Vitali Vitaliev was an investigative reporter and satirist in Australia. He left the Soviet Union in 1990 after a failed coup in Moscow. He wrote of an evening in 1989 when he bumped into a couple of men sharing drinks and laughter at a hotel lounge. They grew up in the same village outside Moscow where the grandfather of one of them – Leonid Brezhnev – and father of the other – Andrei Sakharov – had dachas. When Sakharov was exiled by Brezhnev, his son was thrown out of the university and ostracized. The only person who offered help was Brezhnev’s grandson. In 1989 their positions had reversed: Brezhnev’s grandson was out of a job because of his grandfather and Sakharov’s son was helping him out.
You cannot predict the power of forgiveness
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