Abkhazian Angst: A glimpse of the past in present day Tkvarcheli

by Ben R.
To see the full set of photographs from Ben's trip to Abkhazia, please click here.

I'd been in Abkhazia for a week and I was getting bored. I'd come looking for an adventure but instead I had been seduced by the warm waters of the Black Sea and the excellent Abkhaz wine which I had been drinking liberally since I'd arrived. I'd always liked the idea of a traditional beach holiday, set in beautiful surroundings but with the backdrop of a war zone. The juxtaposition of leisure and horror intrigued me. However as I had soon realised after crossing the Ingur bridge into Abkhazia, this small country only lived up to half of the bargain. It was stunning, a naturalist’s paradise but the terror was over, I could sleep safely. And whilst that was a good thing for the local population who had witnessed enough horror, selfishly, I was a little disappointed. 

I was in the southern town of Ochamchire, a town that privileged Soviets had flocked to in great numbers before the fall to relax on its pebble beach and soak up the southern sun. But the days of Ochamchire's beaches being full of holidaying apparatchiks and their families were but a distant memory. Now the town was a sleepy backwater that had few visitors and a wrecked tourist infrastructure. An abandoned hotel stood at one end of the beach and looked out over a beautiful shore line that now had more cows strolling along it then holidaymakers. 

Abandoned hotel in Ochamchire


View from the abandoned hotel

Ochamchire is a town where every street is a reminder to the war and the ethnic cleansing that took place there. As the victorious Abkhaz fighters backed by the Russian army pushed the Georgian army out across the Ingur river back into Georgia the ethnic Georgian population who had lived in Abkhazia for generations followed them carrying what they could and leaving what they could not. They were the lucky ones. The stragglers and the brave were rounded up and herded into Ochamchire's football stadium from where women and children were systematically raped and the men were killed. Streets of empty houses the only reminder to their presence in the country and the genocide committed against them. I'd asked people in the town how they felt about the fact that the neighbours that they had grown up with sharing their vines and wells had been allowed to be so cruelly treated. Was there a sense of common shame? Few were willing to utter more than a few words on the matter. History may well be written by the victors but they seem less inclined to speak. 

My map showed a solitary road heading deep into the Caucus mountains beginning in Ochamchire and ending at the town of Tkvarcheli, in the mountains some 30 kilometers away. With no idea as to what I would find there but with no better options I flagged down a passing taxi. A battered Volga pulled up driven by a silver haired Abkhazian man. Levar, as he introduced himself, was confused by my request. "Why don't I take you to Novi Afon instead, the scenery there is more beautiful." He was reluctant to take me to Tkvarcheli insisting I'd not like the place. I increased my offer to 1500 Roubles, a foolishly high sum for such a short journey and reluctantly he asked me to get in. We left Ochamchire, passing through streets and neighbourhoods where nine tenths of the houses were abandoned and burnt out, the Georgian quarter.  As we drove on into the foothills of the Caucus mountains the more suspicious Levar became of my intentions there. "What do you want to go to Tkvarcheli for?" he pressed. I'd already explained that I just wanted to have a wander around, I was bored of the beach, but that raised his suspicions further, "They will think you are a spy and arrest you," he said looking at me without a hint of humour. "Well then they'll shoot you for collaborating with the enemy," I said teasing. We drove on in silence.

Levar

As the road climbed out of the foothills and into the mountains the temperature dropped. We drove into a patch of fog but when we appeared through the other side we did so into a landscape of verdant hills, rushing mountain streams and the occasional abandoned building. It was a stunningly beautiful place. It was also more Soviet then the coast, the signposts, the hammer and sickle motifs on buildings, there had not been such a rush to eradicate the reminders to the past. It was also noticeably poorer. Abkhazian people had been wonderfully friendly on my trip. This trip to the Caucuses, my first, had been an epiphany for me. For years I had associated the Russian language and all who spoke it with an unsmiling solemnness. But here in the Caucuses for the first time I saw the Russian language used by races who used the language as an instrument to convey happiness. People smiled at strangers, they said dobri-den whilst passing on the street. It was nothing short of shocking to walk into a shop to be welcomed by smiling faces speaking Russian (Russian is the lingua franca of Abkhazia and the Caucus region) and not to be made to feel as though you were a nuisance. Yet here in the mountains on the road to Tkvarcheli there were no smiles. As we passed half abandoned villages people watched us pass, but seemingly with suspicion etched on their faces. It seemed outsiders didn't come this way much. The road was empty without any other vehicles on it save the occasional army truck loaded with Russian conscripts. I'd heard nothing but resentment towards the Russian military presence in Abkhazia. Shortly after crossing the border into Abkhazia a week earlier the marshrutka I had been travelling in had been stopped at an army road block manned by Russian soldiers. All the passengers and I were ordered outside for a documentation inspection. The Abkhazian passengers were seething that they were being stopped and inspected by Russians in their own country. It was plain to see where the real power lay in Abkhazia and the locals resented it. 

We drove on in silence and passed a sign announcing our entry into the Tkvarcheli region, Lavar the driver turned to me and reminded me that I should be careful. Rounding a corner the view of Tkvarcheli opened up in front of us. It was not a pretty sight. In a mist shrouded valley lay the lower half of the town, the industrial area, the coal mine, the now abandoned railway station, some disused factories with their decaying towers and some Stalinist buildings long abandoned and beyond repair. And up higher on the upper slopes of the mountain side lay the centre of the town, the worker's quarters and all that was necessary for life. Stretched out high above the town and linking both halves, the upper and the lower, were steel cables holding a couple of now disused cable cars, stranded midway between the wheel houses, no doubt used to transfer the workers from the upper half of the town down to the mine. It was a scene unlike any I had ever seen on my FSU travels before. An ugly town, run down and decaying but paradoxically set in such lush and beautiful surroundings. 

 I asked Levar to park up by the railway station that stood at the entrance to the lower half of the town. I switched on my camera, "Don't let anybody see you," Levar instructed tetchily. I entered the collapsing terminal building built in the classical style Soviet architects of the early period were instructed to build. It had not been used for years but once had train services to Sukhumi and beyond. I walked along the overgrown platform, nobody in sight, the lower half of the town was dead. As I walked to the end I saw Levar hiding behind a wall watching me. Did he suspect me of being a spy or was he just looking out for me? In Ochamchire I had been complacent about being in a conflict area, but up here in Tkvarcheli with Levar and his warnings about me being arrested or being seen things felt different. A strange feeling was growing inside me, one I did not recognise. We returned to the car, Levar wanted to return to Ochamchire but I insisted we drive on. 

