Friendship between Russia and Ukraine reached a peak

Representatives of fraternal countries conducted a joint operation in the Caucasus

And it’s a pity that the genre of a portrait of a good person left our journalism.

But I will tell you about one ...

Because, when everyone quarrels and offended, when hostility towards others increases, when they recall the old insults and the terrible word “war”, he lives as if there are no boundaries in the world (at least for friendship), and conflicts are all resolved.

To some extent, thanks to this person, in the midst of a cold confrontation, Russians and Ukrainians conducted a joint operation. In the Caucasus.

I met him in Germany, in German courses. High, fit. Then it turned out that the witty and educated. The interlocutor is what to look for, the soul of the company, smart. And as a guitar will take ...

But the most important thing is in the lines of the biography.

Zaydler Alexander Mikhailovich, Snow Bars, Honored Coach of Ukraine, Master of Sports, Repeated champion and prize -winner of the country's championships for mountaineering, member of the Youth Commission of the World Climbing Union (WAIA), Co -Chairman of the American -Ukrainian Program "Climbers for Peace - Cellulars for the World", Honorary Chairman of the honor of the Dnipropetrovsk Federation mountaineering.

So, about the mountains ...

After hungry childhood, Sasha had problems with the heart, with eyes. I could not do sports at all. From ordinary physical education, they were released.

Therefore, when he - a second -year student of the Dnepropetrovsk Metallurgical Institute - offered a ticket to the climbing camp, he decided to go just to relax. But on the very first day, everyone was given storms, boots with steel shackles, elementary equipment, and - without conversation, “forward and up” ...

He widened his legs to blood. He cursed his frivolity, wild heat, a heavy backpack and mountains sung by someone ...

And then ... “We went out onto the pass, put the tents, it seemed to fall asleep. And at night I got out of the tent. And froze ... The full moon, snowy ridges, sparkling ice, silver peaks with a blue glow. He stood so for a long time until he stuck. And something in me turned over.

And when, after returning to the camp, we were asked: “Who wants to Elbrus?”, I stepped forward.

A dozen of us were such young idiots. Half did not rise, but I ascended.

He ran into the full program, participated in rescue works, froze his fingers on his feet ... But he ascended. "

It was then that he realized that the expression “conquering the top” is only a metaphor. You can only conquer yourself.

After all, climbers are people of a special breed. Or, as a specialist in “special” steels Alexander Zaydler said, “special smelting”. Therefore, after graduating from the institute, already with an almost finished dissertation, Sasha did not stay in graduate school, but left for the distribution in Zaporozhye by the master in the steel -melting workshop.

And in the summer he went to the mountains. So it was then, when he, already returning to Dnepropetrovsk, worked at the project institute ... and to this day ... conquers himself.

“You know, it is very simple to die on top. You sit down and fall asleep. But you must force yourself to fight. You say to yourself: they are waiting for you, you have children, wife, friends. How is it: I-and I will not return, Tram Tarara ... We will all return.

My guys called me Rebbe ... "

Not a single person with Sasha died on an expedition. They said so in the detachment: hold on to Mikhalych, and everything will be fine.

It is difficult to list all the ascents that Alexander Zaydler committed.

Only more than two hundred. In the Caucasus, Pamir, Tien Shan, in the Cordillera, in the Alps ...

To this day, he trains young climbers (on the rocks of Crimea, for example).

Now that the passion for the technical difficulties of the ascent is satisfied, mountaineering has also become the opportunity to see the world, other people, and another life.

And to evaluate the most important thing in the world is friendship.

Perhaps this is precisely for this now, in March 2014, without changing his plans, he went to Shevchenko’s peak in Kabardino-Balkaria. 4200 meters. Probably for a professional is not the most difficult peak. But when you are 83 years old and you need to organize a real expedition (first before Pyatigorsk, then to Nalchik, then to the district center, then on the all-terrain vehicles to the foot of the glacier), and since there are no camps at the foot, everything from the very beginning is to drag tents, equipment, products (and this is in the Psygan-Su gorge, in a completely uninhabited area), and you are twenty people and youth and youth-and young people and youth-and young people and youth. Unsheated, and the weather for climbing is not the best, then you will seriously think ...

But he has long given a word. 50 years ago.

