Had another quick run into the city with Mishah today; took nearly 90 photos at three maidanchyks - Yulia/Pora on Independence Square, Yulia/Pora in the park across the street from the Cabinet of Ministers, and Yanukovych/the Communists in the park near Rada.

Below is the picture of the guys down on Khreshchatyk - the one in the middle is Yulia's supporter, two others may be from Pora, though I'm not sure.

Maybe one day, when my internet isn't this pathetic anymore, I'll post other pictures as well.



***

In general, it all feels a little bit like football: I support one team, and not the other, no doubt about that, but I have nothing against the other team's fans - as long as they behave, of course. And they did behave today. Also, there were not too many of them, compared to Yulia/Pora camps.

But no matter how much I am for that one team, I don't think there should be a new vote. And I also feel that pouring shit on people is wrong: we've got too much of it everywhere anyway. (Man, I should go down to the lake and photograph the trash there again. The new heap is enormous and has been there forever, again.)

***

Regarding Pora's shit, here's a tiny, wonderful blurb about my Friday's translation, by the wonderful David Sasaki:

Russia, Ukraine: Stories About Words - Veronica Khokhlova translates three stories about words: in the first one, they are banned; in the second, they offend; in the third, there aren't enough of them. If that doesn't entice you, where else will you read about a political party that defecates on its defectors?

***

I didn't expect myself to go on for so long here, so here's two more pictures - the first one from Yulia/Pora camp, the second from the Yanukovych/the Communists one, both in the park, on different sides of it, separated by the Mariinsky Palace:

For those of you waiting for Yushchenko, Mishah saw him yesterday at the antiques market again.

He showed up late, when most were beginning to pack. His guards would've been indistinguishable from the rest of the crowd if it hadn't been for their earpieces; most were so casual, they greeted sellers and the market's guards by shaking hands with them. Yushchenko looked good, better than he did in winter. He looked like an accountant. Gesticulated a lot. People were taking pictures of him from afar; Mishah went there without his camera. No one was throwing eggs at him.

My yesterday's translation for Global Voices, done in a great hurry in the middle of the night. The last episode - the Pora episode - isn't about the Pora I voted for in March; if they had done what they did then, I would've never voted for them.

***

Russia, Ukraine: Stories About Words

Below is the translation of three stories about words: in the first one, they are being banned; in the second, they offend; in the third, there aren't enough of them.

LJ user plushev, a Russian radio journalist, writes (RUS) about the government's attack on the name of the controversial National Bolshevik Party (NBP):

All words, words, words

These people are for some reason afraid of words. [...]

The Federal Registration Service has asked RosOkhranKultury [Russian Culture Protection Department] to punish the mass media that cover NBP. On what grounds? Because when they call NBP a party, these mass media are spreading false information, since NBP isn't registered as a party. According to this logic, those who aren't members of the Writers' Union cannot be called writers. By the way, I still remember that this is exactly how it used to be in the Soviet times. But what's most interesting is that folks at RosOkhranKultury are totally confused themselves:

RosOkhranKultury recommends calling the National Bolshevik Party of the Bolsheviks "the party that calls itself NBP." [...]

So is it a party or not? And is [the RosOkhranKultury representative] spreading false information by calling NBP "a party that calls itself NBP"?

I asked [Eduard] Limonov [leader of NBP] today why there is such a fear of words - maybe he, as a literary master, has an idea. He said that history doesn't know a single case where something ceased to exist after a forcible extraction of the word [its name] from the lexicon.

In fact, everything has been turned upside down. Here's what false information regarding NBP's status is: "NBP party registered by the Ministry of Justice." The rest has been made up, but no one cares, and that's why, beginning today and until the cancellation of this piece of paper, you won't hear the words "NBP party" on the air (including our station, though on others these words are rarely used now anyway). But please be sure that plenty new constructions will be coined (I've offered "non-party NBP" and "the Party That Can't Be Named"). This, of course, is good for the NBP party, which considers itself a party, but which cannot be called a party. Ministry of Justice ([Federal Registration Service] is its department) couldn't have made a better present to Limonov - awesome advertisement.

But still, why such a fear of words?

