Theoretically every living being tries to make the distance between its birth date and date of death as long as possible. Everyone dreams of living a long and happy life. I don’t think you can recall anyone wishing you an early departure from this world. On the contrary, more and more people become obsessed with the idea to live longer.

Theory, however, is only theory and has little in common with reality. Statistics shows a steady growth in the suicide rate in Ukraine. Those who disagree with such a solution of ‘to be or not to be’ problem try to engage themselves in some kind of activity to while away the time before the finishing tape. Maybe there are somewhere people who dream about living to be 200 but not in my historic motherland. Here many citizens consider the age of fifty as God’s punishment.

One of the most acute problems in prison is how to kill time. Minutes and hours drag on very slowly like a sticky jelly lazily poured by someone into the Eternity. You can experience a similar feeling when after driving a fast car you have to drive in a horse and cart. There is no comparison between 24 hours behind bars and 24 hours outside prison - they are two different time dimentions. Your former ‘friends’ whose help you stupidly relied upon have no idea of what time is like in prison. Their days seem to end a few moments after they start. Seeing someone who has done 15-20 years in prison they are likely to exclaim: “How quickly time has passed!” Some might as well add:

I was just going to pop in to find out how things are.

Was going to …. but didn’t do it. It happens. Sometimes twenty years seem shorter than ten minutes walk to your house.

Another day passed, and another, and…. How many more slow monotonous days filled with anxious waiting are there in store for you? I often wished I could go into stupor and wake up outside prison walls free again. It won’t be an exaggeration to say that every prisoner has repeatedly asked God to speed up the time so that days and years in prison passed faster.

Most inmates were not prepared to part with their lives though they would eagerly give away the part of life that they considered ‘useless’. I can see you are also under the illusion that once you are out of prison everything is going to be OK. The problem is to get free. As to the ‘useless’ part of life which might be a few years or a couple of decades, you are prepared to get rid of it right away.

Isn’t it strange? On the outside people keep busy. They never have enough time, never a minute to spare. Every moment seems to matter, people cling to every single moment …but as soon as they get it, it is thoughtlessly thrown into the bonfire of vanity.

In prison it is absolutely the opposite: plenty of time and nothing to do with it. Prisoners wouldn’t mind giving hours, days, years! Away but they don’t know how. I often envied those cell-mates who were able to lie on their bunks day after day coming down only to eat or relieve themselves. Just like bears in hibernation. My only regret was that some of them weren’t clean enough. We literally had to force one of such hibernators named Sergei to wash and change his underwear. When he finally took off his socks many of us regretted forcing him - socks weren’t as smelly as his feet. Sergei never washed his dishes either saying that they were his personal belongings and that is why none of our business. I had always felt repulsive watching the soup being poured over the remains of his previous meal.

Every time we made Sergei change his clothes he would climb back onto his bunk but fail to go back to sleep. He complained that we ‘violated his human rights’:

- You have interrupted my sleep again! What shall do now?

Sergei wouldn’t stop whimpering and groaning which was even worse than his smelly socks. He just wasn’t able to sleep in clean clothes.

What shall I do? What shall I do? - he would repeat again and again.

Shut up! - The Boney shouted losing control. - Even Chernyshevsky didn’t know what to do and wrote a book with the same title. (*) Climb back on your bunk! Get away from me! You stink!

Who are you to give me orders? A cop? - Sergei was getting angry.

Comparison with a cop outraged Boney. A big pan with boiling water ended on Sergei’s head. He squealed and seized Boney by the throat. The cell-mates started stirring on their bunks - it looked like they were in for a bit of entertainment. A rare treat in the Kingdom of Boredom. Something to talk about till the next outstanding episode.

To tell the truth, there was no entertainment of any kind in prison. My daily trainings and regular reading saved me from going crazy. Thanks God that unlike SPD playing draughts and chess was allowed in Lukianovskaya prison. If you are lucky to find a partner, of course. Not many inmates enjoyed playing draughts, few could play chess which is considered an intellectual game. No prison can boast of highly intellectual inmates. Only once during my imprisonment had I been lucky to have a really good partner. A new prisoner was once brought to our cell - a white-haired old man who could play chess almost professionally. A music teacher by profession, he looked so out of place in the cell that we couldn’t help asking what his offense was. The old man sighed sadly and said in a bit stilted way:

- I dedicated my life to school and children. And was punished for that. Fell a victim of intrigues.

