Not a fabulous Bali: why the Russian model Masha spent two years in an Indonesian prison

About where she worked on the island

I worked in nightclubs, several at once. The system is like that. I am a model, I have worked with modeling agencies.

You just come to the club, work out a certain amount of time - you just dance, talk to people and go home. You get paid for it.

Some clubs have such a system. In other clubs you have to become a member of a promo group and bring as many people as possible. Accordingly, you also receive a certain percentage for this.

The more clubs you have, the more you earn.

I received a little, about a thousand dollars, if this is the maximum.

What went wrong and how the detention happened

It all went wrong due to acquaintances and an excessive love of parties. Since you work in clubs, they constantly approach you and ask something, not only about alcohol, but also about something more serious. Well, you know what I mean.

Almost everyone is using something there. Either some pills, or something to smoke ...

And even if I didn't use it myself, I knew how to get it.

There was no problem with that - how to go out and buy a pack of cigarettes.

And then I became friends, so to speak, with people who were associated with the Balinese mafia.

There is a serious mafia in Bali, which is covered by the police.

They set people up. Someone they just planted drugs at home. The police came and found them.

Such things were done only with Russians or with people of Slavic appearance.

And they did not touch other foreigners, since, for example, the Spaniards, the British, these issues were very quickly resolved through the consulates. There was some kind of fine and they were released.

The Russians have no protection there. Nobody works with us. And if the case is related to drugs - everything, it means that you are to blame, these are your problems and no one will help you.

The fines are huge - from 50 thousand dollars and more. For one gram, for one person. Further - higher.

A friend of mine with this mafia had a conflict over a poker club, which now belongs to this mafia.

There are three of them. They are engaged in the organization of gambling. One of them used to sell drugs. He, like such a dark horse, was engaged in the importation of these substances, and other guys come with the police, allegedly they are police officers in Indonesia. And they immediately begin to work with you psychologically - you will immediately have a life sentence, or ten years.

At first, there is no question of ransom at all, since the task first is to intimidate you. They bring you to the police station, put you in a monkey house, take your phone and you sit there for two days, thinking about everything.

And only then they summon you for interrogation, begin to communicate with you, with your relatives, and begin to intimidate them.

A close friend of my boyfriend asked me to bring him one packet to the party, I said that I would not do it, I would give a phone number and you would do everything yourself. "No, you'd better do it, we are friends, I have business ..." - he said. In general, he worked with me psychologically.

He asked to buy one gram of cocaine, he never used it, but I did not attach any importance to this. I took money from him, while he did not look me in the eyes, I bought it, hid the bag in my underwear, on myself.

And in the evening, when I arrived at his villa, I was immediately grabbed by two people, took away my phone. At first, I thought that they were going to rape me, they didn’t look like policemen, but looked more like taxi drivers.

And then Artyom came out, who works with the mafia, he is allegedly an Interpol employee, and he said, well, they’ve already been detained here, you’d better give everything in an amicable way, we still know everything. After I was told to take off my shoes, I realized that they would be looking everywhere and immediately pulled out the bag and gave it to them. They had a doctor in the villa, and later they took me to the toilet. Search further. Of course, nothing else was found.

I felt fear and shame. It was May 20, 2019.

In the early days, when I was interrogated in the monkey house, the sum of $ 30,000 was announced to me.

I asked my mother not to tell me about this, I thought I would be able to quickly sort it all out. But no one, of course, helped, it was impossible.

Mom found out about this on June 2 and was immediately taken to the hospital.

There they respect the girls, they never touch them, there was no violence. But men, I heard, are sometimes beaten, they are not given food.

Prison conditions

It was the largest prison in Bali. There were two thousand people in the men's block. They have a tennis court, a swimming pool, a tattoo parlor, and the prisoners themselves work there.

There are 250 people in the women's block.

From 6 a.m. to 4 p.m. you can walk around the territory. At four o'clock in the afternoon we were locked up in cells. There are about 16 cameras there. Each has 7 to 20 people.

There were twenty people in my cell. All are on the concrete floor, on mattresses, these are such black sports mats, mats that you can buy or inherit from those who leave.

The first year I slept without a mattress. There was no money to buy and no one came out. They gave me the pillow, and a friend brought the blanket.

The cell had two windows with bars. Toilets are corners with walls and a door. You are not visible at the same time. The shower was a large vat, you wash yourself with a ladle. The water in the vat was heated right on the street, there was a terrible heat.

I was assigned to an international chamber. There was a Spanish woman Laura, a woman from Kenya and an American, daughter of a famous composer, who killed her mother - who had previously killed her husband, that is, the father of this woman. The cellmate was given ten years for this, and her boyfriend was given 18 years. Killed for an inheritance of 11 million dollars, she was then 18 years old and she was pregnant, and her boyfriend was 19 years old; this story is very popular there. They are waiting for her in Chicago, they want to give money for an interview.

About hazing in the women's cell

Laura and I constantly fought with everyone. We were foreigners and we didn't know the local order.

And there were a lot of strange things. For example, you could not eat with your left hand, you could not blow your nose while others were eating. And the food is very spicy, constantly runny nose because of this, snot, you grab a napkin.

And at that moment, other girls could fart, sorry, and that was normal. Nobody told them anything.

And we were constantly receiving comments. If you are not Indonesian, they constantly put a spoke in your wheels.

About the verdict

I was charged with Article 127. The verdict for which I paid money.

For this article, you are awarded "user". They made me a test, faked the tests, I got certificates - from Russia, that I was being treated in the clinic.

For all this, I paid a total of 28 thousand dollars.

And I was still given 1 year and 10 months. But in general, I spent almost two years, since I was still in the migration prison for two months.

I was later deported with a blacklist and the inability to fly to Indonesia ever.

How prison changed lives

My thinking has changed completely. Now you get to know people better and begin to understand them much deeper.

Thinking has changed in terms of attitude towards life. Thoughts appeared that you can achieve some heights, that you need to go towards a dream, and not just vegetate, going to a job that you do not like.

I had time to think well about everything there.

My family is now in the first place. I used to want to move away from my parents. Now I have changed my attitude.

I had a big school of life in prison.

Now, by the way, I am friends and communicate with people who were also in prison, they themselves are attracted to me.

I even wondered who I would marry. A person who has not gone through any trials, he will not understand anything that was in my life. Not everything was rosy and beautiful with me.

But I still think it was good growth and good experience".

The entire podcast with Maria can be listened to here.