The Volga German Ivan

Because we have covered 100 kilometers almost every day since Aktöbe, which is just under a week ago, we feel like our bodies have been tortured in the morning. We are slow to get going, our muscles are slow to get going. That is the reason why we allow ourselves to get up at 6:00 am. It’s 8:00 a.m. when our thighs are once again moving to the rhythm of the constant ups and downs. The prospect of coming across a gastiniza in about 80 kilometers, where we can also take a shower, is motivating. We are preoccupied with our thoughts and can already feel the planet burning us with 40 degree heat in the morning hours. “Something is dragging,” says Tanja. “Like what?” “I don’t know.” “Hold on, I’ll have a look,” I say, putting on the brakes. While Tanja holds my pedal, I investigate the cause of the noise. I get into the saddle for a test ride and am surprised to find myself sitting on a comfortable sofa. “It’s incredible how comfortable your saddle is! You could be jealous!” I exclaim in amazement. “Yes, I just broke it in well!” “Oh come on, that can’t be it.” “Yes, yes, what else could it be?” Tanja replies with a laugh. “I wish I knew,” I muse and hand her back the Intercontinental. “No more grinding. What was it?” “Just dirt on the brake shoes,” I explain grudgingly as my bottom is hurting as usual. “Now that I know that your saddle sits so well, I can’t cope with mine any more. I thought you had the same problems all the time. I wondered how you were coping and now I have to admit I’m really unhappy. I wonder why that could be?” “I obviously have a different bottom to you.” “I’m sure, but it just can’t be that. Please stop for a moment. Let’s compare the two saddles exactly,” I say, pulling the brake again. “Strange, there’s nothing to see visually,” I puzzle. “What does it say on yours?” “Brooks B 17 Standard.” “Hm, it says the same on mine. Or does it? No, look! It says Brooks B17 Narrow. Well, that’s it. Yours is a bit wider than mine. Who wants to sit on a narrow saddle? It’s pure torture!” I shout even more angrily because I’ve only just noticed the subtle but significant difference after 1,400 kilometers. “And what do we want to do now?” asks Tanja with a caring tone in her voice. “I don’t know.” “We can swap sometime.” “That’s sweet of you, but you don’t need the pressure points on my bottom. Besides, you already have enough to do with your Achilles tendon,” I reply, looking for a solution. Then I unpack the tool and adjust the tilt angle of the saddle more horizontally. After just a few kilometers, I feel a sense of relief. “And is it better?” “Yes, a little. But not ideal,” I reply, still looking for a better solution. “We could call riese und müller. Maybe they’ll send us a new saddle?” “A new saddle? God forbid. I have to break it in again first.” “Well, it’s still over 4,000 kilometers to Lake Baikal. That’s worth it. Besides, you’ll be riding through Mongolia next year. There’s not much asphalt there. Riding in will definitely pay off,” Tanja considers. “You’re right about that. If it doesn’t get much better before Kustanai, we’ll call Heiko Müller. I’m sure he’ll help us,” I chatter, my mood improved by the solution.

A little later, I suddenly get hip pain and it’s not long before my right knee starts to hurt too. “Is it because I’ve adjusted the angle of my saddle?” I wonder. “Maybe,” says Tanja. We stop again, this time to reduce the saddle height by two millimeters. Result: The pain is reduced after just a few kilometers. “It’s amazing how precise the saddle height, saddle tilt, handlebar height, handlebar tilt and the width of the foot straps have to be in order to do justice to the body’s anatomy,” I mused.

