--- cgrimes at rawbw.com wrote:
> -------------
>
> This is pretty fascinating stuff. Particularly the
> idea that `free
> will' is a contradiction in Russian. I think I sort
> of get it. What it
> reminds me of our own mythological wild west or at
> the least some of
> the internal conflicts portrayed in some western
> movie
> characters. Well, not quite that but something like
> it.
Have you ever thought about visiting the place? I could show you around (well, not the whol country).
This whole "laws? what laws?" attitude can be pretty funny sometimes. For instance, take the recent deportation of (a small percentage of) Georgians residing illegally in Russia -- which is most Georgians in Russia. Russia is the world's no. 2 immigrant country after the States, and virtually all of the immigrants/migrant workers/shuttle traders are illegal. Moscow has something like 1 million illegals in a population of about 12 million. If you meet a Ukrainian or a Georgian or an Uzbek national in Russia, the chances are pretty damn high that he or she is illegal. And everybody knows where these people are, so the cops could easily get them if they wanted to -- but they don't, because they are a source of $$ in the form of, ahem, "fines."
But then the spy scuffle with Georgia happens, the government decides to do some damage to the Georgian economy, and lo and behold the police suddenly realize that there are illegal Georgians here! They knew it before -- the law had just not been "activated," so to speak.
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