The calls started coming in the afternoon and tied up phones for hours at the headquarters of at least two organizations strongly critical of the Kremlin. “Putin is life; Putin is the light; love Putin and your life will have meaning; Putin will give you happiness; Putin will open your eyes,” a woman’s ethereal voice chanted over and over and over.
Moscow’s department of education sent out a directive on Friday requiring students in grades 9 through 11 to report for a mandatory Russian exam on Saturday during the time of the protest.
More ominous was an altered photograph of Mr. Putin circulating in the blogosphere that showed him dressed in the flowing robes of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, the deposed leader of Libya, whose violent death in October was condemned by the Russian prime minister.
What a surreal tale of the first major protest since Soviet-era Russia. Murakami could have written this story.
I love it.
