Ruslan from Marzahn

 

Unless you are Wladimir Kaminer, it is not easy to write with empathic humour about Russians in Berlin, Russians in Marzahn, particularly. Marzahn, this piece of nostalgic DDR, with its funny German slang and gang culture and, indeed, its Russians, some left from the time of the Soviet Army friendly residence.

Sebastian Stuertz tried his hand writing about Ruslan, a funny actor with an oncle about to offer his son a Kalashnikov to play with. Also, they drink vodka those Russians. In addition, Ruslan performed naked on the stage, with his parents, and the oncle in the public. There is a dog called Pushkin and another one called Putin. Also, it seems those Russians are going to the Catholic church, a possibility, but most likely not necessarily, as most of the Russians are belonging to the Eastern branch of Christianity. Although the story is funny, it is not relatable and the jokes are rather jokes-about-how-Russians-in-Marzahn-are-supposed-to-behave. I am sure they can much better. The characters mostly look like puppets who are expected to behave in a way that the author believe a Russian in Marzahn may behave but end up as cartoonish stereotypical figures.

What really makes a difference in this case though, is the interactive and high quality of the audiobook. The text is read by actor Shenja Lacher which is fluent in Russian with music created by the author himself - a very good choice. From many respects, the audiobook setting kept me interested into the book until the very end. Otherwise, with the print version in the front of me, I would have very fast gave up, no matter how high the interests of improving my German are.

Rating: 2 stars