Happy Birthday, Tamara Vasilevna

My beloved Russian teacher turns 85 today. I can never express enough gratitude for everything she has done for me.

March 9, 2003, Sakhalin State University. After a few days in Sakhalin Island I am confident enough to walk on the icy sidewalks without falling. Everyone talks of spring, but what is it precisely that the Russians call spring? I see mounds of snow everywhere, no trace of ice melting and temperatures are well below zero. On this morning I can only speak a handful of phrases in Russian. I can read and write the Cyrillic alphabet but there’s no way I can manage even the most basic conversation in English.

Taking a marshrutka (minivan) to Lenin Street, I had gotten off at the right spot and walked into the office of Viktor Korshunov, the charismatic and English-speaking director of the Russian Language for Foreigners Department. In the room are two women. A stern looking person in her mid-50s who would have been the ideal communist in the Soviet Union and a rather pleasant woman in the same age group, who seemed genuinely happy to see me. I get introduced to the duo and am made aware that my teacher will be in the room soon.

Within two minutes, a tall red-haired woman with brown eyes and a grace and dignity that does justice to her 65 plus years in the world walks in. Meet Tamara Vasilevna Chikova. She seems happy and excited to have her first ever student from India. We leave the main building and walk a few minutes to the one hosting her classroom. Inside I see maps, paintings, postcards, memorabilia and a whole collection of books.

“I am so relieved to start this class,” I say. “Almost no one speaks a word of English in this frozen town.” She smiles at me and tells me in Russian that in this classroom, no one speaks any language except Russian. I nod and ask in my basic and elementary Russian if she speaks English and I get a ‘nyet.’ I am in a state of shock! How am I going to learn Russian if my teacher doesn’t even speak English. And then starts a magical journey of discovery into a language, land and culture that would become my own.

From Almaty to Sakhalin

Tamara Vasilevna was born on September 2, 1937 in a small town in present-day Kazakhstan that is close to the Russian border. Many argue that this piece of land she was born in was actually was a part of Siberia that the USSR ‘foolishly’ gifted to the Kazakhs, making their future-independent country one of the largest in the world.

My four years as her student were some of the most memorable and pleasant of my life.

I relived her journey- from a childhood where she, as an 8-year old, said in a public place that she does not like Lavrentiy Beria (Josef Stalin’s main henchman). Those were the days of repression in the USSR and her mother asked to gently to stay quiet. A statement like this could have gotten her mother sent to a gulag.

Tamara Vasilevna went on to study the Russian language at university in the then ethnic Russian-dominated city of Almaty. It goes without say that she was a dedicated communist who adored Lenin, as was the case with all good girls of the day. She graduated with a degree in Russian philology and studied further to become a pedagogue.

It was on a really warm spring day in Almaty in 1958 that she saw a tall, blonde and handsome construction worker who would become her husband till death did them part in 2006. Valery Effremevich was a Don Cossack, born near Rostov-on-Don. A natural athlete, he finally chose to become a table tennis and lawn tennis coach. They began dating in 1958, much to the chagrin of Tamara Vasilevna’s mother, who was believed to have psychic powers.

“Marry him,” her mother asked. “Over my dead body!” Marry they did on the morning of January 7, 1959. Their wedding was on the day the Russian Orthodox Church celebrated Christmas, but this was the Soviet Union, so the marriage registration bureau was working on that day!

Tamara Vasilevna’s mother, who was already unhappy about her daughter’s wedding, was about to receive another bit of shocking news. The Soviet government, monitoring the prowess of the young pedagogue, had invited her to the distant island of Sakhalin! Her newly-wed daughter, then pregnant, was offered a very high salary and an apartment to teach in the small town of Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, which had been freed of Japanese control in 1945. The romantic idea of moving to the eastern fringes of the Soviet Union appealed to Tamara Vasilevna and her husband who was offered a job as a physical education instructor in a college. And off they went to a land that still had a strong Japanese heritage at that time and was called Karafuto from 1905 to 1945. The Soviets guarded Sakhalin Island with zeal and no non-Soviet citizens were allowed there under any circumstances. Even Soviet citizens needed special permits to visit the island.

The couple, along with their son Leonid, would visit Kazakhstan regularly. I remember being told a story by Tamara Vasilevna of one of her visits to her small town. Their train arrived late on a cold December night and there wasn’t a soul at the station, forget a taxi or bus. Just as they were hoping for a miracle, ‘Grandfather Frost’ turned up in a troika- a three-horse carriage! No this was not some illusion induced by the cold… It was actually the local postman who was dropping off the mail to the station. He took them home in his troika, because, well- ‘in the Soviet Union everybody helped each other out.’

