In the town of Novgorod-Siverskiy, pensioners are spending their free time playing cards and discussing politics in the backyard of their 5-storage house. Elderly ladies hesitate whether I should make photos of them. Majorly, for two reasons. On one hand, gambling has perceived a sin in the Orthodox religion. On the other hand - it was prohibited in the Soviet era, from which they still have strong memories.

People who got into the picture, basically share the same opinions. But they don't care if I post this story on my social media or even in the international press. The main point for them is that it shouldn't be seen by their neighbors and relatives! Some of them are actually sitting at the same table. 

These people are hostages of that soviet logic that presented society and individual as something separated. Many of them are simply lost in the system of coordinates that they imposed on the state. This scene is a small example of what post-soviet countries faced when they decided to give up these absurd soviet «values».