or outrageously good health coupled with a lack of proper connections – there is one other choice remains, the “reduced” service. To my apparent “luck” this activity could save one from a trivial difference between going to Afghanistan or not. I was all for fraternising with in comfortable turbans but their propensity to cut white men’s throats was a little disconcerting, unfortunately.
Given the apparent lack of mutual love between yours truly and the next mujahadeen, my grandma resorted to the services of some “benevolent” folks at the local Voenkommat (recruiting station) who loved to make promises. Unfortunately, they could not really influence the ultimate destination of their poor charges. They could effect the original placement, sure, but there was no telling what would transpire after you enlisted in non-combat building brigades, navy (fortunately land-locked Afghanis did care for a seaside spot) or militia formations. The militia units’ postings were scarce and extremely hard to get as it suddenly seemed that the whole “law abiding” Soviet society desperately wanted to see their sons fighting street crime that hardly existed according to the everyday press. Unsurprisingly, only one of my “healthy” classmates made it to the coveted grey uniform, while others struggled to attain some not too distant postings without really knowing the future.
Navy was not a bad choice unless dispatched to a nuclear submarine somewhere in the middle of the Arctic Ocean. Another problem was that the navy service required one extra year of your life, which in itself did not attract many takers. The last option was that of building brigades. These things usually took two kinds of people – partially sick and criminally minded. Having experienced a severe bout of encephalitis at the ripe age of four, I found myself eligible for the glorious opportunity amongst the ones that were not even trusted with guns – building brigades cherished shovels instead. I was assigned to one of these not very glorious units right on the spot – no threat of Afghanistan – we did not really intend to rebuild there – just like Americans in Iraq today.
Shipment
Once they got you, they did not give a minute’s reprieve. That very day of the selection, I was promptly sent with my new cohorts to the railway station to await shipment. After loitering about the station, the new instalment of human military cargo was loaded and duly shipped to the city of Kirovograd, only five hours away by train. I had nothing to complain about – so it seemed…
The initial atmosphere among the fresh recruits was somewhat cheerful. Many talked fast as in a bout of crack addiction, other retreated into their shells to manoeuvre in the dead end of life. At least all was still distant and unknown leaving some room for imagination to roam and toy with the ideas of donning still fresh uniforms or sleeping in the barracks like well stacked sardines. There was even something to joke about and look forward to. It all started hitting home at the dawn of the next day that greeted us at the local and friendly barracks. Feeling woozy from the excitement and the lack of sleep in the jittery train, I could have as well been in a space ship.
The life promptly returned with a send-off to the showers to get rid of our last aromas of civil life.
These were the best specimen in droning piping, slippery nakedness and rough brown soap known for its tickling qualities. Besides, the local density could have rivalled that of Auschwitz on a slow day in summary nature of finality. The shower march culminated in the massive head shaving campaign. For the first time in my life I experienced boldness but not before the gleeful military barber attempted to turn me into an exemplary punk rocker by shaving his first swath right through the middle of my rather thick mane. After admiring his momentary Keith Richards creation, I plunged his blunt machine with a renewed zest seeping in abundance of captive energy. And voila, I was bold as an Easter egg. The new life had begun…
Rude Reality
At first stroking my shorn epidermis felt novel and even liberating. I actually enjoyed it except for the occasional evening chill. After all there was no Ageyevich to threaten you with a trip to the neighbourhood barber. The first four weeks of our time were to be spent in boot camp training. That meant that we were segregated, for a time, from the older soldiers – which was positive as the official hazing could only begin once one exited the training barracks. During the training we were not even considered fully-fledged soldiers, as the official service would only begin following a solemn oath ceremony – let the real misery roll in! For now we were confined to our strange group of new recruits – some of us were partially sick and some of us were partially criminal. A very strange mix, as I came to look at it.
One of the first things one had to do upon receiving a single set of fresh military uniform – was to learn how to use “portyanki”. Portyanki is the vestige of an ancient Russian tradition to use little smelly pieces of cotton rags instead of socks. Two hundred years ago at the time of Napoleonic conquests, the absence of socks was probably quite justified. In the end of the twentieth century, it was a cruel training tool circumvented only by a handful of senior serving soldiers and officers, of course. If you could not catch up with the tricky enveloping procedure that resembled tight Slavic baby bundling, you were liable to experience horrible blisters and be given extra sets of push-ups. There simply wasn’t any other arrangement – bare feet would not do either.
Eventually, having mastered our rudimentary swaddling skills, we proceeded with the torture of incessant marching, running, push-uping and other sweaty activities – all in heavy cotton uniforms tucked into a set of heavy oversized knee-high turn-of-the-century boots. I did not find all this particularly difficult given my pre-service exercise routine of 15K per day, in lighter foot wear mind you. Some of mates, however, appeared to be melting daily. One particularly overweight specimen aptly named Petro must have lost fifty pounds in the first four weeks! And you say Atkins – forget about it!
The only issue with exercising was a complete absence of showers – Red Army preferred a set routine as opposed to indiscriminate use of hot water – they really cared about the environment, and it showed. The routine included about two full showers a month. The rest of the time you either stunk or stunk really badly depending on your ability to stick one’s body under a regular set of cold water sinks located outside. Luckily it was summer. I could hardly imagine what the new winter recruits were to go through. The aromatic training took the hardest to our noses during the night, as all hundred of us were cramped into a three thousand square feet barrack. Each sunset came with its unmistakable smell of portyanki and rhythmic snoring of fast sleepers. Mornings were always a jolt that shot us back to the unpleasant reality, always just a bit too early. As I occupied the upper birth of the bunk bed, my morning usually started with an additional thud. Upon a rising call, we had to dress within a prescribed time – one minute I think. If the results were deemed unsatisfactory – the “pleasant” experience would be repeated few times with the worst offenders taking turns at public displays of push-ups – good morning to all of you!
The only solace from the daily mindless toil of the boot camp was food. But one had to be quick, as many lads were fast to latch on the tasty bits and the drilling sergeants were always keen to march you off to the next bit of torture right in the midst of gourmand dreams. Most of the time, food was edible despite the huge cauldron routine in a massive kitchen designed for around two to three hundred perpetually hungry soldiers. As some cooked parts were treated with a due level of circumspection and caution, the predictable bread, butter and tea were always eagerly awaited. One time, one of the fellow soldiers serving on the sentry was the first to eat the long-expected lunch of beef and buckwheat. By his admission, the desired treat was an undeniable success. Quick on his heels, we crowded in front of the canteen entrance with anticipation of a savoury almost home meal. The palpable agitation of hungry, dirty and thinning soldiers was just soaking up the air. We could barely wait to get our seats. Suddenly, the first whiffs of the long anticipated feast betrayed, first in streaks and gradually in a proverbial avalanche, super putrid smells of rancid meat that must have been recently unearthed from the WWII storage facilities – it smelt that badly! Even the pure and bucolic meal of buckwheat porridge was now out of reach – as the dastardly meat stew covered it all! Nobody touched a thing. Holding our noses and trying not to be overcome by the deathly smell, we quietly chewed on some bread, waiting to get the hack out of there at the first sign of the drill sergeant. The small temporal dream crushed except for the sentry who surely savoured the disgusting stew rather unquestionably – he had a bad case of sneezing that day!
Serving the Motherland - Escape
As the dreaded day of the oath approached, I felt less and less inclined to take the orders. If one is found sick prior to the oath, I heard, there might be an easier way of getting out. As my rapid weight-losing routine of the last few months was catching up to me, I was occasionally beset by slight faintness or other similar and nearly harmless occurrences. “Being a little queasy could make certifiable”, I thought – who can resist little trying if two years is on the line?
So one day my already feeling faint head took a couple of additional nods during a marching drill. I was promptly marched off to the barracks for examination. A quick call to the local ambulance service followed shortly. As medics were getting to examine my already thinning physique, the relative midday cool of the barracks made me feel slightly better but letting on was not an option. Unable to decide the case, they hastily transported their new charge to the nearby hospital equipped with a neurological unit. The further examination confirmed that there must have been something wrong with me – I my pulse just dropped below 40 – they thought it dangerous – I quietly thought that running 15K a day could have its side benefits…
They kept me in the hospital for further examinations.
“This guy looks pretty grave”, whistled a thin tall type by the window. He wore long striped pyjamas and sported a little scraggly look.
“Do not worry, they bring him back soon enough, Tolyk”, his short simian looking neighbour immanently believed in the power of Soviet medicine.
“Maybe”
“Not maybe, just watch. Where were we, that was hilarious…”Ivan picked up a juicy trail of yet another tale of his sexual escapades
In other words I ended up with a bunch of few entertaining characters that spent their days in many an anecdote making it far more palatable to see the days float on by. In addition to his personal conquests, Ivan used to delight us all by his morning shaving routine that included very artistic and dangerous open-blade Ninja tricks. Even a slight mistake could have easily reopened his arteries making it impossible to miss. He always started it with a thorough ‘who is your father” sharpening routine by employing a thick leather belt. Next, he dabbed his thick stubble in the mounds of suds that simmered waiting to be obliterated by swaths of his blade. “Swoosh” a whole new colony of suds flew off the leathery clean cheeks of the proud blade operator. Yes, he survived another day to busk in the glory of his tawdry stories to keep us awake and in good sprits. For me anything beat the barracks.
Even though my condition required a lot of patience and stamina to keep up the bed-ridden regime, I managed to enjoy my station. It beat the heck out of the marching drills and the canteen food. My daily squat sets in the private bathroom stall kept me in some kind of shape despite the need to appear ill to everyone including my own mother who arrived few days later after failing to discover me at the oath taking ceremony. She was appalled at my condition – I had to keep my silence, it was not easy but a quick recovery from a dizzy spell was not a ticket home. I wanted to stay there forever. The days of pondering my fate convinced me that my aversion to the army service was not just of a physical but of a physiological nature. We, the army and yours truly, just could not get along. Unfortunately, the civil hospital could not make such a requisite decision and they sent me back to my hometown military hospital for further evaluations instead. I even had to take a dreaded oath, sitting; as such transfer was reserved for military use only. I guess I was one of them after all!
I desperately wanted to remain sick. I was even prepared to give up my smoking habit. The gravity of my condition demanded it despite delivering one of the very few delights of my barrack career. Alas, the wily military neurologists quickly determined that my faintness, headaches and occasional foot dragging were hardly of terminal nature. The easy time digging ditches was looming large and I became genuinely depressed. Even the melodic night signing of much sicker roommate from Uzbekistan did not help the matters – his songs soothed the night in the unknown Uzbek tongue while my depression primarily raged in Russian. The hard lobbying effort of the local medical community by my mother and grandmother eventually produced a long-awaited fruit - an evaluation by a well-known professional psychoanalyst was nothing to sneeze at. The diagnosis – “clinical depression” was greeted with exuberance worthy of a huge lottery win. I was a subject to discharge! Wow, what a relief! Depression, what depression? I could not care less.