***

qopqop: I'm surprised by something else. The readiness of the mass media to follow idiotic orders. Everyone thinks this is idiotic but all are eager to play along. Officials aren't allowed to use the word 'dollar' and here's [German] Gref [Russia's Minister of Economics] looking like a "clown of a federal level" at a government meeting when he says "non-rubles." Idiocy must be ignored simply because of the Constitution, which guarantees freedom of speech. Or a lawsuit should be filed. But when even [the Echo of Moscow radio station where LJ user plushev works] obeys, I don't even know what to say.

plushev: If you don't know what to say, don't say anything.

vika_1_2: The Soviet Union also doesn't exist anymore. How are they going to punish for mentioning it? [...]

klober: This is absolute, pure paganism, where words are meanings. Pagan women are not allowed to say the names of male gods and fertility spirits. Children are given names at birth but throughout life they are called something else, in order to deceive evil spirits.

***

LJ user otar (Otar Dovzhenko) writes (UKR) about how a TV journalist-turned-politician hurt the feelings of some of his new parliamentary colleagues by using a synonym of the word "Homo Sovieticus":

When he was introducing a draft (don't remember which) from the parliamentary rostrum, head of the freedom of speech and information committee Andriy Shevchenko [member of Yulia Tymoshenko's Bloc, not to be confused with football star Andriy Shevchenko] used the epithet "sovkove" [derivative of "sovok"] to describe some aspect of our television.

This has caused the "Bolsheviks" to protest. Representatives of the three factions took turns demanding that Shevchenko respect other people's views and not offend what they hold sacred.

In particular, a representative of the Party of the Regions noted that "our people were born in the Soviet Union and one shouldn't offend their Motherland."

[...]

***

LJ user lucysd writes (RUS; warning: contains a graphic photo) about how, allegedly, members of the Pora party ran out of words and used feces to punish a young man who claimed at a press conference to have been stood up on a promise to be paid for living in Pora's tent camp at Kyiv's Independence Square:

Contemporary Ukraine: Arguments and Facts

Today [Pora members] poured shit over a guy next to the UNIAN [news agency]. Literally. Out of a pail.

Regardless of whether he deserved it or not, this gesture, imho, expresses very vividly the state of affairs in Ukrainian politics.

[Graphic photo and news story text omitted]

P.S. I've just imagined how [head of Pora] Kaskiv [...] orders Pora soldiers to go inside the tent and come up with a pail of the weapon of contemporary proletariat (or intelligentsia?). [...]

***

b0ris: The weapons befit the war.

aier: Would be nice to do this to all parliamentarians from the Party of the Regions [...], Communist Party and Moroz's Socialist Party - and, ideally, to all who voted for them.

zgollum: I don't see why this shouldn't be done to all parliamentarians in general.

do_: The weapons befit the people, yes.

lucysd: I wouldn't generalize like this :) More like, the weapons befit the army :)

djushes: It'd be interesting to read about it in some English-language media. Any links?

In the New York Times, a piece on Nabatiye, a town in Southern Lebanon, "eight miles north of the Israeli border," now more of a ghost town - Empty Silence, Occasional Rocket Blasts, and Anger in a Bombed-Out Hezbollah Town.

One of the residents quoted in the piece is Jamal Allau, a medical doctor treating Shirin Hamza, a 21-year-old bombing victim, whose "mother, father and brother were killed when the walls collapsed around them from the force of the blast":

“No political questions, O.K.?” said Dr. Jamal Allau.

Dr. Allau, who spoke fluent Russian after years of medical school in Ukraine, said people in the town had been surprised at the bombing of a gas station and parking garage, whose crumpled remains were visible through the window near Ms. Hamza’s hospital bed.

People like him are the ones I feel most sorry for on that side of the conflict: I doubt they ever had time to support the brainless imbeciles and their suicidal/homicidal politics.

Lemuel of Deleted By Tomorrow, a Slovak blog, posts a "quote for the day" - which I totally love:

Republicans claim the credit for everything good that happens, such as last year's anti-Syria protests in Lebanon, while Democrats claim the credit for everything bad, like the coup in Venezuela. The idea that the Lebanese and the Venezuelans might have had anything to do with it doesn’t compute.---Harry Hutton

Could someone following Chechnya please explain to me what Akhmed Zakayev meant when he said this in a recent interview (emphasis mine):

But Russia, too, with every year is getting further and further away from ensuring its security. The war has spread all over North Caucasus long ago. This year, two new fronts of the ChRI [Chechen Republic of Ichkeria] Armed Forces were created in Russia itself – the Urals Front and the Volga Front.

