I recently had the honor of speaking with James Corbett about the rise and fall of the highly prestigious Edward Institute for Village Studies:

The Corbett Report

The Edward Institute: A Post-Mortem - #SolutionsWatch

SHOW NOTES AND COMMENTS: https://corbettreport.com/the-edward-institute-a-post-mortem…

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3 months ago · 150 likes · The Corbett Report

Our discussion is also available on James’ website and YouTube.

A catalogue of Edward Institute dispatches can be found here.

It still amazes me that in two short years, we went from this:

To this:

I think the main takeaway is that Chickenhof must be rebuilt so that we can all gather for CHIEF 2026 and talk about the deep stuff (potatoes).

Be well, internet friends —

Riley

After being deported from Russia for unexplained reasons in July, Katya, co-founder of the Edward Institute for Village Studies, the most reputable institute for higher village learning in Novgorod Oblast, wrote a letter to the Federal Security Service (FSB) asking if she could return to the country she has called home for more than two decades.

She has finally received an answer to her inquiry.

In order to “ensure the security of the state”, the FSB has banned Katya from entering Russia until August 7, 2050.

The FSB also informed Katya she would not be provided “information about the circumstances that served as the basis” for her ban, as this information “constitutes a state secret”.

Got that? A 25-year ban based on a state secret to ensure the safety of the state.

I kept telling you guys that the Russian government, like all governments, prioritizes safety and convenience, but some of you refused to believe me. Are you starting to believe?

Of course, we are all deeply appreciative of the FSB’s tireless work to make our lives as safe and convenient as possible, but I don’t understand how Katya could be accused of undermining these noble efforts.

Possibly Katya threatened our collective safety when she interviewed Novgorod villagers, asking them seditious questions like “Westerners are curious about Russia—can you tell me about your life so they can better understand your country?”

Why banish Katya from Russia until 2050? Is it because Katya helped me document the first (and only?) Chickenhof International Economic Forum (CHIEF)? I understand the FSB were probably jealous that so many world-renowned experts attended this important conference. But instead of shutting down CHIEF, they could have simply invited FSB-approved chickens and cows to cluck and moo at a conference of their own—in St. Petersburg, for example. Some might say they’re already doing this every year with great success, so I’m not sure what the FSB are so upset about.

This is pure speculation, but it’s almost as if the FSB made an example of Katya to discourage people from even associating with individuals who might prefer CHIEF over SPIEF. But instead of punishing these individuals directly, the FSB chose a more safe and convenient course of action. Some of you might think this is cowardly, but the ends justify the means, and the FSB will stop at nothing to ensure our safety and convenience.

Allow me a very quick digression that has almost nothing to do with the subject matter we are currently discussing.

In June of this year—about a month before Katya was deported from Russia—Russian state media proudly reported that Maria Gref, daughter of turbo-patriot Herman Gref, had received approval from the International Federation for Equestrian Sports (FEI) to compete in fancy pony events while waving the unoffensive flag of neutrality.

TASS’ report made passing reference to certain criteria that Maria had to meet before she was allowed to swap out the Russian tricolors for something more politically correct. However, TASS wisely chose not to get into the details, which we will do now.

According to the FEI’s website, in order for her to obtain neutral status, Maria had to demonstrate “the absence of active support for the war in Ukraine.”

The FEI explained:

[Criteria for being given neutral status] also specify that any form of verbal, non-verbal or written expression, explicit or implicit, at any time since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, in particular public statements, including those made in social media, participation in pro-war demonstrations or events, and the wearing of any symbol in support of the war in Ukraine, for example the “Z” symbol, are considered to be acts of active support for the war in Ukraine and will prevent individuals from participating at FEI Events.

Maria, who lives in London, met all the above criteria, and can now showcase her overpriced horsey to the whole world without fear of persecution.

A few media outlets and obnoxious Twitter pundits took note of Maria’s London-based bravery, but for some reason RT passed on the story.

Let’s conduct a quick thought experiment.

Imagine a hypothetical scenario in which Maria might leave London and fly to Moscow so that she could attend some kind of VIP event with her father at the Kremlin.

Upon landing at Domodedovo Airport, would the FSB interrogate Maria for several hours, then tell her she’s free to go, only to then change their minds and usher her into a holding cell, where she would wait for 36 hours before being shipped back to London?

Or would the FSB roll out the red carpet for Maria, kiss her British Ugg boots, and have a limo waiting to take her to the Kremlin? The limo would obviously have a police escort to ensure optimal safety and convenience for Maria.

Again, these are hypothetical scenarios, since Maria would never dream of traveling to Russia, unless of course her horse was allowed to accompany her on the plane as a service animal.

And then there’s Katya, who had to sell her cows and goats, leave her dog and cats with neighbors (in Novgorod, not London), and will probably not be allowed to return to Russia for a very, very long time.

And she never even signed a dumb Equestrian statement while living in London. She was busy with other pursuits while living in Russia. Katya was a respected translator and dairy farmer who recently had to decline a job offer to work with the Hermitage Museum because the FSB nuked her life.

In conclusion:

Up until very recently, I had been busy organizing CHIEF 2026. Now that this conference has been canceled by the FSB, I have an abundance of free time to document (in excruciating detail) all the ways in which the Russian government is championing safety and convenience around the world.

Of course, chronicling the often-ignored human side of Russia—with all its joys and sorrows, its awe-inspiring beauty and its abysmal ugliness—will be more challenging now that the Edward Institute has been forced to shut its doors. Indeed, it seems the FSB has accomplished nothing apart from hindering my ability to share what I love about Russia. But I will do my best, despite the less than ideal circumstances.

I will miss my village, but it would be downright cruel if the FSB had to miss my blogging.

Until next time,

Riley

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Today marks almost four years of Edward Slavsquat. Overcome by the mind-melting absurdities of The Global War to Flatten the Curve, I loaded up Substack and created this here blog. The inaugural post was published on October 19, 2021.

I started the blog while living in a suburb of Moscow. I am presently marooned in Alexandria, Egypt. The passage of time plays funny tricks.

It’s been a wild ride as I’ve tried my best to wind and weave through the unrelenting chaos of the last four years.

Nonetheless, I consider myself eternally blessed for having the rare privilege of observing the events of the last two years from my stove-heated, plumbing-free perch in rural Novgorod.

Of course, even when I was neglecting my blog-duties—and oh, how I neglected them—I was surrounded by a different kind of endless chaos in the village: the good kind, the kind that smelled of cow manure.

I wish I could pretend I always greeted this mayhem with an enthusiastic smile, but in truth, I was constantly whining and complaining and ready to give up. My partner and village co-conspirator Katya was very patient with me.

We reached Peak Village Chaos in the spring of 2024, after Potato the dog gave birth to ten—yes, ten—puppies. Counting the cows, goats, kittens, and chickens, at one point the Edward Institute was steward of more than 30 animals. Thankfully, Irina the farm manager took on primary responsibility for the cows and goats, performing her duties heroically, with incredible tenderness and care for their well-being. (One day I will give a full retelling of her incredible exploits. Have you ever tried milking a cow in sub-zero temperatures, with tears of exhaustion rolling down your frozen cheeks? What a Novgorod legend.)

Yes, there was chaos. Beautiful, dirty, exhausting chaos.

If you will give me 1 minute and 43 seconds of your time, I have compiled a video montage that does a decent job of demonstrating the pure chaos I’m struggling to describe with words:

All of the puppies were later adopted by nice Russians, in case you were worried.

And now for some updates pertaining to my future plans and the general trajectory of the blog.

I regret to report that there is still no clarity about when, or if, Katya—who was inexplicably deported from Russia in July—will be allowed to return to the country she has called home for more than a quarter-century.

With the assistance of her Russian lawyer, last week she submitted another letter to the FSB asking, again, if she was prohibited from entry, and reminding them of their legal obligation to respond.

Under Russian law, the FSB is supposed to answer such requests within 30 days. It has now been roughly 60 days since the FSB received her initial request.

It seems increasingly unlikely that Katya will get an answer to her very reasonable question (“Can someone who has lived in Russia for almost 30 years, raised a child there, and devoted her life to making Russia’s vast cultural riches available to English speakers, return to the country she loves?”).

I must emphasize that Katya isn’t making any demands—she simply wants to know if she is or isn’t allowed to return to Russia. Surely this isn’t too much to ask? For reasons beyond my comprehension, Katya can’t even get a curt “yes” or “no” from the FSB. A bit uncouth, if we’re being honest.

As lovely as Alexandria is, Katya and I can’t wait here indefinitely for a response that may never come. We plan to fly to the United States sometime in November. After that, we don’t really know.

I have received messages from readers hailing from all corners of the globe offering us refuge while we plan our next moves. Thank you, and thank you to all the readers who left kind comments on the blog. Katya was very moved, let me tell you. In the coming days I will do my best to respond to each of you. It really does mean a lot.

(By the way: It’s possible that friends, acquaintances, and blog-colleagues have attempted to reach out to me via my personal Telegram account. I no longer have access to this account. You can always email me, though.)

I don’t want to make any promises, but it’s possible that Katya and I might take a series of sketchy coach buses across the United States to come visit some of you.

Moving on to blog-matters: You’ve probably noticed a sharp uptick in output. Without my animals, woodpiles, and wheelbarrow water-hauling, I have nothing else to do except blog. So you will just have to suffer through it. Sorry about that.

In related news, I have added categories to the blog to make navigating its contents more safe and convenient. Assigning categories to blog posts spanning four years takes time, so this is an ongoing process.

Over the next 6-12 months, I would like to compile a small e-book of short stories about my time in the village. Five or six tales are already incubating in the back of my noodle. These works would be combined with polished versions of village adventures that I’ve published on the blog. An archive of these already-existing stories can be found in the Village Dispatches (EIVS) category.

This book might also include, and expand upon, my zany stories from Czechia and Tbilisi.

If this electronic volume does come to fruition, it will be free-to-read for paid subscribers. Lord knows I owe them as much; I have abused their generosity for far too long.

Maybe down the road I could even release a hardcover edition with a forward by Herman Gref. He wrote a preface for Klaus Schwab’s book, so why not mine? Fingers crossed!

Finally, I would like to extend a truly heartfelt thanks to those who have offered suggestions, and took immediate action, to help preserve Marko Marjanović’s written legacy.

One reader, Wesley, emailed me within minutes of reading my appeal for help on this matter. He was able to create a compressed 3-gigabyte file, which in theory should contain all of the articles Marko published on anti-empire.com.

