Apres le deluge...

My sister's text, 4.50pm Monday 24th January: 'Am sure you've been sent loads of texts already, but just checking...'

My reply a few minutes later read: 'About what?'

That's how it works, you see. In this age of instant information my sister in the west of England knew about the bomb at Domodedovo Airport on Monday afternoon before I did. You think, when you see these events on the news that everybody in the vicinity must know about it. That panic must spread like ripples on the surface of a pond, that whole cities must be lost in confusion and fear, and individual citizens must be too scared to set foot outside their front door.

As ever, real life isn't like that.

When I first moved to London twenty-cough years ago, the IRA was mid mainland-UK terror campaign. Whilst not frequent, the bombings of the city centre were regular enough to give one pause, and to make elderly relatives ask questions about whether it was the right place for me to live. And yet business continued (with the exception of the installation of 'the ring of steel' around the City and increased security measures at certain landmarks) pretty much as normal. Well, it had to; London was the capital of the UK, after all.

I'm sure that that is what will happen in Moscow after this attack; certainly it did after the metro bombings last Spring when commuters were back in the tunnels during evening rush hour, only hours after two suicide bombers struck in the morning of the same day.

The Russians are a resiliant nation - after the upheavals of the last 100 years or so they would have to be - and a fairly stoic one. Certainly they don't waste much time complaining about issues that would have most soft-bellied Westerners (myself included) heading for the hills; they just shoulder the burden and walk on. I'm not sure, mind you, how much of that is out of necessity; the opportunities for a Russian to influence anything other than their own day to day life (and sometimes not even that) are slim. Many don't even bother to vote, arguing that since the outcome is pre-decided in most cases there really is no point*.

*Disclaimer; That's not to say that this point of view is correct, by the way; merely that that is what some Russians believe... (PM glances nervously over her shoulder...)

Of course there is outrage here at this latest terrorist attack, it's not simply water off a duck's back. Today is an official day of mourning for the victims at Domodedovo, and both the president (Medvedev) and the prime minister (Putin) have been quoted taking the hardline on their response. Heads have already rolled both at the airport and in the security services due to the lax approach to enforcing procedures which, if they had been followed, might not have stopped the attack happening but may have ensured it happened in a slightly less busy area.

None of which, however, begins to tackle what it is commonly believed to be the root cause of this and similar terrorist activity; the current situation in the North Caucasaus. And whilst that remains unaddressed, many Russians believe such atrocities will simply continue, and live their lives in the hope that it doesn't affect them directly.

But then, isn't that pretty much the same the world over?

Note: thanks to everyone who checked here and on Twitter to make sure the family and I are OK. We are.