Abandoned railway station

We passed derelict factory buildings until coming to a traffic circle which marked the entrance to the upper part of the town. It was surrounded on three sides by Stalinist apartment buildings, solidly built but long abandoned. The street was empty except for two guys loading a large sack into the back of a Lada. They stopped and eyed us suspiciously before dumping the sack in the trunk of the car and driving off. We parked up next to a fast flowing river and I got out. "If you see someone hide your camera and act normal," Lavar instructed. I ran across the open space in the centre of the road and into an over grown and disused park which had a dilapidated fountain and beyond that a shell of an apartment building. 

It was rare to see housing of such quality in the former Soviet Union. These buildings were built with quality materials and built to last. They had not collapsed, but had been stripped of their wood. Window frames, roof lintels, floor joists. They'd been needed perhaps in the cold winter months of the war. I'd seen plenty of Krushevkas in states of disrepair but these were different, this was not worker's housing. I walked through the park following the cracked cement pathway. It was deserted, the only sound being that of the river running through the centre of town. I returned to the car. 

We crossed the river and climbed higher into the upper town. There was no sign of modernity, nothing to suggest we were in the new millennium. The streets were empty except for the occasional Soviet built car and glum looking pedestrian who stood and watched as we drove past. There were a few shops built into the bottom of Stalinist apartment buildings which had painted wooden signs advertising what they stocked 'Shoes', 'Products', 'Bread'. It was like a film set. We pulled up at an abandoned theatre, outside were some workmen taking a rest from painting a building on the opposite side of the road. I entered the theatre through a broken door in the lobby whilst undoing my zip, better they think I was urinating on their theatre then photographing it. Its rooms had the detritus of the towns past cultural life; a rotting cupboard of costumes, discarded celluloid film reels, a ballet shoe hanging on a nail. The auditorium was a jumble of rotting leather chairs. How had it come to this? Was the squalor in the town the result of the war, or the result of a collapsing economy that was no longer spoon fed on subsidies? 

Abandoned Theatre

We drove on passing more glum pedestrians shuffling along semi deserted streets. At the time of the last great Soviet census in 1989 the population of the town stood at 22,000. Twenty years on it is less than 5000. People had left the town at the first opportunity. Why? Levar turned to me as we drove, "Who are you?" he asked, my previous explanation that I was just a tourist had obviously not convinced him. "Really, who are you?" I'd never had that question put to me before and for a moment I was unsure as to what he meant, but what he meant was what was I doing up here in the mountains of Abkhazia in some hell hole photographing everything that everybody else ceased caring about 20 years ago? It was a good question, one I had no real answer to, but in his mind he knew the answer. I either really was a spy or more likely, an idiot. People wanted to escape this town yet I'd sought it out despite his best efforts to steer me away. Why was I not in Novy Afon with the other tourists? 

 Everything in the town was so imposing, hewn from grey rock, built to survive the winters. During the independence war in the early 90's Georgian forces had besieged Tkvarcheli and tried starving the town into submission. The town's population had held out for over 400 days until Abkhaz forces with Russian help had relieved the town. It was a town built to endure, physically and mentally. We took another road that led to a plateau high above the town and came to an abandoned restaurant overlooking a bend in the river. It was a beautiful setting; the town planners had chosen their spot well. The restaurant was built on a raised plinth with a glass front that opened up the view to the distant snow-capped mountains, up here with nobody watching Levar relaxed a little. He went to the trunk of his car and pulled out a bottle of sickly sweet Abkhaz wine and a dirty plastic mug. "This place was a fine restaurant, you needed connections to get a table. I heard Beria ate here". We both sat in silence and drank the sickly sweet wine gazing out at the view. Talk of Beria and the images that his name conjured up brought back the feelings of unease I'd felt since entering this town. As we finished the last of the wine Levar asked if I wanted to see anything else but I'd seen enough and did not like what I had seen.

I'd visited run down towns all over the former Soviet Union in search of reminders of the near past but this place was different. The difference was that in other towns and cities there had been small reminders to the past in a sea of steadily growing modernity, a krushevka building surrounded by glass office buildings, a crumbling Soviet bus stop mural plastered with posters for an Ace of Base concert, an abandoned fishing boat. They were subtle reminders of the late Soviet period. There were of course two Soviet Unions: Pre-Stalin's death and post. Post-1953 was Yuri Gagarin and Sputnik, it was Glasnost and the Moscow Olympics, it was Alla Pugachova pop songs and Tarkovsky films, it was Kvass dispensers and Cheburashka cartoons. It was a familiar place that on the surface at least was not too different to our own countries. I could have found a place for myself in that world. Tkvarcheli was not of that world. Tkvarcheli was built in the early 1940's,a nastier more vicious period. And it did not just offer a glimpse into that time; it seemingly still inhabited it. 

The abandoned apartment buildings on the traffic circle overlooking the only road into the town were too well built to have been built for the workers; instead they were built for the nomenclature of the Stalinist period: party cadres and their families, securitat men, directors of the factories. And nobody achieved those positions in those dark days without having blood on their hands, without handing over a list of names, without reporting to someone. Nobody got to live in the well-built apartment overlooking the park in Tkvarcheli unless they were able to mute the voice of their conscience and do certain despicable things. Up there looking out of their apartment windows they would have seen all who came and went into the town, making mental notes. The coal mine, the life blood of the town would have been mined by the hands of prisoners, people torn from their homes and dumped here. Nobody would have come to this damp valley unless it was through force or instruction. The town was built to supply coal to the Soviet industrial machine; quotas would have to be filled with dire consequences for ones that were not met. And how did those prisoners arrive in the town? They walked along the very platform I'd walked on at the railway station earlier. The abandoned restaurant I was sitting in had not been not for the town's folk to enjoy but for the ruling elite and that meant people implicit in crimes. The cold stares, the paranoia, the constant watching as we drove past – it was too real. I'd always wondered how it would have been to have lived in the Soviet Union in the height of Stalin's paranoiac reign where nobody was to be trusted, where you were watched and spied upon by your closest neighbours and family. Where there were certain buildings you dared not walk past because of the horrors contained within. Now for the first time in my travels I felt the faint touch of its tentacles, the first sting of fear and despair. Tkvarcheli was a cruel place, sodomised by its own collusion with history. Lavar sensed it and had tried to warn me without verbalising the fact. And now I had come to sense it too. Tkvarcheli was a concrete testament of man's inhumanity to man. 