Creating an archive of his Substack has proven to be more challenging, but for now it can still be accessed by visiting: https://substack.com/@antiempire (the domain that Marko used to redirect to his Substack, anti-empire.org, has expired, and for reasons I don’t understand, this causes a blank page to appear when you try to visit antiempire.substack.com).

I am just beginning to sift through the files that Wesley was able to download. Although I am confident he was able to archive everything—or close to it—please do not let me discourage you from your own attempts to save Marko’s work for posterity. The more archives the merrier, as far as I’m concerned. Thank you again, Wesley.

As promised, in the coming days I will start to republish Marko’s eye-opening journalism here on the blog.

Marko was blacklisted by governments, tech giants, and much of “alternative” media. He will be permanently whitelisted on Edward Slavsquat.

I still don’t know Marko’s cause of death. Does anyone know? Any and all help with obtaining this information would be most welcome. On a related note, I would like to correct a factual error in my post honoring his memory.

When I wrote that I learned of his death “while combing the internet for clues to his possible whereabouts”, what I really should have written was: “Katya spent two sleepless nights scouring the internet for information about what had happened to him.”

Yes, I did send Marko multiple emails and Telegram messages, and looked for possible leads on his social media pages. But it was Katya and Katya alone who made the terrible discovery after hours and hours of searching. I shared the news article she found with a group of blog-friends before publishing my eulogy for Marko the next day. Katya, who possesses saint-like humility and selflessness, didn’t want me to bring this up, but the fact that she went to such lengths to try to find out where Marko had gone speaks volumes to how much he means to so many of us.

Thanks again to everyone. You guys are alright.

Until next time,

Riley

In early spring I began wandering into the Novgorod woods in search of things I couldn’t find from screen-scrolling.

Crawling through windows and squeezing between water-logged boards, I entered the forgotten tombs of villagers lost to time and circumstance.

Inside I found mattresses, wardrobes, wall-mounted rugs, rusted scythes, and gargantuan wood stoves. The walls of their tombs were decorated with faded wallpaper and cigarette-box frescoes.

But it was the villagers’ photographs—sometimes kept in albums pock-marked with mold, other times sprawled on collapsing floors, or buried under dust on bedside tables—that had the greatest effect on me, and gave meaning to my explorations.

I do not know their names, but through their images I know fragments of memories that dissolved into the earth with them.

My wanderings have been cut short—perhaps for perpetuity. The photographs I recovered are sitting in a drawer in my own wallpapered village abode. They may sit there, untouched, for a long time.

And so I would like to share with you what may be the final chapter of my village excavations, what I managed to preserve, digitally, before leaving Russia.

Until next time,

— Riley

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For the past two months I have been waiting for clarity on an unfortunate turn of events that has upended my life. It appears that answers—or even a simple explanation—may not be forthcoming, and so I feel it is my duty to inform my readers, particularly those of you who have honored me with your financial support, of what has transpired, and how these events will affect the ol’ blog.

I am currently writing from Alexandria, Egypt.

On July 22, Ekaterina, my partner and co-founder of the Edward Institute for Village Studies, was detained while reentering Russia from Moscow’s Domodedovo airport. After being questioned for several hours, she was released and instructed to wait while her documents were processed. Her passport was stamped—that is to say, she was granted entry to Russia—and all was well.

Or so it seemed.

Hours passed, and Katya continued to wait. Finally, she was approached by a uniformed officer. But instead of being given her passport and passage to baggage claim, Katya was ushered into a holding cell and informed that she was being deported. She was not told why she was being deported, nor was she told if she was now banned from reentering Russia, and if so, for how long.

Her passport, containing an annulled entry stamp, was not returned to her until she landed in Cairo, Egypt, on July 25, the place of her last departure before arriving in Moscow.

There are usually clear protocols when an individual is denied entry to Russia. The deportee is provided a document that explains the reason(s) for deportation, as well as information on future prohibitions from entering Russia, if applicable.

Katya’s case appears to be an exception to these rules. The document Katya received labeled her a “threat to national security” (without providing an explanation as to why), and contained no information about if or when she would be allowed to return to Russia.

Shortly after checking into her hotel in downtown Cairo, Katya hired a lawyer in Russia and, through the Russian Consulate in Cairo, was able to give her daughter—a Russian citizen currently residing in St. Petersburg—power-of-attorney. A letter to both the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Federal Security Service (FSB) requesting information on whether Katya was banned from reentry was drafted and submitted.

Under Russian legislation, the relevant authorities have 30 days to respond to such a request.

In less than a week, the Ministry of Internal Affairs (that is, the police) responded that, as far as they were concerned, Katya was not prohibited from returning to Russia.

More than 45 days have passed since the letter was received, and we are still waiting for an answer from the FSB.

Needless to say, this is rather frustrating and makes it difficult to decide what to do next.

A Russian diplomat in Egypt was gracious enough to meet with Katya, who explained the situation to him. He characterized her predicament as highly irregular, especially given that she has lived for more than a quarter century in Russia, is a productive taxpaying member of society, and has a daughter with a Russian passport who lives in Russia.

If you will indulge me, a few facts about Katya:

• She received a scholarship at the tender age of 16 to visit Russia, immediately fell in love with the country, and quickly made it her life’s mission to move to Russia and master the language.

• Since 2006, Katya has been living without interruption in Russia. Katya obtained permanent residency in 2018.

• Her command of the Russian language is such that most Russians she interacts with assume she is Russian and express astonishment when they learn she’s from Philadelphia. She is incapable of pronouncing “water” correctly in English, but her Russian accent is flawless.

• Unsurprisingly, in Russia she has become a sought-after specialist in her fields—translation and voice-over work. Just last week, Katya received a job offer from the Hermitage Museum, which she had to politely decline due to her current circumstances.

• A few months ago, Katya competed on a game show with other non-native Russian speakers that was broadcast on Russian state television. She ran laps around her fellow competitors, coming in clear first (although she continues to beat herself up over falling short of winning the show’s grand prize).

• That is to say, the FSB deported a woman who not so long ago was answering trivia about Russian culture on Russian state television; a woman who had to turn down work for one of the world’s most famous art museums because the FSB seems to be in no hurry to tell her whether or not she will ever be allowed back into Russia.

Faced with indefinite uncertainty over Katya’s situation, maintaining the Village Institute’s farm—with its considerable financial and time obligations—was no longer realistic.

The cows were sold, the goats were downsized, and I flew to Egypt at the end of August.

The village just wasn’t the same without her. How I came to live in a half-abandoned hamlet in Novgorod Oblast in the first place was entirely her doing.

It was through Katya’s tireless work and vision that the Institute came into being. While she was scouting out possible rural locales where we could purchase property and put down roots, I was spiraling into despair in Moscow. While she was planting the Institute’s first vegetable garden, I was goofing off in Tbilisi, Georgia.

From cheese-making to folk music concerts, Ekaterina was always the brains behind our village operation. I mostly just shoveled manure and stacked wood in an aesthetically pleasing manner. I was also abnormally adept at breaking things.

Basically everything except the tunnel I tried to dig in her garden was her idea. And the tunnel collapsed, you guys.

Those who have followed updates from our Novgorod village over the past two years are undoubtedly worried about Susan, the Internet’s most beloved misgendered village cat.

Susan, Sabrina, and Potato are being looked after by caring and understanding neighbors.

Edward Junior is with his mother in Moscow Region. I miss him dearly and hope to be reunited with him soon.

Is this the end of the Institute? I don’t know, and the people who do know won’t tell me. That’s the problem, you see.

A final thought before I close things out.

It is possible that these developments will be greeted with schadenfreude by certain individuals who believe they are fighting an existential “info war” that will decide the fate of BRICS (humanity).

It’s not like that, friends.

Take a break from Telegram. Take a good look around you.

It’s just a ride.

That’s literally all it is.

To quote the irreplaceable Bill Hicks:

The world is like a ride in an amusement park, and when you choose to go on it you think it’s real because that’s how powerful our minds are. The ride goes up and down, around and around, it has thrills and chills, and it’s very brightly colored, and it’s very loud, and it’s fun for a while.

Many people have been on the ride a long time, and they begin to wonder, “Hey, is this real, or is this just a ride?”

And other people have remembered, and they come back to us and say, “Hey, don’t worry; don’t be afraid, ever, because this is just a ride.”

And we … kill those people.

“Shut him up! I’ve got a lot invested in this ride, shut him up! Look at my furrows of worry, look at my big bank account, and my family. This has to be real.”

It’s just a ride. But we always kill the good guys who try and tell us that, you ever notice that? And let the demons run amok …

But it doesn’t matter, because it’s just a ride. And we can change it any time we want. It’s only a choice. No effort, no work, no job, no savings of money. Just a simple choice, right now, between fear and love. The eyes of fear want you to put bigger locks on your doors, buy guns, close yourself off. The eyes of love instead see all of us as one.

I don’t know where this ride will take me next. But after all the tears, anger, and frustration over the past two months, I am left with a peculiar feeling. Gratitude? I don’t know what the correct word is. Maybe the FSB also feel gratitude but just don’t know how to express it, and that’s why we haven’t received an answer to our letter.

It’s been a beautiful, wild ride. At times the ride has made me want to rip my eyeballs out. But I couldn’t ask for a more fitting ride. I wonder where this ride will take me next.

As for the blog—I will keep writing, inshallah.

Hop in. Although I haven’t the slightest idea where we’re going.

— Riley

I remember the exact moment when it dawned on me that Andrei had volunteered without my consent to serve as my village drill instructor.

He had recruited me for one of his many schemes. In this case, digging a hole. We both had shovels, but Andrei’s was purely ceremonial—like a sword resting on the shoulder of an officer on parade.

“Dig, dig!” he barked over my shoulder as I stabbed the ground. But Andrei did not approve of my technique. “No, no, not like that. Dig! Good. Now throw the dirt away.”

What else was I going to do with the dirt? Eat it?

When the hole reached a width and depth that were satisfactory to Andrei, he issued me a new order: “Smoke.” That is, take a smoke break. I do not smoke—only hookah.

From that day forward, Andrei would periodically abduct me from my home so that I could fulfill various labor-intensive tasks for him. He would arrive unannounced at all hours of the day, from six in the morning to late in the evening. If the door was unlocked, he would invite himself in. If I was in my pajamas, he would tell me to get dressed. If I was having dinner, he would tell me to stop eating and get in his car. There were things that I needed to do for Andrei and the clock was ticking.

