Kazan — summer 2010

One of the conditions of my renting an apartment here was that I would meet with Lena for English lessons regularly. Today our subject was freedom. We talked about freedom as an abstract concept, freedom of speech, freedom of religion, the right to bear arms. We discussed whether perfect freedom was possible, how laws are made to try to provide freedom as much as possible to the majority.

We also discussed what are to me some of the most powerful words from America's founding fathers. They are words that can still raise goose-bumps on my arms when I hear them or read them, and they are of course known to almost every child in the US:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

Мы исходим из той самоочевидной истины, что все люди созданы равными и наделены их Творцом определенными неотчуждаемыми правами, к числу которых относятся жизнь, свобода и стремление к счастью.