In & Out the Grey Empire

Day 1: Saturday, September 21, 1991

The plane finally breaks through the stratospheric snow field and descends on Moscow International Airport. Moskva! It coasts down the runway, and then past a nondescript terminal about the size you would expect in Iowa City – the first indicator that this is indeed another world… Off the ramp and down corridors that advertise Paloma Picasso and the same luxury lizards seen in every other international airport in the world, corridors that look relatively new, only one or two security people hanging around, gangly, fresh-faced recruits in khaki, down to the visa control.

Yuki, Gilaine and I are first and stand around talking to a crew of men from all over the US who are off to the Tian Shian Mountains for a ten-day hike. As we were landing, the group’s guide had exchanged visa horror stories with us: how he had written to the Embassy in Washington more than a month before the trip; flew to DC a few days before they were due to leave, since he wasn’t getting any response from the Embassy; discovered that nothing had been done whatsoever to start the process of issuing the visas; chewed out the grand poobah, grabbed the visas, and stormed over to the San Francisco Consulate, where everything was processed in less than 48 hours. An engineer I’m chatting with is off to Kharkiv to examine an airplane parts manufacturing facility that makes the things that make the wing flaps go up and down. Their technology’s a whole lot better than we’d imagined, world class, really, but they don’t know what to do with what they’ve got: advertising, marketing sales, delivery… the infrastructure is just not there.

The line is rapidly moving forward when I realize: the visas –oops, Jamie has ’em all! I dash back and catch the rest of our team coming down the stairs. Visas! Jamie hauls a wad of papers out from her bag and peels off our three visas. I scamper back in time to pass Gilaine hers, then Yuki.

When it’s my turn, the young visa agent looks up above my head, then notes something in my visa, smiles a little and says: Gavaritj pa Russki? Po Ukrainski I reply, smiling back. Oh, I’m Ukrainian, too, his smile broadens, becomes more genuine. You live in Moscow? No, I work here. I understand the difference. Spasiba, he hands me back my papers. Diakuyou, I reply and take them. As I turn to leave, I notice the mirror above me and angled to show our backs as we go through. The contradictions have only begun.

We move into another area just like any other: the baggage claim. The number of people grows rapidly; the amount of baggage does not. Slow minutes tick by. Some go off to stand in their first Russian queue: for Smarte Cartes! They cost a dollar, 25? less than they did in New York. The rest mill around the carousel waiting to collect the 23-24 pieces we’ve brought between the 8 of us. We stand around admiring odd things like the ceiling: it seems to be made of a layer of 4-inch copper pipes set in cross-section, lending the area an incongruously modernistic yet depressingly dark look. Eyeing the dark circles, I hazard, Maybe they are showing off their mineral resources for our benefit. Nobody thinks that’s funny: we’re tired of waiting in the close air. The bags finally start to trickle in and in a half-hour, three laden carts plus sundry luggables are in line to go through the “nothing to declare channel”, as it’s called here.

More interminable minutes drip by; by now most of our jackets are long off and sweaters are rapidly joining the heap of clothes on top of the already over-burdened carts. Inch-by-inch, the carts creep up towards the bottleneck of agents’ tables. And then –poof!– we’re spilling out the other side, waved along with barely a glance and a brisk red stamp in our unread visas.

Running the gauntlet of airport greeters, we burst into the main waiting area, straight into the arms of the Moscow Aikido group!

A soup of languages pours out, English, Russian, French, Ukrainian, in a wide range of fluency. For 20 minutes the sloppy introductions go on, greetings and tentative arrangements bumble by. Yuki is matched up with Oleg, whom she befriended in Bozeman; Vasili, a big, blond, jovial punk claims Jamie; Dimitri wants someone who can speak French and before I can say anything, Jamie says that Gilaine speaks French, so I turn to a young blond woman, Alla, and agree to stay with her. But Jamie has other ideas. She wants me to bunk with her, so Susan pairs up with Alla, Robert with Sasha, Edwin with Andrei (the first of many Andreis who will be hanging out with us day after day), Rob with Kyril, and Jamie and I at Vasili’s and Mariana’s. My head starts to spin with the unfamiliar names, both American and Russian: I haven’t really spoken much to my fellow Americans until now, either! 20 more minutes stumble by inconclusively. Jamie and I finally begin to make a move towards where people’s cars presumably are waiting.

Outside, it is overcast and cool, the lot is dingy, and cars mill haphazardly every which way, driving at least 3 times faster than I would have thought safe in such tight quarters with so many pedestrians wandering around. Nobody seems to notice. The cars are dingy too. Most look unkempt, rundown. Vasili pulls up finally. We start to pack. The car’s a total beater, something I recognize from the projects down the street from me in Chicago: torn up seats, a bokken holding the driver’s seat up because the latch is broken; wires hanging out from under the dash, junk all over the seats and floor. I know what kind of a ride this is going to be –or so I think.

Another half-hour wastes itself in the airport parking lot while a confusion of people and luggage is sorted out. A taste of waits to come. We have managed to negotiate one thing already: no class tonight, just rest and gossip. Since I slept on the way over, I feel normal, not jet-lagged, but I know I’m not ready for ukemi just yet. Finally, Yuki and Oleg take off with a buddy of his who drives taxis. A cloud of stinky petrol lingers behind, making me cough. We’re next. Jamie and I collapse into the lumpy back seat while Mariana shares the front with her blond teddy bear. Vasili smiles his sweet smile at me and says Everything OK? I smile back, Let’s go.

The ratty, foul-smelling car sputters to a start. It sounds as unhealthy as it looks, rattling its way down a road that is not so different from National Airport in Washington, only no Metro, no BMWs, no suits. Just these straggly, friendly people in their poverty-stricken land. And already the resemblance to National is a mere hallucination: the ‘highway’ into Moscow is an interminable divided junk road, not as potholed as the South-Side highways in Chicago maybe, but unfinished altogether, sand and dug out holes everywhere. Ghastly trucks, derelicts from the 30s rumble past in both directions. Not a car in sight looks clean or repaired.

It is totally autumn, and the sky is a light grey, the buildings dirty. Clumps of high-rises interspersed with clumps of autumnal trees. Here the trees have already turned, but the leaves are still hanging in, their golden color not seen to advantage in this dismal light, but in places they lend a tarnished veneer to the landscape. The cars, roads, traffic, all are rough beyond belief, hyper, chaotic. After an hour of this repetitive city/country-scape, we pull up into a massive complex of run-down towers, just like the dozens of other complexes we passed during the last long hour. Out with the bags and up some dank, rough concrete steps into a dark hallway, unfinished walls, chipped and half-painted concrete floors and unlit ceilings, like back alleyways. The elevator is also a beater and I think: this place is really poor; it’s, it’s just like the South Side! Minus the vandalism, drugs and crime, of course. Everything’s rundown, poorly made, depressing. The elevator staggers up to the 12th floor, ‘étage’ the Russians call it.

We’ve arrived!

Mariana unlocks a door that leads to a half-lobby serving three apartments on the east side of the floor. Boxes, left-over furniture and other garbage-like remnants clutter this area. Another door unlocks into the apartment itself. Clutter fills the foyer: a single mattress rolled and wrapped up in brown paper. New, I suppose. Parts to a pine kitchen set, tabletop, chairs, and so on. I drop my jo bag against a wall and drag my duffel bag and backpack into the front room.

The brown mottled wallpaper of the entry changes to nondescript beige walls and furniture out of the forties in a room that is about 9 x 20 feet. Which would be comfortable enough if it didn’t also serve as a bedroom: next to the doorway is an alcove containing two hunch-backed metal beds with colorful spreads and lumpy pillows. The headboard obscures the base of a bookcase containing an assortment of materials. And under the bed, in the bookcase, piles of neatly tied envelopes – hundreds, no thousands.

Ten thousand, to be exact, with more bags arriving in the mail every day. Mariana and Vasili explain they have received 10,000 responses to a couple of little announcements they made in a few magazines, from all over the country, asking about Aikido. 10,000. A direct marketer’s dream. We can’t imagine that many aikidoists writing anywhere, let alone to one place, let alone to teachers who have mostly learned from books and biennial visits by Americans! It awes me to imagine such enthusiasm – until I hear the schedule: two hours at noon and two more in the evening. I didn’t know we were coming here to do intensive training for three weeks! I want to see places, to do things!

Next to the beds, a table covered in a plastic white cloth, a wooden armchair of the pseudo-teak variety, with murky, reddish-brown square-edged cushions, and a couple of dining chairs.

On the table, a vase of fresh flowers surprises me. But it fits with the overall look of the room: lower class post-war. There’s no couch, but an upholstered cushion lies on the floor along the far wall, covered with some pillows and a back-rest, and beyond it two chairs are squeezed in against the wall, as though in anticipation of a cell meeting of the Aikido underground or a small but boring party. In the corner, another bookcase filled with books and bundles of tied-up letters. Next to it, a door leads to the balcony that I later discover is unusable: barely two feet deep, it is cluttered with junk and dead plants, and the floor and railing look less than reliable. Opposite us, other identical towers, not close enough to inspire modesty, but in easy view of a low-grade pair of binoculars. The bleakness only reminds me how far I am from golden Paris and August. A radiator under the balcony window pumps vast amounts of heat into the small apartment.

I shove the duffel bag into the area in front of the door and my pack next to it. I haven’t anything perishable in either piece. But the heat reminds me to take the bag of food that I have carried off the plane and refrigerate the pickled Finnish herring and chocolates, and the bread and cheese I bought in Helsinki this morning.

The kitchen is narrow, with dirt-brown moiré-patterned walls and dirty blue tiled floor. In fact, the apartment’s a two-room hole-in-the-wall. Dirty, dingy, unfinished, unattractive. Toilet seat unhinged, tub, sinks and walls clearly never scrubbed.. Poverty – that’s life. Dirt – that’s an attitude.

The sink is filled with bright red tomatoes and lustrous green cucumbers that Mariana is busy washing and slicing. There are more tomatoes than I have seen in anyone’s kitchen in a long time, at least 2 dozen, all looking as good as those my one and only garden produced in the summer of 1986. You’re in the land of food shortages… crosses my mind as I look around and find the fridge. It’s a typical half-size model, the kind that I’ve seen everywhere from France to Japan. Its barren interior confirms my thought, despite the two fresh and huge arbuzes (watermelons) that sit on top along with a sack of carrots, a sausage, some potatoes, and Mariana’s full sink. I set my meager stores on a shelf and look further.

The stove is gas, and water is already at a surface boil. A buffet topped by a scummy-watered aquarium separates the cooking area from the far half of the room where a table that looks quite unused stands, three gallon jugs of unclarified apple juice. It too is covered with a cheap, dark-colored plastic cloth. To the right of the window, which looks out on the same cluster of matching towers, some shelves filled with books and knickknacks hang hazardously over the narrow couch where some plastic bags of goods have been plunked. Nobody is likely to sit here, either, from the awkward placement of it, and it isn’t clear to me why this couch isn’t in the other room, where we will gather for the next few days.

I stash my noodles, spaghetti sauce, ramen, wild rice, and other exotic foods in the lower cupboard of the buffet. A saucer of sugar sits amid papers, some mis-matched china, dead plant matter, wadded paper bags, and other scraps on the open shelving above. I notice that the aquarium has none of the ‘high-tech’ attachments I’m so familiar with: air pump, filter and fluorescent light. They must mostly be keeping goldfish.

