Twenty-four intrepid travelers set out in September for Russia and Poland for Leadership Oklahoma’s 5^th International Forum. For ten days we saw sights from the spectacular to the awe inspiring to the humbling. We also learned a lot about these two seldom visited countries and the opportunities which exist for Oklahoma to play a part in their continued growth and success.

We began in Moscow and were immediately impressed with the building boom, the cosmopolitan atmosphere and the elegance of the people. Just coming in from the airport we were exposed to the opulence of the Tsars, the oppression of communism and the “new Russia”. We were to see and learn much of each as our trip progressed.

Our first two days were heavy on exploration and sightseeing, with guided tours of the Kremlin and its environs, including the restored Tsar’s palace. Photographs in this incredibly grand building showed the degradation and abuse of the communists - the current grandeur evidenced the will of the people to recapture their history after Lenin, Stalin and the rest. Standing in Red Square and looking at the wall on which the communist leaders stood for the military parades that we saw regularly on the evening news during Soviet times was particularly eerie. Even more so at night when GUM department store (opposite this wall on Red Square) is lit up like Disney World. Not that the Russians were running away from this part of their history – far from it, particularly as it relates to their amazing struggles during World War II.

From this observer’s point of view, one of the most interesting recurring themes from Moscow and St. Petersburg to Warsaw and Krakow was how much World War II literally changed everything. While our guides and the people we met helped us understand these wonderfully rich cultures stretching back over one thousand years, these same people could not talk about their history for more than a few minutes without focusing on the impact of the War and its aftermath. What were particularly poignant were the stories in each town of how ordinary citizens, faced with impending invasion by Nazi soldiers, took it upon themselves to rush to museums, palaces and other cultural buildings to hide the treasurers, mark their location for future restoration or otherwise try to save their history. I couldn’t help but wonder how Americans would have acted in such situations.

Our second evening we were treated to dinner at the home of Michael and Julia Calvey. Michael is the son of Mary Jane Calvey (Class XVI) who did so much to make our trip to Russia such a success. Thank you Mary Jane! Michael is a hugely successful private equity manager/investor who has been in Russia for almost 15 years (so famous in the investment world over there that a venture capitalist we met at a dinner in St. Petersburg, when I mentioned to him who Mary Jane’s son was, asked me to introduce him “to the mother of Michael Calvey”!). One comment Michael made to me probably sums up what is going on in Russia today. He said, “If I were a young person who had aspirations of success, I cannot imagine a place to go with more opportunity than Russia today.”

This theme was seconded, albeit with some caveats, when we met the next day for several hours with the heads of the American Chamber of Commerce and a former Managing Partner for one of the Big Four accounting firms. While the analogy is not in any way perfect, we were struck by the parallels to Oklahoma: the two large cities are doing very well, the government coffers are full thanks to oil and gas revenues and, with a few exceptions, much of the rural areas are hurting, many severely. In the discussion of what the government is trying to do to help the rural areas, several of our group exposed opportunities for Oklahoma or Oklahoma companies to help. In particular, Russia is very backward in much of its agriculture and the Chamber representatives took down some names and promised follow up to see if what Oklahoma does could meet the needs they have identified. They were very impressed with the broad reach of an organization like Leadership Oklahoma – they could not name an opportunity or need for which we didn’t have a member involved in the same area in Oklahoma. All and all, a very satisfying meeting.

At midnight we boarded an overnight train to our next stop, Peter the Great’s capital of St. Petersburg. The day was spent touring the Tsars’ Winter Palace and the associated Hermitage Museum. Needless to say, we saw what can be done if you have the entire wealth of a country like Russia at your disposal! Again, we were struck by the actions of regular people who acted on their own to save the treasurers of this amazing museum. St. Petersburg (then called Leningrad) was under siege by Hitler for 900 days. It took the efforts of every citizen – soldiers, workers, women and children – to finally stop the Nazi’s at the edge of the city.

That night, dinner was arranged by Alexander Suvorov (Sasha), who has been in Oklahoma many times working with medical researchers in Oklahoma City. We met with business men and women who were members of a leadership group of entrepreneurs who met regularly to help each other with their businesses. This was a very diverse group and we not only learned a lot from them about the trials and tribulations of being an entrepreneur in Russia but made some new friends and even exchanged some business cards for follow up contacts.

The next day was sightseeing in the nearby town of Pushkin. We toured a couple of Tsarist palaces which had been meticulously restored after the War (we even got to see some of the ongoing restoration work – considering the opulence of the Tsars, it was amazing to see the efforts of today’s craftsmen to duplicate that splendor). Going out and coming back into St. Petersburg we passed several memorials to the defenders of the city and saw the bunkers marking the front lines. We could only imagine what they went through during those 900 days.

