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JUNE 10, 2012 |
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BEHIND THE IRON
CURTAIN
PART 2 |
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www.ArkadysWorld.com
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SHOW APPEARANCES:
June 10,
2012
April 29, 2012
August 19, 2012 |
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Today's guest:
Arkady Faktorovich |
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ARKADY FAKTOROVICHT |
About Arkady
Born in Kiev, Ukraine.
Enrolled in Moscow State University of Technology and
Design in 1965, graduated from Kiev State University of
Technology and Design with MS in Engineering 1971.
After graduation, was drafted into the Soviet Army as a
private, nine months later was sent to
officers school for training, six months later graduated
with the rank of the lieutenant. Following the discharge
from the military, was working as an engineer, being
involved in experimental projects.
Emigrated to the West in 1978. Lived in Austria and
Italy, while my papers being processed. After an
interview with an American Embassy in Rome, received my
entry visa and a work permit to come to the greatest
country the world has ever known, our country, the
United States of America.
I lived in Houston, Texas. When my English skills
improved, was hired by Brown and Root, Inc. (later known
as Halliburton, Inc.) as a field engineer at the
construction of nuclear power plant in Bay City, Texas.
I moved to California and was hired by Bechtel Civil and
Minerals, Inc. as a Senior Engineer, in San Francisco. I
opened my own business in 1982. Married my wife in 1984.
Became a US Citizen in 1985. My wife and I are blessed
with three daughters and six grandchildren.
Life is good when one is free.
Thank you,
Arkady Faktorovich |
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Freedom is Life Without
Fear |
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Today Arkady will
talk about the Federal Reserve. However in his website
he has a paragraph to do about the relationship between
having money and freedom; he says:
Some people believe
that money gives you freedom. Is it true? Don’t take me
wrong; money is good, business is good and noble. But if
you do not have freedom of the individual, you cannot
have freedom of commerce and vice versa.
In my humble
opinion, freedom is life without fear. I can hear
you saying “Aren’t you afraid sometimes?” My answer to
you is, “Yes, lots of times”. That is the thing. This
country provides us with great opportunities and it is
up to us to live our lives the way we want and not how
the government or the bureaucrats want. The life of the
free is unpredictable and it is void of the security
that slavery provides. Fear of any kind, in my opinion,
is an evil force responsible for many evil things:
distrust, envy, greed, cruelty, betrayal, etc. Fear has
been the tool of control for God knows how long. It
always accompanies every evil deed.
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Life Behind the
Iron Curtain |
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Arkady
Fatorovich's |
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REF:
http://www.arkadysworld.com/newsandevents.html |
From "Dutra's The Paper" at Los
Banos, California. February 18th 2011:
Life Behind the Iron Curtain... and America Through The Eyes of an
Immigrant
By Arkady Faktorovich
PUBLISHER’S NOTE: I must tell our readers of my first meeting with
this man you are about to become acquainted. During last fall’s
Memorial Hospital Gala my wife and were sitting at the same table
with Mr. and Mrs. Faktorovich, We got to know about each other’s
history that evening. I believe you will enjoy his story, and his
love for our country. It is a valuable reminder to those of us who
may sometimes take for granted what we possess as natural rights.
For myself his message is refreshing because I, too was an immigrant
to our nation when I first came with my parents as a young child in
the 1950’s. Please read his story and I am sure you will be reminded
too what our country has been to the masses who have made the USA
their home. Thank you, my friend for sharing your words.
I would like to take this opportunity to thank Les and Sandra
Palocsay of the Los Banos Tea Party Patriots organization. I am
grateful to the Los Banos Rotary Club and its members for giving me
a forum to tell the story of my life in the former Soviet Union and
a life in America through the eyes of an immigrant. Great thanks to
Tony Dutra for publishing it in his paper. Also, thanks to you, the
reader, for your interest.
It began in Ukraine, where I was born and raised. I owe everything
that I learned in my early years to my grandfather and my father,
the wisest men I ever knew. They are responsible for instilling in
me the ability to reason and have independent thought.
My grandfather was an illiterate shoemaker who was able to do
complex computations in his head without pencil and paper. My father
was an architect, a highly decorated combat veteran of the Soviet
Army during World War II. He was in charge of vast construction
projects in the Ukraine during peace time.
My grandparents, my parents and I lived in a tiny two room communal
apartment (it was smaller than my garage here in Los Banos.) Before
the communists took over, my Grandfather was able to occupy the
entire floor (approx.. 5,000 square feet) in the same building, and
a large shop in the basement, and was able to support a big family
working by himself.
