The FSB has launched a series of “anti-terror” cartoons replete with black humor, with the intent of teaching children to be alert, to not pick up strange bags, and to report any suspicious activity to police. The short cartoons, which have been aired in the Volgograd region, feature boys who are confronted with tricky situations such as a ticking bag or an alien presence in their dark apartment building’s basement. In one cartoon, a boy that calls in a prank bomb threat to his school is told that he will get “three years, not a moped.” Another clip warns of wandering away from parents at public events.
The simply-drawn stories feature rhymed narration in the style of Soviet-era strashilkas (short, grim poems), which invariably featured a “little boy” that gets into a lot of trouble. Observers have said that, while parents who remember strashilkas from their childhood may appreciate the clips, children are likely to be confused and scared by them.
The cartoons were commissioned by the security service, using funds budgeted for fighting terrorism. They were drawn five years ago by an advertising agency in Krasnoyarsk.
STRASHILKI GALORE (in Russian) can be found online at scarykids.ru
A recently published, abridged version of Alexander Solzhenitsyn’s masterwork, The Gulag Archipelago, is just one fourth the length of the original, and will be used in Russian schools. The documentary work was added to the national school program in 2009 and will be part of the 11th grade (the final year in Russian schools) curriculum. The abridged version was edited by Solzhenitsyn’s widow, Natalia Solzhenitsyna, right, who said she “did everything possible to keep the power and the light of the book intact.”
Russian composer Dmitry Shostakovich’s unfinished opera Orango will premiere in Los Angeles at the end of 2011.
Orango surfaced in 2004 when a musicologist found it in a desk drawer among Shostakovich’s archives in Moscow’s Glinka Music Museum. The finished section is a 40-minute prologue to a three act opera that was to be performed at the Bolshoi Theater for the 15th anniversary of the October Revolution. Orango was to be a satire of bourgeois capitalist society. The libretto was written by Alexei Tolstoy and Alexander Storchakov, and it also contained a fair bit of criticism of the Soviet regime.
The plot centers on a scientific experiment to cross a human with a monkey, the result of which, Orango, hates communism so much that he starts to lose his humanity, deteriorating into a primal state, at which point the prologue ends.
In 2006, Moscow’s Gelikon Opera announced it would stage the work, but the plans never reached fruition, so now the opera will be produced by the Los Angeles Philharmonic, with Esa-Pekka Salonen conducting, according to the Los Angeles Times. The LA Phil acquired rights to the piece through the composer Gerard McBurney, who was asked by Shostakovich’s widow Irina to prepare an orchestral score from the surviving piano sketches.
A court case against a young man who ran a drug rehab center in Siberia has sparked a vicious public debate in Russia while highlighting the lack of official policy on drug addiction.
Yegor Bychkov, whose Nizhny Tagil organization City Without Narcotics took in addicts, primarily those hooked on heroin, and channeled them through a rehab process, was convicted of kidnapping and sentenced to three years in a penal colony. Bychkov called the case bogus and fabricated by police in cahoots with the city’s drug gangs.
As the case proceeded, Russian opinion split, with one side supporting Bychkov’s mission and calling him a hero, while the other compared his harsh methods to torture (addicts would often be committed by their relatives and chained to their beds for the first few days) and said that any cause should be fought for lawfully. The controversy came to a head when a higher court overruled Bychkov’s jail sentence.
Bychkov is now free and his clinic is again operating but, despite all the controversy, one thing is clear: Russian government authorities seem little concerned with growing drug addition rates.
“High authority is like the dearly departed. You either speak well of it or not at all… New reports are possible even without any informational justification. In the extensively weeded garden patch that is television news, any vegetable looks important, just by virtue of the fact that it regularly appears on the screen.”
Journalist Leonid Parfyonov, left, accepting an award from state television Channel One, during which he viciously criticized Russia’s TV news.
In a sequel to President Dmitry Medvedev’s recent schmoozing with California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin in November rubbed elbows with another Hollywood star, Leonardo DiCaprio. The star of Inception and Catch Me If You Can flew to Russia for a high-profile summit to save the tiger. DiCaprio, a long time tiger activist and WWF supporter, kept a straight face when Putin unexpectedly showered him with praise for flying to St. Petersburg despite a grounded plane and nasty weather, calling him a “real muzhik.” DiCaprio also reportedly revealed to Putin that he is “half-Russian.”
OTHER STARS WITH SLAVIC ROOTS: Harrison Ford’s mother was Russian, as were Helen Mirren’s grandparents. Both of Stephen Spielberg’s two grandfathers came from Ukraine. And Natalie Portman’s parents were from Kishinev. And that leviathan of American cinema, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer? It was founded Shmuel Gelbfisch and Lazar Yakovlevich Mayer – emigres from tsarist Russia.
