Beyond the Iron curtain...

Readers of my other blog will know that Ants and I are not long back from a medieval tournament in Lithuania. It wasn't til after we arrived that the penny dropped for Anthony that we were standing behind the 'iron curtain' of the 20th century, inside a former Soviet country. It hadn't occurred to me that, other than my travels in Berlin, it was my first time too.

Mikko's experiences of growing up in a first world country, but just a stone's throw from the Soviets, fundamentally shaped his outlook on the world. From Helsinki to St Petersburg is about 200 kilometres as the crow flies, he often said, and Helsinki kids in the'80s knew that if the west bombed Moscow, St Petersburg would be second, and then Helsinki would have about 20 minutes before it became dust and ash. Where Aussie kids had fire drills in school, Finnish kids would practice going into the bomb shelter, but by his teens, Mikko wondered what the point was, because if they ever went in for real, they would eventually emerge to a barren, toxic world that would only kill them slowly.

I lost count of the late night conversations where he'd tell and retell about the letters his class wrote year after year to Mr Reagan and Mr Kruschev, and later Mr Gorbachev, saying 'please don't kill us with your war. We're just kids in Finland, and we want to grow up to be big, and that won't happen if you drop the bomb'.

About the day he and his parents were driving somewhere, and Reagan's immortal soundcheck gaffe brought traffic to a standstill: "My fellow Americans, I'm pleased to tell you today that I've signed legislation that will outlaw Russia forever. We begin bombing in five minutes". Wikipedia says the quote was never broadcast, but Mikko remembers it differently.

And about the sense of hope he says he and his friends felt when Romanians staged their massive non-violence demonstration, banging tin pots for hours on end in the square; and then Lithuania and other countries declared independence, and the Wall in Berlin finally came down, piece by piece. "I was 18 years old and for the first time I thought I might grow to be an old man".

Most sadly of all, I remember how that confidence evaporated in the months after September 11, 2001, as religious fundamentalism rose to take the place that had been held by political fundamentalism the century before.

It was against Western Christian imperialism, as much as any physical invasion, that he marched when he joined hundreds of thousands on Melbourne's streets during 2001 and 2002, to protest the US-led invasions of Afghanistan and later Iraq, both supported by the Howard Government and detested by my favourite leftie.

As our activism grew, he later protested that I'd usurped his ideology. I prefer to think that he inspired me to stand up for the things I had always known were right, even when it meant stepping outside the structures I knew and felt comfortable with. He always respected where I was coming from, while challenging me to constantly evaluate whether where I'd been was still where I was going.

To you, Mikko, I owe my involvement with the Peace Brigades, the National Environment Conference of 2001, the benefit gigs at Trades hall, countless books I read, workshops I ran and speeches I gave. You led me to put my money where my mouth was start my Masters (to say nothing of the late night shop runs you made to bring me caffeine, cigarettes and chocolate!). With you, I left the Liberals, and joined the Greens.

You were my sounding board and debating partner, my bedrock and my inspiration. If there's any way that you can still look in on this world from time to time, I hope that you get a giggle from the ways in which politics and re-enactment have fused themselves together in my world here in Europe: from the Lithuanian experience to the medieval fundraising feast we cooked for the Green Party. I hope it helps you (as it helps me) to know that I've made this stuff my own and continue to carry it forward to new friends and folk I love. And I hope that what you see might make you proud. Because I don't believe you had any idea just how profound an influence you have had on so many people.