My Russian: An Unrequited Love Affair

I love Russian. I love the sound of it and the feel of it. It’s a language more beautiful than tiramisu is delicious, and that is saying a lot.

My love for Russian, like many passionate affairs, is one-sided. Spoken by me, that language to melt your sins …stumbles.

Exhibit A: Visiting Moscow that first time, I fall desperately in love with peach juice.   At a kiosk, I request “the juice of the fruit of the orange paint.”

Yes, Russia enamored me; I sank into linguistic bliss. Back in the US, my professors signed me up for two intensive classes, and before long I was overwhelmed and had resorted to triaging words, studying “important words” and ignoring “irrelevant words I shall never use in my entire life.”

These last included those pertaining to the household, most particularly bed furnishing.

Foolish child. Thrice life would show me the error of my choice.

Russian Life Lesson One: Crime and Punishment

One particular week, when Russian Speech focused on “the apartment” Intermediate Russian was centered on crime. Jolly, I know.

We had just learned how to use the instrumental case to indicate the means by which a crime is committed (ie with a knife).  This was fascinating, and so I ignored my upcoming oral exam in the other class.

I did have a plan, though. I often have plans, and they are often genius. In this particular case, the plan was to duck low and cram as many words as I could while the others were tested first.

This genius, cutting-edge plan was destroyed by my professor’s unfortunate predilection for outsmarting me.

“Ruth,” he said as I ducked in and made like I was invisible, “you can start. Please describe your apartment and your roommate.”

I thought on my feet.  Which was quite something, considering I was sitting on an entirely different part of my body.

“My apartment,” I said in flawless Russian, “is beautiful.”

I looked at him with resolve and he nodded, doubtless waiting for me to describe my carpet, my duvet cover and my remodeled kitchen. But I had other plans. “But my roommate is a murderer!”

His pen stopped moving over his pad.

“She is a skinhead wanted by the police for theft, and she embezzles money, and I suspect that on Thursday she killed my cat.” Blessedly, I suddenly remembered a household word and whipped it out for my A+. “She killed it—by toothbrush!”

I was told to stay after class.

Russian Life Lesson Two: Meanwhile, In the Bedroom…

A week later, Intermediate Russian turned to “your house,” and my weekly quiz included the following unwelcome question: List four things found on your bed.

I thought hard.

I answered:

1. another bed
2. my husband
3. my lover
4. my chauffeur

I got half a point for my husband.

Russian Life Lesson Three: The Curious Case of the Mustard

A year later, I picked up a book by Ivan Bunin and tried to read it without a dictionary. Not far into the story, I noted an odd thing. Namely—talking mustard.

“D,” I asked a friend, “is Bunin supposed to be surreal?”

“Um, yeah, I think so,” D answered, and like a total dork, I didn’t check.

A month later, I’m in Moscow again for a wintery semester. The city isn’t exactly easy on strangers, so I welcome a weekend trip to Saint Petersburg, that gorgeous Venice of the East that Peter the Great built.

The train ride inevitably brings the weary traveler into the imperial city around 6 or 7am, and the first thing I did upon dropping my luggage in the room was to take a freezing cold shower (for lack of hot water, not a masochistic preference) and roam the city.

When I returned at night, I noticed a slight problem.  Gentle Reader, my bed had nothing on it. No other bed, no husband, no lover, no chauffeur, but also, and this was at least as regrettable: no sheets, no blankets and no pillows.

Have I mentioned it was winter? Have I mentioned that I have never—TO THIS DAY—bothered to learn these critical words?

I braced myself and went downstairs to ask for some bedding. Before I reached the rather strict matron in her office, I snuck up to the guard, hoping for an ally.

“Sir Guard?” He clearly was rarely addressed this way and hid a smile.  “What is it called in Russian, that small thing on the bed that is under your head?”

“Under your little ear.”

Um, well, if you want to go there. “Yes, under my little ear.”

“Under your little ear.”