Cheburashka, the cute, floppy-eared children’s book character created by Russian writer Eduard Uspensky and transformed into a cartoon character in the 1960s, has become a big star in Japan. A Japanese company has purchased the rights to Cheburashka’s story for a new production and has created an 80-minute film, directed by Makoto Nakamura in consultation with several Russian artists. The film took four years to complete and includes three parts, one of which faithfully reproduces the popular Soviet animated film Krokodil Gena. Two other stories include the characters’ stint at a circus and their hunt for a friend’s lost granddaughter. The Japanese film was shown at several festivals around the world, and the producer said more stories are in the works.
“Twelve years is sufficient time for a president to realize his program. We still have a rather inert society, so eight years is not enough.”
Dmitry Medvedev (left) on Russia’s presidential term. (Rossiyskaya Gazeta)
“If we want to spend our life wretchedly, in the role of drillers and lumberjacks… then we don’t need to do anything at all.”
Kremlin ideologue Vladislav Surkov (right) on the merits of modernization. (Interfax)
Minority shareholder rights activist and corruption whistleblower Alexei Navalny (left) has published documents alleging that some four billion dollars were stolen during the construction of Russia’s biggest infrastructure project of the last decade, the oil pipeline from East Siberia to the Pacific Ocean. Navalny claims he found an internal report the pipeline builder Transneft, a state-owned company, published for the state auditor. The report lists deals with subcontractors and significant overspending. “They stole everything. When I read the report, it fell out of my hands many times,” Navalny wrote on his blog navalny.livejournal.com.
“A voluminous file, where it says in a dry tone, over the signatures of high Transneft authorities, who were on the audit commission: Everything Was Stolen. They stole. They overstated prices. They led a dirty game with subcontractors. Then they destroyed documents. Etc., etc.”
Alexei Navalny
Moscow’s Mayor Sergei Sobyanin (below), who replaced long-serving Yury Luzhkov after a political scandal last fall (see Russian Life Nov/Dec 2010 Notebook), has hit the ground running. His first order of business was eliminating Moscow’s omnipresent laryok (street stand), where vendors sold everything from socks to pies. Sobyanin said the street stands obstructed traffic and views of historical landmarks and swiftly fired several city officials to drive his point home. In typical chinovnik fashion, other city officials hurried to outdo one another in their laryok-busting zeal, even removing stands that were legal, making it difficult for Muscovites on the run to purchase cigarettes, magazines, or bottled water.
“There is this sense that every piece of land in this city has been divvied up into pieces. And someone is earning money on them… Objects are located directly on top of metro exits.”
Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin (Interfax)
HISTORY OF TRADE Moscow’s Nikolskaya Street, was, for hundreds of years filled daily with a bazaar-like atmosphere of wooden trading huts and food merchants, sellers of kvas and fresh game. Merchants would gather here, a stone’s throw from the Kremlin, to catch up on the latest gossip and news.
Bella Akhmadulina was a poet in the classical tradition. She rose to popularity during the Thaw of the 1960s and was known for her intimate verse, as well as her emotional and often packed public readings. Akhmadulina died in late November at the age of 73.
One of the few prominent female poets of her time, Akhmadulina was even called “Bella Akhmatovna,” a pun mixing her real patronymic, Akhatovna, with the family name of Russia’s most famous woman poet. Of a different generation, Akhmadulina was spared the sort of harassment Akhmatova received from the State, yet many of her poet friends, like Joseph Brodsky, were forced to leave the country. She also publicly defended Boris Pasternak, Andrei Sinyavsky and Yuly Daniel, and Alexander Solzhenitsyn, when others bowed to State pressure to ostracize them. During the 1970s, she pulled off a publishing coup when her interview with Vladimir Nabokov appeared in the Russian press.
Victor Chernomyrdyn, the Prime Minister that guided the Russian economy during the ups and downs of the 1990s, passed away this fall. He was 72.
Chernomyrdin brought staid moderation to the government of Boris Yeltsin after the unexpected dismissal of reformist Yegor Gaidar. Yet he was also renowned for his often clumsy wording and outspoken manner, a combination that produced dozens of catchphrases, the most famous of which (summarizing the course of reforms) was: “we wanted it to be better, but it ended up the usual way.” Chernomyrdin also created the state energy behemoth Gazprom, by unifying the vast array of gas assets in the Soviet Union into a single enterprise.
Chernomyrdin’s passing was met with words of warmth from across the political spectrum. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin reportedly choked back tears at the state funeral. Chernomyrdin’s star began to fade during Putin’s presidency after he was made ambassador to Ukraine. Some observed at the time that it was a form of exile, as Putin was seeking to sideline other strong-minded, popular politicians.
