On Russian Women, Social Media, and the Quiet Labour of Future-Making.

Leaving the golden hush of KUURORT, we drive north, pine shadows pooling in the dusk as the last of the summer crowd melts into their dachas. The resort is an old imperial relic given a facelift—wide corridors, a whiff of disinfectant, and rooms with windows that catch the last violet line of the sea. Check-in is routine, at least until the clerk hands me and Sandi one keycard, and Karim’s is given for the room next door.

I manage a forced laugh. “Budget measures, or are we building…team spirit?”

Sandi shrugs, the corner of her mouth tucked in—a smile that means nothing and everything. “I’ll try not to snore.”

The room is broad but spare. Twin beds, a desk, a battered nightstand lamp, and a closet with hangers that squeak in protest. Sandi claims the side by the window and sits, long-limbed and watchful as I shake sand from my boot and peel off my blouse, grateful for the dusk. After a quick shower, I dig in my bag for a clean slip and bra, the kind of practical black lace you wear hoping no one will see, and catch her gaze lingering when she thinks I’m not looking.

I turn slightly—too fast. My elbow clips the lamp, sending it spinning. The crash is sharp, the kind that shrinks hotel silence down to a pinprick.

“Shit,” I hiss, bent over with one leg half through my slip.

The door bursts open. Karim, every line of duty and panic—eyes wide, chest heaving, making a perimeter scan before realising the only threat is my stubborn backside.

“I heard a noise—are you—”

He stops dead. In the mirror, I catch the tableau: me, naked and bent over, cursing at a lampshade; Sandi, eyes fixed and unreadable, sitting on her hands at the edge of her mattress.

A beat passes—one, two, three heartbeats.

Karim’s next exhale is less relief, more a sound pulled out by confusion and awkward longing.

I straighten, modesty forgotten. “Not every emergency requires backup, Karim.” I try for wry, but the laugh catches in my throat as Sandi keeps her gaze on my bare breasts and not my face.

For a moment, I’m aware of every thread connecting the three of us—the history, the hunger, and now this new, tight coil of unsaid things.

“I’ll knock next time,” Karim mutters, retreating. Sandi doesn’t blink. “You have nothing to be ashamed of, Elena,” she offers, and I’m unsure if it’s reassurance or inventory.

I pull up my slip, heart thumping. Narva-Jõesuu was once a playground for Tsarist intrigue; tonight the echoes feel dangerously close.

---

“I meant what I said,” Sandi murmurs once I’ve righted the lamp and pulled on a cardigan. “You carry yourself like someone used to being watched. That’s not the same as being seen.”

I risk a sidelong glance. “And you? Cultivating invisibility, or just remarkably good at choosing when to appear?”

“Maybe both.” The look she gives me makes my skin prickle—half appraisal, half warning. “But some things are easier to see up close.”

Time slides past—an hour, then two—filled with the small sounds of inhabiting a room: the hiss of the shower, the rustle of clothes, our phones glowing and dimming. We move around each other, orbiting in a wordless truce, every glance edged with things unsaid.

A muffled rap at the adjoining wall cuts through the tension. Karim: The moon is up, our contact has texted—time to move.

I button my jeans, slip my passport into a pocket, and check the small package of hard-won notes and encrypted contacts. Sandi stands, businesslike now, but when she thinks I won’t see, her gaze skims my hips with something too sharp to ignore.

The corridor is cold, thick with the scent of Soviet disinfectant. Karim waits by the exit, his bodyguard façade extra stiff, trying not to catch my eye. Three exiles from a Chekhov play, hearts tripping over loyalties old and new.

We slip into the night. The cinder path snakes through dunes, then down through trees to the riverbank locals call “the smugglers’ garden.” Our contact—a woman in a shapeless parka—huddles beside a battered rowboat. The Narva River flows between worlds, city lights from Ivangorod pricking the Russian side like scattered gems.

It is a vast, indifferent divide between worlds, carrying the sharp mineral chill of northern currents, layered with damp pine from the forested banks, the earthy tang of moss and old stones, and the quiet breath of wetlands further upstream. Each inhalation brings a blend of cool metal, peat, and the faint brackish promise of places untouched by tourists. On the opposite bank, Ivangorod’s city lights glitter, brittle as scattered gems.

Karim checks the perimeter, signalling with his chin. We crouch low, and I remember the old folk wisdom: Never cross water at night unless the women aboard agree it’s necessary.

Sandi is the first to break the silence, her voice a whisper. “You trust them?” she says, nodding at the oarswoman.

“I trust what necessity creates,” I murmur. “And women, in these parts, are good at surviving what men contrive.”

The boat scrapes low on the shingle, and we climb in, Karim awkward with his long limbs, Sandi shivering as she hunches beside me. The oarswoman rows with hard, practised strokes—no words exchanged but a look that says more than any code.

Halfway across, under the fractured moonlight, Sandi leans in close enough that her breath warms the place behind my ear. “Tonight, you’re not just a bridge-builder, Elena,” she says, her voice mellow, ambiguous. “You’re the one keeping the boat afloat.”

My laugh is soft, uncertain, swept away by the wind. Under the Russian sky, everything feels possible: betrayal, alliance, hope that something can be built in the dark.

As the far shore looms, Karim touches my arm—silent promise and fear. Sandi’s hand lingers at my elbow, and I realise, chilled and alive, that whatever side of the river we’re on, I am seen by both, wanted by both, and for this one night, powerful in ways neither truly understands.

When we brush against the reeds on the Ivangorod side, the woman glances back with a knowing grin. “Welcome to Russia,” she grunts softly. “Now build your bridge.”

I savour the wild uncertainty, already composing the story I’ll need to survive.

We land on the Russian bank, cold river licking at my boots. The oarwoman slips away into shadow, but we’re not alone. Another woman—sturdy, scarf tight enough to hide both hair and secrets—waits just above the reeds, torch held low. She nods and leads us briskly through streets glazed by moonlight, past shuttered dachas and a pale, sleeping park.

The house on the promenade is old but cared for: lace curtains, tea already brewing behind a steaming window. Inside, warmth pulses from a coal stove, and beside it stand Nurgjeta and her sister Ludmila—two retired prostitutes, faces framed in the same stubborn line, eyes sparking with defiance. There’s a hush as we enter; for all the clandestine layers, this gathering feels ancient, like the opening overture of an old tale.

I shake off my coat, boots thunking on the threshold, and accept a chipped mug of black tea. Karim hovers near the door, protective and restless. Sandi circles quietly, not quite blending, still taking measure of every gesture.

I glance around at these women—some city-polished, some with hands calloused by soil, all gathered here not as victims or spectators, but as architects.

I clear my throat. “We’re here,” I begin, “not for charity or for lectures. What I offer you tonight is knowledge—the very strategies, methods, and connections that have lifted women’s networks everywhere I’ve been. These are not just bridges for escape, but tools for influence: so you are giving form to a society after Putin, so you can shape that future with your own hands—rather than have it forced upon you. In return, I ask one thing: help us change the pattern in Narva. Too long, stubborn resistance in Narva only isolates it from those who might help. If we can build trust and cooperation here, it could become a model—a beginning, not just another stronghold of pride and protest.”

My Russian is careful, Dutch-accented, but direct: “Мы здесь не для благотворительности и не для лекций. То, что я предлагаю сегодня, это знание — те же стратегии, методы и связи, которые поддерживали женские сети везде, где я была. Не просто пути для побега, а инструменты для влияния. Чтобы вы могли подготовиться к тому, что случится после Путина, чтобы сами формировали это будущее — не принимали то, что вам навязывают.”

I pause, meeting their eyes. “Взамен я прошу одно: помогите решить проблему в Нарве. Там социальный бунт — но это не конструктивно ни для кого. Упорство, сопротивление… это только изолирует Нарву от тех, кто хочет помочь. Если мы создадим доверие и сотрудничество, это может стать примером — началом чего-то нового, не просто ещё одной крепостью гордости.”

“You see,” I continue in English for Karim and Sandi, then return to Russian, “when women connect across borders — Moscow to Madrid, St. Petersburg to Stockholm — we build something governments cannot break. A network that survives regimes. But this works only when we move past destructive resistance to constructive cooperation.”

I set my tea down, digging into my battered day-pack for the sheaf of pages I’ve carried through every city since I left London. My column—drafted in insomnia, refined by memory, annotated with the hopes and warnings of so many women—slides onto the table between us. I push it toward Nurgjeta, toward Ludmila and the group gathering close.

“These aren’t just my words,” I say, brushing nervousness from my voice. “They’re borrowed from dozens, hundreds of conversations;  woman to woman, from Moscow to Madrid and from Novishika to Nashville and everywhere in between. This is your inheritance as much as mine.”

The headline reads: From Catherine to Kompromat: The Women of Russia Hold the Key.

I share the core argument aloud, translating for Karim and Sandi: “It’s all here—the case for why women, not governments, build the strongest networks. Every crisis, every collapse, has seen women improvise new ways of surviving and helping each other. The piece is full of methods: secure channels, mutual aid, poetry and code, sharing news and practical support, all stitched together below official notice but above oppression. It’s proof you don’t need Western heroes or imported revolutions—just trust between those already fighting to keep their world intact.”

I let them read, let them sit in the power of their own strength, spell back to them. Then, gently, I propose our pact:

“We help you set up this network—quiet, trusted, woman-to-woman, from Narva to St Petersburg and everywhere in between. In return, your connections, insight, and practical support help us stabilise Narva. No Western charity, no outsiders’ lectures; just building on what Russian women have always done best.”

I draw on the poetry, letting the cadence make it real: “Мы строим мосты из силы и мечты“—We build bridges from strength and dreams. “Russia lives in you, and you are her path.”

I meet Nurgjeta’s steady gaze. “This isn’t a Western solution,” I say, shaking my head for emphasis. “It’s yours, born from your mothers and grandmothers who survived much worse than this regime or the social dilemma in Narva. The answers—connections, aid networks, truth spoken in kitchens and over phone wires—are already in your hands.”

Ludmila nods, face illuminated by a flare of hope. Sandi finally softens, the façade slipping just a bit as she listens.

“We help each other across divides—state lines, languages, suspicion. Mutual aid, coded poetry, secure messages, networks built beneath the radar. The problem in Narva can’t be fixed from the outside, but the bridges we build tonight can mean support, food, even honest news for women—here and back there—who refuse to disappear.”

Nurgjeta exchanges a look with her sister—an entire conversation in silence. Nurgjeta nods slowly, a weighty acceptance. “We take your words, Elena. But know—the bridge goes both ways. We lift you and you lift us.”

“This will not be easy,” she finally says, voice steady. “If they notice, there will be consequences.”

I nod, honest. “If you say yes, I will stay as a link. If you say no, I still write—but the bridge is yours to finish.”

Karim, for all his tension, seems to breathe for the first time as the tea circles the room. Sandi’s eyes—so neat, so careful—finally flicker with fundamental uncertainty, and, I think, respect.

I lean in, all pretence dropped: “What do you say, ladies? Ready to build?”

And in that quiet kitchen, against the dark pulling at every window, the future is as fragile and fierce as a single, shared cup of tea.

Author’s Note

This chapter rests not on fantasy but on fieldwork. Its roots are in my original column—written after days in Narva, learning more from conversation and observation than from any theory. If the story sounds tinged with scepticism, it’s because its foundation is lived reality, not literary invention.

Contemporary Russian women possess far more power—social, political, and practical—than outsiders, or even they themselves, readily admit. This agency has deep historical roots, shaped under the pressures of family, state, and survival. But much of that raw power today circles back into the self: flowing into social media, curated status, and networks oriented to personal advancement as much as mutual support. Sometimes the communal web builds safety and trust; sometimes it’s just another gallery of influence and carefully selected truths.

Elena’s proposal in this story is no act of charity. It’s a call to recognise latent strength and to use it—consciously, intentionally—to shape what comes after Putin, not simply to tread water in the present. The knowledge and strategies she offers are part gift, part dare: adapt the old skills, so networks become tools for real influence, not just for show.

But every bargain asks a return. Narva’s resistance—proud, at times self-limiting—must find a new purpose beyond pure opposition. If trust and cooperation can flourish here, it could transform the city from a stubborn, isolated holdout into a model for others. That leap—from personal gain or protest as performance to genuine, collective bridge-building—is the fragile hope at this chapter’s core.

Anthropology teaches that power is almost always contextual, and survival is communal, not individual. Whether what happens next is posted for likes or whispered in kitchens, the story, as always, belongs to the hands that build and sustain the bridge.

May your bridges be well-built and your alliances steady.

I.Ph.