Down to the 12-th Circle. (Ukraine. What I Saw, What I Know, What I Think: Book 2)

By Aza Zello

This is the second book in the series about Ukraine. The first one: “The Road to Hell”, briefly describe thousand years of the history, with major focus on post 1991 period of independent Ukraine statehood. This book cowers much shorter period, from 2014 to 2019, when Ukraine was finally transformed from a state often confused with Russia into the battering ram against Russia. The book presents a different, from the mainstream, view on resent history of Ukraine and Ukraine-Russia relations. Books in the series mix personal recollections of Ukraine born author, hushed by major media events, and author's understanding of past and present of his country.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Aza Zello
• Release date: Jul 28, 2020
• ISBN: 9781005735654

Aza Zello

My biography presented here is different from biographies of other, "normal" writers. Normal writers rarely try to hide their identity, Aza do. Aza was born in the USSR, in what is now Ukraine and remembers the rhyming joke from Brezhnev's era: "To write on the toilet walls / Unfortunately the trend is not new / But what can we do / When only here is freedom of speech".Ironically "History doesn't repeat itself, but it often rhymes" (attributed to Mark Twain), and 30 years after the breakup of the Soviet Union it is still dangerous to tell truth in Ukraine, painted by Western media as "freedom loving and democratic".Aza leaves safely in one of Western democracies but visits friends and relatives in Ukraine regularly and for this reason do not want to put a real name of the author on a book title page. Name Aza Zello is derived from the character of the great M. Bulgakov novel "Master and Margaret".The text below this line is Aza's fictional biography for Russian speakers not worth of translation.-----Я родилась не слишком привлекательным мальчиком, в семье писателя, имя которого слишком известно, что бы его можно было тут упомянуть. Едва научившись ходить, я доковыляло до зеркала, критически оценил увиденное и твёрдо решил превратить себя в красивую девушку. Я добилась этого простым, невероятным усилием своей железной воли. Взгляните на фото и вы убедитесь, что это удалось. Как впрочем и всё остальное, за что брался этот талантливейший ребёнок.В том возрасте, когда другие дети только учатся разговаривать, юная я уже писала свой первый роман. К несчастью для человечества, он не сохранился. Чуть подростя, я попыталась экспериментально проверить теорию негорения рукописей. Результат этого эксперимента, оказал глубочайшее влияние на многие отрасли знаний. Он прочно вошел не только в учебники торетического негорения, но и в инструкции пожарной безопасности. Есть даже мнение, что один из основополагающих педагогических принципов: «Родители, не оставляйте детей без присмотра», тоже возник в результате анализа моих экспериментальных подходов. Сегодня все знают - Аза неопровержимо доказала, что в деревянном доме теория негорения рукописей не выполняется.После обсуждения реультатов эксперимента с отцом, я долго не садилась за письменный стол. И лабораторный тоже. Вообще недели две не садилась. Мне было неинтересно встречать односельчан, временно расселенных по окрестным гостиницам. В один из дней я наконец села. Одни говорили, что я села в автобус, другие, что на крыло пролетающего самолёта. А я просто уехала странствовать чтобы познать тайны мироздания. И вот я вернулась - a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma.

Book preview

Down to the 12-th Circle

(Ukraine. What I Saw, What I Know, What I Think: Book 2)

Copyright 2020 Aza Zello

Published by Aza Zello at Smashwords

Cover images (clockwise):

1. US Vice President Biden and Ukraine President Poroshenko; 2. Celebration of SS division Galichina anniversary in Lvov; 3. Burning Euromaidan opponents in Odessa; 4. All-Ukraine online lesson on modern history for 5-th graders; 5. Wreckage of flight MH-17 plane; 6. Apartment building in Luhansk shelled by Ukraine army.

Smashwords Edition License Notes

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Table of Contents

Preface

The House Divided

Feast of Winners

Crimea Departure

ATO

Biden Son and Biden Papa

Travelling Circus of Bloody Clowns

In Kiev after Odessa

Free and Fair Elections

Ministry of Peace

Ministry of Truth

Ministry of Brains

Ministry of Love

Recipe for Disaster

MH-17 Less Known Story

Splitting Church

That soul up there which has the greatest pain,

⁠The Master said, "is Judas Iscariot;

⁠With head inside, he plies his legs without.

