It’s done. I’m a Sputnik now! I’ve just got my first shot of the Russin vaccine at a mobile vaccination station in Central Moscow. In there weeks I will get the second one. Now feeling a bit lightheaded, but that may be a psychological reaction. How was it and why I did it? /2

The station is located on the second floor of a big food court in a former trolleybus depot on Lesnaya Street near the Belorussian Railway Station. The for court itself was packed with people. Almost none wearing a mask. A paradise for each virus. The vaccination was very.../3

…well organised. Very nice and polite people, explaining everything. Smooth workflow. All in all I needed about an hour. Coming without any advanced reservation, I had to fill out some forms, see a doctor and get the shot. My foreign passport didn’t raise any questions./4

The vaccination was for free. This is one of six such mobile station in Central Moscow, which began to work at the beginning of this week. Why did I take the Russian vaccine? First: I have no other choice, if I don’t want to go to Germany and wait there for probably a long…/5

…time, may be until summer. Second: I saw some friends and colleagues getting vaccinated and all went without any complications. Third: Some of my friend here are doctors. They all got the vaccine, assuring me that it is at least save. Whether it will help as much as the…/6

Navalny’s return, his arrest and the protest. A first quick thread
1. Navalny in Germany had rot make a difficult choice: to stay in exile and become insignificant or to return to stay significant (and may be even rise more), but under risk for his freedom and life. /2

2. I can’t imaging that Navalny and his team thought that his return and even his arrest might provoke a „revolutionary situation“ in Russia like we’ve seen in Ukraine earlier or Belarus now. he’s a too experienced politician for such a misjudgment. He’s playing the long game./3

3. He had to wage his wishes and the risk. His preferred the possibility of a rather long imprisonment to the perspective of insignificance in evil. He’s more than 20 y. younger than Putin. The next medium-term goal will be „smart voting“ in the Duma elections next September. /4

4. Nobody can with certainty predict the tipping point of political developments. No revolutionary moment was ever predicted.Lenin did not know that he will succeed, when he returned to Russia in 1917. What he knew was that there is a crises. There is a multiple crisis in…/5

…Russia now, too. No really worrying for Putin. But worrying enough to be afraid of an upcoming challenger to try to not let become him too strong. So far Putin’s strategy was to use only as much force as needed. This is a strategy that demand first certain skills…/6