Breakfast with a view of the revolution

It is difficult to describe one impression, some one stroke that would characterize what is happening here now. The days merged into one continuous series and no longer differ from one another. Maidan, standing at the Rada, the construction of barricades, the assault on the barricades, the demolition of the monument to Lenin, an attempt to break into the Maidan, the blockade of the police area ... and - lack of sleep, lack of sleep, lack of sleep. When was it? Yesterday? Day before yesterday? Last year? An hour ago? The chronology of events and days of the week has to be restored by pieces.

At some point, you begin to feel like Michael Herr . Where are you? In Kyiv? In Tskhinval? In Grozny? In Saigon? Don't know. You sit in the hotel, scribble your reports, then you will blow up to the next mess, at midnight you push on the barricades until the camera is stabbies from the frost and that huddled in every gap, like your hands, and a peeling face, and then you return and write again, having lost its orientation in time and space, almost forgetting my life, almost forgetting my life. And, not wanting it, merging with the events taking place here, understanding their logic and already becoming part of them. And now the Maidan and these people who came here, whom I see for the first time in my life and whom I will never see again, become part of you, like you have become part of them, and it is already impossible to delete it out of life.

The only bright, clearly remembered day is the arrival of Katherine Ashton , who gave us all the day off. When it became clear that today there would be nothing, I slept all day without getting out of bed even for food. Boots and a camera on the battery - I remember the best.

Maidan is night. In any case, for a journalist. I hardly saw the daily Maidan. Everything happens here in the dark. When the smallest people. The Night Maidan reminds me of Hankal. Army tents, bonfires are burning between them, the smoke of a burned tree mixes with the exhaust of the warming diesel and creates the incomparable winter smell that now causes only only one associations - with the time you lived in the dugout and people killed people - and that only our memory can describe. The light from the headlights permeates the whitish strip of smoke and goes into the darkness. On the perimeter are pickets in combat guards and burning bonfires in barrels for the post, warming this dim fire of his hands. And you completely rely on them and know that they know this and therefore will not leave. People walk, look for food, cook food, bring and take firewood, prepare pilaf for everyone in a huge cauldron, remove garbage, sleep, prepare a scene, develop a plan - in general, they are engaged in the necessary battalion or the Maidan with the necessary things, determined by each for the rank of it. Some people leave, others come, but the backbone remains, and the same remains. And someone constantly, passing and taking a post, stands in front of the stage all night-about the same number of people. And people are collected here, in one place, their own and someone else's human will, and they are in the same time and space, because they themselves also want this, and they have a single, common goal, and they are ready to go to it, subconsciously, can even be aware of this - and still understanding its significance. And life is filled with meaning.

Boots and a camera on the battery - I remember the best.

At some point, the city noticeable by snow was empty. The empty center of the European capital is strange. Involuntarily, the memory transfers to the past or the future, and you see the streets on these snow -covered streets, trying to leave quickly by passers -by, but burning tanks, corpses in soldiers' pea jackets under the walls and hollowing a column of rebels with grenade launchers in the windows.

On the barricades a couple of dozen people. Bonfires, tea, expectation. “Glory to Ukraine! Glory to the heroes! ” The lone chain of Berkuta fighters, pushing people from the house of officers at the intersection of Institutskaya and Shovkovah, a first -aid post in the Lutheran Church and a smiling young pastor, each gateway was tightly blocked by a police bus, the entire government quarter of the village of Siege, Sanbrigade in the gear, near the administration itself, where there was a battle, to the repetition of which are two two. Young girls and a guy in white vests with red crosses are preparing again - they are preparing calmly, measuredly and busily, without fear - and it is from this calm that you yourself become scared. The picket of nationalists in the gateway, in whom you are in anticipation, a column of ultra-radical youngsters with reinforcement, shovel cuttings and nails, loud and stupid, who equalized, crawling on the streets and disappeared by no known to where. The barricades taken into the ring by security forces, the people's deputies, who have become a chain in front of their people, two driven bulldozers, whose mechanics hide their faces, a metal voice from a campaign machine, chasing the same record in a circle: “Soldiers, remember, you must protect your people, your mothers and sisters, do not carry out the officers, do not listen to the shields, throw shields, go to shields Side of the people ”, the unemotional persons of conscripts who are ready to fulfill these very orders - and perform to the end, tension and bitterness on their faces ...

Guys, do not fight. Kyiv is a beautiful city. Agree somehow.

Perhaps the blockade is still. When I left the hotel, it became clear that everything changed. The feeling that now we were all in some other circumstances was physical. The area from all sides is blocked by the police. Buses, lines of the "Cosmonauts" in the chickered helmets, military trucks.

This power of the spirit, this faith is fascinating in their business.

Moleben on stage. Several priests read prayers for three hours and sing psalms. And the people who are very few at this morning hour, the Maidan generally empty at night and is again filled with people only after dinner - and these people stand and read prayers too. Baptized. At the barricades. With helmets in the hands. In anticipation of the battle, already realizing that they will lose it because the forces are unequal, and yet remaining in positions. This power of the spirit, this faith in its own business, is a desire to live freely, as they want, and not as imposed on top, they fascinate. And the wool on the scruff of the neck stands on end. And you understand that now you cannot leave either. Your place was determined, and it is here. Now you need to go with these people this part of the path to the end, although you do not share many of their slogans and views, but fate has ordered this way. It really happened.