By now Mariana and Andrei #2, who turns out to be Vasili’s little deshi (apprentice) and who is to become ours, especially Gilaine’s, little otomo (helper)… have prepared the salad and side dishes and we carry stuff out onto the table.

There are now 8 people in this already-crowded living-room: a third Andrei (who apparently speaks English but doesn’t understand it…!), Jamie, Vasili, Dima, Gilaine, me, Mariana, Andrei #2. Dima’s Frussian is quite comic, and when I say something to him, he often does not understand the proper French. I notice that Gilaine is only addressing him in English, so he’s not getting much there, either. The table is set and we begin to help ourselves to the picnic-like spread: salad, sliced veggies, sliced cold-cut beef, and watermelon. The boys are passing vodka around. No thanks, we’re too burned out from travel. Tea arrives, with lots of sugar. The atmosphere waxes sentimental, with much reminiscing.

At this point, Andrei the Third excuses himself and chauffeurs Gilaine and Dima to Dima’s place. I wonder what the arrangement there will be and if Dima’s going to behave with Gilaine. What if his thought is that he’s got a captive American female at his disposal? He looks aggressively romantic from what I can see. The kind that worships the ground you walk on but won’t let you do anything your way because he, of course, knows best.

Meanwhile, the salad’s great: a simple mix of tomato, cucumber and onion finely sliced, and a creamy dressing. But it’s totally tasty, and I refill my plate three times, hoping I don’t look like too much of a pig. Vasili asks if we would like some arbuz/ Like? Break it out, man, I think. It turns out to be watermelon season, and we will be seeing lots more of the round green and red arbuz before the end of the trip. Vlodya, Oleg and Yuki leave, Vasya, Mariana and Andrei wash up while I dry, and finally the Russians are gone.

Like twin babushkas ready to take the weight of the world, the beds await Jamie and me. Quilts into slipcases, sheets on mattresses, pillows and coverlets on, and we’re ready for slumberland. Instead, Jamie and I talk for about an hour: she shows me her lover, we talk about her family. Finally, a ten-minute hunt for the light switch – none of those on the wall seem to affect either kitchen or living room lights! Finally, one of us notices a string hanging down in the corner behind the door, which leads to a little box at the corner of the ceiling. Ahah! Out go the lights at last.

Day 2: Sunday, September 22

A low-lying grey day breaks and by the time Andrei the deshi comes by to make kasha for us, last night’s melon is dead on the table. We stumble out of bed, ready for the brave new Russia. Class at eleven, then lunch and touring. The first of many false schedules is set. A second mad dash through Moscow streets. I tell Vasili, You drive like a cowboy as he squeaks in between a bus going 20 kph on the right and a car going 80 klicks on the left, in a space the size of a gopher’s butt. Bump the road, grind the tires, whiz and wind through the crazed Medusa’s tangle of traffic. We watch a car in the opposite direction cross the white line and bear down on us. Three lanes of traffic have swelled to five. Why do they even bother painting the white lines? But with all the wild driving and seeming close calls, never the sound of a blaring horn, no yelling drivers, few squealing tires, grinding gears or shrieking brakes. Everybody JUST DRIVES.

The car abruptly turns in between two buildings and lopes across debris and puddles, missing trees, dumpsters and other cars haphazardly parked. We stop. Everyone drags a bag or two and heads for a nondescript door. This is it? A few people are hanging out by the door, a few more inside. There’s the women’s room, says someone, pointing to a dark area below a stairwell. The door creaks open. More dirty, paint-stripped floors, sewage smells, bare lightbulbs. Toilet? Down the hall the other way. Be prepared. Yes. How to prepare for this: two stalls, doorless, one toilet seat, one toilet filled with debris and clearly dead. Metal a dingy green and scratched and rusted. Filth everywhere, from floor to ceiling. But there’s hot and cold running water in the filthy sink, not the usual stingy cold-only taps. Take one strip of paper to wipe down the wooden seat (it would look nice if not for the scum) and do it. Flush works. Wash hands.

Back to the dingy dressing room for a quick change. Upstairs, to the dojo. A room at least as spacious as our Chicago dojo, its tall dark walls remind me of schools I went to in the 50s and early 60s: poor, ill-kempt, painted too long ago, radiators falling apart, lights dim, windows tall and depressing rather than illuminating. The mats are syntho-tatami – softer than what we train on in Chicago, but old and ratty, covers peeling off in places. Dozens of men are already messing around on the mat when we walk in, leaping wildly, enthusiastically, trying everything they know with enormous intent. Someone has clearly left a mark on this group, they fly with such abandon: Koichi Barrish. I watch in amazement. This is Vlodya’s class.

People start moving into position and shortly class starts. One after another, we are introduced: Jamie, 4th dan, 16 years’ training; Yuki and I, 3rd dans with 19 years’ training each; Rob, 3-dan with 16 years; Robert, 2-dan with 15 years; Gilaine, shodan with 9 years, Edwin on and off 9 years’ training, and Susan, a 2-dan in taekwondo with a year of Aikido under her belt. Not a bad line-up, I think. At 14:00 we finally stop, thoroughly warmed up and just a little worn down. Lunch? a cheery chorus rises. The Russians begin to consult. Rumors leak. Lunch, then rest. Rest, then lunch. Walk, then lunch, then rest. The murmurs continue. Finally, consensus. We go to Vasili’s class tonight, 17:00-20:00? American faces pale and eyes dart around for a sounding. We’ve just sweated for almost 2 hours and they want us to do three more tonight? More murmurs. Jamie negotiates: How about 18:00-19:00? More murmurs. Okay OK. Lunch, then rest, then back here for 18:00. Jamie interjects. Oh, we need to have our meeting, the one she and I missed this morning because we arrived late. Make that 17:30 for the meeting, then training at 18:00, OK? Sighs of acquiescence. So much for seeing Moscow on Day 2.

Dima, Gslaine and I walk off to find some apples. Jamie and I are going with Vasya and Mariana. No, Jamie wants the Americans to go together… More negotiations. By now, it’s 15:00. Gilaine and I sit in the car and wait. Jamie disappears and finally the car is tottering briskly out of the wild lot where it had been parked, down Moscow streets to a café. Mariana slips out quickly to scoop out the scene. No room. We tear off for another place. Again Mariana disappears down a cellar door. Big line-up. Finally, we pull up to the Studentskiy Kafe. Okay, we can get food here. This is clearly the land of negotiation, but they have only one dish available at this time. Mariana points to the first entree on the menu. I take a good look at the menu: the most expensive hot dish is 18 rubles, a total of 60¢. Hard to believe. We nod in hungry agreement.

The table has what might have been cute tiny lamp, but its shade melted in several places by incautious tilts. The restaurant is little more than a 10-seater tavern with shingled interior and cheap, thin carpeting. A savvy, pretty woman in a chignon and demure clothes serves us. Vasya and Mariana choose two items. Coffee or tea? Tea. Tea. Tea. Four chayi. We’re all set. A ‘salad’ appears: two rows of sliced cucumber separated by a row of sliced tomato. Fresh sprigs of an herb garnish the plate. I imagine the waitress slicing as efficiently and professionally as Mariana last night. Then the entree: a stew over potatoes and onions, also garnished with a different pair of herbs, plus a plate of rye bread wrapped in a napkin. With the two side salads and bread, the 18-ruble dish is easily enough for the four of us. We eat like orphans, savoring this meal of heart and kidney stew after a six-hour food-less hiatus with training. The vegetables are all fresh. So is the bread. Conversation goes on in a blend of Russian, Ukrainian and English. As the penultimate morsel goes down our gullets, Mariana and Vasya abruptly stand up. We go? Vasya pulls out a 3-inch wad of bills and peels off a bunch. Oh, could I change some money with you? No problem. I give them $10 and Mariana counts out 330 rubles. 330? She smiles disparagingly. Ruble is not worth. Later, I give her back 30. 30 to the dollar is plenty; 33 is too high. We drive off in a cloud of petrol stench.

Do you want to teach? Vasya asks me when we arrive at the Bolshoi Dojo. He and Mariana have a class from 16:00-18:00 and then from 18:00-20:00. We’re supposed to meet with all the group at 17:30. If we’re as good as this morning, it won’t matter. Gilaine and I decide to train now and skip later. Vasya will teach 16:00-17:00 and I will teach the second hour, since this group is not the same people as the later group. The desire for detail, for information, clarification, feedback is so palpable. And the ukemi is of a kind that makes it easy for a different instructor to be able to show things effectively. When I watch Vasya teach, he looks like a picture out of Westbrook & Ratti’s Aikido and the Dynamic Sphere – the broad, extended style of Koichi Tohei and Yoshimitsu Yamada. Very competent and effective, but also the style of a strong and large man. He has the uke push on him to emphasize the commitment to the attack, which I like. The uke then explodes forward into unbalance and the technique is a piece of cake. I start training with a young boy of 14, but then I’m stuck with him: no one here switches partners. Soon a couple of young girls are training next to us, all of them soft and wild and without focus.

Then Vasya’s class ends and it is my turn to teach. My name is Leda Volyanska, I say in Ukrainian. If you don’t understand what I’m saying, please let me know. I start with tenkan and the Saotome standby that has no name, to focus on containing some of the wild and woolly energy and gathering power. Learning stability, center, less emphasis on the throw. In no time the class is a full-tilt boogie and people are clamoring for feedback. Like this? Please watch. Is correct? Is right? Please look! and on and on. The usual endless helping out of people who’ve never seen a move done a certain way before. It’s fun to tease them, to watch them fly with such cheerful abandon.

When class ends, Dima comes up to me and asks me why I practiced with the boy. I say, What’s it to you? He was next to me. He frowns disapprovingly and asks again. I look him in the eye: I don’t run after training partners and I can learn from anyone. Plus I had no way of knowing you folks don’t switch partners. That seems acceptable and he says, Can I work with you? I sit down with him to do kokyu-ho. He holds on tight, as I figure he will, and I do my kokyu-ho. When it’s his turn, he’s unable to do it at all. I don’t even feel like I’m trying hard to stop him, but he can’t do it. This seems to satisfy him. Then he wants to go over some techniques with me. He alternates between jumping suicidally for me and strong-arming. He’ll ask me to do a technique, then lock in. I ‘try’ to do the technique, then wave my free hand in his face and say Why bother? I can hit you if need be. He seems puzzled.

Meanwhile, Jamie and the crew are getting ready for the 18:00-20:00 practice. We sit down for a two-minute meeting. I watch Jamie’s response to my having taught. Not pleased, as I expected, though she says it’s because of the meeting. One issue that I bring up is the fact that there are so many scheduled classes and several dojos and given that we are three sandans and Jamie, maybe we ought to schedule things so that we spread the wealth a little and give as many people as possible a change to have one of us teach. Jamie stonewalls it. I’m not willing to push the issue, but her attitude is a surprise. I thought that the whole idea of bringing senior aikidoists along was to share the instruction. The first of many illusions about Jamie falls down.

Gilaine and I go off with Dima and the rest go on with training. It is growing dark and Dima has no car. His sidekick Andrei will drive us to the Kremlin. It’s obvious that he has decided Gilaine is of interest to him. Of course they trained together, and she got so mad she punched him in the nose and stomped off to the other side of the mat. She tells me this in an urgent undertone whenever he’s a bit distracted. Besides, he knows French rather than English, so he can’t understand much of what we say. I take on the role of intermediary – more like interference at times. While Gilaine fills my left ear with her pleasure at having a place to herself, Dima asks me in my right ear why she didn’t eat his food. Gilaine explains in my left that she overslept her alarm and was very embarrassed at the lovely spread she had to rush away from. Dima looks doubtful; Gilaine says See what I mean? and describes her charged-up morning warding off Dima’s extravagant solicitousness. Dima fills my right ear with fractured Frussian, explaining that he doesn’t want us to go to his dojo at the Kremlin because it’s too small, that he’d like Gilaine to teach at his dojo, that the onion-domed, Joseph-colored St. Basil’s church “is working” maybe – it turns out not to be working after all when he reads the sign out front –, that he likes to speak French and improve himself, and only intermittently asks us about ourselves.