What I would like to say to you is something that we all mention in
our daily conversations. We hear it from our politicians,
broadcasters and writers and almost always take it for granted. What
I am talking about is freedom.
Just imagine being born in prison. Since you only experience prison
walls, guards and inmates, your perception of such surroundings
seems normal to you. There are no questions, no thoughts of life
beyond the barred windows. You have friends among your peers. You go
to school where you are constantly reminded how wonderful life is
inside the prison walls, how free you are and what a bright and
wonderful future lies ahead for the prison system and its
population.
You are taught that the world beyond the prison is ruled by an evil
named capitalism were people are exploited and do not have the
freedom and equality that only our world of social justice and the
dictatorship of the proletariat can provide. You are instructed that
religion is an opium of the people; God doesn’t exist. You can
realize a higher good only through loyalty to the Warden, the guards
and the ideals of socialism.
Your life is very secure because it is very predictable. The prison
will provide everything you need from the cradle to the grave (your
needs being determined by the guards,) and if the guards think that
you have too much, they will see that you share it with others –
voluntary, of course. Your life rolls on like a bowling ball, in one
direction only, ending with a small pension and an almost 100%
chance of dying of natural causes, provided that you do not
misbehave. If you do misbehave, of course, you can expect to be put
in the hole or slaughtered. The prison lets you fall in love, make
babies, listen to music, and even read books that are allowed for
printing. Censorship and snitching are wide-spread in the Socialist
Paradise of prison life.
At the age of eight, I learned that talking freely on the telephone
could possibly have negative consequences. My grandfather told me
that if I had any questions regarding politics, history, or
religion, it would be better to ask him or my father first and not
to discuss it publicly in school. As I started to read the
Constitution of the Soviet Union, it became apparent to me that
freedom of speech, assembly and religion that was promised by the
document was in startling contrast with the reality of life and
didn’t exist.
Growing up, I was able to talk to my Grandfather about the past and
present and what it was like to live without socialism; life during
World War I and World War II; surviving pogroms (we are Jews) and
his perspective of who was involved and why. If he did not have the
answer, he would tell me. He died when I was fourteen. I still miss
him a lot.
My father and mother were working long hours and I could spend time
with them only on Sundays. On rare occasions, my dad and I would go
for a stroll and talk about stuff. He died fairly young due to the
incompetence and negligence of Soviet doctors. I wish I could have
spent more time with him.
Entering adulthood before graduating from high school, my
perspective of life was totally changed from naïve childhood beliefs
to a complete distrust of the system and its dogmas. This was the
time when dreams of life outside the Soviet Union were taking hold.
I spent a lot of summer months at my aunt’s cabin on the river bank,
bringing with me some books and a little short wave radio receiver
for entertainment. At the time, all foreign radio stations were
jammed in the Kiev region, especially those that were broadcasting
in Russian or other languages of the Soviet bloc. Since the cabin
was at the edge of the jamming area, it was possible to hear music,
news and political debates thorough the crackling noise of radio
static.
It was wonderful to lie on a pile of hay and listen to the Ellington
and Miller bands and to look up at a bright night sky. I realized
that the socialist regime was not what it pretended to be and that
it was surviving only by the brute force of the government, the
total control of mass media and commerce, and the denial of basic
individual freedoms to the Soviet people. The world was bubbling
with information on the outside. And even then, I never thought that
life beyond the vast land mass of this socialist paradise would ever
be possible in my life time.
After high school graduation in 1965, I entered the State University
of Technology and Design in Moscow, Russia, and graduated later with
a Masters Degree in Engineering from the State University of
Technology and Design in Kiev, Ukraine, in 1971.
Two Months later after graduation, I was drafted into the Soviet
Army as a private. In less than a year, I was send as a cadet to the
officer’s school for training and graduated six months later as a
2nd Lieutenant. I remember sitting in the Army barracks reading the
newspaper. On the second page, there was a short article informing
the reader that the President of the United States, R. Nixon, and
Secretary of State, H. Kissinger, had arrived in the Soviet Union
for SALT II treaty negotiations. I dismissed the article as of no
importance to me. I did now know how profoundly that visit would
affect my life in the next few years. To this day, I have no idea
what these two men offered to the Russians in exchange for letting
some minorities emigrate and why the Soviet Government agreed to the
terms.
