Categories: Residence and weekdays, Lev Shlyakhter

So I speak about the people in Grodno, the inhabitants of Grodno you met. Did the differ from those living in Magadan? What is your first impression about the people?

Living here?

Yes, here.

From Magadan... And now I cannot tell you. I think you are a local, aren’t you? I have fallen under the impression that people live by their own clans. They live in clusters among their relatives. Because when I went out to the country I could see the same situation. I could see a farmstead as I say „located on the outskirts”, an isolated farmstead. Their children come and dig potatoes, by cars, they help them. They help somehow their parents. And later they bring back chicken, meat, and so on. And they didn’t come into contact with anybody. So that is why we crowded together – the Bruskiny and us.

Did it look like different in Magadan?

By the way ... in Magadan ... we spent 34 years, three families lived together, the Bruskiny, our family, the Koshelevys, the Rybak. Four. They were from Odessa, the Rybak. So we were friends. And we brought up the children together. We went to the university out of there. That was our clan. The Rybak were there. It was possible to live at Kolyma if you are not a lazybones. Do you understand? You shouldn’t go to drink vodka or to kebab house, but if doing so when you went hunting you could become frozen in winter.

Were there lots of drunkards in Magadan?

They drank a lot in general.

When did you come to Grodno?

I have never been a drunkard.

I see, but I mean the other people. Where were there more of them?

You know, my first impression was when I went for business trip from Magadan to Klajpeda. Do you imagine? On the issue of fuel equipment. And in Vilnius I saw how the people drank. They received salary. I considered that ... we have a lot of prisoners of Latvian, Lithuanian and Estonian nationality. And there were drunkards all around. You could imagine what impression I had. In Grodno I didn’t see such great drunkards. You can see drunkards everywhere.

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Researcher: Natalia Ivashchanka, Sviatlana Silava