Andrei had a tattoo on his left arm (likely from prison, although I never inquired) and a scar on his right cheek (from a nearly fatal chainsaw accident), and his proclivity for issuing unsolicited instructions to anyone within his field of vision earned him the title of Know-It-All Andrei in the village.

One of the greatest regrets of my life is that I didn’t keep a detailed record of Andrei’s constructive criticisms (“You hammer like a girl”; “WHAT ARE YOU DOING?”), although I have vivid memories of many of the things he made me do against my will.

One time he caught me minding my own business inside of my own home and informed me that his banya’s chimney needed cleaning. And then, as per tradition, he ushered me into his car.

“Up you go,” Andrei said.

“But I’m a blogger, Andrei.”

“What’s that? Don’t worry, I’ll hold the ladder.”

In spring, I would help Andrei install fish traps—fyke nets—in the nearby lake. I should mention in passing that trapping fish with fyke nets is a very popular and technically illegal pastime in the village.

Andrei had four or five nets strategically placed around the lake. My job was to help carry the inflatable boat, and most importantly, to row him from fyke net to fyke net so that he could collect his winnings.

However, due to the covert nature of these activities—the location of a man’s fyke net is a closely guarded secret—Andrei was initially reluctant to reveal his setup to me. On our first outing together, he instructed me to row to the center of the lake, where he marooned me on a cranberry bog. Then Andrei paddled away, with promises to return eventually.

And then it began to rain.

Time passes very slowly when it’s raining and you’re stranded on a cranberry bog. With not much else to do, I decided to collect cranberries. I stuffed my sweatpants and camo sweater-pocket with berries, and when Andrei returned about 30 minutes later, I was very wet but had a lot of cranberries.

Andrei was impressed, and after that he allowed me to row him to his nets. I would ride my bicycle to his house every morning at 5:00 am, and together we would check for trapped fish. He would sometimes ask me for my phone so he could film commentaries as I rowed.

"No no no not that way … in Russia we'll make a man out of you … He knows how to drink, now we'll teach him how to row … Row, row.”

Our last expedition was on a cloudy evening. Andrei wanted to check the nets before he had to leave for the city the next morning.

“It’s going to rain, Andrei,” I protested when he pulled into my driveway and told me the plan.

He smiled and batted away my objections with his hand.

The rain started moments after we launched the boat. It was torrential rain, the kind of rain that obscures visibility. Not long after, thunder arrived.

I rowed to the first fyke net. Empty. Then the second—nothing. Our vessel was taking on water as Andrei shouted directions to the third net. Not a single fish.

“Well. There it is,” he said, gesturing at the empty fyke net. And with the thunder becoming louder and the rain pouring down even harder, he laughed.

I was in a very sour mood. Silently, I rowed us back to shore.

“I’m sick of Andrei ordering me around!” I told Ekaterina when I returned home, soaked to the bone.

“Well, next time he wants you to do something for him, just say no,” she suggested.

“I will!”

I never did though, because Andrei died of a heart attack last week.

It will be difficult in the village without his tutelage. Who will correct me when I hit nails like a little girl?

Rest in peace, Andrei, my friend.

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It’s been several months since there’s been a proper update from the Edward Institute for Village Studies (EIVS), which is now Novgorod’s undisputed leader in village-related research.

The potatoes and turnips have been planted. The manure continues to be hauled. What else? Earlier this month, Trevor the bull joined the Institute.

Trevor had some trouble emerging from the womb so yours truly pulled him out by his little calf legs. It was an interesting experience. Profoundly slimy.

Also, Sabrina is extremely pregnant and is going to pop out kittens any day now. Maybe today? Possible. Susan, our misgendered cat, may or may not be the father. Such is village life.

It’s a simple life with simple pleasures.

I have compiled a village highlight reel for your enjoyment:

Thank you for your continued readership and support!

Until next time,

Riley

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Earlier this week, thousands of anti-globalists assembled in St. Petersburg to take mandatory PCR tests and talk about the benefits of public-private partnerships and the joys of CBDCs, which Russian President Vladimir Putin fully endorsed.

But this was all part of an elaborate plan to confuse the globalists. The REAL international economic forum was held today, in an extremely rural district of Novgorod Oblast.

Your Novgorod village correspondent is pleased to present an exclusive report from the Chickenhof International Economic Forum (CHIEF), the most influential multipolar BRICS forum in recorded human history.

WATCH AND LEARN:

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Hello!

I have returned from the Novgorod forest with another exclusive report:

A selection of photographs from the album found by your correspondent:

Have a wonderful Friday.

— Riley

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Hello. How are you?

I am pleased to present the second installment of the Edward Institute for Village Studies’ (EIVS) new Netflix series, At the Tomb of the Unknown Villager.

The time capsule I opened in this episode was full of surprises.

I have been zooming around in my neighbor’s hot rod delivering bags of manure to vegetable gardens in need, but I promise soon that I will write about Goldman Sachs-coined acronyms, or the futility of Not War, or something else Newsworthy, even though I do not read the News anymore.

Until next time,

Riley

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The Edward Institute for Village Studies (EIVS) — considered the premier village academy by 9 out of 10 village experts — is tucked away in a quiet corner of Novgorod Oblast that one might delicately describe as half-abandoned.

In fact, there are long-forgotten settlements within walking distance from EIVS HQ that have been swallowed whole by the forest. These clusters of disintegrating village dwellings can only be reached on foot or by tractor.

Your correspondent is fascinated by these village ruins and spends much of his free time seeking them out.

In October I confessed:

[T]hese days I have trouble typing about the News. My mind wanders and I inevitably find myself tromping through the forest in search of things with more meaning.

Then in November your devoted blogsmith wrote:

I have also been trekking deeper and deeper into the forest in search of lost village civilizations.

But where’s the evidence to support these haughty claims?

This blog post marks the first installment of a new blog-series, At The Tomb of the Unknown Villager.

Today’s tomb is a log cabin, inaccessible by road, located approximately 1 km away from Edward HQ.

The cabin itself was unexceptional as far as abandoned village houses are concerned. The windowpanes showed signs of distress, the roof was sprinkled with holes, and the front door was AWOL. Inside, the décor was standard: a few pieces of dilapidated furniture complimented by soiled linen, miscellaneous grime-caked cutlery, and empty bottles of vodka and beer left behind by teenagers, or squatters, or teenage squatters.

There was nothing remarkable about it, until we found photographs lying on a stained, Soviet mattress. And suddenly, the gutted one-room cabin came to life:

The photographs speak for themselves. I’ve nothing to add. What could I possibly add? (According to a note on the back of the photograph, the cat’s name was “Candy Wrapper”.)

To quote Tatyana Dmitrievna: “What a sovkhoz it was! How much effort it must have taken to dismantle it!”

Meanwhile, your correspondent continues his search for things with more meaning.

Until next time,

— Riley

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About a week ago, the Edward Institute for Village Studies (EIVS), regarded by many as the #1 unaccredited institute for higher village learning in Novgorod Oblast, acquired 10 chicks to help replenish our chicken population, which sadly had been thinned out by the neighborhood fox in recent months.

But where to house them? Our hens had squeezed in with the goats for the winter and were in dire need of a summer residence. Preferably one without foxes.

Irina the farm headmistress sent your correspondent some design ideas.

I immediately understood that I had once again vastly overstepped my capabilities as a blogger. But it was too late. “Thumbs-up.”

The next morning I put on my rubber boots and got to work. My first task would be to harvest boards, beams, and other materials from a collapsed shed that serves as the Edward Institute’s lumber quarry. Because why pay for something you can get for free with a crowbar?

The only downside to this method of lumber appropriation is that there is always a 90% chance of stepping on a nail.

This friendly rusty nail inserted itself into the side of my rubber boot and came within 1 millimeter of completely murdering my foot:

The next step was to collect furniture from abandoned buildings. A chicken coop is basically just a cabinet where you store chickens, so why not use actual dressers, cabinets, and wardrobes when constructing one? To me this is a total no-brainer.

Once you have gathered your materials, you need to build a foundation.

Then arrange your furniture in a pleasing manner and make the necessary modifications.

Don’t forget to add a window. I added mine before my chicken coop even had a frame. Some might say that’s way too soon to add a window. But that’s just their opinion.

Now that I had a window it was time to add other things—like a roof.

Then I slapped a door on this bad boy and called it…

… Chickenhof.

You are probably bursting with questions, so I have created a Chickenhof FAQ for your convenience.

How much did it cost to build Chickenhof?

Nearly all materials were scavenged from the lumber quarry or abandoned buildings. I bought nails, screws, hinges, and a few hook-and-eye door latches, which together totaled around $15. But I do need new rubber boots on account of all the rusty nails that nearly disemboweled me, so let’s call it $30.

How long did it take to build Chickenhof?

Approximately 60 hours. But keep in mind I am a blogger with a handsaw who has no idea what he is doing.

I want to rent Chickenhof for my wedding/BRICS conference/birthday party. Can I do that?

Absolutely. Chickenhof can accommodate at least 1 Hobbit-sized person. Please email me for availability and rates.

FOR A LIMITED TIME: Cherished paying Slavsquat subscribers will receive TWO FREE NIGHTS at Chickenhof and ALL-YOU-CAN-EAT raw eggs. (If you are normal-sized and can’t fit inside Chickenhof, we will provide you with a standard room in an actual house without chickens.) Enjoy the ultimate total immersion Novgorod village experience!

Have a pleasant Wednesday.

— Riley

Thank you for reading Edward Slavsquat!

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On a chilly March afternoon, Edward Institute for Village Studies (EIVS) co-founder Ekaterina requested an audience with villager Tatyana Dmitrievna. The 73-year-old Veteran of Labor chose to stand for their entire 40-minute meeting.

The resulting conversation was meticulously translated by Ekaterina, who by popular demand has graced us with another Village Interview. (We are preparing a follow-up interview with our first village interviewee, Anna Yegorovna.)

Note: The name of Edward’s village has been changed, as well as the names of surrounding villages.

Part I: “They would drink, work, they also cut wood for Artyom’s aunt”

Ekaterina: How are you, Tatyana Dmitrievna? It’s cold today.

Tatyana Dmitrievna: I need to have some repairs done on the stove.

E: There’s no money for it?

T: Of course not. It costs 180,000 rubles! Where am I supposed to get that?!