What the fuck is he talking about?

Also, is he still based at the London Hilton?

Okay, this is totally silly to translate/explain, but I can't resist posting it: "Nasrallu - na gorshok!" was one of the slogans at the rally by the Israeli embassy in Moscow on Sunday. :)

Norvezhskiy Lesnoy has photos - here.

A blog with volunteer translations of Israeli Russian-language posts - israelnorthblog:

This Journal serves as a compilation of blogs of Russian-speaking residents of northern Israel, translated into English. All of these blogs were started prior to the launch of the current military campaign in Lebanon. The authors describe how the war has been affecting their daily living.

(Simon Hawkin, thank you for the link!)

A quick note: for some reason, I almost take it for granted, but Maidanchyk looks like Yulia's election campaign, totally. Has given me a flashback into late February, not the Orange Revolution of 2004. Is she really counting on a re-vote?

Oh, and yes, I did a quick run to the city yesterday (Kyiv's center, I mean), after almost a month and a half of living in Pushcha Vodytsya.

Leaving Marta was scary and weird; Kyiv's air isn't as bad as I feared, unless you're driving through the industrial district somewhere in Obolon; Maidan is sleepy, but let it stay there, maybe it'll prove useful; I rode back in a super cool black Mercedes, talking about kids with a sweet, Prima-smoking driver (professional driver, that is, not the car's owner), father of two daughters, aged 27 and 17, who, thanks to me, wasn't only making some extra cash, but also had a chance to revisit Pushcha, which he loved.

I'm posting a few more Maidanchyk pictures here. (The term 'Maidanchyk' is borrowed from a friend - and transliterated from Ukrainian, not Russian.)

My today's Global Voices translation:

Ukraine: Maidan, Again, Sort Of


Kyiv, Independence Square: "President Kuchma - shame, Yushchenko - the nation's disappointment. Moroz - betrayed the Maidan!" - by Veronica Khokhlova

Nearly two years after the Orange Revolution, there are tents at Kyiv's Independence Square (Maidan Nezalezhnosti) again. The camp isn't big, and it looks dormant for now, but as Ukrainian politicians continue to keep the country in limbo, this summer's Maidan seems to be waiting to happen. Or not. (After all the broken promises and mismatched alliances of the past four months, it's not realistic to regard anything as a certainty now.) A just-in-case Maidan.

When Oleksandr Moroz, Socialist leader and the newly elected speaker, deserted the so-called Orange Coalition for the so-called Anti-Crisis Coalition, Ukraine's blogosphere reacted with a tiny virtual Maidan of its own: LJ user kotyhoroshko posted phone numbers of all regional offices of the Socialist Party and invited fellow-bloggers to contact them. Below is the translation of the initiative (UKR) and some responses to it:

You have a fantastic opportunity to call the Socialist Party of Ukraine regional headquarters and ask why "Moroz has [betrayed] us." Also, it seems reasonable to ask if they feel comfortable working for the head of the party who has betrayed the Ukrainian people.

[A list of phone numbers and other contact info is omitted from the translation.]

***

viktoza: I called this number: (044) 573-58-97. Told them: I'm Victor ..., I voted for the Socialist Party in this election, and now I do not understand the actions of your faction. We stood together at Maidan against [Yanukovych], and now suddenly you become his allies. I think you've betrayed me.

A Socialist woman replied: "This is what it looks like at first only, that we've betrayed you. In reality, though, you have to know who truly cares about Ukraine. If someone's guilty of what's going on now, it's the president." And then she hung up.

[...]

In the Kyiv City Committee, I've been told that all the Orange ones are to blame. If they had nominated Moroz instead of [Poroshenko], everything would've been OK. But she couldn't answer the question about why Moroz was kissing with Yanukovych and Kivalov [head of the Central Election Committee in 2004], the men he used to call bandits.

