From the USSR to War Journalism

Angelika Regossi guides us through her career in War journalism that started after her escape from the USSR. She has covered the fall of Yugoslavia, the war in Iraq, the Russia-Georgia war, and other dangerous conflicts. Her life has been filled with so many unconventional experiences, and it is an honor to have her on The East Wing.

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Abdullah Najjar

What is In The East Wing?

Stories of espionage, war, and politics, with a primary focus on the Middle East. This podcast will bring together individuals who were involved in the region in different capacities and lived long enough to tell their stories. This will be raw, balanced, and undeniably suspenseful. Join Abdullah Najjar, as he takes you through a journey to a different world. A podcast by WKNC 88.1 FM HD-1/HD-2.

Abdullah Najjar 0:00
All right, welcome back to In the East Wing. This is a conversation with a war reporter whose name is Angelika Regossi. Now Angelika was an East Europe news reporter for BBC Radio, and she has reported on the fall of the Iron Curtain, the expansion of NATO and the European Union, in addition to the transition from Communism to capitalism. During her early days, she reported on the fall of Yugoslavia, in addition to the trial and overthrow of the President of then Yugoslavia. I think Angelika has some very interesting stories, and a lot of her past experiences were shared with me, and now you will get to hear some more of those experiences as you listen into our conversation together. Finally, I do want to highlight that Angelika has published a few books, including a novel titled Love in communism. She published a series called politics and cooking. In addition to that, she published another series called 1000 words. We will hear more about her books later in the episode. But without further ado, let's, let's get right to it. So Angelika, well, welcome to indie swing.

Angelika Regossi 1:38
Thank you for having me

Abdullah Najjar 1:39
absolutely yeah. So I, I did use the term war journalist, and before I proceed, it does it? Does it apply? Is that how you think your career? Is that a sort of a characterization that you think is accurate about your about the career that you you've led so far?

Angelika Regossi 2:03
Well, definitely covering the news and the stories from the war zones, from different parts of the world, was a big part of my career. But I consider myself as a news journalist, and of course, because there is a lot of news in the war zones, so I went to cover the stories.

Abdullah Najjar 2:27
Yeah, yeah. No, that that? I think that makes a lot more sense, although I do want to explore many of these stories with you as we have this conversation together. But I think it would be interesting to perhaps highlight to the audience and to me, obviously, and take us back a little bit to the you know, your your early days, you know, the start of your career. How did that? How did you find yourself in a position where you were becoming a journalist, or you are, or you were a journalist in the making. Can you maybe take us back a little bit into those early days where you know this the start of your career? How did it, how did it start?

Angelika Regossi 3:16
Oh, well, um, probably we have to go even a little bit further back, how did I came to the idea to become the journalist, and how could I implement this idea? Is, I was born in the USSR, and I was from the family who didn't have any communists, and with this background, and also my grandfather, he was persecuted in a Siberian working camps just because they were property owners. With this background, it would be very difficult to become something to get some interesting profession or something interesting in the USSR, because it was very assortive society. And being Hungarian myself, I am a Hungarian. Belong to Hungarian minority who lived in west part of Ukraine, which was earlier before the Second World War, a part of Hungary. So my ancestors are Hungarians. I always looked west to the west. How can I leave the Soviet Union and become something in outside of the Soviet Union? So when Mikhail Gorbachev he when he liberalized the borders of the Soviet Union, when the changes started to come with perestroika and other things, the first thing was that I decided I will leave USSR, and I was in a big rush to do it, because we didn't know when the board. Will be closed when the rules will be changed. So I'm very, very fast. Decided to leave USSR. I left in september 1989 and I never regret. I think it was the best decision in my life which I ever made. I would be never able to experience and to live and to achieve things which I achieved outside, or if I would stay there. So the first thing, of course, was to come to Hungary, because it was mentally for me, close. And geographically, it was close. It was just Budapest. Was just 360, kilometers from my home, where I lived, and it was very natural for me to come to Hungary, but because Hungary was also part of the Soviet camp, I did not believe that I will stay there. I always wanted to go to America or Canada or Australia, but those countries were very far. It was very difficult to get to America, and I was afraid to go to Australia, so far from Europe. So the option was to go to Canada, and I arrived to Canada. I was in Canada, but it was quite a boring country. It was just really so boring. The news were there, if some cat will climb to the tree and the fire brigade will come to take it off, that was the news of the day. And you know, for me, coming from that background of leaving Soviet Union, the consultation camp of my grandfather, I was followed also by KGB. These things were quite boring. So I decided to go back to East Europe, where many, many interesting things started to happen. And I started to work in Baker and Mackenzie. It is a law company. I was assistant of a boss there, but without having a legal education, I couldn't grow in that company. And in addition, I felt myself like when I looked outside of the window during the office work. I felt that the life goes on outside of the window, and I'm here a lot with the boring paperwork, so I always felt I need to do more. And I started to work for journalists. I started to work first as a translator and as a production, producer and a fixer, and I started to get closer to the journalists who were working for different stages, like Voice of America and NPR and CBS and other stations, and I get involved with journalism, and I was invited for the trips, and that's how I started with my journalistic career. Wow,

Abdullah Najjar 7:56
that was a very I would characterize it as a very unconventional entry into the world of journalism, which I find quite interesting. When you said you you moved to Canada and you couldn't find yourself sort of, you know, you found you found you found yourself in a situation where the news wasn't maybe as exciting as as you would have expected when you first started your when your journalism career was first started, what was perhaps the most exciting story that you covered, where you were like, Okay, I think I made The right decision, and I look forward to more exciting stories, or maybe events to cover. Do you recall the beginning?

Angelika Regossi 8:49
Of course, I recall it exactly as you said, in Canada, I was working as in the office with like administration work or so. I was also working there as a translator. As a translator, I was translating the documents from Russian into English for the oil company. But I didn't get so much satisfaction because it was quite the same work, and I always wanted to have more excitement, more changes, more challenge. And when I came back to Hungary from Canada, when I came back to Hungary, I was receiving so many offers to work because I spoke English, I spoke Russian, I spoke other languages of East Europe, and the people needed this kind of knowledge because investors started to come to Hungary. Journalists were flooding Hungary. So I always were receiving one offer better than another. I could choose work. I could choose for whom I work. It was excellent time. And. And one of the assignments which I received, I had to work together with a VRT, it is a Belgium television. At that time, they had another name. They was a brtn television, Belgium radio and television. And then later they changed the name into Flemish radio and television, and I was working with a crew. I helped them out, because they were recording about the first elections in Hungary. And for me, it was very exciting, because I was able to enter parliament, I was able to participate in the interviews with the top politicians. It was very big challenge. It was a challenge. It was a big step after, you know, administration works away in the office, when you can walk into the parliament and to the top, to the President and to the top people, and you can interview them, or you can also participate in translation of interviewing them that I remember very good, that feeling and that excitement, that challenge I wanted, of course, to continue,

