Odessa Dance

Author's name: Ezzedine Mihoubi

Odessa Dance by Azzedine Mihoubi... A few days later, a surreal image of Moscow formed in my mind. It was like a fat man who, when he walked, was bothered by people's stares, because he was wearing a coat left over from the Battle of Stalingrad, wearing rough polar bear-skin boots, and a Caucasian hat. He coughed like a prisoner who had spent twenty years in a miserable cell in Siberia. That's how I saw this city, which wasn't as cheerful as Rome, Madrid, or Tunis. Talha, a brilliant Yemeni student from Aden, whom I met at the Institute for Learning the Russian Language and the History and Monuments of the Soviet Union, told me: “They are getting rid of the legacy of the Kremlin’s old men, and I don’t think it will last long. They have exhausted themselves in the war in Afghanistan and protecting republics, most of which do not believe in the Red Principles. Behind the borders, the West practices its seductions like Marilyn Monroe, opening a breach in every wall, and saying to the peoples of the Union who are waiting for a miracle: ‘You will not enjoy something called freedom unless you bring down the walls of cement and illusion together. ’”