I immediately felt like a pupil at a school desk overwhelmed with the desire to stand up and sing the national anthem of the USSR. My cell-mates didn’t seem to share my enthusiasm. They weren’t satisfied with the explanation ‘dedicated myself to school and children’ and suspected the old man to be some kind of a sex maniac.

As it turned out the old man wasn’t a maniac but a very easy-going person. We drew a chess board on the wooden deck that served as both a floor and a bed for us. Scraps of paper with symbols drawn on them served as chess pieces. At first nothing seemed to go right. We couldn’t get used to the chess pieces, confused them all the time and failed to concentrate on the game. But gradually we got over it and started to enjoy the game.

I don’t know why our playing chess infuriated the wardens so much. They yelled at us from behind the door threatening to send us to the segregation cell. Our makeshift chess pieces were often taken away during morning shake-downs. We would draw new ones and continue playing. The music teacher paid little attention at the shouts of watchdogs.

- A dog barks but the caravan keeps moving, - he used to say - Set out the pieces. I’ve heard worse things in my life.

The old man’s manner of playing chess, aggressive and risky, was absolutely contrary to his almost angelic appearance. Such manner probably reflected his real nature. I remember once when he check-mated me I noticed a strange glitter in his eyes. It only lasted for a few seconds but it made him look like a predator - strong and aware of his strength. There was no need to look at the chessboard to know who had won: his superior glance said it all in a quick moment. Once the glitter in his eyes faded there was a humble white-haired old man sitting opposite me again.

He didn’t lie when he said that all his life had been dedicated to children. He really was a music teacher in one of the secondary schools. His ambition was to keep teaching till he dies during a class just like famous actors died on stage in front of the audiences.

But the school principal had a different plan in mind. As soon as the music teacher reached the retirement age he was asked to retire. The old man tried to persuade the principal that he was still ‘fit and eager to teach’, that his ‘life was meaningless without pupils’, but to no avail. The school principal had already promised the job to his mistress, a young attractive graduate of the concervatoire. So his advice to the poor old man was ‘to enjoy a well-deserved rest’ and, in case he still felt like working, ‘to give private lessons or, better still, ‘to grow tomatoes on his vegetable patch’.

The music teacher was shocked. He didn’t expect such turn of events. On the contrary, he was sure that the school wouldn’t be able to function properly if he retired. But life went on, the school ceiling hadn’t collapsed, the pupils didn’t seem to care who was their music teacher.

For the old man life had lost sense, taste and color. He continued to get up early and go to school as had been his habit for years. Every day he insisted on seeing the principal and implored him to give him his job back. On any conditions. The school principal got so irritated by the old man that the school guard was ordered not to let him inside the school building. After a few unpleasant scenes at the front door the old man seemed to have given up. At least he hadn’t been seen at school anymore.

Two weeks later the school principal was found dead in the park where he usually walked his dachshund in the mornings. According to the forensic examination his death was caused by suffocation. Joggers in the same park saw an old white-haired man approach the dachshund owner. The latter was obviously unwilling to talk to the old man and turned his back on him. The old man took off his tie and following the principal threw it over his neck from behind. People who had seen it didn’t realize what in fact had been happening. Meanwhile the old man managed to sit the principal down on a bench and wiping the sweat off his forehead slowly went away. The dachshund lay down at its master’s feet putting its nose on his well-polished shoes.

A bony woman was walking her equally bony Dobermann nearby. A motionless figure on the bench aroused her curiosity. Coming closer she decided the man was unwell and started screaming for help. Soon a crowd gathered, somebody called the ambulance. Eventually the police arrived.

By the end of the second day the investigation confirmed the identity of the old man. The quiet man, ‘victim of intrigues’, was arrested. He didn’t stay long in our cell. By the end of the week he was taken to the interrogation and never returned. We hadn’t seen him since.