Abdullah Najjar 11:11
yeah, yeah. And that's when I think maybe you didn't expect at the time that you were going to be covering wars, right? Maybe you expected something more similar in terms of like interviewing high ranking officials or diplomats. Maybe you didn't think that you were going to end up covering a few wars here and there, where things are even more exciting and more intense. Or did that, or was that on your radar at the time? Yes,

Angelika Regossi 11:43
you're absolutely right for me, it was never crossed my mind. Because don't forget that I came out from the USSR in 1989 and after it, the Empire started to fall down, with the huge cows, with the wars, with conflicts, with everything, with hyperinflation, when financially, I didn't feel myself stable, because today you earn so much, and tomorrow it is half of the of your money because of hyperinflation. That was also the reason why I sought to get more stability in Canada. And I thought it will be stable and nice, but that stability was for me a little bit boring. You know, it is every time the same, every time the same, so it was boring. We were used for much more exciting things. And once I met my colleague with whom I was working, whom I helped, and actually he later became my husband. He told me that he was in Lebanon when he was 18. He was covering the war and all that stories. And I was so shocked. I said, you went to the war when now you was 18, and how is your mother? Was he? She not against it. Or he said, My mother cannot influence this, because that was my decision. And I was so surprised. I told him, Listen, you went to the war to risk your life. Why did you do that? Especially, he said, because I wanted to cover the stories. I wanted to bring the true stories to the people. And of course, as a journalist, you want to be in the middle of the event you you want to be the first to report. That is excitement, that adrenaline of being the first to report when the whole world can hear you. So I learned that things from him and I myself couldn't see at that time as the war correspondent. But indeed, when you want to be in the middle of the events, many times these events are happening exactly in the war zones. So you have to make this kind of decision for yourself. Do you want to risk your life for your story or not?

Abdullah Najjar 14:05
Gosh, that's you know. I always you know, before I even delve into the specifics with you about, you know, some of the wars that you had to cover, I always find myself very intrigued and in shock of the, you know, the bravery of many of these war journalists who put themselves on a line and put their lives on a line that is. And you know, they don't have the level of protection and security that say the military personnel has because they they go in and maybe they're wearing a vest or something, but all they have is, you know, camera, maybe a pen, a pencil and a notepad. You know, they don't have the ability, or they don't have the best ability, to sort of protect themselves, or. In danger, especially those that embed themselves with with soldiers or military personnel, which I'm sure maybe that's something you have experienced as well, where you find yourself being embedded with these military personnel, to be in the front lines and to sort of cover what's happening. I mean that I have a tremendous amount of respect for the people that put themselves in such positions, because not people will probably think they're crazy, and maybe that's something you are on the receiving end of, right? People might think that, oh, this is insane. Why would you do that? I don't know. I mean, I've always, I've always found that quite interesting, how people, you know, and I found, find these people quite brave, you know, you know, they put themselves on in these tough positions and in these rough environments. But it's, it's, it's passion, right? I reckon it's passion that's driving them and propelling them to do these things,

Angelika Regossi 16:00
right? It is a passion, it is a challenge. And when you go to the war zone, you don't even think about the risk. You think more, what are you going to tell to your listeners, how you're going to cover the conflict? How can you show how people live in this conflict. Because, you know, to report from the extreme environments, let it be the war zone or the summer, maybe chemical catastrophe, which I also covered in Hungary and or other conflicts you always concentrate more about your story, not about the danger. And I remember, yes, exactly, we didn't get much equipment to protect ourselves, maybe both pro for waste. We didn't had, we had once, but we received that after the war when we came from the war zone, because it was lost away in a post. You don't think about these things. You think, How can you cover the story? How can you meet your deadline, and how, how do you bring the story to your audience that they see the balance story, good facts are checked. And, you know, in the war zone, it's very difficult to set to check the facts, because you don't have maybe the virus, you don't have this, you don't have that. You have to be very fast. You have many broadcasts many times. You don't sleep enough, you don't eat enough. But these things, you also don't think, you only think about your listeners and about your story. What are you going to tell?

Abdullah Najjar 17:44
Oh, well, that's my goodness. We we speak about these things, you know, I think, in a way that doesn't probably convey the true nature of the overall, the overall experience that a person went through. I mean, we you can, you can talk to us, you know, and share with us some of the some of the intricacies, perhaps, of the overall journey, of what it's like to cover a war or a conflict or a dangerous situation, but I still don't think, you know, that people would truly understand the like. I don't think one can, can truly understand what that's like unless they experience it themselves. And even though it might be, you know, I might have some sort of understanding of these things given my background. You know, I've lived through different wars here and there. I sort of have a rough understanding, but probably not a full understanding, right? And this is where I might perhaps maybe transition to a case, a particular scenario that perhaps one of one of the wars that you experienced, that perhaps maybe can paint a clearer picture, to me and the audience of what it's like to be in the front lines and cover maybe a conflict or a rough situation that not so many People would be inclined to perhaps be in. So maybe you can share with us something about your experience with covering the dissolution of Yugoslavia. I think you had some some experience with that back in day, right? So maybe, maybe you can take us back to what you were doing at the time, what sort of coverage you were providing, and how did you find yourself in that situation? Maybe,