We drove back from the restaurant along the half deserted streets passing the more Stalinist buildings. A man in a suit ran out of a building towards us shouting in a language I did not know, Levar accelerated past him. I watched him in the wing mirror as he pointed at our car whilst frantically shouting at a passersby. I turned to look at Levar for an explanation but he was staring ahead,jaw tensed in the direction of the road out of town. I was glad to be heading there with him.

To see the full set of photographs from Ben's trip to Abkhazia, please click here.

Too powerful not to share

Between comparisons to the recent events at Fukushima in Japan and the recent passing of the 25th anniversary of the disaster at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, Chernobyl has gotten a lot of press recently. Most of the articles deal with the current situation of the reactor itself, the ruins of Pripyat, and/or the desolation of the exclusion zone within Ukraine. Not much is currently being written detailing the experiences of those directly affected by the disaster back in 1986, and not much has been written in general discussing the effects of Chernobyl on Belarus. However, a recent article in Eurozine entitled The Chernobyl Nobody Wants by Barys Piatrovich examines his personal memories of the event, as seen from the Belarussian side of the border. It is by far the most moving account of the disaster that I have read, and I highly recommend reading it.

When you're finished reading Piatrovich's article, you should re-visit the photos taken by Desolation Travel's Ben R. in the Belarussian dead zone, which can be seen here, and re-read his blog post from his trip as well. Several of the places which Piatrovich writes about were visited and photographed by Ben are mentioned in Piatrovich's piece (specifically Khoiniki, transliterated by Ben as Hoiniki, Хойники in Russian, and Homel/Gomel/Гомель).

Kyrgyzstan: Faces and Places from 2009

Balykchy, Kyrgyzstan - A Town On The Edge

by Ben R.
To see the complete set of photographs accompanying this post, please CLICK HERE.

I'd heard a lot about Balykchy whilst living in Bishkek (the capital of Kyrgyzstan), and without exception nobody had a good word to say about the place. When I quizzed people as to what the town was like, I usually received a grimace as though someone had just let off a bad smell in the room merely by mentioning its name. Everyone I asked in the nation's capital told me of the squalor that would await me should I travel there. When I mentioned that I wanted to visit the place people would try to persuade me not to as though the town of Balykchy was a national shame that a proud people preferred not to show to outsiders. "Go to Cholpon-Ata, it's much more beautiful" people would say but Balykchy and the horrors it held, or not, had gripped me. I had to see for myself.

On a Saturday morning in February I took a taxi across the city to the main bus station looking for a ride East to Issyk Kul's western corner. I found a mini bus that would be passing through Balykchy on it's way to somewhere else and squeezed into a seat next a young Kyrgyz man in the pre-requisite shiny black jacket and cap. The bus wound its way through Bishkek's traffic before joining the main road towards the lake. I settled in with my knees crushed against the seat in front and stared out of the window watching the world pass.

About 5 miles out of Bishkek I was reminded of the corruption endemic in the nation as our bus was flagged down by a traffic policeman. I watched our driver intently as he walked over to the policeman and in full view of passing motorists handed over a small wad of som (Kyrgyz currency) into the policeman's hand, disguising the action in a handshake. The policeman put the money in his pocket without looking at or counting it and stared down the road for his next payday. It was modern day highway robbery. I spent the next part of the journey wondering how the economics of these transactions worked. Did the policeman share the money with his superiors, how did he choose who to stop, did he have to pay a superior to get this lucrative spot on the main Bishkek to Almaty highway? And what of the drivers who had to pay, was there any point in refusing or speeding on without stopping? I doubted it. I suppose that just like in other countries when you buy a car you accept that you will have to pay for road tax or a motor testing certificate; in this part of the world you accept that a kickback is part of owning a vehicle. If you didn't like it I suppose you just bought a bicycle.

The road passed Tokmok, with its Soviet jet fighter guarding the entrance, before heading out into a barren river valley that skirted the Kazakh border. Kazakhstan was only 500 metres away in distance but a lifetime away in potential. The giant that is Kazakhstan is blessed with huge quantities gas and oil whereas Kyrgyzstan has little to offer the outside world except for, it seemed, land for foreign military air bases.

As we neared the bottom of the mountain range that separated the valley from Issyk kul the road deteriorated, every bump and boulder we hit jarred my knees against the seat making the journey more of an endurance test then anything else. Soon however the gears were crunched down to a lower number and we began our slow ascent up to the pass. To our left, far below were the murky waters of the river Chui, and to our right were the barren mountains of the Alatau range, which had the most amazing clouds I'd ever seen. Running up the faces of the mountains were long slim clouds hundreds of metres long like giant children's slides. I'd never seen anything like it before. We reached the top of the pass and hitting a higher gear began the descent towards Balykchy. It suddenly became warmer.

A sign let me know we had entered the outskirts of my destination. A low built dusty town spread out before me, indistinguishable from other such dusty towns I'd seen in this part of the world. It was the kind of place you would film a modern day western - there was even some sort of tumbleweed blowing across the road. We drove down what appeared to be the town's main road to the bus station. On the side of the road stood women with kerchiefs on their heads selling dried fish on string. I didn't get the impression they were doing much business. We pulled into the town's bus station and I was immediately surrounded by fish sellers as I stepped of the bus. I didn't really have a plan except to have a look around before getting the evening bus home. At one end of the parking area leaning nonchalantly on his Lada taxi was an old Kyrgyz man. I told him that I had heard a lot about Balykchy and asked him to show me what it was really like. We negotiated a fee and set off; I could not have found a better guide.

