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Slava Kurilov: Alone at Sea. An Unbelievable Way to Escape the Iron Curtain

eugenia — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 12:40:40 +0000

The only person to escape the Iron Curtain by swimming.

By job he was an oceanographer, by heart he was a dreamer, by nationality he was a citizen of the planet Earth — in short, he was an extraordinary guy. Yet his personal file in the USSR was stamped as “not worthy of an exit visa” so he was not allowed to leave the country, even if it was for a holiday. So in December, 1974 he jumped a cruise boat “The Soviet Union” off the coast of the Philippines islands — and he swam to freedom.With no food or drink, no swimming equipment apart from flips and goggles, he swam to the shores about a hundred kilometers for three days — completely alone at sea.

Since his childhood, Slava Kurilov had been very keen on swimming and he loved the sea so deeply, he made it his career — he was an oceanographer, a deep sea diver. He knew the sky — all the major constellations, he knew meteorology, he had a vivid inquisitive mind — he also spoke good English, had a sister living in Canada and his father was in a German prison camp during the WWII, which also considered somewhat of a treachery. A few times Slava applied for a permit for research trips outside the country, but to no avail — the reason being “endangering the security of the USSR”.

Slava at a typical day at work

In his diaries he wrote that ““my homeland had sentenced me to life imprisonment through no fault of my own. Until my death I will never see the free world.”

Apart from that, Slava had an interesting outlook on life: he practiced yoga and meditation, he trained himself to abstemious, ascetic regime, and often he went without food — or water! — for five days at a time.

THE CRUISE “FROM WINTER INTO SUMMER”

One day — it was November 1974 — Slava came across a travel ad in a paper: a large cruise line was to go on a voyage towards the equator, departing Vladivostok. The cruise was an unusual one: the ship did not intend to enter any foreign ports so no visas were required — the route was just to travel the outer waters for 20 days without approaching the coastal lines.

When Slava read that, he felt a pang of hope — in his memoirs, he later wrote that he felt like a wild animal which was about to be taken out for a walk before chaining him down forever. So the decision to go on a cruise was made, and it was an easy, confident one.

Interestingly, the cruise ship was built in 1930s in Germany and initially was called “Adolf Hitler” — the rumour had it that it was the Fuhrer’s private yacht. It sank during the war, but was recovered by the Soviet engineers. After that, it became the largest cruise ship of the Soviet Union and was used on the Far East routes, as far as possible from the civilised world — so it couldn’t be vetoed.

The route for this particular cruise was kept in strict secret. What was announced, however, that the passengers could sunbathe under the tropical sun, swim in the onboard pools and enjoy the stunning vistas. The guest lecturers would talk about the geography of the Pacific Ocean as well as the countries in the proximity. A cruise with no stops but with lectures about the South East Asia — well, in those days it did not sound unreasonable.

The main challenge was to figure out when — and where to jump. Slava’s goal was the Philippine island of Siargao, near the southern part of Mindanao.

Passengers were never shown any maps or other navigational tools — yet Slava managed to steal a glance at a captain’s dashboard.

THE JUMP

On December 13, at about 8pm, dressed in tight thick shorts and a few pairs of socks, equipped with a snorkel, flips and an amulet he had deep faith in, Slava walked to the upper deck — and took a leap into the darkness.

The deck was no longer under my feet. For several moments I flew through the air, until I felt the waves parting, gently welcoming me into their embrace. Coming up to the surface I looked around–and froze in terror. Beside me, an arm’s length away, was the huge hull of the liner and its gigantic turning propeller. I desperately summoned up my strength to swim out of reach, but I was held in the dense mass of stationary water that was coupled to the screw in a mortal grip. It felt as if the liner had suddenly stopped, yet only a few seconds ago it had been doing eighteen knots. The terrifying vibrations of the hellish noise went through my body; the screw seemed to be alive: it had a maliciously smiling face and held me tight with invisible arms.

