Gareth Richard Vaughan Jones
A Selection of his Soviet Diaries, Letters and Articles
|
|
Gareth got out at a station at the border with Ukraine and walked along the railway track.
Talked to a group of peasant women. “We’re starving. Two months we’ve hardly had any bread. We’re from Ukraine and we are trying to go North. They are dying in the villages. They won’t give us tickets and we don’t know what to do. We can’t buy food for ? money ****** In the Ukraine. A little later. I crossed the border from Great Russia into Ukraine. Everywhere I talked to peasants who walked past. They all had the same story. “There is no bread. We haven’t had bread for over five months. A lot are dying. The first village had no more potatoes left and the store of beetroot was running out. They all said: “The cattle is dying. We used to feed the world and now we are hungry. How can we sow when we have few horses left? How will we be able to work when we are weak from want of food? Then I caught up
|
|
|
a bearded peasant who was walking along. His feet were covered with sacking. We started talking. He spoke in Ukrainian Russian. I gave him lump of bread. “You couldn’t buy that anywhere for 20 roubles. There is just no food.” We walked along and talked: “Before the War this was all gold. We had horses and cows and pigs and chicken. Now we are ruined. We are doomed.” “You see that field. It was all gold, but now look at the weeds.” The weeds were peeping up over the snow. “Before the War we could have boots, and meat and butter. We were the richest country in the world for grain. We fed the world. Now they have taken all away from us. “Now people steal much more. Four days ago they stole my horse. Hooligans came. There that’s where I saw the track of the horse. “A horse is better than a tractor. A tractor goes and stops, but a horse goes all the time. A tractor only works in certain times of the year, but a horse you can use all the time. A tractor cannot give manure, but a horse can. “How can Spring sowing be good? There is little |
Millet