The Kingdom of: Part Four: The Bon Bon World

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Blog of Gregory Shukhman

By Gregory Shukhman

Read part three: The Kingdom of- part three.

Part Four: The Bon Bon World

Every Saturday, Vadim Rabinovich, an extremely busy man who needed to leave everything behind even for a short time once a week, came to pray at the Great Synagogue of Kiev, one of Eastern Europe’s most famous Jewish landmarks, also known as Brodsky synagogue. Next to him sat his two friends, Igor and Mikhail. The three men were standing with eyes closed, holding a Siddur prayer book in their hands, and thinking of their ancestors, absorbed for the moment in the melody of the cantor’s voice as he intoned the Oseh Shalom:

"He who makes peace in High Places,

He will make peace for us and for all Israel, and let us say Amen."

When the Shabbat service was about to finish, Rabbi Moshe Azman announced, “We are honored to welcome in our synagogue Vadim Rabinovich, the president of the All-Ukrainian Jewish Congress.” The 1,000 members of the Brodsky congregation exploded in cheers for and shouts of “L’Chaim” to Vadim Rabinovich, a man who has given millions and millions of dollars to support the Jewish community and Jewish causes all over the world.

After the service, Rabinovich invited his two friends to his apartment to have Shabbat dinner together.

Vadim’s friends Igor and Mikhail are prominent businessmen who own the most prestigious trademark in Ukraine, "Hetman," best known worldwide as the name of one of the world’s best vodkas. All three were part of a high-level business delegation recruited by Vadim to visit the Kingdom of Cambodia, and they had plenty to talk about in relation to their plans in that country.

Mikhail and Igor gladly accepted the invitation. Together, they walked toward Vadim’s apartment, which was located in the center of Kiev, not far from the synagogue.

The Shabbat table was filled with an appetizing variety of succulent kosher foods, prepared according to traditional recipes in accordance with strict Jewish dietary laws.

The evening passed in amicable fashion in a relaxed, luxurious setting. Before starting in on the plates piled high with delicacies of every kind, Vadim said the Ha-Motzi, a traditional blessing for bread, over the fresh-baked six-braided challah. "Blessed are You, Lord, our God, King of the Universe who brings forth bread from the earth. Amen." and everybody repeated, “Amen,” after which he broke the bread and handed the pieces to his guests. The food was magnificent, and the Hetman vodka enhanced the experience delightfully. The evening passed pleasant in toasting, laughing, smiling and sharing war stories of business coups and deals gone awry.

When the conversation turned to Cambodia, Vadim took the opportunity to share with his guests some concerns about one of their business associates there. After clearing his throat to gain their attention, Vadim paused for a moment, then began: “I do not think will be correct for us work with Bunnaroeun. I found out that the main figure in Cambodia is the Prime Minister. In everything we intend to do there, it is inevitable that the scale of our investments will sooner or later lead us to him. I understood this clearly from our friend Bunnaroeun, who also said that the relationship between the Prime Minister and President is one of respect, with no business involved. The president is an old man, and his colleagues are just waiting for his time on earth to end. Who knows what will become of Bunnaroeun then? By the way, Bunnaroeun told me in the car that the old man wants him to become the Prime Minister.” Everybody around the table started to laugh as they considered that implausible scenario. “I’m sure he is lying: he is too stupid and the old man is too smart. Anyway, how can we continue to work with Bunnaroeun? I do not trust him. As you know, I lost $70,000 I gave him to “expedite” the process of buying that island.” I thought it would be worth the price to speed up the transaction, since I was willing to pay $6 million for the island, and I thought that was a good deal. Soon afterward, he suddenly called to tell me that the President said we had to wait. Then he tried to interest me in a different project involving some generals. Feeling burned, I didn’t want to listen to any more of his nonsense. Through my contacts, I made inquiries to check him out. It turned out to be easy to track him down, because he had studied as an exchange student in the Soviet Union. When you hear the rest of the story I got from my sources, you will laugh. We have to stay away from this guy. He’s bad news.”

“Bunnaroeun used to work for the KGB.”

Igor and Mikhail looked at each other in astonishment. “Listen to this,” continued Rabinovich. “As an informer, he put 14 people behind bars.” Mikhail smiled, and admitted, “He looked to me from the beginning like a rat.”

“How did he do it?” Igor asked Vadim.

“You know” Rabinovich continued, “those foreign students were able to leave the country, so he quickly established a currency smuggling and illegal import/export business. Being a businessman was a serious crime in the Soviet Union, so of course, this idiot fell under the watchful eyes of the KGB. When he next tried to carry out a deal with the local speculators, he was detained by security forces. They gave him two choices: either to be expelled from the Soviet Union and forget the university, or to become a KGB informant. Bunnaroeun didn’t hesitate for a second. He immediately ratted out all his clients and friends at once. The authorities were very happy to have such a great source of information on these underground business dealings. Once he helped put all his friends and business partners in prison, the KGB gave him a green light to do what he wanted. Bunnaroeun loved having such a great patron as the KGB, which enabled him to start making real money. He got in trouble because he didn’t want to share his profits with his patrons. Some of his KGB comrades got angry about this, and arranged to transfer him to Kazakhstan. That’s where he met his wife.”

“Believe it or not, he still thinks he’s working for the KGB. Recently, he called some of his old contacts there to try to peddle them some dirt on Ambassador Tereshchenko. Looks like times have really changed: nobody wanted to listen to him anymore.”

“Anyway, the country is not that bad and has good potential. We can definitely make some money there. We have already shown our goodwill by investing in all kinds of charities and expenses. As you know, I’m still working with the Ministry of Defense on a land mines project, as the old man said they’re interested to do that, and that they are willing to pay us back either with commodities or land. For us, it would be better if the United Nations could come up with a resolution to do that project, since that would make the return of money to us more transparent. I’m planning to use some of the reserve of specialists and retired miners from Ukraine and Moldova, but meanwhile I would need some trading company who may be interesting to purchase commodities from Cambodia, but not our local companies. They are too small and working with them is not that comfortable. I’m thinking about working with some US company; they’re more intelligent and thinking globally.”

Mikhail said, “We used to work with some guy, he lives in NY, I’m sure his company is involved in international business. We met him in a few occasions. When we brought our Hetman Vodka brand to America, he helped a lot. He is originally from Ukraine, and he seemed to me to be well-connected. I’ll call him on Monday and will talk about this with him. I remember his company name: "Bon Bon World."

“OK! Sounds sweet to me,” said Vadim Rabinovich,” let us have desert.”