Note: Transcript fully created by automated AI
[00:00:00] Jesse: Hi everyone. I’m Jesse Lin
[00:00:02] Angela: And I’m Angela Lin. And welcome back to another episode of, but where are you really from? Today, we’re talking about a fairly difficult subject, but something that we thought was important to cover, um, pretty imminently from the beginning of us coming back with new episodes, which is the war in Ukraine.
[00:00:23] Angela: Uh, it’s obviously looming over everyone’s heads right now in many different kind of ripple effects. Uh, no more crushing effects could be had than on the people that it’s directly impact impacting in both Ukraine and Russia. So today we invited a guest who is going to remain anonymous, but we will refer to him as OIG.
[00:00:47] Angela: Um, who will be representing the Russian civilian perspective. Do you want a caveat that our original intent with this episode was to have both a Ukrainian perspective and a Russian perspective, but kind of reality of the situation is that it’s an ongoing war. It’s very sensitive. Uh, lots of people are either unwilling to talk about it cannot physically talk about it.
[00:01:11] Angela: You know, there are many reasons why it’s difficult to get someone. You know, from Ukraine, we’re directly tied to it right now. Um, and we are very lucky that we have Ole with us at least to represent that side. So, um, just laying it out there, but before we get into things, wanna give Ole the chance to kind of introduce himself as he feels comfortable.
[00:01:34] Angela: Um, and then we’ll. Kind of set the stage of how we got to where we are, um, and also get into his current situation so that we can get a kind of real person perspective here. So I like the, uh, typical question of our show, but where are you really from probably an extra loaded question right now, but we’ll, we’ll throw it to you.
[00:01:56] Angela: However you feel comfortable answering that.
[00:01:58] Anonymous Guest: Thank you. Yeah, I just want to start with that. I don’t think I represent all Russians or even a huge subset of Russians because my life been somewhat unique for Russian person. And I’ve been mainly with the Western people for too long . So it’s kind, uh, kinda shaped my perspective and I’ve been traveled into much.
[00:02:23] Anonymous Guest: But to answer to your original question is that I’m from really like a small town in Russia. And I’ve been born there and spent my first, uh, 17 years, my life in this town. And then I studied in Russia universities for, um, Many years. I did like a bio show, a master degree, and I dropped out from my PhD. So I spent like a good portion of my initial life in Russia.
[00:02:53] Anonymous Guest: And then I was traveling back and forth, but always coming back, uh, to Russia. And recently I’ve been living in Moscow for the past few years. And yeah, right now I’m not in Russia. I’m in Europe. And just to, uh, double down on the complexity of talking about the issue. I now have people, or you’ve been following news, but in rationals, war is not called war.
[00:03:22] Anonymous Guest: It’s called special military preparation. And you will say what’s the difference, but the difference is 15 years in jail. Yeah, this is not a so. Uh, by calling a war, a war, I might actually get in jail for 15 years. So that’s the literality of nowadays and the reality of talking about it. And that resulted basically to know journalism in modern day in Russia, because it’s like impossible.
[00:03:52] Anonymous Guest: I think I’m gonna stop on this. Thank
[00:03:54] Angela: you for sharing that. And, and thank you for being on, because obviously we know this is a really difficult. Topic to discuss right now, especially as it’s impacting you and your family, friends personally. So thank you for joining us before we go into kind of your personal perspective and yes.
[00:04:14] Angela: Thank you for kind of clarifying you don’t re you definitely don’t represent all of Russia. I don’t think we ever. Think that any of our guests kind of represent like the holistic view of anything, but it is really, I think, impactful and special to have someone actually from Russia, lived in Russia for a big portion of your life and recently kind of weighing in.
[00:04:35] Angela: Um, but before we go into kind of your, your view on things and how it’s impacted you, um, I think we wanted to give listeners kind of just a. TLDR is not exactly the right word to say, because I’m still gonna talk for quite a bit of time, I think, but just a little, like a short overview of kind of like how this situation got to where it’s at and we’re by no means experts, obviously, but because I think with anything in kind of current events, a lot of us can get pretty wrapped up in kind of just our day to day lives.
[00:05:08] Angela: And we don’t often keep up with what’s happening outside of like, especially our own home country. So. When this first happened, I’m sure a lot of people, honestly, like didn’t really know why it was happening and like what the past and like recent history even is between Russia and Ukraine. So just wanted to give like a quick rundown for folks in case you needed that additional context.
[00:05:30] Angela: Okay. So I took some notes, but both, both folks on here, uh, correct me if I get anything wrong, please do, uh, main sources that I pulled from were the Smithsonian magazine and NPR for. One of the main, like contested things is that when Putin first declared the special military operation, he also went in this like very long winded history lesson of like, the history between Russia and Ukraine and kind of rewrote a few things.
[00:06:02] Angela: But I think one of the contested things was he was trying to say like, Ukraine has always been kind of part of Russia, like historically. And so one of the main things that these sources I was looking into wanted to kind of clarify, was like, you know, throughout centuries that the territory that is Ukraine today has been taken over by many different empires.
[00:06:22] Angela: So it was not always Russia. Um, otro, Hungarian, Poland, Lithuania, and Russia, like all of them had at some point in history. Been part of that or like overseeing that land. So it’s not true. Uh, so that’s kind of like a very late, very long ago history, but as of 1917 was the first time that Ukraine declared independence.