When a prisoner is transferred to a different cell he is usually ordered to take his personal belongings with him. Sometimes personal things of a prisoner are taken by a warden a few hours after he has left the cell. The plastic bag of a music teacher with a bright red Coca-Cola sign stayed in the cell for almost two days. I tried to avoid thinking of the reason. But even the sight of it aroused an uneasy feeling of anxiety and concern which I failed to suppress.

In Lukyanovska prison I often recalled playing chess with a quiet old man. Chess were allowed in Lukyanovka, nobody shouted or took the makeshift chess pieces away. But finding a good partner was not that easy.

As to the card games wardens were unanimous - they were strictly banned in all prisons. There always had been a terrible racket every time cards were found during the usual shake-down. Who brought the cards to the cell? Who played? What were the stakes? Some inmates ended up in the segregation cell, others were badly beaten. I often wondered why cops fell so much on cards. Maybe because their brains were not enough to play even the simplest card games? The more I watched them the more assured I became of the fact that the word ‘cop’ wasn’t just the name of a profession. It is a diagnosis that indicates the amount and quality of the gray matter inside the head of a human being.

But let’s go back to card games. In human consciousness cards are always associated with antisocial elements. It’s quite common to think that only thieves, hooligans, card-sharpers and spongers play cards and nothing good can come out of it. There is a certain truth in that. Cards is a game of chance and is played, practically always, for stakes. Examples of well-off people losing their fortunes in one night at a card table are more than enough. Besides, when a professional is playing against you, you are doomed. He always builds up a game in such a way that you inevitably end up a loser.

Apart from cards prisoners play dominoes (‘goat’, ‘telephone’, ‘oak’), backgammon (long and short) and dice. All the above games are played either for stakes or without stakes. Don’t sit down to play against a prison professional player even if he swears the game is not for stakes. There are too many traps for freshers. Some are primitive, others quite sophisticated.

I remember a prisoner, let’s call him Vasya, charged with high-jacking cars, who agreed to play backgammon with no stakes. He won the first game, but lost the second. His opponent suddenly said that only the first game was not for stakes and demanded that Vasya should pay him. The on-lookers nodded in agreement. Vasya was terribly annoyed but considering himself an experienced player agreed to continue the game. He failed to win a single game afterwards but stopped only when he had nothing more to lose. Vasya who used to boast of his ‘heroic exploits’ on the outside had become the most abased prisoner in the cell whose only place was on the w.c. pan.

A game can be dangerous not only for those who play it but for the on-lookers as well. There is an unwritten rule in prison: never interfere with other prisoners’ game. Some inmates who are fond of giving advice even if nobody asks for it, often forget this rule and find themselves in big trouble. No matter who your advice was meant for, you’ll be made responsible for the failure of one of the players and as the game was played for stakes you’ll be made to pay the winner.

Such situations are quite common, especially in bigger cells. Very often the players deliberately try to involve a cell-mate into their game. First they would make numerous attempts to get the assumed victim interested in the game. Preparations to the game are accompanied by such noise and bustle that there is no way for them to pass unnoticed. After the initial goal is achieved and the victim joins the on-lookers, the main objective is to make him comment on the game. For example, he might say: “I would rather move the knight” addressing his remark to no one in particular. But one of the players immediately moves the knight. The other starts shouting:

- Stop prompting! It’s not with you that I’m playing!

The on-lookers nod in full agreement:

- You shouldn’t have interfered.

The unfortunate prisoner starts explaining that he didn’t mean to prompt or interfere but it is too late.

- You got yourself into it, you have to answer, - that’s the final verdict he gets.

It is highly unlikely that somebody might intercede for the simple-minded prisoner. He has only himself and God to rely on. To plead with the wardens to transfer him to a different cell is humiliating and won’t help him much. Prison is small, news travel fast. Nobody managed to avoid punishment. Besides, prisoners who seek help from the cops become their hostages and inevitably turn into stool-pigeons. Whichever cell they find themselves in, they are always treated as traitors by other inmates.

Days in prison are very much the same, just like two drops of water on the rusty prison bars. Days are pressed into weeks and months. Each prisoner has a feeling that he has spent in prison a few months rather than years. And there is nothing surprising in that. A human life is measured not by the number of days in the calendar but by what it is filled with. A long life - if you just add up years - may, in fact, be worthless.

