Secondhand Time: The Last of the Soviets Read Free Page A

While these are tacitly tolerated, individual activists begin to be arrested and penalized in larger numbers than previously, and the parliament begins to seriously curtail the rights of activist groups and nongovernmental organizations that work in opposition to government policies.
    FEBRUARY 2012: Putin is reelected president of Russia with 63 percent of the vote and names Medvedev prime minister. Oppositionists again take to the streets of several major cities to protest; the police arrest hundreds. Putin’s government harshly punishes a handful of protesters, intensifying its efforts to repress political dissent in the Russian Federation.
    FEBRUARY–MAY 2014: The Maidan protests in Kiev, Ukraine, lead to armed conflict between Ukrainians supporting a pro–European Union political orientation and those who wish to remain under the Russian sphere of influence. After the flight from Ukraine of pro-Moscow president Viktor Yanukovych, Russian forces take over Crimea, which then votes to join Russia in a referendum. At the same time, Russia denies that its forces have entered Ukraine and are providing financial and military support to pro-Russian groups, effectively fueling a civil war in Ukraine. These events spark the biggest East-West showdown since the Cold War, with the United States and its European allies imposing harsh sanctions on Russia.





ON IVANUSHKA THE FOOL AND THE MAGIC GOLDFISH
    —What have I learned? I learned that the heroes of one era aren’t likely to be the heroes of the next. Except Ivanushka the Fool. And Emelya. The beloved heroes of Russian folklore. Our stories are all about good fortune and strokes of luck; divine intervention that makes everything fall right into our laps. Having it all without having to get up from your bed on the stove. *1 The stove will cook the bliny, the magic goldfish will grant your every wish. I want this and I want that…I want the fair Tsarevna! I want to live in a different kingdom, where the rivers run with milk and their banks are heaped with jam…We’re dreamers, of course. Our souls strain and suffer, but not much gets done—there’s no strength left over after all that ardor. Nothing ever gets done. The mysterious Russian soul…Everyone wants to understand it. They read Dostoevsky: What’s behind that soul of theirs? Well, behind our soul there’s just more soul. We like to have a chat in the kitchen, read a book. “Reader” is our primary occupation. “Viewer.” All the while, we consider ourselves a special, exceptional people even though there are no grounds for this besides our oil and natural gas. On one hand, this is what stands in the way of progress; on the other hand, it provides something like meaning. Russia always seems to be on the verge of giving rise to something important, demonstrating something completely extraordinary to the world. The chosen people. The special Russian path. Our country is full of Oblomovs, *2 lying around on their couches, awaiting miracles. There are no Stoltzes. The industrious, savvy Stoltzes are despised for chopping down the beloved birch grove, the cherry orchard. They build their factories, make money…They’re foreign to us…

    —The Russian kitchen…The pitiful Khrushchyovka *3 kitchenette, nine to twelve square meters (if you’re lucky!), and on the other side of a flimsy wall, the toilet. Your typical Soviet floorplan. Onions sprouting in old mayonnaise jars on the windowsill and a potted aloe for fighting colds. For us, the kitchen is not just where we cook, it’s a dining room, a guest room, an office, a soapbox. A space for group therapy sessions. In the nineteenth century, all of Russian culture was concentrated on aristocratic estates; in the twentieth century, it lived on in our kitchens. That’s where perestroika really took place. 1960s dissident life is the kitchen life. Thanks, Khrushchev! He’s the one who led us out of the communal apartments; under his rule, we got our own