[00:06:45] Angela: So it was independent for like a brief period before then all of the globe broke into further wars. And then that’s when USSR Soviet union became a thing and Russia took it back. Millions of people die during, um, the great famine. There’s probably a better word for that. That’s the English ified version of what that was.
[00:07:11] Angela: But under Soviet rule in the early thirties, I didn’t know this until I looked it up, but millions died during this kind of like manmade famine. And it was because Ukrainian farmers were, um, uprising against the Soviet mandate to collectivize. Um, and so that also came about with this reification where Russia also forced the Ukrainian people to adopt the Russian language and kind of uphold Russian culture above their original Ukrainian culture.
[00:07:43] Angela: And that’s a lot of why Russian is a shared language between Russia and Ukraine today is because of this kind of like mass campaign that happened back then. And then where it gets a little, like hairy is that, um, if you’ve been following some of Putin’s addresses, he claimed that one of the main reasons that this special military operation happened is that he’s trying to help D not SIFY Ukraine.
[00:08:10] Angela: Um, and this is Harry because essentially during world war II, Germany, uh, Stepped into Ukraine. And, uh, at least part of the Ukrainian people were kind of like, The German Nazis at the time, because they saw them as liberators from the Soviets. It was kind of like lesser two evils. Like, let me just band with the one that claims that they’ll help me get free from my like previous conquerers.
[00:08:38] Angela: So that’s why there’s this kind of like association with Nazi Germany. It’s not exactly true what Putin’s saying about modern day, but that’s where that, like deifying kind of original claim came from. And then 1991 is when Ukraine declared recent independence again. And it was actually kind of agreed upon that.
[00:09:00] Angela: That would be a thing because in 1994, there was something called the Budapest memorandum where Ukraine agreed to give up all of its like nuclear weapons. Essentially. If the us, UK and Russia all agreed that it was a sovereign state could stay independent. Um, post obviously the fall of Soviet union, blah, blah.
[00:09:22] Angela: But that’s like when it was supposedly like, Hey, leave us alone. kind of thing. Um, and then recent history, two thousands is just kind of like. you know, like most government, very hairy kind of back and forth between like pro Russia, pro west governments, similar to Taiwan, how there’s like a pro China versus prodemocracy back and forth with, with our motherland as well, obviously is the case in Ukraine.
[00:09:49] Angela: And then the NATO of it all was always kind of like floating as a potential Alliance that could happen, but never like formally happened. Putin was always against it because it. You know, they had more powerful friends if they decided to do something. Um, and then, wow, so many, so many things I didn’t fully understand the whole like Cian annexation until I was looking up all of this.
[00:10:17] Angela: But, um, in. Late 2013, early 2014, essentially the, the then president Yanukovitch of Ukraine had kind of like said, oh, we’re not going to enter this free trade agreement with a EU. Despite that being what the people wanted. So like mass protests in Kiev, and they kind of like over the parliament over through that existing government and put in an interim government, Putin said, that’s illegal.
[00:10:47] Angela: This is a coup screw you guys. And then. Kind of invaded the peninsula. That’s when all that kind of broke out and then there’s been kind of ongoing, like fighting in Eastern Ukraine, dumb bus region, especially past that point up until this special military operation. Um, so that that’s what all I found but Jesse, Ole, please weigh in on anything I’ve missed.
[00:11:15] Angela: That was important or incorrectly stated.
[00:11:18] Jesse: I think the only thing that I was thinking about when it comes to these conflicts is that there’s always a part of it. That’s really hard to explain because there’s a deep history that informs how each of these geopolitical players, groups are thinking about themselves are thinking about domination, dah, dah, dah, dah.
[00:11:35] Jesse: And so for those of. Everyone that’s listing and they’re like, I still don’t get it. It’s like, well, you can’t really like it’s time to explain to people the history of racism in the us. It’s really hard to understand, even though we’re quite a young country, why there are these like deep, painful things in our country’s history that even we struggle to understand.
[00:11:55] Jesse: So it’s okay if you don’t get everything. Um, but those are, I think generally the facts that led to the current situ.
[00:12:01] Anonymous Guest: Uh, yeah, might sense. So I suggest the code, just a war, right? Because it’s kind of plays in the put narrative to code special military preparation, which I don’t want to, and it’s basically a war, right.
[00:12:14] Anonymous Guest: I mean, it’s just like definition of it and going back to history, I mean, everything you mentioned, it certainly rings a bell. And I would say it’s correct. I just have a few details and clarifications. So. History is kinda, it’s not physics, right. It’s very hard to, you know, reproduce and argue like who did what, but one thing for sure, what you call the great famine.
[00:12:40] Anonymous Guest: I think in Russian it’s. Go more and it’s likely happened. So in these like thirties, a lot of people in Korean region, they died and well, we can speculate why exactly they died, but it’s like a lot of people died from starvation. I think about 10 million or more people, mostly from Korean region. In my opinion was mostly like poor management, you know, going through this sort of communis mantra that communi is gonna solve everything, but.
[00:13:11] Anonymous Guest: Again, that was unfair because in this whole, like big U you know, country, it’s only like people in Ukraine mostly had to die from starvation, but not people in Moscow who kinda was like extracting, obviously grains from Ukraine. You can all almost argue that was done on purpose, but I don’t believe this.
[00:13:31] Anonymous Guest: I think it’s like, you know, when something evil happens, it’s usually just like, uh, not really. Malaysia’s just purely. You know, like bad management and just like accident. And another one is that you say that body is like, not a comment, but Putin said, oh, to deify a grain, which I think is like a bullshit.
