Cholera and the best of the Russian culture

In times as we live now somebody probably would appreciate a little historical perspective.

There are some pictures I made back in the summer of 1970. This is me, my brother, my mother and our family car Zhiguli (the Soviet knock off of Italian Fiat) and these pictures connected to the events of the last pandemic of cholera in the USSR.

Human memory is short, we can't remember we had these problems like forever in our past and having an epidemic one type or another was a part of our way of life all the time. In fact, there places in a world where it never stops due to lack of development.

The strain of cholera hit Soviet Russia in 1970 probably started in 1961 in Indonesia and considered the seventh pandemic of the type since the 19th century. It was ended in 1975 and had 2 outbreaks in the Soviet Union.

It doesn't mean cholera doesn't exist anymore and gone forever. In fact, this cholera still hit from 20 000 to 200 000 people every year. We learned to put it out of our mind because we can treat it better and it doesn't become an epidemic lately, we learned to use more clean and even bottled water after all. Our antibiotics also working... for now.

Not telling how long this will last though.

Back in 1970, my parents decided to have a little subtropical vacation in a place you heard lately quite a bit - a Crimea peninsula. It was a blessed time. The Black Sea is very welcoming and warm, the weather was beautiful and the sun bright. However, in the middle of it the news, which we were getting from a radio suddenly changed.

Cholera in Odessa. Odessa is a port on the Black Sea and pretty close to the Crimea from the west and the city was instantly closed to the quarantine. Besides it, the road which we used to come to Crimea from the north also was closed to all traffic and this was the only road coming to the peninsula until Putin built a bridge a couple of years back.

Effectively we were locked in this place indefinitely and only the way out was a ferry on the east. The line here was 3 days of waiting and we were 3 days of waiting. Which we used to get more sunshine of course. These pics were made during this waiting.

The picture with the car was made when we finally broke through and passed through the mountain pass later. Unplanned visit to Caucasian Mountains. Not a big deal.

Cholera, in fact, is one of the biggest contributors to Russian culture. Where would it be if in the Fall of 1830 Rissian writer and poet Pushkin would not be quarantined in a village of Boldino? Locked in a place he single-handedly from sheer boredom and a lack of money for incoming wedding created all of it.

That's right, cholera and the best of the Russian culture. Think about it.