After touring the Tsar’s fortress across the Neva River, we flew to Warsaw. Thanks to Stephen and Sherrel Jones (Class XVII), we enjoyed the company several times of Ambassador Stanislaw Pawlak and his wife. Ambassador Pawlak has the distinction – among others in a long amd notable diplomatic career – of having been Poland’s ambassador to the Untied Nations both before and after the fall of Communism in 1989. That gave him a unique perspective on Poland’s recent history which he shared with us at our closing dinner in Krakow.

We started our tour the next day in what is called “Old Town”. As the name would imply, it was a beautiful collection of what looked to be hundreds of years’ old churches, government and other buildings and lovely town squares. However, we came to know the chilling truth: During World War II, Warsaw was 85% destroyed (much of it on Hitler’s orders to wipe Warsaw off the map of Europe as the Red Army approached) and much of the remaining parts were lost in the restoration process. But what they have been doing in the 60+ years since the Nazis left is lovingly restoring their heritage buildings exactly as they were! As in Russia, enterprising citizens had saved pictures, blue prints and other documents which have allowed the Poles to duplicate their past – at least as far as buildings are concerned.

What cannot be duplicated or replaced are the people. Over 65% of the citizens of Warsaw were killed during the War. We all know of the stories of the isolation of the Jewish population to the Warsaw ghetto and the ultimate rounding up of most of them and shipping them to the death camps. What is less well known is that in the early years of Warsaw’s occupation it was all Poles who went to the camps: dissidents, intellectuals, political leaders, gypsies and, of course, Jews, were all rounded up and sent to their deaths.

With all of this it is no wonder that it was hard for us to get much history out of our guides except about the War and its aftermath. But in the discussions with our guides and Ambassador Pawlak, it became hard to tell whether the Poles hated the Russians or the Germans more! As Ambassador Pawlak put it, Poland had the misfortune of being located between the hammer and the anvil (Russia on one side and Prussia/Germany on the other, not to mention the Austro-Hungarian empire to the south). In 1793, the last King of Poland abdicated by signing an agreement which partitioned the country between Prussia on the west, Russia on the east and Austria in the south. Warsaw was in the Russian area. From then to the end of World War I there was no Poland. From 1918 to 1939, Poland existed as a free and independent country only to lose that to the Germans and the Russians pursuant to the patrician agreed between Hitler and Stalin. Ironically, after Hitler attacked Russia, it was the Red Army which liberated Poland, only to have it become a vassal state to the Soviet Union until the Solidarity movement in the 1980’s and the ultimate fall of Communism. From this history we finally gleaned that it is in fact the Russians that the Poles hate more!

With this knowledge we were off to Krakow by bus. After touring the Jasna Gora Monastery in Czestochowa, described as the spiritual heart of Poland, we arrived in late afternoon in time for a tour of the imposing castle fortress which dominates the skyline over the beautiful and picturesque town square, the largest market square in Europe. On this tour we learned that Krakow is know for three things: churches (there are literally hundreds in the downtown area alone), students (over 200,000) and legends. As our guide put it, “If we don’t have a legend about something we will make one up”.

The next day, many of us took the bus the 25 miles to the Auschwitz/Birkenau extermination camp complex. There really are not words to describe the experience. We have all seen documentaries about the camps but the reality is still chilling (an inadequate word as well). The scale is unfathomable (1.1 -1.5 million killed); the torture unimaginable (Dr. Mengele was here); the inhumanity unspeakable. The Nazis, in inhuman efficiency, saved and used everything from those who were killed. We passed rooms full of shoes, rooms full of suitcases, rooms full of jewelry, rooms full of brushes (even tooth brushes), and, most gruesome, rooms full of human hair cut from victims and sold to German textile companies for weaving into cloth. It was a very quiet bus ride back to Krakow.

That night we had our final dinner together and got a wonderful history lesson and future view from Ambassador Pawlak. It is from this that it became clear that it is the Russians they hate most! But Poland needs their oil and gas, so they must entreat with the Russians. They are still the prisoners of their geography. Thank you Stephen and Sherrel for getting the Ambassador and Mrs. Pawlak to join us! There presence and their insights added greatly to our understanding of the Polish people and their future.

The next morning we left our hotel at 4:00 a.m. to begin the long journey home. Several of us were heading to different locations, so good-byes were said at the airport and all ultimately made it back to the good old USA. A truly memorable trip with a great group of old and new friends. Thank you Leadership Oklahoma and all members whose networks made possible the extraordinary opportunities to meet with people who gave us the insights which made the trip unique and beyond what we could have gotten on our own. That is the amazing thing about these International Forums – we see and meet people who would otherwise be unavailable and, through them, we learn the reality of the countries we visit and also generate opportunities for future interaction.