[00:13:51] Anonymous Guest: Uh, but I would still make this comment that breeds like some, like. Minorities, which kinda represent and believe in this ideas of like far right Nazi movement, you know, it’s like saying, oh, because with like white supremacists in America, so now we have to start the war on America to like remove all white supremacists from power, but it’s gonna gonna be true at.
[00:14:17] Anonymous Guest: Best of my knowledge that why supremacist is not in the power. So in, in that way, it’s been like a great excuse for putting, you know, to like start in war saying, oh, you have like Nazi there. So that is why we need, you know, to save people and to deify your claim.
[00:14:33] Angela: Yeah, definitely bullshit. and wow. If, if anyone tried to say that about America, that’d.
[00:14:42] Angela: Really funny. I mean, it’s true though, that like, yeah, humans are complex and there’s, there’s a little bit of everyone everywhere, right? Like you can find the worst of people anywhere, but that doesn’t mean they represent everyone. And to be able to kind of use that as like an overarching excuse to do something upon the majority of the is, is pretty bad.
[00:15:03] Angela: And it’s what we’re seeing now. Hey listeners, wondering how you can support us. The biggest way is by increasing our visibility by following us on Instagram at where are you from pod on TikTok at, but where are you really from subscribing to our YouTube channel under, but where are you really from podcast rating and reviewing us on apple podcasts and telling your friends the more people we can get to listen to the show, the more we can continue spotlighting different perspectives and.
[00:15:29] Angela: And if you feel so inclined, we’re also accepting donations@buymeacoffee.com slash where are you from? Thanks. Y’all we mentioned Putin. I’m curious. We, we kind of wanted to start with like the Putin of it all. So we wrote in our notes, I’m curious what your perspective is in terms of what his actual motivations are for.
[00:15:54] Angela: Declaring this war. I think there’s obviously like many complexities and there’s probably not one, right? Like, this is exactly it, but I think this is especially interesting to us because, um, and people are making these parallels right now, as well as like between China, Taiwan, um, and Russia, Ukraine that, because Putin and Xi J ping have like, Similar cult, you know, cult followings, and like certainly dictatorial, if you wanna just be straight with kind of how they run the country.
[00:16:27] Angela: Um, and a lot of the, at least between she and Taiwan, uh, that like fixation, a lot of it has to do with kind of legacy and like kind of putting a stamp in his own legacy before he leaves power. Um, that he was able to reunify. So I’m curious if that is like a big part of what you think is driving Putin or if there’s just like bigger things that maybe are not being spoken about, that might be driving him as someone who actually lived in his government for like a big portion of, of your
[00:17:01] Anonymous Guest: life.
[00:17:01] Anonymous Guest: So Putin has been in power for 20 years now. I think even slightly more, which is a lot. A lot of people in Russia who was born and put in power the entire life spent and rule the Putin. And unfortunately there are a lot of parallels to, and Thai ation, again, not an expert on this, but the parallels. I see that kind sad because I personally like made big mistake.
[00:17:34] Anonymous Guest: I was certain that Putin is not gonna sort of start war on. My Chanel for this was that in his like 20 years overall, he was somewhat rather rational person in the sense, like he was, you know, opposing the west and, you know, basically playing his cards, but. It’s like rational way. He, so he was like a rational players.
[00:17:56] Anonymous Guest: And how like political power structured in Russia is you have like a Putin. And then he basically has friends and with different groups of friends, he’s like military friends. And then he has this like, um, oligarch circle who like the be who run like business and. And here basically, he’s like, um, he’s like maintenance or keys to power and he was keeping them happy and they were like, keeping him happy and giving him power.
[00:18:25] Anonymous Guest: So he’s like, I mean, any dictator, he has sort of distrusted people, right. Because you can’t run country on your own. It’s not possible. So my logic was that okay. If he starts like full scale war, right then. Obviously Oliar are gonna like lose everything. They seem to value because they’re kind British material people, you know, if you have a billion or yacht that kind tells things about you and then I’m gonna be happy.
[00:18:54] Anonymous Guest: Right. That’s for sure. So I was thinking, okay, he’s not gonna do that because he needs his Oli to run things. And I was thinking like the chance of war this year was like sub 1%. I think I was wrong. I think it was actually double digits. Now, all the , they are super unhappy because not only they lose everything, it seems he also like didn’t inform them, right.
[00:19:19] Anonymous Guest: Because thess getting frozen the ya and frozen, they can’t like go to see the nice video in Italy anymore. So like, clearly we’re not ready for is I would say it’s not even be unlikely to see like a cool in short term or, or a temp of a coup. I mean, maybe it already happened just don’t know about it.
[00:19:39] Anonymous Guest: Basically. I’m saying it’s like, it’s a big stake for the Putin, right. So why would you risk go? Because, you know, He’s like 70, so maybe you just roll 10 years more and then you just like pass away or something. And now he basically risk it all because these sections, they just increase his chances to.
[00:19:58] Anonymous Guest: Lose the power, you know, dramatically, almost exponentially. And I think there is like two reasons for this. Uh, first reason is with sort of a legacy theme slash COVID. So because of the COVID, he was extremely afraid of getting COVID. And as far as I know, he didn’t get it and, and the way he managed it, he was like hiding in the bunker for like almost two years.