Invitation

Traffic is slowly increasing due to the proximity of a larger settlement. We are overtaken by an expensive, brand new Landcruiser. He stops. “Hello, how are you?” says the man who got out to greet us. “Oh hello Nurlan. It’s so nice to see you again,” we say happily. “Did you sleep well in the village hall?” “Very well. Thank you again.” “You’re welcome. If you come to Kustanai, you don’t need to look for a guest niza. You’re welcome to spend the night at my house,” he invites us. Tanja and I look at each other in amazement. But as we want to stay in Kustanai for a week to do everything that needs to be done, we can’t accept the invitation. “Uh, thank you, but we have to stay at least six days. I have a lot of writing to do and we need to get some rest,” I say no. “No problem. Please come and see me,” he says, pulls out his cell phone and calls someone. “Here you go,” he says and hands me his phone. A German-speaking female voice rattles through the loudspeaker. “You speak German?” “Yes, I was Nurlan’s university teacher. He told me to tell them not to go to a hotel under any circumstances. He would like to invite you,” she repeats Nurlan’s words. “Does he know we have to stay for a week?” “No idea. I’ll translate it for him,” says the voice and I hand Nurlan the cell phone again. After he has ended the connection, we exchange a few more sentences and agree to call him as soon as we reach Kustanai. Then the Landcruiser disappears in a cloud of dust.

We are just about to get back into the saddles when a minibus stops next to us and spits its passengers out onto the dirt road. “Can we take photos of them?” some of them ask. “But with pleasure”, we are pleased to be able to offer people an interesting motif. “Do you know Bortsek?” asks a woman. “Hm, the Bortseks are delicious. Yes, we know them,” answers Tanja. “Well then, bon appétit,” she says and hands Tanja a bag full of small doughnut-shaped yeast dough balls that have been fried in fat. “What’s the name of your bike?” asks a young man in broken English. “Because it’s as strong as a sumo wrestler, we call it a sumo bike,” answers Tanja. “Ha, ha! That’s a good name,” he amuses himself. “Aren’t you afraid to cycle alone through the steppe and especially through Kazakhstan?” another wants to know. “No, the Kazakhs are a friendly people.” “But not all of them.” “Not everyone in Germany is friendly either,” Tanja replies. Then the merry group says goodbye to us and their bus also disappears in a cloud of dust. Again, we are just about to get on our roadtrains when a truck driver brings his big machine to a halt next to us. “Do you need help?” he asks. “No, thank you. That’s nice, but everything is fine with us,” I reply. “Good to hear,” he says, shifting into first gear and leaving us with a big cloud of dust. “Now let’s get out of here,” says Tanja, but a car stops again. “We come from Armenia,” say the three young men behind their dark sunglasses with broad smiles. “Why don’t you go by car? You have fantastic cars in Germany.” “We’d rather explore the country by bike,” I reply, to which the men laugh and say goodbye, leaving us with another cloud of dust in their fat, very expensive BMW.

At 16:00, after a strenuous 83 kilometers, we roll into the village of Ordzhonikidze. A bridge leads us over the Tobol River. People lie on a small beach in the hot sun or jump jubilantly into the cool waters. They enjoy their Sunday. I look down at them from the bridge, a little envious. At 44 degrees, we pedal our luggage back up a hill and land in the center of the heat-soaked village. “That’s where the gastiniza is,” I say, pointing to an ugly box building. “Gastiniza Auto-Bahnhof”, Tanja translates the advertising sign on the house. “Should we stay here?” “It doesn’t look very inviting,” Tanja confirms. “Where do they come from? What from Germany? The owner of the hotel is also German. Ivan, come here! There are some of your fellow countrymen!” shouts a cab driver. A man dressed in a white shirt shuffles slowly towards us. “So you’re from Germany?” “Yes, it’s hard to believe to hear our mother tongue again. And you? Are you also German?” “Yes, I’m a Volga German.” “What do you do here?” “I run my business. I own the bus station and the hotel.” “Aha. Fantastic. Do you still have a room available?” “Come with me. I’ll speak to my manager in a minute,” says Ivan and runs ahead of us. “You can leave your bikes in the waiting hall. We lock it at 20:00. There’s also someone there 24 hours a day. So they’re safe there,” he reassures us and leads me to the second floor. We are given a room in which there are no furnishings apart from four beds. “How much does the place cost?” I ask. “Nothing, it’s a gift from me,” I hear in surprise. “Thank you very much, but we can’t accept that,” I reply, to which Ivan agrees and asks us for 1,400 tenge per night. (? 7.60-) takes. “Is there a shower?” “No, it’s currently under construction. But if you like, I can take you to the local sauna. You can shower and wash there.” “A good idea,” we say, carry our things into the room, lock up our sumo bikes, get changed and meet Ivan again on the forecourt of his bus station.

