Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, July 31, 1993 TAG: 9308030331
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By Pat Brown staff writer
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
Helms, proprietor of The Dance Factory, took seven of her dance students and six other adults to the sister city's celebration of its founding 1,090 years ago. They gathered donated medicine, syringes and rubber gloves - nearly two dozen tightly packed boxes of them - and headed for the festivities.
The delegation returned Wednesday from the 10-day trip.
While in Pskov, the young people in the group stayed with Russian families. The adults were guests of the city.
The delegation was royally entertained, Helms said. She and her son, Todd Bryant, became the first Americans to place a wreath on the tomb of the city's unknown World War II soldier.
Helms' dancers performed for the Russians, then she conducted dance classes at one of the city's studios. "They've seen dancing on MYV, so they wanted to try it out," Helms explained.
Attending the city's celebration were delegations from Holland, Finland and Scotland, but Helms noticed that the U.S. delegation was escorted to the front at every event.
"There was enourmous security" at the hotel where the adults stayed, Helms said, because a high Russian official was staying there while he attended the city's birthday party.
"The people were so willing to give us anything they could," she said, recalling that the Russians frequently offered flowers. Helms said the city paid for some of the meals, but host families were responsible for other meals.
"They fed us when they didn't have extra at home," said Krista Mobley, an instructor at The Dance Factory.
"It was very touching," Helms said, recalling that a Pskov man approached whith his son to give the Americans pre-addressed post cards. It turned out he wanted one pen pal for himself anfd another for his son.
Through a translator she learned the father's intent and the rest of his message: "Thank you for helping my son know that all people are brothers," the man told Helms. "We were crying," Dugger said.
The Russians told the delegation that while the Americans were in their homes, they forgot about their economic troubles.
Those troubles included a decision by Russian authorities to nullify older rubles. Helms said she and other Americans scrambled to use as many of the older bills as they could. Among their souvenirs, however, is a fistful of the now-worthless currency.
But what about the uniform and badge?
Dugger, it turns out, is a police officer in Houston, where her duties include patroling and teaching with the Drug Abuse Resistance Education division. She took along DARE T-shirts and passed them out to young Russians. "It was so overwhelming to see those children running around in those shirts," she said. She was surprised to learn that she was the first foreign
officer to visit Pskov's police headquarters. She said the city does have female police officers, but their duties do not include patrolling, and they aren't allowed to carry guns.
"They were in awe," she said, when she showed them a picture of a Houston police car. The Chevrolet Caprice would dwarf the compacts that the Pskov officers use, she said.
On the other hand, she was amazed when the assistant police chief offered her an entire uniform. Not just the hat, which bears the city's brass emblem, the familiar hammer and sickle. Not just the gray and red jacket with gold braiding. But gloves, shirt, flashlight and a badge that convinced a Russian customs agent that she should be allowed to take the whole bundle back to the U.S.A.
"He asked me to make sure he gets a uniform from Houston," she said, adding that she believes her bosses will go along with the idea. Dugger said that whi;le the Russians are years behind in technology, the Pskov Police Department did have one computer, and the head of the city's hospitals had a car phone.
"And their procedures were surprisingly similar to ours," Dugger added.
This was Helms' second trip to the city. It afforded her insight into life in the new Russian nation. A restaurant she had eaten at during the first visit was in shambles this time. She was told it had been bombed by members of the Russian "Mafia" when the owners didn't pay enough protection money.
"I remembered that when I talked to the owner last trip they had said things didn't go well if you didn't pay off the right people," Helms said.
Helms would like to see children among the next delegation of Pskov residents who visit Roanoke, but that would be a costly project. She said she and the rest of the Roanoke delegates had paid for their own flights, but Pskov's citizens simply could not afford airline tickets.
"We'll have to pay for everything," she said.
NBut Mobley was thinking about another aspect of any visits to Roanoke by Pskov residents. "We are going to have to put a whole lot of thought into making them feel the same way they made us feel," she said.
Memo: See microfilm for text.