Vladimir Maslachenko, a goalkeeper on the Soviet national soccer team when it captured the 1960 European Cup, went on to become Russians’ favorite sports commentator. He passed away in November at the age of 74.
Originally from the Ukraine, Maslachenko followed up his soccer career with a brief stint in the 1970s as a coach in Chad. He then went on to work for 40 years as a color commentator and was known for his lighthearted style, peppering matches with jokes. Quips like “good pass, but it’s too bad the field has run out,” made even boring matches watchable, fans said. Younger commentators called Maslachenko their mentor, saying he should be admired for how he shepherded the profession from radio, through television, to the internet.
Aliya Mustafina is Russia’s new star of world gymnastics. In October, at the 2010 World Gymnastics Championships (held in Rotterdam), Mustafina garnered the most individual points and played a leading role in the team’s first place showing at the World Championships – the first for Russia since the fall of the USSR.
Mustafina then went on to nab the all-around title, scoring 61.032 points, the second best score ever in women’s gymnastics under the new system of scoring (first place belongs to Russia’s Viktoria Komova, who received a 61.250 at the World’s First Youth Olympics last August). China’s Jiang Yuyuan finished second with 59.998 and the U.S.’s Rebecca Bross won the bronze with 58.966. It is the first World all-around gold for Russia since Svetlana Khorkina (2003).
“The story behind Aliya Mustafina’s all-around gold today is that of a revived dynasty, the dominant Soviet women’s team of the 1980’s and early 1990’s – whom many consider to represent the absolute epitome of artistic gymnastics – was dead and now reborn. In addition to leading her teammates to their country’s first world title as an independent nation, Mustafina has delivered one of the great performances by a female gymnast ever – capturing the very same artistry, difficulty, and competitive composure that made her Soviet predecessors so beloved and revered. Mustafina’s four-event arsenal is so well balanced it’s hard to pick a favorite event to watch her on, and a win so convincing and undeniable as hers gives a satisfying sense of closure to a competition. She has established herself and her Russian teammates as the absolute gymnasts to watch over the next two years – and the gymnasts to beat.”
– US gymnastics expert
Russia successfully defended its title in the women’s World Volleyball Championship on November 14, defeating top-ranked Brazil in five sets in the finals, while host team Japan upset the United States to capture the bronze.
This was Russia’s seventh world title in the sport. Yekaterina Gamova led the Russian squad with 35 points. “I cannot express how I feel about defending the title in a few words,” she said after the final match. Local volleyball experts gave considerable credit to head coach Vladimir Kuzyutkin for the victory. Born in 1947 in then Stalingrad, Kuzyutkin boasts a 34-year coaching career. His expertise helped him to assemble a cohesive squad, a perfect alloy of “ambitious youth” and “experienced veterans” – the team did not drop a single match en route to the finals.
Zenit St. Petersburg defeated Rostov 5-0 on November 15 to clinch the Russian Premier League soccer title, a competition it dominated for most of the season. It’s Zenith’s second league title (third if you count the championship it won in 1964, when it was still Zenit Leningrad). Heavy spending by Zenit owner, energy giant Gazprom, seems to have yielded dividends. The former state natural gas concern has not been shy about pumping money into the club, assembling a nice blend of Russian stars and pricey foreign legionnaires.
After 12 years on the tour, 29-year-old Elena Dementieva has declared the end of her tennis career. The announcement, made in November at the season-ending WTA Championships in Doha, after losing in straight sets to Italy’s Francesca Schiavone, came as a shock to her fans and teammates.
Dementieva always seemed on the cusp of grabbing a Grand Slam title but never pulled it off. In 2004 she twice came close, losing first to Anastasia Myskina (at the French Open) and then to Svetlana Kuznetsova (at the US Open). She did however take the gold medal at the 2008 Beijing Olympics, along with 16 singles and 6 doubles titles (and over $14 million in prize money).
Dementieva, who will turn 30 in October, is fluent in French and English, and is planning a second career in journalism.
“Russian democracy has disappeared and the government was an oligarchy run by the security services.”
U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates in a February 8, 2010 cable, according to November’s Wikileaks revelations.
“Certain passages are encountered that, to put it gently, call forth bewilderment and regret.”
Foreign Ministry spokesman Alexei Salanov, about the Wikileaks documents.
“We were fully aware of the fact that many people would try to introduce a split in our joint approach to the construction of the Russian Federation... but, to be honest with you, we didn’t suspect that this would be done with such arrogance, with such impudence, and so brazenly.”
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, on the Wikileaks cable which portrayed President Medvedev as Robin to Putin’s Batman.
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