From Khrushchev’s USSR to Perestroika

An avid sportsperson and connoisseur of literature, music and the fine arts, Tamara Vasilevna enjoyed living in Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk. Plays and concerts were held at the Chekhov Centre, the Komsomolets Cinema Hall showed the latest Raj Kapoor films and the university had its own set of activities.

Over the decades, Tamara Vasilevna became known as one of the finest Russian teachers in the entire Soviet Far East. Passionate about studying further, she actually earned her doctorate only in the 2000s.

Life was good in Sakhalin for the specialists who were brought in by the Soviet government, until Perestroika hit many people hard. Many highly-educated people lost their jobs and had to take up daily labour. Tamara Vasilevna was secure in her job, but with Mikhail Gorbachev and the fall of the Soviet Union, her family like all others in the country had their savings wiped out overnight.

The Indian Student

Going strong at the age of 67 and having no desire to retire, Tamara Vasilevna became the favourite of foreign students who were enrolling at Sakhalin State University after the island was opened up to foreigners. In February 2003, she was asked by the director of the Russian as a Foreign Language Department Viktor Korshunov, whether she would like to teach an Indian student.

Having a lifelong fascination for India, Tamara Vasilevna was thrilled to take up the offer. The student was from the city once called Bombay and she was looking forward to hear firsthand about how the country had changed since the day Hindi films attracted crowds in Soviet cinema halls.

“Have you seen Kanchanjunga,” she asked me on Day 1. “Yes, I replied.” She was so happy to hear that. I saw her eyes light up and then she showed me her collection of Nicholas Roerich reprints in postcards. At that time, I had not heard of the artist and philosopher who became one of my idols.

Once the niceties were over, it was time to test my reading skills and penmanship. “You read well, but your handwriting is bad,” she said. I was then given a book where I had to go back to tracing alphabets. This, you can imagine, did wonders for my ego!

Four hours of lessons, five days a week. Homework, homework and more homework… The months went on. I witnessed a real spring, the melting of snow, the first traces of green grass, long and glorious days with late sunsets.. As the winter wear and caps came off, a young Indian man walking the streets of Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk became more than a curiosity and a sight for starers!

How much I treasured those four-hour lessons! My initial understanding of Russian culture came entirely from them. As Tamara Vasilevna would teach me grammar and vocabulary we’d delve into the world of Ivan Shishkin paintings, the Russo-Japan War of 1904-5, which was so important to the region’s history, local chocolates and even the university sports scene. The kid who grew up in New York would go and try his hand at the Saturday basketball league and employ every single dirty trick learned on the streets of Queens!

On Mondays, the lessons would get delayed as I would with the greatest degree of excitement share all the fun things I did over the weekend. By the time it was summer, I could communicate decently in Russian with my new friends, all thanks to Tamara Vasilevna!

Her introducing me to Russian culture included inculcation into the magical world of dachas! So, it began in 2003 with me going back to farming roots and growing potatoes and beet roots that lasted us till the next winter. “You have the hand of a farmer” she told me when she saw me working with passion on the summer cottage land.

By the autumn of 2003, I spoke and felt Russian- Sakhalin was my home and I belonged there.

Fast forward to 2006, a not-so-friendly looking examiner assesses my Russian. And it’s over in 10 minutes! It’s a 5! The highest grade possible. A week later, the Rector of the Sakhalin State University presents their first certificate to an India. Tamara Vasilevna has never been prouder! This is not where Tamara Vasilevna’s time with her Indian student and son ends…

Birthday in India

Ever since she was a child in Kazakhstan, she wanted to visit India, but being a woman in her 60s in Sakhalin, who never set foot outside the former Soviet Union, this looked unlikely. All I can say is from the first day I worked in her dacha as a farmer, I wanted nothing more than to show her India.

It all came to be in August of 2008! My 70-year old teacher was going to fly from Sakhalin to Moscow and then to Delhi! I waited patiently outside the international arrivals of the Indira Gandhi Airport. And there she came- My cherished Tamara Vasilevna in India!

From the August heat of Delhi and Agra, we got respite when we went to Bangalore, where I lived at that time. And on September 1, on the eve of her birthday, we saw the Mysore Palace lit up in all its glory! Tamara Vasilevna had lived her dream to be in India and celebrate her 71st birthday. 15 years later, she still tells me the best thing that happened on that trip was meeting my mother!

A lifelong bond

My love for Russian culture, literature and this vast and enormous Eurasian space comes from being Tamara Vasilevna’s student. I really am who I am because of her, and every single time I read any work of Russian literature or engage in a deep and philosophical discussion in Russian, I spare a thought for the person who armed me with these skills!

Happy 85th Birthday, Tamara Vasilevna!

I can never be grateful enough for everything you have done for me.