I didn't need to ask questions as he began pouring out his life story and the town's history in torrents of words as though he had been in solitary confinement for years and I was the first person he had been able to talk to. Little bubbles of spit landed in all directions as he hurriedly pointed out 'landmarks' and told me what they were. A lot of the government buildings seemed disused and locked up but that could have just been because it was a weekend. There was not much happening in town, no markets bustling with shoppers and traders, no lovers strolling arm in arm under the warm sunshine… it was just dead. But then I suppose in my own country it is only really the high street that provides atmosphere and noise and vibrancy; take away people's disposable incomes and you are left with the basics of life with little in the way of distraction. That was my impression of Balykchy, life had been reduced to its bare minimum: there was a petrol station, a food shop, a cafe, a bus station, a railway station, and nothing else. Nothing else was needed.

"I'll take you to the docks, that's really what this town was about......" the driver breathlessly said as we swerved to miss potholes and stray dogs. We turned down a small track towards the ship yard, its main building topped with a torpedo motif as they had tested submarines here in Soviet times. We parked by an old Soviet mural showing, amongst other things, the muscular Soviet-Erectus, arms thrusting a Soviet flag skywards. None of the people depicted on the mural had Asiatic features, the triumvirate of planners studying a map were all Caucasian. The Asian end of the empire always knew its place in the order. They were equal, but some were more equal then others.

I approached the gates and a guard came out of his hut to ask me what I wanted. I asked if I could enter to photograph the abandoned fishing boats I could see in the distance but was told it was not allowed. Of course the words 'not allowed' are merely the opening gambit in the inevitable negotiation, nothing is really 'not allowed' in the former Soviet Union, unless you don't have money. I paid him a 100 som and removed my lens cap. There were rusting hulks beached on the shore. Abandoned repair jobs lay scattered amongst steel debris, old rivets, drill bits and porthole hinges. I walked to the waters edge, here brackish, and clambered on board a beached boat long stripped of anything of use or worth, even the window panes had been removed probably to be used in someone’s dacha or as a motorcycle screen for a Ural.

An old woman appeared out of the reeds with a shopping bag on her way to the shop. I asked her when life was better, now or in the Soviet days. It's a question I’ve often asked, but here the answer was in the junk strewn yard in which I was standing. Balykchy was once a thriving fishing port. Fish were caught here and sent from its rail station all over the USSR to be eaten by families from Leningrad to Vladivostok. Ship building was also a massive part of the local economy. The importance of boats on the local economy can be found all over the town in unexpected places: a motif on a padlock, a boat carved into a wooden fence. That was all before the collapse. Nothing was built here now and it was hard to imagine a time when it ever would be again. Without a subsidised economy, building boats so far from an ocean made no economic sense, and Issyk Kul itself has little need for ships.

I returned to the car and my driver continued his monologue about the town. "I worked in the factory myself, most of the town did, but then our directors started paying us late. We waited months to get our pay, then when we complained, the directors started mentioning ideas like paying us in fish, like we were performing seals! It was then that we knew that we'd been bent fucked by the party. That was when I decided to leave the factory and do this instead." He patted the dashboard paternally.

We drove to the residential area, and pulled into a large dusty area surrounded on three sides by apartment buildings. One of the buildings was abandoned, seemingly having never been completed. A group of Kyrgyz teenagers were hanging around. I asked them to show me inside the building. It was empty except for the occasional mattress on the floor. Some of the walls had graffiti on them, names of western or Russian music groups, English swear words and loving laments ‘Maksim ya tebya lublu, no ti menya ne lubish.’ (Maksim, I love you, but you do not love me.)

I returned to the car to continue my tour. "I'll show you something you wont believe" the taxi driver told me, "we call it our Iraq!" We drove to a dusty plateau overlooking the top of the town along a dusty track that seemed to be capable of bursting our tyres at any moment and then I saw it. Spread out before us on a gently sloping hill was a sight quite like anything I'd seen, a scene of utter desolation. The whole area was a wasteland of rubble, maybe 30 or 40 ruined houses, their walls shattered. These were not just houses that had just been left to fall into disuse, these were houses that had been smashed to bits, crushed to rubble as though by some great hulking fist from the sky, like you see in the early Soviet propaganda posters of a giant peasants fist smashing a Kulak’s house in retribution for grain hoarding. Just the footings were left where once had stood family homes.

It truly was like a war zone; Dresden after the raids. I walked about photographing the destruction and saw a wooden house in the distance, seemingly occupied. I poked my head over the fence and startled an old Russian woman tending to her garden. "I came with my husband in ‘67, it was a beautiful place. My children grew up here, there were never any problems. Neighbours would always help you, but not now. Everyone thinks only about themselves. My husband died in ’87; at least he never saw what we have become." Her children had left, gone to Russia but she would not return. "This is my home. My children call me from Russia telling me to come, but what for? I'm old and I don't want to be a burden, let them live their lives."

We went for something to eat in a cafe where my driver seemed to know everyone, "I have a famous journalist from The London Times" he mischievously announced. We were joined by an elderly Kyrgyz gentleman. I asked him about the future of the town, "Nobody cares about this place, nobody. You see our President* drive through on his way to Cholpon-Ata. We say that the reason for his blacked out windows is not so that we can't see him but so that he isn't reminded about us. They're all bandits. Our mayor is another one, what has he ever done for us?" I spoke to others all telling sad tales of a town that was seemingly falling into oblivion. Another man told me how the town's electricity supply was cut for 12 hours every night. It did not surprise me; I couldn't imagine how the population could afford to pay their bills as it was. Surprisingly another man told me that the municipality cut off the water supply in the summer, I couldn't imagine why. (*This was before the April 2010 revolution that ousted now former President Bakiev.)

I have visited economically deprived areas in other parts of the former Soviet Union but this place had a feeling unlike any other I'd visited - and I realized what it was. There was no hope. In the run down areas of Belarus the people had placed their faith in an autocratic president, in Russia they had their "Real Man" (Putin), the Moldovans I'd met in the backwater of Unghen had hoped for EU accession, but what could the residents of Balykchy put their hope in? I pondered the question but drew a blank. Despite it's location on the shore of one of Central Asia's wonders, tourists would never flock to Balykchy in the way that many did to the other towns such as Cholpon Ata. Balykchy was always a place of industry and trade, lacking the sandy beaches and stunning backdrop of the other areas of the lake and it lacked tourist infrastructure. Who would invest millions in constructing hotels in this wind swept town? No, Balykchy had known the good times but now it would have to live on those fading memories. It was the 'Tomsk' of Kyrgyzstan, always knowing its past was greater then its future.