Igren – the Happy Place
“Not too fast little fellow”, I sensed much snickering from those pesky military neurologists. My evaluator although highly respected was after all a civil doctor. This was not enough. In the fine military tradition they sent me further down to the depth of the medical discharge food chain – a huge local psychiatric hospital with a military unit. This time I was to be checked out by the impartial and very military Sherlock Holmses in white coats. Now, I was in the really mad soup. The quarters of this unit were located in the suburban park setting that appeared tranquil, serene and untouched by hardly any medical aromas that greet any hospital visitor whether in New York or Kathmandu. I guess the mad did not need much in the way of drugs; they just needed a free pass home! The rooms had no doors since all local crazies were subject to easy surveillance by ever vigilant and ubiquitous nurses. The azure of the late summer sky was marred by the electrified barbed wire on the one side of the compound. I could hardly complain as our neighbours were mentally disturbed criminals. They wanted to go home too, except it was a little trickier since they had barbed wire ornaments hanging on all four walls.
The first few days were pleasant in the midst of befriending a few of my mad cohorts – those that spoke some decent Russian at least, as a considerable portion, if not the majority, of my gowned inmates were the minorities from the fringes of the sprawling Soviet empire – Kirgiz, Uzbek and Armenians were the regulars. Some did appear disinclined to speak much Russian or to serve Russian masters. I guess the two factors mixed quite well and helped with insanity pleas. It was the first time in my life when I wanted to a part of much derided and depressed ethnic minorities!
The majority of time was spent discussing the obvious symptoms of our sicknesses – a sure pass to freedom! The thorough knowledge of requisite signs and one’s ability to rattle them off like an alphabet appeared to be a sure passage back to the civil life. However, this path was wrought with consequences, as once discharged on the basis of essentially bipolar diagnosis one could be subject to various civil life impediments associated with the famed article 7B of the Red Army discharge code. University education and other important career options were in peril. Soviets were excellent trade masters. This was truly a conundrum to ponder, as the dreaded day of the discharge commission was approaching. Everyone was getting nervous – a clear sign of psychopathic aversion to the service if nothing else. I kept rehearsing my syndromes…
One the day of the commission, the halls of the ward were unusually quiet. Instead of multilingual chatter and bursts of laughter, the hush ruled the corridors. Everyone sat on their beds awaiting their fateful hour – to be or not to be…My turn came and I entered the room with at least three senior medical types. My diagnosis of depression and well-rehearsed subdued behaviour seemingly did the trick and I was conditionally discharged pending a final confirmation to come from Kiev from the regional military hospital. Luckily, my article of the discharge code was 6B – a much less restrictive but no less rewarding part of the discharge code when compared to the famous 7B. “Just another unpleasant delay”, I thought. Waiting for the formalities to settle did seem to be too daunting of a proposition.
Sanatorium
While I was to await the final confirmation from Kiev, my grandmother successfully lobbied my transfer out of the chaos of the international mad house into much more palatial surroundings of a stress relieving department for the well-connected. In fact, the maximum one could only stay at this place for a month at a time, the place was that good I was not disappointed. Rooms with doors, well-cared for indoor plumbing, carpets, good food, a colour TV and daily acupuncture greeted my arrival. I took my path to the ultimate cure with a lot of zeal. My schedule was literally packed with all sorts of cures that could have kept one in similar condition alive for decades. Following very nutritious breakfast concocted along the best guidelines of the Soviet health ministry, I was usually treated to goodly doses of acupuncture and hypnosis. It all might sound mundane to the medically overfed West but in the slowly decaying Soviet Empire, those things were the signs of rather special treatment. A set of highly qualified and relatively well-paid physicians administered the treatment – and all of it did not cost me a penny – glory to the Soviet medical system! The rest of my time was spent in eating, sleeping, reading, taking walks and pill swallowing. Boy, did I get a lot of that. While I knew that the nature of my illness was more of emotional nature, I did hardly ever refuse a pill – after all I was trying to prove to the rest of the world that I was really worthy of the medical discharge from the military. So swallow I did.
While all these treatments and needle pampering accompanied by soft music in the room plastered with wallpaper featuring bucolic themes were very pleasant, my body demanded more attention due to some drastic regional expansions. Ones around my waist line required special attention. My body could not longer contain itself, it demanded exercise. But getting healthy was a rather risky business. So I started my clandestine exercise routine. Luckily the park that surrounded our building bordered on the nearby farm fields. Not many patients ventured into the furrows in the brightest of days; at dusk it was sure to be entirely deserted. My regular evening walks typically led me right to these forgotten fields where I indulged myself in some limited skipping and jogging. Even my “dragging” right leg appeared to have recovered its youthful sprite. What a miracle! For now however, the miracles were kept tightly locked in somebody’s drawer in Kiev.
Back in the Wild
Unfortunately, the response from Kiev was not arriving all that quickly while my time at the sanatorium was expiring. The apparent next step was to go back to the doorless international mad house. After the comforts of the sanatorium the prospect was less than appetising. My grandmother turned on her connection motors once again. This time they transferred me to albeit still doorless however much more civilised department with fairly mild lock-down requirements. This department, unlike sanatorium, dealt strictly in males. Here we had an assortment of mild cases that required only minimal sedation. Drunken miners, mildly schizophrenic high schoolers and regular drug addicts – all locals – hardly any of that international stuff from the steppes of Kazakhstan or the mountain cliffs of Chechnya. I found the atmosphere congenial and subdued – reasonable doses of drugs were clearly bearing their fruit.
Here I ended up staying for about four months, my roommates changed quite regularly – as an usual stint was limited to about one to two months. The most entertaining of them all was this middle-aged miner from the neighbouring Krivoy Kog (literally means Crooked Horn – a very narrow 100KM long mining city that snakes along a huge carbon fault) region. This chap, Ivan, was in the perennial habit of spending his relatively healthy monthly paycheques on booze. The unfortunate part was that this typically did not take more than a week, just about three long, hungry and booze-less weeks before the next payday. Fortunately or not, the Soviet system did not facilitate personal credit and our patient, having exhausted the good will of his friends and relatives, was at his wit’s end at about the half month mark. The rest kind of blurry as the conundrum predictably resulted in a blow-up that required medical intervention, restrictive clothing and much drugs. When well-controlled, Ivan’s heroic mining stories hardly ever left his lips – he should have been a poet! Listening to his act and swallowing all my prescriptions with grim determination filled my days to the brim.
During the day, working around the mandatory curfew, I spent time around various parts of the vast grounds walking or taking various physiotherapy treatments – some of them rather exotic and pleasant such as mud baths and paraffin warmers, some less so – enter mild electric shock therapy. Just imagine them putting a whole bunch of electrodes on your head in hope of zapping the crazies away. And zip they did as every time I thought that the bloody electrodes would burn my skin instead of ever-elusive depression. I needed an outlet. Luckily, on one of my jaunts I was fortunate to discover a mini-gym located in the post stroke rehabilitation department. Given the habitual Soviet lack of interest in things communal, I acquired a free reign of the place on a daily basis. The regular routine included push-ups, pull-ups and other ups that, in time, made my impish body appear to be somewhat too healthy for a medically discharged invalid. I kept my clothes on most of the time…
The male only department was a prime spot for TV sports. So any televised events of significance attracted considerable crowds around the standard issue Soviet hospital TV. Amazingly, this even had some colours beside standard black and white. Most of the time, we enjoyed a beloved mix of hockey, soccer and basketball. Once, however, our culturally aware TV bosses decided to introduce a novelty - baseball. The direct broadcast of a key Cuban championship game from Havana attracted a curious few. We knew basically nothing of the game except it was supposed to resemble an ancient Russian game of lapta. The problem was that we knew precious little about the old famed Russian pastime. So we gathered around the TV lounge to learn. The first appearance of the game was surprising, as nobody on the field was wearing helmets and pads – we expected American football and got baseball instead. The next thing you know these guys proceeded to stay around, un-communistically chewed gum and generally serenely minded their own business while three of them started an incessant routine of throwing a hardly visible ball to much delight of Cuban public and an increasing sense of boredom and despair for us. Having at last hit the bloody ball far enough to cause an elated cry on the part of some Cubans, the guy with a stick started making a full circle around the thrower, as if taunting him – nah nah nah nah nah. In soccer a scoring player usually runs away from the opposition to celebrate, here they just make a congratulatory circle right through the thicket of undoubtedly dismayed rivals – it looked like a great pretext for a bench clearing brawl! For Soviets accustomed to the incessant back and forth of a soccer or hockey game, such manoeuvres appeared rather foolish and futile. So did the commentary of the hapless Russian “experts” who spiced up the broadcast with plethora of obscure and meaningless, mostly anglicised terms. We went away dismayed – our Russian souls demanded bloody hockey…
I did eventually get the basics of the great American pastime but not before I parachuted myself into the hotbed of the sport itself – the USA. For now I was spared the agony – no more hated Cuban entertainment – leave it to Fidel and his slow smouldering cigars.
Freudian Burdens
The chief doctor of our department turned out to be an old and obscure acquaintance of the family – that’s how I ended up in this relatively “liberalised” environment in the first place. However, upon further examination, this rather plump, short and congenial Jewish doctor, Georgiy Alexandrovich, turned out to be a bit of a pervert actually. Despite the fact that the apparent nature of my malignity was of a mental sort, he insisted on conducting his first assessment with me wearing nothing but my birthday suit.
“Take your pyjamas please”
Following my compliant and completely normal response considering that I was in, although locked with a large key, a doctor’s office, his round plump face lit up if in an expectation of sorts. My healthy outlines could have put his anatomical worries to rest rather quickly. Instead, he proceeded to prod, listen to and press just about any part of body. I took it in stride, whistling silently into the ceiling while on the examination tables. He gurgled in response obviously having a really good time with any protrusions and crevices that God had decided to endow me with. The closer to middle, of my body, that was he got the brighter his visage lit up helped by new of waves of pleasurable gurgles coming from within his ample girth. Here he rubbed, prodded and gazed with special attention. I did not get any of it till later. After all in my mind, the follower of the great Freud must have suspected something of a disturbance in my libido and ensuing Army problems. I did not feel to disappoint his early suspicion as I remained particularly undisturbed by his medicinal advances. Finally, after ten long minutes my innocence was allowed to leave and return to the world of pill swallowers and wait for the order from Kiev.
So miserable my libido situation must have been that he ventured a full body prod only one more time with no better results despite all his psychoanalytic gurgling and my ceiling whistling - an experience usually reserved for visits to proctologists or procreation specialists. Trust me on this one. With no apparent results behind the locked door Georgiy Alexandrovich was clearly much too busy with scores of other patients and I was left to suffer in my own mental angst without any further full body rubs. I just went on waiting.
My stay in the department unexpectedly extended for months. The balmy September lost its late summer glitter, the November blew off the remaining wilt of the trees and January announced the New Year. I was still under the tutelage of my Freudian friend. And even he, in his libido induced complex view life, felt an urge to give me few reprieves now and then. I even was allowed to celebrate the News Years at home with my distinctly more fortunate and “sicker” classmates who had the privilege of skipping the hated service. My mental state continued to be tortured in the wait for the bloody paper. Eventually, it CAME – only to announce that my person was needed for further examinations in the military hospital in Kiev. This was a grim turn of events indeed.
