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N° 7/58
 
     
     
" SIBERIE - INDIA: along the footsteps of the gulags "
     
   
 
 
 
12 June 2006 / VLADIVOSTOK, RUSSIA
 
 
“ Rainy day in Vladivostok ”

 

The direct train from Moscow to Vladivostok is still on time. At 8 h 15, on Thursday, June 6th, the train stops its 15 wagons at the Vladivostok, the " Eastern Lord " in Russian. At first glance, the city resembles the distant suburbs of London, with red
brick buildings and shantytowns which are interspersed with old car carcasses and other remnants of the industrialised world.
Igor, (his name has been changed because his activities are illegal), the controller of the wagon, has the solution. Since years he travels the 9650 km that separate the capital from the extreme east of Russia. The itinerary lasts 15 days, 7 in one direc
tion and 7 days in the other... Then he takes his 2-weeks of well deserved holidays. During his holidays he has time to sell of his stocks: the buying and selling of red Siberian caviar, a delicacy appreciated almost as much as the black caviar from the
Caspian Sea. The specialists especially value its texture, their large size and its perfect degree of salt. The best time to eat the caviar is during the summer. During this season the caviar is the desired crunchiness.
In Khabarovsk, 9000 km east of Moscow, one can find some the best Russian products. At the train platforms of the transsiberian, some women sell the 300 grammes for 150 roubles (5 euro). Igor, proposes to bring them to you in Moscow at 1000 roubles (30 e
uros) for the kilo. This is a good deal for the moscovites where this caviar usually sells for 1500 roubles per kilo, in a city where the average wage is around 11000 roubles per month. If these little pink balls interest you, Ingor takes you mobile phon
e number and calls you on time. There are no small profits in the ex Soviet Union.
This officer of the transsiberien, like his fellow-countrymen, needs money. In his train, everything is therefore convertible into money. The shower costs 50 roubles (1.5 euro). In fact, Igor has to lend you a tube and showerhead which you can attach to
the taps in the wagon toilets. If you want to load you mobile phone battery, it is the same price, but you have to negotiate this with Elena, the other wagon officer. Or Tatiana, who is the officer of the next wagon over who doesn’t even ask money for an
y of these services.
In Vladivostok, the temperature is around 10 degres. The city is grey, shining under the fine rain which is falling on this war harbour, open to foreigners only since the beginning of the 1990s. Time to negotiate for a taxi to get to the airport, we get
into one of the numerous Japanese cars which crowd the roads of these Russian ends of the earth, stuck between North Korea in the north and the Pacific Ocean and the Japanese coasts in the east and the Giant China as the neighbour in the west. «Here, moc
ks at a world-weary Russian, the Japanese pass us all their products at second hand ». For this reason in the whole region there is now a market for new and old cars of good value, used machine tools and dated tractors made in the empire of the sun. “The
se Japanese are very clever” continues our man. It allows them to sell off all the products for which they no longer have any use. It also allows them to avoid having to transform or recycle products which are often extremely pollutant.”
The Vladivostok airport has a double entrance hall. The first is for the flights that take you to all corners of Russia. It is teeming as a beehive. All people of the ancient empire have arranged meetings here: the Tchoukouchs (people similar to Inuits)
who will fly to the big - Russian north, Caucasians who go back towards their more sun-filled countries or well tanned Russians who have come for business almost 10000 kilometres away from Moscow. The second hall has been named the Vladivostok airport.
This Thursday, June 6th, there are three flights on the schedule: one for Beijing, one for Tokyo and one for Pyong-Yang (North Korea). Vladivostok can also be proud to be one of the only airports in the world with a direct flight to country of the dictat
or Kim Jong-il. While a couple of Korean passengers check in, the staff of the national airline work under the portraits of Kim jong-Il, the present dictator, president, president of the national defense, Secretary General of the Korean Workers Party and
his late father Kim It - Sung. One can never be too protected.

Gwenole

 

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