Day 72 - Spy Story - Part III

Image by vpickering, via Flickr

When I lived in Romania, I knew that I was being followed wherever I went. In Romania, there was no such thing as a coincidence.

For example, everywhere I went in Iasi or Bucharest, whether on foot, on the tram, or by train, I would see the same bearded guy. Initially I didn't think much of it until I heard from my students how unusual it was for anyone to travel between Iasi and Bucharest as often as I did. The guy wasn't in any of my classes, but I assumed he was a student.

Before I went to Romania, I hasn't realized how rare English language books would be. I had brought a few paperbacks with me and in desperation I took those order forms for more paperbacks from the back of all of them and I ordered every one of them. I didn't know how long it would be before I could buy more. One of those books was The Painted Bird by Jerzy Kosinski. All the books I ordered were delivered via unclassified pouch to the embassy in Bucharest where I picked them up when I traveled there. Except The Painted Bird. That one was dropped off on the floor in the hallway outside my apartment one evening while I was in the apartment. There was no note with it to explain who brought it. I was the only American in Iasi. Someone knew where I lived, but I had no idea who.

I also would get phone calls from people who just wanted to speak English. Phone lines were rare. Once a line was put in, the number stayed with the house or apartment. That meant that anyone who ever had the phone number of the American lecturer in the past had my phone number. So they called even though I has no idea who they were.

Because I was there on a Fulbright grant, it is very likely that the Romanian government had a file on me, built from whatever all those people who followed me thought they learned. My apartment was broken into while I was in France on vacation at Christmas and half of anything of value was stolen. Half, not all. And that itself was significant because I had put two cartons of cigarettes in the freezer and two cartons in my underwear drawer. One carton from each location was taken. The thief took one of my two bottles of vodka, one of my two bottles of gin, and one of my two very large bottles of soy sauce which I had had to store with the liquor because the bottles were too large to put into the kitchen cupboard. I would have given anything to see the thief's face as he opened that bottle for a swig. It was also very likely that bugging devices were left in my apartment. For me, it was all a game because I really didn't see how following me would be of any use to the Romanian government.

But then I joined the State Department. So I knew there was a possibility that the information the Romanians had gathered could be useful to some intelligence service. But the real link was only recently revealed.

Kendall Myers, the area studies director while I was in German language training, was a spy for the Cubans. In 2009, he and his wife were arrested and they are now in prison. Details of their recruitment available in a variety of sources are contradictory, but it appears the Cubans recruited both Myers from South Dakota where they had moved when his wife's employment as a member of the staff of Senator Abourezk ended when he chose not to run again. In fact, it was the Cubans who convinced Kendall to try to get work with either the CIA or State. He had worked at the Foreign Service Institute on a temporary basis before, so he returned to State in 1980.

Remember, I accepted a book from Kendall before I went off to Stuttgart. It never occurred to me that there might be something in that book to track me. I'll never know if all those coincidences in Germany had anything to do with Kendall Meyers. But learning that he was a spy provides a possible explanation. At a minimum, it makes a good story, right?