Promise of Ancient Kiev
The ancient Russian capital has seen its share of fortune ebbing to and fro. It had had its share invasions, ruthless and barbaric; rulers, vicious and benign; and petitioners, hopeless and hopeful. I was just a grain of sand in the millennial tradition of wish seekers as I donned my mouldy uniform that had to serve as a recognition device to enter the perplexing confines of the highest military medical court. I remember arriving in Kiev on a cold, snowy, overcast and otherwise unhappy February day. Given that my initial hospitalisation had to do with an apparent neurological condition, I was sent to the neurological department – away from the cosy and by now very familiar door-less existence of the mad department. On the one hand it was welcome news given rather low curfew standards that compared favourably with nearly draconian lock-down procedures reserved for my article 7B friends. On the other hand I was on the very thin ice neurologically speaking – there was hardly anything wrong with me. I desperately needed a miracle – nerve damage, grave head wound or something equally damning.
Alas, my narrow-minded neurologist handlers were finding, albeit slightly aberrant, a mostly normal eighteen-year old body. The protocol however required them to undertake more tinkering with the diagnosis, working together with some psychiatrists. Without family connections I was just a pawn in the hands of all-important major or colonel epaulettes. Their looks were rather doubtful, severe and nearly condemning like those of a sceptical soccer referee about to award a yellow to a simulating forward wallowing in the mud of the penalty area. Things were not looking very promising. The only choice was to bide my time and forget about the big picture by plunging into the soothing happenings of the mundane. Engaging in kitchen duties was just a perfect distraction. This was a tedious and comforting quagmire that consisted of collecting and washing about 150 dishes at any one time. No matter what the number, the murky hot water of the vast utilitarian sink was much preferred to the frozen shovel clumps in the middle of the winter. Moreover, the clammy and hot dish-washing room even became a place of refuge from the cold and ever suspicious corridors of the ward.
One of such days when things looked particularly bleak, I was informed of a visitor wanting to see me. This was a bit of a surprise. I was not expecting anyone – my mother and grandmother were at home, and I hardly knew anyone in Kiev, not counting some very distant relatives. Upon entering the lobby I could not help but let a joyful yelp of excitement – it was my long-lost father! I thought him to be in Siberia, he was of a differing opinion escaping his second marriage that was unravelling much quicker than his first one.
After the years of smoking, drinking and drugs combined with his ever less agreeable new wife my dad managed to get his first and nearly fatal heart attack before he turned forty. This was three years prior. Now somewhat recovered and brimming with new energy, he was ready to abandon cold and less than hospitable taiga for warmer environs of the central Ukraine. He called my grandmother before his furtive departure – he did not want to cause another heart attack by suddenly showing up at my grandmas – what a guy! The grandmother duly informed him regarding my precarious military career that needed help drowning. This was one of the most precious, joyful and hopeful moments with my father I had ever had. After warm embraces and updates that fed our pent-up hunger for mutual company, I was happy to fill in my father on my current affairs.
He was ready to leap into the fray right away. At first, the medical military establishment types were quite reluctant to deal with one of their own, medically speaking. His first attempt to meet with the chief neurologist was met with the habitual “He is about to have a meeting with someone”, to which my father replied with the indignation and humour of the perpetually shafted Jew - “I am a someone too!” I did not work on the first try but he persevered and his persistence paid off over the next few days – as he had not only made a plea to the chief neurologist but also called on the chief psychiatrist whom he bludgeoned into submission with his habitual “As a colleague to colleague…” And all these despite the menacing rank of colonel, my father surely had guts. In the end the tough psychiatric guy gave in to stamp the approval on my file without as much as seeing me – what a blessing! I was almost free and I had my father to thank for it.
All these shenanigans went on for a couple of days, which were fruitfully spent in my father’s company. We walked a lot despite his seemingly perpetual hunger for heart saving nitro-glycerine and heart damaging cigarettes. Both were taken virtually in the same breath – as a doctor with years of experience he relished to concoction. I enjoyed better cigarettes and our discussions about the future that appeared to be endless in the sea of our resurgent optimism. Few days later all was settled save for a final, rather ceremonial, certification of the discharge that had to take place in the next three to four weeks.
Shovel Hell
Strange enough for any Western sentiment, the Red Army Byzantine-like procedures were strange and stupid even to the weathered Russian brain of mine. Here you are about to be discharged on the medical premise, just waiting for T’s crossed and I’s dotted. You think they will just keep you where you are, in the hospital that is and then send you right home. Think again…
In two days after the agreement was reached, I was quickly packed and shipped out to my long-lost comrades in the building brigade to await the final papers. You can imagine the “joy” I felt staring at the prospect of spending few more cosy evenings by the fire at the barracks. The deal is the deal however and I had to go. My final leg of the journey to freedom was about to take a short detour to hell.
After arriving at the main building brigade location wedged right in the middle of mostly civilised urban neighbourhood, I was informed that my unit located outside of the town and that was going to be my assigned station for the next few weeks. The quick trip to the outskirts revealed barren ice-laden fields dotted with barracks, canteens and various auxiliary structures of a sprawling air force base that used the poor hypothermic building brigade sods to undertake the most menial of tasks of digging. This included almost endless snow covered trenches and foundation footings along an airfield strip. The sight was brutal – nearly reminiscent of war movies depicting the battle of Stalingrad or the battle of Moscow in the middle of the horrible and unforgiving Russian winters. As freezing wind whipped the last vestiges of comfort afforded by tar fed fire pit, my comrades scurried about with their various shovelling tasks, their first sighting of your truly did not look very promising – one sheep in front of ten wolves might have had a better chance. I was doomed to misery for the next few weeks.
Alas, my sick ridden status deprived me of a veritable chance to prove myself in the battle. As a result I had to stay in the barracks most of the day cleaning floors, windows and running whatever odd errands required attending. The unfilled time was spent smoking, eating and even napping with the small exception of the morning and the evening tortures supplemented by the Sunday routine that kept the whole contingent on hand inside, away from the miserable trenches. The pecking order of the building brigade at my location turned out to be quite different from a typical Red Army setup. Our peculiar group was comprised of a different mix. The dominant ones consisted of past, current and future criminals. The rest relied on slightly sick and minorities to form a contingent. In a regular army unit, one has to go through brutal hazing especially hard and abusive during the first few months of service. This however is well balanced by the promise of an easier life by the end of the first year. After that everything is a piece of cake, you turn into a hardened hazer yourself inflicting the miseries on the next generation of recruits. My battalion did not subscribe to this nearly natural order of things. The criminal element was strong, weathered and well prepared to face up to any abuse. The slightly sick were not prepared to take on the role of hazers themselves. As a result, the habitual seniority did not matter – what mattered were the bullet proof foreheads and steel fists. The criminal elements had them in abundance, turning the place in a prison without bars.
I got into my first fight on the day of my arrival. I was accosted while I was trotting back to the barrack after a frozen routine in the outdoor latrine of a communal type. The latrines were always a suspect location for all sorts of stuff including drinking, smoking pot and beating up the weaker side. In this first scuffle I really did not stand a slightest of chances. Luckily, my jaw withstood the impact though it hurt like heck. This was just the beginning, as I was an easy prey especially considering my rather privileged temporary status. It looked like the local villains were trying their hardest to catch up on some intimate time given my previous and future absences from the local circus ring. The days were relatively calm with only occasional abuse doled out by the officers who did not appear to enjoy their building brigade stint either. Mornings usually were a hectic affair when one was more concerned with getting ready for yet another unwelcome day of outside drudgery – a hardly conducive atmosphere to harass fellow human beings. At night, my troubles usually trebled after the hungry, tired and mean spirited locals returned. The officer oversight was minimal in the evenings too, as the usual duty at night was doled out to the lowest on the totem poll – “praporshiks”. This is the most ridiculed and the least respected army rank. The ranks of praporshiks are usually filled by the soldiers wanting to stay on as professional military, past their mandatory term. Saying the least, these types inclined more to sadism than to acts of random kindness. Their station in life was so static that the only outlet for anger build-up was to cheer on the worst of the abusers. With credentials lacking those of officers they upward mobility was as stable as dinosaur bones buried in the Goby desert, and their very choice of preference for the army spoke volumes as certain lack of adaptability required on the outside. In other words expecting any protection from our praporshiks was useless.
Usual abuse was essentially confined to periodic beatings that were highly correlated to one’s degree of belligerence after a hard day digging at the airstrip. Thanks to the snow-laden and blustery work location, my torturers’ tired interest in my persona was somewhat diminished compared to what could have happened in a real jail. To summarise, the spirit of my unit was miserable, racist and rather individualistic – everybody followed, although viscerally, the Darwinian argument of natural selection. Forget about the Marxist solidarity – a man is nothing but a wolf to another man. The only folks who remotely resembled charitable human beings were the national minority groups who stuck together no matter what, albeit exclusively along the racial lines. Alas, being in the majority did not bode well for any solace of ethnical separation.
Sundays were the most dreaded – as the blessed day of rest really meant more energy and bottled up anger for my criminally minded friends. Their busily mischievous nature hardly ever allowed for much in the way of reflective and contemplative moments. Church services were not on the menu either so unlucky weaklings had to pay for being in the wrong place in the wrong time. Predictably I was unfailingly in their ranks.
More of the Garrison
Since our shovel unit was located amidst a huge air force base, the number of military personal in the immediate neighbourhood was huge. We had to share the canteen with the entire garrison. My first experience of the military canteen in the previous summer was relatively tasty compared to what was lurking in the huge kitchen that catered to at least a couple of thousand of soldiers at a time. The cooking of the previous summer catered to only two hundred heads was longed for just like a Christmas dinner. Even the habitual pleasures of tea, butter and bread appeared sour and delivered minimum satisfaction on the coldest of days that reminded me of Stalingrad in 1943. The only difference was that this time we, instead of Germans, were encircled in the frozen circle of inevitability.
The only joy was the TV that was not off-limits in the mornings. This was right in the midst of the great transformation that beset the dour and stolid world of Soviet broadcasting. Perestroika was on the march and change was just hanging infectiously in the air. The broadcasts gradually become more colourful and jazzier with some music numbers and surprisingly smiling announcers – what a novelty. I think some of the producers must have been taking clues from the likes of CNN. We even started having talk shows. At first, these shows were jointly conducted by the American Phil Donahue and the Soviet with the perfect American pronunciation – Pozner. They primary target audience were Americans. However, our suddenly cheerful leadership dared to give us a directly translated version. Amazing – you can actually express your own, presumably unrehearsed opinion on the air! So the TV was a definite plus despite its unfortunate location right in the middle of the stinky barrack. This was the February 1987, and as a special treat we were allowed to watch early morning direct broadcasts of Canada Cup. When it came to hockey there were hardly any impartial observers, nearly everyone cheered and enjoyed the earlier successes of the Soviet team during the opening week of the tournament. Even the pockets of local Central Asian populace were sucked in despite their much stronger preferences for soccer and not the game on the bloody ice that must have reminded them of the hated frozen trench along the airfield. This enjoyment was a nice visual reprieve from the harsh environment and the whopping boys received an additional reprieve from the hockey fans with big fists…
Talking about nearly universal hazing is totally OK. Here even the worst examples of the strict fraternity that is US Marines become bleak and selective. When reflecting on the first attempts by Soviets to attack the German war machine with cavalry, even the most senseless and brutal acts of the Vimy Ridge stand pale in comparison to the generals‘stupidity. When the word “food” comes into the picture, the grim tales of the Irish potato famine can hardly compete. In other words hold on to your seats as you are about to hear yet sordid another tale – I hope to find at least half of you in your seats at the end of this painful experiment.