Behind bars weekends and holidays are even worse than ordinary days. On weekdays at least something is happening: inmates are taken to interrogations, new cell-mates arrive in the cell, etc. Some kind of entertainment. On weekdays and holidays life in prison comes to a stop - no movement of any kind. Some inmates try to overcome boredom and depression by telling stories of how they used to celebrate holidays and spend weekends. It only made me feel worse.

The only exception was New Year’s Eve. No comparison to Independence or May Day. Something to remember. Three days preceding the New Year prison turns into a madhouse. Shake-downs every other hour. Watchdogs won’t miss anything knowing that every family would try to put something special into the usual parcel. Some inmates get a pair of warm socks, others - a new track suit. Every parcel is checked ten times, cops look for vodka and drugs often taking away whatever they like.

The closer the New Year the more cheerful the mood of the wardens. Some of them start walking unsteadily but manage to keep up vigilance - experience shows. They have taken away from prisoners whatever they could and now feel satisfied walking slowly up and down the prison corridors, the service cap at the back of the head, red-faced and complacent - typical representatives of the Ukrainian Law Enforcement Bodies.

As for me I have never had such a New Year celebration before. I usually spent those days with my family in a quiet and peaceful atmosphere. What a difference now! What a company! What an atmosphere!

Inmates started preparations for the New Year celebration well in advance. Foodstuffs are never plentiful in prison; however, anything that could be classified as tasty and special had been put aside starting early December.

In the morning of December 31^st my cell-mates started a big row for no particular reason. None of them had pleasant recollections of the ending year and they decided to pour out their unhappiness and rage on the heads of the cell-mates. Cops arrived just in time to stop the bloodshed. Two of my cell-mates were transferred to different cells. Their bunks were soon occupied by two new neighbors: a silent Caucasian and Fifi with a big bag of marihuana. The latter was a typical cops’ informant, we were unanimous in guessing it. But his marihuana bag happened so handy that nobody was much interested in his biography. After a joint everyone seemed happier, some took a handful of pills to be in the ‘right mood’. Soon the atmosphere in the cell was festive enough for a celebration.

Making a cake became the culmination of the day. None of us had any experience or culinary talents. We just started mixing things together, not even trying to follow a certain recipe. We fully relied on our intuition and childhood recollections. The ingredients were plentiful, from dried fruit and stale cookies to melted chocolate bars. The shapeless pile was growing bigger and bigger but it wouldn’t keep shape no matter how hard we tried. Some cell-mates started putting crusts of bread around the cake to keep it from falling apart. Others were watching and giving advice. Somebody suggested putting some thread around the cake but the majority decided against it: nobody wanted to pick pieces of thread out of their teeth.

The most surprising thing was that by midnight the cake somehow managed to harden. The taste was unforgettable - one of the best cakes I have ever eaten in my life. We sat down around the table - people of different ages and attitudes, with different past and vague future. We shared the food and drink and for a time forgot about the differences between us. What did it matter if some of us headed for Heaven while others could only end up in Hell? What difference did it make if some were predators and others their prey? Sitting side by side we were equal and eager to believe that all our misfortunes would remain in the passed year and that a New Year would work a miracle for everyone.

In my country it is customary to open a bottle of champagne at midnight and pouring it into glasses make a wish. People wish each other a happy and prosperous New Year. In civilized countries a huge X-mas tree is set up in central squares and fireworks organized.

We also had a small X-mas tree on our table neatly cut out of a postcard. We didn’t mind it to be so small and made of paper. X-mas tree is a symbol of a New Year celebration and we had it! The only difference was the toast typical only within the prison walls:

- Freedom, mates!

- And good luck!

People seldom appreciate what they have. They wish themselves and others to have what they don’t have yet. Simple but most important things are always forgotten. Nobody drinks a toast to fresh air, for example, or sunlight or clear water. Sounds silly, doesn’t it?

Fifi sipping ‘chefir’ said pensively:

- If only girls could join us…

The others started nodding in agreement. Some of them hadn’t touched a woman for years. Only Denis said blowing his nose into a pillow:

- What do we need those whores for? They can only cause trouble. Who wants this headache?!..