And so he began to swim, trying to keep the liner behind his back, swimming away from it. After the initial shock, Slava was consumed by utter silence — just the mild murmurs of the ocean accompanied his thoughts. He realised that he really needed a compass — yet taking one on board would have seemed suspicious. Now all he had to do was to continue swimming — but he found it comforting, as the water was warm and the ocean seemed friendly. Had he known what was ahead of him, he later wrote — he would have jumped anyway. Anything lying ahead — losing the direction, thirst, hunger, uncertainty, jelly fish or shark — was a better option than returning to the ship, to the Soviet Union.

Kurilov in his latter days.

A day later he did not feel sore or tired — only the breathing of the ocean, which by now seemed like a living creature with heavy breath. Slava miscalculated the route, and his initial estimates — to swim for about 24 hours — had grown to three full nights alone in the ocean.

THE REST

There was a lot between the jump and the land. He was all sore and swallen from the salt water. He scratched his knees on the coral reefs and was bleeding, thinking of the sharks. He almost made it to a quiet bay — until he was picked up by a strong torrent and taken back into the open ocean. A boat passed right by him without noticing. The Soviet cruise liner seemed centuries away now to him.

At last he felt the land under his feet. The first thought at that moment, funnily, was “If I get attacked by a shark now, it would have been the biggest fail ever”. The second thought — even a feeling — was a wave — pun intended — of huge love towards the element of the water, towards the Pacific Ocean, the feeling of a beautiful force that had looked after him so very well. And after that he immediately fell asleep on the sand under a palm tree.

Waking up a few hours earlier, Slava took stock of himself. he was not hungry — his mouth was still swallen. He was vey thirsty, but far from the state of dying of thirst. When planning the great escape, what never crossed his mind was the thought of actually reaching the foreign land — and so he did not foresee a need for matches, a knife, an ID. But nothing mattered — Slava felt like the first person on Earth, like Adam, like Tarzan from the Jungles, and it felt great!

The locals, who found him on the beach, could not believe his charade swimming motions — after the initial contact was established, they kept asking him about “the rest of the bunch”. It was incomprehensible for them, in a way, to believe that there was no shipwreck — just an escape.

Till his death, every year he celebrated the days of 12, 13 and 14 of December as his second — spiritual — birthday.

Slava spent six months in the Philippines, while the authorities figured what to do with him. He was imprisoned for a few weeks, but then released as of “good character”. After the contacts were made with his sister, he was sent to live to Canada. His very first job was at a pizza joint, but after he perfected his English and got himself oriented, he continued doing what he loved most — working with the oceans. Once he travelled to Israel, which he instantly fell in love with — and so in 1986 he immigrated to Haifa. He continued doing oceanography-related research until 1998, when a diving accident went wrong — he was 62 years old.

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Wrap Your Baby in Old Newspapers — the 70 Years of Deficit of Everything.

eugenia — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 23:23:42 +0000

A typical Soviet shop with bare shelves.

One of the main critisisms of the Soviet Union now, from an every day perspective, was the huge deficit of everything. The planned economy failed to supply a constant flow of goods necessary for the well being of people. It was not the matter of incapacity — no, the means certainly allowed to build space shuttles or create extra strong tanks. The shortage for goods was created artificially — due to the reasons of the strange Soviet ideology.

A shop in Vladivostok, The sign on the wall: Juices. Water. Ice Cream. The photo is by Vladimir Kobzar.

According to the Soviet census of 1977 — cited from the Grand Soviet Encyclopaedia — volume 24, part 2, data on the house hold items of prolonged usage (that is, TV sets, fridges, washing machines) - the times of Brezhnev were far from abundant. For instance, in 1975 only 74 out of 100 households owned a TV — which means that 26% of all families would not have one! Furthermore, these TVs would have to be black and white, as colour TVs did not widely appear in the USSR until very late eighties. In the mid 1970s an average American family had a 1.5 TV sets per house — and they were certainly colour.

Come here, honey, Brezhnev is on now!

In the mid to late 1980s the situation with TVs had straightened out — but doesn’t it seem ridiculous that in 1975, the year of Soyuz Apollo space docking project, every fourth family in the USSR did not have a telly! Now it seems like the government had to make a choice — either every house gets a TV — or we explore outer space. The success of the Americans in both of these missions was frowned upon.

It’s very hard to gauge what was kind of a shop it was!

