City of Despair: Yost faces struggle for survival.
Yuri Suglobov-Feature Writer
The bus rolled down the E-96 headed east early this past Tuesday morning. Its destination? Yost, a city of about 50,000 located roughly 200 kilometres west of Ulgava. Some ex-residents who had recently moved brought the city to the attention of the paper. They claimed there was nothing left for any reasonable person in the city and moved to Petersburg to start a store on Main Street, which proved sucessful. So, the money had been allocated, and following their advice, we headed into the city from the west, which meant heading through the Coocoo Autonomous Oblast. The Ikarus bus had left Vityazk about 6:15 on the aforementioned Tuesday. Id been on inter-city buses before, but nothing like this. I remember once going between the Capital Oblast and Southern District by train
there wasnt even a sign. Here, not so much. There was a sign, which said, in Russian CAO Checkpoint. There were two barriers across the road, but traffic was non-existent. Soldiers, not from the army, but the small number retained by the Interior Secretariat, boarded the bus and checked the paperwork of everyone, including the driver. Meanwhile, a cohort and his dog searched all luggage. The dog sat when he smelled something and an elderly man was made to explain why he had a hunting rifle in his bag. When he didnt have a good enough explanation, he was taken across the street, to a larger hut, where a man was watching over the entire checkpoint. He waved them into a back room and that was it. We drove on without him. We drove the endless miles of highway, before I made a few observations. There was nothing but trees. Eventually, we passed a sign indicating that EnergiyaKorp ran a nuclear power station nearby. Then the horror stories began. One night in the summer of 1988 a sharp crack awoke the city of 75,000. Nobody thought anything of it, and the tram headed off to the power plant with a load of workers, none of whom returned. It was after this that door to door searches began, most housepets were confiscated. The mass graves containing the bodies of some 128 people were discovered only a few months ago. While the Hagans government never acted on the issue, the Pakhomov government has ordered an investigation. Still, we pressed on and arrived at the city to find another checkpoint, the last headed east, for now. The Interior Secretariat wants to keep Yost from becoming a haven for militants, amongst the poor population.
The bus pulled up at the lone checkpoint outside Yost. The Interior Secretariat soldiers refused to be photographed.
This time, after another search and a payment from the bus driver to the guards on the account of his being technically too drunk to drive, we drove up the main stretch, to come up to the town square. The concrete had begun to crack, with shrubs and even small trees poking out. The square had the bus station, the highest level of transport out of the city and the Diplomat Hotel, a 35 year old soviet-era building. In fact, with Yost being a showpiece city for the plant and a few factories, all the buildings were soviet era. No new buildings in 16 years. Theres no need for them. Needless to say, the Diplomat hotel was hardly a place for visiting dignitaries, but it was by far the best lodging in town. I ask around and am told that the lone restaurant in the city(few residents can afford to eat out) is the place to talk. A crowd of russian-speaking men who withold names offer up pointed criticism. This town has been abandoned ever since the accident at the plant. Whatever happened there, so many did not return. Three governments have tried to help, but all have failed. Kaygorodovs contribution was the most interesting by far. It was decided that the town needed a boost in morale, so a Ferris wheel was built.
The Ferris Wheel. Out of operation since the mid 1990s, it is now the prime site from drug dealing after dark, with the Bratva charging “rent”.
It now lies rusting, in the centre of a park whos paths are slowly being reclaimed by bushes. The local stadium, a small grandstand for about 3 or 4 thousand, has also fallen into disrepair, with the pitch overgrown by shrubs and trees. The last match there was the season of the collapse. None since. We then toured a local school, one of three in the city. The week before, they had all been broken into and anything of value was taken. Only the broken glass had been removed, the shattered windows still in place. The three levels of school, grammar, technical and candidate are all in operation, but all are in this state as all three were targeted.
Yost’s Technical School after being looted. They took even the basketball hoops from the school gym, likely to sell for scrap metal. Out the window you can see the disused stadium, with trees growing on the pitch.
A quick fly around to some factory sites showed the disrepair they were in. Overnight, some of the factory vehicles had been stripped to the frame. As I returned to the Diplomat for the final time, a policeman warned me not to go out after dark. I paused, but agreed. Surely enough, at about 4:30 in the morning, a car zoomed down an empty footpath in the nearby park. Seconds later, shots rang out. One after the other, a total of 16. When it was all said and done, a man who had been selling drugs at the foot of the same Ferris wheel had been killed by some Bratva, apparently for not paying rent on the prime location. At the Gastronoma, the crowd said they knew the killer would go free. Its not whether the police CAN catch him, its do they WANT to? I know I wouldnt for their salary? Not a chance. Unless a chance is given to Yost, and soon, the spiral of violence and poverty could continue.