My driver took me back to the bus station. Whilst I was heading back to the capital's bright lights, the residents of Balykchy would be settling in for another dark night without electricity. I paid my driver and thanked him for his tour of Balykchy. As I boarded the bus he shouted out "Next time go to Cholpon-Ata, it's very beautiful!"

To see the complete set of photographs accompanying this post, please CLICK HERE.

Transdniester: A Guide by Ben R.

[To see the full set of photographs accompanying this post, CLICK HERE.]

Transdniester or Pridnestrovie Moldavian Republic to give it it's full name (from here on refered to as PMR), is a small slither of land covering just over one and half thousand square miles wedged between the river Dniester's east bank and the Ukrainian border to the west. Famed as being one of the 'Breakaway Republics', it has a reputation as both a hotbed of gun running and criminality and also as a place where it is still possible for a traveller to step back in time to something reminscent of the Soviet union. People who manage to cross the border with their wallet in tact will find themselves in a land of juxtopositions. Soviet trolleybuses, Yuri Gagarin statues, Soviet buildings on the one hand and modern football stadiums, car showrooms and western style supermarkets on the other. If you are coming form Moldova people will warn you against going, citing banditism and criminality as reasons to avoid it; don't listen, the people are friendly and the streets are safer then Kishinev's. Go now to see a small country desperate for recognition from the world at large. PMR, Europe's last frontier?

Why is it a breakaway republic?==================================

As the USSR started it's final death throws, republics began to assert their political freedoms given to them through Gorbachev's reforms. On August 31st 1989, the then Supreme Soviet of the Moldavian SSR voted to make the Moldovan language the only official language of the republic with Russian reduced to a second language. This had the impact of alienating the large Russian and Ukrainian population of the Moldovan SSR who due mainly to historically reasons had settled on the eastern shore of the river Dniester. Culturaly, historically, and linguistically Russians and Ukrainians are a distinct group from the Moldovans who are non-slavic and linked to the Romanian/latin culture. In the 1990 PMR declared itself a newly formed republic within the USSR, calling itself the Pridnestrovian Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic, seceding from it's place within Moldavian SSR proper. Despite then Soviet premier Mikhail Gorbachev anulling the decision of the Tiraspol Soviet no troops were sent in to uphold the presidential decree and hence the newly formed republic was left to consolidate it's place. Ethnic attacks took place on both sides of the cultural divide but it was not until after the USSR ceased to exist in 1991 that war proper broke out between the two sides. In the spring of 1992 clashes intensified and turned into all out war along the banks of the river Dniester. Fighting was most intense at Bender since the main bridge across the river is situated there and the main road into the capitol, Tiraspol. What should have been a swift victory for the army of the newly formed republic of Moldova was not so, as stationed in Tiraspol was the Soviet's 14th army who entered the fighting on the PMR side in the summer and fired on the Moldovan forces. With Moldova unable to reclaim it's lost territory and the possibility of losing more on the western bank a ceasefire was agreed on July 21st 1992. Fortunately the ceasefire has held ever since, although resentment particuarly on the Moldovan side runs high. PMR gained a degree of independance, whilst Moldova lost not only at chunk of it's territory but also a huge chunk of it's industrial output.

Independance, union with mother Russia or re-joining Moldova? Time will tell what will become of PMR.

What is it like there?======================

Actually surprisingly normal, the first thing you will realise is that it is not correct to call it a Soviet playground. If coming from Moldova you will notice how much cleaner and better run the place is. The population are free to travel outside it's borders and most people hold three passports, Russian, Moldovan, and the PMR passport. People sport European fashions, tour companies offer trips to Egypt and Dubai, there are foreign tv channels and internet access, etc. Public transport is eficient and subsidised. There are pizza restaurants, nightclubs, hotels. There are also of course Soviet paraphanlia, Lenin busts, parks with names like 'Peace', streets bearing the names 'Youth' and other names the Soviets were fond of labeling things. But there is a modern football stadium and a modern car showroom all owned by 'Sheriff' the ruling elite's all encompassing company. Infact If you spend a summer's day lazing by the river eating ice cream, talking to the locals and making plans for the evening you would be forgiven for thinking you were in a 'normal' country much like any other in Europe, but then on the way back to your hotel you will notice the policeman in the car watching you, or the same face re-appearing throughout the day and you remember that not all is quite as it seems in PMR.

Getting there
===============

Flights: There are no international flights to PMR. The nearest airports are Kishinev in Moldova or Odessa in the Ukraine. Both are within a couple of hours by taxi from Tiraspol. You can fly to Kishinev from European capitals for vast ammounts of money considering the distance, or better yet fly to Romania with Wizz air and take the train from there (most nationalities do not require visas to enter Moldova). Flights are available to Odessa with Baltic Air and other non budget European airlines.

Bus: There are regular bus services to Tiraspol from both Odessa and Kishinev. Tickets are cheap.

Marshrutka: From Kishinev they run every hour (and vice versa).

Visas and invitations=========================

You may enter PMR without a invitation or visa for a day i.e no overnight stops. I was told I had to be out by 10pm. At the border you will be asked to fill in a form and pay about 50 cents to be granted entry. To stay longer you will need an invitation from a citizen of PMR. The best way to get one is through the website marisha.net where you can also book apartment rooms. You then take the invitation to the OVIR office in Tiraspol to register. It is not expensive.

Avoiding Border Shakedowns===========================

I will describe the main border crossing between Moldova and PMR outside of Bender.

I have always walked across this border. The first thing you will do is be waved through by Moldovan soldiers who will look at your passport wish you good luck. Along the 250 metre walk across no mans land you will notice bunkers with machine gun barrels sticking out. If either side attacked, this is the route they would take. Eventually you will reach the PMR side where a soldier will meet you and bring you into a hut. This is where any shake down will happen, they will ask how much money you have and check your passport ask why you want to visit, etc. I have always found them to be friendly. Both times I crossed the border the chief asked for a 'Present' with a smile. I was happy to give $5 just so that I have a story to tell and I like to spread the wealth but it would not in my opinion be a problem to refuse. Just keep it jolly and plead poverty with a smile. After the hut you will go to a glass fronted building where you join a queue, you will need strong elbows to get to the front and nobody tells you anything. Just fill in the form and hand over the small ammount of money then you will be given a piece of paper and are free to cross the border. If you have walked across, then border guards will flag a car down for you and insist the driver takes you into Bender or you can walk into Bender which will take 30 minutes.