Buses from Germany

“Do you recognize the bus?” “Um, I kind of do,” I try to remember. “Well, that’s a German police patrol car. I buy the discarded cars and buses in Germany and drive them to Kazakhstan. Then we rebuild them and turn them into public service buses. Take a look inside,” he says, opening the door of the bus. Inside, the former crew van really does look like a bus. “Good work,” I praise. “Yes, I’ve driven 12 buses from Germany to Kazakhstan so far. Always by myself and alone. It’s a long distance. About 8,000 kilometers there and back. We also renovated the bus station. It was an ancient, collapsed building. The mayor gave it to my brother and me. But only on the condition that we got the old place up to scratch again. It cost us a lot of money and time. The pictures of what it looked like before are still hanging inside. You’ll have to take a look. Now it’s usable again and the town has a real bus service again.” “Was there no bus service here?” “No. People had to wait for the buses from Kustanei. If there was room, they could get a ride, but if it was full, they had to wait for hours for the next one. It went on like that for many years. After independence from Russia, when we declared our sovereignty within the USSR on October 25, 1990, things went downhill. Everything collapsed completely. Crime increased. People stole anything that wasn’t welded on and if it was welded on, they simply sawed it out at night. You could use anything, even manhole covers, bridge railings, simply everything was stolen. You were never allowed to leave a car outside. It could happen that it was parked on bricks after a short time and all four tires were missing. No, that was not a good time. The Russians no longer invested anything in Kazakhstan, they had their own problems. But now things are slowly getting better, the country is slowly recovering from the shock.” “Hm, I’m glad I didn’t have to experience times like that.” “They can too. That was one of the reasons why we Volga Germans all emigrated to Germany. Although we were actually doing well. We had our cows, our horses, sheep, small fields. We were able to feed ourselves. But then we were suddenly allowed to emigrate and almost everyone took the opportunity. But come on. I’ll take you to the sauna. We can have a little chat there if you feel like it.” “I’d love to,” I reply, impressed by the stories and the country’s recent past.

Hot sauna and birch twigs

Tanja and I get into one of Ivan’s VW buses. Then we drive to his girlfriend’s house. “I called Lena to accompany Tanja to the sauna. She can then show them what it’s like in our bathhouse,” he explains, turning to Tanja. A little later, Lena, a pretty woman of about 45, sits next to Tanja in the bus and Ivan drives us the few hundred meters to a run-down house. “Is that the sauna?” I ask. “Yes, come on,” he asks us to enter the building. While Tanja and Lena go into the women’s section, Ivan and I enter the men’s section. Ancient lockers covered in thick paint line the wall. Their wobbly doors, which stare at us, cannot be locked. “What do I do with our valuables?” “Didn’t you leave them at the hotel?” “No, we never leave the papers in the room.” “Is there a lot of money in there?” “Enough, plus our passports etc.” “We’d best lock that in the car.” “And Tanja? She has her valuables with her too.” “Okay,” says Ivan. We leave the men’s room again, stand in front of the women’s wing and shout. The door opens and a naked arm comes out to hand me the papers. We lock the important documents in the car with a bad feeling. “Is it safe there?” “I think so,” Ivan replies.

Back in the sauna, I watch Ivan to copy him. I hang my cycling clothes in the open locker and hope that they are still there afterwards. Then we enter the interior of the steam house. Here, too, it looks as if nothing has been done since it was built perhaps 40, 50 or more years ago. Large metal bowls are stacked in the corner. A naked man has one of the containers standing in front of him on a slippery wooden pot. He scoops out the water with his hands and washes himself. Ivan also grabs one of the bowls and fills it with water from an old-fashioned tap. “Have one too,” he asks me. “You have to clean the bowl first,” he says and shows me how to do it. Then I pour the water over my exhausted body and feel energy flowing through my veins again. A large, deep puddle has formed beneath us. “We only tiled the floor last year and you see? The tiles are all broken again,” he explained, shrugging his shoulders and pointing at the hole. “Come on,” Ivan asks me and finally opens the last door to the sauna. Hot steam hits us. We are the only guests in the room at the moment. “Watch out for the lower bench. It’s wobbly,” he warns me, climbing up three steps and lowering myself with my bare bottom onto the old, sweaty wooden floorboards. Unfortunately, I don’t have a towel with me, so I follow his example. “I’m not going to catch a fungus,” I think to myself. Ivan now takes a bundle of dried birch twigs from a bowl filled with water and wraps the herb vigorously around his body. “For her,” he says and gives me the twigs after the self-flagellation so that I can whip myself vigorously too.

