Unprecedented footage from the early 1990s shows Vladimir Putin looking strange, wearing a tracksuit and long hair, during a visit to Finland, The Guardian newspaper reported on Sunday, as cited by News.ro.

Finnish television YLE received this original amateur film from an anonymous source. The video was shot on May 1, shortly after Vladimir Putin, then a 40-year-old KGB officer, became an adviser to Anatoly Sobchak, then the mayor of St. Petersburg.

In the video, Putin and Sobchak play table tennis with the mayor’s security. At some point, Putin smiles. He repeatedly scratches his neck.

After that, the group continues fishing. Putin, probably knowing that he is being filmed, sits with his back to the camera, while someone from the shore shouts to show the caught fish.

On the way back, you can see how Putin’s wife at the time, Lyudmila, guts the catch – a pike. Their two daughters, Maria and Kateryna, can also be seen nearby.

The footage also shows Putin, eyes downcast, standing next to Sobchak as the mayor tries his hand at darts.

Filming took place at the guest villa of the Finnish company Thomesto, which imported wood from Russia. The wooden villa is located on the island of Torse in Raseborg, about 100 kilometers west of Helsinki on the southern coast of Finland.

Putin returned to Leningrad (now St. Petersburg) in 1990 after a five-year stint as a KGB intelligence officer in the East German city of Dresden. He joined Sobchak’s team and became chairman of the committee on international relations, responsible for trade agreements and foreign investments. The Guardian states that Putin’s first accusations of corruption date back to this period.

Putin claims he quit the KGB in August 1991 in protest at the failed coup against Mikhail Gorbachev. According to YLE’s source, during the visit, Putin confirmed that he works in intelligence.

The source called Lyudmila Putin “very nice.” The person added: “You couldn’t get close to Putin, like you could have a drink together and talk about women and life – nothing like that. He was very strict about alcohol and didn’t smoke.”

The video shows the group having a leisurely lunch over beer and wine in a wooden house. Sobchak is sitting at the head of the table, and Putin can be seen chewing well. As the mayor is served a large piece of meat, Putin jokes about the market economy that was recently introduced in Russia after the fall of communism.

According to the YLE source, Putin communicated very little at the villa in Raseborg. He asked only one question: what will happen if “one and a half million Russians” cross the border with Finland? At that time, Russians were experiencing an acute crisis of food and basic goods.

In the 1990s, Putin often visited Finland. His subsequent performances as Prime Minister and President of Russia were closely monitored.

YLE comments that the video is “far from the macho and dictatorial image that Putin has created for himself since then.”

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