Short History According to Posoukh
The Red Army takes its origins from the heap of metal, limbs and mouldy bread that used to form the glorious army the last Tsar took to fight the misguided and idiotic WWI. As the Tsarist army departed the barracks in the general direction of the hated Kaiser in 1914, it was a tight, coherent, relatively well-fed and well-dressed singing mass of humanity. When the Tsar was overthrown by the wave of discontent and desperation in the early 1917, the army had disintegrated into a heap of bedraggled, hungry and wounded anarchy that rotted in the insurmountable mud of the Eastern Front. The prospects of ending the hostilities overwhelmed any inkling of allegiance to just about the only form of tyranny known by the tragic Russian soul – the monarchy. Things got even juicier by the end of 1917 when the perpetual Russian desire for certainty gave way to the flip side of the monarchy – Bolshevism. In the first few months of the new regime, the army left suspended waiting for electrical charges to build up in the bloody conflict-ridden magnet that was Russia. Some of the army drifted to the Whites and Antanta (limited contingent of foreign anti-revolutionary forces represented by the US, England etc.) trying to strangle the newly birthed social experiment. More progressive and socially conscious folk lent their allegiance to the Soviets, while more adventurous and individualistic ones joined the Anarchist movement, or just joined packs of marauding bands that roamed the defenceless countryside in the uncertain turmoil of war communism with its basic lack of bread and vodka.
The forces throwing their allegiance behind the Soviets first congregated on the Western Front in February 1918. They closely averted their first test and near disaster for Lenin and the comrades that was Brest Letovsk. It is here near the Western frontier of now defunct Tsarist Empire where the German military onslaught on the “Workers” republic was stalled due only in part to a decent showing by the new forces behind the burgeoning Bolshevik regime. This stall and subsequent miraculous survival of the regime in Moscow was mostly due to other factors such as general German fatigue, their own domestic revolution (thank you Rosa Luxembourg) and Bolsheviks’ willingness to give in to territorial concessions. However, despite these less than glorious beginnings, the Soviet propaganda later portrayed these events as the definitive turn in the fortunes of the new regime, hence the selection of the official army birthday – February 23, 1918. This day is still celebrated quite lavishly, although the old Soviet glory has given way to lesser supplied and more diminutive version of an army, the Russian army.
The fortunes did indeed improved and by 1922, nearly all vestiges of the old Tsarist resistance were erased from the map of the old empire. Almost all intact except for few concessions given to perennially pesky and hardly profitable Finns, Poles, Estonians and other democratically inclined types, the empire was resurrected. From here on, the army grew and prospered in its new pride of the true defenders of workers’ freedoms. The top commanders were always on the short leash however, as Lenin, Stalin and cohorts always preferred the power of political propaganda prevailing over the general unpredictability of military interference. The force that is always liable to plague any empire if not properly governed. This had remained a comfortable balance until Stalin’s political blindness and his prodigious stubbornness nearly cost us all our country. You see, this wily tyrant refused to give in to the demands of the military to modernise in the mid 1930’s, i.e. switching from cavalry to tanks, from simple to automatic rifles etc. He feared the military power and decided to subdue the culprits using well-proven methods of mass repression, murder and intrigue. The army weakened, demoralised and gave way to the least deserving but certainly more loyal commanders. Its new “worth” was proven in the nearly disastrous Finnish campaign that cost Soviets almost all of their reputation, millions in material losses and many thousands of casualties. And all this for few kilometres of although strategic but still impassable and frozen swamp!
Yet at the same time, Stalin unwittingly stepped into the carefully planned trap of the Non-Aggression Pact with Hitler, which Stalin saw as an ultimate political opportunity to cement his personal hold on power even at the expense of the growing Nazi threat. The timing was not in his favour, as his political “genius” broke to pieces in just two years when he faced Hitler at the Moscow’s doorsteps in the ice cold and blustery winter of 1941. Facing the impending disaster, the hauled up dictator was forced to recognise the need to shore up his military strength by summoning fallen out of favour but thankfully still alive generals headed by the genius of Zhukov. These guys put aside their personal pride, at the point of a gun mind you, and reasserted the control of the military for the sake of the country and the world. The rest is known, as the Third Reich faced its ultimate doom at the hands of the Allies led by the Soviet Union. Contrary to some popular Western myths, the Soviets were the ones who bore the brunt of the horrible warfare with the most casualties and material losses. Following the war, the Red Army was at its height buttressed by awe and reputation unsurpassed from the times of Napoleon, with its generals decorated and revered, and with its technology boasting the latest achievements including a nascent nuclear arsenal.
Now the battlefield shifted from the bunkers and field tents to Kremlin, Whitehall and White House. The bitter odour of war, briefly assuaged by the sweet taste of victory and peace, was turning sour and unwelcome once again. The cruelty of war and warmth of peace was giving way to the acidity of iron. The game became political, rational and rife with ever-increasing stakes of mutual destruction. Generals were no longer needed, as engineers and rocket scientists were ushered as the next set of altar boys at the solemn mass of international politics.
The generals were sent to a cold war exile, while the army left to stagnate under the rudderless yoke of the Soviet leadership and its failing vision. Even the saviour and the people’s darling Zhukov did not escape a demotion to a lowly southern region to bide time, write memoirs and plan for a quiet retirement. Long gone were the idealistic days of the new vision inspired by fresh and idealistic regime. Forgotten the struggles and hope of the post-war years, and even the glorious days of the German defeat barely remembered, left just about only in the hearts and minds of the veterans and much less on the current agenda of the army rotting at its core. Few attempts at reasserting itself in times of the Soviet leadership changes in the 50s and 60s did not bring much awaited revival. With Brezhnev firmly in power (1964-1982), the whole country settled into a dreary morass of moral an ideological emptiness. Apart from few key and all-important areas in rocketry and air force, the army experienced further disintegration of its currency, as now the very pride and glory of Soviet power was avoided like plague by just about any draftee. The prospect of spending the best years of one’s life in the miserable barracks with frequent physical and psychological abuse had become very dreary prospect indeed. No pride, no inspiration – now just about everyone went in the army with the same level of enthusiasm as a criminal would go to serve a sentence. An inability to summon a basic level of positivism was a critical part of the Soviet downfall in their misadventure in Afghanistan – one of the last attempts to rehabilitate the Soviet ideology in the open armed conflict. The mudzhahadeen had the belief and ideology, stirred and fed by the generous American effort, while the Soviets were exhausted, morally and physically, with nothing to gain but a hope to get out of that hell alive just to see another day of normal, or nearly so, life.
This failure was not the last, as the ghost of the Red Army still persists at the core of its still living offspring – the Russian military. The inability to douse the ongoing Chechen conflict is a glaring testament to the political as well as military failure of the current occupants of Kremlin; the failure that is overcome with emptiness and an apparent lack of direction. The failure that requires a change of ideology and fresh air of genuine optimism that is in such a short supply in the eyes of perpetually sceptical Russian audience. Similar struggles have haunted the American military in the wake of the Vietnam conflict, as well as in the current Iraq engagement. The latter one produced a huge plunge in the moral and the very sustainability of the professional military thanks to the absence of candour emanating from the highest seats of military command and political power in Washington. More than gullible and heavily self-reflective Americans at times like these require a genuine effort at truth… The Red Army during its last gasps of the 1980s needed much more than Glasnost and Perestroika, it needed a fundamental change in direction that never came. Despite a short flirtation with freedom fighting for the sake of the people during the military putsch of 1991, the Red Army could not even stop the avoidable – the death of the Soviet Union.
Serving the Motherland – Fist Steps
My personal experiences and those of my friends predominantly belong to the last period of disintegration and chaos in the ranks of the military. My relationship with the army started in the junior high years when we were just in mid teens.
As noted, the army had become an odious beast that was avoided by just about everyone who faced a prospect of draft – just about the sole tool of recruitment, as the stream of volunteers had been dry practically since the last days of the Great War. Now, when I say avoided – I primarily refer to the soldier draft, as the service for officers was much less painful and at times even desired as many officers either stayed on after their obligatory term and countless many even enrolled into military colleges to become military men for life. Nobody wanted to be a fool even in the Soviet masquerade – so, how did not one get drafted as an officer? First of all, you needed to enrol into an institute of higher learning and pray that during the time in school the soldier draft pipelines are full and you get a chance to finish your education that usually included a military component. This component qualified you as being eligible for the officer draft. That is precisely how my father served as a military doctor as opposed to the whipping boy experience of yours truly. If you have a bachelor’s degree you could avoid the service altogether, as the demand for officers was always less brisk than for the perennial cannon fodder - soldiers.
Now, enrolling into colleges and universities was not necessarily a simple task in the easiest of times. It only got worse when the demographics and Soviet military needs were stacked up in your favour. In the earlier 1980s such fortunate confluence of circumstances appeared ever less likely, as the baby boom of the post war era gave way to the lower birth rates of my generation coupled with increasing military needs in part due to the Afghan war. So the higher education avoidance option was basically out of question.
The next best thing was to become rather sick. Not totally sick mind you, as no one relished the prospect of spending much time in and around medical establishments in the ripe and busy age of eighteen. Everyone wanted to become just a little sick, enough to be disqualified for service. The wily Soviet military smelled the rat earlier on and instituted mandatory annual medical check-ups for all boys of the age fourteen and higher. We thought they cared about our health. No luck cowboy what they really cared about were their quotas. They checked everything including your epidermis in the most sensitive of places. Most of us did not seem to mind as a free day from school was always welcome. Girls were not as lucky.
This system was vigilant, efficient and precise even in the pre-computer bureaucracy of the lethargic Soviet state. The economy could have been in shambles, the social values and ideals could have been fraying around the edges but the military draft worked like a Swiss clock. To be disqualified from service by the military medical people one needed to be really sick and many connected a parent got busy conjuring up a nefarious multitude of illnesses that had befallen their beloved offspring. Suddenly, scores of my friends and acquaintances were stricken with the most grievous but never too apparent symptoms. This was never discussed but secretly envied, as such certifiable non-draft worthy cases most frequently occurred in the families of well positioned bureaucrats that counted among some of my closest friends. It did not seem fair but as old as the world. So we, simple folk, proceeded through life eating bologna sausages while others found solace in caviar and salami.
The last two grades in the high school also contained a military class requirement – for everyone including the girls. After all in the high-tension state of the raging cold war the total military preparedness was a virtue that transcended genders. These classes were a little painful at times – you know, just a little too much discipline for ADD stricken teenagers. An old retired major with a very funny sounding paternal name of Ageyevich was an exemplary military man of straight posture, impeccable dress and cheap cologne. The latter example proved useful as his wafts of wilted roses ended up serving well in beating the acrid stings of boot polish that used to overwhelm the overcrowded barracks.
The first order of any morning inspection was your dress and haircut. Short haircuts were not in vogue then as the AC/DC was all the rage. Coming up to grade nine just about all of us grew long horrible looking mullets complemented by frayed jeans shorts and ripped T-shirts. Yes, the West and its evil influences were not far away thanks to the local black market and short-wave radio. I basked in pro-western enthusiasms and was ready for anything but a confrontation with Ageyevich. And yet, loathing to shear my carefully grown main I, like many others, risked a rebuke by showing up at the first class jut as we were.
