Today is 13th August, I'm not superstitious, but maybe I should have been.
Getting up when the dawn is breaking, today we leave for Russia! The trip is a mistery, a lot of people has told us terrible things: "the route is awful, there are bandits at every corner, be careful!". Moreover the press talked about an epidemic of yellow fever. So we leave early, at 6 am we are in front of the hotel, the ugly one.
We leave at 7.30 am, Leandro and Giuseppe (he has convinced him) leave us: they go back in Kijev. They're going to remain there for a week, to come back to Italy and then to reach us another time in Saint Petersburg. (at least.. this was the initial program they had.. At the end just Leandro will reach us again). So we greet them, a little bit disappointed, and we divide. We find the direction at once. We decide to take the northern route, avoiding Rostov, also if at the Lvov Russian embassy they told us that the story of the epidemic was a huge joke. We continue queued up, at a good speed. At the third road block they stop us. Fine. For the three cars. -Why?- because you were in the middle of the road and not in the right lane. The policeman tells us everything in Russian and by gesture. So he takes our driving licences and the cars' documents and he goes in his office waiting for the money. Michal controls the situation, looks at the ground, then he enters the office and they start to discuss:
right in front of the office there's a parked bus. To pass we should have changed lane. Moreover in the right lane there's almost a lawn, so quite nobody pass there.He tells all these things talking in a low voice, calm. Then, considering that the policeman doesn't listen to him at all (he wants Michal to look at the route code he has in his hands)... Michal begins talking louder and louder, in Russian and in a very fast way. Francesco is astonished and look at me saying:
well, at least now I know he can speak, and also better than I thought!-I laugh a little, but I'm also a bit worried, maybe now they decide to arrest us! So I enter the discussion, it's better if I scream, because Michal is becoming evil and not educated. So I begin:
-You try to give us a fine just because we're Italian, everybody stops us, everybody gives us fines. I drive in a very good way, I go slow and I'm diligent with road signs, but you know I'm Italian and everybody asks me for money, this is not right at all!(I've said all these things in a not perfect Russian). Francesco is enjoying himself, so he begins: (in English)
I'm a journalist, I'll write these things you do on the papers in Italy!-and the policeman, (in Russian)
Have you got a document which testify you're a journalist?-god- Michal understands the danger, so he proposes an inspection on the road: the bus, the grass... (but he still shouts). Policemen (now they're two) are convinced or something, I don't know. What I know is that in the end they leave us go without any fine. We thank'em, greetings, and we leave (finally!!).
Now we go slower, we ask for informations about the way to follow to reach the border (you should never ask for the way to follow, it's always a risk, people don't answer you, often they've never been in their whole life 20 km far from their homes, how can they tell you where to go?). We take the wrong way for a couple of times, we lengthen for about 20 km (Michal notices it by the position of the sun), we go towards North, not West, we take the right way.
It seems the border. But it isn't. The office from where two militaries come out is an other road block. They ask us 10 $ for each car. Reason? Transit. We see other people of the place who pay about 2 $ -why should we pay more?- - Well, ok, so 4 dollars.- What an anger. We pay.
The border. It seems the hangar of a plane. There's no queue. The sun's hot, they tell us to fill in a paper for each, written in Russian, telling every thing we carry with us.. money, objects, suitcases. Michal writes, we copy. Half an hour there. We have to give it to the policeman. He's a young and arrogant guy, who tells me that I can't carry with me more than 1000 dollars out of Ukrajna, because I can't enter the country with more than 1000 dollars ...!?! Not considering the fact that I have the money for the three cars.. if in Ukrajna you can take dollars with credit card.. where's the sense of all this?
