THE IRON CURTAIN

 

The iron curtain

After some time of my parents hunting the world for a cure for my inevitable blindness, they found a reverlucionary treatment in the USSR.

It took two long hard years to acquire a visa, as no one in those days visited the U.S.S.R for any form of treatment.

How my parents discovered the treatment, is a story on its own. I wish one day to let you know the full story of my life in an autobiography, and I hope my dream comes true, but in the meanwhile I would like to talk to you about the first time I visited Russia.

It was  back in 1975. January the 5^th to be precise. I knew nothing of Russia as I was a six year old girl. All that I was aware of, was my parents were worried sick about how they would afford the trip and my Mum spent months crying, because every bank she went to refused to loan her any more money, after she was so much in the red already with previous trips she had tried and failed to meet with help for my eyes.

My new coat was handed to me as a kind of ceremonial ritual. It was white with a thin red piping and fir around the hood and edges. It was to be as cold as cold could be.

The mayhem of the media was gathering outside our house and as I left the house, in our small village of stone colliery houses, the press charged at us like lunatic’s. The sounds of clicks from the huge cameras and the bright lights blistered my eyes, as equipment was thrusted in my face as questions were shouted to us, like

“Fiona, are you afraid? Mrs Cummings, do you know what to expect? Why don’t you let your daughter go blind Mrs Cummings?

It was awful. On our arrival at the airport, it got worse. There were over a hundred members of the press there. The police escorted me past all of the queues and media. My poor Mum was pushed and pulled in every direction. Suffocated in hungry greedy men, needing their story for the day.

I went up the steps of the plane, saddened by the reaction from my darling Dad, whom I worshiped. He was so sad we were leaving. So with the worlds press holding onto my picture and my Mum holding onto my hand, I began my trip to the iron curtain. This in itself haunted me as how would we fly through the iron curtain? I was six?

On our arrival to Moscow, we were asked to leave the aeroplane first. As the flight doors opened, the gust of air blew me back into my Mums body. I could not breath, the shock was too much. It was so unnatural for me to survive in such conditions I thought?

I learned years later, that it was minus 27. Never had I known such temperatures. The air was dry and it grabbed my throat and punched our hearts.

At the bottom of the aeroplane steps, stood two young angry looking soldiers with pointed guns. Pointing in our direction. My Mum expressed her discussed as they were aimed at us. I thought she was going to be shot. It was dreadful.

The smell of the air was like nothing I have experienced before. The smell of fear was to come.

I am cutting this very long story as short as I can for this blog, but I was stolen from my mum. The echoes of her voice shouting for me as I looked back at her being restrained by a man from the British Embassy.

I was taken into a dark cellar. With only gas lights on the walls. Cats circled my ankles as I was lead into a huge pitch black room, where by I was given electric shock treatment, streight into the eyes. Oh the pain of thinking about the seven weeks that was to follow is excruciating.

I did not see my Mum in that time, no one spoke English to me and I was given 172 injections of pure pain, as the cerum was new and was also known to be a painful one.

Rusty needles were administrated and I was force fed the most revolting food of sloppy potato and oats.

So much went on over that seven weeks and what was to follow in my life in the USSR, is to me looking back at it, incredulous, an yet my closest friends are Russians and I have huge respect for the Russian people, as they under suffering and threats, showed me their hearts.

I had dealings with the Russian mafia and KGB. So much pain I went through over the many years I went there for eye treatment. Threats that I would be killed and the sickness of fear filled my childhood.

Russia was a country of mystery. Like no other I have ever been to, but a country where by I felt so safe, though watched by authorities and the underworld at all times.