Luck was not on our side that day and the nearest barber got busy quickly on that warm day in early September – bye-bye my golden locks…
Ageyevich did not tolerate dissent, especially when questions of hairstyle and general sloppiness were involved. His morning routines were ruthless and always in accompaniment of his low and menacing voice. Always curt in his summary fashions Ageyevich had a gift to remind everyone how it was like to stand in front of an execution squad – all you future killers and embezzlers be aware!
It did not end there as his inspections were always regular and thorough. I would never forget one time when he decided to closely observe one of my friends – Kolya. Kolya had a nice set of very straight, very blond worthy of the best Swedish traditions hair. Once when it was long Kolya sought to avoid a deportation to the barber, as he had carefully combed and prepped his malleable strands behind his ears. To anyone with less experience this arrangement would look as neat as the best of Dr. Phil, but not to Ageyevich. Pacing briskly through the ranks his steps ceased abruptly sending a chilling thud through everyone’s heart. All craned to see what was in store next. Ageyevich’s face suddenly broke up in an unexpectedly sadistic personification of a smile as he gleefully commenced probing Kolya’s hair with expertly strokes originating from behind the ear of his hopeless victim. Few short seconds later the verdict was in with loose long strands of hair hanging in the most shameful and scruffy fashion from the Red Army point of view. Had Kolya been born a Hassidic Jew he would have been exemplary alas he had not. From then on the local barber was Kolya’s favourite hangout.
Similar inspections of dress were just as damning – should a non-regulation tie or a shirt be worn - beware you all deviants! Once done with the inspection, we usually proceeded into the class that was conducted with solemnity of Orthodox Church services and useless safety meetings at work. The most exciting part of the course was occasional trips to the shooting range for riffle practices. Oh yes, we did not have to go very far as the shooting range was incidentally located right in the school basement - I guess Soviets always planned for contingencies…
At the end of our two-year course we were treated to a live AK-47 target shooting at a countryside range. I distinctly remember that sunny spring day as we played soccer on a local and almost grassy pitch awaiting our turns taking deadly aim at some well thrashed cardboard targets. The deafening noise and violent reverberations of the convulsing killing implements were the most surprising. Since it was a test in target, and not mass, shooting, an instructor soldier was assigned to each of us to ensure that our bullets went exclusively in the intended direction with no temptation to settle high school rivalries in a Columbine manner. In the States they just sell these easy killing things under the guise of the Second Amendment and then wonder why they experience such high rates of firearm deaths. As you see even the decadent Soviets appeared more sensible in this contentious arena. I bet there is much to be said about efficiencies of a dictatorial state, maybe later, as every soccer game and target shooting outing eventually had to come to an end. I was turning seventeen, just one year away from the inevitable experience of the mini Gulag ahead.
Serving the Motherland – Caught!
The first year of university was winding down and I was expecting to be getting summons to the local recruiting station any day now. The life was about to stop and nearly lose all of its meaning as I saw it. Most of the days were spent in the hazy stupor that lifted only for a few seconds of reprieve following daily mail pickup. “Not today!”– what a relief, one more day of mindless freedom. Some indulged in partying and alcohol, I indulged in the recently found passion – running and working out. I had already lost about thirty pounds in the last five months and could make a chin-up for the first time in my life. I was even slightly overdoing it with the weight-loosing bit, as I struggled through my runs in sweaters and windbreaks even on the warmest of days. This obsession with weight loss was to ultimately prove useful later on. For now in the midst of mind numbing exercise routines I even delighted in such wild fantasies as being lost in the massive recruiting annals. “Maybe they just forgot about me”. That was not to be, my dear state did not forget one of its most ungrateful sons - one dreadful day it eventually came! Upon its receipt, I attempted the last looser trick, the simplest in the rule book. I pretended not to have received the hated summons in the first place.
To make matters more plausible, I arranged an urgent holiday dash to the deep and refreshing blues of the Black Sea. I suddenly felt a need for a shot at bumming at a Crimean beach without “anyone” knowing my whereabouts, the whereabouts where even my mother was lost for an answer. Special caution was to be attributed to any uniformed strangers that might have a gall to show up at my doors. While this last ditch effort at anonymity did delay the inevitable, but it did not prevent it. One day my mother’s pleas of ignorance fell on the deaf ears of a wily draft officer, as he gave her an ultimatum of either my imminent appearance or jail. I weighted my chances and the army service came out ahead – apparently I still had some semblance of a brain left, just in time where it was needed the least – the army. Few days later I stood in front of the recruiting office with the whole bunch of other poor sobs.
When one fails to avoid the soldier service either due to bad demographics or outrageously good health coupled with a lack of proper connections – there is one other choice remains, the “reduced” service. To my apparent “luck” this activity could save one from a trivial difference between going to Afghanistan or not. I was all for fraternising with in comfortable turbans but their propensity to cut white men’s throats was a little disconcerting, unfortunately.
Given the apparent lack of mutual love between yours truly and the next mujahadeen, my grandma resorted to the services of some “benevolent” folks at the local Voenkommat (recruiting station) who loved to make promises. Unfortunately, they could not really influence the ultimate destination of their poor charges. They could effect the original placement, sure, but there was no telling what would transpire after you enlisted in non-combat building brigades, navy (fortunately land-locked Afghanis did care for a seaside spot) or militia formations. The militia units’ postings were scarce and extremely hard to get as it suddenly seemed that the whole “law abiding” Soviet society desperately wanted to see their sons fighting street crime that hardly existed according to the everyday press. Unsurprisingly, only one of my “healthy” classmates made it to the coveted grey uniform, while others struggled to attain some not too distant postings without really knowing the future.
Navy was not a bad choice unless dispatched to a nuclear submarine somewhere in the middle of the Arctic Ocean. Another problem was that the navy service required one extra year of your life, which in itself did not attract many takers. The last option was that of building brigades. These things usually took two kinds of people – partially sick and criminally minded. Having experienced a severe bout of encephalitis at the ripe age of four, I found myself eligible for the glorious opportunity amongst the ones that were not even trusted with guns – building brigades cherished shovels instead. I was assigned to one of these not very glorious units right on the spot – no threat of Afghanistan – we did not really intend to rebuild there – just like Americans in Iraq today.
Shipment
Once they got you, they did not give a minute’s reprieve. That very day of the selection, I was promptly sent with my new cohorts to the railway station to await shipment. After loitering about the station, the new instalment of human military cargo was loaded and duly shipped to the city of Kirovograd, only five hours away by train. I had nothing to complain about – so it seemed…
The initial atmosphere among the fresh recruits was somewhat cheerful. Many talked fast as in a bout of crack addiction, other retreated into their shells to manoeuvre in the dead end of life. At least all was still distant and unknown leaving some room for imagination to roam and toy with the ideas of donning still fresh uniforms or sleeping in the barracks like well stacked sardines. There was even something to joke about and look forward to. It all started hitting home at the dawn of the next day that greeted us at the local and friendly barracks. Feeling woozy from the excitement and the lack of sleep in the jittery train, I could have as well been in a space ship.
The life promptly returned with a send-off to the showers to get rid of our last aromas of civil life.
These were the best specimen in droning piping, slippery nakedness and rough brown soap known for its tickling qualities. Besides, the local density could have rivalled that of Auschwitz on a slow day in summary nature of finality. The shower march culminated in the massive head shaving campaign. For the first time in my life I experienced boldness but not before the gleeful military barber attempted to turn me into an exemplary punk rocker by shaving his first swath right through the middle of my rather thick mane. After admiring his momentary Keith Richards creation, I plunged his blunt machine with a renewed zest seeping in abundance of captive energy. And voila, I was bold as an Easter egg. The new life had begun…
Rude Reality
At first stroking my shorn epidermis felt novel and even liberating. I actually enjoyed it except for the occasional evening chill. After all there was no Ageyevich to threaten you with a trip to the neighbourhood barber. The first four weeks of our time were to be spent in boot camp training. That meant that we were segregated, for a time, from the older soldiers – which was positive as the official hazing could only begin once one exited the training barracks. During the training we were not even considered fully-fledged soldiers, as the official service would only begin following a solemn oath ceremony – let the real misery roll in! For now we were confined to our strange group of new recruits – some of us were partially sick and some of us were partially criminal. A very strange mix, as I came to look at it.
One of the first things one had to do upon receiving a single set of fresh military uniform – was to learn how to use “portyanki”. Portyanki is the vestige of an ancient Russian tradition to use little smelly pieces of cotton rags instead of socks. Two hundred years ago at the time of Napoleonic conquests, the absence of socks was probably quite justified. In the end of the twentieth century, it was a cruel training tool circumvented only by a handful of senior serving soldiers and officers, of course. If you could not catch up with the tricky enveloping procedure that resembled tight Slavic baby bundling, you were liable to experience horrible blisters and be given extra sets of push-ups. There simply wasn’t any other arrangement – bare feet would not do either.
Eventually, having mastered our rudimentary swaddling skills, we proceeded with the torture of incessant marching, running, push-uping and other sweaty activities – all in heavy cotton uniforms tucked into a set of heavy oversized knee-high turn-of-the-century boots. I did not find all this particularly difficult given my pre-service exercise routine of 15K per day, in lighter foot wear mind you. Some of mates, however, appeared to be melting daily. One particularly overweight specimen aptly named Petro must have lost fifty pounds in the first four weeks! And you say Atkins – forget about it!
The only issue with exercising was a complete absence of showers – Red Army preferred a set routine as opposed to indiscriminate use of hot water – they really cared about the environment, and it showed. The routine included about two full showers a month. The rest of the time you either stunk or stunk really badly depending on your ability to stick one’s body under a regular set of cold water sinks located outside. Luckily it was summer. I could hardly imagine what the new winter recruits were to go through. The aromatic training took the hardest to our noses during the night, as all hundred of us were cramped into a three thousand square feet barrack. Each sunset came with its unmistakable smell of portyanki and rhythmic snoring of fast sleepers. Mornings were always a jolt that shot us back to the unpleasant reality, always just a bit too early. As I occupied the upper birth of the bunk bed, my morning usually started with an additional thud. Upon a rising call, we had to dress within a prescribed time – one minute I think. If the results were deemed unsatisfactory – the “pleasant” experience would be repeated few times with the worst offenders taking turns at public displays of push-ups – good morning to all of you!