It could be understood if this applied to some high tech for those times gadgets — but no, this was the every day necessities. Say, the very first range of video cassete players and recorders was released by Sony in 1969. If we were to say that an average Russian person did not even hear about the VCRs till late 1980s — we would not be exhagerrating. Moreover, a regular household was only able to purchase one in the early 1990s. But this applied to almost everything, from fridges to radio transmitters — only 61% of families owed a fridge in 1975. How is that possible that the space exploration programmes were costing the country a formidable chunk of the budget — yet very little money was spent on supplying regular people with the necessities? The data on washing machines is similar: about 40% of all households had to do their washing by hand.

The same was with almost all household goods — the notorious example here is baby nappies. The disposable nappies were invented in 1958, and three years later they became a necessety for every baby born in the West. If you were born around that time and you are reading this here now, you would be very likely to think the situation was no different all over the world, exept perhaps some Africa bits. Alas — the USSR saw no nappies - not till very late 80s, and when they appereared, they cost a small fortune. To wrap babies in old newspapers was not unheard of.

This nappy phenomenon was idisyncratic for the USSR, and no logical explanation has ever been offered. Moreover, the goods of prolonged usage had really proved to be of this kind: as no replacement was available, TVs and fridges were in use for decades, often despite the technological progress. Also, to buy a fridge or a TV one had to fill a request which could take months to come through.

The siege of a wine shop. 1990.

This total deficit of everything created an agitated demand for things on the black market. As shops were barely filled, the savings of an average person mounted, and much of it would have been disposable. Of course, a TV cost three or four average monthly salaries, but often there was nothing to spend the money on — at all.

One item check out

The was and its aftertaste was long gone, yet the Soviet life was not in the hurry to improve and to catch up with the American lifestyle. The Soviet dream was meant to be in full throttle, according to the movies and other means of propaganda. Yet the huge gap between the reality and the official version was one of the most debilitating features of life back in the Soviet Union.

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The case of The Kremlin Doctors and its Consequences: the State of Anti-Semitism

Dmitry Yakimenko — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 06:44:02 +0000

Be Vigilant! Disclose an Enemy Under any Mask!

1953 was the last year of long and terrifying governing of Stalin. In January the huge country although accustomed to repressions shuddered from the new horror – this time the enemies-saboteurs were Kremlin doctors of a Jewish origin. The commenced persecution also applied to ordinary doctors. Soviet people who believed to the politically edited stories broadcast in the media were scared to be patients of Jewish doctors. On March, 5 of 1953 Stalin passed away and the case of Kremlin doctors was dismissed. Humiliated, maimed doctors were released. However this was only the beginning of the political repressions of the Jewish specialists and today we would like to introduce you to a striking example — the story of my family.

1951. Soviet doctors with the patient and recovered sight

My grandfather graduated from the Marine Military School in 1945, the last year of the Second World War. The training for the young officers was accelerated as the country was preparing to start the war with Japan. Soon my grandfather chose the profession of the submariner. He was a sailor on the most little submarines – so called ‘baby-submarines’ where the conditions were especially harsh. When the war with Japan ended he had a 5 year service contract in Port-Arthur in China.

By 1953 my grandfather was already a successful military officer who was preparing to get the position of the submarine commander two months later. My grandmother was a doctor, but in winter of 1953 she did not work as she gave a birth to her daughter, my mother. That February, just within a day all the officers of Jewish origin were dismissed fromtheir work. No, they were not imprisoned, nor withdrawn from work completely. They were simply sent to work for the Training Troop Base in Vladivostok, the camp traditionally used as a punishment camp for alcohol-addicted or misbehaving officers. With no explanation, a huge group of people — from navigators to mechanics, including highly qualified staff from the Leningrad Military Engineering Academy were sent to the Training Troops Base.

In March 1953 my grandfather, offended by unfairness to the innermost of his heart, wrote to Nikita Khrushchev. He satated that he had graduated from the Marine Military School with merits, had 5 year of experience of military service on submarines with permission to control and that he wanted to continue his career there. Surprisingly he received a reply, albeit not from Khrushchev personally. The Commander-in-Chief of the Soviet Marine Army replied that the order for transfer would not be reversed and that was the end of story. He did not provide any explanation or apology.

