In the Land of Endless Expectations

"And, grandad, what will you do with the treasure when you find it?”

“Do with it?” laughed the old man. “H’m!…If only I could find it then.…I would show them all.…H’m!…I should know what to do.…”

And the old man could not answer what he would do with the treasure if he found it. That question had presented itself to him that morning probably for the first time in his life, and judging from the expression of his face, indifferent and uncritical, it did not seem to him important and deserving of consideration.

… what interested him was not the fortune itself, which he did not want and could not imagine, but the fantastic, fairy-tale character of human happiness."

- Chekhov, Happiness (Luck)

Communications engineer and patent agent
   
"In the bluish distance where the furthest visible hillock melted into the mist nothing was stirring; the ancient barrows, once watch-mounds and tombs, which rose here and there above the horizon and the boundless steppe had a sullen and death-like look; there was a feeling of endless time and utter indifference to man in their immobility and silence; another thousand years would pass, myriads of men would die, while they would still stand as they had stood, with no regret for the dead nor interest in the living, and no soul would ever know why they stood there, and what secret of the steppes was hidden under them."- Chekhov, Happiness (Luck)
   
Guide to the underground warfare caves at Adzhimushkai, Crimea12000 Soviet citizens - soldiers, civilians, women, children lived and fought underground at Adzimushkai n the Great Patriotic War. A kindergarten and hospital was established deep below the surface. The surrounding landscape is a moonscape of collapsed land where the fascist forces tried to collapse the caves using high explosives.
     
  
As I took his picture, he shouted to me: "That is why we won in 1945!"
   
  
And I am in Arcadia
     
  
Traces of a Soviet temple of pleasure. In the film ‘Koktebel’ by Boris Khlebnikov and Alexei Popogrebsky the village came to represent a near-unattainable promised land or utopia.
   
"Only from there could one see that there was something else in the world besides the silent steppe and the ancient barrows, that there was another life that had nothing to do with buried treasure and the thoughts of sheep."- Chekhov, Happiness (Luck)
   
"Eyes fixed on the penguin, the fisherman shook his head.'Look,' he said at last, 'is that a penguin you've got there, or am I seeing things?''You're seeing things,' Serguei assured him firmly.'Christ!' he whispered, aghast." - Andrei Kurkov, Death and the Penguin
     
  
   
  
The habit of reliving Soviet films
     
  
Promised land
   
Promised land
   
Poet, chief engineer, artist, and former soldierKherson, Ukraine
     
  
Oleksey is introducing organic food and ethical employment practises through his own factory and chain of shops in Kherson
   
  
     
  
   
  
Promised land
     
  
   
The 'Valley of the Beggars' - exclusive district of Minsk where millionaires build their homes"People... [pause]" "Disappear?" "Yes" "Belarus has deep forests?" "Exactly. Deep forests. People can easily disappear, and nobody ever knows of what becomes of them".
  
Three generations of a family
     
  
Deputy Director, University of Shipbuilding
   
Single mother looks after three sons who have been suffering from respiratory health problems.
   
These are the women of Russia,They are our honour and our fate.They mixed concreteAnd ploughed and reaped.They have endured all.They will endure all.They can do anything on earth,They have so much strength.It is shameful to short-change them.It is a sin to short-weigh them.And, pushing dumplings into my pocket,I watch, solemn and silent,Their tired-from-bags,Saintly hands.- Yevtushenko, from At the Store
     
  
   
New district of houses for the rich
  
     
  
The spot where the Black Death entered Europe
   
One of Kherson's main industries is supplying crew for ships travelling worldwide
   
     
  
   
Wild grasses rustle over Babi Yar,The trees look sternly, as if passing judgement.Here, silently, all screams, and, hat in hand,I feel my hair changing shade to gray.And I myself, like one long soundless screamAbove the thousands of thousands interred,I’m every old man executed here,As I am every child murdered here.No fibre of my body will forget this.May “Internationale” thunder and ringWhen, for all time, is buried and forgottenThe last of antisemites on this earth.There is no Jewish blood that’s blood of mine,But, hated with a passion that’s corrosiveAm I by antisemites like a Jew.And that is why I call myself a Russian! - Yevtushenko, from Babi Yar
   
     
  
Total devastation during the Great Patriotic War followed by post war reconstruction programmes means Minsk is rich in enormous, grim appartment blocks with breathtaking views to other enormous, grim apartment blocks.
   
St Petersburg