Upon returning to civilian life, I was hired as an Engineer for
experimental projects. As I found out later at work, most of the
people had the same political views as I did, but didn’t share them
openly (it wasn’t safe and helpful for one’s career.) I had to wait
five years for my military clearance to expire in order to file a
request for emigration. I filed my emigration papers in 1977 at my
place of work. It felt like a bomb explosion. There was a vacuum
around me. People that were considered my friends, who drank and
sang songs in my apartment and shared vacations, wouldn’t shake my
hand nor talk to me. Some people wished me well (when nobody was
watching.) There was a great meeting of workers for the purpose of
public expulsion of yours truly from the trade union. Some people,
whom I didn’t know, read speeches from notes calling me traitor,
public enemy, etc., just for my desire to leave the country. I do
not blame or hate them. I believe they did it as an act of
self-preservation. There wasn’t any certainty that my request to
emigrate would be granted by the authorities. However, my life was
irrevocably changed. Most “experts” told me that I would never be
able to leave.
Fortunately, they were wrong. A year and a half later, I was called
to the Department of Visas and Registration and was told that
permission had been granted for me to leave the Soviet Union for
permanent residence abroad. A month later, I boarded a train that
would take me from Kiey to a little border town between Ukraine and
Slovakia called Chop.
Upon arrival, I observed a very large crowd of people on the
platform. At the time, Chop did not have any hotels, so everybody
was camping inside the railroad station or outside with their
luggage. It was a nice, cold December morning. As I found out,
everyone was waiting for the train that was scheduled to depart at
10 pm and take us across the border. I had to take my place in line
to go through customs. The line was long and so was the wait. I
entered customs around 8 pm. The room was quite large with a
polished, long bar (approx... 4’ wide) with three customs officers
behind it. The border guards were letting three families at a time
enter the room for inspection. My luggage consisted of a small
briefcase containing two reference books in mathematics, a slide
rule and two changes of underwear (I was young and crazy, traveling
light.) The two families ahead of me traveled with their children
and grandchildren. The customs officers instructed them to put their
suitcases flat on the bar upside down, so the cover of the case
would be on the bottom. When the case is opened, all the contents
are visible. Then, they started to throw everything to the floor.
They didn’t do it to me because there was nothing for them to
“inspect.” I tried to help the families pick up their stuff off the
floor, but the guards told me that if I wanted to leave, I’d better
stay put and not do anything.
There was a little girl, about seven or eight years old, holding a
doll. She and her mother were taken to a separate room for a private
physical examination. I will never forget or forgive that kind of
cruelty to a child. After inspection, we were placed in the bog
holding room, waiting for a train. While waiting, the guards were
inspecting our papers, every ten minutes or so. We were informed
that the train would stay at the platform for only five minutes. If
you ever saw a movie portraying a mob storming the train, that was
it. As soon as the doors were open, everybody rushed outside
carrying their possessions. The entrances to the railroad cars were
quickly jammed with people and luggage. I found myself carrying
somebody’s luggage to the end of the last train car. My briefcase
was lost, but I didn’t care anymore. People were throwing their
luggage through the car windows, women were screaming, it was a
panic. The train started to move. I was able to hang on at the far
end of the car. Fortunately for me, the restroom door was open. I
got in. The stench was unbearable. I opened the window to let the
cold night air in, and observed what nobody else did, because
everybody was busy sorting their luggage and taking care of their
families.
The train was moving very slowly and then stopped. I could see tall
concrete poles with barbed wire stretched between them. On the top
of each pole was a metal bracket with a dozen or so strings of
barbed wire laid horizontally. On the bottom of that border wall was
a huge coil of barbed wire lying on the ground. If anyone managed to
climb that wall and jump, he would be caught in the wire coils
below. Beyond, I could see a machine gun tower with search lights.
It was as bright as day. The border guards armed with AK-47’s,
accompanied by German shepherd dogs, were checking every little
space between, below and above every train car looking for anyone
trying to escape. Then the train started moving slowly through
plowed ground. In about a mile, I could see the real border. It was
the same thing: poles, barbed wire, gun towers and search lights.
The train sped up and drove into the cold, dark, moonless December
night.
I was free. It was December 7, 1978. Ironically, that day was Soviet
Constitution Day, a document that promised so much and gave
absolutely nothing except misery, poverty and lack of freedom to the
Soviet people. After coming out, I saw my briefcase lying on the
floor of the car. Somebody had carried it for me. I sat down on the
hallway bench. I couldn’t sleep – so many thoughts and feelings. It
wouldn’t be possible to describe the first moments of being free,
shedding thirty years of my life, leaving behind my family, friends
and everything I knew, looking forward to the unknown, hoping and
believing deep in my heart that there was a better place for me
ahead. |
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REF:
http://www.arkadysworld.com/newsandevents.html
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Websites and
material mentioned on
today's program: |
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www.ArkadysWorld.com |
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Ask Arkady a question
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