Angelika Regossi 19:53
right. You know, Yugoslavia fall of Yugoslavia, which was artificially created states. Yugo it means south, and Slavia means people. Slavic people live there that is a Yugoslavia south. Slavs, these people who have, like Slavic languages in common. They were pulled together in one state. And if the state was called Yugoslavia, it consisted of six republics. But in 1990 at the beginning of 90s, when there was a fall of communism, which started in 1989 these nations, this these republics, they decided to go separately, and they wanted to have a separate states, but Belgrade, or which is a center of Serbia and all incostavia, they did not want to allow those republics to go their way, and they wanted to keep them forcefully. And that's how the war started. And why is it so? Is because some of the republics, like, for example, Croatia, it lays through the on the Adriatic, Adriatic Sea, with a huge front line to the sea and other republics. They were bringing a lot of money to Belgrade, and Belgrade didn't want, of course, to lose it, so they forcefully decided to hold these republics, and the wars started. I was involved in the war, first of all as as a translator, and then later as a journalist, but I remember how we were reporting in Kosovo, and that touched me very much, because we were there exactly when NATO started to bomb Belgrade. It was exactly during the Kosovo War. And was the Kosovo. Kosovo was part of Serbia. In Kosovo, there were many Muslims who became in majority and Christians, Christians, Serbs, they became in minority. But this situation was not, not like that before, but because of the birth rate, Muslims have more children than Christians, so that they became a majority. They wanted to go separately. They wanted to separate from Serbia, and Serbia didn't allow so we went to cover that war. And at that time, there were many mines. You know, the Serbs were putting many mines in the roads, in the forests where Kosovars Muslims were hiding. And also they were putting mines by the entrances of the houses of Kosovo people. And you know, some people were warning us that Be careful. You have to be careful by walking in Kosovo. So what did we do? And what the guides advised us to do. They were taking the cows when we had to go to the forest or somewhere, to the fields, that is the most dangerous place to go, because you can step on the mine and you explode yourself. So they were taking the cow, and we had to go step in, step after the cow, because if the cow steps in the mine, the cow explodes. So then we don't go there. So we had always to go behind or behind the horse or behind the cow. But we had, we needed stories. We needed stories. Where can we get an interesting stories? Because it's one thing that you are journalist in the war, but those things that every time you can have something super interesting story, okay, news. You have one diplomat arrived, another ride, something is born. But you want the story. We find a girl who was exploded at the entrance of her house with both legs amputated. And it was summer. It was summer, and we were it was summer, and we were in Kosovo, and we had to go to the hospital in Tirana. The girl was laying there in a hospital room. It was very hot. It was so hot there maybe over 40 degrees, and the flies were flying around her amputated legs. What's left from the legs just sitting there with all these flies? And we had to interview her. And the girl didn't even understand that she lost two legs. She was so still smiling. She was in a shock of this pain. She was still smiling, and she was talking how she would like to become a surgeon and everything. So when we finished interview, I think I couldn't even finish interview. I just woke up because I just faded away in the in the corridor. It was so shocking for me to see this young girl of 17 with two legs teared away by the landmine. And this kind of stories, you know, make you say. Talking about the about these conflicts, and that a big powers are having these conflicts, but the real, small people, simple people, suffer so terribly much, and nobody will remember about them anymore in few years. That hurts very much about these conflicts that this, these people who live in these environments, who are losing the legs, the hands, the dogs, the cats, also their houses. They have so little to say. They have such a little voices, and many people will never hear about them. So these stories we were trying to bring also to the public to show how simple people are suffering this kind of wars.

Abdullah Najjar 25:46
Good lord, that's, that's, that's rough I was it's, it's so shocking to me that that a young girl like her who now probably is way more mature and maybe has accumulated more life experience might not even, maybe she wouldn't even remember that particular aspect of the story where she may have, you know, when she was smiling and didn't realize it, right? Maybe you know that that, to me, is just like, you never, you never really see these things coming. And maybe that's the shock element, where it's like, oh, even when with military personnel, when they get hurt, it's like, because the adrenaline, they have this sort of adrenaline rush, and they don't really, they're not paying attention, perhaps to a cut or a wound here and there. They only realize this after the fact, after the whole, you know, when the dust settles, that's when they start realizing that, oh, that is actually I hurt myself, or I lost a finger, perhaps, or, you know, I cut myself so, so so bad that I can't really that. Now I'm realizing that how bad it is, but in the moment, at the heat of the moment, you don't really, you don't know. You really don't know, because just the adrenaline is rushing, which maybe that's something you would probably resonate with. Angelika, I don't know.

Angelika Regossi 27:22
Yes, it's very difficult to come back to reality. After these kind of stories, you report, you make another story, you make another story. And when you come back home, sit down with your family and they ask, how is it you don't even know what to say, because so many things you just arrived from another planet, like from another world, and many things you don't even tell to your closest for example, my mother, she not even always knew that I'm going to the war zone I am. Many times I had to lie to her because, you know, I'm the only daughter. And of course, she cared of me much, and she didn't know many times that I go to the war zone. What I had to do is I always told her, No, no, I go to the Where do you go? Well, I go to Turkey. It was, for example, during the war in Georgia. Of course, we fly through Turkey so Istanbul, and then we went to Batumi in Georgia, and then further to the war zone in pulisi. And my mother asked, Where do you go? I said, Well, I go to the conference to Istanbul, and then I and then she prepares for me a nice blouse, a nice costume. And I don't need that, you know? I need to take a recess. I need to take my boots, I need to take my jeans and so on. So I always had to double the wardrobe. So she prepares for me a nice closing for the conference. And I secretly prepare for myself everything, what I need for the war zone. And then I quickly had to change this wardrobe. And then I go. And then when I'm arriving back home, my mother is asking, how was it? I said, Well, it was an interesting conference. She said, You are lying to me. I checked there was no conference there.

Abdullah Najjar 29:13
God, yeah, sometimes one has to strategize. You know, they you gotta, you gotta come up with something. Or,

Angelika Regossi 29:22
for example, I tell you another story, when we had to go to the war in Iraq, my mother, at that time, didn't realize the time going to the war zone, and it can be dangerous. I always thought, yeah, don't worry. We don't go so close, or we just go in the area. We are not going there. And then she said, No, I don't worry. And she asked, how, how are you going to go there? Well, I said, we go to Oman and from Oman, we will go to Iraq. Oh, I know you will have a you will go there on camels with air conditioning, no, no. There will be no camels. So my mother, my mother, she passed away, 50. Years ago, but she did not realize really what dangerous I went through and and how dangerous it is, and I didn't want her to realize I didn't want to hurt to be more extra stressed.

Abdullah Najjar 30:14
No, I totally understand. I mean, you wouldn't want to put someone like her in that position where she's constantly worried. That's one thing that I always try to I ask people who put themselves in such difficult situations, I tend to ask them about how, how, what sort of reaction their loved ones that exhibit when, when they hear about you know situations that that you know you or other folks put themselves into, and oftentimes, like you said, the people that are in that are experiencing these tough situations, they find it a difficult to disclose some of the details. And, you know, for obvious reasons, obviously and B, they probably would choose to omit disclosing the details because they don't want the their loved ones to get hurt or to feel worried. So I think, I think, you know, think you made a rational decision to to avoid sharing the exact details of your journeys or experiences with your mother. God rest her soul. I do want to, I don't want to go back maybe to so with, with Yugoslavia. Would you consider that to be the first war you covered,

