Sliding on the Snow Stone (27 page)

Once Anna reached ten and Andriy was eight, they spent many weeks of many summers at
Tarasivka
, at the yearly camp that was held there. Not only did they immerse themselves in Ukrainian culture, it helped them to become more independent. The Soviets may have taken Ukraine from us, but they couldn’t steal it from inside us. Anna and Andriy grew up some more and started senior school, and I don’t know where those years went. They trickled by like rainwater on a window pane.

Every day I thought about my family back home. It tormented me to think about Mother, and what would have become of her. I hoped and prayed she hadn’t been harmed. I was never able to free myself of the regret that we’d left her on her own. And what of my big brother, Volodimir? I imagined him shivering in some ramshackle hut in the depths of freezing Siberia. I had no doubt that’s where he would have ended up. After all that had happened to me and my family, I still wanted to go home, to walk again on Ukrainian soil. To gaze across the steppes in the steamy heat of summer and drink in that blue, blue sky. I wanted to, once again, breathe that mountain air.

Mikola was a good friend to our family, and a frequent visitor to our house. I remember one evening, it was in 1974, he came round and we were playing cards and having a smoke and just talking in general when, there was a dull hiss, and all the lights went out. ‘Hell and fire, looks like a fuse has blown!’ said Mikola.

‘
Don’t worry, I’ll go and see.’

I fumbled my across the room, using the furniture to guide me, and pulled the curtains open to let in some of the light from the moon and stars. A gentle shaft of light from the sky above shot into my face and I was about to feel my way to the kitchen to the fuse box, when I spotted something. There were no lights on in any of the neighbouring houses. ‘Mikola, I don’t think this is just a fuse, all the lights round here are out.’ I grabbed a torch from a kitchen cupboard and checked all the lights and power sockets. They were all dead.

‘
You know what?’ I reported back. ‘Everything they’ve been saying on the news is true. The miners’ strike has caused this power failure. This is what they’ve been threatening. I’ve bought some candles just in case.’

I lit one of the candles, and was thankful that Maria and the children had gone to bed. Mikola and I smoked a few more cigarettes in the dim light, ‘I’ll tell you what this reminds me of,’ said Mikola, ‘it’s just like living under the Soviets. Nothing ever worked properly there under the communists. There are forces at work in England that would seek to drag it into a communist state. I wouldn’t be surprised to find there are Soviets here in England, trying to spread their propaganda and their doctrines. We know what that means eh, Stefan? It means poverty and persecution. I hope the Government stays strong.’

The power cuts didn’t last too long, much to the disappointment of Anna and Andriy. They enjoyed living by candlelight, it was magic to them, but for the rest of us, it was a relief to get back to normal.

Apart from the miners’ strike, and other minor industrial unrest that occurred at times through the seventies, the other dilemma we faced was the nuclear weapons race. The Yanks and the Soviets were locked in a battle neither could win. The rest of the world looked on, and swallowed their fear down, and pretended that everything would be okay. It just needed one madman to push a button and we’d all be fried, and the earth around us would be injected with radioactive poison. We lived day to day. All we could do was keep working and pay our way, just like all ordinary people do.

It was often hard, existing as a foreigner in a country not your own. Wherever you went, amongst the native population, it was as an outsider. We looked different and we couldn’t speak English so well. Sometimes, I’d walk into a shop and, as soon as I opened my mouth and spoke, the atmosphere changed. People hushed their voices and glanced sideways at me. I guess it was only natural really, so at the end of a working day I looked forward to coming home and relaxing, in a Ukrainian household, with my lovely wife and children. As they grew older, Anna and Andriy often preferred to spend time alone in their bedrooms. Anna would be reading a book or sewing, and Andriy was learning to play the guitar, so it was better for all of us that he stayed in his room, but one thing was guaranteed to get us all running into the living room, and that was when we saw anything to do with Ukraine on the television. There was a talent show called Opportunity Knocks hosted by a fellow called Hughie Green. One of us would be watching the show, and then a cry would go up, ‘Ukrainians on television. Quick!’ The children would scramble down to the living room from all parts of the house, and we’d gather together to watch. It would always be a troupe of Ukrainian dancers, boys and girls from somewhere in Britain who had been taught the traditional Kozak dances, the boys wearing the embroidered shirts and the
sharivari
, and the girls with lots of coloured ribbons in their hair, and also with embroidered clothing. I can’t describe the joy I felt to watch them. For five minutes, probably less, it felt to all of us that Ukraine was still alive.

