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| Angelika/Mike Schilli |
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Angelika Sometimes I think that the world has gone completely crazy. After we were able to catch our breath a bit regarding COVID-19, the war of aggression in Ukraine is once again plunging the world into fear and terror. There is often the prejudice that Americans are hardly affected by foreign events that are far away, but here too, the war in Ukraine is a constant topic of conversation. Of course, this is also because the USA is directly involved, taking in Ukrainian refugees, albeit in small numbers, and providing money and weapons.
Secretary of State Blinken and Secretary of Defense Austin have already traveled to Ukraine to meet with President Zelensky. Last week, Nancy Pelosi, who holds the third-highest position in the country (after the President and Vice President) as Speaker of the House of Representatives, made her way to Ukraine. In our neighborhood, we see many Ukrainian flags fluttering in the wind and peace doves in the windows, which likely also reflect a sense of helplessness, as these symbols have little influence on the course of the war.
In school, we always try to discuss current news with our students. We often use videos from the website Flocabulary. The word is a portmanteau of "flow" and "vocabulary." It refers to an educational platform that uses hip-hop music and rhythm to teach vocabulary and other academic content. It brings current political events closer to students in an age-appropriate manner through hip-hop style. Every week, there is the so-called "Week in Rap" recap. The children in my class find these videos very appealing. I remember that during my school days, it always annoyed me terribly when current events were swept under the rug, and instead, we focused on the ancient Romans and Greeks. One of my students was immediately concerned about my family because, after watching the videos, she correctly noted that Ukraine is not that far from Germany.
Then, of course, there are various experts here who try to understand the situation in Ukraine. I particularly appreciate Masha Gessen, who writes for the New Yorker, grew up in Moscow, and emigrated to the USA with her family as a teenager. Gessen has written several books, including some about Putin. I can also highly recommend the journalist and historian Anne Applebaum, who writes for the magazine "Atlantic." One of her most well-known books is "Red Famine: Stalin's War on Ukraine.
But in the past few weeks, a conversation has been running through my mind that I had over 20 years ago with a photography teacher in the darkroom of the UC Berkeley Extension. Putin had just been elected president, and I asked the teacher what he thought of it, as I knew he originally came from St. Petersburg. His face darkened, and he simply said that he couldn't understand how this criminal had been elevated to office. He told me that he and his family had been persecuted and threatened by the KGB at the time because, as a photographer, he had taken pictures of people on the streets of St. Petersburg. Many of his film negatives were destroyed. The photos weren't even very political, but rather snapshots of a city. How I would love to talk to him again now about the current situation.
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