Norman Cousins by Allen Pietrobon

Author:Allen Pietrobon
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press
Published: 2022-06-15T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER

25

A SOJOURN

with

KHRUSHCHEV

After arriving in Moscow, Cousins was informed that his meeting with Khrushchev would actually take place at the chairman’s dacha in the small resort town of Gagra, in southern Russia, on the shores of the Black Sea. The next morning Cousins would have to follow him the sixteen hundred kilometers, and this time he was not traveling alone. When Cousins had first visited Khrushchev back in December, the Soviet leader had reprimanded him for leaving his children at home. When Cousins answered that he couldn’t bring his daughters because they were in school, Khrushchev said that he should know that his children would learn much more on such a visit than they would by remaining in school.1 Correcting the mistake, this time Cousins brought twenty-one-year-old Andrea and eighteen-year-old Candis along on the trip.

After the two-hour flight from Moscow, they landed at the airport in the nearby city of Sochi, where they were ushered into two black Volgas, the Russian government’s favored vehicle, for the thirty-mile drive to Khrushchev’s private resort. The road from Sochi to Gagra hugged the shore of the Black Sea, climbing and diving through the rugged and verdant hills that dropped down to the water. The cars proceeded cautiously (ultimately making them a half hour late), not only because of the blind curves but because the road was a haven for cyclists.

The vast estate was ensconced behind a painted concrete wall. The car carrying Cousins and his daughters was waved through the gate by a lone guard (Cousins was surprised at how lightly guarded the compound was) and headed up a driveway that wound through a pine forest before finally approaching a large, attractive house beautifully situated on a knoll overlooking the Black Sea. Andrea noticed a heavyset man wearing a green tweed cape and a wide fedora hat standing in the front doorway. It was Khrushchev, whom Andrea described as “dogged, sturdy, and curiously gracious.” Alice Bobrysheva, Cousins’s longtime Russian translator, had traveled with them, and Khrushchev warmly took her hand upon opening the car door, quickly ushering them inside the house, where he said their lunch was getting cold.

Andrea and Candis were directed to sit on Khrushchev’s side of the table, while their father was placed opposite. For five minutes the two men held court over which wine, brandy, and mineral water should be distributed to whom. Andrea asked for a glass of Georgian wine, while Khrushchev urged a glass of brandy on her father. Khrushchev himself served his guests, filling their plates with local fish, smoked salmon, and a type of rare fish that Khrushchev said was his favorite. He persuaded the girls to try the fresh crabmeat and then pointed proudly to a golden cheese pie that he said was made by the locals. Khrushchev joked that had his wife been with them for lunch, she—determined that her husband should lose weight—would have attempted to keep him from eating and drinking so much.

From left, Alice Bobrysheva (Russian translator), Candis, and Nikita Khrushchev.

(PHOTO

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