"We couldn't do these meetings in person in the last two years because of the pandemic", explained G. to another newcomer as I entered the room, the last word preceded by a measured pause and accompanied by scare quotes drawn into the air with his fingers. "Well, this is up for a good start", I thought.
I attended this meetup the second time, the first after the second wave of the "so-called" pandemic. That time I was invited by a former colleague and the conversation was about climate change and the role of fossil fuels in it. The speaker then, who customarily gave a presentation that was followed by a free-style debate, was a representative of the coal industry. So I was prepared to hear some controversial opinions about the Ukrainian war as well, which was tonight's topic.
G., who is the chief organizer of these events, is a fellow countryman of mine. He has lived in Switzerland long enough to lose his Australian accent which he had acquired before. Despite the decades of absence, he hasn't lost his touch with our motherland, as I learned five minutes later when the conversation with the nice Canadian lady strayed onto Hungarian politics. "Orban is a center, very center-right guy, who just refuses to go along with this woke craziness" - he explained. "Maybe I should add some nuance to that?", I wondered silently for some seconds, then decided to pass.
Slowly, people started pouring in, and at seven, the official start time, the oblong table was densely surrounded by circa twenty people. The age distribution of the participants ranged from the early twenties to late fifties, the gender ratio was 6-1 for men, and a depressing 80% of us were software developers. And this is a talk about geopolitics. I'm not sure whether there is something wrong with software engineers or maybe with everyone else.
In absence of a designated speaker, G. kicked off the meeting with a quick overview of the situation. This is a terrible tragedy. It's incomprehensible why no one in the world stood up and demanded that the warring parties stop this immediately and sit down to the negotiating table. The Swiss are equally incomprehensible, giving up their hard-earned neutrality? If they freeze the bank accounts left and right, who will keep their money in their banks in the future? The media is biased and unreliable, and this heroic picture they paint of that corrupt Zelensky is just ludicrous. Still, it's a terrible, terrible situation. And so confusing. What does Putin want? What do Ukrainian Nazis want? Just sad.
I stopped any effort to be subtle about my facial expression halfway through the speech when it dawned on me that I made a terrible mistake. God, there is still two hours left. But luckily, the situation slowly began to improve and a real conversation started with a diversity of opinions. There were a couple of guys who were, not experts by any means, but well-informed. Some were not very well-informed but were arguing in good faith. Then the mandatory useful idiot, chewing on the Monroe-doctrine (what would the US do if Canada wanted to join a Russian military alliance? it wouldn't behave any differently, would it?) and the stealthy, creepy encroachment of NATO upon Russia (that is, the rudeness of the Baltics towards their neighbor for looking for protection). Anyway, what's been wrong with Finlandisation? A like-minded young historian kid chimed in musing on what right the West has to condemn Russia after Iraq? At that point, I was exercised enough to challenge that but someone else raised his hand quicker.
And then there was the highlight of the evening, the guy who bravely made the next step over G.'s hand-wringing lamentations. Ukrainian Nazis are indeed active in the Donbas. How much do they influence the government? Well, who knows, can you prove they don't? Euromaidan protests, orange revolution? The CIA staged them. Russian incompetence? He is not so sure about that, he read some articles. Mariupol? The Ukrainians themselves are shelling it. Bucha? You shouldn't believe the media uncritically. Nothing confrontational, just asking questions. Politely taking notes, nodding. Then the next observation (the Ukrainians were developing nuclear weapons, you know). For a while, I was genuinely puzzled by him. Is he on Russian payroll or simply enjoys being a cretin, just for the thrill of it? In the end, I decided it's the latter (judgment confirmed later in the bar when he said he knows about international banking and finance - that's why he knows it for a fact that the US is about to collapse - because...prepare...he is a software developer in a bank).
But there is was a real and pleasant surprise in the evening. A young Polish guy, A., who, unlike the rest of us, knew the topic in depth. Not my own "30-days podcast crash course on Ukraine" type of education. He was respectful, but argued forcefully, almost passionately. So passionately, that at one point his voice cracked. He had friends in Eastern Ukraine. His dismantling of the nonsense was merciless, and I leaned back and enjoyed the show.
At 9:30, I almost felt sorry that the conversation ended, but my bladder was on the verge of explosion. I went to shake the hands of A. and joined others in the bar for an after-event beer.
The topic of the next event will be "Books vs Tik-Tok". I'll think about going.
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