E: 180,000! We put a new one in in the kitchen for 90,000.

T: That was 100 years ago!

E: It was all brick, though. Not one of the metal ones.

T: This one is brick too. But it’s connected to the wall. All the houses are like this. But my house is pretty old….

E: I guess you need to do things as they come up.

T: You need money for that!

E: Yeah I know… But I mean what has to be done for this kind of house if you do have the money?

T: We didn’t think about that when my husband was alive. We thought everything was just fine. He went on vacations… He worked on the tractor in the sovkhoz [a state-owned farm in the Soviet Union].

E: He drove them?

T: Of course. And repaired them, he also worked on the harvester. On all the machines.

E: How long have you lived in Kolobovo? When did you come here?

T: I came in 1978.

E: Together with your husband?

T: No, I met him here. I first came here with my sister, Marina. She lived in that three-apartment house down there.

E: Here in Kolobovo?

T: Yes. Down there past Irina’s [Headmistress of the Edward Institute Farm], the ruined three-apartment building.

E: And which one did you live in? The middle one?

T: Not me, her. With her husband. In the closest one. Her son Vanka came and helped you chop wood, remember? Vanya Vasilyev.

E: Oh, Vanya’s your nephew.

T: Yes, he cut wood with you, remember? Remember he helped you? That was my nephew. And he lived with Artyom. In the house next door to Irina. Lida Smirnova died. Her son Artyom was living there along with Vanya. He cut some wood for Irina, then for someone else… They would drink, work, they also cut wood for Artyom’s aunt…. And so Marina and I came to Kolobovo together.

E: Was Marina older or younger than you?

T: Younger. She died. She was 49.

E: Of what?

T: Liver failure, maybe? She had fibromas and had a hysterectomy. At 49.

E: Vanya’s mother?

T: Yes.

E: How old was he when she died? A teenager?

T: I don’t remember. Lord. I don’t remember, really.

Part II: “It’s been so long since I sang”

E: Ok, tell me instead about when you first came to Kolobovo. You arrived, with your sister, and then what?

T: First we moved to Nozhkino. Marina moved there to live with her husband. Later they gave them an apartment here. He went to work in the sovkhoz, and she got a job in the kindergarten. But first we lived in Nozhkino. And that’s where I met Vasya. He was Marina’s husband’s cousin. He lived in Garusovo with his parents. And he would come to Nozhkino to work, drying up the marshes, on the tractor. Then later he worked for the sovkhoz.

E: Were a lot of the marshes dried up here? Was that done for a long time?

T: Of course a lot.

E: And what did they do with the land? Was it just to get rid of the mosquitoes? Or to use the land in some other way?

T: They dried them up to build on them. We live on a marsh.

E: Tell me about the celebrations in Kolobovo. Were there holidays where everyone got together? In the club, maybe?

T: Oh before… we went to watch movies.

E: In the club?

T: In the old club. Praskovya Ivanovna would show the films. The whole club was full. We went to see Indian movies there all the time.

E: Indian films? Where they sing and dance?

T: What?

E: Singing and dancing. I mean in the movie.

T: Yes, the Indian movies.

E: And what else?

T: Hm, what kind of holidays…. I myself used to sing.

E: What did you sing?

T: I sang one of Anna German’s songs “A sweet daze wafted on the wind…” (“When Gardens Bloomed”).

E: Would you like to sing now?

T: Nadezhda Karpovna was the director of the club then. And she was also director for a while when it moved to the new building. But she hasn’t been around for what, three years now? It’s going on the fourth year. Viktor Andreevich was here crying about it recently. Now Tanya’s taken it over. There aren’t really any such concerts there anymore. May 9^th [Victory Day]. I used to sing in the veteran’s choir. Now there aren’t any veterans left. They were all older than me. I was the soloist, and they were the choir. And there’s no Karpovna to ask me. I don’t have many teeth, I’d be ashamed to open my mouth.

E: Pshaw.

T: And maybe I’ll forget some of the words. It’s been so long since I sang... Andrey Afanasievich would announce me: “Please welcome artist from Kolobovo, Tatyana Petrova!” And I sang, yes. “My dear old people”, Anna German’s songs, Loza’s song “My Raft”.

E: Oh, I know that one too.

T: I sang alone, to a whole club full of people... And what holidays, well… New Year’s. We might show up at the club before 12. There were all kinds of games. They would ask me to sing… well only when Nadezhda Karpovna was alive… I remember Vasya and I would go there…. One time we were there before 12, then we came back after 12. There was dancing…

E: In the middle of the night?

T: Yeah. Well first you have to bid farewell to the old year, then welcome in the new one…

E: Oh, it was New Year’s, right.

T: So one time we headed there after 12, and we only got back at 7 in the morning… So there we celebrated before 12, and after 12… And some people would come up here to give concerts. To the new club even. There were three women, one on an accordion and two sang. Did you see them?

E: No I didn’t. They were before I came, I guess.

T: I can’t remember what they sang. They were great. Sang clearly. Really good. One on the accordion and two sang.

Part III: “Like Nadezhda Mikhailovna says to me, ‘Tanya, you kept the whole school running’”

E: You worked at the school?

T: So, I got a job there and at first there were three of us who cleaned the school.

E: You and who else?

T: I cleaned… alone for a time, but I was there for a long time, it was mostly the others who came and went. Zdravomyslova and I would do it alone for a while. Upstairs and downstairs. It’s a two-story building. Then I worked there with Aunt Dusya Smirnova. She’s been dead for a while. Sergey Smirnov, her relative, is also dead. I washed the school with her too. And oh yes, with Praskovya Ivanovna. Panya Smirnova, Vitka’s mom, across the bridge. She’s dead too. And then I cleaned the school by myself. Two floors.

E: And how long did that take, all day? The whole day? Could you wash it in a day?

T: Why the whole day? When classes were over, then you clean. You’re not going to clean during classes, of course. During the day they’re studying.

E: Of course.

T: So I cleaned the school. Then they needed a cook. There were a bunch of people who worked as a cook before me, while I was cleaning, and then I got the job. I fed the internat children [students from neighboring villages who would board at the school] hot lunches.

E: The internat was for the kids who lived in the villages around Kolobovo, right? Because there was no school bus?’

T: Yes. They lived further that way, and even some from the other direction. Some from Malinovo down there.

E: Did these kids go home on the weekends or did they just live there all year?

T: Yes, they went home on the weekends, of course.

E: How many kids were in the internat?

T: I don’t remember. They came and they went… I don’t remember. It was so many years ago. I worked in the school for 30 years.

E: Beginning in the late 70s and until…

T: Until I began receiving my pension, and even afterwards.

E: Until the school closed?

T: No. I worked cleaning the school, and I cooked… and we had to look after the school garden. There was a big plot of land for the school. All the vegetables, the green house, the flowers… And I was only allowed to take a vacation at the end of August, because I had to weed the garden with the kids, take care of the garden, and that’s all of June and July.

E: Oh, the kids who went to the school, they helped too? It was a plot of land for the school, where they grew the vegetables they would use to cook, right?

T: Yes. There was a cellar too. Where Seryoga Smirnov lived. It’s a big, tall house. Past Nadezhda Mikhailovna. If you go further down the road. There’s a high cellar there. We kept the vegetables there.

E: Is it still there? A two-story house past the school?

T: No, one floor. Just high, the foundation was high. And the cellar had high ceiling. So that’s that. I cooked, and cleaned, and tended the garden, and I washed the laundry, which they used to send to Borovichi. Some of it was sent to Borovichi, and I took some home too. When Tamara Vasilievna was still here.

E: They took it to Borovichi?

T: Yes. The laundry from the internat. But then I took it home. Like Nadezhda Mikhailovna says to me, “Tanya, you kept the whole school running”. I woke up at 5:00 AM. I’m used to it. Now, maybe at 4, today I woke up at 5. Yesterday at 5, the day before yesterday at 4. But I go to bed early of course—8, 8:30, 9. And I woke up at 5, and by 5:30 I was at the school. And then I was there until 7:30 at night.

E: So the whole day?

T: Yes the whole day, Sometimes I would run home for an hour, if I could. But that’s it, from 5:30 to 7:30 I was at the school.

E: And your children studied there, right?

T: Of course. I was with Sasha until he was 4, then he went to kindergarten. So I would come home. Valentin got home at 4. Valentin somehow grew up fast. He was almost 6 years older than Sasha. Yes. I gave birth to Sasha at 32.

E: What did they do after they got home from school? They came home and watched TV, went out to play?

T: They did different things. They did whatever they wanted to do. But they didn’t get up to any mischief. Neither my kids, my two sons, nor—um, Galina Petrovna has a son and a daughter, but they were older; Galina Aleksandrovna also had two sons, and then Lena—she died, Lena. I was talking once with Galina Aleksandrovna, and I said “None of us, neither you, nor I , nor Lena, all of whom had two sons, ever raised any troublemakers”. They never caused problems. Never. They’re decent people to this day. Valentin works on the tractor for a logging company. He used to work on the logging trucks. My oldest one, he called me today. Sasha lives in Borovichi, has an apartment and a mortgage that he is paying. He has two kids, Valentin has one.

E: What does he do there?

T: He works… he worked at a furniture factory. Then he left and now… he had some acquaintance who found him a job where he works three days and has three days off. He works fixing cars. And on his days off he delivers groceries. Around Borovichi, to Davydkovo… wherever he needs to. That’s my youngest.

E: You said you continued to work after receiving your pension?

T: I began to receive my pension, and then began to work as the daytime guard. They found a replacement cook, Masha Zverkova, who left Kolobovo. She was the cook after I left that position. But by that time the school already had hot and cold water in the kitchen. We had to carry it from the river.

E: Ah, so by then they had hooked the school up to the water system.

T: Yes, and we had that thing there that warmed it up and everything. That was when Masha came in as cook. But me, first we had to bring it up from the river, only later did they install a water pump outside the school… We had to bring the water for the system too.

E: For what?

T: The heating system, for the radiators. We had to bring the water from the river for it. You bring two buckets with water all the way up from the river, then you carry them upstairs…

E: Why do you have to go upstairs? The kitchen was downstairs, the system was downstairs…

T: Where is the river?!

E: Oh, you don’t mean the second floor of the school?

T: No. First we brought them from the river, with snow banks on either side, you bump the bucket and the water falls out. Then you haul more. I was doing this while I was pregnant too, not the final months, but still. Then once you get into the school you have to take them upstairs, where Bolshakov worked, and he would dump them into the system.

