Do you have a favorite moment of the day? You know, like your morning coffee. Or when you get to work by 9, answer your emails, and at 11:30 finally—with a sense of duty fulfilled!—open social media and spend the rest of the day there? There are two moments in my routine that I absolutely love. Both early in the morning. At 6:00 they wake us up, at 6:10 we do exercises outside, but before that we listen to the national anthem. Picture it: the fenced-off area around the barracks in the prison camp. Snow. Men in black prison uniforms, boots, and fur hats stand in the dark with their hands behind their backs, while over the whole compound, from a loudspeaker mounted on a tall pole, comes: “Glory to our free Fatherland.” Pure delight. My second favorite moment comes very soon after. The last exercise of morning drills. At my suggestion, everyone in my unit now calls it “The Empire Strikes Back.” The loudspeaker on the pole commands: “March in place. Starting position: hands on hips. Ready. Left foot first. One-two-three-four.” And the men in black, with feral expressions, march in place, their boots pounding. At that moment I imagine I’m in a Russian remake of *Star Wars*, where instead of Imperial stormtroopers there are convicts in quilted prison jackets and ushankas (fur hats with earflaps). Cigarettes clamped between their teeth. Instead of laser rifles, iron crowbars. Defending the Emperor’s interests, these space-cons travel from planet to planet, crushing rebellions. But wherever they are, at exactly 6:05 they listen to the anthem, at 6:10 they do their exercises, and at 6:30 they spoon out porridge into their metal bowls and pour sweet tea into their metal mugs. May the Force be with you 😉