With time, the doctors were rehabilitated but the innocent officers were not. The years after that were full of career obstacles, like a total ban on further study, should one enter the Military Academy. At the same time my grandfather’s colleagues of non-Jewish origin were aquiring the experience on the most contemporary nuclear submarines. None of them are alive at present as those first nuclear submarines were too dangerous for the health!

Surfacing Soviet Submarine

The overt discrimination of the Jews in different forms continued till the very end of the Soviet Union. Being accused of anti-Semitism was not something the Soviet officials liked: so there usually were formal examples of successful careers of Jewish specialists. For instance, the General of the Red Army Comrade Dragunskiy, who held a high ranking post despite his origin. However, that was exceptionally rare and was nicknamed as ‘museum rarity’.

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Diamond Dog’s Run 4,000 miles long: David Bowie in the USSR.

eugenia — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 13:17:23 +0000

Just like John Lennon or Elton John, in 1970s David Bowie was an iconic figure of the Western music scene. Nicknamed Chameleon of Pop for his flamboyant outfits, pale make up and eccentric tunes, David Bowie made a train tour of Russia, all the way from Vladivostok to Moscow, eighteen days in a sleeper. Back in the days, when the Cold War was in its prime, getting a permission to look behind the Iron Curtain was an incredible phenomenon by itself. Well, did David enjoy himself while in the USSR? Let’s see.

David Bowie in the Red Square, Moscow, April 1973.

While in Moscow, apart from visiting the top 10, David did not get up to much. He visited GUM, a Russian version of Bloomingdale’s, where he got a pair of souvenir underpants and some soap. He enjoyed the May Day Parade, which he later described as “incredible”; however, he also called the Moscovites “cold people’, stating that the Siberian crowd is a much warmer lot.

May Day Parade, Moscow, 1973

Interestingly enough, soon after David got back to the civilised world, the Western media labelled these photos fakes, which was understandable: a prominent singer walking about in a communist country, and even more so, taking the longest train in the world? Incredible!

Sightseeing in the USSR

The Trans-Siberian Express is not only the longest train ride in the world — 5,350 miles from Khabarovsk in the Soviet Far East to Moscow — but it is considered by railroad buffs to be the last great train ride on earth.

David, who spent most of his time while on the train in a kimono, did not mind singing for the train passengers every now and then. The people travelling seemed to enjoy his songs although they probably did not realise who he was. He also had a camera which he had bought in Japan, which he kept using continuously, shooting everything around him.

Just about to board the Transsiberian Express

David wrote in his diary then:

We had these two fabulous attendants, Danya and Nadya. I used to sing songs to them, often late at night, when they had finished work. They couldn’t understand a word of English, and so that meant they couldn’t understand a word of my songs! But that didn’t seem to worry them at all. They sat with big smiles on their faces, sometimes for hours on end, listening to my music, and at the end of each song they would applaud and cheer! They were a wonderful audience — it was a real pleasure to sing to them.

The train journey was eighteen days long.

David left the USSR by a plane bound for Germany. West Berlin, with its neon lights, taxis, doormen in their red uniforms with shiny buttons and the cold champagne waiting in the hotel suite, was just incredible. But there was just one thought in our minds, wrote David:

How to get as quickly and inconspicuously as possible to a hot bath, a good hair wash, and a suitcase full of lovely, fresh, clean, beautiful clothes.

From DB’s personal notebook: “It was an old French train from the turn of the century, with the most beautiful wood veneer, decorated oval mirrors, and velvet couches. Really it was like something out of a romantic novel or film.”

In all honesty, there is a lot of discrepancies in the story of David touring Russia. His own personal diaries are brief and inexpressive — apart from calling Russia “incredible”, David does not bother with further notes. The photos he took never saw the daylight. Most importantly, there is a controversy about his travel companions: there are numerous references to the other foreigners sharing his sleep car or encountering him on the train, and this seems to be fairly improbable. But nonetheless, considering that the Beatles never made it to the USSR, Ziggy Stardust was lucky enough to actually visit the country behind the Iron Curtain.

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