COLUMN: Outside the urban turmoil

From Lindsay Faber's, "From Russia With Love," Fall '98 From Lindsay Faber's, "From Russia With Love," Fall '98Leaning over a precariously wobbly railing, I stared out of the window of a train for 40 hours last weekend, with my eyes glued to the Russian countryside. The immediate image of this country is one stricken by poverty, but the poverty of the countryside and the cities are two completely different things. In this Russia, the farming country-side, much of the economy is moneyless, and is based, really, on cabbage and potatoes rather than a devalued ruble and a default on state debt. The villager in Russia has no running water or gas; he drinks from a well, uses an outhouse for a bathroom and cooks from an old stove fueled by the wood he collects in a nearby forest. He survives on the cucumbers and cabbage he grows himself and cannot rattle off the top of his head how much the ruble is worth, how much money his country has lost or who his politicians are. I found myself instantly attracted to this minimalist lifestyle, where the most important things are those which are intangible: love and family, for example. I thought about how my life might change if money were measured in potatoes, if my biggest daily worry was cabbage theft, if the prices or imported yogurt or government bonds were themes unheard of. And then I thought how it seems so strange that this stark countryside could coexist under the same nation as does the metropolis of Moscow, a city whose people are becoming more frayed at the edges which each passing day as the economy plummets before their eyes and they lose control of their money. The small villagers are so much more naive; they might not even know that the present Russia faces the danger of a democratic collapse and a Soviet revival. Many of them simply may not have heard. And maybe they are better off that way. But how, I thought, could Russia be so shockingly disjointed? The final destination for my journey would be Estonia, a nation occupied by the Soviets in 1945, which now rests peacefully on the Baltic Sea with its neighbors, Latvia and Lithuania. The Estonian has witnessed a very turbulent history. His country was ping-ponged back and forth between Sweden, Germany and Russia, among others, for hundreds of years. It wasn't until the early 1990s that Estonia was restored to its status as an independent state. The Estonian has only known the ideas of freedom and market economy for a very short time; his success is young. And he is certainly plagued by his nation's identity crisis, as it has been tossed back and forth by so many nations for so many years. Still, I stood staring by the window of my 3' by 6' train compartment (which I shared with three others), gloomily expecting to spend my five-day vacation in another poverty-stricken nation, anticipating that the same black cloud that hovers over Russia would also hover over Estonia, and impose the very same mood of despair and desperation. I lay awake most of the night on the train, questioning my decision to spend four months in a country laden with danger and fragmentation. I was abruptly woken up at 5 a.m. to the sound of the Russian border control banging on my door in an effort to inspect my passport and visa. The Russian guard wore a camouflage suit, black leather boots, a taut hat and donned a long club and a large pistol. His eyes were serious as they stared into mine, making sure I was who my passport said I was. He screamed at me to get out of bed so he could inspect my compartment and make sure I wasn't smuggling anything illegally out of Russia. I winced as I made eye contact with this guard, who looked like an austere remnant of the Soviet days, intent in his need to exert power over me. Fifteen minutes later, I was again woken up as I crossed the Estonian border, but this time by Estonian guards who apologized for disturbing my sleep, and smiled at me as I handed over my passport. I was shocked at how differently I had been treated at the two borders, just 15 minutes away from one another. These two separate nations were both part of one nation -- the USSR -- for roughly 60 years. How different could they be? When the train arrived in Estonia, I stepped off with my bags slung uncomfortably over my shoulder, and my eyes immediately blurred at the sight of a sun I had not seen in weeks. I walked around the city of Tallinn, wandering over perfect cobblestone walkways and admiring the majestic castles and cathedrals which remained from the 13th century. The architecture of each building featured unique archways which served as informal entrances to tucked-away cafes and bars. There were beautiful parks dotting the city, with bright flowers framing the perimeters, and benches overlooking the Baltic Sea. But it was the people of Estonia who shocked me the most. They smiled at me as I walked by, and some even threw a casual "hey" as they passed. No one talked about the ruble-dollar exchange rate, insolvent banks or the default on state debt. No one shoved me as I walked by, no one tried to pick-pocket me, and no one even hinted at the words "financial crisis." Having grown accustomed to my hardened Russian lifestyle, where smiles are forbidden, I almost wondered where I was. How could two formerly Soviet states differ so much from one another? I was stunned by the fragmentation of the former USSR. In reality, I probably shouldn't have been, since Estonia is much closer to Finland than it is to Russia, and has piggybacked off of the Finnish language and culture. But in my mind, I had always envisioned the notoriously powerful Soviet Union to be one massive aggregate of congruous republics, each one in some way resembling the next. I suppose that in my now Russified state, I have grown blind to such possibilities. Completely consumed by bankruptcy and poverty, I wake up each day expecting to be shoved around on the metro or glared at with a hateful eye. That's how things work in Russia. And strangely, I find myself understanding this way of life, because here in Moscow the situation is so bad that there is really nothing to smile about. Life, each day, presents a new challenge. And from my heart, I pity the people who are victimized. It is the unpredictability and the long, broken history of this country which make it as enigmatic as it is. From country to city, from one republic to another, nothing is the same. But the one uniting factor which spreads across the entire former Soviet Union -- from the farming villager to the successful merchant in Estonia to the forceful guard on the Russian border -- is that no one knows what will come next, no one knows where his country stands in the world and no one can take comfort in security.