- This will be a problem for you-he tells me to go away -he doesn't want witnesses. He asks Michal 50 $ for each car, Michal calls me
-come here you too, this guy is mad-Brave-heart comes
-gives him the receipt that you've taken 1000 $ in Kijev using your credit card-Michal says. Brave-heart find the receipt (he's really organized!). The policeman gets angry. He takes all the papers we have in our hands and says:
- so you have to write them down another time, sharing out the money among you...I can't go further: (in Italian, because in Russian it wouldn't have been the same)
StooooopWhile I'm going out from the office I begin shouting among a lot of people (our "guys" were together, in the corner, a little bit far, in the shadow for the heat of the day, but -they told me- they could heard everything)
we are not animals, I believed we were in Europeee, not in Africa, and he'd like to see us write a useless paper an other time? Are we going crazy? We don't write anything more, take us under arrest, I'd like to see...- and moreover-
we are not animals, we are men ...and I go on repeting this, shouting and gesticulating. Everyone seems astonished by my reaction. At the end the chief arrives, he enters the office, he tells the young policeman to go away and tells us to enter. He listens to Michal explaining. He gives us the papers we had written back and tells us:
-well ok. Now go to the immigration office.
I'm almost beginning to laugh. The "immigration" office: a little room 100 meters far from where we are, where we enter one at a time. To each of us the policeman asks for the passport and writes the data in a big register. When he notices that we're not a couple of people but 7 or 8, -but how many are you? couldn't you tell me? I could write everything in just one paper. He has had enough and we have to go away. I understand it's a mockery, because I'm standing in a queue in an other office where they should give me the cars' documents, but when it's my turn the employee goes away. I follow him, I explain him that we've been waiting for two hours. He doesn't do anything -I work- he says. I wait another bit, he comes back and begins writing in a register. I begin becoming impatient. Then he calls me, while everybody's there. The immigration office finishes and they give us our documents. We can go, finally... We take every little paper they gave us to on leaving the border. At the level-crossing the policeman says: you have to pay the insurance. Stop there and go in that office- Michal is nervous, so I go.
-Hello, we have to pay the insurance. How much does it cost?- I understand 12 dollars
-OkI give him the car's document and while he's writing I go out and I repeat loudly: dvje stje dollar (I thought it was 12 dollars, but in reality it means 200 dollars) Michal listens, he gets out of the car and he tells me
- 200 dollars, but are you crazy?
- 200 dollars?? I thought 12. I've given him the document.The others are entering the office and they are beginning asking for a discount:
skitki, pazhalusta...
But what about a discount!Michal shouts angry
this should be a joke!he enters the office, too. There are two policemen who are sitting at the desk, dressed in camouflaged combat clothing.
- Give me back my document (the car's one)
- No, your document remains here!
Give me back my documenttttt-Michal shouts in Russian. The policeman takes the document and he puts it in a drawer. Michal hurles himself at the desk, he open quickly the drawer making a muddle of papers looking for our document and finally he gets it. Everything lasts no time at all. But the man on the right seizes him. Michal wriggled out of him and comes out of the office. I'm struck dumb and follow him out. We've both are out of breath (me too also if I've not moved a muscle). And now? Michal:
they're not policemen at all, if they were they would have already arrested us. They're just employees, dressed in camouflaged combat clothing. Go there and tell the others to come away.-
- But I'm scared-I go. In the office the atmosphere is calm again. There's Cesare who asks for a discount
-we remain just for 12 days, why should it cost so much? Otherwise in Italy all of us have got the insurance...-The false policeman tells them that there are 80 dollars to pay for another thing, but he can allow us a discount on the insurance. I say in a very low voice:
-Cesare, take the document back, pretending to do nothing, we go away, this is not police...he takes his document back, the cop notices him, so I say:
-we haven't all those money with us, we go for an other insurance office....-he gets angry, takes the phone: (in Russian)
stop the italian cars, there's a black Alfa Romeo(Francesco's one, the only one he could recognize from his seat)
, furnished ....-then he tells me, like a menace:
now they're gonna arrest you. Police, big troubles.
I'm literally scared, I go off with the tail between my legs
-go-
and what if they arrest us?
- Would you like to pay 600 dollars + 80? We are not crazySo we leave, at a very low speed, we look for a cross-road but there isn't. At a certain point we reach one, my heart's beating fast, they stop us. It's over. The cop says:
-go in the office.(it was at the first floor). We all go upstairs. Everybody but Leopoldo, who looks at the cars. They want 6 dollars for the transit. I would kiss him for the relief: they don't know anything! (So the one at the insurance office was pretending to call someone). Michal hasn't the same reaction
-6 dollars, why so much? We've got no rubles, just liras.-
What about Ukrajninan grivni?Francesco nods, Michal says no, they say
well, ok, so 2 dollars in Ukrajnian grivni.