[00:20:23] Anonymous Guest: And then. In order to like, meet with him. Everyone has to be on like this two week quarantine, right. Just to meet them. And that resulted to a lot of his like high ranking officials, basically not seeing their families for like one year or something, because just they have to work with them, which they were also super unhappy.
[00:20:44] Anonymous Guest: And basically he spent last two years, like completely, you know, isolated and, and again, he’s like 70, right? So it’s like, if you’re 70. and you spend two years alone. I mean, you can only like, imagine what’s your like mental health will be. And I don’t, I don’t think Putin is doing therapy. He strikes me not as a guy who’s, you know, doing therapy.
[00:21:05] Anonymous Guest: And then the second reason is, is like this kind of delusional and living in a bubble, right? Because like no one wants to tell, pushing bad news, you know, you tell pushing bad news and like next day you’re. Right. So everyone is like, yes, Mr. Putin. It’s so great. You know, we have the strongest army in the world and blah, blah, blah.
[00:21:26] Anonymous Guest: It’s like when the crime was next, it was like a military success. Right. It was basically a next in like couple days, almost like no short to a fight, almost no casualty. And if you look at his like speech and you look at like how the ion was initially, tructure. It was structured almost like if you just would drive the tanks to the center of the ke and everyone will be treating like, yes, like we are saved.
[00:21:56] Anonymous Guest: Like it’s great. Finally, we can, you know, return back to this like reform Soviet union or whatever it is. And I think he had this delusion it’s gonna work this way. Just need to say tanks and everyone will be happy and there will be no resistance. And obviously he kind had this idea that NATA is not gonna, you know, intervene because of the nukes.
[00:22:21] Anonymous Guest: It, I was like this like desire to rebuild Soviet union on one hand. And it’s like, delusion is gonna work out really well on the other hand. But I think when he just really detached from reality, obviously he’d never been, no, he had been recently. And Ukraine never talked to people, you know, everything he knows from like his like intelligence rapper, which is, I mean, I haven’t read them, but I can imagine they probably, you know, biased.
[00:22:56] Angela: So speaking of bias and delusions, um, I’m curious if you can provide any perspective on. The news and how it’s been covered in Russia. Um, and also kind of like be before and after the war started, because in China, at least obviously like news is highly, uh, controlled, and the state tells you what you should know.
[00:23:22] Angela: Um, and I imagine Russia is like that as well, but I know that certain outlets and, and like distributions. Got like blocked only during, like, after the war, uh, started. So I’m curious how, how you viewed, like the news that came in through Russia. Pre-war and now if you’re hearing anything through like family and friends that might still be in Russia about like how it’s being discussed.
[00:23:50] Angela: Um, and if people believe it, like, I’m just kind of curious on how that environment.
[00:23:57] Anonymous Guest: So Russia suddenly had censorship prewar though. Not at the level China has it because. Facebook and Instagram and WhatsApp, all like Western social medias and communication channels were available. And they were YouTube in particular.
[00:24:16] Anonymous Guest: They were not, uh, CED, at least not in like full mode. We had a lot of YouTube channels and radio stations, uh, telegram groups, which people basically say whatever they wanted, you know, sometimes you would have almost sort of public trial, you know, just to make example of someone, but, uh, it must resulted in fines.
[00:24:40] Anonymous Guest: And it was not that often once the war started rapidly, they, uh, passed with law. It’s called fake law. So with law literally says, For spreading fakes about the war, which you, by the way, can’t say the war, uh, name, the war you all basically can receive up to, I think, 20 years penalty in jail. And that may basically any journalist work impossible because this law literally says, if what you’re saying is not what government says, then it’s a fake.
[00:25:14] Anonymous Guest: So it’s like, as a journalist, anything you can do is, is, you know, like cite the government, which kind of not what journalists should do anyway. And as it was not enough, they recently blocked Facebook. By the way, Facebook is now recognized as a terrorist organization in Russia, which is, I mean, it’s kind of even funny on some level Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp and YouTube, they are blocked.
[00:25:40] Anonymous Guest: So you can’t access them without VPN. and even if somehow you can access them about the VPN. If you put content there, which is somewhat newsworthy, obviously you, you can go again to the jail. And then there was some sort of independent, uh, medium outlets and magazines. They basically received the, you know, legal notice to shut down.
[00:26:06] Anonymous Guest: You know, they didn’t want to wait to prosecute them. They just literally it’s like unplug them from, you know, internet and. Basically, they cleaned up the whole thing, zero tolerance to, you know, any other opinion, which is not like state or state approved or state sponsored. So it, I would say it’s like the most dramatic change in the, in the, in the media.
[00:26:28] Anonymous Guest: I think the only channel right now, which is still holding is, is actually a telegram because telegram is taking pretty neutral position. It’s kind of not moderating anything in any side. And obviously the. Telegram founder already had, uh, its beef, Russian government. So it like we created it’s like headquarters and team everything from Russia.
[00:26:53] Anonymous Guest: So they literally don’t care. Russian government comes after them. And yeah, I think that’s like the current state of affairs. How many
[00:27:03] Angela: people like believe that it’s just a special military operation though, because, and I don’t know how much you know about this because you were luckily outside, um, Russia at the time that it started, but because I’m seeing things like, I’m sure everyone has seen that, like that video that was floating around of that, like Lieutenant or Colonel or whatever, from the Russian side who got captured.