E: Oh, the system is upstairs, of course.

T: Yeah there’s this big thing up there that you dumped water into and that would warm the school, dump the water into the radiator. And then you had to bring the water for the kitchen, so you could cook. They made the water pump later and then we took it from there. And only later did they hook the school up to running water. That’s how much I had to carry, then cook so much! And there were so many people! All the teachers would eat there. It was only later that they started going home for lunch, and just Valentina Andreyevna would stay, who lived where Irina lives now. But when I was there all the teachers would eat lunch there. And how many students! And also the people from the commissions who would come.

E: You’d have to feed them too…

T: Of course. And when people would come from other schools. Or our people would go to theirs.

E: For what?

T: To share information, how we do things, how they do things. There were a lot of exchanges like that with other schools. 6 or 7 teachers. And you’d make the food for them all. When the school was being repaired/remodeled, the workers would come and live there and you’d have to feed them too. So there was a lot of work. Then I worked as the daytime guard. Vasya died when I was 55, and he was 55 too. From stomach cancer.

Part IV: “What a sovkhoz it was! How much effort it must have taken to dismantle it!”

E: When did people begin leaving Kolobovo and why?

T: Why? Because the sovkhoz fell apart.

E: And it fell apart in 20…?

T: You think I remember? For me it’s not that important.

E: Ok, when it fell apart isn’t important, but what happened? Why did it fall apart? What happened after that?

T: What happened? The men began to die. You know it yourself. Where are the men now? There are none left. Just a whole bunch of widows. Old ladies. One, two, three and they were all gone. The men. They started drinking. What else were they going to do? They had nothing to do. They were used to working on the tractors, many of them. Some of them worked with the cows, in the barns. And the calves were taken out every day, for sale. And milk, they sold milk. They did everything here…. I’m even getting goosebumps… What a sovkhoz it was! How much effort it must have taken to dismantle it! [visibly upset]

E: So, one day someone just said “That’s it, the sovkhoz is no longer operating”? Or what happened?

T: They just began closing it down, gradually. Selling everything.

E: Who? The government?

T: It was dismantled by the ones who became the directors. Tamara Fyodorovna left. She was the director for I don’t know how many years. Then she wasn’t able to work anymore, she sold her house here and moved to Borovichi. Then after her the Chechens started coming. One Chechen director, another Chechen, then another.

E: And these directors gradually started selling…

T: And then it began gradually falling apart. There was a great dryer. What a dryer! A brand new one. The old dryer for the sovkhoz was near the school. And right near it they put this new dryer. A big, huge thing. And guess what? Not once was it used. Next thing you know people came to chop it up for metal and parts. Everything was destroyed.

E: What was this dryer for?

T: What indeed…?

E: Cereals?... Maybe grasses? Grains?

T: I mean, these things used to be grown here. Rye, oats…

E: Ah yes, so different types of cereals…

T: Yes, different cereals, of course. That was what the dryer was for.

E: So that means they also grew grains here, rye, etc.

T: Yes, they were all grown here.

E: Fields.

T: Peas too. And now the birds, all the birds come to the village to eat, when before there would be plenty for them in the fields. And now they eat our berries.

E: I heard the same about the mosquitoes. Before there were fewer?

T: In some places yes. The birds… And now all the fields all around are overgrown. Like that, bit by bit. Everything. And now they say “let’s revive agriculture”. It’s easy to destroy it, but try to revive it! Take a look at the farmer. Valentin Ivanovich. Look at how he gets by. It’s difficult for him. He had cows at one time. Then no more. He can’t.

Part V: “We live in the forest, the lumber is being taken away somewhere, and then how many piles of logs do you see along the road just sitting there, rotting!”

E: Do you watch TV a lot?

T: Of course I do. I don’t have anyone here but Pusinka, my cat. I live alone. I wake up in the morning, at 4 or 5, and I turn the TV on. Then I do the things around the house I need to do while the TV is on. Then I sit down in my chair to rest. That one’s my chair, and the other is for when guests come over. I sit down and rest in that one, watch TV. Then get up and do the other things I need to, or go somewhere, maybe to visit Galina Petrovna, when she lived here. Nowhere else really, only to Galina Petrovna. And also when her Boris was alive, Boris Pavlovich, her husband. I would go visit them both. I get a little lonely, living alone. Just Pusya and I.

E: Where is Pusya?

T: He’s running around somewhere, the old... I was about to say “the old man”. [laughs] He’s an old cat.

E: How old is he?

T: I remember that Natalia from Volyshovo brought him to me after Vasya died. And he’s been dead 18 years.

E: Oh wow that’s a long time ago.

T: Well not right away, but he must be about 16 or 17 years old.

E: 16 or 17! How is that even possible here? Lucky boy!

T: He’s a big boy! He was so little when she brought him to me and now he’s huge.

E: I’ve seen him, I would have never thought he was so old.

T: He’s not orange, not white, something in the middle. Piebald. Grayish. Irina likes him a lot. She was here bringing me some milk or something, and she asked me “Tatyana Dmitrieva, if something happens to you, what happens to Pusya?” I was shocked that she would ask and I stood there with my mouth open. I guess she meant if I were to die. But I don’t plan on dying anytime soon.

E: Good.

T: He likes her too. He’s afraid of everyone. Of strangers. Anybody who comes over. Even Sasha, or Natasha the social worker, whom he sees often. But Irina can stand on the porch and he’ll come right up to her. I guess he knows that she loves dogs and cats.

E: Yes I guess he can sense that. I guess he’s telling her that if anything happens he’ll go live with her.

T: Yes. Once we were standing there on the porch, and Irina’s dog Danny came over, and Pusya went right after him! It was the first time in my life I saw a cat attacking a dog. I was so surprised. Natasha the social worker said that yes, she sees it on the internet all the time, how cats go after dogs. But I’ve never seen anything like that. And Danny’s pretty big too. I really like Danny. I always give him treats. I give them all treats. Cookies, or dried bread. And he takes it so delicately. The rest of them just grab it. And he is so gentle.

E: Yes, he’s very well-mannered.

T: Yesterday I was going to get water, and he was sitting there, lying there, on the chain. He saw me, and started wagging his tail like crazy, wagging it back and forth. I didn’t go up to him though, because I was getting water. But later I brought him some bread.

E: Can we go back to the TV? What do you watch? News, movies, what do you watch?

T: I watch serials. I like them.

E: Western or Russian?

T: Ours, of course. Nash Spetznas (Our Special Forces). I like our serials. As for the news, well, they start showing that…. about the war. And I get tears in my eyes when I watch those young men. I watch war movies, too. I always cry when I watch them. I watch shows about love, betrayal.

E: Whatever’s on, right?

T: Yes, I turn it on in the morning and it makes noise all day. Maybe I’ll go see Galina Petrovna, or go to the avtolavka [a truck that sells groceries that comes to the village four times a week], then I turn it off, or when I’m stacking wood…. I turn it off when I’ll be gone for a while. But if I’m not gone for long I leave it, to get water, or wood. I went this morning to get water and left it on. It’s pretty cold today.

E: About wood… how do you get it? Is it from the state? Do your sons bring it?

T: Do they give it to me? This wood that I have out here, the chopped wood… Natasha the social worker called and got it for me. They brought it from Davydkovo yesterday. It cost 9,500 rubles.

E: So it’s not from the government? That’s normal price, 9,500.

T: Who is going to give me free wood? They brought two free trucks once, of cut wood, and half of it was full of dirt. It took so long for Natasha and I to get rid of it. I don’t even have a wheelbarrow. We had to take it all over there with my old cart.

E: So they don’t give you any more wood, right? Now you have to pay?

T: Yeah that’s it. Just one time. Now Nadya Fyodorova is getting it, since she’s getting help from the government. She got the two trucks this year. One time.

E: So just one time. I thought it would be every year.

T: No. And consider my pension. With everything altogether, including the veteran of labor pension, it comes to 16 thousand-something. The subsistence level is 18,000, and I get 16-something. Try to get by on that somehow! I’m a veteran of labor! I have the labor veteran’s book!

E: And you worked all your life, right?

T: Of course. I’m a veteran of labor! I have the book.

E: And half of that, even more than half, went to wood. One truck, small truck—and how many months is that good for? Two winter months?

T: And how much more of it I’ll have to buy! I’ll need to buy another 15-20,000 worth! We live in the forest, the lumber is being taken away somewhere, and then how many piles of logs do you see along the road just sitting there, rotting! But just try to go take them! And we live in the forest! It would be great if they took that wood that was left over and gave it to seniors, poor people, those whose pensions are small. They could bring it to us — here you go! No. That’s our government. That’s how we live. Well, what are you going to do? We survive, in other words. And the prices! And you want to eat… When I go to the avtolavka I spend about 1,500 each time. Well I spend less on Thursdays and Mondays when Natasha goes for me. Sometimes it’s 2,000. Then you come home and it’s just the things that you need. I don’t buy anything extra. And if you don’t eat, what’s the point of living? If you can’t even eat? What’s here? Before people got together, went to the movies, to the club. What can I say? That’s how we live… Lord, my knee is starting to hurt…

E: Why have you been standing for this whole conversation?!

T: I’m more comfortable like this. It’s like being on stage again.

Thank you, Tatyana Dmitrievna and Ekaterina!

Did you enjoy this interview? Maybe you have some follow-up questions for Tatyana Dmitrievna? Leave a comment!

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It’s been almost a year since our last VILLAGE MAYHEM post, which makes no sense because it’s basically non-stop mayhem in the village.

Time for a long-overdue MAYHEM update.

More baby goats (“Oh my gosh” — Edward)

A few days ago I was minding my own business in the goat pen when suddenly a new goat appeared.

We’re best friends now. He likes nibbling on my beard.

Two more goats from a different goat-mom were born a day earlier. But I wasn’t present for their delivery so there’s no placenta reaction video, sorry.

The goats are also very fond of Potato the Dog.

Head Mistress of the Edward Institute Farm, Irina, documented how she feeds the baby goats and any nearby puppies that might also enjoy some milk:

There’s still one goat that is massively pregnant and is due any minute now. I’ll keep you posted.

That covers all the baby goat news.

Wood status: Stacked

In November I expressed regret that I had spent the summer tunneling instead of splitting and stacking wood. This is a typical rookie mistake if you’ve ever lived in the village.

The good news is that after a few days of stacking I was able to accumulate considerable reserves in my wood shed.