I try to discern if he’s a pervert or just mad. “Yes, the thing under your little ear, what is it called.”

“It’s called under-your-little-ear,” he explains slowly.

“Oh God,” I say in English. “No wonder I never learnt that word.”

I thank him and tip-toe to the temperamental matron’s office. I knock. She’s not pleased to see me.

I smile hopefully. “Thank you again,” I say. ”I’m sorry for interrupting you, but I do not have an under-your-little-ear on my bed, or any of the other things.”

She’s irritated, very irritated. “Why didn’t you tell the mustard!?”

I gape. What is it with Russians and mustard?

“The mustard was on your floor today! Why didn’t you tell the mustard THEN?”

I’ve never considered telling mustard anything before. I don’t know where to begin answering this question. My stupefaction is only aggravating the situation immensely.  I try to have a rational conversation.  (Things always go wrong when I am forced to take this step.)

“I… I didn’t know that I should tell the mustard.”

“Oh? And who would you tell?”

Well, not the mustard.

“Now that the mustard isn’t here—now you want [insert immediately forgotten words for bedclothes]!”

“I can tell the mustard. Is the mustard in the kitchen?”

“The mustard WAS everywhere! In the kitchen, in the bathroom, everywhere!”

“And now? Is the mustard in fridge or in the cupboard?”

She’s really angry now.  “Why would the mustard be in the fridge?  The mustard has gone home!”

My brain, already exhausted from the long day, is beyond fried. It’s whizzing like a crazy deflated balloon. She begins to stomp out, grumbling loudly about my lack of consideration. I follow in a stupor. She grumbles along the corridor and past the friendly guard, who I barely see in my dizziness, and she grumbles up the stairs where I dazedly stop.

And then it occurs to me. I see a vision of a hot dog stand with a sign advertising ketchup and mustard. And the word for mustard is…different.

My Russian lessons brain began to scroll through short stories by Pushkin, Tolstoy and Chekhov, and then it arrives at the answer; and there at the bottom of the steps I grabbed the word (so similar!) by its beautiful font and shout it up at her.

Most unexpectedly she storms down to shake me in laughter and I am half-hugged, half-heaved up the stairs. 

I’d muddled the word.  What I’d thought meant mustard was actually another word I’d considered irrelevant and useless: “cleaning lady.” No wonder she thought me crazy (or rude) asking if the cleaning lady lives in the fridge.

Perhaps it is no wonder that my love affair with Russian is a one-sided affair. At least I have my bed, my husband, my lover and my chauffeur to keep me warm.

FYI: the two words were: gorchitsa (mustard) and gornichnaya (cleaning lady). Come on, they’re awful similar.

Menu in a Tbilisi Restaurant - no longer serving Putin

In the Beginning, there was the Word. And the Word was…

“Come and translate for me,” he said, and my gut sank.  It’s one thing to translate, you know, unofficially and with only your personal pride at stake.  I lost that a long time ago, linguistically speaking, at least.  But to actually translate at what amounted to an official meeting between representatives of two governments…

Let’s just say I was not thrilled.  Or, if we must cleave to honesty, I was set against it with all of my heart, and made this clear.

He wheedled and pled.  I stood firm.  He pulled puppy dog eyes.  I stood firmer.  He said, “Really, just come there and if I make a mistake, you’ll step in to help.”

Mmph.  I stared him.  Tried to discern his honesty.

“You can speak Russian, you know,” I groused.  He nodded. “Better than me,” I added.  I cut off his objection with a cold glare.

“Will you come?” he asked.

“You will speak.  And only if I think it would be helpful will I add a word here or there.”  He nodded. “And I am not responsible for any international disasters,” I added firmly.  He nodded again.

So the date was set.

And because it was Georgia, it was postponed.  Mind you, for any international development nuts out there, particularly those prone to laughing off all delays on other countries’ cultural foibles, I’ll tell you this was AT LEAST as much due to the expat as it was a local cultural phenomenon.  Let us not cast stones…

Anyway, the day did come.  I was summoned, and I went to the meeting.

