Translated material
Yes, myself. Yes, to the punishment cell
Many people drag their communication style and habits with them to freedom. I didn't take anything from it.
Two weeks ago, Novaya published a story about Masha Vlasova about the optimism with which she copes with a serious illness and how she laughs and makes plans until she turns 80. After that, dozens of people wrote to her on social networks with words of support. And then Masha timidly asked: can I write about how I was in prison? After a long pause, she added: “Don’t be afraid, it won’t be sad at all, I don’t know how to be sad.” And she sent me a story about the punishment cell - outrageous, unlike anything else, shameful and instructive at the same time.
This happened five years ago. The waitress in the cafe where we always hung out had a birthday, we drank a lot, and she started teasing me: “Mash, Mash, can you get a martini? And for a liter for 500 rubles?” At that time, I could do a lot of things that were prohibited by the Criminal Code, so, without thinking twice, I rushed to the nearest store. She brazenly took three liter bottles and confidently walked out into the street through the door where it said “Entrance”. Nobody noticed. I would have stopped there, but everyone in the cafe applauded me, and I went to the store a second time, this time in a luxurious way - by taxi. This time I also picked up some chocolates. Well, they swept me away - drunk, with all this beauty.
There was a trial. The lawyer advised me to say that I sold everything I stole and spent the money on food for stray cats. But it was stupid, and I didn’t lie. In short, they gave me eight months of corrective labor as a janitor in the trolleybus department of our town.
It’s funny that I used to work as an auditor in this park, but they kicked me out because I looked stale. And there all workers had free trolleybus travel. And I visited the HR department again and again - in case they hired me. The boss, a woman in a mohair beret who lived with her mother and cat, could no longer see me. And then I asked the Federal Penitentiary Service to send me as a janitor to the trolleybus department. I come to the boss, bam, a piece of paper on the table - they say, don’t get away with it. How she hated me! To be honest, there was a reason not to love me then. Well, she got me fired under the article, and, three months before the end of my term, I, by court decision, went to a penal colony in our region.
There are two options to get to the colony. Either you are driven by the cops under escort or you, with a paper from the Federal Penitentiary Service, receive a free ticket at the bus station and go to prison on your own. For some reason the inspector believed that I would get there.
On the way, I bought canned food, tea, sugar, and cigarettes. I wasn’t scared at all – it was as if I was going on a business trip. Why be afraid? Everything has already happened and nothing can be changed.
My grandmother accompanied me. She was very worried. She even wanted to go with me and rent an apartment there to go on dates. But I assured her that everything would be fine and I would be back soon. While I was riding on the bus, I thought for the entire four hours that this was temporary, not forever.
...We lived in a five-story brick building. The men's squad had a horizontal bar in the yard, but few people played sports there; mostly everyone sat on benches, smoked and looked at the metal fence with barbed wire.
In the cell I took the top bunk. It’s good that no one bothered to ask questions: who wrote the “killer whale” (cassation appeal), who wrote the letter home, who read it. In prison they give you a laminated piece of paper with your name, article and sentence on it. It must be sewn onto the robe. Since I’m not good at sewing, I quickly found someone who did it for me in exchange for cigarettes.
But then I stopped liking it there. Getting up at six in the morning, exercising on the street, lining up for roll call four times a day, queuing for gruel, carrying heavy tanks of gruel, cleaning the premises. I looked at this melancholy and decided to go to the punishment cell. Yes, myself. Yes, to a punishment cell.
This is a basement-type room, four by six meters, a toilet behind a curtain, a sink, a table and a bench screwed to the floor. At nine in the evening you are given a mattress, pillow and blanket. They pick you up at five in the morning. There are no bunks or beds, you sleep on the plank floor. Check twice a day. You cannot take anything with you except soap and a toothbrush and toothpaste. The exception is books from the library.