I also made an emergency stash of unburnable wet wood behind the banya. Just in case.

The logs that I was too lazy to split were used to construct a woodpile rotunda.

Now that all the wood is stacked/arranged in impractical ways, it’s time to prepare for next winter.

Can’t wait to break out the ol’ handsaw!

Smarty the Calf joins the Edward Institute

I was summoned to the barn at 3am on February 23. Gavryusha the Cow had given birth.

He was able to drink milk from a pot with minimal human assistance so we named him Smarty.

We now have rivers of cow and goat milk. Soon we’ll be swimming in cheese and butter.

A big thank you to the milk-producing animals for making it all happen!

Anyway. Welcome to Team Slavsquat, Smarty!

Introducing: The Cob-400

You are probably already familiar with the Cob, a highly flammable device made of cardboard toilet paper cores. For centuries, villagers have used Cobs to ignite their stoves. We wrote about it.

But what if I told you there was something even more flammable than a Cob?

What if someone combined the world’s two most flammable things—cardboard toilet paper cores and birch bark—to make the ultimate stove-igniter?

This is not a hypothetical question. This is the top secret science behind the Cob-400, the surface-to-stove missile recently invented by the Edward Institute for Village Studies.

The Cob-400 in action:

QED.

I misgendered my cat

In May the Edward Institute adopted a kitten that was advertised on the internet as female. We named her Susan because she was a girl-cat and she looked like a Susan. There could be no other name for this adorable little female kitty. She was Susan. It was the perfect name.

I was proud of my female kitten named Susan and so I posted revealing photos of her on the internet. Everyone loved Susan. Everyone except for one black-pilled commenter, who pointed out that Susan had man-parts.

After reading the above comment, Ekaterina and I spent an entire afternoon looking at cat vaginas on Yandex Image Search.

Our findings were inconclusive. And because you need a preponderance of evidence to change a kitten’s gender, Susan remained a girl.

Time passed …. Things grew.

Eventually it became abundantly clear that something was amiss.

SUSAN IS A GUY.

Sorry about that, Susan. But we’re not changing your name. You are forever Susan.

Until next time.

— Riley

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On a frigid January morning, village co-conspirator Ekaterina knocked on Anna Yegorovna’s door and asked for an impromptu interview.

Anna Yegorovna, who lives just up the road from the Edward Institute for Village Studies HQ, graciously agreed.

The resulting conversation was painstakingly translated by Ekaterina.

(Note: The interview has been broken up into three parts, where there were long awkward pauses. Also, the name of Edward’s village has been changed, as well as the names of surrounding villages.)

Part 1: “It was fun back then. And there were lots of people. Now people have become savage, anti-social.”

Ekaterina: How long have you lived in Kolobovo?

Anna: In Kolobovo? I’ve lived here for a long time.

E: About 50 years? When did you move here? From Glinki, right?

A: Yes, I’m from Glinki. Maybe not 50 years, less.

E: You were in your 20s?

A: Maybe 30 years ago.

E: So you got married and came here?

A: I got married while I was still in Glinki.

E: Oh and then you moved from there to Kolobovo.

A: Yes, we moved here.

E: Ah ok. And where did you live when you first came here? In what house?

A: Which house? That one over there that has fallen apart. The Isakov’s house. I lived in that house. Then that house began to fall apart. So then we moved to the house across from Babushka Olya. To the house where some old granny lived, I forget her name. But she died and I moved there. And my husband and I got divorced.

E: Ah

A: Yep

E: Can I ask why?

A: Why do you think? He drank wine, ran around, got other people pregnant…

E: Then what, he stayed in Kolobovo, or he went somewhere else…?

A: Yeah, then… My mother lived here, in this house. I moved in with her. I stayed with her after that. My mom was buried here, then I was here.

E: And when did your mom die?

A: Oh she’s been dead a long time. A long time ago. Probably more than 10 years ago. She was 80-something…

E: Oh she lived a long time too, like you…

A: Yeah I’m already 77!

E: What do you remember about Kolobovo, about life here before?

A: What do you mean?

E: When there were more people. Like, there used to be a canteen, right? Where was it?

A: Yeah before, there was a canteen. We would go there to socialize, celebrate holidays.

E: In the canteen?

A: Yes

E: Where was it?

A: It was right over there, behind that house there. It that house right there. The next one. That was the canteen.

E: And the old club? Did you go there to have fun too?

A: Oh yeah, we did. We did. [smiles]

E: Were there, like, performances?

A: Yeah, there were concerts, people would come from Davydkovo [the nearest town] and give concerts..

E: Oh like they sometimes do now.

A: Sometimes we would do it ourselves when we had had a bit to drink. Give the concerts ourselves [laughs]. We would make up our own program.

E: Do you sing, or play any instruments?

A: We would dance there too, in the club. Yeah we did. We did all those things.

[Above: Edward exploring the old club]

E: And when you were working… Where did you work again? At the farm up there? Milking?

A: I would clean up after the pigs, and after the cows, and after the calves. Then I got married. And then I went back to cleaning up after the cows and calves…

E: Was there a lot of livestock?

A: There were 2, no 3 barns in Glinki.

E: Oh in Glinki. What about here in Kolobovo? You also did the same kind of work here, right?

A: Yes, in those barns up over there.

E: The ones that are in ruins now?

A: Yes, yes. I would walk there from my grandmother’s, from my mom’s here.

E: Were there a lot of people working there? Almost everyone, I guess… Either worked in the school or there?

A: Yes I worked a lot, for a long time.

E: It was a sovkhoz [a state-owned farm in the Soviet Union], right?

A: First it was a kolkhoz [a collective farm in the Soviet Union], then a sovkhoz. I worked there for a very long time. And I retired at 55.

E: So at the normal age, right?

A: Yes. I could have gone earlier, but I didn’t.

E: At 55, so 22 years ago. So the sovkhoz was still operating then? It would have been 2003.

A: Yes, it was all still there.

E: Everything.

A: Yes, there was an office, and a medical station, and everything. And a club. We went to dances there.

E: What was the first thing to close? I suppose the store was the last thing to close, right?

A: Yes the store closed. And that was it. And now there’s nothing.

E: Yeah there’s not much left.

A: The medical station is closed. There’s practically no people left.

E: Do you go to see the doctors in the medical van that comes every week?

A: Yes, my knees hurt, my legs hurt.

E: Does it help?

A: My Lyuba [daughter] helps me. She brings me all the pills. They told me to take them, prescribed them for me. She puts all the pills for the week in the box. I take five pills every day. Five in the morning and five in the evening. My knees hurt, that’s all. My legs were frozen! You go every morning in the barns to give the pigs water in the cold, the water from the buckets gets all over you, you walk home in that cold, you’re frozen! And I had to walk all the way back here to my mom’s house. Such a long way, from the barns, in that cold! And my knees felt it.

E: Didn’t you have special clothing? Warm pants or something like that?

A: You’d spill water all over them! When you were giving them water. They’d freeze.

E: How long did you work with livestock?

A: First I was the one who did whatever needed to be done. Whenever there was a hole that needed to be filled they sent me there. And then I started working with the livestock.

E: Did you have any animals yourself?

A: Yes. I had a cow, and sheep, and everything.

E: So that means that every morning, when you worked there, you would wake up, feed your own livestock, then go to work and clean up after and feed the livestock there.

A: Yes, that’s how it was. We had a cow and everything else.

E: And four kids to boot.

A: Yes, four.

E: And you were by yourself?

A: The fifth one died. When he was very small. He died. I was working hard, and he died. The other ones were all normal, though. Lyuba, my Margaritka – you probably know them.

E: I do.

A: You know Margaritka, You know Lyuba, then there’s my son Kolka, who died…

E: And the other one is in Borovichi?

A: There’s also Masha. She’s in Novgorod.

E: Have you been there? Novgorod?

A: To Masha’s? No, I don’t go there. It’s too far. Masha comes here to visit me.

E: How many grandchildren do you have?

A: I’ve already lost count [laughs]. And all my grandkids have kids. And me, I have four, and the fifth didn’t make it. I was in labor for a very long time. He wasn’t coming out. He was normal size too, more than three kilograms, but it just took too long.

E: I see, something happened during labor…

A: Yes. And the work I was doing was very difficult. And maternity leave… you only had a little time off and then it was time to give birth. It’s only now that you can leave earlier.

E: Yes I wanted to ask you about that. Tell me about maternity leave. How long did it last? I was under the impression that it was longer, but you mentioned before that…

A: 56 days before you give birth and 56 days after.

E: 56 before and 56 after. Then you have to go back to work, yes?

A: And then back to work.

E: What did you do with the kids?

A: Where else? With their grandmother.

E: The kindergarten didn’t take children that young?

A: The bigger ones went to kindergarten of course. But my mom, who lived here, I would bring them to her. She sat right there at the door with a toy – there was a little more space here then – and she’d stay sitting there, on guard [laughs]. What are you gonna do?

E: Good thing that they had their granny.

A: Yes they had a granny. Now she’s dead, has been for a while. Now I’m the grandmother. She would tell me that all the time, “Annushka, when I die, you will live here.” And here I am. In her house.

E: It’s a nice house.

A: This house is old too. Its 80-something years old.

E: Really?

A: Of course. 80-something years old. Now it’s better, since we at least managed to raise it up [the foundation was sinking and the house was placed on a new one]. The house had already begun to slant. So that’s that.

E: Um, do you have any memories of, maybe, where you worked — or things you did outside of work, about the club, for example. Some vivid memory.

A: There were meetings in the club.

E: Can you tell us about one? Maybe a meeting, or when you were celebrating something, having fun…

A: Yes we celebrated holidays. Celebrated the peredoviki…

E: What?

A: The peredoviki. The ones who did the best work.

E: Oh, gave them awards, you mean.

A: Yes. I’ve got some medals. But I don’t know where they are.

E: For work.

A: Yes, medals for work.

E: Did you have any friends here?

A: What do you mean, what friends?

E: I mean, I know about your family, your kids, but how about your friends, your neighbors. Or was everyone friends?

A: Friends… everyone was friendly with one another before. It’s only now that that’s all gone. Back then everyone was friendly to one another.

E: So you were sort of friends with everyone?

A: Yes, when a holiday would come around… and before there were so many holidays, all kinds… and you would go from house to house, people would gather all together. And why not, it’s a holiday! People would come over to my house too. And you’re not going to kick them out, of course. It’s a holiday, after all! It was fun back then. And there were lots of people. Now people have become savage, anti-social. Either they’ve become rich or… I don’t know what. And they don’t want to associate with the poor people. And that’s how we live.

