It’s an everyday gray evening in Chelyabinsk. A man is going home from a 10-hour shift at a factory. His work is boring and physically hard. The salary is so small that his wife needs to work too, in order to support a family consisting of a wife, husband and a 13 year-old boy.

     When he walks into the small apartment that he lives in, the boy said he wants to talk to him. He sat on the couch and waited for son to begin.

“Father,” begins the son, “do you like your homeland?”

     The question stumbles the father for a second, but he already knows the answer.

“Yes”, he says softly, like there is no other answer than that.

“But look”, the son argues, “your life is boring, your salary is tiny and you have no way to get a higher-paid job?”

     Room went silent for five seconds, but then father’s soft voice starts to tell a story:

“It was 30 years ago. A boy lived in a small house with his parents. When he was 8 years old his father died in a car crash. His mother, heartbroken by this accident, started drinking a lot, trying to forget it. In almost a week she forgot about her responsibilities as a parent, and even started to whip the boy with a stick whenever she got drunk. But the boy, no matter what, did the chores, went to the store and cooked food for both of them. Finally, after a month and a half his teacher noticed marks from whips on his arm, and also his really depressed face. She asked him if everything was ok, and the boy said yes. She knew it wasn’t true.

     When the teacher came to their house with the police, she saw his mother and immediately it was decided that the boy would be sent to an orphanage. Hearing their decision the boy grabbed his mother with all his strength and started crying that they won’t separate them. Finally, the policemen uncoupled them, but the boy’s cries got even louder. He even managed to escape while the policemen were carrying him down the stairs, but he was caught right by the door of his apartment. 

     After a year, the boy got used to his new life, but still the only thing he wished for in his life was to meet his mother again.”

     After that there was another pause. It was longer than the previous one. Finally it was broken by the boy.

“Do you mean that our homeland is like a mother to us?”

Father gave the son a warm smile, then got up from the couch and went to the kitchen, where his wife and his mother were cooking dinner.