Red Square is dark by now and a sharp little wind has come up. We drift cross the empty cobbles where the Russian and Communist empires once marched. Yet I don’t have even a passing thought for the mausoleum or the military dress parades that have made this such a focus of power and terror for the last seven decades or more… probably for its entire history in fact. Tonight, it’s just a cold, old, cobbled square. We walk on to the other side of the Kremlin where the cars of VIPs come and go. There is a small wooded garden that we wander down into. Gilaine is vehement about keeping Dima at arm's length; Dima is equally vehement about his courtship. I’m amused by his silly, pompous courtship and don’t envy Gilaine in the least.

I see a dead cat lying by a railing. It doesn’t look like an auto accident. Dima confirms this: probably stoned by some kids. Stoned? Oh yes, a fairly common occurrence here. Adults actually shoot them. I shudder and wonder why. So far, I have not seen many cats or dogs, but this will soon change. Luckily, this is also the last dead cat I will get to see. Ahead of us is the Moskva River, so we walk along it for a bit. The river is wide and surprisingly calm here, by the bridge. Tame and cold. We are now walking quite briskly in the chill night air and I ask what time it is: time to head for our respective homes. We turn around and hurry back up the street, detouring a little in the park, then down into the subway.

The famous Moskva Metro. I’ve only read about its supposed art galleries and marble walls, but this station has a plain, well-lit entry. Then the escalators, the soviet super-escalators, going down for what seems like miles in to the bowels of the earth. They’re scary. Only a long time later does somebody point out that they run much faster than North American escalators. I realize that’s why they gave me such a feeling of vertigo the first few times. Carriage lamps line the long slides in between each set of stairs: far prettier than the anti-juvie studs that are so popular on western escalator slides. Dima pays for us, of course. I have only a wad of 10-ruble notes, Gislaine has only American, and the fare is 15 kopeks. The station itself is like another world, built for princes, not plebes. The cars are actually not that modern, but immaculate and well-kept – well-made compared to everything else I’ve seen so far. People quiet down a little to look at us as we get on in our western ways. The conversation then jogs along in English and Frussian. Not much can be seen of the stations’ famed glory as we race from one to the next. People look well-fed and very bourgeois. Off we get at last and wander back up the service street to where Jamie and I are staying.

Dinner tonight resembles dinner from last night: onion and tomato salad, some meat, more arbuz. Oleg and Vlodya are here, as are Mariana, Vasili, and Andrei. Yuki is also, having tagged along with Oleg, whose house she’s staying at. Gilaine and Dima stay only long enough to greet everyone and leave for his (her) place. The vodkas are broken out as we sit to eat. Mariana decides to go and make grits at this point. Once again, I demur. Yuki takes a sip. Jamie fights two toasts. In the background, the color TV drones. Tonight a surreal, ironic fashion piece from England drags on and on, woman after scrawny woman, tits showing through cellophane or butt cut out of cardboard “outfit,” wrapped in plastic of one kind of another. In between sets, a clownish woman in top hat, Professor Someone-or-other, simpers and postures. It may all be tongue-in-chic, but the parade of naked and nasty mannequins strikes me like a video porn parade for onanists. Plus it’s very distracting from the company and conversation.

Three toasts, and those of us who are eating food have pushed our plates aside. The evening wears on. Yuki crashes out on our bed. Vlodya, Oleg and Jamie are rapping in Russian. The issue of money comes up. They want $900 per person. I think, that’s a bit rich, $50 a day, when lunch cost about one dollar and they aren’t exactly feeding us caviar. We haggle a little and Oleg whittles it down to $800. I point out that, whatever their work, the ruble is only 32 to the dollar, so they are getting a princely sum. Also there’s the matter of three people with travelers’ checks. Once we’ve agreed, Jamie and I decide we might as well pay them our shares up front. Oleg and Vlodya go into the hall while we get the money together. $1,600.

What about Yuki’s share? We shake Yuki awake. She smiles groggily and sits up. Money? Oh, it’s all sewn into my undershirt. We chase the men out of the apartment altogether and Yuki undoes her home-made money belt. She pulls out a pile of $20s. Then another of $10s. Then a bundle of singles. Jamie and I look at each other: Singles? What’s this? Yuki pulls out another lot. Singles. And another. And yet another. Yuki! we both shout at the same time. What the hell –!?! She shrugs. I just wanted to be sure I could cash it. Singles?!? we groan and watch her take out pile after pile of one-dollar bills. My husband said it wasn’t necessary, but I didn’t want to chance it. Do you realize we now have to count all this? Yuki giggles. Jamie and I grab wads of bills and start: 1, 2, 3. On and on we go. But the stacks get mixed up. Jamie and I are already to scream as we re-count stack after stack and neatly pile the bills up in 100s. Yuki finishes counting her heap. Then we look and realize there is another stack under her knee. Was it counted or wasn’t it? I pick up the stacks we know were counted and we pile them on the table. We’ve been fanning bills for almost 20 minutes at this point. Finally we have $1,673 counted out, $700 of it in singles. We take $800 to pay and Yuki stashes the rest back in her undershirt. Then Jamie and I go to our stashes and get our money.

Finally, we call Oleg back in – Vlodya’s gone home – and hand him $2,400. The rest has to be worked out. Oleg smiles. Now you will toss and turn all night over this money. Jamie and I laugh dismissively. He and Yuki leave. And of course, Jamie and I start thinking about the money. I do some elementary calculating. Do you realize they want 180,000 rubles from us? Do you realize what that means in terms of their money and their earning power? That would send 30 aikidoka to the US with round trip airfare to New York at around $200 or R 6,000. That’s also the equivalent of 50 years’ salary at R600 a month! We are both flabbergasted at these figures and begin to re-hash the arrangements. It’s past 02:00 when we fall asleep. Oleg, it seemed, had cursed us.

Day 3: Monday, September 23

Jamie rises early and hides in the kitchen to do her chanting. When she comes out, she’s all excited: You know, I was telling you about this therapist saying I needed a 5-year vacation? Well, it came to me while I was chanting: I’m in retirement NOW. I’m not going to wait until Bali. I think – Is this the right time to retire? I mean, we have three weeks of Aikido ahead of us. But it sounds like what Jamie needs and she’s obviously happy with the solution.

By 09:00 I’ve called Sprint to make an appointment with Henry Radzikowski for this afternoon. He’ll also let me use the fax machine; Rob’ll be glad to hear this. The driver arrives to take Jamie to the airport: in our rush to get through customs with the 32 other pieces of baggage we had lugged across the sea to this frontierland, she’d left behind the box of bokken, our wooden swords. At 10:30, Andriy comes by to make me some kasha and at 11:30 Vasili and Mariana come to take us all to the Vakunin Dojo for Vlodya’s class. At 12:00, Jamie arrives and informs us that she feels terrible, so sick that she’s going straight home to bed. I look at Rob: Shall we share this class? We agree to split this one, Rob then me, and set someone up for tonight’s class.

Down to the grimy “locker room,” and another round of interminable “negotiations” and discussions. Rob is coming with me and somehow we have to get to the Central Post office, which is where Sprint is. Well, how are we going to do this? Finally, Rob and I go in Dima’s car with his deshi Andrei, the one who speaks English but doesn’t understand much, according to Gilaine. We follow Vasili and Mariana to the same café we were at yesterday. By the time we arrive, it’s quarter to three and Andrei and Rob and I get right back into the car and split for the appointment. The others will go on and eat their lunch and wait until we get back. 45 minutes later, we finally pull up beside the post office. I figure our appointment will last about 15 minutes. Andrei settles into his seat while Rob switches shirts and we get out.
We walk to the far corner and enter a cavernous building with a million queues. Telephones, telegrams, faxes, and postal services: it’s all in here, if you care to wait. I look around. There’s no access to any other area of the building, so we turn around to leave. Two military types pass by, but Rob doesn’t feel like asking them for directions; neither do I. We get out of the building and look around. There seems to be another entry or two down this side of the block. We try the first. No dice. The second has a lobby with no one in it and no signs. We ask someone in the street. They point to the far corner and suggest the office there. Inside, a middle-aged woman in a snug red dress and old-fashioned bouffant sitting behind a glass panel, smiles and says Yes, in the pereulok, pointing to the lane to the left of her entrance. We turn down the lane and Hallelujah, there’s a familiar name: Ñïðèíò!

By now, it’s a quarter to four and I’m upset that we’re late: though I’m used to the mañanaland sense of time here, I figure an American manager might still expect punctuality. After the dismal drabness of the rest of the building, I don’t know what to expect when we climb up the nondescript stairway and arrive at a plain frosted glass door. Inside, though, is a beigely warm office area with wood trim, old-fashioned but refurbished. Plants. A pleasant, very European-Slavic blond receptionist greets us. Very feminine – rather, very womanly: well-built and dressed in a discreet but flattering skirt and blouse. She ushers us into an empty office as Mr. Radzikowski is occupado. We sit for a few minutes and I worry that he’s going to blow us off for being late.

After 6-7 minutes, however, a pleasant-faced man, silver and balding, comes in and greets us. He’s in shirtsleeves that unmistakeably say “The Boss.” There is a reassuring aura of serious work and pleasant confidence about him, not the affable phony American I’m so sick of, with his 3-piece suit and clammy handshake. We are ushered in to Mr. Radzikowski’s office. Everything about his style seems right to me. As I present him the materials from ILIS and explain my connection via Matlid, he listens carefully, looks at the offer and asks: Are you buying or selling? I’m taken aback, not quite sure what he means. He explains: Are you offering me a service or do you want me to provide one? I have to know which hat to wear if we are to understand each other. I am pleased that he’s so direct and at the same time not condescending at my obvious ignorance. We’re selling, hopefully through your offices. He then explains his position: We don’t have the infrastructure to offer value-added services yet. We have about 100 clients and our sales force is pretty full up selling Sprint’s direct services. As we go on, however, he says that he has a colleague who has gone freelance as a consultant and might be interested in an arrangement. He then asks me about Matlid and his interest is definitely piqued. He explains that he has been here since December, in the offices since March, and has been developing a pool of highly-qualified Russian translators who are learning computers (he’s brought PCs in to train them) and he figures in another month they’ll be up and running. They can work on ruble or cheap dollar basis, he says, whatever we’d be interested in. He is clearly proud of these people he has trained and without doubt is a good motivator. I am more impressed with this man every minute: his professional enthusiasm, his pride in his staff, his desire to promote local talent. Then we get to talking about Rob’s business. Finally, it’s time to leave. We arrange for the fax to be transmitted in the morning, when the lines are free-est. He’s not going to charge us anything. He’ll call his colleague tomorrow and get back to me and get back to Michael within a week or so. He explains things to his receptionist-assistant in correct but heavily-accented Russian. We shake hands and leave.