Part 2: “You have to go all the way over there to the river. Over the hill. And coming back with the water, that’s really hard.”

A: … While I still remember. My memory now… it’s not as good.

E: Yeah I know what you mean, even I have started forgetting things a bit.

A: I forget things. 77 years is nothing to sneeze at. I’d still like to live a little more though. But besides that I’m still pretty good. Except for my legs, they’ve failed me. My hands work fine. I can still do everything with them. But my legs… I walk with that crutch…

E: And your garden? You used to have a very large garden, right?

A: Before yes. I used to live where Babushka Olya lives now, in a small house. Then I lived in the Isakov’s house. Then he kicked me out and I lived in another house across from it, across from the old lady. There was an old house. Where an old woman lived. Then I lived in that house.

E: You mean further down that way?

A: No, here’s mine, and there is Baba Olya, and between them was a house.

E: Oh there was another house between you and Baba Olya?

A: Yes, and I had a garden and everything. And then I moved in with my mom. I began working and moved in with my mom. And after that I remained with her. He wanted me to come back to him, but I stayed at my mom’s. [sneezes]… You see. It’s true. [In Russia a sneeze is taken to mean that what was just said was true.] Well that’s just how it was. So, daughter, there you go. I had a garden, and my mom had a garden. But not anymore. Last year I planted a few things close to the house.

E: Yes I noticed, last year you were planting things still. Good for you.

A: Yes, I planted some potatoes, some flowers… I do what I can. And now, as for the wood, Lyuba brings some in, the worker brings some, the social worker…

E: Right the social worker. She comes twice a week, right?

A: Right.

E: She mainly helps around the house?

A: She brings in wood. Sometimes she comes with some men…

E: Men too?

A: Yes in their car, they bring in wood, and water, and that’s all the way over the hill…

E: By the way where do you get it from? The river?

A: From the river. Over the hill.

E: So before, you went… you don’t have running water here, correct?

A: No.

E: So you went all the way over there…

A: Yeah you have to go all the way over there to the river. Over the hill. And coming back with the water, that’s really hard.

E: Wow that’s… and you need a lot of water, I guess.

A: When we kept livestock, yes, of course. Now not so much. Just to do the wash, do things around the house. But still… you need about two buckets…

E: Two buckets a day? You use it very sparingly…

A: Well, just to wash things, wash clothes.

E: And drinking water? You boil the river water?

A: Yes, from the river. I just boil it in the kettle. For tea.

A: Right over there is some water that was brought from the river… You’re not freezing from that bucket right next to you there?

E: I’m not cold.

A: Lyuba brought it. Things are freezing over today. It’s cold.

E: Yes, definitely.

A: Usually it can just sit in the entryway but it would freeze up there today. And the bucket is plastic…

E: I almost fell twice walking up here. It’s pretty dangerous out there.

A: Oh how many times have I fallen! More than once I walked home from the farm and fell on my fu… [laughs, catches herself about to curse…]

E: It’s ok, it’s ok, you can curse, no problem.

A: …I fell down hard, many times. It’s slippery! I fell pretty bad.

E: They found you later, right?

A: Exactly.

E: How many animals… how many cats do you have now?

A: Three. This one, another female cat, and a tomcat, Senya. They’re running around somewhere. I have three.

E: Do you have a hole so that they can get out when they want?

A: No I just let them out. The hole to the basement is closed. I open it sometimes but now it’s closed. So that’s it, daughter, that’s how we live.

E: Hmm. Well I guess that’s it. I just have one more question. Of course you can talk as much as you want. The more the better…. What is important to you? Family?... Tell me about what you consider important? Family, your garden, animals and livestock, the country, what you wish for, what you believe, things you want to pass down to your kids? What do you consider important?

A: Well my kids are all grown now.

E: But I see you keep in touch with them still, right?

A: Yes they call all the time.

E: Do you have the internet?

A: What?

E: The internet, on this special kind of phone…

A: No they call on the phone.

E: You talk on the phone, right?

A: Yes Margaritka just called me today. Yes, they call. Lyuba is here. Kolya is dead, Masha’s in Novgorod too…

E: Not that far…

A: They all call, ask me how I am… When I had a little to drink maybe it was more lively. Mom’s allowed to thin her blood out a little [laughing]. But no more of that. My birthday was on the 15^th…

E: 77 years.

A: Yes, 77. Some people came over. But I’m not allowed to drink wine anymore. Because I take those pills. Not allowed, that’s it. I was told – prohibition for you.

E: Yeah?

A: Yep. We ate, and that was it.

E: Yeah I guess it’s better if nobody drinks.

A: Yeah that’s what I said.

E: Yeah, there are a lot of people who drink here. And I guess there were before too.

A: Yeah sure, but… So what? I used to drink too

E: Well yeah I used to drink too.

A: Babka Panya, who used to live across the bridge…

E: Yes I’ve heard of her. The one who rode the motorcycle.

A: Yes. She would come over in the evenings and we would sit together… talk, drink. I was fine, but she would always pass out on the couch, sleep a little, then go home. We used to have lots of fun.

E: Evenings after work?

A: But now people have become… boring. We lived better before. People were friendlier. Not anymore. There aren’t even any people left.

E: Yeah nobody wants to live in the village. We’re different of course, but there aren’t very many of us.

A: Exactly. There are no people here anymore. You see for yourself. There used to be so many people. Every house was occupied.

E: How many people lived here? You say every house had people living in it?

A: Yes, every house.

E: And now more than half of them…

A: Now everything is empty.

E: Yes, almost all of them.

A: There’s these two houses in ruins on that side… The Fyodorov’s lived there. Auntie Ira Aleksandrovna lived over there… every house had people living in it. And now what? Now it’s just Lyuska and me on the hill. That’s it.

E: Lyusya, right.

A: Yep. And Zinka, too, over there. They moved there.

E: Zinka?

A: Yes. Zina. Vitka just died, her husband.

E: Ah, right, Zina, I know. She lives over there.

A: Yes she lives there, and Vitka [her brother] sometimes lives over there [in another house].

E: Yeah there were just puppies born there.

A: Right so there are no people left. They’ve all died. Lots of people have died.

E: Yes. Not only that they die, but their kids don’t stay. All their kids have gone.

A: Some people leave...

E: Because there’s no money here. There’s nothing here. There used to be some kind of infrastructure…

A: Yes. In the past it was much more interesting. When there was something on in the club there was a good amount of people that would come … And now what?

E: So before you lived normally here, you didn’t have to go into Davydkovo for anything.

A: We had everything. The post office was over there. And now…

E: The post office, right, that building covered in green stuff.

A: Yes now it’s closed. There were a lot of people who lived on the hill.

E: How many… Do you remember what the population was back in the 70’s, for example?

A: Oh, I don’t know. A lot. I’m telling you, there were a lot of people. And now it’s over. Everyone is leaving… [looks out the window] Oh, there go the fishermen. Catching their fish…

Part 3: “ When it was too cold for the piglets, we would put them in baskets, bring them home, and put them on top of our stoves.”

A: I worked in the kindergarten.

E: You did?

A: Yes, I helped take care of the little ones. In the kindergarten, yeah. And I forget the name of that little one that I would carry around all the time… Ah!, Vitka Pankeev’s … Vanya, I think. I would carry him around all the time and show him through the window, when I worked at the kindergarten as the cook. There was work everywhere.

E: How about the food that you made here, at the sovkhoz... Was most of it sent to other places? Did some of it stay in Kolobovo? Like, the milk for example. Did all the milk get sent to Borovichi, to Petersburg?

A: The milk was taken to the milk plant. In Mitino.

E: Up that way.

A: Yes, the milk was taken to the milk plant. I took it there on a horse. There was a long flat cart on which you could load milk canisters. You understand what they are? So you would take seven of these milk canisters and load them up, and the horse would take them there.

E: On a horse? You did this by yourself?

A: I took them from Glinki to Mitino. Well what else could you do? The cows were brought in from the fields in the evening, then they were milked, and then the milk had to be taken there while it was fresh.

E: Even in the evenings?

A: Yes.

E: And there was no kind of lighting on the roads of course..

A: Yes, we took it on horses. Going there was OK, but coming back was scary. And the road of course was bad.

E: I can imagine…

A: If the horse falls into a ditch or something how was I supposed to get it out? And with all the canisters. And that was the kind of work I did. And just try to move a full 40-liter milk canister. ‘

E: And they had a girl do that all by herself…

A: Yes. That was my work, wherever they needed me. What are you gonna do?

E: Yeah, so as soon as all the livestock left…

A: Yes, I worked mostly with the livestock.

E: And most people in Kolobovo too, right? Most worked with livestock?

A: Yes. I worked in Glinki with livestock, and here too.

E: OK, and here’s bit of a strange question: What kind of livestock did you prefer working with? Cows? Pigs? Which ones were your favorites?

A: Oh! When the sows would give birth in the winter, and it was too cold for the piglets, we would put them in baskets, bring them home, and put them on top of our stoves in the baskets.

E: The little piglets?

A: Yeah, they would dry off, then you would take them back to their mother to feed. Then the mother would lie down and they would suck. 10 of them.

E: Ten huh? That many?

A: Yes, that’s how many there would usually be. Sometimes 10, sometimes 12…

E: Were they pink? Black?

A: When they are born, they are reddish. Then their hair grows and they turn white. You’ve never seen them?

E: Me? No, just on the internet, on TV. I heard that Margarita got some pigs there in Novgorod, no?

A: No. Ah, wait. She did say something about… sheep I think.

E: Sheep?

A: Yes. Sheep. That’s what they have.

E: For meat I suppose.

A: Meat, of course. So there, daughter, there you go…. Retelling all of this is… [laughs]

E: Let’s do a second interview sometime…

A: Nah, that’s enough [laughs].

Thank you, Anna Yegorovna and Ekaterina!

If you enjoyed this interview, leave a comment. We will translate your message (if it’s not in Russian) and hand deliver it to internet-less Anna Yegorovna. (Also: Don’t you think “Village Interviews” should become a regular feature on the blog? Tell Ekaterina you crave more!)

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I was helping my neighbor build a Mad Max BRICS-mobile when a long-suppressed memory emerged from the cobwebs of my subconscious.

“I’m a blogger,” I said aloud, astonished and horrified.

