Chapter 27. The Besieged City
The publication of the book opened up new perspectives and was the starting point for new plans. However, the story did not quite end at its arrival in the shops.
Time was running, the circulation was selling out, and the question of the fee had to be closed. I was to be paid as soon as the sales gave me an estimated sum. By the way, it was calculated in Russian roubles, and due to inflation its dollar equivalent was constantly decreasing. From $120 it turned into $110, and then into $100. In order to sign a contract with the publishing house, I had to open a special account where it could transfer the money. In the same contract there was a clause according to which the publishing house was obliged, in order to avoid double taxation, to pay taxes from my fee in Russia, and to send me a paper certifying it, which I, in turn, had to submit to the Belarusian tax authorities. Otherwise, trouble could follow.
When I raised the issue of the fee, the publishing house started to stall and give various excuses: that the sum had not yet accrued, that there were some difficulties with tax paperwork, or something else. It seemed that things were not going brilliantly for them, and it was clear that they were reluctant to give even this hundred dollars. I decided to go along with it and offered to give the royalties in books, for the full amount. It is quite profitable for publishers when an author takes books: they don't have to pay money, and part of the circulation is sold in this way. I needed books more than money, because ten author's copies were given away very quickly. They also seemed to be satisfied with this option. But when I asked them to pay the taxes and to send the necessary paper along with my copies, they replied that they didn't want to bother with all that and offered to just send the books. This, however, meant that I would have to pay taxes here. With what? Books, perhaps... So not only would I get nothing, but I'd have to pay out of my pension. I drew their attention to this, said I didn't agree and asked them to fulfil their contractual obligations and pay the taxes. Then they cut off communication.
I didn't start demanding anything. Well, not to start a lawsuit over such an amount of money, moreover in another country. If these people do not shy away from such theft, let it remain on their conscience.
We monitored the book in online shops, and saw that somewhere it is very expensive. For example, in one of the shops in Minsk it cost so much that I could not have afforded such a purchase under any circumstances. It was very funny: I couldn't afford my own book. And in one of the foreign shops — how did it even get there? — it came in at over $200. It was very difficult to believe in such a thing.
Concluding this topic, I will tell one case. A man wrote to me in social networks and in a somewhat swaggering tone said that he had ordered a book and was going to check it out. However, he was concerned about whether I was a "semi-Jew" and whether I belonged to "the Jewish fascist organisation HABAD, which has blood on its hands". That's practically a verbatim quote. I was disgusted by his words, and I replied in a rather harsh way that I was not going to talk to him. He wrote a bunch of insults in response. Apparently he thought his suspicions came true. And then a scathing review of the book was found on the website of a well-known online shop. I think it was written by that guy.
Speaking of Jews. Along with other religions, I study Judaism as much as possible, read about it, watch video lectures of rabbis representing different currents within it. I like Jews as a people, their culture, their history as such and their historical experience. And Jewish music occupies one of the most prominent places among my musical preferences. Did someone wrinkle his nose in displeasure? Well, that's their problem, not mine.
When the book was published, we came to the idea of trying to offer it to English-language publishers. After all, it now had a published edition to its name, which spoke in its favour. We are no longer just me and Hantur, but also Anna.
After a year and a half of fellowship and visiting, she declared herself a disciple and later accepted the Teaching. But she could not formally join, because it could not be done by correspondence, and we were not communicating by video link at that time. Therefore, she had to wait for several years until she was able to come again, in the summer of 2014.
But Anna got involved in our activities even earlier. She started by looking for people in social networks who might be interested in the Teaching and orienting them to it. So when she, having joined the Teaching, asked me to give her a name, I suggested the name Amradkhari. It was formed from the Sanskrit "dkhara", among the meanings of which are "knowing", "bearing", "affirming", "helping", and our "Amra", that is, the Teaching. In my opinion, the name means "Carrying Amra" — that is, carrying the Teaching to people.
Well, she also knew English very well — even studied in the UK — and was therefore the driving force behind the aforementioned project. There were no decent online translators at that time, so the foreign contacts we were interested in could only be made through her. Actually, the fact that she was with us was the only thing that made such an idea feasible, at least in theory.
We discussed everything in detail and drew up a proposal — taking into account the new realities and the audience we were now addressing — which she translated and posted, along with excerpts of several texts, on an English-language publishing forum.
Bearing in mind the long way we had travelled before and the number of rejections we had encountered (we didn't even count them), I didn't expect a quick response. It was just a probing of the ground. However, within the first two or three days, four European publishers responded at once. One offered a contract for electronic publishing. I rejected this offer at once, because I did not understand well what an officially published electronic book was and did not consider it something serious. Two other publishers, I think British, looked at the sample texts and agreed to publish the book in advance, but refused to translate it themselves and asked for a complete translation. We didn't have it. And we realised there was nothing we could do. Amradkhari, despite all her knowledge of English, was not a translator, and couldn't translate the whole book. As you can easily guess, there was no money to hire a professional. The fourth publisher — this one was from the Netherlands — undertook to provide the translation himself. However, they offered unacceptable conditions in my opinion. They planned to publish only 100 copies, but in a luxurious version. The highest quality paper, hard cover made of genuine leather, and a lacquered wooden case for each copy. It was meant to be an expensive collector's edition for a wealthy buyer. Which I wasn't happy with at all. I wanted the book to be read by as many people as possible — and here it was clear that it would disappear into a few dozen closed private libraries without a trace. Besides, the contract was too long: five years. To publish a hundred useless copies and for a long time to lose the right to offer the book to someone else was not in my plans. If the term of the contract had been shorter, I could have thought about it. I tried to negotiate on this point — but it didn't work out and the co-operation didn't take place.
We didn't see the outcome as a failure. On the contrary. The probing ended up with a more than optimistic result. The book was interesting and demanded by foreign publishers. Maybe not the most famous ones, but still. The problem, as it turned out, was translation.
We priced the services of translators and came to the conclusion that it was possible to order a translation of acceptable quality for not so terrible money. Moreover, Amradkhari would proofread and correct it. She knew our texts well by that time, and she would be able to improve places that would be difficult for an outside translator. So I borrowed the necessary amount and we started another search.
Amradkhari was also in charge of them. She was the only one who could evaluate samples of the translator's work and explain to him the specifics of what was to be done. We managed to find a decent translator in Russia with a good track record who was happy with the pay offered. She said she was finishing a job she had taken earlier and asked me to wait a little while. Then a little more. Then some more... And then some more... Six months passed, and she still asked to wait. And there was no end to the waiting. We said goodbye to her — which seemed to hurt her — and continued our search. Soon we found a man from Transnistria. He did not have such a track record, but Amradkhari appreciated the quality of his work. It was agreed that he would do the translation in two instalments and that payment would be made in two tranches. He set to work. He did not work very fast, but he worked well. He translated a noticeable amount — and suddenly disappeared from sight. He just stopped contacting us. In the end, we were left with a few well-translated but unpaid texts. I decided that we had no moral right to use them.
We had to start all over again. However, the two translators took a whole year, and the money borrowed and never used had to be paid back. Therefore it was decided to postpone the continuation of attempts to translate the book for a while.
...While all of the above was happening, the Crimea happened. Unexpectedly for everyone. I have already said that from the very beginning of Putin's rule I saw something dangerous and threatening in it. Russia's war with Georgia was a vivid confirmation of that. Since 2010-2011 I thought that Putin was gradually going mad. I don't know how right I was, but the annexation of Crimea confirmed this opinion even more. I took it as a personal tragedy. It was a monstrous meanness and injustice. And worst of all, everyone was helpless before the aggression. Ukraine could do little to counter it, the West flapped its eyes and mumbled something. Those were truly black days. It became clear that unpunished international lawlessness was possible, even in Europe, and the future immediately appeared in gloomy colours. The sense of impending even greater catastrophe became so vivid, so piercing that it was almost physically painful.
Crimea served as a test, thanks to which a lot of things became clear about many people at once. Some condemned the aggressor, others approved. It was as if the society split, a crack went through it. It went through families and between friends. My father was very happy about the annexation of Crimea and the mess in Donbass. As a man who grew up in the USSR and used to honour the "big brother", he was always and in everything on the side of Russia, wanted Belarus to become a part of it, and looked at Moscow as a place where only good, truth and justice come from. Moscow cannot be wrong. All those who think differently are scoundrels and enemies. From that moment on, his attitude towards Ukraine and Ukrainians was defined by this. He watched Russian TV channels and believed every lie they broadcast. Naturally, this did not improve our relationship with him. Mum preferred not to openly take either side and not to discuss what was going on either with my father or with me.
Then my correspondence with A.S. ended. He welcomed Russia's aggression and was looking forward to its troops entering Kharkiv and liberating the city from "Ukrainian fascists". I remarked to this that we seemed to see the fascists on different sides of the front. Then he stopped answering letters.
But communication with V.B. became, on the contrary, more frequent, meaningful and warm. We agreed about the Crimea, and this brought us closer to each other. He became interested in my worldview, and now I told him quite a lot about the Teaching.
He did not seek a spiritual path, and he did not become a follower of the Teaching. But he became my friend. Not a disciple, just a friend. For the reasons I have already told you about, this was even more important for me personally.
But let's finish the subject. Hantur, of course, was on the side of the Ukraine. Amradkhari was not particularly interested in politics. She kept to the position that everything was complicated, and there was no way to know whose Crimea should rightfully belong to. She saw that something wrong and bad was happening, but she was not ready to condemn the actions of her country.
Besides, her attention was completely absorbed by other things. At the time, she was working on her own book. It was a psychological thriller about an American policeman and two maniacs.
She was meticulous and thorough. She read works on psychiatry, learnt how mental hospitals work, studied detailed maps of the places where the events of the book took place, down to which road to take. She communicated with real American policemen on their forums, asking about the specifics of their work. After the Crimean events, she was kicked off the forums. But she already knew everything she wanted to know, and work on the book was in full swing. I was the first reader of each new chapter. We discussed the plot and the characters. I helped develop one of them, and I also wrote some poems specifically for the book (again under the name of Digenis). When the novel was finished, I gave it a proofreading.
Amradkhari took up the search for a publisher. In addition, she needed beta-readers — people who would be the first readers and give their opinion on the book. My mum and one of Hantur's colleagues acted as such. Both of them liked the novel a lot, although they found it heavy because of the subject matter and the dystopian plot. This, by the way, coincided with my impressions. But, basically, it was supposed to turn out that way — so the reviews hit the mark. Beta-readers then received copies signed by the author as a gift.
As is clear from the above, the book found its publisher. It came out in 2017 under the title "And Death Sat on Every Step". It was insanely interesting to me to watch it being born, and even more so to be involved in some way.
Even earlier Amradkhari and I used to amuse ourselves by playing a kind of literary games: exchanging letters on behalf of the fairy-tale and fantasy characters we were playing the roles of, writing small texts on the same subject, playing it from different angles, or just writing something humorous. Regardless of this, she wrote several small tales, sketches from trips to various interesting places, etc. I think she could have achieved a lot as a writer if she had set herself such a goal.
Due to her communication skills she communicated with many people and told some of them about the Teaching. Someone simply took note of the fact that there was such a spiritual system, someone got acquainted with it more closely, read texts or other materials. But as a rule, everyone limited themselves to a superficial glance, without giving themselves the labour to go deeper. Although there were all sorts of things. For example, one lady read the "Evor" and was delighted, "What a wonderful teaching!" But then she read an article which said, among other things, that the Teacher is an authority to be trusted, and her opinion immediately changed to the opposite, "Terrible teaching!"
In general, it is the role of the Teacher as the most authoritative person in the Teaching that has been and continues to be a stumbling block for so many. Some are afraid, seeing it as a dictatorship; others simply do not want to recognise any authority, putting their own opinion above everything else. It is clear from this case that for some people the content of a spiritual teaching as such is not really important. What is more important is whether there is someone in it who has the highest authority. If there is, then no matter how good it is, it is still bad. I could add much more on this topic, as I have studied this phenomenon, so to speak, up close over the years. But it is hardly worth doing so here. Let us simply note, for the sake of understanding the general situation, that people who seem to be seeking the Truth are often intimidated or angered by the need to recognise the simple fact that someone may be more competent than they are in such matters. Although in the realm of spirituality, in a wide variety of spiritual traditions, the principle of the Teacher's authority has always been and remains not only natural and normal, but fundamental.
However, not all of Amradkhari's efforts ended in vain. One day she spoke about the Teaching to a guy called Alex. He was half Russian, half German, and lived in Germany, where he had moved with his parents from Kazakhstan when he was a child. After a brief chat with her, Alex read the pandect and was very impressed. But he took his time. Several months passed, during which he reread the texts, reflected, listened to his feelings. And he was completing parallel spiritual endeavours. Being a man of thoroughness and consistency, he decided to finish them first, and then to undertake a deeper study of the Teaching. When the time came, he wrote to me. Our communication was not without mutual misunderstandings and pauses. Nevertheless, Alex eventually came to visit me in the late summer of 2015, and officially joined the Teaching.
For almost a week we talked daily, for four hours each day. The rest of the time he walked around the city, alone or in the company of Hantur, with whom he even played tennis. Alex liked absolutely everything in Belarus — in Homieĺ and Minsk, where he was passing through — clean streets, good roads, air, tasty food, friendly people... So when I told him that our country is a dictatorship, there is no freedom of speech, protests are dispersed, people are imprisoned and killed, he smiled incredulously. He thought that I was exaggerating because of my personal dissatisfaction with the Belarusian authorities. Well, in fact: everything around is beautiful and blessed — what kind of bloody dictatorship can we talk about?.. His opinion changed only five years later.
And in the same year, after the expiry of the author's contract, our new website was launched. It was called "Amra Blooming", was designed differently from the first one, and had more extensive and diverse content. Needless to say, the pandect also. English translations, same. Articles and other material on the Teaching, and even a selection — though unfinished, incomplete — of quotations from the pandect. Later, the section "Documents" was added, and several translations into French were added. A page with audio tracks appeared, where you could listen to the dubbed texts of the "Doron", 13 out of 20. They were narrated by an experienced narrator who has recorded many audiobooks. Hantur reached out to him and paid for his work. Unfortunately, the dubbing of the whole book was never completed: he just suddenly disappeared from our sight. And not only from ours: other people were looking for him and couldn't find him. It seems that no new audiobooks from him have appeared since then.
In addition to the sections dealing directly with the Teaching, a section "Personalities" was opened on the website. It was intended for publishing the works of the followers of the Teaching. I posted there my poetry and other things, excluding political satire and humour, which I considered inappropriate on the official website of the Teaching. Amradkhari posted her fairy tales, essays from her travels.
And there was a text she had written called "Diary". Though not really a diary in the usual sense of the word, but something like an essay of several chapters, in which she told about her spiritual quest and about our meeting, shared her thoughts on the topic of following the spiritual path, wrote about the difficulties and problems she encountered on this path, and about various moments that were significant for her. It was a very important text. For the first time it allowed us to look at the Teaching not through the eyes of its founder, but through the eyes of a follower. Through the eyes of one who had come and accepted. A testimony, for many, more important than the words of a Teacher. One who familiarises himself with the Teaching and considers it as a possible spiritual path associates himself with those who have already gone through it. To draw an analogy with another sphere of life, it is like an advert from a manufacturer and a consumer's review. That's why the experience of an established follower is so valuable.
The pandect was back in the public domain and no longer had to be mailed to those interested. If one wished to present the Teaching, one could now simply give a link to the website.
We took advantage of this, in particular to try again to offer the book to Russian publishers for reprinting. Hantur did a couple of mailings using the old method. Thanks to them and to a general study of the current situation in book publishing, a very bleak picture was revealed to us. The political and economic situation in Russia was deteriorating, publishing houses were getting poorer, going bankrupt and closing down, and the survivors were becoming more fearful and cautious. They were understandable. We, on the other hand, received a clear signal: the Russian direction of efforts can be closed.
A little later, though, we did make another attempt. There was still an opportunity to publish something with our own money. There was nowhere to get the necessary sum, so we decided to try crowdfunding. The idea was to publish all three books of the pandect under one cover. We calculated the volume, Hantur made the design layout. The result was a very voluminous book in a large format, in a good hard cover, in a beautiful design. We found a suitable Russian crowdfunding platform, calculated the amount needed to publish 100 copies, including gifts to donors. It came out to something around $6,000. The idea, basically, did not look hopeless.
However, there was one catch: they did not accept projects to raise money for the publication of religious literature. Philosophical, occult, mystical literature was allowed, but religious literature was not. The Teaching is not a religion. But if one reads, without setting out to understand its texts, which mention gods, the Creator, revelations, prophets, life after death and other things in the same vein, it can be taken as such. Question: how to make a description of the project to exclude the possibility of such misunderstanding? After all, you can't talk about the book without mentioning revelation, etc. People need to know what they are donating money for. Two phrases will not be enough. And to write about everything and then verbally assure that it is not a religious teaching will not work, because they simply will not believe and will not pass. What to do? There were no ideas. Then I wrote to the platform support service, outlined the problem and asked for advice. They couldn't recommend me anything but to try to make a neutral description as much as possible, without mentioning undesirable moments. Alas, this was impossible. In the end, we gave up the idea of crowdfunding in Russia.
It became finally clear that now there is nothing to count on there, and we can only focus on publishing our books in the far abroad. The question of translation became acute.
...In general, if we talk about opportunities, it was almost a complete deadlock in all respects. In Belarus it was impossible to do anything at all; in Russia it was still possible to do something in social networks, but the screws there began to tighten faster and tighter. I felt myself bound hand and foot, and my mouth was almost completely shut. To create an organisation, to register it and to carry out any official activity under such conditions was out of the question. So I had been thinking for years about moving to some other country.
It was not about how I treated my homeland, whether I loved it or not. Belarus is a normal country, not worse than others. But a brutal dictatorship will turn any country into a gas chamber where you suffocate. And for me the main thing was my work. I would be happy where I could work freely.
On the one hand, I love the whole world and could feel any country as close and native. My homeland, after all, is not so much a country as it is the planet. There are nuances, but that's basically it. On the other hand, I would not like to leave the city of revelation. Here is the energetic heart of the Teaching. However, the opportunity to work is more important. The opportunity to develop the Teaching, to spread it freely, to organise it, to put it on its feet, to create and implement various projects, to work on changing the world for the better. For me the choice was obvious. I should leave at the first opportunity.
But there was simply no opportunity. Nor was one in sight. Moving and settling in a new place required significant funds. And considering my physical condition, the need for constant care, and so on, the difficulties of relocation and resettlement increased tremendously. Consequently, so did the necessary expenses. If the Teaching could develop properly, we would eventually have projects aimed at self-financing. There was no other way — after all, I do not charge disciples, the Teaching does not demand regular fees, nor does it ask for donations. Therefore, something was needed to generate income, to support its organisation and ongoing activities. The efforts of individual enthusiasts were valuable, but they were not always enough. And here we faced a vicious cycle. Without the ability to establish proper activities, we could not develop the Teaching to the point where it could sustain itself financially — and as long as it could not sustain itself, we had no way to establish proper activities. Most importantly, we could not relocate to a place where we could work freely.
That was the case at the time in question, that was the case then, and that remains the case now. There is no way out of the vicious cycle in sight. And all I can do is dream of moving somewhere where I wouldn't feel as if I had been living in a besieged city for decades.
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