There was also a film,
Taras Bulba
, an American production of the novel by Gogol about Ukrainian Kozaks. It starred Yul Brynner and Tony Curtis. Whenever it was on the television, we’d all gather together to watch it. We loved it. It was a part of our history when we had warriors who were prepared to fight our enemies, and it was something we needed to hold onto.

Our good friend Mikola passed away in April 1977, and as we stood in prayer at his funeral I wondered whether we’d all be under the ground before Ukraine might be free.

My 50th birthday came and went in the following year, and by then I’d pretty much given up hope of ever getting back home. England had been my home for nearly 30 years – much longer than the years I’d spent growing up in Ukraine. It was a strange situation to be in. I hadn’t chosen to leave Ukraine, but England was where I’d landed and I’d done my best to be a part of what was around me. All we Ukrainians did. We knew how to work hard, we earned every penny that was paid to us, and we were grateful, but it couldn’t change the Kozak inside us. Our eyes were eastern, that’s where we belonged. That’s where we should have been.

As we continued to look upon the world we began to see changes. In Poland, a fellow called Lech Walesa led a protest and a revolution against communism. Years later, following many battles, all carried out in peaceful protest, he succeeded in removing Poland from communist rule and in achieving independence for his country.

For Ukrainians the world over, hope began to build. Walesa had inspired us. If he could do it, then why not us Ukrainians? To break the communist chain that was locked around us, we needed to do something. Of course, it was easier for Walesa, because Poland was not actually part of the Soviet Union, but it showed the world that ordinary people didn’t want communism.

Anna and Andriy grew up some more and, in 1982, Anna got married to a fellow, also called Stefan, from Coventry. A traditional wedding was held in Stefan’s city and a reception at the local Ukrainian club. It wasn’t long before they produced our first grandson, Marko. The years were passing quickly.

In 1984, the mineworkers were at it again. Most evenings, we would watch the news on television to see what was happening, and I shook my head when I heard the mineworkers’ leader talking. The militants had the language of the communist, and I had no doubt the Soviets were infiltrating. For England to go through a revolution similar to the Russian one was unthinkable, but strange things have happened in the world. The forces of communism are like a creeping rash, they get everywhere and they aren’t easy to get rid of. Any opportunity to spread their doctrine would draw the communists like flies to an open sore. They would use any methods they could to feed the masses lies and propaganda. For a whole year the mineworkers battled, but Margaret Thatcher, the Prime Minister, beat them in the end. There were some bloody clashes with the police. The images on our television screens were graphic. The police were armed with truncheons and they weren’t afraid to use them. It was a war. Mrs Thatcher held on and used the brute force of authority to smash the miners back. They weakened, until their campaign faltered and died off. Many saw this as a heavy defeat for the working man, others as a victory for democracy. I was just glad the communists had faded into the background.

Then, in April 1986, something happened that was to carve a scar as big as a Kozak sword slash right across all Ukrainian hearts. It was the 26th of April to be exact. Easter had come and gone and summer was on its way. It was a time of year when there was always much to rejoice over. The flowers were beginning to jump up towards the sky in search of rays from a golden spring sun. People all around were coming out of their houses to tend their front gardens. To mow their lawns, and plant flowers to add colour into their own, and everyone’s lives. We didn’t have much garden at our house, but I tried to make the most of what was there. I grew vegetables in our back garden. They tasted so good, so much better that the ones from the shops. I could grow just about anything; people around us said I had ‘green fingers’. When people said things like that to me, it made me smile, but it also made me a little sad. It reminded me of my brother, Volodimir. Any green fingers I had came from him. On our land back home, we often worked side by side, and Volodimir had the knack, he had that bond with the land beneath him. Plants would push their way out of the soil up to him, to feel his caress. Under him, our garden grew, and I learned from him. We had plump, luscious tomatoes, cucumbers and rows of full of potatoes, carrots and onions.