No! We go back and change road. We won't pay anything.And we go away. We get on the car, we've said we would go back, but we're exhausted. So we go on, and what if they run after us? What if they shoot? They don't say anything. We go. It's over. Really! And I can't believe it. We do 100 km more with a light anxiety, then we forget everything about it.
The road is quite nice, it's not so crowded, until we reach the one for Moscow. At that point the road is really crowded in both directions for about 50 km. The fuel gauge lights up: it's full of water. With Cesare's help, who's always well-equipped, we remove about half a litre of dirty water. So the discussion about fuel begins another time: we always go at cheap petrol pumps while Cesare'd prefer to go in the expensive ones. Brave-heart agrees with him (but nowadays I consider him the "pre-eminently consumerist", because he buys always the most expensive things).
We're tired but we continue. At about 8 pm it's almost dark, so we decide to look for a place to sleep. We stop in the little town of Morozovsk, where we ask for a hotel. We find it. We are the only clients and even if a room costs just 5000 liras, Francesco asks for a discount: skitki!? The moral's excellent, the bathroom's awful, there's not running water (just in the bowl, because in the wash-basin there's no problem). We take a room for each crew, but Michal and I, Francesco, Leopoldo and Cesare.. we decide to sleep in the car, but there's no parking.
We're hungry. In the square someone was eating skewers (shashlik), so we go there. There's a kiosk with little tables in the yard in front of it. They're all full of people except for one in the middle of it. We sit down there and order. They bring us an only big plate with 5 forks. They have already taken the meat away from the spit and there's a lot of tomato sauce on the whole thing. Not bad, if you don't think to the quite inexistent hygiene. Every now and then a drunken man gets up from the neighbouring tables and he staggers a bit, someone goes there to take him, and also the others stagger. It's disgusting.
Francesco tells us his life: in the meeting of Doneck there was a piano and at a certain moment I've noticed someone who was playing, just few chords, but you could say he was playing well.. what a surprise! I didn't know he could play. So
-But.. who does write men's data? -
I write them, but yours is two years old, I can't remember it.. Is there written that you play? -Now I can look at him in a different light. I ask him, he tells us a lot of things about a musical past, records' editions, the different surrounding, a life without privacy, so he's had enough of everything and he's decided to do enter the Naval College. I don't know many things... He's smart, so we laugh. We don't have to drive anymore, so I drink a beer. Then we can go to sleep quietly. But something else goes in the wrong way.. we can't manage to open the trunk on the car. Brave-heart has inside it almost everything, so he's desperate and he gives to it strong shoves. Maybe in the inside a case is blocking the lock. I go backwards and forwards in the square, speeding up and braking, to see if something moves. At a certain point we stop.. there's nothing to do with it. Brave-heart is worried, I'm too, but less. We've got a suitcase in it, but we don't care. In these days is the last problem we consider.
Finally we go to sleep. But it doesn't last enough. I get up an hour later. There are three drunken boys who are knocking at my window. It's not well closed, so one of them slip his hand in the inside. I get scared. I call Michal, but he's too tired, he doesn't wake up. I get more and more scared. I shout. Nothing. The boy leans against the car and slip another time his hand in the inside
- go on, give me some money-(in Russian) So I begin to hoot for a bit. Francesco and Brave-heart arrive from the hotel (Cesare go on sleeping in the BMC. Leopoldo too, in his Alfa-Romeo) and they convince the drunken boy and his friends to go away. Then Brave-heart goes to sleep, while Francesco remains 5 minutes more to ask Leopoldo to open the car, because he can't manage to do it by himself.
Friday 13th it's over! But I'm not superstitious!
We all take a shower in the hotel, also if the water is really cold. But it's hot and after it we feel good, ready for the last part of the trip. We have to reach Volzhskij, near Volgograd, the city which was called Stalingrad.
