The Deceit of Riches Page 2

  I watched from the windows in the carriage’s corridor as the train pulled up to the platform of the station. I waved through the frozen window to Yulia, waiting for me on the platform, as the train cars came to a gradual stop and jolted softly forward in a slow chain reaction collision. The conductor’s shrill whistle broke the quiet reverence of the moment of arrival. The crowds piled out the doors and into the cold morning. Steam filled the platform.

  I had met Yulia the summer prior while working as a tour guide and interpreter for American tourists who were seeing Russia for the first time from the deck of a cruise boat, visiting one-horse villages and industrial cities up and down the Volga River. When we first met, there was friction. The friction, though, had created a curious spark that kept the both of us coming back to check what that spark might possibly become. It was a happy moment of trepidation and anticipation to see her again waiting for me. She greeted me with a warm hug on the icy platform.

  “Peter, I am so happy you have arrived! Welcome back to Nizhniy Novgorod!” Yulia greeted me with the pageantry of a tour guide meeting jet lagged tourists for the first time.

  Ladend like a camel with my bags, dressed in fur and wool, I trundled through the station behind Yulia and down the escalators to the metro platforms.

  “My, it is very cold here!” I commented as my chin began to stiffen in the frozen air.

  “Yes, it’s not sailing weather anymore! I’m glad you still have your shapka! You’ll need that in Russia. Ukrainian winters just aren’t the same.” she boasted of Russia’s northern extremes.

  “Are you hungry? We have a breakfast waiting for you at home,” she offered thoughtfully.

  “Yes, thank you. Didn’t get a chance to have any dinner last night.” I apologized.

  “Did you see anything in Moscow this time?” she asked not knowing yet what to talk with me about.

  “No, not really, it was Christmas day so only the biggest attractions and restaurants were open. I showed some acquaintances from the hostel around Red Square and the Kremlin.” I recounted my frozen day in the capital.

  “Did you bring other shoes than those?” she said glancing at my feet.

  “Yes, I have my winter boots in this large bag,” I replied slapping my luggage with two good thuds.

  “That’s good because your feet will freeze in those!” she said laughing at my folly.

  “Yes, I was not very comfortable yesterday in Moscow. Luckily I have good socks,” I said with an entertained smile at her concern for this naive foreigner experiencing his first Russian winter. The temperature was negative seventeen Celsius.

  If the tea hadn't warmed me, the five flights of stairs carrying my luggage would have. I was sweating in my long underwear in the warm apartment. Inside, I shed my wool and fur as quickly as possible. Not having slept on the train I involuntarily drooped off to sleep in my chair.

  When I woke up the apartment had been flooded by bright winter sunlight and the ladies were already preparing lunch. I was rather embarrassed and begged their pardon.

  “Please excuse me. I don’t know what happened. I was here and then I was asleep,” I bumbled still a bit disoriented.

  “It’s not a problem. You’ve had a long journey!” Yulia’s gracious mother replied, “You’re awake just in time for lunch.”

  “Peter, after lunch we’ll walk over to Mikhail’s apartment before it gets dark again and you can take an early bedtime. We have arranged for you to sleep there for the weekend until Monday when your room in the student hall will be ready,” Yulia explained.

  “Very kind of you to arrange all this for me, Yulia, thank you very much,” I thanked her sincerely.

  “I hope you will be comfortable there,” she replied politely.

  “We have an appointment for you with Valentina Petrovna at the university on Monday morning at ten-thirty. I don't have lectures on Monday so I will take you there to make sure you get introduced there,” she continued.

  “Thank you again,” I offered with a smile.

  We ate bread and pickled cucumbers and sipped warm tea politely as we tried to get reacquainted after seven months.