The only solace from the daily mindless toil of the boot camp was food. But one had to be quick, as many lads were fast to latch on the tasty bits and the drilling sergeants were always keen to march you off to the next bit of torture right in the midst of gourmand dreams. Most of the time, food was edible despite the huge cauldron routine in a massive kitchen designed for around two to three hundred perpetually hungry soldiers. As some cooked parts were treated with a due level of circumspection and caution, the predictable bread, butter and tea were always eagerly awaited. One time, one of the fellow soldiers serving on the sentry was the first to eat the long-expected lunch of beef and buckwheat. By his admission, the desired treat was an undeniable success. Quick on his heels, we crowded in front of the canteen entrance with anticipation of a savoury almost home meal. The palpable agitation of hungry, dirty and thinning soldiers was just soaking up the air. We could barely wait to get our seats. Suddenly, the first whiffs of the long anticipated feast betrayed, first in streaks and gradually in a proverbial avalanche, super putrid smells of rancid meat that must have been recently unearthed from the WWII storage facilities – it smelt that badly! Even the pure and bucolic meal of buckwheat porridge was now out of reach – as the dastardly meat stew covered it all! Nobody touched a thing. Holding our noses and trying not to be overcome by the deathly smell, we quietly chewed on some bread, waiting to get the hack out of there at the first sign of the drill sergeant. The small temporal dream crushed except for the sentry who surely savoured the disgusting stew rather unquestionably – he had a bad case of sneezing that day!
Serving the Motherland - Escape
As the dreaded day of the oath approached, I felt less and less inclined to take the orders. If one is found sick prior to the oath, I heard, there might be an easier way of getting out. As my rapid weight-losing routine of the last few months was catching up to me, I was occasionally beset by slight faintness or other similar and nearly harmless occurrences. “Being a little queasy could make certifiable”, I thought – who can resist little trying if two years is on the line?
So one day my already feeling faint head took a couple of additional nods during a marching drill. I was promptly marched off to the barracks for examination. A quick call to the local ambulance service followed shortly. As medics were getting to examine my already thinning physique, the relative midday cool of the barracks made me feel slightly better but letting on was not an option. Unable to decide the case, they hastily transported their new charge to the nearby hospital equipped with a neurological unit. The further examination confirmed that there must have been something wrong with me – I my pulse just dropped below 40 – they thought it dangerous – I quietly thought that running 15K a day could have its side benefits…
They kept me in the hospital for further examinations.
“This guy looks pretty grave”, whistled a thin tall type by the window. He wore long striped pyjamas and sported a little scraggly look.
“Do not worry, they bring him back soon enough, Tolyk”, his short simian looking neighbour immanently believed in the power of Soviet medicine.
“Maybe”
“Not maybe, just watch. Where were we, that was hilarious…”Ivan picked up a juicy trail of yet another tale of his sexual escapades
In other words I ended up with a bunch of few entertaining characters that spent their days in many an anecdote making it far more palatable to see the days float on by. In addition to his personal conquests, Ivan used to delight us all by his morning shaving routine that included very artistic and dangerous open-blade Ninja tricks. Even a slight mistake could have easily reopened his arteries making it impossible to miss. He always started it with a thorough ‘who is your father” sharpening routine by employing a thick leather belt. Next, he dabbed his thick stubble in the mounds of suds that simmered waiting to be obliterated by swaths of his blade. “Swoosh” a whole new colony of suds flew off the leathery clean cheeks of the proud blade operator. Yes, he survived another day to busk in the glory of his tawdry stories to keep us awake and in good sprits. For me anything beat the barracks.
Even though my condition required a lot of patience and stamina to keep up the bed-ridden regime, I managed to enjoy my station. It beat the heck out of the marching drills and the canteen food. My daily squat sets in the private bathroom stall kept me in some kind of shape despite the need to appear ill to everyone including my own mother who arrived few days later after failing to discover me at the oath taking ceremony. She was appalled at my condition – I had to keep my silence, it was not easy but a quick recovery from a dizzy spell was not a ticket home. I wanted to stay there forever. The days of pondering my fate convinced me that my aversion to the army service was not just of a physical but of a physiological nature. We, the army and yours truly, just could not get along. Unfortunately, the civil hospital could not make such a requisite decision and they sent me back to my hometown military hospital for further evaluations instead. I even had to take a dreaded oath, sitting; as such transfer was reserved for military use only. I guess I was one of them after all!
I desperately wanted to remain sick. I was even prepared to give up my smoking habit. The gravity of my condition demanded it despite delivering one of the very few delights of my barrack career. Alas, the wily military neurologists quickly determined that my faintness, headaches and occasional foot dragging were hardly of terminal nature. The easy time digging ditches was looming large and I became genuinely depressed. Even the melodic night signing of much sicker roommate from Uzbekistan did not help the matters – his songs soothed the night in the unknown Uzbek tongue while my depression primarily raged in Russian. The hard lobbying effort of the local medical community by my mother and grandmother eventually produced a long-awaited fruit - an evaluation by a well-known professional psychoanalyst was nothing to sneeze at. The diagnosis – “clinical depression” was greeted with exuberance worthy of a huge lottery win. I was a subject to discharge! Wow, what a relief! Depression, what depression? I could not care less.
Igren – the Happy Place
“Not too fast little fellow”, I sensed much snickering from those pesky military neurologists. My evaluator although highly respected was after all a civil doctor. This was not enough. In the fine military tradition they sent me further down to the depth of the medical discharge food chain – a huge local psychiatric hospital with a military unit. This time I was to be checked out by the impartial and very military Sherlock Holmses in white coats. Now, I was in the really mad soup. The quarters of this unit were located in the suburban park setting that appeared tranquil, serene and untouched by hardly any medical aromas that greet any hospital visitor whether in New York or Kathmandu. I guess the mad did not need much in the way of drugs; they just needed a free pass home! The rooms had no doors since all local crazies were subject to easy surveillance by ever vigilant and ubiquitous nurses. The azure of the late summer sky was marred by the electrified barbed wire on the one side of the compound. I could hardly complain as our neighbours were mentally disturbed criminals. They wanted to go home too, except it was a little trickier since they had barbed wire ornaments hanging on all four walls.
The first few days were pleasant in the midst of befriending a few of my mad cohorts – those that spoke some decent Russian at least, as a considerable portion, if not the majority, of my gowned inmates were the minorities from the fringes of the sprawling Soviet empire – Kirgiz, Uzbek and Armenians were the regulars. Some did appear disinclined to speak much Russian or to serve Russian masters. I guess the two factors mixed quite well and helped with insanity pleas. It was the first time in my life when I wanted to a part of much derided and depressed ethnic minorities!
The majority of time was spent discussing the obvious symptoms of our sicknesses – a sure pass to freedom! The thorough knowledge of requisite signs and one’s ability to rattle them off like an alphabet appeared to be a sure passage back to the civil life. However, this path was wrought with consequences, as once discharged on the basis of essentially bipolar diagnosis one could be subject to various civil life impediments associated with the famed article 7B of the Red Army discharge code. University education and other important career options were in peril. Soviets were excellent trade masters. This was truly a conundrum to ponder, as the dreaded day of the discharge commission was approaching. Everyone was getting nervous – a clear sign of psychopathic aversion to the service if nothing else. I kept rehearsing my syndromes…
One the day of the commission, the halls of the ward were unusually quiet. Instead of multilingual chatter and bursts of laughter, the hush ruled the corridors. Everyone sat on their beds awaiting their fateful hour – to be or not to be…My turn came and I entered the room with at least three senior medical types. My diagnosis of depression and well-rehearsed subdued behaviour seemingly did the trick and I was conditionally discharged pending a final confirmation to come from Kiev from the regional military hospital. Luckily, my article of the discharge code was 6B – a much less restrictive but no less rewarding part of the discharge code when compared to the famous 7B. “Just another unpleasant delay”, I thought. Waiting for the formalities to settle did seem to be too daunting of a proposition.
Sanatorium
While I was to await the final confirmation from Kiev, my grandmother successfully lobbied my transfer out of the chaos of the international mad house into much more palatial surroundings of a stress relieving department for the well-connected. In fact, the maximum one could only stay at this place for a month at a time, the place was that good I was not disappointed. Rooms with doors, well-cared for indoor plumbing, carpets, good food, a colour TV and daily acupuncture greeted my arrival. I took my path to the ultimate cure with a lot of zeal. My schedule was literally packed with all sorts of cures that could have kept one in similar condition alive for decades. Following very nutritious breakfast concocted along the best guidelines of the Soviet health ministry, I was usually treated to goodly doses of acupuncture and hypnosis. It all might sound mundane to the medically overfed West but in the slowly decaying Soviet Empire, those things were the signs of rather special treatment. A set of highly qualified and relatively well-paid physicians administered the treatment – and all of it did not cost me a penny – glory to the Soviet medical system! The rest of my time was spent in eating, sleeping, reading, taking walks and pill swallowing. Boy, did I get a lot of that. While I knew that the nature of my illness was more of emotional nature, I did hardly ever refuse a pill – after all I was trying to prove to the rest of the world that I was really worthy of the medical discharge from the military. So swallow I did.
While all these treatments and needle pampering accompanied by soft music in the room plastered with wallpaper featuring bucolic themes were very pleasant, my body demanded more attention due to some drastic regional expansions. Ones around my waist line required special attention. My body could not longer contain itself, it demanded exercise. But getting healthy was a rather risky business. So I started my clandestine exercise routine. Luckily the park that surrounded our building bordered on the nearby farm fields. Not many patients ventured into the furrows in the brightest of days; at dusk it was sure to be entirely deserted. My regular evening walks typically led me right to these forgotten fields where I indulged myself in some limited skipping and jogging. Even my “dragging” right leg appeared to have recovered its youthful sprite. What a miracle! For now however, the miracles were kept tightly locked in somebody’s drawer in Kiev.
Back in the Wild
Unfortunately, the response from Kiev was not arriving all that quickly while my time at the sanatorium was expiring. The apparent next step was to go back to the doorless international mad house. After the comforts of the sanatorium the prospect was less than appetising. My grandmother turned on her connection motors once again. This time they transferred me to albeit still doorless however much more civilised department with fairly mild lock-down requirements. This department, unlike sanatorium, dealt strictly in males. Here we had an assortment of mild cases that required only minimal sedation. Drunken miners, mildly schizophrenic high schoolers and regular drug addicts – all locals – hardly any of that international stuff from the steppes of Kazakhstan or the mountain cliffs of Chechnya. I found the atmosphere congenial and subdued – reasonable doses of drugs were clearly bearing their fruit.
Here I ended up staying for about four months, my roommates changed quite regularly – as an usual stint was limited to about one to two months. The most entertaining of them all was this middle-aged miner from the neighbouring Krivoy Kog (literally means Crooked Horn – a very narrow 100KM long mining city that snakes along a huge carbon fault) region. This chap, Ivan, was in the perennial habit of spending his relatively healthy monthly paycheques on booze. The unfortunate part was that this typically did not take more than a week, just about three long, hungry and booze-less weeks before the next payday. Fortunately or not, the Soviet system did not facilitate personal credit and our patient, having exhausted the good will of his friends and relatives, was at his wit’s end at about the half month mark. The rest kind of blurry as the conundrum predictably resulted in a blow-up that required medical intervention, restrictive clothing and much drugs. When well-controlled, Ivan’s heroic mining stories hardly ever left his lips – he should have been a poet! Listening to his act and swallowing all my prescriptions with grim determination filled my days to the brim.