[00:27:25] Angela: And then he spoke to press where he was like, we literally didn’t know what we were going into. Like, we truly believe that we were here to. D not SIFY and like, you know, free the Ukrainian people that should fight for, you know, their safety. And then we got here and realized it was all scam. And now we’re like ashamed of ourselves and give us whatever punishment you think we deserve that kind of stuff.
[00:27:48] Angela: So I’m, I’m curious if you have an, a sense of like what proportion of the population actually believes it’s war versus special military operation. And like, if there is a distinct. Um, divide between, I don’t know, like socioeconomic class or something else. That’s kind of dividing the people who believe or don’t believe, um, one or the
[00:28:10] Anonymous Guest: other.
[00:28:11] Anonymous Guest: I wouldn’t say it’s about special media or what it, it just like propaganda is so high that they have to call special media decoration. Most people intelligent enough to realize if you have to use tanks and fighter jets and RJ area. And where other part is return in fire. It’s a. So to me, I mean, any reasonable person understands it’s a war.
[00:28:38] Anonymous Guest: And going back to the comment about the military, I know like a lot of military people got tricked because it kind of makes sense from military perspective, you don’t want to, every soldier to know you about to start the war because obviously intelligence, you know, uh, happens. So they were told they’re going to do some military exercises and then they were like, given the command to.
[00:29:02] Anonymous Guest: but I would say it’s like a standard cookbook for, you know, warfare and military though. Going back to population in Russia, I’ve been talking to many friends and relatives there. The thing is a lot of people actually support war, even they know it’s a war, right. I mean, I’m super antiwar. Right? I don’t think you can solve anything reward in life in general.
[00:29:26] Anonymous Guest: I think it’s. If two countries at war, it’s a sign that they failed that communication and failed on so many levels. I believe there is no, there is no reason to bump like another country. I mean, you can, like, in my opinion, you can come up with doesn’t matter how many, like historical reasons or justifications.
[00:29:47] Anonymous Guest: It just like something you just don’t do. This is like my opinion. It’s not like information is not available in Russia. It’s like not North Korea, right. In the sense. People have phones and we’re like telegram groups and people sort of engage in the topic so that they like consume information either like one side another or both, but they know, you know, everyone looking with pictures, you know, of like tanks and jets and bombing.
[00:30:13] Anonymous Guest: So it’s like, it’s not that you can say, oh, I didn’t know that the war is happening. So it is why I’m like not responsible. I. Most people in Russia, likely aware to high degree of what’s going on. And to be fair, Russia has quite good internet, you know, it’s like super well connected country, Joseph internet, more than many parts of Europe.
[00:30:35] Anonymous Guest: And in fact, internet literacy is high in Russia than in many European countries. This is like what’s striking to me, is that people really onboard this war, especially. So if you, if you try to like bucket it, especially like it’s like all the generation people who lived in this Soviet, uh, union era. they kind, I dunno, they kind used to this mentality of, uh, seeing the world, like they and us like west and east kind thing.
[00:31:12] Anonymous Guest: And they’re totally behind with sort of, um, idea of and nature advancing on the east, which is, I mean, uh, factually speaking is true and you can speculate what’s the reason for them. To pick a side at all or to support it. But I would say, you know, like this double digit support of war in, in Russia, because yeah.
[00:31:38] Anonymous Guest: I don’t know exactly why, but it just seems to be the case. I mean, to me, I just wouldn’t support a war ever, any kind of war. Uh, but if you look at the history and I don’t need to name, you know, many countries, you would know. During the war, where is always, you know, a proportion of people in any country who support war and who don’t.
[00:32:02] Anonymous Guest: And Russia is like, not exception. There’s like many people who support this war. If you look at like, uh, wealth and inion certification, then. It’s like the less wealthy you are and, um, less educated. You are the more likely to support the war. For example, people who work in tech, who is somewhat, you know, wealthy, uh, they mostly don’t support the war.
[00:32:25] Anonymous Guest: And in fact, many of them like left the country in like the first days of war. So, which is a clear, you know, divide in society on this issue. It’s really dramatic because I mean, I’m lucky and blessed enough, you know, to have my girlfriend. And she also works in tech and we are like in Europe, so fine, but you know, a lot of people, this like line of division, it like runs through their family or relatives.
[00:32:51] Anonymous Guest: I even heard stories, people, you know, getting divorced because of this issue.
[00:32:55] Jesse: I have a question related to, to that. So for those people, and maybe, maybe you don’t know, I, I’m not sure. And you could just say if you don’t, but for those people who do support the war is your opinion that they’re fully bought into the, the propaganda.
[00:33:08] Jesse: Like they believe that, you know, the soldiers are there to deify Ukraine or reintegrate Russians and Ukraine into greater Russia, or do they think there’s something else they’re getting out. Out of, out of this war, because generally I think, as you were saying, I think people are rational actors. Like they don’t, you wouldn’t go into a war for no reason.
[00:33:28] Jesse: There has to be some, something that they believe that they’re getting out of it
[00:33:33] Anonymous Guest: to support it. Right. Uh, I think a lot of people buying like food package and it’s a different full package. There’s so many people, so many reasons, you know, obviously there is a her mentality, you know, some people just do because they’re friends and their social circles.
[00:33:50] Anonymous Guest: Do some people afraid to go to jail. Some people really, you know, istic want to build. So union. I think it’s like, it’s a huge mix of reasons. And I certainly think there are some people who believe into deifying Ukraine. You know, if you’ve never been to Ukraine ever in your life, and you’ve been watching this like state sponsor TV for last eight years and last year, years, eight years, it was exactly what it was saying or.