A part from the enormous holes in the road (but the night before we didn't noticed them), everything is just fine. We reach Volzhskij in the early afternoon. The problem of the trunk has not been solved yet. We take the rooms in the meetings' hotel (we and Brave-heart with air-conditioned, he even the luxury one. Instead the others are at the top floor, in the cheap and neat ones), where everyone's nice, cheerful and kind, and we begin trying to open the trunk another time. Someone suggests a drill to pick the lock. Michal takes a pair of pincers and he manages to open it!! General relief, Brave-heart is deeply satisfied in being able to take his things again. We go round the city. There's a gorgeous italian bar, there's no more a cinema (Alena wanted to go there).. In the evening in the square in front of the hotel there are a lot of young people, so we think there can be a concert. We ask.. No, there isn't, but is the meeting point at Saturday night. We are really tired, so we go to sleep very early. In the room there's a tv and there's rai3! Tomorrow morning we go to Volgograd-Stalingrad to visit the city: we leave at 9 am, be punctual, I entrust..
At 9.15 am everybody's quietly having breakfast. Michal gets angry and I go following him. Cesare and Giorgio get up leaving the breakfast there. The others rest there, I don't know if because they don't believe us or because they're not ready enough.
We go again on the bridge on the river Volga. It's really long and it's the only one. For this reason Stalingrad is 80 km long and just 3 km wide! Because they've not bridges on the river.
We go and visit Mamayev Kurgan, the hill from where Russian resisted during the Second World War and which rendered Stalingrad one of the 13 heroic cities. Before the stairs there's a yard where there are the symbols of them: in Ukrajna, Kijev, Odessa, Sebastopol and Kertch, in White Russia Minsk and the Brest's fortress, in Russia, Moscow, Stalingrad, Leningrad, Murmansk, Novorossisk, Smolensk and Tula.
They sell flowers to bring to the tombs. A distinguished man approaches, he's a guide.. Yes, we're interested. He'll speak Russian and Michal's gonna translate. He begins to tell us everything about the place. We climb the stairs and we reach a big yard where there's a big statue which indicates the effort of the Resistance. On both sides there are two big walls on which are carved the heroic achievements. Then there's a big celebration square with seven big statues on the sides. They represent the models of heroism: there's the girl who carries a dead soldier on the back, there's the general (7 generals are dead during the attack which lasted more than 1 year) who, while he was dying, sustained by a soldier, goes on giving orders.. there's the allegoric statue which represents the smashed German snake, there's the standard-bearer. In the air resound the musics of the time, the atmosphere is really evocative, the words of the guide are precise, also Michal's translation is clear and help us feeling impressed. Under us are buried thousand boys who have struggled for their country, for their lives, for their families. They had not to allow German to reach the river. Every day the top of the hill was disputed, but at the end Russian managed to repel the enemy. In 1970 survivors have written a letter to future people and they've closed it in a reliquary which will be open there in 2045, the guide tells us to be there too... We climb again, and there's an enormous statue dedicated to mothers. In fact it represents a mum carrying her dead son in her arms, she's got the head covered by a sheet. the guide says it's not realistic, in fact no mother has found the remnants of her son. Then there's the mausoleum. It's round, with the eternal flame and a melancholy, sweet and yearning music. On the walls there are mosaics and the names of the men who died.. long lists of names, I read the nearest ones. And in the end, at the top, there's the statue of Victory, in a lawn full of tombstones. They're the generals, the officers... It's impressive, 85 mt high, built in '54. We go all around it. If you look at it underneath it makes your head spin.
the fifth meeting: Volzhskij ...
During the meeting we meet a very nice lady who speaks very well Italian, she's proud of being able to cook the Italian plates in a very refined way. I can't believe when she invites us to dinner and I accept the invitation also for Michal and Alena. (I know how much Michal loves carbonara spaghetti!)