I told her, "You are traitors all the same, and I won't vote for you anymore." That was the end of our conversation.

[...]

067_33_44_55_6: I don't think it'll work, but I'm writing letters in which I let them know that they can cross me out of the Socialist Party voters list and I'm also wishing them success in further political intriguing.

kotyhoroshko: Letters are being read by their [computer network] administrators. Making phone calls to them, on the other hand, is fun. You'll enjoy it a lot.

Not everyone is feeling so upbeat and being so proactive, however (RUS, LJ user lucysd):

orange juice

I'm reading today's news and feel the world collapsing. The world that we seemed to have created two years ago.

[Victor Yushchenko's Our Ukraine] is in the opposition, Pora lies by the [Parliament's] door, [Yulia Tymoshenko's Bloc] is blocking all they can and cannot, but is it going to help in any way?

Yanukovych will be the prime minister. The rest will follow. Kalashnikov [parliamentarian from Victor Yanukovych's Party of the Regions, assaulted a TV crew recently] will head the Freedom of Speech Committee. [Yulia Tymoshenko's Bloc] will continue to block everything and everyone.

Russia will lower gas prices for us, potato prices will be lowered focibly, pensioners will get a pension raise that will last one month. Everyone will be happy.

My Russian friends will say gleefully: "We did tell you!"

And NATO isn't taking us anymore, anyway, and no one's relaxing visa regime for Ukrainians.

Finita la comedia.

?

***

yurr: finita.

I'm probably not even going to vote in the next election - there's no use.

And if they lay themselves underneath [Moscow], I'd even think about where to leave for. Because I love this country, but I hate this state.

rgmss: [...] Actually, all this was showing through.

When we were standing and freezing there [at Maidan in 2004], everything was right. But right afterwards it all began to fall apart. When "they" [representatives of the former regime] were all interrogated and then let go... it became clear then.

This country needs [Pinochet]. For five years, no longer... just to purge the ranks.

983: Then all the Medvedchuks [representatives of the former regime] will quickly change their last names to Pinochet. And then they'll purge so much, the only thing left to do would be pray to the photo of Leonid Brezhnev...

And since the situation is ugly enough, there are jokes, of course.

Abdymok translates one - all but the punchline - that he was told during a recent visit to a Ukrainian village:

[...] this is the simplified version. there’s another, infinitely more colorful, one featuring tymoshenko, but too much would be lost in translation.

three famous ukrainian men, volodymyr klichko, andrey shevchenko, and president viktor yushchenko are pushing baby strollers in the park.

klichko starts contemplating the future of his progeny out loud.

“take a look at his jaw and big fists,” klichko says. “he has all the makings of good boxer.”

shevchenko then beckons the men to examine his baby boy, who is thrashing about with his legs. “my son will probably become a world-class soccer player,” he says.

both men turn to the president and ask, “what future awaits your son?”

yushchenko bends over slowly and sticks his head the stroller.

after straightening up, the president turns to the men and replies: “[Obosralsya. Molchit.]”

The punchline goes something like this (RUS):

"He's shat himself and is silent now."

More on yesterday's missionary band: not just their music, but their message was pretty bad, too. Most of it was the usual stuff, but then they put one guy on the "stage" whose path to God had been through sex, drugs, alcohol and plans to kill somebody - everything that the late 1980s and the early 1990s had to offer. Considering that an overwhelming majority of his audience were kids, his story sounded strange. He ended it by implying that God, among other nice things, was an alternative to cheating on your spouses. Again, all the 5-year-olds must've found the sermon very useful.

Oh boy. All of a sudden, this apartment has turned into backstage for some Christian missionaries masquarading as a rock band. Voiceless young guys trying to conceal their voicelessness by making lots of noise with their electric guitars, drums and other equipment, all packed into the wooden gazebo right outside our window. They wanted to use our sockets, but this room happens to be Marta's bedroom, so I didn't let them. Oh, and they are preaching, of course. "We are normal, religious guys." (My normalniye, veruyuschiye rebyata.) Soundwise, it's worse than Khreshchatyk on a weekend. But the kids seem to love it. Songs are in Russian and Ukrainian - and, Jesus, I have to say it again: that guy is so voiceless.