Changing money==============

Your first opportunity to get the local currency, the Pridnestrovian Rouble will either be to strike a deal with the woman who works in the drinks shop immediately after the border on the right or in Bender, the first town you will come to. There are exchange booths in Bender's market place or in the bank or supermarket exchange booth. When I was there the Rouble was trading at 10 to the US Dollar. You can exchange Euros, US, Hryvna, Moldovan, Russian Rouble, and – if you are lucky – the British pound.

Getting Around===============

Trolleybuses and marshrutkas ply the road between Bender and Tiraspol which is a 20 minute journey across the heavily protected bridge over the Dniester. Prices are cheap. Taxis are also numerous, negotiate before setting off.

Accomodation=============

When I visited, the town of Bender was under curew so Tiraspol was the only real option for overnight stays.

Hotel Druzhba

The cheapest places are rooms in apartments which can be had for about 20 Euros a night. Again,

marisha.net is the best source of apartments in Tiraspol. She can put you in contact with a family who rent a room in the centre of town. The splurge hotel is the Timoty which offers near western comfort at very western prices. The Hotel Druzhba was closed when I visited, which leaves the Aist. The Aist (Stork) is a Soviet creation unchanged since soviet times. It has a bar/disco downstairs and a bar on the upper floor, it's like stepping into the 70's with out of date decor. It has rooms with antiquated furniture, hard beds, horrible bathrooms, and creaking balconies. Apparently there are single rooms with shared shower for $20 US. The service is also terrible. I'm sure there is no need to book ahead, it was empty when I visited at the height of summer.

Food and Drink===============

Tiraspol's two main places are Andy's Pizza which does suprisingly good pizza and other dishes and for more of a splurge there is the German restaurant on the main square. I forget it's name but there is a statue of a fat German cook outside so you can't miss it. It's terrace is the perfect place to people watch in the summer and the food and serice are excellent. Drinks were expensive however.

For a drink and a dance you can try the Aist if its sleazy atmosphere doesn't put you off or my favourite place was an underground bar on the left of the main square. All western brand drinks are available aswell as the excellent 'Kvint' cognac, PMR's most famous export.

A great thing about PMR is that you find babushkas selling fresh Kvas on street corners for pennies. Delicious.

In the summer one of the river boats moored up on the Dniester apparently becomes a disco but I never visited it to confirm. There was a nightclub in Bender by the main market but how that navigated the curfew I have no idea. There are clubs in Tiraspol but I never visited any.

Things to do================

Not much! PMR is not really a place to go and do things, it's more of a place to go and soak up the atmosphere, meet some locals,drink some Kvint. In the summers the locals head to the beaches of the Dniester to sunbathe and socialise. Summers here are extremelly hot, bring suncream! You could watch FC Sherrif play in their stadium. They reguarly play in European competitions against top sides. A tour of the Kvint Cognac factory where you can have tastings of vintage bottles is apparently well worth it although I sadly never had the time. There is a funfair that has seen better days in Bender, just down the road from the border. The most interesting thing to do for the tourist I suppose is to wander the streets photographing Lenin statues. I was never stopped by the ever present police from photographing anything. Outside of Tiraspol there is a church which people recommended I visit but you will probably need a taxi to get there. Again 'Marisha.net' offers trips to a country farm in the north of the country where you can ride horses and experience village life for a few days.

Things to buy================

Kvint Cognac is worth a buy, the main factory shop has the best prices. Tiraspol has a bookshop where you can buy PMR maps and postcards.

[To see the full set of photographs accompanying this post, CLICK HERE.]

Dead Lands of Belarus: Travels Along A Desolate Border by Ben R.

[To see the entire set of photographs accompanying this post, click here.]

The above is a map of Belarus. The areas in varying shades of red are those affected by radiation from Chernobyl, with the darkest shades of red being those most contaminated.

I'm fascinated by maps. I spend hours tracing my fingers over them, following winding tropical rivers, exploring distant mountain ranges, following the contours of jagged borders, imagining what those places are like. It was whilst exploring a Soviet road atlas that my finger was drawn over to Belarus, that unknown land of our great continent. As I traced my finger over the map, following roads and contours, I noticed that in the far east of the country stretching along the Belarus/Russian border were the names of villages with their names in brackets; it wasn't something I had seen before. Sometimes there were clusters of villages, their names enclosed in said punctuation marks, surrounding a village whose name was not shackled by the two curved lines of English grammar... and then in another place, the opposite: un-bracketed names surrounding one small village which had its name in brackets. There were tens of them stretching from north of Gomel all the way down to Komarin in the far south of the country. I investigated and discovered that these were the villages which had suffered the brunt of the Chernobyl accident lying as they were in the path of the prevailing winds on that April day in 1986. They were the places that had been deemed uninhabitable by the Soviet/Belarusian government and had therefore been evacuated and scrubbed from history. My Belarusian friends had never been to any of these villages or the area in general so were unable to offer any more info regarding what exactly was to be found there, were the places bulldozed and buried or were they just evacuated and left intact in the hope of re-populating them one day? I decided to visit one.

The above details the places mentioned below.

It took me 2 days to drive from England to Belarus. I entered Belarus at a quiet border post south of Brest on a summer's evening and immediately stepped backwards to a more tranquil time. There were no advertisements, no street lights or signs of modernism, it was as though I was driving through one of Constable's paintings. The road east followed the Pripyat river, from which the town near where the Chernobyl reactor is located took it's name. The problem with driving in a 19th century land is that there are no road signs indicating the speed limit; consequently, I was radar gunned within an hour and fined $20. I drove on more slowly and as the night's blackness closed in I found a small parking area in the woods and parked up for the night, hoping sleep would come quickly so as not to be unnerved by the total silence and blackness of the woods.

I awoke to a misty landscape and drove on through vistas of barren farmland and huge tracts of forest, forests that would once have hidden partisans, forests that would now be hiding something just as deadly. The road was mostly empty, but occasionally I drove through small villages that lined the highway, just 20 or so Izbas their fences painted in the colours of the Belarusian flag. As I neared the East of the country the verge of the roads by the forests occasionally had wooden signs painted with warnings not to pick mushrooms or berries,no doubt due to radiation levels, yet I often drove past Babushkas selling buckets filled to the brim with pine nuts and berries, products no doubt harvested from the same forests. I stopped to buy some honey from a babushka and she asked me where I had come from. When I said I had driven from London, she asked me how many villages away that was; life beyond the village seemed to have little meaning.