During the day, working around the mandatory curfew, I spent time around various parts of the vast grounds walking or taking various physiotherapy treatments – some of them rather exotic and pleasant such as mud baths and paraffin warmers, some less so – enter mild electric shock therapy. Just imagine them putting a whole bunch of electrodes on your head in hope of zapping the crazies away. And zip they did as every time I thought that the bloody electrodes would burn my skin instead of ever-elusive depression. I needed an outlet. Luckily, on one of my jaunts I was fortunate to discover a mini-gym located in the post stroke rehabilitation department. Given the habitual Soviet lack of interest in things communal, I acquired a free reign of the place on a daily basis. The regular routine included push-ups, pull-ups and other ups that, in time, made my impish body appear to be somewhat too healthy for a medically discharged invalid. I kept my clothes on most of the time…
The male only department was a prime spot for TV sports. So any televised events of significance attracted considerable crowds around the standard issue Soviet hospital TV. Amazingly, this even had some colours beside standard black and white. Most of the time, we enjoyed a beloved mix of hockey, soccer and basketball. Once, however, our culturally aware TV bosses decided to introduce a novelty - baseball. The direct broadcast of a key Cuban championship game from Havana attracted a curious few. We knew basically nothing of the game except it was supposed to resemble an ancient Russian game of lapta. The problem was that we knew precious little about the old famed Russian pastime. So we gathered around the TV lounge to learn. The first appearance of the game was surprising, as nobody on the field was wearing helmets and pads – we expected American football and got baseball instead. The next thing you know these guys proceeded to stay around, un-communistically chewed gum and generally serenely minded their own business while three of them started an incessant routine of throwing a hardly visible ball to much delight of Cuban public and an increasing sense of boredom and despair for us. Having at last hit the bloody ball far enough to cause an elated cry on the part of some Cubans, the guy with a stick started making a full circle around the thrower, as if taunting him – nah nah nah nah nah. In soccer a scoring player usually runs away from the opposition to celebrate, here they just make a congratulatory circle right through the thicket of undoubtedly dismayed rivals – it looked like a great pretext for a bench clearing brawl! For Soviets accustomed to the incessant back and forth of a soccer or hockey game, such manoeuvres appeared rather foolish and futile. So did the commentary of the hapless Russian “experts” who spiced up the broadcast with plethora of obscure and meaningless, mostly anglicised terms. We went away dismayed – our Russian souls demanded bloody hockey…
I did eventually get the basics of the great American pastime but not before I parachuted myself into the hotbed of the sport itself – the USA. For now I was spared the agony – no more hated Cuban entertainment – leave it to Fidel and his slow smouldering cigars.
Freudian Burdens
The chief doctor of our department turned out to be an old and obscure acquaintance of the family – that’s how I ended up in this relatively “liberalised” environment in the first place. However, upon further examination, this rather plump, short and congenial Jewish doctor, Georgiy Alexandrovich, turned out to be a bit of a pervert actually. Despite the fact that the apparent nature of my malignity was of a mental sort, he insisted on conducting his first assessment with me wearing nothing but my birthday suit.
“Take your pyjamas please”
Following my compliant and completely normal response considering that I was in, although locked with a large key, a doctor’s office, his round plump face lit up if in an expectation of sorts. My healthy outlines could have put his anatomical worries to rest rather quickly. Instead, he proceeded to prod, listen to and press just about any part of body. I took it in stride, whistling silently into the ceiling while on the examination tables. He gurgled in response obviously having a really good time with any protrusions and crevices that God had decided to endow me with. The closer to middle, of my body, that was he got the brighter his visage lit up helped by new of waves of pleasurable gurgles coming from within his ample girth. Here he rubbed, prodded and gazed with special attention. I did not get any of it till later. After all in my mind, the follower of the great Freud must have suspected something of a disturbance in my libido and ensuing Army problems. I did not feel to disappoint his early suspicion as I remained particularly undisturbed by his medicinal advances. Finally, after ten long minutes my innocence was allowed to leave and return to the world of pill swallowers and wait for the order from Kiev.
So miserable my libido situation must have been that he ventured a full body prod only one more time with no better results despite all his psychoanalytic gurgling and my ceiling whistling - an experience usually reserved for visits to proctologists or procreation specialists. Trust me on this one. With no apparent results behind the locked door Georgiy Alexandrovich was clearly much too busy with scores of other patients and I was left to suffer in my own mental angst without any further full body rubs. I just went on waiting.
My stay in the department unexpectedly extended for months. The balmy September lost its late summer glitter, the November blew off the remaining wilt of the trees and January announced the New Year. I was still under the tutelage of my Freudian friend. And even he, in his libido induced complex view life, felt an urge to give me few reprieves now and then. I even was allowed to celebrate the News Years at home with my distinctly more fortunate and “sicker” classmates who had the privilege of skipping the hated service. My mental state continued to be tortured in the wait for the bloody paper. Eventually, it CAME – only to announce that my person was needed for further examinations in the military hospital in Kiev. This was a grim turn of events indeed.
Promise of Ancient Kiev
The ancient Russian capital has seen its share of fortune ebbing to and fro. It had had its share invasions, ruthless and barbaric; rulers, vicious and benign; and petitioners, hopeless and hopeful. I was just a grain of sand in the millennial tradition of wish seekers as I donned my mouldy uniform that had to serve as a recognition device to enter the perplexing confines of the highest military medical court. I remember arriving in Kiev on a cold, snowy, overcast and otherwise unhappy February day. Given that my initial hospitalisation had to do with an apparent neurological condition, I was sent to the neurological department – away from the cosy and by now very familiar door-less existence of the mad department. On the one hand it was welcome news given rather low curfew standards that compared favourably with nearly draconian lock-down procedures reserved for my article 7B friends. On the other hand I was on the very thin ice neurologically speaking – there was hardly anything wrong with me. I desperately needed a miracle – nerve damage, grave head wound or something equally damning.
Alas, my narrow-minded neurologist handlers were finding, albeit slightly aberrant, a mostly normal eighteen-year old body. The protocol however required them to undertake more tinkering with the diagnosis, working together with some psychiatrists. Without family connections I was just a pawn in the hands of all-important major or colonel epaulettes. Their looks were rather doubtful, severe and nearly condemning like those of a sceptical soccer referee about to award a yellow to a simulating forward wallowing in the mud of the penalty area. Things were not looking very promising. The only choice was to bide my time and forget about the big picture by plunging into the soothing happenings of the mundane. Engaging in kitchen duties was just a perfect distraction. This was a tedious and comforting quagmire that consisted of collecting and washing about 150 dishes at any one time. No matter what the number, the murky hot water of the vast utilitarian sink was much preferred to the frozen shovel clumps in the middle of the winter. Moreover, the clammy and hot dish-washing room even became a place of refuge from the cold and ever suspicious corridors of the ward.
One of such days when things looked particularly bleak, I was informed of a visitor wanting to see me. This was a bit of a surprise. I was not expecting anyone – my mother and grandmother were at home, and I hardly knew anyone in Kiev, not counting some very distant relatives. Upon entering the lobby I could not help but let a joyful yelp of excitement – it was my long-lost father! I thought him to be in Siberia, he was of a differing opinion escaping his second marriage that was unravelling much quicker than his first one.
After the years of smoking, drinking and drugs combined with his ever less agreeable new wife my dad managed to get his first and nearly fatal heart attack before he turned forty. This was three years prior. Now somewhat recovered and brimming with new energy, he was ready to abandon cold and less than hospitable taiga for warmer environs of the central Ukraine. He called my grandmother before his furtive departure – he did not want to cause another heart attack by suddenly showing up at my grandmas – what a guy! The grandmother duly informed him regarding my precarious military career that needed help drowning. This was one of the most precious, joyful and hopeful moments with my father I had ever had. After warm embraces and updates that fed our pent-up hunger for mutual company, I was happy to fill in my father on my current affairs.
He was ready to leap into the fray right away. At first, the medical military establishment types were quite reluctant to deal with one of their own, medically speaking. His first attempt to meet with the chief neurologist was met with the habitual “He is about to have a meeting with someone”, to which my father replied with the indignation and humour of the perpetually shafted Jew - “I am a someone too!” I did not work on the first try but he persevered and his persistence paid off over the next few days – as he had not only made a plea to the chief neurologist but also called on the chief psychiatrist whom he bludgeoned into submission with his habitual “As a colleague to colleague…” And all these despite the menacing rank of colonel, my father surely had guts. In the end the tough psychiatric guy gave in to stamp the approval on my file without as much as seeing me – what a blessing! I was almost free and I had my father to thank for it.
All these shenanigans went on for a couple of days, which were fruitfully spent in my father’s company. We walked a lot despite his seemingly perpetual hunger for heart saving nitro-glycerine and heart damaging cigarettes. Both were taken virtually in the same breath – as a doctor with years of experience he relished to concoction. I enjoyed better cigarettes and our discussions about the future that appeared to be endless in the sea of our resurgent optimism. Few days later all was settled save for a final, rather ceremonial, certification of the discharge that had to take place in the next three to four weeks.
Shovel Hell
Strange enough for any Western sentiment, the Red Army Byzantine-like procedures were strange and stupid even to the weathered Russian brain of mine. Here you are about to be discharged on the medical premise, just waiting for T’s crossed and I’s dotted. You think they will just keep you where you are, in the hospital that is and then send you right home. Think again…
In two days after the agreement was reached, I was quickly packed and shipped out to my long-lost comrades in the building brigade to await the final papers. You can imagine the “joy” I felt staring at the prospect of spending few more cosy evenings by the fire at the barracks. The deal is the deal however and I had to go. My final leg of the journey to freedom was about to take a short detour to hell.
After arriving at the main building brigade location wedged right in the middle of mostly civilised urban neighbourhood, I was informed that my unit located outside of the town and that was going to be my assigned station for the next few weeks. The quick trip to the outskirts revealed barren ice-laden fields dotted with barracks, canteens and various auxiliary structures of a sprawling air force base that used the poor hypothermic building brigade sods to undertake the most menial of tasks of digging. This included almost endless snow covered trenches and foundation footings along an airfield strip. The sight was brutal – nearly reminiscent of war movies depicting the battle of Stalingrad or the battle of Moscow in the middle of the horrible and unforgiving Russian winters. As freezing wind whipped the last vestiges of comfort afforded by tar fed fire pit, my comrades scurried about with their various shovelling tasks, their first sighting of your truly did not look very promising – one sheep in front of ten wolves might have had a better chance. I was doomed to misery for the next few weeks.
Alas, my sick ridden status deprived me of a veritable chance to prove myself in the battle. As a result I had to stay in the barracks most of the day cleaning floors, windows and running whatever odd errands required attending. The unfilled time was spent smoking, eating and even napping with the small exception of the morning and the evening tortures supplemented by the Sunday routine that kept the whole contingent on hand inside, away from the miserable trenches. The pecking order of the building brigade at my location turned out to be quite different from a typical Red Army setup. Our peculiar group was comprised of a different mix. The dominant ones consisted of past, current and future criminals. The rest relied on slightly sick and minorities to form a contingent. In a regular army unit, one has to go through brutal hazing especially hard and abusive during the first few months of service. This however is well balanced by the promise of an easier life by the end of the first year. After that everything is a piece of cake, you turn into a hardened hazer yourself inflicting the miseries on the next generation of recruits. My battalion did not subscribe to this nearly natural order of things. The criminal element was strong, weathered and well prepared to face up to any abuse. The slightly sick were not prepared to take on the role of hazers themselves. As a result, the habitual seniority did not matter – what mattered were the bullet proof foreheads and steel fists. The criminal elements had them in abundance, turning the place in a prison without bars.