  Yulia, a feisty, persistent student of journalism seemed to me one the most resourceful people in all of Russia. She carried a self-confidence in her which seemed to make it difficult for people, anybody, to tell her no. Her face, while very pretty, most times had a look of intensity and determination that would wear her opponents down with reasoning, questioning and just a pinch of sugar. She had a fair complexion next to her strawberry blonde hair and deep round brown eyes that made her memorable to even casual acquaintances. With the typical long legs of young eastern European women, she struck an elegant, long, slender figure. She was a free thinker, ignoring perceived limitations to her goals and dreams, yet she was as pragmatic as a popular politician. When she was sweet, she was as sweet as wild honey. When she was irritated her wrath could lay waste to the city. She beguiled and frightened me at the same time. She was Russia embodied in a beautiful young woman.

  My decision to return specifically to Nizhniy Novgorod, and not to Moscow or St. Petersburg to study after an intense summer on the riverboats, was greatly due to her influence and her facilitating communication, and ultimately my acceptance at the university. Understanding the politics of bureaucrats, she lobbied my independent application with the needed professors, vouching for me and promising great results. She was relentless in search of needed approvals for my admission and ultimately succeeded despite all the red tape and delays. When she set her mind to something it was nearly impossible to exorcise her of it until she was fully satisfied. She was a researcher, a detective, and a prosecutor. Her opinions once formed were as hard as granite. Her good grace once lost was never to be granted again. She judged quickly on first impressions and was rarely wrong.

  My initial meeting with Valentina Petrovna on Monday morning at the University’s foreign student’s office on Gagarin Street was not a pleasant nor comforting experience. In the place of a cordial greeting, I was chided and scolded for one thing or another, from my muddy shoes to wearing my coat and shapka in the building. There was a wardrobe at the entrance of the building for such things and I should learn to use them. Yulia was livid at Valentina’s condescending attitude and excused herself halfway through the interview before she said something she shouldn’t have.

  Valentina Petrovna would not speak Russian to me although I answered all her questions quickly in the local language. I sat across from her over her pressboard desk while she questioned me.

  “Mr. Turner, Where have you been sleeping since your arrived?” was her first line of interrogation.

  “With acquaintances nearby,” I replied, expecting some polite conversation.

  “Why have you not yet reported to the local police station to register?" she demanded to know.

  “Because I do not know where my dormitory is located,” I answered truthfully.

  “How do you plan to pay for your studies?” she was making notes as she questioned me.

  “In cash as instructed,” I tried to see what she was writing as I answered her random questions.

  “Peter, are you carrying that money with you in town?” she looked up at me with a startled face from her writing.

  “No, I will use a credit card to withdraw money from my account in the USA at the right time,” I said sitting back in my chair looking her in the eyes.

  After my interrogation and instruction from the directress, I was introduced to Pasha and Marina, a cute couple who were co-presidents of the school’s new English club. They were very enthusiastic to have a native English speaker join the department and had volunteered to show me around the dormitories and the Gagarin Street complex. Pasha, a handsome, well dressed and groomed young man who spoke with reserve, was juxtaposed with Marina, a very bubbly bright-eyed girl with an infectious smile and pale blue eyes. She was very excited to speak English with me.

  The two showed Yulia and I the way to the do
rmitories and gave a brief tour of the ground floor. There was a cold, bare cafeteria, a sterile medical station, void of any nurse that morning, and a wardrobe for coats and shapkas from where the superintendent kept tabs on everybody as they came and went, making notes of the times students arrived or departed. I was begrudgingly given a key by this middle-aged woman from her office next to the wardrobe. As we climbed the stairs to the student rooms, Marina whispered some advice to me about our less than friendly superintendent.

  “She never had a husband. He is dead in the big war. She no likes our boys. I think she reminds of her dead lover,” she explained in her best English possible. “Don’t talk to her. Just say thank you and go away quickly.”

  Pasha commented in Russian, “She is always watching us and tries to make problems for us if we have had too much beer. She makes notes of everything you do so don’t try to do things against the rules. She knows everything! She must work for the secret police,” he said rolling his eyes.