The above sign says that it is forbidden to pick mushrooms and berries as this is dangerous to your life.

At Mozir I turned right following the Pripyat south to Hoiniki, there was no traffic except the odd Lada or Soviet built motorcycles. In the distance of some fields stood factories and commercial buildings that seemed long since abandoned, windows missing, roofs with holes in, and their approach roads overtaken by nature. In the entire drive I did not see any wildlife except some crows in the fields, no rabbits or squirrels dashing across the road, no deer in a field. South of Hoiniki I started seeing signs forbidding entry into the forest, radiation symbols on posts, signs saying permit holders only, and 'Danger' written on trees. I had arrived at the zone.

My plan was never to go into the official de-markated ecological disaster zone, that would be for another time when I could arrange permits and local knowledge. Of course I could have just crossed in unofficially to look around, but the idea of hiking through areas of possible cancer inducing levels of radiation without so much as a pair of Wellington boots or a Geiger counter wasn't really an appealing one. The places I was going to go were dangerous enough, as people had constantly warned me. Instead I wanted to visit one of the abandoned villages and then some places that were still inhabited to see how life was progressing there.

I studied my map and decided to head for the 'bracketed' village of Omelkovshina, just north of Hoiniki. I had decided to visit the villages north of Hoiniki as I presumed that as they were further from the reactor they might be somewhat safer radiation wise, I'll never know for sure. I followed the main road before finding the turning. At the crossroads was a small cluster of pretty Izbas and and a village shop outside of which sat some old men, as I turned and drove past them they all turned and stared at me, outsiders obviously didn't come here too often. The road passed through the small village of Dubrovitsa, in the middle of which stood a derelict building that looked like a bomb had exploded in it as rubble lay all around the building, I drove on past the village cemetery which was well tended to, the photos of the dead welded to the blue metal crosses as is the custom. Belarus was the most well kept country I had ever visited, people took pride in their houses and gardens and villages were all freshly painted in matching colours. As I came to the far end of the village the paved road ended and just a lonely rutted disused track led into the distance with the forest visible on the horizon. It was the road to Omelkovshina. I continued on, excited about what I would find. It felt like I was driving out of the known world into terra-incognita: 'Here be Dragons!'

Grave marker in the village of Dubrovitsa

I drove on following the road for about 6 or 7 miles entering the forest, civilization receding in my rear view mirror, there were no signs of life, no people, just dark woods enveloping me, and then, like in fairy tales, I entered a clearing and another world; I was inside the 'Brackets' for the first time. I'd reached Omelkovshina.

I got out of the car and stepped onto the old tarmac road of the village's main street and headed into 'town'. The village was dead, nobody lived here nor had done for a very, very long time, probably since April 1986, but I could see the signs of its previous inhabited self. There was the 'Dom Kulturi', its timbers intact, its wallpaper peeling but surviving Belarus's elements. There was the old village shop, overgrown and rotting, foxgloves now growing where once would have stood jars of essentials. Then there were houses, maybe 30 or 40, in different states of decay. Some were almost completely enveloped by nature, whilst others just needed a few minor repairs to be habitable again. Some houses had gardens that were so beautiful, filled as they were with stunning arrays of purple and red flowers and weeds that it looked as though they must have been tended by gardeners. Butterflies swirled about in the afternoon sunshine. As I entered houses, I found them to be full of swallows’ nests, baby chicks chirping their mouths open waiting for their parents to return with food. As I explored the undergrowth at the back of what seemed once to have been a government building of some sort I heard something large running through the bushes. I was gripped by a sudden fear; it was probably just a wild pig or a deer, but I suddenly felt vulnerable imagining escaped prisoners jumping out of the forest and attacking me with shanks. A body would never be found here.

Inside an abandoned home in Omelkovshina

I explored deeper, pushing open unlocked doors, finding signs of the village's previous inhabitants, a framed photo of a man in Soviet clothing, some Soviet banknotes, a rotten calender on a kitchen wall. I had stepped through a worm hole and entered The Soviet Republic of Belarus, circa the 1980s. I sat down at a kitchen table and ate my bread and honey as the previous inhabitants no doubt did 25 years ago. I explored some more, looking in sheds, exploring back yards and empty houses. One thing was certain, the village had been totally left to die, there was no chance of restoring it in the future should the radiation level drop to normal levels. It would be too expensive, and besides, the old residents had probably settled in their new lives with little inclination to return to the forest.

I walked down the main street to the far end of the village where a track led to another bracketed village that was marked on my map but the path was undriveable and I didn't feel like walking for miles through the forest exposing myself to even more radiation. I had read of huge packs of wolves inhabiting these places and other animals pushed to extinction in Europe re-building colonies here but I saw no evidence of this and presume that that is in the zone itself. I'd hoped to find an overgrown Lenin statue but it was a wooden village so my photo opportunity was not to be. It was unlike anywhere I had been on my travels before, streets of derelict buildings that within my life time had been full of life. I wanted to spend a long as possible there as there was always one more door to open, another window to peer inside, like finding an old chest in an attic and wanting to explore all its contents in the hope of finding some vital piece of information… but as evening approached I had to leave the village, I headed back to the main road, and back to life.

This part of Belarus had been hit hard by Chernobyl; abandonment and desolation was everywhere. Apartment buildings abandoned and uncompleted, warehouses being broken apart by nature’s instinct to replicate, roots cracking concrete, and the elements helping a hand. These rotting concrete structures affected me more then the village I had visited, the wooden village had returned to nature which seemed a natural course of events but concrete and steel are altogether different, thought of as impregnable and ever lasting - yet not here in the dead zone. And people were living here amongst it. A disused shop sat next to a village house with a well tended garden, life and death had become blurred.