[00:34:17] Anonymous Guest: Ukraine is, you know, getting owned by Nazis and blah, blah, blah. Yeah. Some people are certainly buying it, but in general, I would say people have all sorts of reason, reason to support a war. Even ranging from economic home to political, to just, you know, oh, I don’t want, you know, to upset my, you know, social circle.
[00:34:38] Anonymous Guest: Let’s say you live in like small city and everyone like support war, like your friends, your family. And it’ll be extremely hard, you know, even to stay neutral right at this point. You
[00:34:49] Angela: started to talk a little bit about like, you still have family and friends that are in Russia. And so I wanted to completely step back.
[00:34:58] Angela: And first we should ask this up top is how are you feeling? how are you doing
[00:35:05] Anonymous Guest: well? I, I feel mostly sad about this issue because I kind always care about people. And in the end we were just old people having, trying to have our best lives and. Always like politics, fancy concepts, you know, countries and empires, uh, fighting for global domination.
[00:35:26] Anonymous Guest: But in the end, it’s all just us people. I truly believe there is no reason for anyone, you know, to die or to have their house bombed. Or to lose like family friends, and to be, you know, forced to migrate and to lose your home and stuff. In a sense, it’s always people who suffer for, you know, whatever reason.
[00:35:52] Anonymous Guest: And I feel really sad for people in Ukraine and for everyone who affected by this conflict. And I don’t, honestly, I don’t even, you know, care that much about politics of the ation. Because to me it’s just important. The wellbeing of people. I mean, it’s literally sad that we have always amazing technologies nowadays in food and, you know, like launching rock to space and yet.
[00:36:23] Anonymous Guest: We still have, you know, to, to bomb like places it’s like really, really upsetting, you know, that is like, is this is what as humankind, the best we can do. And also very sad for Russia because when Soviet union fell apart, we kind had 30 years to, you know, push shit together. Obviously it has like many people and resources and like, we had a chance to build like better future for everyone.
[00:36:53] Anonymous Guest: You know, you can, you can be like South Korea, I guess, you know, do something, you know, amazing. Like they did, you know, Kpop and, but you can do something else. But in, in the end, like this 30 years resulted to do like, you know, starting war on a neighborhood country. you know, which is like ridiculous. I also feel, feel good.
[00:37:15] Anonymous Guest: It’s not like justifiable because people say, oh, the crane will be NATO. And then Russia will be basically torn apart by, well, this is putting propaganda. Right. But we haven’t seen, and we probably won’t see any. Uh, country with, uh, massive amounts to be invaded, right? It’s like, like a suicide. So not buying this argument, I guess I’m very sad that it turned out.
[00:37:42] Anonymous Guest: And obviously I think it’s almost the most worst way it could turn out. The only verse outcome would be obviously word, word free with nukes, right? I mean, I think this is like the only verse
[00:37:55] Angela: option. So you mentioned obviously, like, hopefully we, as humanity could have come up with better ways than just bombing people.
[00:38:02] Angela: Um, let’s talk a little bit about how war has gotten more complex. So, um, One of the main ways that the west is trying to stop Russia right now is through heavy economic sanctions. I wanna talk about that in terms of like, what that actually means for the Russian people. Because I think when we sit on the west and we just see headlines, like this were like great punishment for Russia for doing bad, good job us, like, well, this’ll fix it.
[00:38:35] Angela: And. I think we often think on kind of the governmental level or like just the elites, like this is gonna hurt the rich people who are in power. It’s gonna hurt Putin. Great. We’re doing our job as opposed to like, what does that mean for the actual Russian people who did not decide to wage this war and are like, kind of stuck with a consequences?
[00:38:56] Angela: Um, what have those sanctions done in terms of like your. Personal life and like those of your family and friends, how is that actually impacting the, the people? Right.
[00:39:08] Anonymous Guest: Um, I mean, I’m briefly starting from my personal position. I mean, I’ve been lucky and blessed, uh, to have a tech job and now I’m staying in Europe.
[00:39:19] Anonymous Guest: So, so I pretty much has no. Except the sanctions make. It’s incredibly hard for me to use financial institutions and it’s almost impossible nowadays, to open a bank account in Europe, if you Russian. But again, I’ve been lucky enough to work in crypto. And I feel always years of building crypto infrastructure, it’s kind of separate topic, but guess where I’m going with is, is script, um, is like a neutral layer, which doesn’t judge people based on their password, which I.
[00:39:51] Anonymous Guest: Overall is a good thing though, where might be some misuse to it. Yet banking system is used to longer, you know, $3 of money every year and to, you know, fate always a drug trade. So I think it’s fine. But more interesting question is that how is affecting Russian people you have to understand Russia has been experiencing for the last, I would say 10 years.
[00:40:17] Anonymous Guest: Economic decline. And it’s mostly been caused by discrim relaxation. Certain economic economic policy run by Putin. And in the sense of average citizen, it means that average Russian in last 10 years didn’t have much sort of economic opportunities or options. Average citizen couldn’t, you know, travel a lot internationally or by like, uh, you know, IM imported like expensive goods, like latest iPhones or, um, expensive cars, Europeans, American cars.
[00:40:53] Anonymous Guest: and a lot of Russian citizens will experience like a new decline because of the sanctions. I mean, sanctions are real, but the, the irony of sation is once you get, once you are poor, you kind review your life around, you know, other things, you know, like family, maybe reading books and, you know, like watching and pirate content because you’re not gonna pay.
