Wednesday, July 4, 2018

How Bad are Things in Russia? So Bad that One Russian Tries to Fleet in Homemade Boat


Paul Goble

            Staunton, July 4 – That ever more of the youngest and most educated Russians want to leave their homeland for other countries is well-documented and widely accepted, all of Vladimir Putin’s bravado notwithstanding. (See takiedela.ru/news/2018/07/02/vciom-emigracia/ and windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2018/07/three-pieces-of-very-bad-economic-news.html).

            But in a story that echoes those of flights successful and unsuccessful from Soviet oppression such as Teppo Turen’s  classic The Tuntsa, a Russian a few days ago sought to flee his country for Japan on a homemade boat that looked like a wooden box covered with a tarp (rusmonitor.com/zhitel-sakhalina-pytalsya-sbezhat-v-yaponiyu-na-samodelnojj-lodke-foto.html).

                Unfortunately for the man and his dash for freedom, things ended badly: he and his boat were seized by Russian border guards. There is no word yet on  his fate in their hands, but one fears for the worst. 

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