Of the two others, who head downward are,

⁠The one who hangs from the black jowl is Brutus;

⁠See how he writhes himself, and speaks no word."

Divine Comedy. Dante. (Longfellow

translation)/Volume 1/Canto 34

Preface

This is the second book in the series about Ukraine. The first one: The Road to Hell, briefly describe thousand years of the history, with major focus on post 1991 period of independent Ukraine statehood. This book cowers much shorter period, from 2014 to 2019, when Ukraine was finally transformed from a country often confused with Russia into the battering ram against Russia.

-*-

A long time ago I read a fiction book, likely Russian sci-fiction, the name I do not remember. In this book some character mentioned Dante's Divine comedy and said that the deepest and the most terrible circle of the hell is for those who saw evil deeds but did not try to stop them. I think a lot about this passage, often after reading in news about the death of somebody who have courage and attempted to stop robbery, rape or other serious crime but ended in a hospital or in a cemetery. My own uncle was savagely beaten when he attempted to stop hooligans in a bus in a situation like one presented in Larry Peerce 1967 movie The Incident.

I do not know how I would behave in a situation like this; I am too rational to act according to feelings only. Nonetheless, I feel good now because instead of trying to make something as safe and profitable as Lolita I found enough courage to write the book that may put me in a trouble.

Couple of years ago I finally read Dante's Divine comedy and discovered that the 12-th circle in his hell is not for cowards or rationals. It is for a traitors. This sounds reasonable because betrayal was always considered to be the ugliest thing that human can do. On the other hand, if the Holy Bible story about Jesus is not a fiction, it is unlikely that God have a sympathy to traitors. If so, he would not accept excuses about past oppression, present aggression, our love for freedom or about quite natural desire to have soft, lace European under panties instead of wooden ones from Siberia. To Him all this could not overweight the fact that Ukraine betrayed Russia by siding with Russia enemies after hundreds years of standing together, so it is highly likely that a lot of people will follow Ukraine Presidents down to the 12-th circle.

The House Divided

Maidan victory tremendously deepened the existing split in Ukrainian society. Yanukovych was not much loved even in the East and the South of the country but he was a lawfully elected president and people who voted for him, as a lesser evil, felt that the victory of aggressive nationalists in Kiev would not bring anything good to them. However, the split was not only geographical, Maidan divided coworkers, friends, lovers and families. It was hard to believe that ordinary people who have no conflicts over factory, land or mine ownership may become so antagonistic on matters of politics, but propaganda is a powerful tool.

-*-

In April 2014 previously unknown Ukrainian poetess Anastasia Dmitruk posted online the poem that started with the following lines:

We will never be brothers

not by birth, not by mother.

You don't have the spirit to be free –

we can't even be your half-brothers….

Her message: Freedom-loving Ukrainians are different from and superior to dull Russians - was exactly what Maidan organizers wanted to put into a head of every Ukrainian. It got several million views in a short time and the author instantly become the famous Ukrainian poetess. She was able to put away her information security diploma and become professional poet-patriot. In April 2016, she received the title of Kivan of the year 2015 - For contribution to the cultural development of the capital. In September 2016, she received the award: For National-Patriotic education of citizens, training young people to defend the independence and territorial integrity of Ukraine, development of the volunteer movement, promoting the Armed Forces. And in November 2016 she received the all-Ukrainian award Woman of 3-d Millennium.

In 2015 an information appeared that her boyfriend left her and moved to Russia in order to escape military draft. In her web page, Dmitruk rejected it as a propaganda, saying that thousands seen her and her boyfriend together but no images that proof this statement were presented.

-*-

During and for some time after Maidan, I discussed ongoing events with people whom I knew for many years. Soon realized that normal discussion with arguments and counterarguments is not possible. People refused to follow logic and accept facts that contradicted to their beliefs. Their mentality appeared to be close to Arthur’s from Magician by Maugham: 'If my eyes show me what all my training assures me is impossible, I can only conclude that my eyes