the most depressing Q&A about leaving Russia, life in the Far East, propaganda and Zombie apocalypse
Hi guys, welcome to my new Q&A video! Today I'll answer most of your common questions, and I'm so glad that I finally can make this video because I wanted to talk to you for a long time. So let's begin but first I want to show you the place where I am now, so I am now in Spassk, yes, while all the smart people are leaving Russia, I decided to come to my hometown, but I'm here just for five days so don't worry about me, and yeah, yesterday I was walking here, like in my neighborhood, where I'm supposed to know everything but I found this really amazing place, it is a car dump, so there are like many old rusty cars, and I found it so peaceful, so now I just want to share this aesthetic with you. And yesterday in the evening when I was walking here I was scared that maybe there's some security or big dogs, and you know what, this place was completely empty, but there was one tractor with one suspiciously working gear light, and there was a camera... You see, some tractors, an old bus, look, just like on my hoodie. So yesterday this thing was working and you see there's like a camera.
Yeah the camera that is filming this place. I didn't film it but that man, he's like a guard, he came up to me and said "What are you doing here?", I said, "I'm just walking, I like the aesthetics of this place", and he said, "Well as long as you don't steal anything", and I was like "Thank you!". Let's go. I actually like that I can talk to you now in such a calm atmosphere, even making friends with the guard of this area. So guys, most common question was am I going to move out from Russia. And the answer is of course, yes. Because I wanted to do it for a long time, it's like it's not even
a question for me, and when this all started on the 24th of February, I was scared that what if the government closes the borders, there will be an iron curtain and I will be stuck here forever. But now I hope that there will be no such a thing, and since that time, thousands of people already left Russia, and these are mostly middle class, IT workers, people who had some valuable skills. I always wanted to do this and i will tell you about my next plans a little later.
Another question was "Do we have food shortages here in the far east?" Our prices raised like 30 percent, some 10 percent, for technologies, phones, laptops, although I don't see food shortages because I don't know, I don't go to, you know, big supermarkets, I don't see empty shelves. And guys, I must say that I'm really privileged and I had some savings. My situation is different from situation of millions of Russians, of majority of Russian people, so I just buy food as usual, but of course this economical situation is getting to become worse and worse. How are you? Do you feel OK? What about your driving license, thesis, travels do you have any plans? Greetings from Poland. Greetings to Poland, thank you for this question, and uh, when I see all that videos and photos, I just cannot express the range of emotions that I have with just helplessness, it's just such a big grief. I mean I'm used to it. You are becoming used to some things after a long time.
And yeah, as for another part of this question, I am writing my thesis, it's quite hard it's a very routine work, and it's not easy for me to sit there in one place and just to do this, but I accepted it as my fate, and I'm writing it and I hope that i will graduate, finally. As for my driving license, guys you remember, I even left that possibility, I don't want to do this anymore because for this I had to come here to Spawsk all the time, and it felt like going to some backward place, dealing with that people, it was a really unpleasant experience, so I just decided to not torture myself. As for travels honestly, I am so tired. I don't want to travel now. What I want now is just to find a peaceful safe place, a place where I will be
surrounded by people who I can trust, when I will do a job that is appreciated, and that is contributing to something. What is the outcome and how hard is it to access information outside of official Russian media right now? Well, the outcome will not be really good. Russia now is basically closing up, shutting down, and really bad times, really dark times are coming to our country. Of course, our economy and many other industries will deteriorate more and more, and as for the media, all the TV channels in Russia are state-owned, so there's no healthy argument, just one agenda. We have some independent media outlets online but some of them recently were
banned and they're closed now, and some others were considered as foreign agents, and people still can access them with VPN. So of course guys, I see all the news, because I saw people sending me comments with, like the news, what happened. Maybe people think that we don't get information at all, but still at least, YouTube works. Thank you. Maybe they even will not close YouTube because I heard that one reason of this is that it has a lot of cartoons, and parents show these cartoons to the kids, so it will affect them too much, so thank you Peppa Pig for saving Russian YouTubers.