When we get outside, I discover that it’s 16:30: we were with him for nearly 40 minutes! Wow! We hope Andrei hasn’t gotten pissed and driven off without us. We rush around the block, past all the politicos and religious types with their placards and tables and back to the parked car. Which one is it? Oh, this one – and there’s Andrei, dozing. We scramble into the back seat, apologizing. Then the car lurches out into traffic. And this time, it’s serious traffic. Rush hour in Moscow. We crawl down one street, and another, and another. No cowboys here: there’s no room for a rodeo out there. Interminable minutes tick by and the car is gradually saturated with the odor of diesel. Rob and I look at each other in consternation. Where’s the EPA when we need it? Give me emission controls, I beg. I promise never to complain about the Illinois emissions test again, Just PLEASE give me a breath of Chicago air. Not even Rocky Mountains or New Hampshire: I’ll settle for the Kennedy on a bad Friday. I never thought I might die in a car in the middle of rush hour, but Rob and I won’t bet on it at this point. A half-hour crawls by, then an hour.

It’s 17:35 by the time we get back to the tavern. We hope that the others haven’t left. They haven’t. This is a quality of Russians that I am already beginning to appreciate: a stoic acceptance of the probability that everything will be running between two and five times later than you originally planned. Indeed, planning as such seems a nonstarter here. Luckily for us, the others have even left some odds and ends of food for us. But they took all the lamps off, apparently because they didn’t like them, so it’s hard to see just what’s there. Rob and I order something via Mariana. Then she suggests that I come with her and Gilaine to this dressmaker’s place next door while we wait for our food. Sounds good. We traipse into a B-grade “designer” salon with lots of 1970’s style outfits: big flower patterns, not-quite-mini skirts, flounces everywhere. But there’s one dress that catches our eyes: black with burnt orange roses and autumn leaves. It’s really quite sharp and they talk me into trying it. It fits like a charm and, for all its Hallowe’en shades, does look good. Gilaine tries on an outfit that might look nice but the skirt is too large by about 5 sizes and she decides she looks like suburban Italian (Nancy Sinatra?) in it. I know what she means, but I like the top on her. She decides to pass. I put a deposit on my dress and agree to come by tomorrow to get it. The woman now tries to persuade Gilaine to try something else, but each outfit she proposes is more ghastly and inappropriate than the last and I can see Gilaine’s about to blow a fuse. My mother always does this to me, she finally hisses to me. I can’t stand it. I tell the woman to drop it. We quickly take our leave, Gilaine remarking that the dress I’ve bought was the only good thing in the shop. I think she may be right.

Back at the tavern, dinner is in full swing. I nibble on the veggies, bread and sliced meat. Tea to drink. Dima and I chat about this and that. Maybe Gilaine and I would like to go to Arbat Street? It’s the main gimcrack touristy shopping alley in Moscow. Why not? I’ve arranged for Robert to teach the evening class. Rob goes with us because he wants to find a military watch for someone back in California. He’s pleased that the fax to Dana’s taken care of and we’re all hoping that maybe tonight we’ll also get to finally buy something here…! Another student of Dima’s will drive us down this time, Kiril, a good-looking 6 foot 3 kid who doesn’t look a day over 18. We part with Vasili and Mariana, who are going to check in on Jamie. Another – mercifully quick – drive through downtown Moscow, which has so far thoroughly failed to reveal anything of real architectural or historical interest. It’s just a conglomerate of Stalinist decay and messy exteriors. Nothing seems older than the Revolution – except a church or two, of which there is perhaps a handful in the entire city today.

We park the car and saunter to what looks like a construction zone but reveals itself to be a cobbled alley with hundreds of small vendors at their tables. What a hoot: the first one has Gorby dolls, several different kinds, including one that has 12 dolls going all the way back to Alexander Nevsky. That’s the one I want. But as Gilaine and I make noises about it and start to ask the price, Dima stops us. Non, nous aller regarder tout. Apres acheter. Nous acheter, non vous. I get it. He figures he’ll get a better price being a native. But what do they cost? I ask. But what if we don’t find this one again? Gilaine asks. Next to the Gorby dolls is a wooden model of St. Basil’s. I like that too. The doll is not priced, the church is R 900 or around $30. I decide I can wait. We move away, ushered up the street by Dima and his minion. The younger man is actually quite nice, and, as Gilaine puts it, would be pretty interesting if he weren’t 19. He pumps iron. I remember training with him this afternoon, and for all his strength, he was very much fun to throw around.

We meander down Arbat, both sides of the street lined with small tables and vendors eager to practice their two sentences of perfectly colloquial American on us gringos. Got any dollars? I bet you’ll like this. I start talking in Ukrainian, though the clothes are still a giveaway. I do have rubles and I do want to buy something, but we pass table after table, watch vendor after watch vendor and make no decisions. Rob is getting visibly peeved. He really wants to get this watch. I’m looking for a box. Ruslan and Ludmilla glow redly in dozens of variations, troikas on a black background. Each of the boxes is truly lovely. Gilaine wants a Gorby doll. I’ve decided I want an icon doll, gold gilt. But those are really expensive: R 1,500. Dima asks Gilaine what she’s looking for. Well, actually, I’d like to get a small chess set. Mike and I play chess sometimes. I think he’d like it. There are a surprising number of different kinds of chess sets. Some of the lacquerware is on the cheap, just reproductions glazed onto the wood, but everything is handmade and unique, that’s obvious. It’s such a delightful relief. After all the touristy kitsch I’ve seen everywhere else, I feel guilty that these handmade things are so cheap for me. At one table are wooden lacquer spoons and bowls. Kiril warns me that the lacquer won’t bear actual use. If I put liquid into the bowl, it will come off! Scratch the bowl and spoon idea. Rob finds a red lacquered box he likes and decides to go for it. Fifteen dollars, says the eager vendor. Ten, says Rob. Fifteen dollars good price, persists the vendor. Rob shakes his head and walks away. Then he saunters back and says, Twelve dollars. The vendor shakes his head. Good price. Fifteen dollars. Rob persists, the vendor doesn’t budge. We all finally drift away empty-handed. Gilaine spots some chess sets, but Dima immediately wants to either buy one or proposes a different one. She walks away, exasperated.

Darkness is starting to fall and it’s harder and harder to distinguish anything. We’re all feeling chilled and hungry and not a little disgruntled that we haven’t found a chance to actually buy something. Prices have been up and down and I think of the missed opportunities. Now we’re talking coffee. Is there a café anywhere near? Yes, but we’re having dinner with Vasya and Mariana. OK, so we starve. We finally decide to turn around and stroll back up the street: to the left and right vendors are packing up their stock and leaving now. We look for a café, but in the end we decide that it’s too late anyway and head back to the car.

Another rousing ride through the streets of Moskva and over to the apartment Jamie and I are staying in. Word is she’s been quite sick and when we get there, it’s like an intensive care unit. Jamie’s wrapped up in her pyjamas and a jacket, a scarf around her neck and looking totally wretched. Vlodya and his wife, both physicians, as is Dima, have been medicating her: ampycillin, anti-congestants, and at least a half-dozen homeopathic remedies, plus cayenne, garlic and pepper – the whole nine yards. I almost smile at the incredible paraphernalia, but decide to express sympathy instead. I feel so lousy, Jamie snivels, her voice sounding like nails scraping the bottom of a crate. Dima gets in on the doctoring but after a half-hour of hanging around, he and Gilaine leave for the metro. Vlodya checks Jamie one more time, explains the medications and now we’re alone. Jamie crawls into bed. After a while, so do I.

Day 4: Tuesday, September 24

The morning starts the usual way: we get to Bakunin, to Vlodya’s dojo about five minutes before class and I hustle to the toilet, then to change. The crummy under-the-stairs closet doesn’t look quite as depressing as it did on Sunday. Today Yuki and I are sharing the class. I feel a bit nervous now, being thrust into so much teaching so abruptly. No time to psych myself up or plan anything. I do a big long warm-up, including lots of ukemi and shikko. When my 45 minutes end, I can hardly believe I’ve only done tenkan! Then Yuki takes over and does some wild ushiro stuff. It’s great. I wail on Mariana and she wails on me. I’m pleasantly pooped by the time training ends. While Yuki heads off with Oleg and Jamie is up to something with Vasya, Andrei decides it’s time for a cultural break, so he drags Gilaine and me off to the Contemporary Art Gallery. The building is chill and vacant, and we quickly drift through the show. I find little that is memorable. By 17:00, we’re on our way back and they drop me off at the apartment. Jamie and Mariana are already there.

Not far from Mariana and Vasyl’s is a Korean café, apparently, and word is that we will be having dinner there. Mariana, Jamie and I are supposed to meet Vasyl and Oleg, so around 19:00, Mariana walks us over to the Seoul. It has grown chilly over the last few days, and the sun has long set as we head out, although it is still Daylight Savings Time. It seems that Moscow is about one hour later than it should be, that is, the time really should be 20:00, but maybe they don’t want to seem so far from Europe or something.

It takes a while to figure out which entrance we should be going into in a deserted-looking complex. When we figure it out, we find that, inside, the place is a gaunt, empty place with frayed table cloths and wall hangings in some kind of Oriental style, bleak and dimly lit. It looks more like a dining hall in a bad war movie, and it’s poorly heated. We find a table under a wall with a carpet and sit down to wait for Vasyl and Oleg. Half an hour goes by, with the waiter or manager coming by to ask Mariana what we would like and her shaking her head that we weren’t ready to order. Finally, Jamie decides that enough is enough.

“Let’s just go ahead and order. I’m cold and hungry.” I agree, so Mariana calls the waiter over and begins ordering in Russian. Another interminable wait during which silence grows like a pall, since Jamie and I are becoming uncomfortable together, while Mariana is not a great conversationalist. Finally some bowls and plates are brought out and we look at the lumps shredded cabbage, kim-chee and other pickled stuff. The trouble is, most of the dishes are cold, and we’re not only really hungry, but also in need of warming up.

“The pickles will make you feel hot,” says Mariana unconvincingly. Desperate to have something in our bellies, we dig in. It doesn’t taste much better than it looks. Probably like Chinese food in Iowa: not quite authentic because the proper ingredients aren’t available. The boys still haven’t shown up. Eventually lukewarm noodles are brought out in big bowls. Bits of vegetables and meat float in them and we half-heartedly eat a little, but our appetites are gone. We’ve been in this dismal restaurant for over an hour and a half at this point. Even though it’s still early, all we want to do is go home and pass out, there is so little wit or warmth this evening.

Suddenly, Vasya shows up with Andrei. They promptly sit down, ready to dig in, but Jamie’s having none of it, so Mariana calls for the bill. Another interminable wait while she settles. Meanwhile, I ask for the left-overs to be packed up. This causes a little consternation, doggie bags being an unknown phenomenon in this land of wasted food, but eventually they bring over a wimpy bag with the noodles wrapped in plastic and we trail out. It’s taken another half hour to get out of the place! Outside the night is pitch dark and very ill-lit as we shiver back across the massive boulevard to their apartment complex. The Russians see that we are in no mood to socialize and promptly leave. It may be only 21:30, but the food goes into the fridge, and Jamie and I go to our beds.

Day 5: Wednesday, September 25

Jamie seems worse this morning. Around 09:30, Mariana calls to say Andrei’s on his way. and he’ll be taking me to a church this morning. At 10:30, Andrei shows up and we have some breakfast together. Jamie demurs at first, and then gets up and nibbles half-heartedly at some kasha. At eleven we start for the dojo. We’re going by bus. Sounds like fun. How far is the church? Oh, it’s close to the dojo. OK. We walk down to the main street. It’s cold and gloomy, much like the previous days. The sun, when it shines, is thin and lukewarm. The streets are weak and dirty. As usual, he has grabbed my bag and virtually whistles as he walks. A very pleasant, endearing young man. Helpful without ever seeming either obsequious or pushy. He’s been practicing English with Gilaine. In fact, he’s quite a contrast to Dima and I think she’s really enjoying her time with Andrei.

