Why hasn’t Pavlo, the cabbie, left yet? Like many other people he has no place to go, but he is afraid to stake everything on one roll of the dice.
“I don’t have any family to take me in permanently. I have no idea how I could start a new life with my wife and two children but without any support,” he explains. It happens very often to Donbas residents that the Donetsk or Luhansk regions, or the city in which they were born, is their entire world. They have never left its borders. That’s why now, even if their life is in danger, they are scared to risk everything, and they try to wait for the war to end. Others simply have to stay here. They can’t afford to live anywhere else.
Pavlo claims that people are tired of the separatists, but usually they are not eager to organize and challenge the new “authorities.” And when they are eager, they don’t know how.
But first impressions are completely different. Walking in the streets of Donetsk you can easily meet a supporter of the “people’s republic.” These people are very happy to express their views. They are not afraid because what’s to fear? It is their people who control the city. If Ukrainian forces enter Donetsk, the Slovyansk scenario may be repeated: some people will flee and others will transform themselves from separatists into Ukrainian patriots.
Yet when you come to know the residents better or talk to them far away from the insurgents (many journalists don’t pay attention to this detail when they ask people for their views), you will hear critical remarks about the separatists.
“I am a friend of the Donetsk Republic,” Roman, a translator working for the foreign journalists, says to the separatists. Only when we are alone does he state: “They are scum.”
The first place in Donetsk any journalist should visit is the office of the Donetsk Public Administration, still the separatists’ headquarters. You can get press accreditation there. It was very early in the morning, so I called them to ask whether I could come.
“Please, come. We are already at work,” replied Klavdia, Press Bureau Secretary of the Donetsk Republic.
The surroundings of the building have been tidied up. The barricades that were here in May are gone, and the only tents still standing are the ones with propaganda materials. The separatists want to prove that the city is totally under their control and that they don’t need any security. I enter the building.
“I have come to get my press accreditation,” I say to a guard.
“OK, call them so they confirm it.”
“From my phone?”
“Sure!”
I call Klavdia. I pass my phone to the guard and she explains something.
“You may go. Fifth floor.”
“Am I supposed to go there alone?” I am surprised, but this thought I don’t say out loud. Press accreditation appeared for the first time during the referendum. The procedure was similar, but my entire time in the building I was under the careful scrutiny of the “owners.” In May when I was coming in with a group of journalists, a guard said: “If we notice that you are recording something or taking photos, we will confiscate your equipment.” Now nobody cares. Previously, the building looked like it had been struck by a tornado. Everything was scattered and destroyed. Now, on the floors where the journalists hang out, everything is relatively neat and tidy.
My instincts tell me to go left, toward the staircase, but someone is following me.
“Hey, young man, where are you going? Please use the elevator,” says one of the guards.
“It’s functioning?” I can’t hide my astonishment.
A uniformed man nods. I walk toward the elevator.
On the fifth floor I enter the press bureau. I meet Klavdia there. She takes my information. “Oh, Poland doesn’t support us. I won’t issue accreditation,” Klavdia jokes, with a smile on her face. When she has all she needs, she leaves the room to print our accreditations. She is away for a very long time.
There are two more employees of the press corps and one Western journalist in the room. He is reading a separatist newspaper. I can only see the other side of the paper. The correct name of the region is given in large print: “SOUTH EAST—NO. NOVOROSSIYA—YES.” The press employee sitting next to me stares at his computer screen the entire time. He is browsing Vkontakte, the Russian equivalent of Facebook, and he is playing some version of Bubble Shooter. The other press employee is fooling around with his video camera. After a while a stringer shows up. He is a freelance journalist working for Russia Today. He is Ukrainian but he supports the separatists and knows them all. He sits back in the armchair and starts talking, breaking the grim atmosphere. He and the fellow playing on the computer chat about their vacations. The stringer has been to Egypt. The computer guy takes his eyes from the screen from time to time, as if he were doing something important. The Western journalist will occasionally throw a glance at them, and the “cameraman” is not interested in the conversation at all. That’s why the stringer turns to me.
“When I am on vacation I am embarrassed to admit that I am Russian,” he says, unexpectedly, to my astonishment. He continues talking about an article in the Egyptian press that explained why Russians were the worst tourists: because they abuse alcohol.
“It’s true! Russians buy everything in Duty Free. They drink all the way to Egypt, then on the bus, and finally they have to be dragged to the hotel because they can’t walk on their own.” He laughs his head off. Then he says that drunk Russian tourists behave really badly. They provoke fights, they insult other people, and they are very loud. According to him, no tourists from other countries behave like them.
“That’s why, when they ask me where I come from, I say I am Ukrainian. And then all of them say OK.” He gives a thumbs up.
The computer guy has probably never been to Egypt, so he changes the subject to Israel. Stringer has been there, too, so now they can exchange opinions. They describe Israel in superlatives. Everything there is great, beautiful, and delicious. It is easy to get a good job and have a better life. After I heard talk about the shame of being Russian, I thought nothing else would surprise me. And suddenly I hear about an Israeli model for Donbas. I have heard about Transnistria, Abkhazia, Ossetia, but Israel?
“They don’t have any natural resources, but they have good brains. That’s their wealth. We can do the same in Donbas,” proudly claims the computer guy. Stringer nods in agreement, but I am not sure if he believes that it is possible. How would they do it? Who will pay for it? Russia? Russia was to turn Crimea into another Singapore, but it has changed its mind for now. If Russian financial aid hasn’t reached Crimea, it is even more certain it won’t end up in Donbas. Meanwhile huge sums of money should be invested in the region to rebuild buildings that have been destroyed, streets damaged by tanks, and bridges that have been blown up. The list is very long. In the beginning of September the Ukrainian government estimated that eight billion dollars were needed. This amount increases every day.
In the end Klavdia comes back and says that the Central Department Store has been blown up and everyone has to get there fast, so today accreditations will not be issued. Supposedly, the CDS was blown up by Ukrainian nationalists. What for? Nobody knows.