  Marina hissed back at him, “Pasha, you must speak English!”

  He rolled his eyes again behind her back as we climbed up two flights of stairs. Yulia thought this was a rather funny exchange and laughed aloud, causing everybody to chuckle.

  Pasha showed me to my room while the ladies lingered in the stairwell and chatted like hens with each other. The bedroom, empty of roommates still to return from the winter break, looked itself like a cheerful jail cell, or a clean Russian hospital room. The walls were jarring bright green and there were matching green and white fuzzy wool blankets on the bunk beds. The room screamed “Gulag” at me, except for the large window with sheers and curtains. The chunky radiator hidden under the window sheers was fully opened, warming the room to near suffocation levels. The hot air in the room caused the residual odors of the occupants in a closed terrarium to rush into the cold hallway through the open door: garlic, onions, alcohol, body odor, and tea all mixed into a pungent eastern blend. There was a samovar station in the corner of the room on a triangular table that fit snuggly in the corner. Assorted unwashed utensils and plates in a washing-up box and washed clothing lay at the foot of beds to dry. At first look, my stomach turned upside down.

  “Do you share this room as well, Pasha?” I asked him with caution.

  “No. I sleep in a different room,” he answered slowly and deliberately in English.

  Holding my nose in exaggeration I asked, “Does your room smell better?”

  Pasha looked at me as if I was completely crazy. “Do you think this room smells bad?” he asked as he took in a deep breath through wide nostrils, “Smells like everybody’s room. It’s normal,” he commented shrugging his shoulder. I was immediately conscious that I would not be able to handle such conditions for more than two weeks, if that.

  Marina proposed that the four of us meet for dinner that night and spend some more time speaking English. For Russians to speak English now, more than ever, was a requisite for success. To speak English well-improved one’s chances of getting noticed by a new joint venture business moving into Russia to work locally as an interpreter, or even eventually to be asked to work abroad. We agreed to meet on Minin Square at six o’clock that evening for dinner in a Stubbe inside one of the city's kremlin towers.

  Dinner with Marina and Pasha was a half game of charades and laughing. Marina refused to speak Russian and was searching for English words in the smoky air hanging above our table. This spectacle drew the attention of the entire cafe to our corner table.

  “Why did you choose your study in Nizhniy?” Marina asked me after drinks had been brought to the table.

  “I have heard that in Nizhniy the governor is helping to grow private businesses by making good new laws. I want to study how he is doing that,” I answered slowly for her and Pasha to understand.

  “Not because you have a beautiful girlfriend here?” Marina asked smiling and winking at Yulia.

  “That helped my decision,” I admitted bashfully.

  “I want to understand how Russia is changing on the inside, not just in Moscow. Maybe I came more to live the changes than studying it from books,” I added regarding my motivations.

  “But why? Why come to our country when it’s falling apart?” Pasha challenged me.

  “Is it falling apart? I think maybe it's just getting a new life. Don’t you maybe think?” I countered.

  “Oh no! In four years I have been student we have so less opportunity now for job than at beginning. My certificate will not get me engineer job. I will have to look to work for foreign company to earn money,” he said with some urgency and regret.

  “Then we had better speak English to give you lots of practice,” I offered, hoping to soothe the sting of his situation.

  “But you have come here to learn to speak Russian,” Pasha returned my offer.

  “But he already speaks Russian!” Marina interrupted and turning to me continued, “I heard you talk with Valentina Petrovna. You speak very good Russian already. We need to learn English like you speak Russian.”

  “Really, Marina, it takes immersion in a language to learn to speak it fluently. You can’t learn to think in a language from a book, no matter how much your read,” I explained to Marina as she pouted.

  “Yes, but Peter sound as if he is Russian. Maybe like he’s come from Estonia,” she moaned again to Pasha who seemed less concerned about the question.

  “When you study it abroad, Masha, you can sound like English girl too,” Pasha said deliberately to his disheartened girlfriend.