Angelika Regossi 31:45
right? That was the first time when I went to the war zone, to the conflict zone. And, yes, that was, that was interesting experience, yes. And then when you get this kind of adrenaline, then it is a little bit different experience than to report just about the conference or some maybe election events being in the war zone is also brings you to the situation when you meet an extraordinary people who you would never Meet in real life or in another kind of journalism. For example, in Iraq, when I went to Iraq, I met Tom Brokaw, and it was very interesting, because we we went to Iraq by bus through Kurdistan, from Istanbul, through Kurdistan to Silopi, which is in the border of Iraq. And we had one stop in one hotel, and a beautiful man, very beautiful man, surrounded by soldiers, by many nice girls entered, and I asked him, excuse me, do you have something to do with journalism? How can we get to Mosul? Well, he said, my name is Tom Brokaw. Yeah, I have something to do with journalism. You know, he was very, very, very famous journalist. Of course, in America, maybe younger generation don't know him, but my generation, of course, know he knows very well. So what I'm saying is that when you are in the war zones, you meet also extraordinary people, people from, well, they pose as if they are a businessman. He comes to establish a new businesses. But of course, it's a people from Secret Service. Because why would you go to establish the business when there is still war going on, right? So very extraordinary people you meet. You mean people you meet people who are posing as if they are from a humanitarian organization, help from Germany. And well, clearly he is from German Secret Service. We had a lot of experience like that, also, also in the war in Iraq, when we got even the car from them. And so this, this interesting stories, which which keeps you going, and which keeps you, of course, wanting to enter these zones, because it is just so extraordinary. The whole situation, how people help each other, how local people help also to journalists, how military protecting the journalist. There were many times when I saw that I'm almost kidnapped or they wanted to keep them me. Or when you are reporting because you don't see nothing around you. When you have a live broadcast, you just want to talk. You know, you just want to make your appetite and you don't notice that somebody wants to stop and push you into the car to kidnap and then there are another group is protecting you. That's all things people tell you afterwards in Iraq, we were walking on the street. I was reporting an American tank stopped with American soldier, and. Was watching me, reporting, protecting me, that nobody shoots at me when I'm standing there on the street in the middle of the conflict. These kind of things, this, this support from each other with this, this understanding from each other. It is so special. It is so extraordinary, that you will never get it outside of the war. I think,

Abdullah Najjar 35:22
oh my gosh, oh my gosh. And you spoke of Iraq, and I think, you know, there's an element of the of camaraderie that you you probably, you know, it's a good example the war in Iraq, because, you know, you've got, you've had American military personnel, obviously. And you know, they through a lot of the the chaos and and and the the intensity of the war, a level of of of, I guess, camaraderie or a bond, a deep bond forms, right? And I think you might have, as you alluded to, you might have experienced that, not just in Iraq, but in other places where you had to, where you know you covered a conflict or a war, and it's a crazy experience that you perhaps bond over with your fellow journalists or fellow friends in those situations. And since we're on the subject of Iraq, I think it would be interesting to maybe share, share with me in the audience, how, how your involvement in covering that war started. I reckon it might be. It could be your first experience in that part of the Middle East, right? And if, if it is your first, maybe you can tell us what that was like before we delve into the covering of the war and being in Iraq during, during or post the invasion.

Angelika Regossi 36:55
All right, you are right. That was my first time in the Middle East as a correspondent, as a war correspondent, of course, I was in the Middle East before, as a tourist in different places, but in the middle of the war, in the middle of the conflict, and this kind of conflict, military conflict, I was for the first time. At that time, I already worked as a full time I worked already as a as a BBC correspondent. I made many, many reports already at that time for BBC, for Radio France International. So also worked as a producer for different stations, including deutscheville, Voice of America and others. And when the war broke in Iraq, we already know that we will go there, because to be honest with you, there were many, many interesting news in Central and East Europe before that time, but when in 2001 there were terrorist attacks in America, we understood that the news will shift, that the news will be not anymore in central in East Europe, how we are going through the process from Communism to come to capitalism and so on, that the interests will shift, and the news will shift to Middle East, to that area after 2001 and we were absolutely right, the news started to fade away. In Central and East Europe, there were less and less interesting events. There were, of course, some events, but less less powerful, less interesting. And when the war broke in Iraq, we immediately knew that we will go there, because that is a place to be that is extremely interesting conflict to cover, and it is, of course, a very big privilege to be there to report to the world about what's happening there. It was in March when we decided to go exactly when the war started. It was we fly from burpees to Amman. And in Amman, we had to sit for several days because we couldn't find the convoy who can bring us to Baghdad. To Baghdad, it was very difficult to find how to go to Iraq, because, you know, the the coalition, military coalition, started already, the war, the airplane routes were closed. You can only go there by road, and we didn't know which part of Iraq is better to enter or to the north, through the north to go to Mosul, where there were many battles, or we tried to Baghdad. So we decided to go to the north, and we started to cover the war there, from the north of Iraq. And then later, a few months later, we decided we were we were covering it for some time, for. Few weeks or so. And then we went back to Europe to, let's say, to a little bit calm down, to change their closing, as we used to say. And then we went back to Baghdad, already in August, also from Amman. We had a special trip by car when we saw that we are kidnapped, but we were not. So it was a very exciting time to cover. We covered not only the events of the war. We also covered, I also covered about the Christian minorities of Armenians in Baghdad, about baptizing of the girl, about the Asian language of Aramaic, or Aramaic in that area, that is the language of Jesus Christ. They say we covered, I covered different stories also how the museums of Baghdad were robbed, and how customs in Baghdad, they thought, in Iraq, they saw that I also have a picture from that museum, because I bought one picture from to support one Christian painter. And then they saw that it is from looted time. So these kind of stories covered, and of course, you you cover the explosions, how many people died, and animals also animals. It is very rare who covers the situation of animals in the war, but because I'm a cat lover, I love the cats, and I always see them, and these little cats and these little animals, they also suffer so terrible much in the war, you know, we covered that stories also,

Abdullah Najjar 41:45
wow. I mean, I mean, this is another interesting element that you brought to the discussion, the the cost, the cost of war, not just on, not just a human toll, right? And the the numbers that you know, the the lives that turn into numbers, but also the the you know, land, right? I mean the damage land that's being damaged, infrastructure and now this interesting element of animals, because I never, you know, when we think about war, that's one thing that doesn't usually pop up on on the list of, you know, damaged, damaged elements of the war, or consequences of the war, which is, you know, the the The animal, the animal cost, where a lot of these maybe, you know, you have, especially maybe in Iraq, you do find a lot of cats stranded. I mean, I know in Libya, that's one thing you you find a lot, lot a lot of cats. You know, in Turkey Istanbul, you find dogs everywhere, almost everywhere. But that's maybe something I never, I never really talked to anybody about this. And I think you bring it up here into discussion. I think it's really interesting. So do you? Do you recall one of the stories you covered about how maybe the the the pets or the animals were damaged by the war, and were you, were you perhaps able to maybe save one or two, or was that not possible in such a such a dire situation in Iraq?