We take the Metro and then a bus. Rah, buses. Dumpy and crowded. Lots of chatting, not like CTA. We get off a block away from a baby blue domed church. By now it’s a quarter to twelve, but Andrei seems unconcerned. We wander briskly through the church and I tell him that I’d like to come by again, when there’s a little more time to really look around. We go back to the main street and catch a bus the remaining kilometer to the dojo. There’s a lack of order to the streets that’s very un-European, though there’s more variety here: some houses and gardens, a theater for children, the usual government-issue “îâî÷û” “ôðóêòû,” “öâåòû,” sprinkled about.

Today, our cultural program is a trip to the famous Tretyakov Gallery. Right now, it has an exhibit of Pskov icons, so we are look forward to quite a history of Russian art and religion. When we get there, the place has a long queue going in and is fairly crowded inside. Understandably so, since the Tretyakov is an internationally known gallery and one of the top in all of Russia. I find the collection astounding and lose myself in going through room after room mesmerized by the most beautiful icons I’ve ever seen. Of course, my previous experience is what was in Greek Catholic churches in Canada and the US, mostly tacky and mostly less than a generation old. These are the real McCoy, and the variety is astounding. Of course, there are the endless portraits of Christ, the Virgin Mary with Baby Jesus, and hundreds of apostles and saints. There are also diptychs, tryptichs and bits of iconostasis. There are some that frame entire tableaux of Christ’s life in a series of tiny individual scenes, much like an early version of comic books, really. There are any number of different St. Georges fighting dragons. My favorite is one in rich shades of red and gold leaf. Gilaine is particularly good to be doing this with as she really knows her stuff, in fact has trained in restoration. Has she considered coming here to do some? In fact, she’s interested in finding out about programs or projects involved in restoration, she says. There’s apparently something of that nature in Ukraine. The only thing is, she says, that the money sucks. She couldn’t live on what they pay restorers. I’m pretty tired by the time we get out of the gallery, although I could have sat and stared at some of the icons all night.

That night, I decide to make some ramen for supper. Jamie demurs because of the state of her stomach. “I feel terrible. My stomach’s a mess too. You know, I’m allergic to just about everything.” “Maybe you should go easy on all these medications, then,” I suggest. She looks doubtful and I realize that she likes being pampered. So I urge her, “Have some ramen, it’ll quiet down your stomach.” I go into the kitchen and poke through the store of leftover vegetables from the Korean café. There are carrots, onions and sprouts among the slop of noodles, cucumbers and other oddities. I set the three choice vegs to boil and wander back into the living room.

Jamie’s reading something but looking generally uncomfortable in the only armchair. She’s wearing her cap and a scarf and housecoat. Her hair hangs limp and oily and her skin is a dull yellow. And she’s got full-blown viral bronchitis. Bed rest for a few more days… maybe no Pskov.

I flip over the tape and she comments that she likes the music – it’s Ray Lynch’s No Blue Thing. I tell her my favorite tune is "The True Spirit of Mom and Dad" and she cracks a smile. What a name! But we remember our talk the first night. The veggies are done, I strip the plastic off the tightly curled slab of ramen and ease it into the boiling water. I separate the noodles as they soften, stir the soup a little, count roughly 20 seconds, tear open the soup powder and sprinkle it in. Where are the bowls? Are there any bowls? I find a couple in the sink, rinse them and serve the soup. Jamie gets up from the armchair and sits at the table. Her hat and scarf give her a comic look as she examines the bowl of swiming stuff dubiously, poking her chopsticks half-heartedly into the noodles.

“Do you think I should really eat this?” “I think soup’s good for the stomach,”I say, “but if you don’t feel like it, I wouldn’t.” “Well, maybe you’re right. I haven’t been eating at all. Maybe I should.” She pokes at the soup some more. “Just drink the soup and leave the noodles. It doesn’t matter,” I say and start slurping on my own portion. The first familiar meal in four days: no tomatoes, no cucumbers, no sausage.

Day 6: Thursday, September 26

Maybe the real reason we don’t yet respond to Moskva as we do to other world cities is simply this: everyone knows the Eiffel Tower and Champs Elysees, London Bridge and Big Ben. We know the Golden Gate Bridge, the Empire State Building, Mont Royal. But no one in the west is familiar with soviet landmarks: St. Basil’s, Ukraina Hotel, Gorky Park. Even when we know the name, we don’t recognize the face. Below and to the left, the red brick wall with its green trim running around the Kremlin. Farther to the left, the Joseph-colored cupolas glitter with gold, red and green stripes joining the exhuberance of the circus with the ecstasy of religion in a merry dance. Beyond the Kremlin, the ivory towers of another church glow like heavenly butter.

Lunch is a lengthy affair at the Zymniy Sad or Winter Garden and afterwards, another fruitless round of shopping. We wander araound the famed GUM store facing Red Square, a strange and potentially beautiful bit of architecture with a lot of ironwork railings and galleries. But right now it is now filled with a chaos of commerce that ignores the bone structure altogether.
Mindful of our 20:00 train, we get back to the apartment around by six. At seven in the evening, the baggage finally gets loaded into the car and we tear off for another wild pony ride through Moskva. Vasya assures us that we’ll be there by 19:15, our rendezvous time. At 25 past Mariana says we’re “almost there.” At 25 till, they point ahead at a building and say “It’s right there.” Except that we turn the corner and drive another 5-6 blocks. “When exactly does the train leave?” Originally they had said 20:00. Now Vasya amends it: “19:45.”

I look at Gilaine in disbelief. Only if the trains run as badly as the people here are we going to make this one. We pull into the tri-station plaza and Vasya lets us out at the Leningrad. We dash into the station, through endless waiting areas and unbelievable masses of people seeming quite aimless in their milling around. Three or four rooms in, we see Andrei and Oleg. Andrei grabs our stuff and whisks us off. “We’re the last ones.” Oleg and Mariana will wait for Vasili. The three of us scurry through several more areas, down a corridor and into a courtyard. A marching band plays in the background, and in the darkness there is a feeling that we are in another century, when trains were vital and farewells more momentous. People everywhere, game machines, vendors, hawkers, boys in uniform. It is more like a fair than a train station.

The clock says only 27 to. Thank god our watch was fast. But our pace quickens as we reach the train. I am aware that my jo bag is the same length as a rifle and wonder what the boys in uniform think of it all. We reach the platform. On the right, the Lev Tolstoy. On the left, Pskov. Our car is 14, we are at 21. Time to dash to the right wagon. At every car, quiet clusters of people watch us, catching a last smoke and final bit of gossip before parting. 16… 15… Ah, 14 at last! Past a young conductor and on board. Seats 6, 7 and 8. But the compartment already has 3 in it! Oops, pardon us, wrong seats says a man and leaves with his companion. A third man stays and we have our three seats. Andrei unloads all the gear and says, “I’ll go get Jamie.”

A minute passes and suddenly the train begins to move. No announcement, no warning! We look at each other. Do you think they got on? Surely there wasn’t enough time for Vasya to park the car and for them all to make it to this part of the train… Hopefully they hopped on at the far end.

Next thing we know, Jamie comes in, then Rob, then Andrei, and eventually Vasya, Mariana and Oleg. Seems everyone made it except Edwin – who will probably spend the weekend kung-fuing to his heart’s content.

Oleg, of course, wants a vodka partner. We all demur. He presses. Gilaine finally says, “Look, come back at midnight. If I’m still up, I’ll need the vodka.” But after our two cups of Russian-style tea, in a glass with a silver holder, and the making of the beds, we quietly lock the door and one by one drift off. Some time later, I hear a knock. No one stirs, and neither do I. Vodka is not what I need, but vodychka. The compartment stays at about 72°F all night and my throat dehydrates more with each passing hour. I sleep fitfully, listening to the mighty heaving of the train at its frequent stops. Finally, it’s 07:30 and we all wake up with the day. Ablutions and another round of tea, Conversation with the engineer from Kharkiv who now lives in Pskov and studies economics in Moskva. Fun talking Ukrainian so comfortably. The countryside looks like Iowa: gold and green and low-lying.

Day 7: Friday, September 27

The train whistles into Pskov, a tidy but dirty white stucco station building with the regulation reddish overhanging roof and dangling sign. We hustle off with all our lumpy bags and clattering weapons and three people step forward hesitantly. The young woman looks fiercely prim, like the iron-maiden style tourist guard one might have expected until recently, or the headmistress of a miserable girls’ school. She clips out a greeting and we meet Vadim, the instructor of the local dojo. As we walk our gear towards the parking lot, the usual state of confusion arises. Who goes where? How to organize this? Men in one place, women in another? Shall we drive the men to their quarters so that they can rest up – the women can wait for a taxi? etc, etc. No wonder this country can’t distribute any goods: it can’t even get eight people home from a train station in a provincial town…!

Used to the courtesies of Western chauvinism, the women are a bit miffed at being left hanging while the men get to settle in pronto. We finally all pile into the same bus, which rattles and bumps its way through the pokey streets to an unpaved courtyard. The four men and Mariana pile out and take their paraphernalia into a scrappy-looking building with rusted shutters hanging askew at its windows. Across the yard, out the other side of the bus, I can see a shed with a big alley cat prowling, not as tough-looking as the Venetian bullies I saw last winter, but definitely a prowler. I watch the cat slink up and down parts of the shed while more confusion is resolved and finally it is agreed that we’ll be taken forthwith to the place where the five of us will stay.

It turns out to be the family of one of the Aikido students, a police detective, his wife, their two daughters, and the wife’s parents. We worry a little about the onslaught of so many guests when they already live in what for us are tight quarters, but they are adamant about me and Yuki staying in their apartment. The daughters will sleep with the parents. What’s more, by soviet standards, their apartment is huge, thanks to the father’s work. (As it turns out, he will not be able to train because he’s on duty, tracking down some criminal gang or something.) But they have three spacious rooms in addition to a decent-sized kitchen in a not- too-bad part of town. Moreover, the building is newer and the furniture relatively contemporary, with a breakfast nook in the kitchen.

We are told to wash up and rest a little, then they will feed us. After that, training. And in the evening, the baths at the local sports complex, as they call them. So we settle into our room, spread out our few possessions, wash up a little. Washing hands is a standard ritual, and it is quite normal for a hostess to suggest to visitors upon arrival that they wash their hands. Even a necessary ritual, I think, in an environment as rundown and dirty as much of the former Soviet Union seems to be so far. Yuki sleeps while I write a little, then read, then doze as well.
An hour later, we are called to lunch. I feel dopey, as I usually do when I sleep during the day and stumble off the bed a little out of balance. We slip on the taptsi – as opposed to kaptsi as we called slippers at home – and flap our way down the corridor to the livingroom, which doubles as the parents’ – and now the whole family’s – bedroom. An amazing spread greets our eyes: the table has been pulled out, extended, covered with a pristine white cloth, and laden with all kinds of wonderful things. This is the first proper Slavic welcome we have had since arriving nearly a week ago.

