In 1991, the Soviet Union had just broken up when I became Chairman of Sovaminco in Russia. Sovaminco’s American partner was the seventh American company to ever enter into a joint venture in the Soviet Union and its primary business was in publishing, printing, and distribution of foreign press. It had the exclusive rights to the International Herald Tribune, USA Today, News Week, and about two hundred other periodicals. Sovaminco had well-located offices next to the Conservatory and very near the Kremlin with about forty staff members.
I always knew that my General Director was an ex-colonel in the KGB and that’s probably one of the reasons why we never had any problems with business. His Deputy had also been in the KGB in Denmark, and then there was Yuri who had been part of the KGB in Ethiopia. So, it was quite an eclectic team.
Sovaminco had a lady called Claudia who used to make lunch for all of the employees in a little office kitchen. One afternoon, when I went to the loo, which was just beyond Claudia’s kitchen, I was walking back to my office when I saw that she was still busying around the kitchen. This was unusual because it was well past 2 pm, by which point she was normally long gone.
I said, “What’s going on Claudia, why are you still working?”
She replied, “Big dinner tonight, big, big dinner with lots of food,” and left it at that.
I went to Alexi, the General Director, and asked, “What’s going on? Claudia said there’s some big dinner in our offices this evening?”
“Oh yeah, we’re having a KGB reunion tonight – just four of us.” I knew there were three ex-KGB in my staff but had no idea about the other one. He then asked what Josie and I were doing that evening and I told him we would probably be at home watching BBC or CNN, to which he invited us to join them. I thought this sounded like a great opportunity and accepted the invitation.
Josie and I walked into the kitchen area that evening and saw all these guys sitting around the table. We took a seat and Alexi said in a serious tone, “We’ve just had a meeting before you came in and we’ve unanimously decided that we need to make you and Josie honorary members of the KGB if you are going to join us for dinner and drinks this evening.” Wow – that was a surprise, but Josie and I looked at each other and thought, why not? They put on some sort of symbolic ceremony and we were passed into their ‘trust’. Let me be clear, this was all a bit of fun. They had all been out of the KGB for so long that they were considered to be what is known as ‘empty’ – meaning they didn’t have any secrets that would be compromising to the state. Or at least that’s what they told me. The evening went on for a very long time with lots of vodka consumed, with many toasts – something I’d become quite accustomed to but I’ve learned to never try and outdrink a Russian with vodka.
And that’s the tale of when I had dinner with the KGB.