Angelika Regossi 43:29
Yes, that is a very good issue, because I want to save them all that, because you are working there, and you cannot take them with you, and you cannot take them for one or two days because it's also responsibility in front of the animal, because animal will start to feel safe, and then you have to put it back on the street. So what I did is I always try to feed them. Of course, you always have an extra hour with sandwich or something, and you just give that to that little animal. And when I was interviewing, for example, a shop owner or cafe owner, I always ask, can you please take this little cat in your restaurant? I give you money for it. And so then they always, they always, accommodate a little cat. You leave a little bit money for a food and so about unfortunately I was born, I would be not able to take any animal with me from the war zone. And the only thing what you can do is to report about it, because then maybe some organizations step in and try to help those animals. And you know, animals suffer a lot in the in these conflicts. I know about dogs, of course, and about cats. They are very, very, very much afraid, very much. And cats, for example, I know for sure the cats can get heart attacks during the bull. Bombing, they are so afraid that they are just falling unconscious with their with the heart attacks. Yes, that is true.

Abdullah Najjar 45:07
Wow, wow. No one. I don't think I've ever thought that that was the case, but gosh, this is uh, was that one of your discoveries during that your time in Iraq? Or did you know about that before?

Angelika Regossi 45:20
Yes, yes. I spoke with people, with we spoke with locals. When I was doing the repertoire, once about, also about how animals are suffering the war. The locals were telling us that, yes, the cats can. The cats are just getting the heart attack during the bombing. They are just falling down like a people. They are getting just heart attack, and they are, they are just dying because of the scare, because of the fear of the war. Hmm,

Abdullah Najjar 45:47
that's, that's so sad. I mean, you never really think about these things, because that's what during war. That's when you a lot of your world sort of becomes very, very small. Your priority list is simple, your your your focus is on perhaps staying alive, surviving and maybe helping your loved ones or the ones that are closest to you to get through this. But you bring in a more sort of nuance, I guess, understanding or perspective, where now I can see how that sort of major conflict can cause damage, not just to human beings and infrastructure, but also some of the smallest, some of the things that we don't focus on, whether It be animals or otherwise. And that's really incredible. I That's, yeah, I should, I should pay more attention to that. I didn't think that was an element that. It never crossed my mind, you know,

Angelika Regossi 46:52
right? And I know, because when we were coming, I was carrying the war zone. It's very rare who thinks about the animals. But as I said, I love the care. I love cats, and I see them everywhere. And I definitely was sure to make a few appetites about it, how those little creatures are suffering in the war. And believe me, they are not less afraid than people. They are even more afraid than people, and it is very scary to be bombed. I was when I was in Baghdad. It was in August. 2003 worked in a Christian headquarters there, because the question was, where to go to live in, which hotel? You know, usually journalists from big stations, from big television radio stations. They go to big hotels, big international hotels, or intercontinental if it is there also, but those hotels are very often are targets for the bombing exactly because the military knows that there is a concentration of diplomats, of Secret Service, of journalists and so on and so on. So they target those buildings and me, because I already had experience working in a war zone, I always tried to go to a smaller place, less target, just between somewhere small hotel, maybe even Bed and Breakfast, which is not a target of things, which is not a center of United Nations, troops and people and so on. So in Baghdad, I lived in an Armenian headquarter, in a Christian head headquarter where mainly Armenians live, and it was a small hotel, so we were far away from bombing, but still, and I worked on the roof of the hotel, because I had the satellite theory at that time, because the line was good at that time with that satellite, and I could get a good signal only on the roof of the building. And the roof was flat. It was a flat so I brought my tables there, I brought my chairs there. I had my satellite telephone so I could run there, and I had a very good view, also in the city. But once it started to bomb nearby, in the nearby district, it was so scary. It is so really scary, that I am not surprised that the cats are getting heart attack. Human can easily get heart attack only from the sound of bombing.

Abdullah Najjar 49:17
Yes, yes. No, you're absolutely right. You're absolutely right. I mean that that that is very, very tough position to be, like, in on the roof. Obviously, that's, that's tough as well, because it's like, you're, you're exposed, in a way. But when, when? When, earlier, when you mentioned, you know, before we even started recording, when we were in contact with one another. You mentioned that when you were covering borma or Myanmar, right? You were in the jungles in a way, so you weren't technically exposed. But in that, in this scenario that you're referring to, being on the roof, that might be. Be more exposure than then you probably be more exposed in being sort of underground or embedded somewhere that that where people cannot see you. Would you say that's an accurate assessment? Is there? Am I? Am I painting a clearer picture here, or is, are there still a few missing pieces that I still maybe don't