The daughters join us. They are 8 and 12. Very pretty girls with long flaxen braids, somewhat shy, but keen to try out their English on us. Training is at 14:00, so we don’t want to be eating too close to the practice. Soon we are taken over to the Pskov dojo, a huge, bright space in a sports center, with mats put together in the middle of a basketball court. There are bleachers, but it’s not like a typical court at home: the walls and bleachers are white, more like the kind of building it might have been in the 1930’s or 40’s. There are ropes hanging from the ceiling and mirrors on one wall. Jamie does most of the teaching. There is a tall skinny girl with long hair, Anya, who seems to be the dojo mama, as we called them in the west. She is the girlfriend of one of the instructors (who’s not quite divorced from his wife) and the administrator of the club.

There is a charming young girl, about 17 years old, who is a tall, dark-braided beauty, like the Ukrainian princesses of fairy tales. I peg her for about a 5th kyu level, with six months to a year under her belt. When we train together, I begin to see that her aikido is completely fossilized, and later I find out she’s trained on and off for several years! She has no physical aptitude at all, from what I can see, something I have not really encountered in someone so young before, but I like her. In fact, she turns out to be from L’viv. Marina Serebriakova. Her father was a Russian officer, and her mother from L’viv. They met in school in Russia, but after the father died, the mother returned to L’viv. Marina speaks Ukrainian quite well, but the mother identifies as a Russian and so the language at home is Russian. Marina has come to Pskov to study at the university, leaving her sister and mother back in L’viv. Eventually I realize her English is quite fossilized, too. She has rather exotic British-like expressions and a tinge of a British accent, but she was obviously taught by locals.

Day 8: Saturday, September 28

Pushkinskaya Gora – Pushkin’s Hill. We’re bumping along at 80-100 kph on the main drag from Leningrad to Kyiv: Leningrad = 370 km, Kyiv = 480 km. Unsurprisingly, the road is less well kept than the old two-laners of 1950s Canada. And perhaps there is a good reason: if slashing and burning are the ultimate Russian defence, a serious network of roads such as in the US would render the tactic useless. The same infrastructure that might have made the movement of USSR troops easy and quick would aid and abet any invading army. With that in mind, rails are both easier to destroy effectively and to rebuild cheaply. So you have the opposite effect as Henry Ford’s.

I’m afraid my cold has infected my respiratory tract. I keep blowing my nose, sneezing and feeling congested but the infection is not in my sinuses. Oops, the benzine and the water are in their respective tanks and we’re off in another cloud of putrid toxins. The countryside is lovely: magpies and rooks flying about. I love the whirring look of the black and white wings. One stop was aptly named Sunset [zakhod’]. The land is rolling and mild: full greens and yellows. The poverty of the human plane is not apparent under the thick grey clouds cut through with gold and smokey blues.

The excursion to Pushkin’s grave is mainly a photo op for us all, me in my Japanese fireman’s jacket, hanging around a well with poetic inscriptions and so on. It is cool, but not too chilly.
That evening, Marina the Ukrainian princess joins us again. When I mention at dinner how nice her outfit is, she replies: “When there isn’t much beauty in life, you try to create it wherever possible.” The “Fable Room” we are sitting in is also a work of beauty, with fairytale carvings on all the walls. It’s such a treat to see such lush, rich handwork in this otherwise impoverished land.

On our return, we are prepared to fag out after the long day, but our host insists that we should try the baths: “It’s good for fighting colds.” So off to the sports complex baths we all go. The changing room is a narrow affair that feels crowded with just Gilaine, Yuki and me in it. But this is a proper Russian banya, which means steaming yourself to melting point and then lying on your stomach while one of the helpful men from the club whacks you with birch branches. Invigorating it is, but messy, as the leaves shred in the process and everyone is covered in wet greenery when the “beating” is over. I decide I prefer saunas.

Day 9: Sunday, September 29

Oleg comments about US lifestyles and gadgetry: “So you buy a vacuum cleaner and all it does is create a vacuum in your life…”

Meanwhile, as if to prove his point, Marina makes bread and 3 tonnes of jam. After a lazy morning, lunch is by the lake, Ozero Vel’ye, but it’s definitely not picnic weather. Oleg hauls out fishing rods, lines, tackle – even a pair of hip-hugging waders. Down by the water, the land is boggy, spongey and very very wet. My feet sink in as I walk along the reedy shore. Plastic and left-behinds abound, even here. A double-hulled boat sits in the water, a kind of primitive catamaran without a sail. It does not look seaworthy. The weather is overcast and chill, the countryside low-lying rises and somewhat barren. The lake’s edges are dotted with clumps of tall grasses, not fit for swimming or boating, really. I’m frankly glad when we make our way back to the apartment where we are staying.

But not for long. We now head towards the Estonian border to one of the largest monasteris in Russia and apparently the only one that was never closed, not even during WWII, the Pskovsky Pechersk Monastery, another cave monastery. But it’s in much better shape than its Kyiv counerpart: beautiful dark blue domes with golden stars everywhere and well-preserved buildings forming a a kind of long courtyard in the middle, surrounded by an old forest of very tall trees. It’s almost like a religious Disneyland with all its colorful, tidy buildings with golden-domed towers.

Day 10: Monday, September 30

By eleven the next morning, we’re back at the savvy Leningradski Vokzal, where we trace our steps in reverse, to Vasya’s car. Apparently his dad borrowed it while we were gone and brought it back for us again. It looks a little cleaner or something.

We go home to shower and pack for the trip to Kyiv.

At 14:00, Oleg and some others show up and take us across the huge boulevard not far from Mariana’s and Vasyl’s apartment. It is the crest of a ridge and beyond it is another part of the city. We walk the equivalent of several long blocks and it is not warm, but the sun is bright for a change. In behind some more decrepit-looking buildings, we find ourselves going in under a hanging to an open restaurant-like space, although it is grey concrete and fairly barren. This is the Korean restaurant the boys had promised to take us to earlier. We try the ubiquitous kim-chee and other dishes. Korean cuisine, which I am eating for the first time, is rather different from both Chinese and Japanese, and I can’t say I really like it. The others seem not to mind. To me, it’s very spicy without actually being flavorful or interesting. We hang out in the chilly room, where no more than three other people come in to eat the whole time we are there, then leave finally to do some shopping on the Arbat before our 22:25 train to Kyiv. Once again, I find little of interest at a price that is worth it but Yuki and others stock up.

One thing that has struck me is thc condition of the high-rise we are staying in: the walkway to the entrance is overgrown, the sidewalk cracked. Inside, the dismal concrete walls are chipped, lightbulbs are missing in the overhead fixtures, there’s a broken window in one corner and the elevator barely runs. I’m assuming the building is from the 60s, and I mention it to Vasily.

“Oh no, this building is about five years old. It’s just that the public space doesn’t belong to anyone in particular, so it’s not taken care of.” A lightbulb goes on in my brain: so ghettos and rundown projects have little to do with education, skin color, or poverty—and everything to do with ownership. When no one owns something—a building, a space, an object—it is neglected and those who are inclined to abuse property slowly wreck it. This is a real “eureka” moment for me.

Day 11: Tuesday, October 1

The train station in Kyiv, where we arrive around 11:00, is normal, human, organized. No latrine smell. The people seem a bit smaller, stockier, more familiar too. Someone comments that they look more like peasants. I suppose that’s what provincial capitals are like. What I notice even more is that it’s bright and sunny. The area in front of the station looks like pre-war France: clean. old-fashioned cars, people bustling about with some purpose, streetcars hustling with business-like efficiency around a loop. At first it’s not clear how we are getting to where we are going, but in the end we hop a tram. With so little baggage and cars leaving every few minutes, here it makes sense. The unexpectedness of sweat in the warm sun tells us gradually that here is a glorious Indian summer, Ukraine’s answer to the damp, bone-chilling grey of Moskva. The sun drips like honey through the turning leaves of trees, and pastel plasterwork adorns block after block of 5-6 storey buildings.

We pull up to the hotel – the Leningrad of all names – and a smokey, musty smell overwhelms our nostrils. Baggage into the lobby and up to the second storey. “Don’t say anything to the concierge,” we’re told in a whisper. “They don’t know who you are and we don’t want them to know you’re Americans. We’ll have to pay more…” How anyone could mistake us for locals is hard for me to imagine, however, as our clothes and our body language are so unlike everyone else around us, even if we never say a word. A middle-aged woman and a young couple join us. Relatives of Oleg, I think. They will take us around while Oleg fishes for an itinerary. The Kyiv aikido group still hasn’t responded. We find ourselves in a tidy, dark room with 14-foot ceilings, papered walls, and deep window well. Four beds with earth-colored patterned spreads, a fridge and wardrobe. A light gleams bleakly above each headboard. Since Jamie’s not here, I can use her bed if I don’t get hold of my niece Lada. First, to get oriented.

We burst out into the warm sunny street again, to the strange musty smell, happy in light jackets and t-shirts after the chill of Russia. What a joy! The weight of an unnoticed millstone has lifted off our chests. The woman who leads us is a gracious, handsome woman around 50. I like her immediately and enjoy chatting in Ukrainian. As we pass a replica of some historic wooden ramparts, Yuki decides she wants some stamps, someone else some coffee. We go a block and there are several small stores – state-owned but open and accessible. Sorry, no coffee.

It’s pleasant and easy to walk around. The streets open onto a huge plaza with a blue and white confection of a bell tower and Bohdan Khmelnytskiy rearing on his horse. Apparently he’s pointing to Moscow with his bulava…but the gesture is more of a “Let’s go get ’em, they went that-a-way!” kind of gesture, not a friendly or subservient one. The next block we find a post office. Yuki goes in and actually gets some stamps. After Moscow, this place is an astonishment of availability. We don’t need to be escorted, either.

We wander up a couple of more streets to a walk that overlooks the lower town and a deep, wooded ravine: Podil. Down there in a crevice among two low ridges is where the tanners, potters and carters of old plied their crafts: Honchari i Kozhumiaky it’s called. Not much is visible among the heavy-headed trees, but there are supposedly factories even today. At the far end of this open area, a rock monument with old Slavonic writing: “And where is this land of ours called Rus’?” How appropriate, I think: where indeed is it after all these centuries of oppression? I feel a bittersweet joy at being here, finally, where history and reality are one and nostalgia evaporates in shame. We turn. A large tree spreads in the middle of the plaza, a dog chases around the brown grass. We suddenly realize we are looking at the outline of a long-gone church: the Desiatynna. One of the earliest churches, maybe the first, I don’t know. At the opposite end of the plaza is a gaudy, rococo church: Andriyivska. A baroque confection in the same style as the bell tower of Sofia. But when we go inside, it is a disproportionately tall and spiritually empty disappointment. The church has been a ‘museum’ for too long, it seems, and the architecture, Rastrelli’s, far more attractive as a structure than an interior.

Halfway down the cobbled Uzviz, we finally find a rundown place that’s open, down a narrow couple of stairs into a cave-like café with tiny dark wooden tables along its side walls. The entire place is about the size of half a train car and possibly less wide, maybe as wide as a Montreal Metro car. There are people at most of the tables, but the boys manage to round up some chairs and we sit at two tables. They also bring us all coffee, the Turkish style stuff with grounds in the bottom, and some crystalized ice cream. It’s nothing to write home about, but we’re happy we found something and can rest our legs for a bit.

Half the group decides to go on, as they don’t want to wait around and there aren’t enough seats for everybody. When we’re done, we wander down the hill where Oleg shows us an art gallery with some embroidery and other souvenir-like stuff but it’s all a bit despondent-looking, with little to show. There is some inexpensive silver stuff, but I’m not into jewellry. When we leave, we find ourselves in the area known as Podil, the Old Town where the Jewish merchants used to live and all the trade went on. It’s right on the river, flat and open and apparently was subject to flooding in the spring most years. Now it’s all cobbled or paved over.