A guy of eighty centimeters tall approached the group of journalists:
- Boys, I'm scared.
So said. In Russian.
“Let me take a picture of you, my friend,” I say.
- Let's.

The girl is crying. It can be seen that she is frankly scared. But it does not leave. A couple hugs at a distance. Also not joyful. And also remain. And the people on the barricades, calmly, from the cigarette in the mouth, without unnecessary words, unnecessary movements and bustle awaiting assault. Everything has already been said, changed, suspended and decided. There is nothing more to talk about here. Over the square, it is very and scary, like a team before the battle, it spreads: "We will put our souls for our freedom, and show, we, Brother, Kozatsky,".

In my opinion, they were really ready to die.

The assault began the next night. The system of depersonalized people in black helmets with Plexiglass races, divided into cohorts and phalanxes, filling the whole street and silently standing with shields waiting for the attack, is impressive. I don't know how many of them were. In my opinion, the whole Ukrainian police. Thousands four. And I did not suspect that this was such a power. But when with me there is only one platoon of little boys in three lines with depths with only one general pressure just broke the cast-iron lattice, I began to look at them differently.

The first, on the left flank, went the internal troops. Following them, according to the right, leaving the center of the street flooded with water and turned into the rink of the street, Golden Eagle went. They were opposed by hundreds of one and a half veterans of Afghanistan.

The parties came together, and ... I do not know how to describe it. In my practice, there was no such experience. The complete feeling that you got into a movie about ancient history. Three hundred Spartans. Alien farmpils. The conquest of the Gauls. Rome above all. The legion of the warriors armed with shields in armor, opposing them less organized and lighter armed people who protect their freedom, rising above the heads of the barricade, aimed at attacking sophita, screaming, clang, ringing of iron. Adrenaline in the blood. Strength for strength. But the other force was stronger.

The barricades reached quite quickly, the splashes of the broken sophists, pulled out one several of the most active defenders, the screech of the grinder cutting in the middle of the sea, the cables and steel reinforcement, the breakthrough and pushing defense down the street, the entrance to several special forces, which the defenders released upwards their corridor and which, also seemed to be ready, were ready. To die surrounded by something of your own, for the power of the order. The cries of thousands of people and the ringing of hundreds of police shields, merging over an area of ​​one continuous rumble, which, mixing with a steam of thousands of mouths and with the smoke of set -on tires and burning tents, goes into a frosty black sky with one common giant club. A breakthrough of defense with the ambush battalion from the flank from the flank, from the European Square, and the capture of almost half of the Maidan, a short -term fight near the House of Trade Unions, where the batons, reinforcement, fire extinguishers and where the defenders nevertheless drove the “Golden Eagle”, but they themselves lost their system and lost the people who were delayed and then beaten in autosaks. An attempt to storm the City Council, where the defenders poured storming from the corpuscles of the Brandpoits brought out in the windows. People who heard a call and by three in the morning began to arrive from all over Kyiv - they came on foot, took helmets and got into line, and at one moment there were so many that the security forces were simply physically unable to break through this mass and, realizing this, stopped. A truce, the team "Blord to Earth!" And the knock of hundreds of shields simultaneously placed on the paving stones, the departure of the troops to the starting positions and the victorious cries of those who won this battle, but have not yet defeated the defenders who lost one of the barricades and almost half of the Maidan in the rear, but still defended the entire area as a whole, and chanting from the stage: “We are a nation! We are a nation! We are a nation! ”...

"Boys, I'm scared." So said. In Russian.

How much did all this last? I don't remember. Five or six hours, probably. In any case, I realized myself only at eight in the morning sitting in the restaurant of the hotel at breakfast, stupidly looking at the mug of tea, feeling only strong fatigue, almost apathy. It always happens.

Breakfast with a view of the revolution ... This is strange.

Although ... I'm already used to it, perhaps.

Now the parties have gone to their original positions and restored the status quo. The government remained the government quarter, which the protesters could not capture and hold, the opposition was Maidan. Which the security forces could not capture and hold. A certain parity of strength has been identified. Neither one or the other side has a clear numerical advantage. And to use extreme measures - gas, plastic bullets, grenades, batons and waterflies - the authorities clearly does not want to.

In exchange for the demolished toy barricades, new, real ones are built. From bags with snow reinforced with cooked reinforcement, cables, chains, metal shields and hedgehogs with barbed wire. Four meters in height. All that could be done wrong, the authorities did. Such things need to be checked as an erdogan - either pressed to the end immediately, pouring half a city with gas and water, or not start at all. Viktor Yanukovych, recently, the former is more likely in the plus - in any case, the opposition had previously carried image losses - lost the advantage. There are now seven to ten thousand on the Maidan at night. They are waiting. They prepared. They thought and organized everything. For the first time in ten days, the Maidan does not look like a “Zarnitsa”, but to a real military camp, where posts are set, shifts are painted, shelling sectors and liability vectors are assigned. Having turned this anthill, the authorities got it, and people are cheerful, angry and ready. Of course, you can demolish all this. Four thousand prepared fighters with gas, shields and water bodies are able to work miracles.

But then the Maidan will be really half a Ukrainian.

Note from the author

The text is written as part of the Arkady Babchenko project "Journalism without intermediaries." The essence of the project is that the readers decide whether to pay or not to pay the work of a journalist, depending on the significance of the text, its quality or just sympathy directly to the author's account.

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