I reached the city of Gomel at nightfall and checked into the old soviet monolith in the centre of town. Gomel was full of life, university students promenaded along the river bank in the summer evening, bottles of Baltika in hand. It seemed strange to be amongst such energy and life after a couple of days spent in rural Belarus. Yet Gomel was surrounded by contaminated land. The fear in 86 was that this city would need evacuating which would no doubt have made Gomel the largest ghost town on the planet but, the radiation mostly passed it by, the theory being that the heat given off by the city had pushed the clouds on to other areas. I explored the city which was built entirely in the Socialist Realist style, Corinthian columns with wheat sheaf motifs. I had an evening clubbing and getting drunk with Gomel's hip young things, who all seemed perplexed by my choice of holiday location. Discussion of Chernobyl stirred strong emotions amongst them, many angry at the then Soviet government's decision to seed the clouds to ensure that the radiation was dumped mainly on the rural backwaters along the Rus/Belarus border.

In the morning I stocked up on food for my journey to the border and in light drizzle I drove East, I didn't have long to see the first signs of abandonment. Gomel's outskirts were an array of abandoned factories, houses, and overgrown wasteland. Just past the town of Dobrush I headed south through empty fields towards the village of Korma. Rusted signs for long defunct state farms marked my way, rotting combines lay outside derelict chicken sheds, the dark brooding skies signifying impending storms. I drove into a small village not marked on my map, Horoshovka, situated just a mile from the fenceless border with Russia. It was an inhabited village, yet abandonment was everywhere. I parked and explored a derelict school, its climbing frames now covered in vines, textbooks littering the floor. I found an abandoned apartment building 2 stories high, I explored the ground floor apartments which were filthy and covered in dog shit; the rooms stank. On the balcony lay the rotten carcass of a dead cat, it's odour long since dissipated into the ether. I climbed the stairs and was looking around another empty apartment when I heard people coming up the stairs. Not sure of the reaction I would receive, being a foreigner photographing the village's squalor, I stood still hoping they would not hear me. I needn't have worried as they knocked on an apartment door and were let in. I couldn't believe that people were still living in the building which to all intents and purposes looked ready for demolition. It was hard to believe I was in Europe and not some war zone. The village reminded me of images I had seen of war torn Bosnia.

Inside an abandoned school in Horoshovka

I drove along the Russian border stopping to photograph and explore villages and buildings. There were no other cars on the roads, even in the villages I rarely saw anybody just the occasional hunched figures escaping the drizzle under bus shelters and shop doorways,a drunk knocking on someone's door to ask for money. I couldn't imagine what work people had here, there was no apparent industry, few shops, most were probably employed by the local state farm, the ones which had survived. I drove back up to Horoshovka, past caved in government buildings, an old stolovaya, its kitchen cupboards left where they had always stood, weeds growing to the height of the lintels.

My Belarusian road atlas showed a track leading across the border from Horoshovka to the Russian village of Lisiye but when I asked in the local shop where to find the path nobody could tell me, it did not seem as though there was any coss border traffic or contact. I eventually found an old man who directed me down a path, I drove down past abandoned houses, the same chirping of swallows audible through the glassless window frames. I parked up and continued on foot towards the Russian border, its boundary being marked by a thin line of trees in a field. I didn't have a Russian visa, and being caught would most likely have blacklisted me from ever receiving one, so I walked fast hoping nobody was watching, but as there was nobody in sight between me and the half a kilometer to the village so I walked on. I crossed into Russia and briskly followed the dirt track, avoiding the large puddles that had formed from the rain.

As I entered Lisiye I could tell I had left Belarus behind. Gone were the prettily painted picket fences and neat and orderly homes, instead were sagging wooden houses with broken machines parked in yards, a broken well, and a distinct feeling of neglect. I heard someone working on the other side of a fence so I popped my head over. The man working introduced himself as Stepan and he invited me in for tea nonchalantly as though foreigners were always coming into his village asking questions. I quizzed him about abandoned villages on this side of the border but the combination of my not so perfect Russian and his severe stutter made communication stilted and difficult, he said that there was an abandoned place a few miles away but I wasn't sure if he meant a building or village and not wanting to push my luck too far I decided not to find out and headed back into Belarus instead, relieved to have mde it without any problems.

Whilst looking at the local war memorial in Horoshovka I was approached by a local woman who invited me for tea at her elderly mother's Izba. I spent the evening with her being taken from house to house visiting the village's residents and being fed huge quantities of food everywhere I went. I heard some incredible stories over cups of tea from women who were sent to Germany for forced labour in the war, of the partizans, of Stalin's time, and then of happy times in this sleepy backwater of the former USSR where nothing much seemed to happen. And then of course of the fear after the Chernobyl accident and the slow death of the villages in this area, and the slow death of some of the residents to the diseases it had induced.

From what I could gather the young families had been evacuated to apartments or purpose built townships on the outskirts of cities such as Minsk, Zhlobin, Svetlogorsk; others had been sent further away to the Baltics or Russia. And then the government had pulled out, abandoning schools and infrastructure. It must have been a massive logistical nightmare, one which would always mean that certain people had to be left behind, and I suppose the elderly were the ones to whom that fate would fall. I had noticed in my journey that there was a distinct lack of children despite it being the school holiday period, everyone I had met had been elderly. However the elderly that I met seemed to bare no bitterness at being left in these contaminated lands by their government. The only complaint I heard was the lack of medical care in the villages. Life here is hard, toilets are outside, most don't have piped water, there is no central heating and these elderly work their small plots and take care of their animals in Belarusian winters when temperatures drop to minus 30 centigrade at times. Hence high blood pressure and arthritis seem endemic here, I was constantly asked about medicines we had in the West for such ailments, a person with just a basic medical knowledge and a well stocked medicine cabinet could do an immense amount of good in these parts and bring real relief to a lot of needy people.

My time was up. As I drove West I was overcome by a distinct feeling of melancholy. This area of Belarus had suffered a terrible fate through no fault of it's own; it had been decided by nothing more then the wind direction on that April day. It was an area of higher then average birth defects, childhood cancer, and industrial and social collapse, yet the people I met remained stoic and at peace, it seemed like a metaphor for Belarus in general. But there is hope. The Belarusian government has a policy of re-populating areas where radiation levels have fallen to within safe levels, re-investment of infrastructure is mentioned but Belarus is not a rich country and hence it will probably take generations for tangible change to happen. I hope the future will be kinder than its past. Sometimes at the end of travel blogs the author writes something along the lines of "go see it before everybody discovers it" - no such words are needed for Belarus.

***
This article was written by Ben R, and all photographs were taken by Ben R, and may not be used without his permission. To see the full set of photographs accompanying this post, please click here.