We wend our way past dark and unappealiing-looking state-owned shops, boarded-up buildings and unfinished projects to the foot of the Funicular, a blue and white cable car that takes us back up to the top of the hill we just descended. There we find an ugly monstrosity of a building with columns the scale of Paul Bunyan and his Blue Ox Babe. The pedestals alone are taller than a healthy basketball player and make you feel very insignificant standing next to them. No surprise that this was built under Stalin.

The hotel is back along the same road we came up, with Bohdan swinging his mace and trolleybuses trundling, dirty and beaten, on St. Sofia square. At 18:00, dinner is served—nothing worth writing about, like most of the meals in this dismal ex-Empire. We go to Aikido at 20:00, with Yuki and me scheduled to teach. There is a man with a beard, not a large man, but nice-looking, with mild brown eyes and a demeanor I am not familiar with, watching the training. I do my usual more technical stuff, while Yuki does a flowy class that everyone seems to like. Class ends at 21:30 and Ihor Shmygin, the founder of the Kyiv club, introduces me to the man as a friend of his, Oleksandr Lysiak. He’s going to take care of me while I’m in Kyiv, that if there’s anything I would like to do etc etc. After a cold, stringy shower, I dress and leave in his car for Lada’s. The two of us do a little night-time sightseeing, but there is a class scheduled for 07:00 the next day, so I don’t dare stay out late. Les seems like a nice guy, but also a bit of a scammer, I notice, out for the main chance. As all the men here seem to be. This one wants to emigrate to Canada. With his family. Hint-hint...

Day 12: Wednesday, October 2

Morning class, at seven o’clock goes to Yuki, Robert and me, we should be so lucky. The local Aikido teacher, Shmygin tells me that the main soviet factory for making tatami is actually in Kyiv. But it has only one machine and only produces, according to him, 10 mats a year. I find that hard to believe. I tell him I would by 100 tomorrow for $30 each if I could. Dogi are made in Pskov, and hakama need to be made. All obvous money-makers with a global niche market. I mention this to Oleg, but he’s not keen. Vasya’s not sure about the hassle. Ihor seems interested, says the machine is from Germany and they need more. Alex is very interested. I think he could get rich – as could any number of people if they took this seriously. A cheap labor pool is their ace-in-the-hole. They can be the Japan of the 1990s and carve out a market. Tatami would sell like hotcakes since the Japanese or American varieties are too pricey for most dojos and most of us put makeshift mats together.

The day’s main attraction is the renowned Kiyevo-Pechersk Monastery, or Monastery of the Caves. It appears to be in the process of staggering out of the soviet era, everything run down and commercialized, for what that’s worth. The territory is quite large, with a covered walkway going around much of the downhill territory. I step into a big dark rotunda of a building opposite the ruins of the main church, apparently destroyed during the war and apparently by the Germans, though I later find out, as usual, that Stalin did. This dimly lit, cavernous warm brown hall turns out to be a chapel, but there are no pews, just a railing and an empty space this side of it. Some women are there in kerchiefs, and so I wander into the attached refectory, which has art-nouveau-ish larger-than-life portraits of some of the more famous abbots, including Nestor the Chronicler.

At five we’re taken to Kureni, another grey eatery, but this time outdoors with enormous stone seating in a U-shape around an equally enormous stone table. The sunny weather here in Kyiv has made being outdoors less of a trial. The food is becoming familiar: shredded beet salad with a tiny drop of smetana, tomatoes and cucumbers sliced on a platter, borshch as the first course, then what looks like breaded pan-fried cutlets that they call “bytky” here. The bread, as usual is fairly stale. To drink we’re given a watery drink that they call compote. I’m surprised as compote at home was stewed fruits, not a drink. We’re offered something called zephir for dessert. They’re a confection sort of like meringue or a textured marshmallow. They look sickeningly sweet, like something that would hurt your teeth. I try one and decide it’s not for me.

Instead of joining the others at a Sholom Aleichim play, I go sightseeing with Les. Once the sun goes down, the city is very dark. No billboards, no neon, some minimal lighting on landmarks, but even that is not very visible. The city is hilly and overlooks the Dnipro so I get a fair sense of its geography if nothing else.

Day 13: Thursday, October 3

Seven o’clock class is handled by Yuki and by ten, Les is driving me to a village near Periaslav-Khmelnytskiy. The farm looks very poor to me, but I suspect it’s better off than most. The 40-year-old wife wears a kerchief over her dark hair and looks like 60, her fine-featured face a filligree of fine wrinkles. Strangely enough, they have electricity and a TV but no running water. The house is very tidy. Lunch is real homemade soup and fresh bread. What a treat! I talk to the woman a little about life on a kolhosp or collective farm. Apparently rural Ukrainians were not issued passports, so they could not travel anywhere without the permission of the director of the farm. And they were paid 50 rubles a year, as opposed to the 100-150 a month that ordinary workers got. Welcome to soviet serfdom.

We tour Periaslav-Khmelnytskiy in a car. This is the historic spot where the Hetman finally decided to cast the fate of the Ukrainian kozaks with the Muscovites, mainly because he was orthodox, whereas the Poles were Catholic and the Turks were Muslim. As great a military leader as he was, Khmelnytskiy was a terrible religious chauvinist and had persecuted Jews and Catholics mercilessly. The accord Khmelnytskiy signed with Tsar Alexei went very bad for Ukraine. Today, the town is small and browbeaten.

Les proposes taking me to L’viv for a day while the others go back to Moscow. I agree. I didn’t like Moscow and don’t want to see any more of it. I can meet the team the day we go on to Leningrad instead.

Back in Kyiv, we join everybody at 19:30 for a rendezvous at the train station with the stationmaster, who pulls out a bottle of local bubbly, which they call shampanske, and some canapés with a bit of dried salmon or kovbasa on buttered bread. There’s even some red caviar. But nothing seems entirely fresh and the main sense is that he wants to impress the foreigners. It’s sad. An hour later, everyone going back to Moskva is on the train and by nine I’m at Lada’s for the night.

Day 14: Friday, October 4

07:00-08:45 Aikido-Lidia
12:30 To Pyrohovo with Les
16:00 To Lada’s
21:00 Train to L’viv in SV car

Day 15: Saturday, October 5

08:30 Arrive in L’viv, impressions from train window
09:00 Go to Ukrdial and leave our bags.
10:30 Tour of Arsenal and Center, St. George’s with 5 weddings in a row and simultaneously
13:00 Lunch at Mandrivky
15:00 Ukrdial office, drawing
16:30 Tour Center, including taxi tour
21:07 Train to Kyiv.

A semi-sleepless but peaceful night. The car is so warm I only needed a sheet to cover me. Lesyk of course makes a play and I, being attracted, don’t object. Nothing special...and an early arrival in Kyiv.

Day 16: Sunday, October 6

Kyiv seems colder, people on the platform are wearing jackets, but as the day wears on, the usual warmth comes back and by mid-afternoon, when Lada and I wander around the Maidan Nezalezhnosti (formerly the Square of the October Revolution), the sweater and windbreaker are making me sweat.

I walk slowly down Lenin Street, watching the morning folk. We go into Volodymyrskiy Sobor and it proves to be one of the most beautiful churches that I have ever seen. Its interior is flooded with paintings in the style of the Pecherska Lavra, the Pre-Raphaelite era of the Rosettis—and a gorgeous Madonna and Child called Oranta stare down from the altar wall with infinite mildness. It is the head church of Ukrainian Orthodoxy. Later I was told that the interior was supposed to have been done by Mikhail Vrubel, but he made the mistake of having an affair with his patron's wife and so the commission went to Viktor Vasnetsov instead.

Lesyk leaves me to wander around the naves rubbernecking, and when I find him again, he is meditating (I hesitate tro say “praying”) in front of an icon. When I ask him afterwards who the icon was, he says, St. Mykola, the Miracleworker. I think that’s St. Nicholas. I was surprised that he had turned to a Christian saint, since religion is not his background. Lada and I later walk by the church again, and both comment on the very commercial side of it: Mass going on and meanwhile people queuing to buy candles and beads and other “good luck” charms at several kiosks in the church proper. “Time for Christ to chase them out again!” So much goes on every day that I later tell Lesyk that Lada and I went into the church and he rightly corrects me. I feel odd about the confusion, as though I have let him down.

Lada and I go to the park in honor of Shevchenko and then to his museum—one of the best-organized and most thorough I’ve ever seen, and also a bit more than I could possibly absorb in one fell swoop. But I want to get the Kobzar now and read and translate all of Shevchenko.

“When I die, then bury me
in a grave that lies
before the vast steppe,
of my beloved Ukraine.”

Then we wander to a cafeteria and have some varenyky and a compote and finally we hit the Maidan, where we find, not one, but two copies of Hrushevskiy’s illustrated history of Ukraine for 30K (about $1). I could have had a dictionary too for about 50K, which we foolishly pass up though it’s really a pittance for us. And now the sun grows hotter and hotter. Lenin stands in scaffolding and hundreds of people mill around the rejuvenated square, checking out the magazine and booksellers. Above Lenin, the ill-named Moskva Hotel holds sway—but not for long in this phoenix land!

Lesyk leaves me at the top of the hill where we all got off the Metro and we go our separate ways, him home and Lada and I to meet her mom Lilea and her friend Bud Conway for dinner at the Kyivkska Rus Hotel.

By 20:25, I'm ensconced in my train car, leaving Kyiv at last. Riding through the dark countryside, light from the train falling on the tall rows of trees, I can feel the history of my land, it really is ‘my’ land in a way that Canada is not, let alone the US. The years of reluctant reading and hearing about Pechenigs and Riuryk and Olha, even the story of Peter and Charles XII have buried themselves deep in me and I know them like I never ‘knew’ the 100 Years’ War or the French-Indian Wars. These are my people; those are not. It’s impossible to describe the feeling of aliveness, of living ghosts, the spirits of this beautiful land milling around among the trees. And I am on my way back to Moskva, the land of the Moskals.

Everything has been so rushed, I don’t know where it all fits. What to do about Lesyk. He says that I’ve “stood on his head,” meaning that I’ve turned his life upside-down, but I don’t know what he wants in me. If I understood him correctly, he told me the first night that he and his wife are just in the process of asking themselves what their marriage means to them. At this moment, he and Ukraine are almost a single entity. What will be further, I don’t know. Three, four days is nothing when it comes to deeply understanding another person…

Day 17: Monday, October 7

I arrive in Moskva at nine in the morning. In the Chapel of the Well, a couple fills their old Evian bottle with water from the armpits of God. Mother takes a swig, then father, and they stand in the golden light of an icon and argue wordlessly, lips suspended in mid-prayer.

The group is clearly restless as we prepare for our one last exrursion, to Zagorsk. After a quick lunch at the Baranovskis, we head our. A West-German style freeway runs us to Zagorsk and its immense Sergeyevska Lavra, undamaged by history, only worn by time. It is seemingly larger than the Kyiv Lavra, but the atmosphere, even with Mass going on, is a bit different. However, in the one chapel where two priesets are either christening or giving the eucharist—I think the latter—, I suddenly feel like crying. The walls are flooded with art and there is almost no lighting. A few high slits of windows cast some grey daylight on the interior, but the task of painting every square centimeter with now-faded art must have been heroic.