Fuck politics.



I walked around Gorenka today, a village next to Pushcha Vodytsya. Felt like I'm in Turkey, very foreign and very curious. Took some pictures, but am not gonna bother posting most of them: my internet is too slow.



It was fun and crazy to realize that the local language here isn't Turkish, that it's a mix of Russian and Ukrainian, and I actually know it. (A very hot day today, too, and I never wear hats.) I stopped and chatted with one woman about her goats, asked another one for directions and had a few more tiny interactions. The local people are very friendly.



Only once did it all feel familiar: I was walking down a narrow path behind the houses, and all the green things around me were totally amazing, hard to tell which of them were growing by themselves and which were grown by the villagers, magnificent, and not a single person around. It gave me a flashback to the months spent in a village as a child.

My tonight's translation for Global Voices:

Israeli Women Blog the War, in Russian

The Israeli blogosphere has a Russian-language corner: quite vocal, it is populated mainly by those who emigrated from the former Soviet states in the past few decades.

Below is a selection of posts about the war, written by Israeli women, in Russian.

LJ user gollitely (Lena Lagutina, Jerusalem) - July 14, 2006:

Real

A dear childhood friend [LJ user] dzogaba, who specializes in making reality shows for television, has sent me an SMS, asking: "Are you having a war over there? For real?" So I'm sitting here and thinking how to respond. Meanwhile, my friends, shabat shalom from Jerusalem to all! For real.

LJ user pepel (Yelena Pepel) - July 19, 2006:

On girls and bombs

Very moving discussions are taking place in LJ regarding the photos of the girls signing missiles with "To Nasrullah from Israel with Love." Incredible discussions, cave mentality, along the lines of "and you drink the blood of Christian infants [...]." Seemingly normal people are fighting each other on both sides of the barricade.

But do you know that in Israel there is such an army profession as a military clown? It's a person who entertains children in bomb shelters. And there's also such a branch of child psychology as the psychology of stress. And a child on whose house fall Katyushas, who hears sirens ten times a day and has a class on "how to hide from missiles" at school, is taken to paint missiles, by psychologists. The missiles, which, by the way, aren't going to be used to bomb a specific Nasrullah - because these are artillery missiles. But children don't care. This is therapy. It'll just help them stutter less and sleep better at night - yes, until the first siren, but still - and not to hide under the table for 20 hours each day as the children of Sderot do.

By the way, they changed the missile alert code in Israel ("the scarlet dawn" - "shachar adom"), because of a request from a 4-year-old girl called Shachar (Dawn). The army has changed the missile alert code because a 4-year-old Shachar gets teased at the kindergarten - they call her name "a bad sign."

Everyone has, of course, forgotten about bombs with flowers and words written in chalk: "On to Berlin!" Even though it's our - our common - history textbooks.

God willing, you won't find out what a war in your house is - the house that you have nowhere to go from. Nowhere to go because you don't have thousands of kilometers for retreat. And, God willing, YOUR army will listen to little girls' requests. And there'll be a profession of a military clown in your army. [...]

LJ user sestra-milo (A Woman on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, Nahariya and Haifa, originally from Ismail, Odesa region, Ukraine) - July 17, 2006:

A police car drove by, I went to the window to listen in. With crackles and coughs, in two languages (Russian is already like a state language!), they've allowed everyone to leave the shelters. And right at that very moment, there was an explosion.

LJ user sestra-milo - July 19, 2006:

We're being bombed, send me a repairman!

Yesterday after the bombing, my satellite TV switched off. I called the tech support department.

- Hi, my TV's not working.
- How did it happen?
- We were being bombed, a missile hit a building next door, and now the TV picture is gone.

The girl on the other end of the line begins to stutter. Together, we try to push on various buttons, but the TV is not reacting, the screen is still static.

- Could you send a repairman? - I ask tenderly.

The girl falls silent.

[...]

In yesterday's attack on Nahariya, by the entrance to a shelter, a Russian guy was killed, my acquaintances' friend, I've read an interview with them. His face seems familiar. I should call them, but I can no longer look at the phone - over ten phone calls since morning.

[...]