[00:41:21] Anonymous Guest: Netflix and stuff. And there is like a huge amount of people in Russia who are like, I don’t care about sanctions because I wasn’t going to Monica anyway. I wasn’t buying, you know, Mercedes anyway. I mean, I didn’t have the, like a yacht, you know, so it’s kind, it’s kind okay. I’m gonna spend, you know, more time on my Dutch, which is like outside of the city house, you know, farming.
[00:41:48] Anonymous Guest: You know, like veggies and like raising chickens. I mean, if you look back to Soviet union people in Soviet union, they were super poor in terms of GDP, but they still’s like, he’s a human, like amazing in a sense they can find meaning in life and, you know, adopt and. As long as like state propaganda can convince people that always sort of economic misfortunes are caused by the west, then, you know, people obviously not gonna rebel.
[00:42:19] Anonymous Guest: And in fact, the more poor people are the easiest to control them and to influence like a state propaganda on them. So I think sanctions in this like short term that it has almost no effect, but even in the long term, because. They, they had this fact in short term that all the people who could leave the country, they left the country.
[00:42:43] Anonymous Guest: And a lot of people who want to live wanted to leave the country, they kind of now made the decision either to deliver the state. But it’s like people who were not gonna leave the country for them. You know, it’s like, it, it doesn’t change their word view. Right. In fact, it probably makes them angry because let’s say they used to buy with like Zara clothes.
[00:43:05] Anonymous Guest: Right. And, and za like left Russian market. So they must angry with Zara. Right. Because Zara is like private company. So it was like it’s own decision, you know, to live Russia. I mean, you could argue that with like social pressure, which is probably true, but I guess it just makes people more angry to the west and.
[00:43:26] Anonymous Guest: I’ve had a lot of argument that people will be angry, so they will get on the streets because of democracy and they will overflow the government. But that is like literally impossible at this point. I think the latest point in Russian history, it was possible. It was 2008. Which was like 14 years ago. So it’s about 14 years late in the sense that all the people who were like for freedom and democracy, they were either imprisoned or, or jailed or of the country.
[00:43:53] Anonymous Guest: I mean, all the leaders and then R police is like kind, really good. And the whole sort of spy state is really good. It’s like we had these videos where people would go on. It’s like red, Square’s the center of the Moscow with, uh, we were just like a blank, uh, paper, right? It’s like white paper has, there is nothing.
[00:44:16] Anonymous Guest: And they’re arrested in like 30 seconds. Right. It’s like, uh, I mean, having seen it with, through psych ridiculous video now, it’s like pretty good. And then it was even more funny video. So I was this guy. See, he’s holding just like a blank paper. It’s like completely. Alone. So it’s something with mass gathering and then the other guy’s filming him.
[00:44:36] Anonymous Guest: And so he is getting arrested immediately. And then there is another lady there, which is like filming, which is like, just like a bypass passer. Right. And she’s like clearly pro like Putin pro uh, power. And she’s like, oh, you like sort of manufacturing this sort of Western propaganda here is like, no, I’m just like shooting everything.
[00:44:57] Anonymous Guest: And she’s like, if you’re shooting. Then you should like ask me and he’s like, okay, I’m gonna ask you, tell me what you will think. And she’s like on the camera, like starts to, you know, say, oh, I support the government. I support everything. And it’s not even 30 seconds. And she’s also getting arrested. It’s like, it’s like so funny.
[00:45:17] Anonymous Guest: But the point is they just basically arrest everyone. They don’t even care what you say. It’s just like, if you try to, you know, have a public opinion, Where it’s not even like any sort of attention to what you say, you just, you just get arrested. It doesn’t even matter what you say, because you know, you can be like row Eagle have hidden messages.
[00:45:39] Anonymous Guest: It’s government not taking its changes. Right. If anything, it just, uh, is like any kind of during the war, public speech or activity, you just get sent to jail. So always sanctions, they obviously harm a Russian economy. That’s like for sure, but they’re not gonna result to overflowing the government. I mean, they might result in a sense that if some sort of higher ranking officials will be pissed and then they will stage a queue secretly and privately, but it’s kind of, you know, a different thing.
[00:46:13] Anonymous Guest: It’s not like democratic way to do it. I would say. And long term, you have to look at countries like I on North Korea, right. They show. Once, like the government can control the narrative, then Cuba. Right. Then the country can live like four decades under the sanctions. It doesn’t matter. And Russia has like a lot of nature resources.
[00:46:37] Anonymous Guest: So it’s like, it’s not gonna be start of any the basic production. So I don’t think it’s gonna work to do anything to the government in short term or long term, unless some is like, like.
[00:46:50] Angela: Kind of trying to bridge the, the, like the people that are affected by this war between Russia and Ukraine. You mentioned that, of course, like any war, like anything that you can have, depending on there are gonna be people who are pro or against shore, but there are also a lot of people in Russia that are against the war happening and have friends and family in Ukraine.
[00:47:15] Angela: I was curious if number one, you have friends and family in Ukraine. And how much of a kind of like shared. Culture or like relationships exist already between those countries that kind of make it just like, not such a black and white and like you versus us situation that the at least Putin probably wants to make the narrative out to be that it’s like good versus bad.