“What’s a blogger?” my neighbor asked. “Nevermind. Come here and hold this while I weld.”

“Do I get any eye protection?” I asked him as he pulled his welder’s helmet over his face.

“Yeah. Close your eyes.”

We were a great team. With the hot rod almost halfway complete, my neighbor decided on a test ride through the village—he in the driver’s compartment, and me dangling from a metal rod in the barely constructed cargo bed.

It’s always safety first in the village.

We reached speeds of several kilometers an hour, which was quite thrilling for a wheelbarrow driver like myself.

But returning to my neighbor’s piercing question, “What is a blogger?”—we now have an authoritative answer from none other than Russia’s friendliest banker, Herman Gref:

“It’s just awful to me, all these bloggers who haven’t achieved anything in life. Listen, if a person has achieved something in life, will he become a blogger? He doesn’t have time for that. And losers who can’t do anything else except chat, they become bloggers,” [Gref said while speaking at a SberUniversity conference at the end of October]

Brutal.

I mean, he has a point. Gref is preparing to launch the world’s first space bank (?) …

… Meanwhile, your Novgorod village correspondent is feverishly chopping and stacking wood, which brings me to the main point of this informative internet article.

If you live in a Novgorod village, you need to chop all your wood and stack it by August at the latest.

Also, do not buy wet wood, even at a steep discount, if you intend to burn it in the near future.

If you do not follow these instructions you will be cold and sad.

Back in June when I was tunneling underneath Ekaterina’s garden, I remember chuckling to myself as I watched my neighbors diligently tend to their wood piles.

Chopping wood—in summer? What is this foolishness? I would think to myself as I cheerfully excavated my secret subterranean passageway, which flooded two weeks later.

If you learn nothing else from this underachiever’s blog, let it be this: Under no circumstances should you attempt to dig a tunnel before sorting out your wood situation.

I AM STILL CHOPPING WOOD. IT’S COLD. EVERYONE IS LAUGHING AT ME.

I have also been trekking deeper and deeper into the forest in search of lost village civilizations. I will be compiling a full report on my findings soon.

I wish you a very pleasant Saturday.

Until next time,

Riley

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Edward Slavsquat, the most trusted name in Russia News, turned three yesterday.

Published on October 19, 2021, our inaugural blog post was titled, “Russia mobilizes robot army to defend restaurants from unvaxxed vermin”. Simpler times.

(Russians didn’t take kindly to being cattle-tagged. Consequently, the plan to terrorize the country with QR code-checking robo-bouncers was shelved.)

If you are interested in Slavsquat lore, I have already written about the circumstances that led to this historic blog post and the subsequent blog posts that came after it.

But today's blog post is not about reminiscing fondly about the past, but rather looking to the future.

We're among friends, so allow me to type frankly: Things are a bit precarious. And not just in Russia. What to do?

The only thing we can do: Wake up every morning and try to make the best of it.

I don't know about you, but every day I’m leveling up my skills.

For example, just fifteen minutes ago, Ekaterina asked me to retrieve a chicken from the freezer in the garage.

“If you have trouble opening the freezer, gently chip away any ice that has formed around the sliding glass,” she advised.

Gently, Ekaterina reminded me as I headed out the door with a hammer.

I did as instructed and successfully extracted the chicken.

That’s village life, though. Honest work that makes my bread taste sweet.

I wish you could see my village. Some of my cherished readers have actually made the trek out here to say hello, which makes me very happy.

Susan has a new friend, by the way. Meet Sabrina:

I have to confess that these days I have trouble typing about the News. My mind wanders and I inevitably find myself tromping through the forest in search of things with more meaning.

There are still so many unsolved village mysteries and unread Peasant Woman magazines; somewhere in the village there are more KGB telegrams waiting patiently to be discovered.

These are the important geopolitical issues that I am most excited to share with you in the weeks and months and years ahead.

Of course, this blog's bread and butter is making fun of Herman Gref, which I will still do with pleasure, but honestly Gref can suck it. Who even wants to know what that lunatic is doing at this point? Reminds me of that wonderful passage from Voltaire's Candide:

[T]he news was spread that two Viziers and the Mufti had been strangled at Constantinople, and that several of their friends had been impaled. This catastrophe made a great noise for some hours. Pangloss, Candide, and Martin, returning to the little farm, saw a good old man taking the fresh air at his door under an orange bower. Pangloss, who was as inquisitive as he was argumentative, asked the old man what was the name of the strangled Mufti.

“I do not know,” answered the worthy man, “and I have not known the name of any Mufti, nor of any Vizier. I am entirely ignorant of the event you mention; I presume in general that they who meddle with the administration of public affairs die sometimes miserably, and that they deserve it; but I never trouble my head about what is transacting at Constantinople; I content myself with sending there for sale the fruits of the garden which I cultivate.”

Candide and his crew were quite impressed with this wise Turk:

“Let us work,” said Martin, “without disputing; it is the only way to render life tolerable.”

The whole little society entered into this laudable design, according to their different abilities. Their little plot of land produced plentiful crops. Cunegonde was, indeed, very ugly, but she became an excellent pastry cook; Paquette worked at embroidery; the old woman looked after the linen. They were all, not excepting Friar Giroflée, of some service or other; for he made a good joiner, and became a very honest man.

Pangloss sometimes said to Candide:

“There is a concatenation of events in this best of all possible worlds: for if you had not been kicked out of a magnificent castle for love of Miss Cunegonde: if you had not been put into the Inquisition: if you had not walked over America: if you had not stabbed the Baron: if you had not lost all your sheep from the fine country of El Dorado: you would not be here eating preserved citrons and pistachio-nuts.”

“All that is very well,” answered Candide, “but let us cultivate our garden.”

I would only add, “if you have the time and means, consider digging a tunnel under your garden.”

But other than that, Candide pretty much nailed it.

Who knows what the next three years hold. There's no way to know. What is most important is to cultivate our garden, which can be a figurative or physical garden, depending on our specific circumstances.

Thanks for reading and take care of yourself.

Until next time,

— Riley

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I was admiring the tree branches propping up the bus stop, when I saw a flyer inviting me to afternoon tea at the village social club in celebration of Elderly Person Day.

I had never heard of this Day before, but I knew from past experience that drinking tea at the social club was a euphemism for consuming beverages that contain 0% tea.

Then the gears began to turn. Fact: There were a lot of elderly persons in the village. Fact: Some of these elderly persons enjoyed drinking tea regardless of what fake holiday it was. Fact: A tea party at the village social club in honor of the elderly would probably be the wildest rave in Novgorod’s entire 1,166-year history.

Naturally, I was intrigued and marked my calendar.

(I would later learn that International Day of Older Persons is a United Nations-recognized Day and that the Day’s “theme” for 2024 was “Aging with Dignity: The Importance of Strengthening Care and Support Systems for Older Persons Around the World”.)

Edward Junior, Ekaterina, and I arrived at the social club five minutes before noon, just as the first cup of tea was being poured.

After the third round of tea the older persons began to reminisce about previous Older Persons Days.

“Do you remember when Viktor Andreevich’s wife used to play the guitar and sing for us?” one of the older persons asked our gathering.

“This year is more modest,” sighed a villager of advanced age as he took a swig of tea.

Nina Nikolaevna, who lives three houses down from the Edward Institute’s milk-extraction facilities, had the most vivid recollections of the times of yore.

“I had a wonderful sense of smell—people would even travel from neighboring villages just to knock on my door and ask, ‘Nina Nikolaevna, please, smell this pot of soup—has it spoiled?’ and I would take a whiff and reply ‘yes!’ or ‘no!’”.

Around this time, your correspondent and Edward Junior—who will fulfill his father’s unfulfilled dream of joining the Igor Moiseyev Ballet—began to dance.

But the revelry came to an abrupt pause when Polina Sergeevna went white in the face and asked to be taken home.

“She has problems with her blood pressure,” her husband explained as he escorted her out the door.

Ten minutes (one tea) later Polina Sergeevna’s husband swung open the door of the social club.

“122 over 80!”

“Not so bad! Hurray!” the older persons exclaimed in near-unison as they hurriedly poured each other more tea.

“To acceptable blood pressure!” exclaimed Polina Sergeevna’s husband as he raised his tea glass.

Polina’s husband then called his wife on his 2010-era flip phone to make sure she was alright, but she didn’t answer.

“She’s probably just taking a nap,” he said.

Another round of tea was poured.

“To good sleep!” everyone shouted.

An hour later, your correspondent was tasked with escorting Nina Nikolaevna, who had had too much tea, back home.

As we approached her domicile, Nina Nikolaevna dug her heels into the dirt road.

“Wait, wait, wai—”, cried Nina Nikolaevna as she grabbed my arm. “I need to tell you something, Roma.”

“What is it?”

She turned to me, tears racing down her cheeks.

“I’m—I’m half Polish.” And then Nina Nikolaevna began to wail.

“Don’t worry. It’ll be alright,” I said as I led her by the arm to her doorstep.

“Roma, tomorrow can you bring me something to smell?” she asked me as she wiped away tears.

“I’ll try, Nina Nikolaevna.”

“You promise?”

“Yes.”

She cracked open her door and stumbled inside.

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Hello internet friends,

In July your correspondent promised his beguiling paid subscribers exclusive access to video recordings of the Edward Institute for Village Studies’ first-ever VILLAGE RAVE (a very calm and charming folk music concert attended by no more than 20 villagers).

I was dreaming of providing translations of all the songs, and annotations, and bibliographies, and etc. etc.—but it just didn’t happen. I’m sorry about that.

But the concert was absolutely wonderful. So it’s time for a long-overdue DATA-DUMP.

Here is a SNEAK PEEK for the freeloaders:

THE REST OF THIS JOYOUS MUSICAL EVENT (MINUS EDWARD’S THEATRICAL APPEARANCE, WHICH HAS BEEN CLASSIFIED FOREVER FOR NATIONAL SECURITY REASONS) IS BEHIND A CAPITALIST PAYWALL:

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As we mentioned in our last dispatch, the Edward Institute for Village Studies, the only unaccredited research university in Novgorod with a secret tunnel, sponsored a folk concert at the village’s social club on Friday evening.

Here are the stars of the show, Svetlana and Irina, during a pre-concert warm-up:

We’ll be releasing a highlights reel of this charming musical event in the coming days.

But if you want to watch your correspondent dance for 20 seconds, you will need to climb over the PAYWALL …

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