On this particular day, I came in from the garden as the sun was setting, tired but contented. I pulled off my shoes and then Maria made me a cup of tea. I went through to the living room and turned on the television, and as I waited for the picture to appear, I took a few sips of tea. The early evening news broadcast was the one I liked to watch, to see what was happening in the world. The music at the beginning, with its dramatic stabbed notes, was just fading out and, as always, the newsreader’s face looked out at me. I took a sip from my cup and listened to him as he read the opening news story. The words
nuclear disaster
and
Ukraine
made me start. I dumped my cup on a side table and leaned closer. My heart beat so hard inside I thought it might burst, as I looked and listened in horror to a news story from Ukraine about a place in the north called Chornobyl. It was the site of a nuclear power station, and an accident had occurred. There was a film taken from a helicopter showing a pillar of smoke erupting from the tower. The newsreader confirmed this was releasing a gigantic cloud of radioactive dust into the atmosphere. I felt sick, right from my stomach into every bit of me. I wanted to stand up and kick the screen in, to stop the broadcast and break the television so I couldn’t look at it. Instead, I froze. I sat there, ready to explode, but motionless, like a statue, listening to the detail, and burning inside with hate for the Soviets. Damn them all to Hell! I watched as more pictures came in from Ukraine of fire-fighters trying to douse the radioactive inferno with jets of water. It wasn’t making much difference. The newsreader finished the broadcast by saying there had been some deaths, about 50 or so, and then the report finished. I was left with my head spinning and my heart slashed open.

Over the next few days, I listened to every news broadcast there was. I watched, in horror, as they continued to battle the radioactive fire. For 12 days, those fire-fighters worked tirelessly, with determination, with little consideration for their own welfare. They were heroes. The recovery operation was frantic and disorganised. The pictures on the television showed lead and sand being dropped into the tower from a helicopter to douse the flames. The day after, they found the temperature was rising once again, releasing further radioactive dust from the reactor. That was so typical of the Soviets! They had no idea how to stop the fire. They caused so much damage to our beloved Ukraine, they can never be forgiven. To poison our land in this way, to cause ill health with cancers and deformities in children, that could only be the act of evil madmen.

One day, I hoped a radioactive rain would fall onto their land, soaking into the water below, infiltrating everything around them. Let them taste it. Let them feel it. Let them sit and wonder where the next mouthful of decent food would come from, but not the ordinary people or the children. Just the leaders, those communist elite, those bloodthirsty villains sitting in the Kremlin scheming and plotting. How I wished I could burn that monstrous den of devils down. That’s what they deserved. They’d been only too eager to inflict years of pain and suffering on our Ukrainian nation.

I followed the situation at Chornobyl over a period of a few weeks. Much was written in the
Ukrayinska Dumka
on the subject, but words count for nothing, not when people are dying or placed in danger.

The nearby town of Pripyat, a town built for the purpose of housing the workers of the Chornobyl Power Station, had become a ghost town. All the dwellings had been abandoned, and worst of all, a newly built fun fair sat rotting. It never got used by the local children. The townspeople had worked hard to create prosperity in the region, to give their children a good life. As all parents do, they wanted their children to grow up free of fear and with every day full of smiles and laughter. It was taken away from them in the space of a few hours, when a radioactive cloud was allowed to cover the land like a toxic blanket. The people were left with no choice. Because of the Soviets, all the people of Pripyat were forced to leave their homes.