In the yard outside the Lavra, gorgeous gilt Matrioshkas painted with icons instead of the standard kerchiefed, cherry-cheeked Slavic maiden, for $200; in Kyiv, I can buy a 3-room apartment for $1,000… And immediately outside the Lavra, in the vilage itself, are houses of the most tumble-down, barren variety. Even the window frames sit drunkenly askew in their walls and the road is a muddy rut. Dolls for 6,000 rubles next to this terrible poverty leaves a very strange feeling. So much of this country is like backwoods Appalachia.

I think the desire to cry in the church today was about leaving Ukraine. I truly don’t give a shit about Russia, as long as they leave Ukraine in peace for once. Moskva actually locked out all non-Muscovites during the 1980 Olympics. Mariana says it was great: no crowds, no dirt, no air pollution. I’m glad Kyiv is not a city that would ever do such a thing. To me, cleanliness comes from within, and it does not seem to be part of the Russian character.

By four, we're back in Moskva and fritter away our last evening packing, bathing, snacking and watching TV! At 23:00, our train slips out to Leningrad, without any of the drama that accompanied our Pskov trip, thank goodness. On the train, it's another night with a Russian woman. This time, the shade is locked to the bottom of the window frame, curtains tightly wrapped against the cold draughts she imagines the speed of the train will bring. Having noticed that the windows are sealed, and having never felt a breeze even when I might have wanted to, I don’t look forward to a viewless, stuffy night. I was not designed for cave dwelling. This one has lived in Petersburg for 15 years because of her husband’s construction work and still hates the place. “The Hermitage, the palace, the Neva—you do those in a day or two and then there’s nothing. Neva Prospect (avenue) used to have small commissaries for milk, bread, clothes, and the usual things. Now it’s all selling for hard currency—all of it for dollars and no one can go there. Where there once were 10 shirts, there are now 5 and they cost twice as much…And it’s grey all the time, grey and so cold.” I shiver and pull up my blanket to my nose.

Day 18: Tuesday, October 8

In the morning, my neighbor raises the blind, opens the curtains, and gives me an apple. “It’s washed, clean.” I bite into the soft, sweet, yellow fruit. She picks up my System 7 manual and asks “What is ‘System 7’?” “The new Macintosh system for computers.” She starts to leaf through the first few pages. I point out that the author is of Russian descent—Danyloff—and she reads off a few of the headings in the table of contents in translation. Her English comprehension is pretty good. After another minute, she closes the book. “It’s technical.” I nod. At least the sun is out.

Much of the day from when we arrive at 07:30 to when we go to the Hermitage at 15:30 is spent on mundanities: breakfast, bank, shopping – I pick up a lovely hand-painted wooden box with a green landscape of fields and trees for a princely $15, but then I haven't bought muh at all until now –, visiting St. Nicholas Cathedral, going to the post office and the railway station. The day is bleak and chilly, none of the sunny warmth of Kyiv. But the Hermitage is astounding, an 18th century palace that looks half a kilometer long, set in a gentle curve arond a barren plaza. We have only two hours but it's overwhelming as it is. I see Van Goghs that I have never seen before in any book. The museum building may be tattered and very much in need of some TLC, but its collection is phenomenal. I like the sculptures much less than the painting, however. At six we head back for a short break and a class at Tagirov's dojo at 19:00. He's a small, swarthy man who obviously thinks very highly of his own abilities and has no interest in allowing any of us to teach. I'm fine with that, myself, but not so sure about Jamie. We enjoy a nondescript supper at 21:30 durin which my stomach issues a small protest and head back to the residence where we are staying at 23:30. I think we're all very ready to leave.

Day 19: Wednesday, October 9

Night passes less eventfully than I feared and whatever amoebas beset me that short while in the evening must have fallen asleep too. At 06:55, Yuki wakes me and I’m grateful for the extra minutes of sleep. I was packed already and besides, the rumours about Leningrad water make me want to do little besides splash my skin a bit to wake it up. Dr. Joe’s toothbrush will have to wait for airplane water…

Oleg appears at the door dressed and smelling of his usual potpourri of alcohols, smiling and alert, offering me a bag of yet more gifts. I hug him. My bags are in the hallway and I quickly bid Christy goodbye. Oleg keeps saying “No hurry,” “It’s okey” in his speed-freak way, but I figure it’s past seven and the others had started going downstairs. He grabs my black case and Yukis’s duffel back, I take up my knapsack and weapons, and we trudge down the hall. “You’re so manly!” I tease him as he drags the suitcase full of books and gifts, glad that there would be an end to the overload and to the endless gentlemanly yanking away of my personal effects by these wild Russians.

On the 07:30 airport bus, pop rock is humming in the rafters. I sigh—the Americanization of our group has begun. But five minutes into the drive, Robert decides he really can’t stand it—I silently cheer—and Oleg asks the driver to stifle it. Ah, a last peaceful view of Petersburg in the golden dawn. Even with the long shadows and bare trees, the early commuters scurrying to work in the late days of autumn, winter already breathing down the canals, this city is glorious compared to Moskva! I want to come back here again. With Lesyk. When the bus pulls up and stops, I look around in astonishment at the small grey box of a building and the empty parking lot. No tower, no planes visible, no nothing. This is the airport? “How big is Petrograd?” “6 million.” SIX million?!?! I think.

Our baggage is loaded onto a cart and Oleg assures us we will be the first in line and all is OK. We troop in for breakfast. Inside is even worse. It looks like a welfare clinic in lower Slobovia or the Ensenada bus terminal. A few weary people sit in dingy corridors on the square oak benches I remember from old hospitals. We go down several ill-smelling hallways and into a dining area. White cloths and chrystal goblets in a honey-colored room. We bee-liine for a large table but Olek’s beetling on through another doorway. “This way, this way!!” We pick up our hastily dropped stuff and go on to the next room—slightly less well-appointed but somehow cozier and drop our gear again. “Breakfast!” A minute after we settle in, plates of the ubiquitous bread, tomatoes and meat appear, this time a roast-beef/kovbasa combination for a change. Yuki and I gobble down the meat.

Oleg inhales some cognac then gets up to fidget. Wanders down to the back of the room for a smoke. Wanders back. In a careless moment, I snatch his cognac and put it on the floor, by our table. Edwini notices and laughs, raising his eyebrows. In three seconds, Oleg is panicking. “Where’s my cognac?! Where’s my cognac?!” He looks at everybody except me. Nobody says anything: most of them didn’t notice me. I say, “We were laying bets as to how long it would be before you noticed.” Some of the others laugh and sit down at another table. Oleg mumbles, “Well, I have another bottle…Lidia, did you take it?!” I shrug my shoulders and hold my hands out. “I don’t have anything.” Oleg starts to hunt ineffectually, twitching off to another table. Yuki and Robert express alarm. They think he could have a fit right here and now. “Really?” “He’s very agitated,” says Robert. “After just 5 minutes without liquor?” “Yes. I think this is serious.” I am disconcerted. How could this be, the man’s as bad as a heroin addict without his fix. But Yuki and Robert seem quite serious. I put the bottle back on the table. Oleg’s still off at the other table. God knows what he thinks he’ll find there. I have never seen this before, but I’m beginning to understand the depth of his addiction. He’s completely oblivious to us. I finally call, “Oleg!” He looks around and leaps back to our table, grasps the flask, and beams happily. He offers us a swig. He still has not eaten anything. I feel ill.

Robert and I go over the inscriptions on his medallions and we finish our coffee and Pepsi. Gilaine has managed to swipe an unopened bottle for Mike, a major victory in this land where everything can be had but nothing is available. We even get hot milk for our cofee. Of course, Jamie is peeved because she wanted the milk for her grainola. “Can’t you wait until you get home?” someone queries. Jamie whines a little about needing a good breakfast.

Breakfast abruptly breaks up and we’re off to check-in. The same Finnish-looking couple are sitting at their bench in one corridor. Around the corner, the mathematician from Minsk, Pinsk or Vladivostok is adding yet another cryptic line to his unending thesis. In pencil.

In fact, our luggage is first in line and we join it. Seats are assigned by the Finnish crew. A fine ‘Aryan’ specimen in a dark military suit seems to be in command here. He gets more ‘Aryan’ by the minute, pinched lips and cold eyes overseeing everything, herding us through (he must have been a German Shepherd in a previous life…). Oleg trails along, wheeling and dealing and moving us through in his frenetic fashion. Finally some of us have passed the checkpoint and our luggage goes off on the conveyor to the plane’s big belly.

Now the good-byes start and the overseer begins to look agitated. He starts issuing orders as we mill about, Americans and Russians in a jumble of hugs and last-minute chit-chat. First he separates the wheat from the chaff, chasing the non-passengers away. Oleg is still floating among us. The suit starts issuing warnings and Oleg tries to negotiate. The suit starts using body English to force Oleg away from us. We begin to drift off ourselves. I wave and smile. Oleg steps closer again and I go to take his hand. The ‘Aryan’ loses it: “Either he goes away, or you don’t get to leave. Those are your two choices.” Oh my, I think to myself, as I laugh and blow Oleg a last kiss, this man really missed his historical calling! What does he figure on doing with a foreigner whose visa has expired?

We breeze through customs. They take away our visa forms and leave our passports unmarked, as though they prefer to remain a figment of our imaginations, as we become a cipher in theirs. And finally we’re in the waiting room. Only slightly more airport-like than the other parts of the “terminal,” the room is crowded, with seats for no more than 60 people. This is IT. Duty-free shops with souvenirs marked in ruble prices. The catch? Rubles here are worth 58¢ each, or about 15 times more than the official rate in soviet banks. Probably more reasonable as a rate, but a shock to the wallets. I decide to only buy some postcards and a couple of chocolate bars, the most reasonable items here. Matrioshkas that sold for $15 on the Arbat cost about $70-80 here. Who would buy this stuff? I decide to slip into conversation with an elderly couple who are, in fact, buying. “We’ve been from Siberia to Tashkent and we’ve never seen any of this stuff”—pointing to the lacquerware, the Stoli vodka, the knickknacks. I’m astonished. This sheds yet another light on our visit, though without a doubt a good part of this couple’s experience can be chalked up to too much $ and not enough adventuresomeness. So that’s who buys here…

One hour, two fur hats and six chocolate bars later, our flight begins to board. That is, we file out the building, down a walk between a barricade and the terminal building to a bus, and then to one of the four airplanes standing in the field. As we get to the stairs, Jamie decides to take a last picture of us, with a young officer in a snappy hat behind. Half-a-dozen people pass us up the stairs, while she wails, “My camera won’t work! It’s fucked up” and fidgets with the buttons. Someone comments on how typical this is of Russia. We shrug our shoulders and head up into the plane. When we are up a few thousand feet, I look out my window and notice the settlements of houses below, green and brown tufts of unshaven garden and unmarked property spilling around the bungalows like an unkempt and uneven beard. Neat at this distance, but messy compared to what I know.

After an unmemorably brief layover in Helsinki, we board the 13:45 to New York and on to Chicago.

Hours later, the airplane’s engines begin to reverse and we can feel its rapid descent. Outside, there’s only a grey blanket and no indication of land below us. Familiar sounds tell us that we are about to land in mid-air when suddenly, about 50 feet below the wings, the stubbly grass of a field appears and, at the last instant, the edge of the tarmac.

Someone says “Let’s go back to Petersburg. It was sunny there!”

Thursday, October 10

I come home to discover that my landlady has killed all the trees and bushes in the front area of our building and what’s a person to say? Why on earth did she do it? Neither the trees nor the bushes bothered anyone—on the contrary, they made the entry area pretty. Now all there is are some dead stumps and the area looks like someplace in Moskva. I feel so sad. Everything’s changed.

1991-2023