Read Online Voices From Chernobyl: The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster by Svetlana Alexievich - Free Book Online
Authors: Svetlana Alexievich
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poured the sarcophagus. It was a giant grave for one person, the senior operator, Valery Khodemchuk, who got caught under the ruins in the first minutes after the explosion. It’s a twentieth-century pyramid. We still had three months left. Our unit got back, they didn't even give us a change of clothing. We walked around in the same pants, same boots, as we had at the reactor. Right up until they demobilized us.
And if they'd let me talk, who would I have talked to? I worked at a factory. My boss says: “Stop being sick or we'll have to let you go." They did. I went to the director: “You have no right to do this, I’m a Chernobylite. I saved you. I protected you!" He says: “We didn't send you there."
At night I wake up from my mother saying, “Sonny, why aren’t you saying anything? You’re not asleep, you’re lying there with your eyes open. And your light's on." I don’t say anything. No one can speak to me in a way I can answer. In my own language. No one can understand where I've come back from. And I can't tell anyone.
I’m not afraid of death anymore. Of death itself. But I don't know how I’m going to die. My friend died. He got huge, fat, like a barrel. And my neighbor—he was also there, he worked a crane. He got black, like coal, and shrunk, so that he was wearing kids’ clothes. I don't know how I'm going to die. I do know this: you don't last long with my diagnosis. But I'd like to feel it when it happens. Like if I got a bullet in the head. I was in Afghanistan, too. It was easier there. They just shot you.
I clipped an article from the newspaper. It's about the operator Leonid Toptunov, he was the one on duty that night at the station and he pressed the red accident button a few minutes before the explosion. It didn't work. They took him to the hospital in Moscow. The doctors said, “In order to fix him, we'd need a whole other body." There was one tiny little non-radioactive spot on him, on his back. They buried him at the Mytinskaya Cemetery [in Moscow], like they did the others. They insulated the coffin with foil. And then they poured half a meter of concrete on it, with a lead cover. His father came. He’s standing there, crying. People walk by: “That was your bastard son who blew it up!"
We’re lonely. We’re strangers here. They even bury us separately, not like they do other people. It’s like we're aliens from outer space. I’d have been better off dying in Afghanistan. Honest, I get thoughts like that. In Afghanistan death was a normal thing. You could understand it there.
*
From above, from the helicopter, when I was flying near the reactor, I could see roes and wild boars. They were thin and sleepy. like they were moving in slow motion. They were eating the grass that grew there, and they didn’t understand, they didn’t understand that they should leave. That they should leave with the people.
Should I go or not go? Should I fly or not fly? I was a Communist—how could I not go?
Two paratroopers refused—their wives were young, they hadn’t had any kids yet. But they were shamed and punished. Their careers were finished. And there was also the court of manhood, the court of honor! That was part of the attraction— he didn’t go, so I will. Now I look at it differently. After nine operations and two heart attacks, I don't judge them, I understand them. They were young guys. But I would have gone anyway. That’s definite. He couldn’t, I will. That was manhood.
From above the amazing thing was the hardware: heavy helicopters, medium helicopters, the Mi-24, that’s a fighting helicopter. What are you going to do with a Mi-24 at Chernobyl? Or with a fighter-plane, the Mi-2? The pilots, young guys, all of them fresh out of Afghanistan. Their feeling was they’d pretty much had enough, with Afghanistan, they’d fought enough. They’re sitting in the forest near the reactor, catching roentgen. That was the order! They didn’t need to send all those people
And if they'd let me talk, who would I have talked to? I worked at a factory. My boss says: “Stop being sick or we'll have to let you go." They did. I went to the director: “You have no right to do this, I’m a Chernobylite. I saved you. I protected you!" He says: “We didn't send you there."
At night I wake up from my mother saying, “Sonny, why aren’t you saying anything? You’re not asleep, you’re lying there with your eyes open. And your light's on." I don’t say anything. No one can speak to me in a way I can answer. In my own language. No one can understand where I've come back from. And I can't tell anyone.
I’m not afraid of death anymore. Of death itself. But I don't know how I’m going to die. My friend died. He got huge, fat, like a barrel. And my neighbor—he was also there, he worked a crane. He got black, like coal, and shrunk, so that he was wearing kids’ clothes. I don't know how I'm going to die. I do know this: you don't last long with my diagnosis. But I'd like to feel it when it happens. Like if I got a bullet in the head. I was in Afghanistan, too. It was easier there. They just shot you.
I clipped an article from the newspaper. It's about the operator Leonid Toptunov, he was the one on duty that night at the station and he pressed the red accident button a few minutes before the explosion. It didn't work. They took him to the hospital in Moscow. The doctors said, “In order to fix him, we'd need a whole other body." There was one tiny little non-radioactive spot on him, on his back. They buried him at the Mytinskaya Cemetery [in Moscow], like they did the others. They insulated the coffin with foil. And then they poured half a meter of concrete on it, with a lead cover. His father came. He’s standing there, crying. People walk by: “That was your bastard son who blew it up!"
We’re lonely. We’re strangers here. They even bury us separately, not like they do other people. It’s like we're aliens from outer space. I’d have been better off dying in Afghanistan. Honest, I get thoughts like that. In Afghanistan death was a normal thing. You could understand it there.
*
From above, from the helicopter, when I was flying near the reactor, I could see roes and wild boars. They were thin and sleepy. like they were moving in slow motion. They were eating the grass that grew there, and they didn’t understand, they didn’t understand that they should leave. That they should leave with the people.
Should I go or not go? Should I fly or not fly? I was a Communist—how could I not go?
Two paratroopers refused—their wives were young, they hadn’t had any kids yet. But they were shamed and punished. Their careers were finished. And there was also the court of manhood, the court of honor! That was part of the attraction— he didn’t go, so I will. Now I look at it differently. After nine operations and two heart attacks, I don't judge them, I understand them. They were young guys. But I would have gone anyway. That’s definite. He couldn’t, I will. That was manhood.
From above the amazing thing was the hardware: heavy helicopters, medium helicopters, the Mi-24, that’s a fighting helicopter. What are you going to do with a Mi-24 at Chernobyl? Or with a fighter-plane, the Mi-2? The pilots, young guys, all of them fresh out of Afghanistan. Their feeling was they’d pretty much had enough, with Afghanistan, they’d fought enough. They’re sitting in the forest near the reactor, catching roentgen. That was the order! They didn’t need to send all those people
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