 Today, I am doing the first ever Zoom interview, Fireside Chat. This is a big step, and I'm very honored to begin this interview with two wonderful mental men. The primary guest today is Alexei Grachev from St. Petersburg, Russia, the president of St. Petersburg Leatherman. Assisting us today is Mike Est of Estonia, who is the president of Leatherman Club Estonia. Mike is being very gracious to assist us with Russian and English translation, because my Russian is maybe two words or three words only. So Alexei, I must apologize for that. So I will begin right now. Alexei, please tell me about your early life and your family. Well, my youth was very ordinary for many young people of Soviet times. My childhood was quite ordinary as other young people in Russia. I studied in a special school for children who had problems with hearing. But after finishing this school, I studied in an ordinary school as ordinary children. I was the first one who came to the ordinary school with problem with hearing. So I was the first, that wasn't such kind of children before. If I graduated from the secondary school, I went to the institute, to the higher school. I have two diplomas. I have a certified pharmacist and also a businessman, a business administration. Please tell me a little bit about your life in the communist system. My personal life, well, it was practically a study, but if you talk about personal life, then I, how can I say, was interested, of course, in children, but if he didn't understand what it was. Mostly the study was fulfilling my life at this time, but of course I was interested about guys, but I didn't recognize my interest in this time so well. If I was 15 years old, I chatted with my friends in school and so on, but nothing especially. With time I started to understand about my interest, but of course nobody could know it. It was indeed a secret. He needed to keep a polite position because his stepfather was a vice major of St. Petersburg this time. And therefore he needed to keep such a polite and pristine position and the position of his family too. I have a son who is 25 years old, I know everything about him, he respects me and supports me. But did you feel at age 21 that you must marry a woman? The situation was so that in this time it was common that people must marry and if they don't, then it looked strange and if you like to make a career, you need to have family and children and all kinds of stuff, then you could have a better position in your career. Therefore it was necessary. The society needs is that you are a correct and ordinary member of the society. Yeah. How long were you married? How long were you married? Seven years. Oh, okay. How did you come out as a gay man? I make my coming out this way that I didn't pronounce it loudly but I didn't do it secret too. It's this way. If I got 35 years old then I started more think and busy with gay topics. Before I had three companies, I had a lot of works so I hadn't too much time for my personal life and also I thought that maybe it's not normal to live a gay life this time. So after when I got 35 then I had more time to think about it and to act more likely. This time when I was 35 I started the first gay sites in the internet in Russia where you could have relations and to know each other and therefore it was easier to communicate with gay people in Russia this time. Please tell me more about that site. There was different advertising and a lot of such kind of advertising where guys like to meet immediately and to have sex the first time but I was more interested to know the other person more detailedly understood which person he is, he is a serious man or just some kind of such a person who likes to have one time fuck and that's all. Was it very popular to use this site? Yes, it was probably, if not the only one, but in the early stages of access to the community understand that there is a bar, there is a place and so on, but only in Russia, in Russia, you have to go to the community. It really was the first chance to have a contact in Russia for gay people, because before there wasn't such kind of places. It was the first one and all gay people in Russia could use it. So it was very popular, because there wasn't anything before. It came with the internet. They didn't have such magazines or printed places where you could advertise. So the internet gave a chance to communicate directly to the gay people. How did you learn about homosexuality and about kink? I think it came intuitively. I don't know. I don't know what my inner nature was. I took my own and started looking for the internet. I remember very well that I studied Wikipedia, which means the word gay. I only knew it, but I didn't want to understand what it was. This way I could collect some knowledge about cis topics. So the internet was where I could educate myself on this field. For many of us in North America and Europe also, we are very curious about gay life under communism. Please tell us a little bit about that in the communist days of Russia. How was their gay life? Were there bars or saunas or a cruising area? This is very curious for us. I knew very well that St. Petersburg was a place for such meetings. St. Petersburg has an old gay club in Khabarov, which existed long ago in the Soviet times. There is a place called Pleshka. I don't know how to describe it. It is a place to meet gay people in St. Petersburg. That's why I only know about my gay life. Okay, I'll translate it. I don't anticipate too much this time, but I knew that there are some bars and some places where gay people could meet. Also in the center of St. Petersburg on the main street, there was a place where gay people could meet. Of course, this information was known only in a case circle, not for everybody. But in St. Petersburg, there was already in Soviet times one club, which was well known for gay people and who gay people like to visit and to meet. Officially, of course, it wasn't gay club, but people knew that they could meet other gay guys very often. Of course, there was such a situation that in public saunas you could in a certain time meet gay guys. But it was such unofficially and Alex didn't visit these saunas and these cruising places this time. But yes, there was such places and people who were interested, they could visit them and to meet some other guys in this time. In Soviet times, these gay people, they looked like ordinary people and there wasn't any difference. But of course, if some gays were more differently outfitted or something special, then there could be some, how to say, higher interest or other guys could attack them because they looked like different and act different. But of course, it wasn't so generally but with some certain persons. So there wasn't a big danger for gay people if you act like ordinary straight people. So nobody was interested and nobody didn't care. Russia is depicted as having a negative view about homosexuality. How do you see that in Russia today? Now the situation is different. The fact that the government has found in our country a very negative view about gay people, in addition to the fact that President Yeltsin took away the right to homosexuality from the list, the right to put it back on the table, so that everything would be better. And the fact that the country, which is a very important country in the world, is only complicating everything. Therefore, now that there is movement in Poland, even though the activists are trying to solve this problem, the situation in Russia is going more complicated nowadays because official authorities, they found in gay movement useful enemy who they need to attack to orient people from real problems to such, how to say, moral problems like is a gay movement. And after collapsing of communist system, the first president of Russia, Yeltsin, he took from penal code homosexuality as a crime. But now the authorities, they are talking again that we need to put it back to the penal code. So this way, this gay activist who would like to organize and develop a gay movement in Russia, they are going more deeply under the cover because authorities try to show that it is not common for Russia and not common for traditional values. Do you think authorities will succeed? They are not only men and women, but they are also not acceptable. Of course, the church itself includes it. I think that the authorities nowadays like to fix that the only normal and acceptable relation is between the man and the woman and the other relations are not legal. And if the authorities think that they need to stop and to liquidate such gay movement, of course they can do it. But it's difficult to say because Russia is so large and of course the public opinion is a little bit different in bigger cities and the small towns and countryside. So we need to accept these differences too. How is the current gay life in St. Petersburg? There are three gay clubs working nowadays in St. Petersburg and there is a cruising club which is working in St. Petersburg too. But of course the life is changing and some clubs have openings and some are closing, so the situation is changing all the time. You mentioned a cruising club. Is there a leather bar? The leather bar is very closed in St. Petersburg. The leather bar doesn't show up. It's just for our pleasure. In the cruising club there are mostly vanilla guys. Leather and fetish guys are very closed in St. Petersburg and they didn't show yourself on these clubs in Leather gear. Only these Leather club events there are guys in Leather and they are visiting other places in other clubs. Do you have private Leather parties? He is asking if you organize private Leather parties. Yes, they organize private evenings. How does the community feel about this? Is it popular? Yes, it's popular, but it's not popular. Japanese clubs are not popular. But it's popular, it's popular. People are very careful and therefore this interest is not so big. It is bigger than it was some time ago, but not too much. Because our Leather club is not very large, there are not too many members. So we couldn't rent a whole room. So we need to accept that if we organize our meetings in some club rooms, then there will also be other persons who are not members of our club and who are not into the fetish. They could be of course interested about this, but they are not members of this club. So therefore we don't organize events only for fetish people. How about if you do this in a private home? In general, if we organize meetings in a club or in a place, then we participate in the fetish. There is no such thing as a special event for us and other people. No, they don't organize events on private apartments or such places. They only use such public clubs. If it's a large place and they have some room or corner where they are collecting for this event, then this way. Wow, how many people are part of the club? Fifteen members. Fifteen, five zero. Fifteen. Fifteen. Fifteen. Fifteen. Oh, small. This is a primary activity, but the most active activity is probably seven or eight. There are fifteen members, but the active members who participate in organizing is seven or eight in reality. That's a real situation. This is of course not too much people, but it's a reality of today and a lot of guys who are a little bit interested about leisure and fetish, they are afraid that if other persons could know about their interest, they could have problems at work, always family and so on, and therefore they keep a low profile. How is it seen elsewhere in Russia? It's quite normal. There is a movement in Moscow. There is a movement movement movement. It's clear. Okay. In Moscow, the situation is a little bit better because it's the capital and the biggest center. There are more key clubs and also the movement organizing regular sauna meetings in Moscow. But there are four free cities where the key activists try to organize something, but in smaller places there is nothing because the public opinion is so that it is not legal and not supported. So in smaller places there is no such events and meetings as in bigger places. And also, I forget, the influence has this so-called law against homo-propaganda for minorities which put big pressure to gay activists because it's forbidden to make gay propaganda for minorities in Russia. And therefore if there is something about gay life, the authorities also turning it against gay people that it's not prohibited to talk anything about gay lifestyle and so on. Even if these for adult people, grown-up people, but these authorities say don't that this information could get for children somehow and it's forbidden. So that's a question and a problem. There is a fetish club in Moscow who are interested in latex and they are organizing once a year competition Mr. Rubber Russia and Alex cooperating with them and they have connections. But this is only once a year, so there is no more regular events during the year, but once a year they are organizing this competition Mr. Rubber Russia. Alex thinks that they have organized this competition Mr. Rubber Russia three times, three years. Please tell us about being the president of St. Petersburg Leatherman. Actually there wasn't any election for presidency in this club, they just needed a person who was a leader who could organize and other guys trust and go after him. So he elected himself president. Very good. And the other point was also that the president is somehow public person and so he don't afraid to be looked as a leader of this fetish and Leatherman. That was the other point where he was agreed to take his role and post. What would you do if you could be open about your kink? He told that he is interested in different kinks but he hoped that he could practice them in some private meetings in private places. But he didn't specialized very much what kind of kink he would like to practice himself. I think what is your favorite kink that you like to do? I like to do kink kink myself. I don't know what to say about the value of kink kink. I don't know what to say about the value of kink. I don't know what to say about the value of kink. He likes to dominate and if there are puppies then he can organize and discipline these puppies. Then he is puppy owner in his role. You must come to the international puppy contest here in the United States. He is very interested but he thinks that it will take couple of years and he could arrange it. Of course they are organizing this competition of Mr. Lezer Russia couple of years. But it is also very in the very beginning and if this event will be more developed and so on then probably they can visit more such kind of competitions different fetishes in other countries also in the United States. What kink do you most want to try? It is complicated. If he could meet such real man, real masculine man he don't tell any specific kink he likes to practice. My last question is what is the biggest misconception about you? He thinks that most people don't think he is a gay. Because how we act and how we look it doesn't show any way that he could be a gay. That is the point. Lovely. But Alexey I must say thank you very much for such a lovely interview. Alexey told thank to me that I translated and also to John O'Brien who connected us. Also to you that you are interested about people in Eastern Europe and especially about us. My pleasure. But Mike I must thank you very much as well you were very kind to assist Alexey and me. This was very kind of you and I say thank you very much. You are welcome. You are welcome. I did my best. You did wonderfully.