Back in 1939, the Ukrainian alpinists, during the celebration of the 125th anniversary of the birth of Taras Shevchenko, submitted then the still name peak of the Caucasus in the area of the Sugansky ridge and called it the name of the poet.

After 25 years, Sasha and his comrades hoisted the bust of Kobzar, made at the legendary Yuzhmash at this peak. (By the way, the alloy from which the bust is cast is still used in the production of missiles. Maybe that's why it stands at the top of the mountain, not touched by winds, not snowfalls, not lightning. The highest monument to the Ukrainian poet).

Then they decided: on the 200th anniversary of Shevchenko to rise to this height again.

And here, as Sasha himself says, this mess began. It is not clear how the international expedition will be met in Dnepropetrovsk, from where it is necessary to start, whether they will help in Kabardino-Balkaria ...

But he still decided.

Moreover, the administration of Dnepropetrovsk said: “Come! We will help both equipment and money. ” Governor Dmitry Kolesnikov signed all the papers and a letter in Kabardino-Balkaria almost a day before his own resignation. A curious detail: when the guys returned, the leader of the city was already a man from another team - Igor Kolomoisky. But nothing - awarded the expedition ...

They were perfectly accepted in Kabardino-Balkaria. They gave cars, placed ... Well, because there are many friends. And because they came with a living, uniting purpose.

The head of Kabardino-Balkaria, Yuri Kokov, said to them: "We perceive you as messengers of goodwill."

They gradually began to feel like that. “Instead of ordinary sports climbing, a peacekeeping action was obtained. We were met as brothers: after all, Shevchenko is also both the Ukrainian and Russian poet, and the Balkars know him well. ”

By the way, since 1989, Alexander rose to this peak with the Balkars, who actually do not really know how to go high to the mountains. One of them secretly carried a bottle of champagne. And, having decided to please the comrades, he uncorked her on the top with a cry: “Let's drink for your Shevchenko!” I did not know that the contents in the sparse air would immediately break out. But they still managed to swallow a bit. Symbolically ... for the fact that Shevchenko was for everyone ...

And now, March 9, they hoisted four flags in honor of this. Russian, Ukrainian, the flag of Kabardino-Balkaria and, of course, the flag of the native Dnipropetrovsk region.

And then, when they returned, the Kabardino-Balkarian cultural fund organized an evening in honor of the two hundredth anniversary of Shevchenko. And the entire climbing team was invited there. They read poetry poetry in Russian and Ukrainian, all together sang Ukrainian songs.

And the chairman of this fund Vladimir Vorovkov said: “Do not take into the soul that we fell in love with you. We will never lose love. ” This is how Sasha Zaydler told me. In the local press, they quoted a little differently: “Who can quarrel us? Yes, no one ever. "

Well, right - gave me the right thing?

There were 19 men there, in the mountains. And the girl, the wife of one of the climbers. Ukrainians, Russians, Jews, Balkars, and even one Udmurt. The ascent was difficult, because the fog, and the snow is avalanche hazardous these days, and could not find the path for a long time, and Sasha, having spent a little (two hours of the most difficult path), returned to the middle camp, realizing that he would go slower than usual and could delay the ascent.

When they left, there was fog. And they returned - the sun! And I watched the video how they, happy, reported to my Rebbe: “The young composition gained kilograms of experience! The veteran composition has lost kilograms of nerves! The Balkarian composition found out what mountaineering is! " And the happiest was the head of the administration of the Chereksky district of Kabardino-Balkaria Makhti Temirzhanov. He so dreamed of climbing to the top. Zaydler was afraid to take him. (There is no experience, and even the bosses, you never know what). But then they still decided: they trained, however, they drove along the rope ... and he reached. Together with their friends - Balkars, along with the senior coach Vladimir Khitrikov, along with veterans - Viktor Shabokhin and Valery Vyshinsky, along with the young ...

And they will never be fucked up. And for them that Ukraine, that Russia, that Kabardino-Balkaria is all one homeland. And even that Germany ... because if together, then is it all the same ...

Zaydler says so: “We are like in climbing bunch on a steep slope. If we start cutting the rope into pieces, everyone is the end. No one asks - who is who. We insure each other, help and only come to the top. ”

Guys, maybe who forgot? We are in one bunch.