Stephan Orth: Behind Putin's Curtain: Friendships and Misadventures Inside Russia [aka Couchsurfing in Russia]

Juliya: Her parents have almost given up. She is slim, tall, and beautiful but at twenty-nine she already feels that the choice in Mirny is limited, if she doesn’t want someone too difficult or too young, as most people marry in their early twenties. She is out of the question for Igor’s athlete friends as she comes from Sakha and has Asian facial features.

There must be a simpler way.

The traditional reindeer nomads in Sakha did things differently. When they met men from other regions, the outsiders were cordially invited to get the nomads’ wives pregnant. In nomadic communities, almost everybody was related to one another, and they knew that different genetic material would guarantee healthier children.

After the theoretical part of the evening we’re ready for the dance floor in the other room. Disco ball, brick walls, a brightly colored neon sign advertising cocktails. It smells of alcohol and garlic as here, too, hearty meals are served.

At the moment there are only women on the dance floor; the men need a few more drinks. Russian dance-pop seems to be the most popular genre; when Shakira or Beyoncé is played, the dancers return to their seats or to the bar.

All of a sudden it’s break time for the guests when a strongly built man, light on his feet and with a proud swagger in his shoulders, showcases a Caucasian dance. Every step and every turn embodies an amount of anger and resolve that would intimidate even Maori haka dancers. Only his glassy eyes don’t quite match the precision of his movements. Finally the man clenches a schnapps glass from the floor with his teeth and, without using his hands, knocks it back before tossing it behind him with a whiplash movement of his head. For the rest of the evening you can hear the sounds of glass shards being trodden on by high heels. “Not a marriage candidate,” muses Marina, who herself is a fantastic dancer.

Another young gentleman, however, has caught her eye. “I’m a bit shy,” she confesses. “But I don’t think men want a woman who is too adventurous or crazy.”

We don’t arrive at a definite conclusion about what men or women want. Late at night, Igor drives us all home, but not before making a slight detour on a straight road to push his Lada to its limits. With music, of course. I’m a poor tramp, but I will marry the most wonderful woman in the world.

The next day I revisit the diamond mine. It’s a forty-five-minute walk down dusty streets between the modern factory buildings of an old industry. Young truck drivers transport earth from the mine in numbered yellow dump trucks from the Belarusian company BelAZ. Surface mining has been phased out, but Alrosa continues its underground mining operations for precious stones, and a lot of debris accumulates. A couple of tons of waste material for a few carats of diamonds. But business is good: in the forty-four years before the closure of the Mir mine, almost US$19 billion worth of diamonds was extracted.

A wedding party in expensive SUVs drive past honking, which sounds like muffled ship’s horns. There’s no security fence or guards around the perimeter of the crater, just plenty of danger signs with lots of exclamation marks. People who are tired of life and wish to go climbing here have no other obstacles to overcome.

A better recommendation for climbing can be found on a nearby hill, on top of which a huge crane and dumpster have been placed as a monument. A couple of kids are doing gymnastics on the scoop and loading platform.

The view of the airport is spectacular from here. Through the mist you can see huge scrapped Tupolev phantom planes. Pilots have to observe special regulations here—no helicopters or planes are allowed to fly above the mine because of the treacherous downwashes. In winter, before takeoff and landing, the runway has to be leveled to make it useable.

I get into a conversation with Olga and Dmitri. He’s in the ninth grade, she’s one class below. “We’re glad to meet a foreigner because we can practice our English on you,” says Dmitri. “Now we’ve got a story to tell our teacher. Normally you never see tourists here.”

The Muscovite architect Nikolay Lyutomsky would love to change that. Under the banner “Eco City 2020” he presents his bold concept of transforming the huge hole into a multistory ecological city, with gardens and natural ventilation, a glass dome, and solar cells that will provide enough energy for the 100,000 inhabitants. If this dream were to become reality, tourists would be sure to come. But for now it’s pure fiction, though one illustrated with some fine sketches.

I think that the open mine in its present state is much more interesting. A void created by decades of donkeywork. A void as a warning of what human greed can do to the landscape. A void with a visitor’s terrace.

THE BAGGAGE DROP-OFFat Mirny airport is a storage room. There are no conveyor belts; I just pass it on through an iron door. Will I ever see my backpack again?

The plane, however, soon relativizes my concerns about my dirty laundry and second pair of shoes. It’s a Sukhoi Superjet 100, the latest achievement of Russian engineering skills. Its commercial launch didn’t run all that smoothly, though. Four years ago in Indonesia a Superjet 100 crashed on a demonstration flight for journalists and potential customers, killing everyone on board. Since then, seventy-one machines have been delivered, most of them flying in Russia, a few in Mexico, and none in Indonesia.

Up until then I had been surprised that I hadn’t flown in a Russian machine. One stage of the journey I took a Ukrainian Antonov; other than that they were always Bombardiers or Airbuses. The notoriously noisy Tupolevs and Yakovlevs from Soviet times are becoming rare. Sky travelers are still not encouraged to have too much fun—entertainment screens on every seat are not to be expected in Russia.

As far as airlines go, I have learned to appreciate Aeroflot. Not only because of the sensationally fashionable uniforms of the stewardesses, but because the machines are comparatively punctual, look fairly modern, and are not regularly falling from the sky anymore, as they did in the ’70s and ’80s. Not long ago, I used to avoid Russian airlines when flying to Asia, even if the competitor cost a bit more. On this trip, I’m happy when I can take an Aeroflot plane for domestic flights. But they don’t fly to Mirny, so I’m now traveling with Yakutia Airlines, a small company with just thirteen planes. The smaller companies are the worst. According to statistics from 2015, the risk of an accident on internal Russian flights is four times the global average. This is probably why passengers still clap after every landing here.

An unobservant passenger would hardly notice the difference between a Superjet and a Boeing or an Airbus. The cabin seems to tend a bit more toward plastic; the sound of the motors is a bit more like an electric razor. But the whole design, even the overhead reading lights and the ventilation fans, are similar in style and emit similar chemical smells.

Just as I sit down at seat 14A, the motor chokes. There could be a variety of reasons for this. Ten minutes later the pilot restarts and taxies to the runway.

The Sukhoi Superjet lifts off and stays in the air for the planned amount of time. The engines don’t drop into the taiga and the oxygen masks remain in the overhead paneling, although there is quite a bit of turbulence before the landing. When we arrive in Khabarovsk, the pilot thoroughly deserves the applause.