Living History by Unknown (the lemonade war series txt) 📗

night before the meeting convened in Denver, Madeleine Albright invited her Russian counterpart, Yevgeny Primakov, to dinner at a local restaurant. She treated him to a regional delicacy called “mountain oysters,” a polite term for deep-fried cow testicles. I assured the spouses that they were not on my menu.

Whenever we traveled abroad, the State Department always gave us fact sheets about the countries we visited, along with helpful protocol hints. Sometimes I was warned about unusual foods I might be served and how I could avoid eating them without insulting my hosts. One veteran Foreign Service officer suggested I should “push the food around” on my plate to simulate consumption, a trick well-known to every five-year-old.

But no diplomatic manual could possibly have prepared me for my dining experiences with Boris Yeltsin.

I like and respect Yeltsin and I consider him a true hero who saved democracy twice in Russia: first when he climbed onto a tank in Red Square in 1991 and spoke out in defiance of the military coup attempt and again in 1993, when a military cabal tried to take over the Russian White House and Yeltsin stood firmly for democracy, aided by strong support from Bill and other world leaders. He is also, in his own way, delightful company.

He has a great heart and can always make me laugh. Of course, he has a reputation for being unpredictable, and as is often apparent, he enjoys a drink or two.

I was usually seated next to Yeltsin at official dinners, with Bill on his other side and Naina next to Bill. He did not speak English, but a simultaneous translator sitting behind us conveyed his words to Bill and me in the same deep, raspy voice and with all of Boris’s inflections. Boris rarely touched his food. As each course was set before us, he’d push it away or ignore it while continuing to tell us stories. Sometimes the food itself became a story.

When the Yeltsins hosted us at the brand-new Russian Embassy in Washington in September 1994, Bill and I were seated with them on a dais before dozens of tables filled with luminaries from Washington society as well as Russian and U.S. officials. Suddenly Yeltsin motioned Bill and me to lean toward him. “Heel-lary” he said. “Beel! Look at those people out there. You know what they are thinking? They all are thinking, ‘How could Boris and Bill be up there and not us?’ “ This was a telling comment. Yeltsin was smarter than some of his adversaries understood, and he was well aware of the whispering campaign from the Kremlin to the State Department that he was not acceptable or polished enough. He also knew that some of the same people disapproved of Bill’s exuberance and looked down upon his Arkansas roots. We smiled and picked up our forks, but Yeltsin kept going. “Hahhh!” he laughed and turned to the President. “I have a treat for you, Bill!”

A whole stuffed piglet was laid out on the table in front of us. With one swipe of his knife, Yeltsin sliced off an ear and handed it to my husband. He cut the other ear for himself, raised it to his mouth and bit off a piece, gesturing for Bill to do the same.

“To us!” he said, holding up the remainder of the ear as though it were a glass of fine champagne.

It’s a good thing Bill Clinton has an iron stomach. His ability to eat anything put in front of him is one of his many political talents. I do not share his intestinal fortitude, and Yeltsin knew it. He loved to tease me, and this was one moment when I was glad that a sow has only two ears.

Years later, toward the end of Yeltsin’s and Bill’s terms in office, we had one final dinner together in the Kremlin. It was held in the domed St. Catherine Hall, one of the loveliest of the ornate dining halls in the old palace. Toward the middle of the meal, Yeltsin said to me in his rumbling, conspiratorial voice, “Heel-lary! I will miss seeing you. I have a picture of you in my office, I look at it every day.” There was a mischievous gleam in his eye.

“Well, thank you, Boris,” I said. “I hope we will still see each other from time to time.”

“Yes, you must come to see me, you must promise to see me.”

“I hope I’ll get to see you, Boris.”

“Good!” he said. “Now, Hillary I have a very special treat for you tonight.”

“What is it?”

“I’m not going to tell you! You must wait until it comes!”

We sat through course after course and toast after toast and finally, just before dessert, a waiter set bowls of hot soup in front of us.

“This is it, Hillary, your special treat!” said Boris, grinning as he sniffed the pungent steam. “Mmm! Delicious!”

“What is it?” I asked as I picked up my spoon. He paused dramatically. “Moose lips!”

Sure enough, floating in the murky broth was my own set of moose lips. The gelatinous shapes looked like rubber bands that had lost their stretch, and I pushed them around the bowl until the waiter took them away. I tasted a lot of unusual food for my country, but I drew the line at moose lips.

The Denver meeting was a success, but building good relations with the Russians was a long-term project that carried over to the NATO summit in Madrid in July. Bill and I traveled to Europe a few days ahead of the conference for a visit to the Mediterranean island of Majorca as guests of King Juan Carlos I and Queen Sofia of Spain. Once there, we met up with Chelsea and Nickie Davison, her best friend from high school, who were traveling together.

I always looked forward to spending time with Juan Carlos and Sofia, who were great company, warm, witty, down-to-earth and always fascinating. In 1993, we met the King and Queen and their son, Felipe, who attended Georgetown