I got into my first fight on the day of my arrival. I was accosted while I was trotting back to the barrack after a frozen routine in the outdoor latrine of a communal type. The latrines were always a suspect location for all sorts of stuff including drinking, smoking pot and beating up the weaker side. In this first scuffle I really did not stand a slightest of chances. Luckily, my jaw withstood the impact though it hurt like heck. This was just the beginning, as I was an easy prey especially considering my rather privileged temporary status. It looked like the local villains were trying their hardest to catch up on some intimate time given my previous and future absences from the local circus ring. The days were relatively calm with only occasional abuse doled out by the officers who did not appear to enjoy their building brigade stint either. Mornings usually were a hectic affair when one was more concerned with getting ready for yet another unwelcome day of outside drudgery – a hardly conducive atmosphere to harass fellow human beings. At night, my troubles usually trebled after the hungry, tired and mean spirited locals returned. The officer oversight was minimal in the evenings too, as the usual duty at night was doled out to the lowest on the totem poll – “praporshiks”. This is the most ridiculed and the least respected army rank. The ranks of praporshiks are usually filled by the soldiers wanting to stay on as professional military, past their mandatory term. Saying the least, these types inclined more to sadism than to acts of random kindness. Their station in life was so static that the only outlet for anger build-up was to cheer on the worst of the abusers. With credentials lacking those of officers they upward mobility was as stable as dinosaur bones buried in the Goby desert, and their very choice of preference for the army spoke volumes as certain lack of adaptability required on the outside. In other words expecting any protection from our praporshiks was useless.
Usual abuse was essentially confined to periodic beatings that were highly correlated to one’s degree of belligerence after a hard day digging at the airstrip. Thanks to the snow-laden and blustery work location, my torturers’ tired interest in my persona was somewhat diminished compared to what could have happened in a real jail. To summarise, the spirit of my unit was miserable, racist and rather individualistic – everybody followed, although viscerally, the Darwinian argument of natural selection. Forget about the Marxist solidarity – a man is nothing but a wolf to another man. The only folks who remotely resembled charitable human beings were the national minority groups who stuck together no matter what, albeit exclusively along the racial lines. Alas, being in the majority did not bode well for any solace of ethnical separation.
Sundays were the most dreaded – as the blessed day of rest really meant more energy and bottled up anger for my criminally minded friends. Their busily mischievous nature hardly ever allowed for much in the way of reflective and contemplative moments. Church services were not on the menu either so unlucky weaklings had to pay for being in the wrong place in the wrong time. Predictably I was unfailingly in their ranks.
More of the Garrison
Since our shovel unit was located amidst a huge air force base, the number of military personal in the immediate neighbourhood was huge. We had to share the canteen with the entire garrison. My first experience of the military canteen in the previous summer was relatively tasty compared to what was lurking in the huge kitchen that catered to at least a couple of thousand of soldiers at a time. The cooking of the previous summer catered to only two hundred heads was longed for just like a Christmas dinner. Even the habitual pleasures of tea, butter and bread appeared sour and delivered minimum satisfaction on the coldest of days that reminded me of Stalingrad in 1943. The only difference was that this time we, instead of Germans, were encircled in the frozen circle of inevitability.
The only joy was the TV that was not off-limits in the mornings. This was right in the midst of the great transformation that beset the dour and stolid world of Soviet broadcasting. Perestroika was on the march and change was just hanging infectiously in the air. The broadcasts gradually become more colourful and jazzier with some music numbers and surprisingly smiling announcers – what a novelty. I think some of the producers must have been taking clues from the likes of CNN. We even started having talk shows. At first, these shows were jointly conducted by the American Phil Donahue and the Soviet with the perfect American pronunciation – Pozner. They primary target audience were Americans. However, our suddenly cheerful leadership dared to give us a directly translated version. Amazing – you can actually express your own, presumably unrehearsed opinion on the air! So the TV was a definite plus despite its unfortunate location right in the middle of the stinky barrack. This was the February 1987, and as a special treat we were allowed to watch early morning direct broadcasts of Canada Cup. When it came to hockey there were hardly any impartial observers, nearly everyone cheered and enjoyed the earlier successes of the Soviet team during the opening week of the tournament. Even the pockets of local Central Asian populace were sucked in despite their much stronger preferences for soccer and not the game on the bloody ice that must have reminded them of the hated frozen trench along the airfield. This enjoyment was a nice visual reprieve from the harsh environment and the whopping boys received an additional reprieve from the hockey fans with big fists…
Papa to Rescue
After a couple of weeks into my last stint with the beloved military, I was feeling particularly distraught over the never-coming confirmation from Kiev. One morning, as I was pacing in the front entrance enjoying my usual cheap military cigarette, I noticed someone, wearing an artificial fur and decidedly non-military coat, approaching the lonely barrack. Something clicked. I have seen this coat before! It was my father, coming once again to my rescue! After a warm and much needed welcome, he told me that he had arranged for me to be transferred to the local hospital while awaiting my final discharge confirmation. I was certifiably sick after all and could not be held as a useless punch bag for the local villains. The idea of suing anybody for negligence did not really exist in the well-regulated and rarely attended Soviet courts. The authorities could really do what pleased them. Considering this it was all the more surprising how my father managed to get things done. In the West with its reliance on rules and rights, talking somebody into obedience without a threat of a suit would be truly an unyielding impossibility. In the USSR things could be arranged if one could be an offer that could not be refused. My father was clearly a master. His wheeling and dealing worked like a charm and I found myself in the welcoming surroundings of the local civil neurological hospital unit that very night. I did not even get a chance to say a fleeting goodbye to my “buddies”. They must have been pissed that night!
My hospital surroundings were not new to me – it was the same hospital that initially accepted my frail and sun-stricken body some months ago. Everything looked familiar and much brighter – doctors, nurses and food. They received me as a long-lost son, and accorded me a great treatment of smiles, a bright room and cordial personal attention. Since I was still on the “recovery” trail, I returned their affection with cheerful smiles and a slightly dragging right leg. I could let them down and felt obliged to make some effort at being sick!
The hospital coddling did not last long, as on the third day of my stay I received my long-awaited discharge confirmation. Despite all the cosiness of the hospital ward, the civil life at home was calling and I was on the way home that very day. Having stayed overnight with a hospitable grandmother of the military unit medic, I boarded a bus for a 5-hour ride home. I could hardly wait and in the commotion did not even call ahead. Good thing, I really wanted it to be a surprise. Having arrived in my hometown, I took a tram home. Suddenly, I saw my grandfather in the car – it was great – pleasant surprises started early. Instead of going home, he decided to accompany me to my grandmother. The prospect of a tasty meal was always an exciting prospect for my frugal grandfather. This time it was doubly sweet. The reunion with my grandmother, mother and father was a fantastic experience savoured for a long time. My helpless military career was over, the civil life full of future promise and optimism was about to begin anew.
The transition took no time except for my peculiar propensity to keep wearing the uniform that lasted for few more days. I think that partially it might have been a case of extreme frugality – as I strove to preserve my limited civilian wardrobe by giving it hard to the governmentally provided garb. Partially, it also might have been a case of youthful and silly pride of the uniform without a threat of returning to past nightmares. I even enjoyed giving out extra crisp military greetings when passing other military on the street, now I could gloat at their misfortunes with impunity. After all there was something about this stupid uniform – appreciated by the ungrateful brat at last! Fortunately, this foolish inclination did not last more than a few days. The uniform was stored for good and a fresh set of long awaited civilian fashions made me look just like every other youth in the grimy post winter filth of the city streets.
The time spent in the course of my Red Army adventure was not entirely wasted. I did manage to avoid more wasted time by not serving the entire time. I learned a great deal about the medical establishment, especially about things that medical professionals either did not really know or were ambivalent about. I came back to University one year earlier - one year closer to the great promising future of an engineering professional rummaging around the Soviet industrial heap that was just about to collapse. I got a great additional perk as a medically discharged type since I did not have to attend weekly military classes that usually took a whole day. Instead I spent my time honing other more useful skills including English. And voila, here is an entirely boring compilation of personal details written entirely in English!
Oh, remember Georgiy Alexandrovich and his overindulgence in the Freudian perversions? I guess my lack of response to his magic did not deter his proclivities as once too often he was found locked up in his office with a naked mental patient. He could have been misunderstood of course but whatever the reason the Soviets decided that his libido frustrations needed a different outlet shipping him to Israel on the first boat out.
My hospital surroundings were not new to me – it was the same hospital that initially accepted my frail and sun-stricken body some months ago. Everything looked familiar and much brighter – doctors, nurses and food. They received me as a long-lost son, and accorded me a great treatment of smiles, a bright room and cordial personal attention. Since I was still on the “recovery” trail, I returned their affection with cheerful smiles and a slightly dragging right leg. I could let them down and felt obliged to make some effort at being sick!
The hospital coddling did not last long, as on the third day of my stay I received my long-awaited discharge confirmation. Despite all the cosiness of the hospital ward, the civil life at home was calling and I was on the way home that very day. Having stayed overnight with a hospitable grandmother of the military unit medic, I boarded a bus for a 5-hour ride home. I could hardly wait and in the commotion did not even call ahead. Good thing, I really wanted it to be a surprise. Having arrived in my hometown, I took a tram home. Suddenly, I saw my grandfather in the car – it was great – pleasant surprises started early. Instead of going home, he decided to accompany me to my grandmother. The prospect of a tasty meal was always an exciting prospect for my frugal grandfather. This time it was doubly sweet. The reunion with my grandmother, mother and father was a fantastic experience savoured for a long time. My helpless military career was over, the civil life full of future promise and optimism was about to begin anew.
The transition took no time except for my peculiar propensity to keep wearing the uniform that lasted for few more days. I think that partially it might have been a case of extreme frugality – as I strove to preserve my limited civilian wardrobe by giving it hard to the governmentally provided garb. Partially, it also might have been a case of youthful and silly pride of the uniform without a threat of returning to past nightmares. I even enjoyed giving out extra crisp military greetings when passing other military on the street, now I could gloat at their misfortunes with impunity. After all there was something about this stupid uniform – appreciated by the ungrateful brat at last! Fortunately, this foolish inclination did not last more than a few days. The uniform was stored for good and a fresh set of long awaited civilian fashions made me look just like every other youth in the grimy post winter filth of the city streets.
The time spent in the course of my Red Army adventure was not entirely wasted. I did manage to avoid more wasted time by not serving the entire time. I learned a great deal about the medical establishment, especially about things that medical professionals either did not really know or were ambivalent about. I came back to University one year earlier - one year closer to the great promising future of an engineering professional rummaging around the Soviet industrial heap that was just about to collapse. I got a great additional perk as a medically discharged type since I did not have to attend weekly military classes that usually took a whole day. Instead I spent my time honing other more useful skills including English. And voila, here is an entirely boring compilation of personal details written entirely in English!
Oh, remember Georgiy Alexandrovich and his overindulgence in the Freudian perversions? I guess my lack of response to his magic did not deter his proclivities as once too often he was found locked up in his office with a naked mental patient. He could have been misunderstood of course but whatever the reason the Soviets decided that his libido frustrations needed a different outlet shipping him to Israel on the first boat out.
