— Had you ever thought about going to a training camp in America?
— No, I never thought about it. The thought never even crossed my mind. Everything was good for us at home. I understood that over there they would try to study us, read us. Although the Japanese came to us — and filmed all the training sessions. And nevertheless, their fighters couldn’t oppose anything to us.
— That was when you first took your older sister Marina to a fight.
— I wanted to show her Japan. She works as a doctor, and I love her very much. With my very first stipend I bought her a watch. That’s the kind of relationship we have. I wanted to do something for her, and so I took her to Japan. Oksana flew as well. Later my Ksusha said that for Marina it was insane stress — that as soon as the opening started… And what an opening it was… You can’t even compare it to a roller coaster! Fireworks, drums, music. Such a performance, a show. And if in America fans came only for the very last fights, then in Japan — always right from the very beginning. And when Marina was watching that show, her eyes were already wet.
Ksusha says: “When Roma was announced, two streams started pouring from her eyes. And when you came out, her eyes were just like this! Two streams were flowing nonstop!” There’s a photo from the locker room where she’s pressed up against me. Those two streams didn’t stop! She said: “You’re such a great guy…” She didn’t know how else to express her emotions. I’m grateful to my sister for that. “Marish, come on, what are you doing, I won, everything’s fine now, it’s all over.” But she still couldn’t calm down for a long time. Then I asked her: “So, will you go to my fight in Japan again?” — “To Japan I’ll go, to the fight — I won’t!”
— But your wife handled it all very stoically.
— No… She’s been to my fights several times. Once I took her to Rings. Either I gave her a camera, or someone else did. So she hardly saw the fight at all and didn’t record anything. Her hands were shaking, the poor thing… She always supported me.