Photo: from the personal archive of Maria Vlasova
No one went to the punishment cell of their own free will. But I spent less than a day on the detachment, and that was enough for me. I went to the dubachka (that’s what they call the guards in prison) and honestly said that I wanted to go to the punishment cell. She was already wedged, she decided that I was joking so stupidly. I had to repeat the request. She says: I will put you there until the end of your sentence. I nod happily – that’s what I need.
The whole prison was stunned by my action. This was the first time they actually saw a person who voluntarily went to the isolation ward. Even the head of the colony called me to her: “Are you having a conflict with someone?” She couldn't admit the idea that I was myself. I honestly told her that it’s hard for me to get up to exercise outside in the winter and carry tanks. According to the law, you can’t just send a person to a punishment cell, and I was given a refusal to work.
As strange as it may sound, it was better in the isolation ward. We lived either alone or in groups of eight. You can’t bring foreign objects there, but I smuggled a watch in and hid it under the floor for the entire time - not a single check found it. That’s what they called me in the cell – watcher of the clock. She was also called the bread watcher. The fact is that every day a person was given half white and half black. The girls, out of boredom, ate all the bread before lunch, and in the evening they ate nothing. And I said: we’re slowing down with bread. Since then, the bread began to stretch throughout the day.
The morning began at five in the morning, when the mattress was taken away. Others continued to sleep on the bare floor, and I, in order not to chill my kidneys, sat on a bench and read. We were taken to the library once a week. I love history and didn’t take romance novels, but historical ones. The inspectors were even surprised - who is reading your biographies of Hitler and Stalin?
At seven in the morning they brought breakfast. Porridge, bread, tea. We ate, then the girls slept again until lunch, and I read. After lunch, I started egging everyone on: let's play (cities or crocodile). We laughed all over the room. Sometimes the guards came to find out what was going on with us.
We got it from the dubacheks. For any violation you could be put on stretching - this is when you stand almost on the splits facing the wall with your arms raised up. Some fainted.
They could shave your head with a clipper and write lice on the card. But I didn't care. Once they also threatened me that they would shave me. I shouted joyfully: “What, a typewriter? Hurray, you don’t have to spend money on a haircut!” They got rid of it.
And one morning they didn’t give us bread. Dubachka lied that there was not enough space in the car. And then the boss was checking the cameras. She always asked: Do you have any questions? And she looked at me, because I always had questions. Like when the “beluga” will be changed (white underwear should be changed once a week) or why we don’t get walked every day. It was more difficult to ask the girls - they had sentences of a year or two, they could be sent to a different regime. But I don’t care, my time was minuscule and every day it’s getting shorter and shorter. So I ask: will there be bread today? The boss was so surprised: what about the bread? I nod at the young lady who said that there wasn’t enough space in the car. We then heard the dubacha roaring in the corridor. But they gave me bread.
The girls told me that I am now her enemy number one. On the next shift, she threw me an extra half a loaf and half a loaf and told me to gobble it up in two hours. But what kind of punishment is this? My cellmates and I had fun gnawing away at the unexpected addition.
My relations with those who sat with me were smooth. I didn’t get into their mess, and they didn’t get into me. You just need to position yourself correctly, not lie and not be afraid. And everyone knew about me - this is the Masha who doesn’t care about anything.
Two days before my release, I was put on stretching duty: I handed over the blanket not at five, but at seven in the morning. I stood stretching for about two minutes, realized that I was tired of it, and I said to the dubachka: do you want me to tell you why I went to the isolation ward myself? But they are all interested. I say, I want to write an article for the newspaper about the inner life of the punishment cell. And I’ll write about you. She somehow quickly gave up and just said: “Mash, go to the cell.”
After the end of the term, the office gave me 850 rubles in allowance and money for a ticket home. This is all I took from prison. Many drag with them to freedom both that manner of communication and those habits. I didn't take anything from it. I walked out the gate and called it a day. And I was only recently able to tell my current acquaintances about this. Many were amazed: were you sitting? It seems to me that it doesn’t matter whether there was a prison in your life or not, the main thing is to remain yourself.
Maria VLASOVA