The Adventures of Kesha the Russian Boy

The Adventures of Kesha the Russian Boy
Konstantin Voskresenskiy

“The Adventures of Kesha the Russian Boy” is a coming-of-age story about the poet and engineer Konstantin Voskresenskiy, written as an autobiography. This fascinating account of the adventures of one young man takes place at a turning point in history: the early years of modern Russia, the following the collapse of the Soviet Union. This book is intended for a broad readership.

Konstantin Voskresenskiy

The Adventures of Kesha the Russian Boy

Foreword

Konstantin Dmitrievich Voskresenskiy[1 - Russian: Константин Дмитриевич Воскресенский], whose work until now has only been released in the form of poems and «The Tale of the Coronavirus», presents to the world this book of prose based on his own life. A rather bold undertaking, given the difficult subject matter: firstly, because of the difficulty journey of self-discovery throughout adolescence, when one's personality is ever-evolving and perceives the world differently on a spiritual level. Secondly, the time frame depicted was a whirlwind, with life shifting dramatically across a huge nation; this book captures life in the immediate vicinity of the capital Moscow. And thirdly, lacking any experience writing a book, Voskresenskiy relies purely on memory.

But those now reading this book see before them the final product; the difficulties have been ironed out, from key moments to tiny details. In this book, over thirty years of the central character's life and the country where he lives, works and indulges in literary creativity, emerge as a whole. It is a living, breathing organism with all its vital organs and functional features.

At the beginning of the story, we find the central character still a child, who like all children, is not too aware of himself in this world. He is growing, developing, and absorbing the good with the bad. He goes through periods familiar to anyone with experience of bringing up preschool and school-age children and how their minds work. Here we find inquisitiveness, a thirst for knowledge, bouts of negativity, first-time experiences and first disappointments.

In adolescence, the central character undergoes typical teenage «restructuring». He breaks away from the emerging set of values, sometimes in a very painful and frightening manner. His teenage years brought the need to «find himself», whereby he decided which path he would take on into the future.

The author depicts each of these stages with soul, fascination and directness, while maintaining a masterful hand. His creative truth does not contradict this depiction of his life, as can often happen with novice authors and other modern artists. Konstantin Voskresenskiy gave us a piece of work that, when reading, involuntarily takes us back to Russian classics about childhood, such as Nikolai Garin-Mikhailovsky's «Tyoma's Childhood» and Maxim Gorky's «My Childhood».

I hope that Konstantin Voskresenskiy's future as a writer will grow in such a way that this, what I deem to be, successful experience will only be further underlined by subsequent successes along his literary path.

    Sergey Smetanin[2 - Russian: Сергей Сметанин], Member of the Union of Russian Writers

Preface

Welcome, everyone. I am glad to present to you my autobiography. Both to those who know me personally, as well as the curious minds, thinking, searching and reading this book. Every person is a universe, a mystery and a real miracle. I'm sure each of you has something to say about yourselves, as well as recall and recant from your lives. But with this book I want to share my universe, my reflections, and talk about my adventures. This is not a memoir. This is about the very extraordinary life of an ordinary person from an ordinary family. And, importantly, it includes moments that have occurred in very few people's lives, especially in such quantities as in mine, or in the same order.

It is worth noting that this book does not cover the topic of love. On one hand, I could have written a separate edition of seven volumes on the subject. On the other hand, my story wasn't particularly out of the ordinary, so why tell the tale? Moreover, I covered this topic, albeit without commentary, in my first book: a collection of lyrical poems «In Your Name[3 - Russian: «Во имя твоё»]».

All of the names, dates and events recounted in this book are real and are not fictional.

Chapter 1. 1985. The Beginning

1985. Kesha

Let's start with the boy's name in the title of the book.

You must agree that naming a child is a fascinating but difficult task. Many parents will confirm this. In our day, my wife and I also faced this task. We cheated a little, naming our child after the saint of the month she was born. This practice in the Eastern Orthodox Church and Eastern Catholic Churches that follow the Byzantine Rite.

My mum decided to call me Innokenty, or Innocentius in its Latin form. I lived with that name for almost two weeks. Later it turned out that not everyone liked it, which she discovered when my aunt Nadia came to the baby shower. At the time, she was still at primary school. When they told her what I was called, she said, «Oh, I know, he should be called Kesha! I watched a cartoon yesterday about a parrot called Kesha…» My granny Marina lost her patience and emphatically stated that no grandson of hers would be called Innocentius. The boys would tease him at school!

But if this was no longer his name, then what was? They decided to write three names write on three pieces of paper – Ilya, Roman and Konstantin – and mum picked them out of a hat. Lo and behold, I became Konstantin.

To be honest, I would have been satisfied with the first name, but the one I ended up with is much more normal…

1986. My father's death

But changing names is just for starters. More significant events were just around the corner. When I was one year and five days old, I found myself without a father. My dad, Dmitriy Voskresenskiy, was killed while serving in the military at the (tender) age of 19.

You may not be familiar with how they recruited for the Soviet Army. Long story short, the USSR conscripted young men from the age of 18. Back then, they had to serve for two years. These days, lads tend to serve one year. This can be for many reasons, for example, men are excluded on medical grounds or defer their service because of academic or familial commitments.

When I was born, the Soviet military system, as strange and erratic as it was, gave my father six months leave to help care for me as a new-born. After that, they sent him 3,500 miles away to the remote Amur region on the border with China.

