Remembering the 1990s in Russia

The holy 90s, as Naina Yeltsin called them, if not to talk about my happy personal life, about my dear friends — this is a series of pictures that turn the heart into stone.

October 4, 1993 — The plot on TV: The journalist is fussy, lively, spinning around the bodies of those killed in the center of Moscow, looking at the soles of their shoes. Suddenly, he triumphantly exclaims something like: “Everyone has worn out soles! These are outcasts!”

One story happened very close. My wife and I rented a room in a three-room apartment at the beginning of Petrogradka, not far from the Neva. The owner’s daughter was twelve years old. She was pushed into a car right next to the house, raped for several days, and then pushed out. She remembered the crime scene. The OMON is type of special police forces rolled up there, they didn’t detain anyone, then they forced the girl’s parents, threatening them, to withdraw the application.

And another picture from the TV, this time I remember on NTV-channel as journalist Tatyana Mitkova talks about the victory of the Lithuanian army over the Russians, either in the 16th or in the 17th century, which I don’t remember how widely they celebrated in Belarus. Perhaps “The Battle of Chashniki is the day of the military prowess of the Belarusians.” This is the current entry from the web. It was about a clash where the Moscow army lost its commander — Prince Shuisky, up to seven hundred soldiers and a large convoy. The attack took our troops by surprise when they were preparing for the night. The Moscow regiments chaotically brushed aside for two hours, and then retreated. This battle had no effect on history. I don’t remember verbatim what Mitkova said, I remember her lips saying with pleasure how the Russians were driven twenty miles away.

This is not all. The holy 1990s certainly hardened us enough to be felt for a long time to come. When, year after year, people are insulted and deceived, raped and killed with impunity, this cannot just be erased from memory. Something needs to be done about all this, but I don’t know what.