Let other mayors fret about potholes, taxes and sewers. This is an Olympic city, and here is the jeans-clad mayor striding into his office on a recent afternoon, fresh from a landslide, and not the electoral kind. When Sochi won the 2014 Games, life went epic.
First Mayor Anatoly Pakhomov and the mere mortals of Sochi were sent on a marathon of construction that clogged traffic and made heads throb. Then came the wrath of the gods. The city received nearly 50 cm of rain in September — six is the average for the month — setting off landslides requiring mayoral attention. Last week, the downpour was so heavy and roads were so flooded that the Emergency Situations Ministry deployed 1,800 workers to pump out water and shovel debris off city streets.
And now, the clash of civilizations.