Angelika Regossi 50:26
Yes, so I think you you give me a new perspective, because actually, I never saw that. I'm more exposed on the roof then I'm more exposed in the environment jungle. But you know what I always many people ask me, Are you not afraid to go there and so on. I always thought that God protects me. It's not my time. When it is my time, I will be gone and nothing can be done. I always thought that maybe I have more things to do still in this life, and God will protect so I so much relied on God that I never thought that I'm going through the very dangerous situations. But once I was very much afraid. Once, once I was very scared. I was really scared. It was when we were finishing, when I finished the work in Baghdad in Iraq, and we took a local taxi, because, again, you try to move in these zones with as less as possible, exposing that you are journalists, that you try to be with locals. You try to do what locals do when locals go to the market to shop, you go with them. You don't go to the first class restaurant somewhere, or to where some classes thing you go just to the market to eat some bread, there some tomato or something like that. And when I traveled in these war zones, we always try to take a local taxi. And you know the danger is when you take a local taxi, because, of course, you can go with the convoy. You can go with the military convoy, if they are, if you are lucky, they take you with you, or with some United Nations with the bulletproof cars. But those are also very much, very much targeted by by the terrorist groups, or by another, another and other groups, military groups. But the danger is, when you take a local taxi, for example, or a local driver, you ask to drive you, you always try to play you always try to play dumb, that you are not so important, that you are not a journalist, that you are just here for, I don't know, for looking for relatives or for something, because those people, they know that you carry a lot of money on yourself. Because you know, when you go to the war zone, usually it is a cash economy, and when you go there for one month, you have to take a lot of money with you, because everything goes up. Gasoline is high, food is expensive. Everything costs money. You have to carry a lot of cash on yourself. And then you have, of course, equipment. You have a satellite telephone, which also expensive, you have laptops, you have recording systems and so on. So you carry a lot of variables on yourself, so you try to play down that you are not so important. And of course, you hide your money. You have to put it in several places on your body, not in one place altogether, a little bit in your shoes, a little bit in your bra, a little bit here, a little bit there. Because if there's still something, you still have something. And yes, this kind of things, you know, people maybe don't talk about it so much, but it is true when, when you, when you prepare for the war, you put the money here, money is there, money all over where you can. And then, and yes, then also, when you go to the war zone, bring a small coupe. Never bring $100 together, because you need to pay 235, dollars here and there. Nobody will give you change there, right? That is another yes, no, yes. Once I was very scared. I told you I was very scared when I came from Baghdad. I hired a taxi with my colleague. We hired a local taxi, and he said that he can bring us from Baghdad to Amman. And that is quite a long trip. That is around 900 kilometers to travel, around 909 hours to go, but the road from Baghdad to Amman is just excellent. They invested their oil money in the road, and you have a huge several lines in one direction and several lines in another direction. Excellent road. And we took this taxi. He didn't speak, no English, and we were sitting behind together with my colleague, because you always have to be together. Um. And the man just just stops in between Baghdad to Oman, somewhere in one village. He just drives away from the road, and he comes in a house, and I see him, no, no, no, not here. We go to Oman. He said, No, you will come here. And he didn't speak any language, any English language. Everything was by signs. And it turned out that he's a Sunni Muslim, that he's on a side of Saddam Hussein, against whom the war actually was there. And and he brings us to his home. And I was so scared. I saw that we are kidnapped. You know, I telephoned my station still I had, still my my satellite telephone still was charged, because it is also problems that you can be discharged. And I call and I say, I'm called studio in BBC, and I say, Listen, I'm traveling from the from Baghdad to Oman, but I'm I think I'm kidnapped. So if I don't come back to the broadcast, because I had to have the broadcast in about half an hour from that time, if I'm not in a broadcast, then I am kidnapped. Everybody was shocked in London, you know, when I made this call, and what happened to us is that this man said, No, I bring you, I bring you here. And he brings us to the village. Everything looks like as if it is not finished. Construction come some ways offenses, some ways the house is not finished, but it is not a bond. It was not the war zone there. There was just the village look like that. And he comes, and he brings us to his home, and a beautiful young woman is coming out, and he shows me to go into the room. So I go into the room because you can't do nothing. No. First I thought that, no, I am not coming out of the car. And my colleague says, No, you have to come out, because otherwise, you know, he has the weapon. I said, No, no, I am staying here. I'm not coming on the car. No, he said, you can just pretend as if everything okay, try to smile. Calm down. I was so stressed, you know, I couldn't come down. I saw me a kid that he said, Just calm down. Just be friendly. Just this. Come out. I said, No, I stay in the car. So finally I get out of the car, I went to that room, and the beautiful woman comes, and there are little chickens in that room, because they keep chickens together where they live. You know, the chickens are walking in the living room and so on. The whole living room was like only one sofa and one table, like a prison, yes, and I am sedan on that, on that. Doha, the door closed, and comes another Arab into the room in a dirty, long, white clothing, and he has a Kalashnikov in his hand, and he put this halashnikov by the door, and he stands there. I tell my colleague, listen, we are kidnapped. It is for sure, we are kidnapped. He said, calm down. I don't want to listen, but he was so nervous. He himself was so nervous, because I knew he's nervous smile, you know, I know how he smiles, but he's nervous, so I'm just, you know, I'm just sitting on my my I'm just starting to realize that I'm kidnapped, that I never go back to Europe, that they just kill us here, and nobody will know what happened to us, because we can't do nothing, you know? And even if they're in a studio in London, they know that I'm kidnapped. So what if they shoot me? They shoot me. That's it, you know, I was really scared, but it turned out, it turned out then somebody came to translate that. It turned out that the man, he was just very tired, and he wanted to see his wife because he didn't see her for some time, because he makes these tours from Baghdad to a month by taxi. He's a driving people, and he wanted to see her, and he wanted just to take her home tea. And they offered us tea also, but I refused to drink it because I thought maybe it is poisoned. But everything was so crazy because I really, I was really scared at that time, but it turned out that the man just wanted to see his young wife, and that's all. And then when he saw her, I don't know, we had to wait that three hours or so. And after it we we were able to go back into the car, and he drove us safely back.

Abdullah Najjar 59:39
That must have been a huge relief, like

Angelika Regossi 59:43
afterwards, and that was a huge relief. And that was for the first time, when I was scared so much. And then after it, I think I was never scared so much. It was also because, I think, because the barrier of the language, you didn't understand what he wants. You didn't understand what is going on. And that is. Also was the factor there playing a negative role, of course. Gosh,

Abdullah Najjar 1:00:04
well, I do want to, I do want to delve into two more things. And I know we, I think we reached it. I think we reached an hour mark. I don't know if you had more time to spare, but if you didn't, I mean, it's totally fine. I do. I have. What do you think? Do you think he can keep going for maybe 1015, more minutes? Is that

Angelika Regossi 1:00:30
Yes? Yes, that we can. We can do I can. Yes,

Abdullah Najjar 1:00:35
yeah, okay, but let me just take a short break and we will be right back. And in the meantime, perhaps our viewers might be interested in checking out some of the earlier episodes of in the East Wing. I think one, one thing we wanted to maybe touch on is the Russia Georgia war. I think it broke out in 2008 and after maybe we touch on that for a little bit, you can, you can tell us more about your your books, especially, I think, the the latest one, a novel titled Love and communism, a young woman's adult story. And I know you published, you have two other books that are considered a series, right? Cooking in politics. And there's another 1000 words series. So that's, you know, that's one thing we can we can talk a little bit about your books, but before we delve into that, we were touching on On Iraq, your experience over there, and just just, just for a little bit of context, especially the ones for the ones listening, the war started in 2003 you, you went there in, I think you mentioned October 2003 Right,

Angelika Regossi 1:02:02
right? Right, yes, yeah.

Abdullah Najjar 1:02:03
And then for Georgia, the Russia, Russia, Georgia, Russia war, that would have been 2008 if I'm not mistaken, right? Yeah. So you were when you finished with Iraq. Was there a stage in between, a time period where you weren't covering war, or did you jump straight from Iraq to Georgia? What was? What was the timeline? No,

Angelika Regossi 1:02:33
because after Iraq, I was in Burma covering the Iranian conflict, Karenni conflict. It was in 2005 so the war in Iraq was in 2003 then in two years I went to to Thailand, Laos and and Burma. We crossed illegally the border to enter jungles. And there we covered this long lasting conflict of Karenni minorities. And then after it, there was a period of calmness. But you know when you come from the war zone and you make many reports, of course I covered as a user, covered all kind of conferences, all kind of elections and meetings and chemical catastrophes and all kind of demonstrations. But everything is, of course, much smaller and much much looks to you, looks, of course, less less exciting, less dangerous, less adrenaline. But of course, you always want to go back to the war zone. You want to cover the news. That is the reason why I was open to go back to the war zone in 2008 when it broke in Georgia, and it is very easy to remember about this war when it started. Basically, it's 8888, of August, 2008 it started. So you can remember it forever, right? And of course, because I was from coming from the Soviet Union, and I spoke Russian. And I'm familiar with Georgia because I was in Georgia several times before as a tourist and as a as a worker, as a working also, and of course, I wanted to come as with conflict,