Yeah okay, the sound is fine, the picture is fine too. This is the new place... But one more thing about Russian media is that not so many people are reading that independent sources, only like thinking people, like myself, and all the others, they're just watching the TV, the majority of people in Russia watch the TV, they're used to this source of information that's why they believe it. How are your family and friends doing with all that is going on, do they worry about you posting? Oh okay about my parents so, my dad believes the official agenda, everything that our TV says, and it is really impossible to change his opinion because I mean it's a set of values that developed in a person for years, and people are comfortable with this. When you live all your life in a small town and don't know how life can be, you... As from my mom, she is like the same, but my victory was that I convinced her to read independent news, but she is still arguing with me and sometimes she's saying such words that are not even her thoughts, I don't believe that she could make it up, she heard it from somewhere, and yeah, it was useless to try to speak to them, but I tried to do what I can. And yeah, my mom also was worrying about my university, she was like "Don't post anything, don't go to protest or you will be expelled from the university, you'll have problems!". This is the kind of
fear that all post-Soviet people live with, not all but the majority of them. As for my friends, I don't have friends. In Khabarovsk I have just two friends, we go to the cafes and that's it... Most of my friends are online, and they left Russia, and I realized how damaging it is for my mental health to not communicate with people in real life, but really what I can do? Like, okay I went to an English club in Khabarovsk, there we talked in English, there were three other guys, two of them are also going to move out of Russia. So I don't know, I just exist. I hope that when I move out I will be in a new environment and find new people, guys look what I found on my pants, when I was going through all these bushes. Do you have such things in your country? In my childhood we called it kolyuchka. And the next question: "How did your family come to live in Eastern Siberia?"
Well first guys, let me be a little annoying because we, at least in the Russian language, we don't call it Eastern Siberia, we call it the Far East because there are federal districts: there's a Siberian Federal District which is like in the middle of Russia, and Far Eastern Federal district, even though if you look at this on Wikipedia, it will say that this is like, a larger Siberia but you know, this term is very broad but we usually say just far east. But maybe in Western terminology you can call it Eastern Siberia. So my ancestors came here a little more than 100 years ago. So my dad's parents are Russians and they came to the far east in the beginning of the 20th century, somewhere from the Oryol Oblast, this is what I know, and from my mom's side... so my mom's mom, my Grandmother, she is Ukrainian, and her mother, my Grand grandmother was among peasants who came from Ukraine to populate these territories because in the beginning of the 20th century, and in the end of the 19th century, there were programs that, like gave people land in the far east. They even formed many towns and villages here with Ukrainian names, for example, she lived in a village called Красный Кут (Krasny Kut), which is, I believe, in Ukrainian means a "Beautiful corner", and this village still exists here, and she spoke Ukrainian in her house and that's why my grandmother knows some Ukrainian words. Yeah as for my mom's dad,
he is Belarusian, and he came to the far east actually not as a peasant seeking for land, but a little later, in the 60s, he was a constructor, a builder and in the Soviet times, there were jobs by distributions, so he was distributed to build houses in Spassk, that's how he settled down here. So resuming this all, I have Russian, Ukrainian and Belarusian roots.. but I mean this all is quite close to each other, I mean genetically, we are all one branch of Eastern Savic people. Moving on to the next question: if trade with China increases, do you think there will be any economic benefit to your home and region? Well, no. I don't think that there will be any benefits because guys, China is not going to help us. They're acting in their own
interests, I completely understand them, so, maybe it seems to you that if we live here, in the far east, we have many connections with them, but how many people who I know traveled to Japan? Like it's just one hour flight to Japan but maybe like two percent of people living in Primorsky Krai, in Khabarovsk Krai, are able to go there, because it is so expensive and you need to get visa which is also really hard. As for China, well, to go to China was a little easier, when Yuan was just four Rubles, now Yuan is like twelve rubles, and I mean basically it's just another undeveloped broke Russian region, so... Maybe logistically somehow it will help them, you know, to transfer goods from Vladivostok, but honestly, I don't know much about this topic.
"A couple of days ago i read about some polls that suggested an increased popularity of approval of the government... What is your impressions, best wishes, Sebastian." Uh, we have to understand how these polls are being conducted, so imagine you live in a state of fear, and an unfamiliar number calls you and asks your opinion, or what is even better, comes to your apartment, what would you say? So another thing is that the organizations that are making these polls, do you really think that they are able to make something independently? Another thing is that concert, that happened in Moscow recently, you guys were asking me, like how is it possible? So many people came there? And again, we have to understand how things work. In russia there is a public sector, which consists of like "budgetary institutions" as we call them: schools, universities, libraries, hospitals, many different institutions, and often they just are "invited" to such events, like if you don't go there, you will have problems with your boss, and you know people live in the fear, and they came to that concert, just checked in, that they came there, and left as soon as they could. This is how things are done. Of course, there are some people who still believe it, but honestly guys I'm so tired of trying to figure out, how many people support this, how many people don't support it... Another question was about how often I see the Z symbols around Khabarovsk. Well, quite often...
You can see them on their city buses, you can see them on the beautiful building of the scientific library, they put that billboard, and when i was walking in the market in Khabarovsk, I even saw T-shirts, I began filming this, and the saleswoman, she was like, "Do you mind?", and I asked her about these T-shirts, what does it mean? And this is what she said: And when I see this, I feel so helpless. Do Russians prefer Western media or Russian media in terms of music, video games, movies, shows. Do most Russians know English? Well, most Russians don't know English, because not many people travel, it's taught in schools not really professionally, Older generation... maybe like five-ten percent know English, among younger generation, it's a little better... So yeah, I think, in terms of music it's 50/50 because there are Russian musicians, they're foreign musicians, and you know, tastes are various for different people, so... The same probably for movies, but... *sigh of indignation* Guys...
RUSSIAN MOVIES... Maybe there are some good directors, there are movie festivals, okay, I cannot say that everything is so bad but the majority... When the industry is not developing, you can see it on many different things that this industry is producing. They're funding MILITARY FILMS. On the average, what I see, Western and foreign movies are more popular, like if you go to a Russian cinema, not anymore because now, I believe, there are no foreign movies at all, but before February 24th, probably 80 percent of films in the cinema were foreign, and the rest is Russian movies. And of course, foreign movies are dubbed into Russian, we used to have all the like... *birds chirping* We used to have Spotify, Netflix, Hulu, Russia was integrated into the Western, into the global culture so much and now we are closing up. As for video games, I honestly don't know any Russian video game.
Metro 2033? Is it a Russian game? (NO) I don't know, let's discuss it in the comments, yeah I just need more comments under this video, and don't forget to put like, so that YouTube knows that this video is interesting and... promotes my video more. Honestly guys, I'm not... Like, I don't watch movies at all. Yeah, this is my confession. Am I the only one? I can watch like one movie in in two months, and even though I like, studied cinema history, I know all this like Lumière brothers... Because I have some professional deformation... When I watch movies I begin to analyze all the frames, how this was shot, basically I do this when I watch any YouTuber, when I took a break from YouTube two months ago, I managed to... detach from this, and I was just enjoying videos. Yeah, I don't watch films, this is probably a trauma caused by Russian films.
I don't know what I do in my free time, like watch TikTok, watch YouTube, read books... sometimes. Wow, hello. What guests we have. The thing is that I don't have a mirror on my camera, on my phone, so who knows, maybe there were many other things behind my back. Let's go. *funny howling of dogs* Okay, let's try to get into the bus. Oh my god Actually guys, I came here prepared.
