GAGIK GELONYAN WAS AN ONLY CHILD AND HAD everything a respectable family could provide. After graduating with a major in management from the Presidential Academy, he was a runaway success in everything he did, including some things he should have actually run away from. So his doting mamma packed him off to the Institute of Technology in Israel.
All would have been good if he had graduated from that elite school and scored a job as an analyst in a bank somewhere, golden parachute, and all. But no. Instead, Gagik the golden boy set off with a bunch of other equally gilded youngsters for Tibet. Then on to Goa. And after all, that, once he’d found a place in his heart for the teachings of Buddhism, gone vegan, and sprouted a wondrous man bun, he realized that being an analyst was stupid. He had to turn himself around and buck the system.
Time was, someone like that would become a roving mercenary or a pirate. Now they join an ashram or make their home out in the country. Gagik opted for the absolutely exotic step of moving to the Russian countryside. If he’d gone to an Armenian village, that would have been the end of it. After eighteen months in those high mountain pastures, he would have scampered on down to Yerevan, had a shave, bought a Brioni suit, and headed back to Moscow. But a Russian village is something else altogether, because it has diddly squat to offer. No goats, no mountains, no electricity.
Gagik thought of Chekhov, whom he’d never read, and hired on as a village school teacher.
“And what would you be, young fellow?” asked Grandpa Vanya, eyeing the bearded young loiterer outside the school. “A gypsy, I dare say?”
Diese Geschichte stammt aus der November/December 2020-Ausgabe von Russian Life.
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Diese Geschichte stammt aus der November/December 2020-Ausgabe von Russian Life.
Starten Sie Ihre 7-tägige kostenlose Testversion von Magzter GOLD, um auf Tausende kuratierte Premium-Storys sowie über 8.000 Zeitschriften und Zeitungen zuzugreifen.
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Sidewalk Art
The lamentable state of Russia’s roads and sidewalks has long been fertile ground for memes and jokes. Irkutsk artist Ivan Kravchenko decided to turn the problem into an art project. For over two years he has been patching ruts in city sidewalks with colorful ceramic tiles.
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The Russian vaccine seems top-notch, but low public trust and a botched rollout remain formidable barriers to returning to normalcy.
the Valley of the Dead
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Food & Drink
Food & Drink
POLAR YOUTH
Misha Smirnov has the day off. There are the traditional eggs for breakfast and the usual darkness out the window.
Russian Chronicles
Russian Chronicles
A People on the Brink
Over the past century, the ancient people known as the Votes has been exiled twice, has seen its language banned, and has faced the threat of having its villages razed. Today, although teetering on the verge of extinction, it holds fast to one of the last rights it enjoys – the right to bear and to say its own name.
Tenders of the Vine
Visiting Russia’s Nascent Wine Region
Restoring the Future
A Small Town Gets a Makeover
Ascending Anik
Here I stand, on the summit of Anik Mountain, drenched to the bone amid zero visibility, driving rain, and a fierce wind.