“Please let me not cause an international catastrophe,” I prayed to the same God who saw fit for me to freeze during that winter like most of earth’s population.

So the meeting began, and to my surprise and gratitude, the man who’d asked for my help did indeed lead the conversation without expecting me to serve as a real translator.  I began to relax.

Pff.  Never begin to relax.  That is PRECISELY when international catastrophes sense a crack in your armor.

He was describing something and I’d drifted off somewhat.  He turned to me with a frown, his hand gesturing like he was sifting sand through his fingers.  I knew that mildly desperate look in his eyes and leaned forward to hear what word he needed.

“Forestry?” he asked.

Forestry?  FORESTRY?  What, he couldn’t pick a simple word?  FORESTRY?  Who KNOWS that word in a foreign language? Dude, I don’t even know what that means in ENGLISH.

I looked at him poisonously.

That was the only thing he asked of me.  I shrugged helplessly.  I didn’t cause an international scandal.

That night, however, I did look up forestry in the dictionary.  Learnt two different words for it.

I have never used those two words since.

New York

They told me I’d be asked. Told me to have an answer ready

But I was otherwise engaged, and besides, I didn’t know how to answer.  And they were right; people do ask.

“So, what was Peace Corps like?”

Some expect a two-line answer.  Others want to really get into it, to imagine it vicariously through you, sometimes to think on doing it themselves.

Peace Corps… I loved it; even the worst of times was worth it.  The insight gained from those times lingers with me still, a million miles away from those moments.

They say Peace Corps is the toughest job you’ll ever love.

They say Peace Corps is different for everyone.

They’re right; which of course means they’re wrong.  :)  If it’s different for everyone, it stands to reason that for some it’s not the toughest job they’ll ever love.

I never regretted joining Peace Corps.  Not for an instant.  And it was true for me: it was the toughest job I’ve ever loved, and I credit it with so much, personally.

There were times I wept with frustration.  There was even one time when I locked myself into an outhouse to cry, so you can imagine… (!!!)  But there were also times I cried with happiness.

Are my tear ducts too willing to gush, you wonder?

Nay, I say.  They’re about average.

I remember the winter when I cried in the outhouse.  (How could I forget?)  I texted my site-mate to ask if it was safe out; if I could escape unseen.  (A site-mate is a fellow volunteer placed in the same village/town/city.)

“Yes,” he texted back.

Together we ran from the building down the only main street in town.  Well, I exaggerate.  We walked.  But swiftly.  Stumbling, for the ground was cracked and slippery with ice.

My bedroom also, by the way, had ice in it.  I look back now and realize that for the first time I was experiencing seasonal stress, which only seemed to be eclipsed by the frustrations of culture shock.

“I’ve had it,” I said.

“With Peace Corps?” Sig asked.

I laughed. “No, I love Peace Corps,” I said, and then a few more frozen tears eked out.

Again he probably wondered why he’d been paired with me.  With nowhere to go, we followed our feet down the road, eventually reaching my other workplace there.  I was working directly with four NGOs (non-governmental organizations) at the time.  With a sigh, I stumbled into the building.  He followed me.  This place was the only one which had heat…  And in that cold, brutal winter, heat was something precious and not to be turned down when available.  (Have I mentioned the ice in my bedroom?)

We walked into my large shared office.

There was a spread laid out on the table.  Delicious Georgian foods and wine.  I looked at my colleague sitting there.

“It’s been forty days since my relative died,” she explained in Russian.

Ah.  My face grew hot.  That meant it had been 39 days since I’d misunderstood the word “passed away” in Georgian and had told her that her relative would be fine the next day.  This is why she was now reminding me in Russian, my stronger language.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

She sighed deeply and nodded at the chairs next to her. “Sit down.  We must toast her and commemorate her with this meal.”

I wasn’t supposed to drink at work, you know.  Peace Corps rules.  But I felt this superseded the rules.  I opened a spot at the table with a shift of a chair, and sat down heavily.