Quality content. Dogs... There's just a jar. "On your channel, I always enjoy when you show old derelict buildings, things that are rusty or in a bad state of repair, what is about these things that draws you to them, what makes them interesting to you?" Well, I think that today's location is a good illustration for this question. I just like the aesthetics of such rusty places. I'm not a gamer at all, but I have played some video games that inspired me, one of them is Dishonored, all these steampunk aesthetics, rusty things, and another game is Life is Strange, and particularly there was an episode called Junkyard, and when I found this place yesterday, I had such a flashback to that game, and as for the graffiti, also there was a question why I like graffiti, is that when I was 12, I played a computer game called Mark Ecko's Getting Up, and it is a game about graffiti, you have to find different spots there were elements of parkour, and that game inspired me so much, I just... After that, I can say that I have like a trained eye, my eyes are searching for new graffitis, and sometimes it's not really good for me because this makes me to notice all the city elements like the Z billboards and so on. But one important thing I have to say is that maybe I
created a wrong impression about myself. There was a comment that "Natasha loves her hometown Spassk, and is showing it like, with love and she cares about it", but the thing is that I don't live in Spassk, for five years already, I moved to Khabarovsk when I entered the University there, I lived in Moscow for a while, I lived in the United States, this is not what my life is about, like all these rusty places. It happened because I was often coming to Spassk, and in Spassk I feel so easy to film, so comfortable, and I know that I will be really interested myself to film these places, that's why I'm like yeah, I can film this, I can film that, and that's how, I showed you all that like, countryside, my neighborhood, fishing, but in general, my lifestyle is pretty urbanized, like I live in Khabarovsk, in the city center, I go to coffee shops, so this is what my life is about. What will help people in the West better understand the way people in Russia think and maybe why? Yeah it is a really good question, and you know, because my channel used to be called Yeah Russia, and I created it to tell you things about my country, it felt to me that understanding Russia is my job, but now it became so unbearable for me to try to understand this. But this is how I see it: Imagine that you was brought up in a broke post-Soviet dysfunctional traumatized family and for all your childhood you see just this. In schools, in universities, polyclinics, in any institutions you are being treated really rudely, and if you're speaking up, people think that you're a freak, because just shut up, nobody ask your opinion.
And if you're smiling and laughing there's something wrong with you because what there is to be happy about? Don't you have a 20 years mortgage for a one room apartment in the outskirts of Khabarovsk? So it feels to me that this feeling of helplessness, of devastation around you, this is what many people, the majority of Russian people grow up with, and there is this idea that nothing can be changed, it's impossible to change anything, so don't even try. My hometown is in Alaska, I've always wondered, how Russian people feel about Alaska and how it was purchased? Yeah, sometimes there are jokes, like Alaska, go back to your motherland! But you know, these jokes, they have never been like too serious and guys, I'm so happy for you like, I'm so happy that you live now there on the territory of the United States because if it wasn't sold many years ago, your region would look like that abandoned Soviets north pole cities like Pevek and so on. Good for you. I am happy for you. I envy you. "Is Climate Change discussed in Russia, is it even a topic, have you noticed anything different in the environmental climate, is the weather getting weirder?" Well, I have not noticed that weather getting weirder. But when things are deteriorating in the country, when
all the important issues are hushed up and not talked about... Of course, there were conversations about this on the higher level, but if we are talking about recycling, my favorite recycling, about like five percent of Russian trash is being recycled. All the other trash is being just buried under the ground, or burnt in the special polygons, and there are many polygons around all Russian cities, and this is a big ecological problem for us. I don't know if the government is going to do something about this, it's not our... It's not discussed in schools. In some yards in Moscow, there're these bins where you can leave trash of different kind, but in Khabarovsk, we have such a thing, but it's like one thing for the whole city, well there are several of them, but sometimes you cannot, for example, recycle some particular plastic, like number six or number five. In Spassk, there is at all no possibilities to recycle, so
yeah, people just don't know much about, people don't even think about this, I was so terrified when I realized it after going to the United States where we recycled even in our dormitory. There was a question about how now Russian YouTubers can get their income, and of course I'll answer these question. So YouTube still is monetizing my channel, it only doesn't show monetized ads to people in Russia, but most of my audience is foreign, so anyway.
YouTube still shows ads on my videos but I cannot access that money yet, because I have some issues with my Russian bank account, so I'll access that money but later. The same works for Patreon, it still accepts your pledges, but I just decided to put it on hold, and it's just been kept on Patreon. As for PayPal, it doesn't work in Russia at all now. And I also created a crypto wallet if you guys want to donate me in crypto, there is a link under this video.
And yes this is the end of my video, I hope that you enjoyed this video it was a long one, I hope that you liked the aesthetics of this place, please let me know if you want to see something more like this, and yeah there were many other questions that I unfortunately didn't answer today. Maybe I should make another Q&A video. So thank you for watching, thank you for all the support that you give me, I really appreciate this. And I wish you lots of love and have a great day, goodbye, poka-poka!
2022-04-20 13:35