[00:47:44] Angela: It’s more like it’s very gray because there’s connected points. I’m curious what your connected points are. How much that was even just like part of everyday kind of interaction between the two countries and cultures pre pre-war.
[00:47:57] Anonymous Guest: Well, I mean, Russia says immense history, Ukraine. I mean our nations or a culture, language, food families.
[00:48:07] Anonymous Guest: A lot of people literally has families split across the countries like marriages and kids. I have friends in Ukraine and I, again, been blessed, being friends with reasonable and understanding people. and I think people will overcome always political crisis in the war because to me, relationship with other people is more important than whatever political agenda, anyone pushing though.
[00:48:36] Anonymous Guest: I have to say the war is real and, you know, damage to crane down Israel and it’s immense damage and Russia will have to repay it. In all the means, you know, like morally, and even in the sense of, you know, some kind of contributions I can imagine in the future because you can’t just say know bomb, the other can tell, oh, actually, you know, what’s wrong.
[00:49:01] Anonymous Guest: So now, you know, we are best is again, it is not how it works. And I think a lot of in Russia, people don’t realize it yet, but I mean, everyone is guilty to a certain degree, right. I mean, but it’s impossible to measure how much, you know, each person is guilty, but we is like a measure of being more or less guilty.
[00:49:22] Anonymous Guest: But as a whole countries, the nation, you know, it is like people say, oh, it’s like, the Putin is the bad, but people are the good, but no, like one man can’t do much. Right. there always like some other people, you know, supported directly or indirectly in the way. And I think as a nation and as a country, we’ll be, you know, suffering for starting this war and, you know, dealing with it for like decades to come.
[00:49:49] Anonymous Guest: I mean, I don’t see it being, you know, a small thing or, you know, going away. I think people would realize, I hope in near future. I hope the fastest is they. And yeah, I certainly feel sorry for Korean people and I hope we can find a way to resolve it as fast as we can. I hope the war, Y as fast as we can and the war, Y I hope there is a way, you know, to like rebuild, you know, repay the damages done because in my opinion, this is what’s gonna happen eventually on the transitionary
[00:50:25] Jesse: note to the close of.
[00:50:28] Jesse: Episode. Um, hopefully we can end it on a little bit of a higher note, um, because we always like to end on a sweet treat in the fortune cookie section. So you were just kind of talking about the hopes of how it could resolve. Do you have like a best scenario of how it could resolve a positive scenario?
[00:50:50] Anonymous Guest: Uh, I mean, I honestly hope just the word ends as soon as possible. I dunno, what would be the best scenario at this point? I guess I just would say what I don’t want to happen, which I can see can happen is that this conflict would last, you know, for years and years, you know, Russia stays under the sanction in Europe because basically is like European know Europe, Ukraine became to.
[00:51:17] Anonymous Guest: Better European, better ground for proxy wars, for China or other parties, which will, you know, be sort of poisoning entire Europe for yes to come. I guess that would be the worst outcome. And I hope this just does not happen. I hope. Somehow we find the way to stop the war and start rebuilding, you know, our countries, our economies, our like burn bridges and relationships.
[00:51:45] Anonymous Guest: So it’s more like a pure feeling. And I mean, as hope goes, I’m trying to be really optimistic. So, uh, this is what I hope for again, I’m not a politician, so I have no idea how to achieve.
[00:52:00] Angela: Have any of your friends in Ukraine mentioned any like actually helpful things that people can do that are outside of Ukraine?
[00:52:09] Angela: Like I know people are donating money. I know that there’s like crypto made a positive wave when, um, people were able to donate crypto to the Ukrainian government. Are there any like big things that you’ve heard from your friends there that. Oh that actually worked or like, oh, I’m happy that happened.
[00:52:28] Angela: And maybe we can do more of, or encourage
[00:52:30] Anonymous Guest: more. Yeah, I would say just, um, you know, help people who are in need because of this work who like displaced or, you know, need like a shelter need, you know, food or, you know, need like bank card to pay for something or, you know, whatever they need it just, you know, just try to minimize the suffering of humans who are affected by.
[00:52:57] Anonymous Guest: By by the war, I think it would be the best. Um,
[00:53:02] Jesse: well thank you for joining, uh, us on this episode and lending us your voice and your opinion as Angela at up top. Obviously like it’s not a easy thing or technically legal thing for you to be doing. So it’s really great to, um, hear from someone who could, who could really guide kind of like what’s going on in the
[00:53:21] Anonymous Guest: current situ.
[00:53:22] Anonymous Guest: Yeah, thank you for inviting me. And despite this being a hard conversation to have, I think staying away from this topic at least times is something I would regret. And I think it’s, uh, great to step in in ways you. and I would encourage everyone to do it because humans have long lives. And if you don’t do something you feel right in the moment, then you have to live for the rest of your life.
[00:53:55] Anonymous Guest: Uh, thinking about it and caring with sort of emotional, uh, baggage through your entire life. And that’s like, doesn’t.
[00:54:06] Jesse: um, well, listeners, if you have any questions on this topic or for us,
[00:54:12] Angela: or if you are Ukrainian or have Ukrainian family, friends directly, uh, affected right now and you wanna share their story so that we can kind of balance out what we discussed today, in the perspective we share today, since we weren’t able to secure ARA guest for this episode, Also contact us.
[00:54:33] Angela: Rison um, tell us where you’re from@gmail.com. We could do a follow up episode if there’s someone who’s know, really interested in sharing that perspective, um, or just share some stories that we read on the show as well.