'A rabbit, a wolf, and a fox are sitting in a Soviet prison cell. The rabbits is there for the evasion of military service, the fox is there for being a thief, and the wolf is there for rustling horned cattle. Suddenly the door flies open and a rooster is flung into the cell.
'I'm a political' he cries immediately.
The others gaze at him in amazement and awe. 'That's really something!' they murmur respectfully 'We're just common criminals, but you . . . . Tell us what did you do?'
The rooster assumes a heroic stance 'I pecked a pioneer* on the bum!'.
But all jokes aside, wild romantic liars like this don't become 'political prisoners'. After all, our women's political zone, reserved for 'especially dangerous state criminals', is the only one of it's kind in the country. There are other women political prisoners scattered throughout other Soviet camps, but you don't find yourself in the Barashevo Small Zone just for possessing an over-vivid imagination. The KGB are not fools by far, so what could their reason for sending so transparently false a person into our zone? Why do it?
Gradually things start becoming a little clearer. Vladimirova announces that camp or no camp, she will continue her struggle! She even has a plan prepared: first we must establish contact with the men's political zone - it is not far, after all, just across the road. All we have to do is cross our no man's land in full view of the two guards armed with sub machine guns, climb over the fence, cross the road, climb another fence and pass through another no man's land under the eyes of the guards: as for negotiating the barbed wire obstacles - well that is child's play.'.
*Soviet equivalent of a cub scout or girl guide
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