  “Peter? Did you work with a private company in America? Do they like you to speak Russian?” Marina asked me directly.

  “Yes, in fact, Yulia and I met when I worked for an American company in Russia. We know the people in Moscow who hire interpreters. If you want we can introduce you to them,” I offered, reassuring her distress that she was figuratively missing her ship of opportunity as Russia sailed further with only the bilingual.

  “Oy! That will be …wonder…very nice of you,” she looked to Yulia for confirmation.

  “I have Irina’s telephone number in Moscow,” Yulia proffered, “We can tell her about you,” Yulia’s spoken English was awkward but always very correct. She understood far more quickly the spoken word than she could speak it back, but when she did it was always the right word with the right grammar.

  “Will I speak to Americans the whole day through?” she asked excitedly.

  “Yes, many Americans with many different accents. All day long, and sometimes in the middle of the night too,” I warned her.

  After we had eaten a bit of our dinners, two tall young men in their late twenties came over and introduced themselves in very sophisticated English accents and shook hands. Their clothes looked a bit shabby and their hair a bit wayward creating an obvious mismatch between accent and appearance.

  “Good evening, I am Richard, this is Andrew,” the first one spoke for both, while both leaned in for a proper handshake. I stood to meet their handshakes.

  “Hallo. Peter Turner. This is Pasha, Marina, and Yulia,” I replied motioning to each of them in turn.

  “Nice to meet you all,” Richard said to all three looking them politely in their faces, “So sorry for intruding but we don’t hear many American accents in this town, or spoken English here for that matter. We just had to find out about you as we know probably all the westerners here.”

  “Just arrived over the holiday weekend. I’ve come for a Master’s program here at the university for the next year,” I revealed, “What brings you both here? You’ve been here a little while I can see,” I said pinching my still stiff collar on my shirt.

  Richard rolled his eyes with a bit of knowing disgust and pinched his collar to help it stand a bit taller. “We are here with the World Bank outreach,” he replied.

  “Really!?” I was immediately pleased to meet them for the research connections that they represented.

  “That’s right,” Andrew replied just behind Richard’s shoulder in th
e cramped corner space of the Stubbe.

  “How long has that been going on?” I inquired.

  “About fourteen months now, but we’ve only arrived maybe four months ago and will stay another two,” Andrew confirmed.

  “Would you like to join us?” I asked and I made a scooting motion with my hands to those sitting in the corner booth bench to see if we could make room for two more backsides.

  “You are very welcome!” Marina bubbled as she moved closer to Pasha to further compress her already small size.

  Richard replied politely, “No, no, please, we were just leaving, but please stop by our office for a chat, it’s just around the corner next to the new pizza restaurant ‘New York’s Best.’ This term ‘New York’s Best’ was spoken with some irony between the three westerners.

  “I certainly will. Our history lectures are here at the square on Mondays and Wednesdays,” I mentioned.

  Marina nodded to confirm the information.

  “Very nice to meet you, Peter,” Richard said holding out his hand again for a second shake.

  “And very nice to meet you all as well,” he said somewhat slower and more annunciated than needed.

  After seeing Yulia onto her bus that would take her back across the Oka River, the three of us rode the bus back to the dormitories on Gagarin Street. Pasha helped me to carry my bags that we had retrieved from Yulia’s apartment earlier in the afternoon. Marina kept talking and asking questions, half in English and half in Russian while we rode through the cold dark night.

  We wished Marina a good evening and climbed the stairs with my bags, after paying homage to the superintendent who noted down our arrival. Pasha kindly introduced me to my roommates, now present, and in different half states of being dressed, with the radiator still open and pumping waves of rising heat at full force.

  Standing in the open door surveying my new colleagues, Vitaly, the only Russian in the room, dressed in Adidas training pants, tapochki with no socks and a sleeveless undershirt yelled,

  “Current!”