Another Face of those 'damned' Russians

We are now in the year 1954/55, I am in year five and started to learn Russian - a compulsory subject in them days. Naturally, there was no English taught back then in East Germany. There was of course an advantage in learning the language spoken in the rest of the world - according to Sovjet propaganda! The rest of the world being everything east of the 'Iron Curtain' - the border between East and West Germany - and all the way to Siberia. There are two (maybe three) events embedded in my mind from that period. One was us boys using my uncles paddleboat to cross the river and meet up with the Russian soldiers 'incarcerated' on the other side of the river.

The Crew has landed - smoking is next

Let me explain: the other side of the river is a peninsula bordered by the river Staabe and Krimnick lake. It used to be a 'landed gentry' retreat with quite large buildings on it. The Russians commandeered the property since it was quite easy to fence off the frontage to the road. This made a garrison out of the old mansion and adjacent buildings. They stationed about 100 to 250 men there, presumably to npb trouble in the butt post the June 17, 1953 workers' uprising, to ostensibly present a strong face in the region. The poor buggers 'interned' there had little to do or enjoy. They were allowed into the nearest town, Koenigs Wusterhausen, about once a fortnight. During the warmer months (May to early October) us boys would use the boat to paddle across the river and spend time with some of them. They seemed quite comfortable with us, we'd take them whatever fruit or vegetables were in season. In return, they would share some of hteir rations with us, mainly some horrible tasting imitation chocolate and cookies. BUT - most importantly - they taught us to smoke!!

One of those 'well equipped' Russian soldiers

Their poison of choice was something called MACHORKA! It has been variously described as 'Farmers Tobacco' and 'Stalin shred'. They taught us that it was most important to use the right newspaper to roll the cigarettes! Neither 'Neues Deutschland', the mouthpiece of the ruling party in East Germany, nor any of the West Berlin/German newspapers were any good. ONLY the PRAVDA was of any use: because it had wide clear margins at the bottom and you could roll your fag, lick the paper and it would stick. So, there we are, elevn to twelve year old boys learning to smoke with great gusto! Now that would be just so socially unacceptable these days it isn't funny. How did we know and recognise these guys? Not only did we learn Russian, which was one aim of visiting them to practice our new-found language skills, we also spend many weekends with them sailgliding. YES, sailgliding. Somehow these guys had acquired a sailglider and volunteered their time, after all they had bugger else to do, to teach us whippersnippers how to operate a sailglider. It involved one of us sitting in the 'pilots' seat and being launched of a cliff face! The cliff face was an embankment into a disused quarry. We'd get enough speed and some lift to glide a few metres and then come to a grinding halt.

Sail gliding 101 - the pilot in a really safe position!

The soldiers were disperesed all over the 'airfield' to ensure we did not die. They had a long tow rope to retrive the glider at the end of the flight and labouriously hauled it back up to the top of the precipe to give another guy a go. It was always the same five or six guys who attended these sessions. And they were the guys we'd paddle accross the river to meet, swap supplies, and practice our Russian. By the way, the older boys were priviliged to actually soar in a proper glider. The Russians had secured a special winch which could launch a glider via a very long steel cable and a powerfull winch driven by a diesel engine. Small problem though: the beast was very temperamental, it would sometimes take ages to start. Might have had something to do with that the engine was about a thousand years old and really 'clapped out'. But them Russians were experts in kicking life into old machinerey. They had learned from a young age to make do with what was available. Repairing broken machinery using whatever they could find in a scrap heap gave them great satisfaction and they would positively beam with pride every time they got the winch beast to perform properly. Them were the days when TV was unheard of and we marveled at a few comic books (in COLOUR) smuggeled from the West. They would make the rounds till they literally fell apart.