Abdullah Najjar 1:04:35
when at the time were you? What was, what was your, I guess, what was the mindset like? I mean, there must have been a lot of for you that that must have been a you more more unique than, say, covering maybe Iraq, because maybe you, it feels like it hits close. To home, in a way, if that's an accurate way of describing it, right? I mean, there's, there's a some sort of connection there, you know, from previous your life. I mean, you lived under Soviet Union, and now you see Russia waging war against, you know, Georgia. It must have been a surreal experience for you to sort of, you know, go back to covering something that has to do with with Russia or or, yeah, can you, can you tell us more about that? What was the experience like for you,

Angelika Regossi 1:05:34
right? That was, of course, realistic, a little bit experience. Because, of course, you speak Russian, I speak Russian. My grandmother is Russian. My grandmother is Russian. She's from Siberia, and it is very difficult to put in your mind that Russians can invade somebody, that they can attack somebody, because it's always in front of me is my granny, who is so friendly and so loving. And she always said that Russians are very open, very friendly, very, very nice people. You grew up with that. And then when you have this conflict, and when you can see the Russian military and people suffering from this, from there what they are doing, it is very difficult, of course, to put in your mind. But when the war started in in Georgia, I was went there within just two days or so, we I knew immediately that when the war starts, we will be there. And of course, the main reason is, of course, because I speak Russian, I can perfectly report from there, because for me, there is no language barrier, and it helped a lot. Because, of course, we didn't need translator. You can understand everything. It was very interesting experience, but you already have experiences with this Iraqi war, and especially in the Balkans. So for me, these four in Georgia, it was already less dangerous. You already perfectly well knew how to report and what to do, what not to do. But still, there are many situations when you could expose yourself to danger. And again, you try to cover a human story of the war. You try to cover how women are there, how men are trying to supply their families. And this kind of stories, you know, yeah. And this war. Yes, this war, basically, this was the last war which I covered, because after it. Now, you know, there is a war in Ukraine, and I'm coming from west part of Ukraine, and again, I speak Russian, but this time I decided not to go to the war because my husband did not allow it,

Abdullah Najjar 1:08:02
and so, did you When? When you when? Did you realize that Russia, Georgia, war, was, was, you know, the or No, actually, let me rephrase that question. Did you realize that, at the time when you were covering the Georgia Russian war, did you realize that that was actually, or potentially would be your the last war that you were going to cover?

Angelika Regossi 1:08:32
No, I didn't realize it. No, not at all. There are so many wars going on in the world. There is always somewhere, wars here, sparkling here and there. I didn't realize it, not at all I would be ready to go more to the war. But my situation changed. My family situation changed. I lost tragically. I lost my mother one year after the war. Yes, she died in exactly now will be 15 years in 2009 and she died because fighting with Ukrainian mafia. That is another story which I'm going to write the book about it. She was only 64 she died on my hands five days laying, actually, physically, laying on my hands. I hold her, and she died like that. And those five days, they changed completely my mind. They completely changed my vision of the world and the values of the world. I became, let's say, less ambitious for me became less important to be first to tell the story. For me became more important to have a comfort of the life of the family, and I started to value the life more, because I saw how fragile is alive that. She passed away on my hands, and I literally saw how her soul is going up. It's Believe me or not, it was at four o'clock in the morning when I she hold my hand very strong, and then that hand started to release, and when I opened my my eyes, I saw a spirit of soul coming up. Maybe it is my imagination, but I saw it, and I saw how fragile is alive and you cannot return it back. You cannot she passed away. You cannot say, Okay, let's do it again. You cannot do it. And I realized that how fragile is life, and I am playing with the fire all the time when I'm going to the war zones, that's fine that I can tell the story, I can tell this story, I can tell that story, but life is given only once, and maybe I can do something else with my life and with my experiences at that time, at the death of my mother in 2009 I decided I will not go anymore into the war zones, and I will finish working as a war correspondent. So when the war broke in Ukraine, something was inside me. I started to send proposal, I can go to the working and another side said no, and my husband said, No, you will not go to the war this time.

Abdullah Najjar 1:11:27
Gosh, that's Wow. I think that that is an, I guess, an unconventional closure to your, I guess war correspondence journey, maybe in a way that you didn't expect. And so that's, it's a really interesting way of, sort of saying goodbye to that world, and not, not just to that world, but, you know, it's a sad way to say goodbye to your mom like that. Yeah, I again. I'm really sorry about that loss. I do want to say that there's the title of, I guess your latest novel, love and communism captured my attention when when, when you, when you cover wars. I mean, generally speaking, for all of the wars that you've covered, there's, there's a great deal of sorrow, and there's a great deal of of depression that a person might witness firsthand or experience as a result of being in these conflict zones and and in these dangerous situations. But this title prompted me to maybe ask you just a little bit about, you know, the element of love, and how you may have or may not have witnessed it in these war torn areas, especially here. Your title is a young woman's adult story love. You know, loving communism in these difficult times. You know, it's always a theme is sadness, sorrow and pain. But we seldom focus on on the concept of love and the theme of love. And you know, I think that this could be a window to maybe understanding more about why you chose that title and what you what would you say about love in war in general?

Angelika Regossi 1:13:37
Well, about love in war, war or not war, but the hormones are there. People still want to have love. They want to have sex. Doesn't matter war or not, because it is a human nature. About my novel, love in communism, why I decided to write it. And why i What is it behind it is actually my husband inspired me to write it. He said, You have to write some little story, some little novel about love, something easy, going, something entertainment. And I always said to him, yeah, of course, Sex sells. Well, let's write about that. And and so I was thinking, what, what to do? And he said, Well, why don't you write about about how it was in a communism? And so, because my husband is from the Netherlands, so he knows about communism and the USSR only from what he reads and what I tell him and I started to write, I told him, you know, actually, in a communism, there was no sex. He said, How? How come? No sex? Yeah, I said, because people were not doing it for pleasure. They were just banking. Children, because it will the state needed children. They needed children to build communism, to fight in the war and so on and so on. So sex. There was no sex in the communism. You will never find sex education in the communism. Or the people will never talk about sex. People were talking about making children, and so that was a point for me, why I thought I would choose this title, love and communism. But when I started to write, I came. It took me, the story took me, and I wrote about, about the girl who had to face at her 17 Prison for Women in Soviet Union. It is also not so much covered this topic about prison in women, about her feelings, how she felt, how she experienced, how she was witnessing it and other things. There is also some sex, of course, involved. I wrote this story, this book for adults, and there are some sex scenes, of course, in it, let my imagination go. I refresh my memories and and I wrote about it also, but it's not only about sex. It is about about about women in prison, about pedophilia, about how the Soviet girl lived her life and how she inherited diamonds, and from where these diamonds are coming, and so on. So are many elements of in this book. And I would love if readers will buy my book and read and give me opinion. What do they think about it? Because I would write the continuation of this book, and the title would be love after communism.

