Red Wake, The

"A historical rollick through the -stans. A journey across the former soviet states, a hybrid of travel and journalism. Since childhood, Kurt Johnson was alert to 'the communists' his immigrant grandparents spoke of and became transfixed by the stories of the Soviet Union. While not a particularly politically active teenager he sought the site of radical change, he wanted to visit somewhere where history happened. The language,symbols and archetypes of the Soviet Union have become almost a nostalgic brand in our world, but Kurt suspected after early travels to the Balkans, Romania and Bulgaria, that for some people they may still be real. So Kurt enrolled in Beginners Russian at community college and spent an hour each day learning Russian and in 2015, he returned to these Soviet satellites that appeared like organs cut off from the heart left to atrophy. It became imperative that he visit the heart. Kurt broadened his thesis and set off investigating other legacies left by the Soviets, like ethnic conflicts in the Caucasus, the grab for oil and natural gas in Central Asia, the ecological disasters that continue to make life so difficult for the people of the K