Three families left the building next door yesterday. I was watching them pack their suitcases from the balcony. The father was carrying the luggage, in no hurry, the mother was running very fast, covering herself with a bag. Then they led the kids out - an infant, a girl of 7 or so and a boy of about 13. Behind them ran an old mama. It looked especially wild with some man walking his dog in the background.

Only two families are left in the neighboring building - one of them is the family of Lebanese refugees with four children. These ones definitely have no place to go.

[...]

Ira and Andrey came for a visit yesterday, and I was drinking vodka with them, for the first time in many years, and I felt good. If I had known that vodka helps to relax so well, I would've been drunk every evening.

But I still didn't manage to get enough sleep: I woke from an explosion at 4 am.

When I was showing them the apartment, we heard a siren and headed for the shelter. Only later did I realize that I'm no longer in Haifa, that we don't have sirens, and the sound was coming out of the stupid TV.

Today at work, there was a siren without explosions and explosions without a siren.

[...]

LJ user nitsa - July 18, 2006:

I'm sitting on the balcony, looking gloomily in the direction of the Lebanese border. Danya takes a seat next to me.

[...]

The Gadyukins (a [...] nickname [referring to a poisonous snake] of the neighbors downstairs, with whom we've had a rich history of [bad] relationship) are listening to the damn music again.

- Well, what can we do? They are fighting stress with music. These are difficult times.
- But they're difficult for us, too, and you have a headache!
- You have a headache? - asks a worried voice from the balkony below us.
- Yes, - Danya and I reply in unison, [startled].
- I'll turn it off now... You should have told me... It's just that I'm off to milium tomorrow... So I've relaxed.
- Oh, then leave the music on! - I tell him, leaning forward over the balcony rail. - You do have to relax! You're going ... to Gaza, aren't you?
- To Gaza. It's time to pack for me anyways...

A multitude of useless thoughts rush through my head...

- I'm sorry for your dog... We lost our cat in December, - I say (it's hard to find something more idiotic to say).
- I know, - he says softly. - We have the same vet doctor.

- So! - He's looking at [Danya]. - You haven't been hitting the ball for so long, we are feeling somewhat uneasy!

[Danya] is embarrassed.

- Do play your ball, - [the neighbor] says. - But not too much. They found my mama has Hepatitis C, she needs to rest a lot, and she works hard...
- Let her get well, - I say, with the most genuine feeling.

Let his mother get well. Let him be all right. Even if we fight over idiotic trifles.

LJ user mishkofefer (Shushka, originally from Tver and Moscow) - July 18, 2006:

At last, my sister has moved in with us. She didn't want to leave but when a missile fell just one house away from her, I managed to talk her into [moving]. It turned out to be not so easy to leave Haifa - no trains or buses, the price for cabs has gone up three times. [...] My mother keeps watching the news in all accessible languages, and yesterday I happened to watch the [Russian state-run channel] ORT news, too. Reminded me of my [Soviet] pioneer childhood, around 1980, "the Israeli aggression in Lebanon." They are showing Beirut in ruins, are talking about evacuation of the Russian citizens. Not a word on the shelling of Israel, nothing on the fact that there are hundreds times more of the Russian citizens here. [...]

LJ user pilka (Lena, Haifa) - July 17, 2006:

This is Lena-Pilka speaking, from the frontline Haifa.

And you thought I wouldn't write anymore?

Dream on!

Everyone here is migrating south, following the birds. On my way to work in the morning I saw some guys walking furtively with suitcases. I thought, damn, they've robbed someone! Wanted to call my husband, but looked closer and recognized our neighbors [...].

The sirens wailed 4-5 times today. We didn't hear the first time, though, and went to the dining hall. And were surprised by how few people there were at the hospital.

And my husband was at home and kept running to the shelter with the little one periodically. [...]

He says: He's running with the stroller during yet another siren alert, and suddenly - an explosion, a "boom" real close, the windows begin to shake. He thinks: "Well, the little one probably has poops up to her ears in the diaper." But looks and sees that the kid is sitting and clapping her hands and laughing, like: "Bravo! [...]" She liked it, you know.

[...]

Anyway, all's okay. Thank you to all for your support, and don't worry!

I'm off to watch the third Terminator with my husband. Life continues.

[...]