This may seem like a regular blog post but it is not. You can think of it as my resume, my job application that I submit to all of you at once although you never asked me to do so. It is also a confession filled with self-pity, depression and just about nine different types of hopelessness. Knowing this, you are now free to stop reading. Close the tab and move on to something more important or funny.

Well, I am glad you still here. Promise to keep it brief. Every day, as I close my eyes lying in bed at night, things that happened over past six months hunt me. I try to stop thinking and sleep but can’t. Not a biggest problem on Earth but turns out it can be bad enough if persistent.

First I think of the Ukraine and things that happened there since November last year. Think of all the blood and gunshots, and deathes, and people fighting riot police at the barricades. I have never been in the Ukraine but working in a Moscow-based newsroom I had no chance of not seeing all the photos and video footage. Screams, chanting, singing the national anthem, screams again.

Some of my colleagues spent weeks in Kiev covering Maidan. The rest of us spent weeks sifting facts from rumors, trying to let Russian people know what really goes on with the Ukrainian revolution. In Russia, where almost every media is a state-controlled propaganda tool, this was hard but fun thing to do.

Next I think of how it all ended. We were half way throught the regular day when our editor-in-chief told us that after being around for more than ten years she has been fired by the owner and replaced with a new, Kremlin-friendly one. As owner has put it, our special reporter in Kiev, responsible for covering the Ukrainian uprising, had to quit too.

Words failed us. Chaos followed. Starting that day there won’t be independent Lenta.ru (the news website I worked for) anymore. I singed a letter of protest and soon most of us quit. Being jobless is ok really when the alternative is to work for someone who makes you lie to people. If you are interested it all got a bit of coverage in The New York Times and The New Yorker. So do you job, click the links.

Meanwhile, this finally brings me where I am today. No job, no hope to find one. Every option seems temporary. Every Russian media that still appears independent can be closed or turned pro-Kremlin in a blink of an eye. It happened before. It most certainly will happen again.

As I close my eyes lying in bed at night it becomes pretty obvious to me that I don’t have future here, in Russia. I have tried political protesting and failed. I have tried working hard and do my best no matter what and ended up jobless.

All I’ve got is passion for writing and reporting things, finding stories, speaking to sources, summarizing facts, working endless shifts for the sake of informing people of what is going on in the world. I am used to low pay. I am used to pressure and immune to propaganda of all sorts. I believe free speech is sacred. I believe in freedom and democracy. But everything I value my country rejects.

All these years I tried to fight back. Right now I am sick and tired and all I can think of is that I have a life to live. I want to work. I want to marry my girlfriend and have kids someday. I want to know all of us will be safe and free.

As you probably have noticed reading this blog post, my English is far from perfect. But I assure you I am a fast learner. So if you are a media person looking for a journalist (editor, reporter or whatever) feel free to contact me. If you are not but know someone who works in English-speaking media, let me know too. I am more than willing to relocate and you won’t regret hiring me.

email: anonymous18220 at gmail dot com