I was born in the village of Sergeyevichi in the end of 1960s. At that time the village was in the Soviet Union – now it is in the Republic of Belarus. Space flight was already under way, and my father liked it when my mother put on high-heeled shoes and styled her hair into a “babetta” for village festivals.
My father and elder brother taught me how to work, while my mother and younger brother indulged my penchant for the arts and sciences. At school I was friendly with the history teachers Galina Drozd and Natalia Demidova. On dark winter evenings Galina would often tell me about her sailor nephew’s voyages around the world. When I left school at 16, I went to study at the Admiral Makarov Naval Academy in St. Petersburg (then Leningrad).
I graduated from the Academy with distinction, thanks to Professor Vladlen Adamenko, but I did not spend much time at sea. I met the writers Sergey Kalinin and Catherine Phillips, and began to write myself, with encouragement from the artist Bella Matveyeva.
Valery Katsuba / Artworks
Fotografía / Photography