It only takes a few moments for the heat to penetrate my every pore and almost cause my heated bike body to explode. Never in my life have I visited a sauna when it was 44 degrees outside, but here in Kazakhstan it seems to be different. After about 10 minutes I think I’m going to fall off the perch like a stricken bird and ask Ivan to go outside. “Gladly,” he says, climbing down the damp wooden benches, soaked with the sweat of generations, to open the door into the anteroom that will save him. There we have another good wash. “Do you want to go back in?” “No thanks. I’ve had enough for today. I need a cold beer now,” I reply, which is why we leave the estate’s bathing establishment again.

“Do all the residents come here to wash themselves?” “Only those who don’t have their own sauna. The others stay at home,” Ivan explains as we get back on the bus and drive to Lena’s house. Tanja and Lena are already there. They walked the short distance home. “Come in,” says Ivan. Lena’s house is lovingly maintained and cleaned. Everything is spick and span. There are also neatly arranged potato, tomato and cucumber plants in the front garden. We sit down at the table with Tanja and Lena. Lena has served up potatoes, sausage, fried eggs, pickles from the jar, fresh tomatoes and bread. She apologizes for the sparse meal as she hadn’t expected to have guests today. “Oh, you don’t need to apologize. Everything tastes really good,’ we praise and eat ravenously. “Shall we have a drink?” asks Ivan. “I’d love to,” I reply politely, whereupon he places a bottle of expensive cognac on the table and pours us each a glass. Served with a cup of delicious plum juice. We absorb food and liquid like dry sponges. We drink many cups of tea and devour an entire loaf of the usual white bread, taste waffles, Russian chocolate, piraniki cookies, redcurrant jellies and pickled cherries until we finally feel a little satiated. “Shall we continue?” asks Ivan after the delicious meal. “Gladly”, we reply, say thank you and goodbye to Lena and leave the welcoming house. Then Ivan takes us to a magazine where he buys dried fish and beer. “I’ll pay this time,” I say and put the shopping in a large bag.

Sad past

We now sit on rickety chairs in our simple room with beer and dried fish and continue our conversation. “What was it actually like back then? Why exactly were the Volga Germans expelled?” I want to know. “When Adolf invaded Russia so quickly with his army and marched directly on Stalingrad, Stalin was filled with fear. He was worried that the Volga Germans living there would collaborate with Hitler and that his situation would become even more hopeless. Around 600,000 inhabitants, two thirds of whom were of German descent, lived there in around 100 villages. 400,000 of us were forcibly resettled to Siberia and Central Asia. It was a terrible time for my parents. They only had 24 hours to pack what they could carry. That was all they were allowed to take with them. Then they had to leave behind all their possessions, their house, garden, furniture, simply everything that was dear to them and were crammed into trains without food or water. As the train set off, they heard their animals bellowing in the stables. That hit my grandfather particularly hard. They wanted to eat or the cows had to be milked, he said. It was just awful. The train traveled for a month from the Volga near Saratov to Kazakhstan. It stopped again and again for an indefinite period of time. The displaced people used these stops to cook in front of the wagons. Many of them took something to eat with them. My grandfather slaughtered a pig at night and salted the meat. I think that saved my family, although they shared with those who had nothing left. Many people, especially children and old people, died during the journey. When the train arrived in Kazakhstan, the Volga Germans were distributed family by family to the Kazakh villages. Sometimes 30 or 40 families lived in holes in the ground. They had nothing to eat and hardly any clothes. My father told me himself that two or three families died on some nights. It was a tragedy of immense proportions. Especially when you consider that these people had nothing to do with Hitler’s war. Stalin was certainly just as much a criminal as Hitler. Thank God the Kazakhs were good to us. Without their help, many more would have died,” he says, his voice echoing in the simple room. Tanja and I sit there and look at each other. I am on the verge of tears. Although I had already heard a lot about the crime at the time, Ivan’s story is gripping. It has a completely different weighting when it is reported by an affected person.