Abdullah Najjar 1:17:03
That's an interesting one. I'll be sure to I'll not only attach it in the link to it in final once the episode is published, but I'll also try to mention it in the intro as well post production. And I'd love to check it out as well, and read, read about this, this interesting piece of work that you wrote, but it's not just that one that that you it's not just that book that you wrote. You also had another, another series where it's titled cooking in politics, right? Russian colonial food journey through the dissolved communist empire. Can you? Can you? Can you tell us more about that, what it's what it's about? Yes.

Angelika Regossi 1:17:53
So this was the first book which I wrote, and it is also the first book in the series, cooking and politics. I wrote it. And I was thinking how to do it. Yes, I wrote it because, as I said, My husband is from Netherlands, from Holland. And of course, we are cooking together. We are eating together. And I cooked many things from East Europe, from East Europe kitchen. And he was always amazed, something he liked, something he didn't like. So I always wanted to impress him, and I find out that it is so little known about, about the kitchen of East Europe, here in the west and especially people don't know about many countries of ex USSR, like Kyrgyzstan or Tajikistan or Turkmenistan. Young generation know so little about it, so I thought I will write the book. And first I thought I write the cookbook with the stories, but then I thought, I will make it differently. I wrote 15 stories, which is a big story, yeah, about the colonies of Russia. Russia had the colonies. And I never thought about it that Russia had the colonies. It was once I was invited for a very exclusive lunch in Intercontinental Hotel in Budapest, together with the Habsburg you know, he was from a Habsburg Empire family, Austin Hungarian empire, a Habsburg family. They were emperors, and it is an ancestor of that emperors. So he was together with me in the same table. We had a lunch. It was a big conference, and we were launching together, and we had a conversation. And he told we were talking about Austro Hungarian empire and other empires. How did they had to colonize their colonies? How did they had to travel far away, like Netherlands, to travel? To Indonesia to colonize it, and so on. And he said, Yeah, but Russia, Russia didn't have to travel nowhere. They just colonized their neighbors. I said, what? I never thought about it. I never thought it from this point of view, that Russia colonized their neighbors, and that's how they became empire. But that is true. When you look around around Russia, all neighbors were colonies. They colonized all their neighbors. And I said, Listen, why don't I write the book Russian colonial food? And I read the stories about these countries which were ex colonies of Russia, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan, Georgia and other and then I bring the authentic recipes, the recipes which are disappearing now from those countries, because now with the globalization of the food and food industry, globalization everywhere, we eat the same everywhere, pizza everywhere, swarma everywhere, the same. But those national dishes, they are disappearing. And I collected all these dishes with a simple ingredients, simple to cook. The children can cook from this book. Teenagers can cook from this book. Adults can cook from this book. And my stories, which I wrote also for young adults and for children. For example, Russia I'm covering, I'm talking about Jews and nicknames of these communist leaders. They all had nicknames because they're all coming from the prisons. They had a prison backgrounds, and in prison, it is called to heaven nicknames, or about Georgia, where the Soviet mafia started, the Soviet mafia, which turned into Russian mafia, well known now, yeah, and other story, other other countries. So I made this combination of stories with recipes, and I started the city. Now I'm working on the second book in this series, and I hope it will be in spring, published already, and all together, I planned five books in this theory. Wow,

Abdullah Najjar 1:22:12
that's incredible. It's an interesting story. I I'm so glad you highlighted it, because I would have never guessed that this is where I never would have guessed the background of, you know, of the book and how it came about, or how it turned out the way it did. And in addition to that, I think you had 1000 words, 1000 words series. I think that's a translation from the original right? Because I think you wrote it. Did you write in a different language? Yes,

Angelika Regossi 1:22:45
because I myself speak five languages, and a little bit more than five, because I also speak several Slavic languages. And I speak these languages not because I am so talented, or because I'm just having this I put a lot of work to learn that languages, a lot, a lot of including English, including Hungarian, including Dutch. All was a hard work to learn the language. And I always started to learn the language a bit creatively. Yes, when I am learning the language, when I'm learning the words, I tried to associate them with something, yeah, so that that that the words associated in my mind with something, and the easiest way was to associate it with your mother tongue. I have noticed that many Russian words are used in Dutch, in Russian and in Hungarian language. And the easiest way when you think, Oh, this is like in Russian, this is like in your mother, so immediately remember those words. And the second point was that I read somewhere that linguists believe yes, before I read that, I wrote a story on BBC about gypsies. I covered a lot of gypsies in East Europe from Hungary for BBC, and one of my story was about gypsy language, that gypsy children are not so developed because they speak very primitive language at home, and when they get to school, they don't understand what your teacher is talking about, because they use very primitive like chair, table, this, this, and not more. And when teacher tells them something more specific, they can't understand. What is it? They cannot follow the teacher's order. And I explained in my stories that it is because the Gypsy language, and one of the Gypsy language, because they have several have only 500 words. When I wrote this story, I get so many negative, negative results from readers. How come? How can I say that the Gypsy language has only 500 words? It's much more rich and so. And so on. So this 500 words were in my mind. And then I read that linguists believe that when you know 1000 words in a foreign language, they think that you can understand 75% of the conversation. So basically you can understand what is it about? I said, Well, that's great idea. So because I learned myself these languages, and I learned it so hard and I always had to associate it, let me make a book about 1000 words, the same words in English as in Russian. But first I wanted to make Hungarian Russian, because Russia is making a lot of projects in Hungary now, including nuclear power station and many other projects. And Hungarian language is extremely difficult. It's so difficult to learn because it's so special. So I said, let me help these people. Let me just make this book. And so I wrote this book, Hungarian in Hungarian as in Russian, and then I wrote this in English as in Russian, and in Dutch as in Russian. And I call this silly, my 1000 words. So when you learn 1000 words in that language, then you understand 75% of the conversation, according to The Linguist. So let's check,

Abdullah Najjar 1:26:17
gosh. I love it. I Gosh, this is incredible. I'm glad, I'm glad you got to share with us this story on this one as well, because it caught my attention the 1000 words here, as I was like this, I got to ask you about this, and I'm glad I did. So I do want to say Angelika, I truly, I truly enjoyed our conversation together, and I think you have incredible stories. And I'm sure there's, there's a lot more to talk about. And you know, one conversation definitely wouldn't capture the intricacies and all of the the entirety of your journey. But thank you again for joining me, and again, I will make sure that your books are linked in the final product when the episode is out, and they will certainly be mentioned in the intro. So thank you again for joining me.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai