THROUGH A SCIENTIST’S EYES

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23014, 17 October 1936, Page 4

THROUGH A SCIENTIST’S EYES

OBSERVATIONS IN EUROPE

By O. 11. Frankel

IV. In Kiev, the capital city of the. Soviet Ukraine, I left the beaten tourist track. I was to visit old friends in Poland, and the nearest frontier station had to be reached by a slow-moving local train. Though travelling “ soft ” —that is, second class—l was in close contact with the passengers of the “hard” half of the carriage, since the door dividing both was permanently open. I must say that this journey, though less comfortable, was both more enjoyable and more interesting than any other I had made in Russia. For one there was a complete absence of inquisitive fellow tourists. Second, I. travelled for 16 hours together with a frequently changing crowd of Russians of all classes, officials, soldiers, workers, peasants, male and female, with numerous children. I have never seen a more orderly behaved crowd in any railway carriage, or a slow local train which was kept so scrupulously clean. There were long discussions obviously centring round questions of local organisation and politics. I was treated kindly and left entirely to myself. The woman conductor firmly refused the offered tip. I was the only passenger to cross the border that day, and, I gather, the only one for some time past. At' the Russian frontier station I was conducted to a large, brightly white waiting room, where, sitting at a table, I was interviewed by an official as to the purpose of my visit to Russia, He was businesslike and exceedingly polite. Henceforth four officers performed the most thorough search of my luggage I have ever witnessed, no scrap of paper evading their inquiries., They seemed honestly grieved when I refused their kindly-offered assistance in repacking the wreckage. A train consisting of a locomotive and a single railway carriage appeared.. I witnessed a searching investigation by police officers of all its parts, inside, below and on top, where anything might be hidden. ‘ I shook hands with the officials, and the carriage left with myself as its sole passenger, guarded by three police officers armed with revolvers, one man each on the front and rear steps, and a third inside. They left at the border, where Polish soldiers, heavily armed with guns, stormed the carriage to make another search of tjpe premises. The Polish frontier police were obviously baffled by my presence. What for, they asked, had I gone to Russia? It was so very far from New Zealand, a statement which naturally was hard to contradict. They launched an enthusiastic search of my suitcases, but, their contents being tightly packed, they soon tired, having triumphantly unearthed a number of the English weekly paper published in Moscow, and—a theatre programme of an old Russian comedy by Ostrovsky, a performance of which I had seen in Moscow. The former I had obtained for the sake of an article by Professor Vavilov on the organisation of agricultural research in the U.S.S.R., which I had already removed to a file. I was amused by the confiscation of the pernicious theatre bill, and when I indicated that the readers of these columns also would appreciate the joke, programme and journal were speedily returned. I discarded both in the nearest rubbish bin. Presently I