Was it a mistake to emigrate to Germany?

“And why did you go back to Germany?” I ask after a long pause. “I was like many of us. Everyone suddenly left. It was a euphoria. We left everything we owned behind to go to rich Germany. Germans and many Russians emigrated again. Millions. That was another economic disaster for Kazakhstan. All the skilled workers and craftsmen left the country overnight. If I need someone today, I can’t get one. It still hasn’t recovered.” “Is that why we’ve been driving through countless ghost settlements since the Russian border? Were these still the villages of the Volga Germans until 1990?” “Exactly. We lived there and today the villages are depopulated. We couldn’t sell our houses back then. They weren’t worth anything at the time. Then, after we left, Armenian families moved in. They had the war with Azerbaijan in their own country and were also refugees. Unfortunately, they ran down our houses and property. Today, many of them are back in their home country.” “Was it a mistake to emigrate to Germany? Do you regret it?” “Without a doubt, a big mistake. Only a few of us were really happy there. As I said, we were all euphoric at first, but only a few of us still spoke German. We had to learn the language first. Everything was different. A culture that was completely foreign to us and with which we hardly had anything in common. But we wanted to create something and work. I opened a Russian store. It went quite well at the beginning. Then I bought three Mercedes Sprinters. I used them as snack vans. Then came the euro. People suddenly didn’t have as much money and my business went bankrupt in a short time. I founded a demolition company. That didn’t go badly either. I had five employees. Then I got a big contract. My client paid us less and less. After a year, I stopped the work. I still haven’t received the money and I was broke again. Now I’m unemployed and get 200 euros a month. If the employment office finds me a job, I have to accept it. But now that I’m 57, I don’t want to work in construction any more. My back and knees are broken from the hard work. I live mainly from my business in Kazakhstan. I used to work for the police here. They all retire at 45 and have a pension of 300 euros. I’d be better off today. I could still run my business on the side.” “You can anyway.” “Yes, I can.” “Would you like to move back to Kazakhstan?” “I’m thinking about it. But somehow I feel at home in Germany now.”

Dear reader of our diary!!!

We are happy to write down our experiences here. We are happy to share our experiences with you. However, our journey also has a meaning for us, a deeper meaning. We no longer expose ourselves to such efforts just for the pleasure of it. We have experienced too much for that. Of course, our motivation is still to experience peoples, cultures, their customs and traditions. We are still exploring the unknown corners of our mother earth with an unquenched thirst for knowledge. It gives us energy and purpose in life. However, despite all the positives, we have also experienced many of the downsides of human civilization. We have seen with our own eyes a tremendous amount of human suffering and environmental destruction. It hurts us as if a knife were penetrating deep into our own skin. Our life project “The Great Journey” has taken on a different dimension for us for years now. During the trip, during our travel life, we also want to do something to balance things out. Giving something back to the troubled planet. Not out of selfishness or gratification or self-aggrandizement, but to really do something sustainable. To do something for us humans. For our children. So that they too can breathe fresh air tomorrow. So that they too can play in the sandpit in the open air and swim in clean rivers. We wish all beings on this wonderful, fantastic planet a future worth living. So we urge you to plant at least one tree a month for the Green Vein. You can find more information on our website. (One tree 5,- Euro) We can’t do it alone. We don’t have the financial means. Not yet. Only together can we make a difference. Our motivation lies not only in knowing that our texts are currently read by between 40,000 and 50,000 (forty thousand and fifty thousand) people a month. Our motivation is to work together to create something sustainable for our human future. Together means together with all of you. That’s why we write, that’s why you can read the texts without any financial investment. So we ask for a donation to the mountain forest project. A project that works without profit. A project we have been looking for years to give our name to. A project we trust. We ask you to donate trees. Trees that give us air to breathe. Habitat for insects and birds. Living space for the earth’s population in future years. The donations do not benefit us financially in the slightest. Everything you give goes to Mother Earth!!! We guarantee this with our life project and our name.

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Account number 8022916200

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