At 8 pm her friend comes to take us and with our car we go at her home. We've already seen the reinforced concrete buildings which there are in all East Europe (also in Prague). This isn't different from the others, with a big yard inside, children and people who pass by, dark stairs. When we enter home I feel hot at once. The place is little, there's a big fan, but the heat is unbearable: they've been cooking for hours. We sit on a big sofa which is quite as big as the entire room. There's a low table in front of it which it's full of several things. Carpets everywhere, on the ground, on the walls. I'd like to look out to control the car, but someone tells me that it's safe: in the building lives a chief of the police. We relax and we begin chatting. This lady lives with her 20 years old daughter, who's out now. She's medician and she works in a hospital. She's small, a little bit fat but she's got a very sweet face, with two big dimples on the sides of her mouth. She has joined our Agency and I'm sad, because she doesn't got many chances: she's out of the parameters of mostly of our men. With her there's her friend, the one who came at the hotel to take us. She's slim, really shy.. and she'll talk just a little during the dinner. Then there's another friend, a very beautiful woman, tall and slim. In fact she was a model. She wears a tight-fitting dress. She's got divorced by an Italian man: when she understood they didn't go well together she came back to Russia, but she'd like to live in Italy, so she's joined our Agency too.
The meal begins with a carbonara spaghetti plate, which deserves its name, with an exaggerated portion of sauce on it. There's also parmisan! The plate is big and full, but not a spaghetto has remained there. Then there's roast chicken with potatoes, ham and cheese with cucumbers, salad with tomatoes and basil, Russian wine, red and sweet. Finally.. we've eaten very well, we've been in good company, we've greeted them with an "arrivederci". They're gonna come to Turin in November and we repay the dinner back.
The "guys" are always busy after the meeting. They won't go to sleep at a reasonable hour, anyway tomorrow morning we'll get up at 8 am.
We leave at the right time, everybody is ready for that hour (they begin to understand we don't wait for the late-comers). Also this stage will be hard: we've got more than 1000 km for Suzdal.
We do a little stop on the Mamayev Kurgan hill, to take photos for the ones who couldn't take them, then we go to the center of the city. We can say that the symbol of the city is a big ruined house, which was the Headquarter. It's the same as how it was at the end of the war.
Queued up in the square there are a lot of tanks, I don't know anything about it, but Brave-heart, for instance, takes photos of each. There's a big construction, modern and circular, in which there's the museum and a big picture which describes the whole struggle. But everybody tells us that today it's closed. On the other side there's is the Volga, nearby and calm. I compare it to the Po (which is the river of our city, in Italy) and I'm almost beginning to laugh. Then I'm also touched a little bit when I begin thinking to all the guys who died there, in the same place where we are.
The others stop in the expensive one and they fill the tank. so we discuss a little with Brave-heart: he'd like to buy that sprays which free locks. He's got one for each car he has. But Michal doesn't want to, he wouldn't be useful at all. Brave-heart insists, then he menaces:
-next time the lock doesn't open at once, I'll break it!Michal is quiet, it won't break any more.
Along the street we cross a column of tanks. These days the press and tv are always talking about Daghestan, and if Russia should intervene or not, we're a little bit scared ...
In the afternoon we stop to eat something in a restaurant. It's strange because it's in an old train carriage. We've already seen a lot of them: the meal's really bad. They bring us scrambled-eggs, rice not well heated.. and finally (and luckily) a water melon. Brave-heart is nervous: he thinks we go too fast ...
On the right and on the left there's always the same landscape, country, country, not a house, not a village or a town. But where do people live here? Probably cities and towns are far from the road. Few are also the road signs. We reach a town in the middle of the night. We look for a little bar but we find just a emporium which seems the store of a prison. There is a rolling shutter almost shut from which the head of a woman leans out. She's looking at us to know if we desire something: three bananas, a packet of chips (in reality they are biscuits), an orange juice in a terrible pink-orange colour. I'm not hungry, considering what they sell. We go to sleep, yes, but where? In front of the police station, in these way we are surely safe. Said and done. As fast as we park 10 mt far from the police station, a little bus full of cops arrives:
-did something happen?
-no-
did you got problems with the bars here around?
-no, we sleep here to stay safe, we're going to North-
ok, if you got any problem, you know where we are-kind and nice. Now we're cheerful, Michal and I go for a walk. When we go back Francesco and Leopoldo are already sleeping, in the BMC the others are cooking and Brave-heart is chatting with them. We fall asleep. The day after we notice that Brave-heart has slept in the BMC: when he was coming back in the car to sleep he's found us asleep (and we were also in his seat). So he's preferred not to wake us up... what a kindness!