After five months of service, there was an attack by «unknown persons» on a military unit near the city of Blagoveshchensk, where my father was serving with his comrades. For his «main course» my father was served five bullet wounds, and gas poisoning came «for dessert». No, don't try and look up this news from 20th August 1986. The death certificate clearly states «Hemorrhagic Fever with Renal Syndrome» because «Killed by bullets and poisoning» is an unproven hypothesis in the eyes of the state. In fact, it's not even in any archives. This has been contested many times to Russian Defence Minister Sergey Shoygu, until in 2016, the Military Prosecutor said: «Would you care to explain who told you about this?» If you're not working within the military system or the state, there's no point in trying to find out what really happened.

Apparently, it doesn't matter how he died: in any case, Cargo 200[4 - Russian: Груз 200. A military code word referring to the coffins used to ship Soviet soldiers' coffins home.] means Cargo-200. Only my grandad was there to identify my father's body. But, oddly enough, it wasn't my father's father, but my mum's father, Nikolay Timanov. At one point he started to tell me about it, but then he stopped immediately and pressed pause on this conversation. He never got around to telling me before he passed away. Nonetheless, our family gathered much of what he probably wanted to say, even without him saying it out loud. After all, we had another source; my babushka's[5 - «Babushka» is Russian for «granny».] friend worked at the morgue the year father died, and she let a lot of information slip. Nowadays you can write to Putin (I've written, but more on that later). But back then, times were different. No one in our family ever tried to find anything out while the trail was still hot. I can't say I blame them, but I think they should have at least tried. Of course, it wouldn't have brought their husband, your son or brother back, but they had a little son, grandson and nephew to think of…

It is not difficult to assume that the death of my father radically changed both my fate and that of my mother.

1988. A New Dad

My mum was a beautiful young woman. Even with a baby in her arms she could stop a man in his tracks. After just one summer of being a family of two, with just 24 years between us, a new dad appeared. I don't remember this, since I was only three years old. I always called him «dad». We are still friends and get on well; he never said a word in anger or laid a finger on me. Actually, he preferred not to interfere, but just help out financially. I can't say it was the most successful strategy, but I'm eternally grateful to him. He gave me space to grow up by myself, without trying to forge me in his own image. I didn't have to match up to his standards. Some forethought and a light-touch are valuable qualities…

Chapter 2. 1988. First Shocks

1988. Went for a bite to eat

In the summer of 1988, a funny little thing happened in Yevpatoria, Crimea. Well, it wasn't that funny… I got lost. My mother and aunt Ira left me on the beach while they went for a swim. I'm sure they asked some other responsible-looking lady on the beach in a wide-brimmed hat to watch over me. But I'm also sure that she barely took a bit of notice at what I was up to, she was more interested in the sun, the sea, and the beach. When they came back from their swim, I wasn't there. They called out, shouting for me… Nothing. They ran all over the place and spotted me walking along the tram tracks chewing on a tasty bun.

«Where did you get this from? Where were you?» asked mum.

«I went for a bite to eat…» I said.

Oh yes… a small little man, but a hearty eater. Thank God that ended well enough that it remained funny and relatively short.

1988. Fire

Another unpleasant story happened the very same summer. Perhaps even more serious: there was a fire. I remember clearly how my grandmother's room in her flat on the second floor of a five-storey brick building was on fire. Thankfully, Grandma and everybody else were fine. Cars, fumes, people rushing around – that's what impressed me the most. This was the first time I'd seen such a commotion and crowd of onlookers. Of course, I didn't really understand what was going on, but the general anxiety made a real impression on me. Since then, every time I see a fire, I literally go numb and mentally fall back to this episode.

1988. Promising to cut my tongue off

So, summer ended, and kindergarten began, leaving a deep incurable wound in my soul. For me, girls were always the epitome of divine beauty. I don't know who taught me that or when, but it's what I believed. So, what stood out most to me in my kindergarten years? A scruffy blonde girl in a black-and-white plaid dress, smeared with porridge. A real mess like I'd never seen before. Good God, this harsh reality broke my little, naïve, childish world. I started to refuse to go to kindergarten, kicking up a huge fuss, for fear that I would have to see her again.

There was one girl I liked. I remember neither her appearance nor her name, but it doesn't matter. It so happened that our little beds were next to each other during nap time, so I started a conversation with her. «Hello,» I would say, «How are you?» As if I was greeting a stranger. Of course, the kindergarten teacher was quickly on me, promising to cut my tongue off for speaking during nap time… It sounded so threatening and so convincing that you would believe it yourself even now. Ever since that day I use my words carefully, often choosing to keep quiet. Because who knows what might happen…

1989. Forgetfulness

The challenges to my young psyche did not end there.

One day, nobody picked me up from kindergarten. I sat there late into the night until a relative who worked there picked me up. What was I thinking about? Nothing. I just sat there, still as a statue, watching out the window. Outside, everything was quiet, snowflakes were falling and covering the oaks and pathways. It grew dark.

A similar thing occurred during the summer school holidays. I was out all day, and in the evening, nobody let me back inside the house. It wasn't a nasty joke or out of unkindness, just, there was nobody home. And I didn't have a key. At about 9 o'clock in the evening, my neighbour, Vera's mother from flat number 48, took me inside. We all watched a children's TV show together, had dinner and went to bed. I was given a place to sleep in with Vera's brother.

In both cases, many years later, I heard very convincing stories about what difficulties had befallen my parents that meant they couldn't come and pick me up or let me inside. But the harsh truth is simple: both my mother and my stepfather were, at some point in their lives, drunks. I don't exactly have evidence, but I'm sure that while these things were happening to me, they were at my stepfather's place in a nearby town or at someone else's flat. I'm not blaming anyone, but, as it I often say in my anecdotes: «it left its mark…».

1990. Stutterer

I started to stutter at the age of about five. It all happened very fast…