Remember, remember the 5th of November

I admit this tag line from quite a thoughtful (certainly by the standards of our unsophisticated times) recent movie is too good to be neglected. Taking into account my still unchanged location and the corresponding anxiety growing daily I find it appropriate to dedicate this sliver of my usual ramblings to this country. In an academic sense, I am definitely interested in the way Russia will continue its seemingly aimless existence of pain and sorrow. If not for my parents living here I would probably be delighted every couple of years hearing about new large-scale feats of stupidity achieved by that perverted nation led by mediocre thugs of the KGB fame.

As the attentive among us might have noticed, about six weeks have passed since my visa became valid. While a few colleagues of mine have been relishing NYC for a few weeks by now I am still waiting for my ‘Ready, steady, go’. This fact is quite hurtful. I believe I mentioned before that stories about people waiting for relocation for eighteen months tend to conclude that the mental state changes throughout such a predicament. Indeed, I feel my excitement has mostly burned out. Nevertheless, I guess I’d better get used to waiting indefinitely – stories about getting a GC nowadays effortlessly eclipse any H1B-related inconveniences :)

Harking back to my present country, recently I have been guilty of breaking one of my cardinal rules – never read in Cyrillic, especially local news. The lame excuse is that I did it out of sheer desperation and the need for motivation. As for the latter, one can always count on the local government. They never fail to instigate the irresistible urge to run from their corrupt clout. In this sense, I certainly was not disappointed.

It turns out that elections are not used anymore in this country. The only formal exception is laughable because the current tsar is going to select his heir himself anyway. In a sense, the nation-building experiment seems to have failed spectacularly. As I understand, even Iraq has been less a debacle – and strangely enough the US was more willing to oust a comic Arab instead of truly powerful Kremlin mafia. It can be argued that these two countries share a lot – from allegedly great distant past, abundance of oil and pure insanity of the indigenous rulers before the US intervenes to the complete inability to incorporate social institutions found in civilized places and ultimate failure to be forcefully developed.

When I was much younger and democracy and progress were believed to be possible in this country someone smart said that only a real price paid by the people guarantees success. Neither Iraqi (whose freedom was paid for by American tax-payers) nor Soviets (who received their short-lived freedom as a gift from maverick rulers) did anything substantial to prove that they deserve better fate. In this respect I pity the Americans who believed that one day that they could help those nations transcend their retarded circumstances. And that’s why the aforementioned movie is so keenly relevant to this place but so much different from the local reality in its denouement.

My bet is that the turbulent history of this country will be equally chaotic, there will be a major crisis in five to ten years (unless oil still costs $60 in 2016), the general decline in everything from high-tech industry to the environment and quality of life will continue for years ahead. In general, I believe the relatively safe period to hedge one’s bets and leave this country at least for a few years will be essentially over in 2008. In comparison with which the perspective of a few slave years in H1 status might be not a huge price to pay after all.