Circular letter to friends, May 16, 1928

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Conditions in Alma-Ata

How are we getting along here? We have had to answer this question dozens of times already, for our "correspondents" are increasing in number very quickly. Nevertheless I recognize the total validity of the question, since I myself read with the greatest interest those letters in which comrades tell about themselves, about their being relocated, how they got settled, how they are getting along, and what work they are doing.

To report briefly: for about three weeks we lived in a hotel-after which we were given the opportunity to relocate to an apartment, which at first occupied half a house, but now comprises the entire house. This "house" however, consists of four rooms. By way of exception, the apartment has electricity. In view of the extremely feeble output of the local power plant, there is electricity only in government institutions and the homes of government employees. However, in view of the same feeble output and general worthlessness of the power plant, the electric current which is supposed to be functioning, according to the official schedule, roughly from 7 a.m. to 12 p.m. plays nasty tricks, going off for several minutes every now and then, sometimes for half an hour or more at a stretch. The apartment is left dark and its occupants begin calling out to one another: Should we light the candles and the kerosene lamp? Or wait for the electricity to come back on?

As for the availability of food, here too severe interruptions have been evident, especially when it comes to bread. Here it is, a month and a half already, that the city has been suffering shortages, especially a shortage of bread: terribly long waiting lines, extremely limited amounts of bread, and extremely poor quality. The price of a pood [32 lbs.] of wheat flour on the free market had remained constant at the level of ten rubles, but just in the last month it began going up and has reached twenty-five rubles. I must say, however, that personally, in this regard, we have been accorded every kind of preferential treatment. There was only one critical moment when it was completely impossible to get any bread. However, just before that happened, we quite unexpectedly received a package in the mail from Moscow, from P. S. Vinogradskaya, containing the very finest flour. From that we made our own bread, of the very highest quality.

There are very great difficulties here with meat also and with every kind of food in general. As far as manufactured goods go, what is sent here primarily are factory rejects, defective goods. In the bookstore I have not succeeded in finding a single book that I need. As it turns out, the library here is not short of books, at least not of old ones, but they are in total disorder, not catalogued but strewn about in chaotic heaps. I have access to them, however, and can choose any I need from them. It has very few new books published during the war or since the revolution, and absolutely no new foreign books. The number of periodicals received is also insignificant. All such things must therefore be obtained from outside.

As far as our so-called regimen is concerned, at first an excess of zeal was observed, which resulted in several very sharp conflicts. But now things have settled down, and I personally cannot complain in this regard.

The conception of Alma-Ata as a southern locality requires very substantial amendment. At any rate this year spring was very late, good days have been rare, interspersed with rainy and even snowy ones, with a last big snowfall coming at the end of April and damaging the cherry trees. This entire region, as is true of Central Asia in general, is a realm of horrifying dust, especially saline-soil dust. It is a region of malaria, and the presence of malaria in me is no longer subject to doubt. I swallow my quinine conscientiously every morning and this gives good results.

The city is laid out in terraces descending from the foothills to the plain. The farther down a section of the city is located, the more malarial it is. We live in the middle area and consequently have an average rate of malaria. In the summer it is almost impossible to live here because of the heat, the dust, and once again the malaria. At that time a migration goes on up into the "mountains," or more accurately the foothills, which here are called "the stopping places." Very extensive orchards are spread out there and wooden "dachas" have been built, actually structures of a barracks type. During the summer period, houses are also made simply of interwoven strips of lath which for some reason here is called wickerwork. We too have secured for ourselves a summer home.

At first we planned to move at the beginning of May, but now it is already the sixteenth and we have not yet moved – both because the summer house is unfurnished and because of the rain, which has lowered the usual temperature greatly.

We subscribe to Pravda, Izvestia, and Ekonomicheskaya Zhizn. Until recently the comrades have sent publications from Baku and Tiflis. Sosnovsky frequently sends us very interesting clippings from Siberian and other newspapers. Foreign papers have come from Moscow and above all from Comrade Rakovsky in Astrakhan. Recently we have begun getting foreign newspapers directly from abroad. I brought with me a certain number of books for my work (alas, far fewer than was claimed in the newspapers, which lied about the celebrated large number of "boxes"). Our friends have sent books from Moscow. Some books have also begun to come from abroad.

During this whole time I have been working mainly on China and partly on India. I am still busy with the East primarily. But I do not intend to limit myself to the East. I wish to draw some sort of balance sheet on the postwar development of the world economy, world politics, and the world revolutionary movement. In my leisure hours I am writing memoirs, something Yevgeny Preobrazhensky put me up to. Other than that, I am translating some things for the Institute of Marx and Engels. And that it seems is an ample reply to your question of how we are getting along here