I think I needed to commemorate life and death that day.  And I think I needed a drink.

I toasted loquaciously and many, many times.  In the Republic of Georgia, that’s the only way to drink.  Actually, that’s literally the case. Whereas in the US you sip your wine throughout your meal, in Georgia that is VERY bad form, and no-one would lift a glass without toasting first.  A long toast.  Fortunately, I happen to love toasting, and my Georgian friends loved that about me.  I knew how to honor a glass of wine and the people around the table (and away from it, and passed on, and future generations,–and everyone that one tends to toast at Georgian parties).

So I toasted and toasted and toasted, and soon we were all toasted.

Which was precisely when Sig’s cell rang.  He looked up suddenly.

“Peace Corps is here,” he said.

I lowered my glass. “Huh?”  (See what I mean by eloquence?)

“Right outside the building.  They’re here to inspect my new place before letting me move.”

I sat up. “Sig, they can’t come in!  I’m wearing jeans!”

He looked me flat in the eyes then let his glance travel to my glass.  I lowered it slightly.

“Go on, meet them outside, come on!” I pleaded.

“It’s cold outside,” he grumbled, but he dashed out.

And I toasted him next.  :)

Yeah.  Peace Corps isn’t what you expect.  Good times, bad times, hard times…  Okay, no easy times.  But my God, if you put your all into it, and if you’re lucky and get great colleagues…  It’s all worth it.  One hundred times over.  More.

You know the US Army slogan– “Be All You Can Be”?

That’s EXACTLY what Peace Corps is to me.  A two year increment of your life where you put yourself to the test and you make sure you pass.  Sure, you can do it at home.  But many of us don’t.  We forget to live life to the full, back home.  But make it the whole point of a period of your life, and you can achieve so much.  You can begin to achieve being yourself, the way you want to be.

Just not a particularly well-scrubbed self.

Gori Apartment, Republic of Georgia

Pride and Prejudice, or the Single Girl’s Life in a Small Caucasus Town

My host mom heard I liked a Turkish guy.

She pulled me aside with a kind and sweet smile.  ”Ruth,” she said, “you will have cultural differences with this boy.”  I sigh heavily, thinking I know where this is going, because somehow ’tis my pattern to like boys of different cultures and to be warned away.  I stare into the sinking fire, squaring my shoulders against the usual.

She nods wisely and continues.  ”You need to find a good Georgian boy.”  I look up in surprise.  I bite the inside of my mouth to stop a traitorous smile.  How will a small-town Georgian Orthodox macho boy be any better a match than an Istanbuli secular Muslim?  Curious.

My host mom’s on a roll, thinking my choked silence and crooked mouth means a possibility of American capitulation to wily Georgian sex appeal.  She leans forward and raises her eyebrows conspiratorially.  ”He’s single.  Thirty-seven.”  Already the huge red flag is raising and waving madly–in this part of the world this is a very suspicious sign in a man–but I let her continue. “His name is Soso, and he’s not in prison anymore, and he’s unemployed.”  She smiles winningly at me, like she’s just let me in on the jackpot.

I blink for a second.  What is the diplomatic response to this?  I return her smile and choke down another laugh.  ”See, the thing is,” I say eventually, “I don’t like the name Soso.”

And I carefully return my gaze to the fire, glad a season-long power-outage will help my scraggly hair hide my face.  ”But thank you for thinking of me, anyway.”

Last summer; or Life and Dreams in a Small Caucasus Town

Sighnaghi in the Mist

I served in Georgia, the Republic nestled in between the Greater and Lesser Caucasus Ranges, touching on Chechnya and Russia to the north and cradling the Black Sea to the West, with Turkey, Armenia and Azerbaijan neighboring in the south.  I was to be there for two years and three months, only the Russian army had other ideas, and invaded after one year.

In a country famous for its dramatic mountain ranges and exquisite landscape, I had managed to be placed in one of the flattest areas, where the earth looked parched despite its great bounty of potatoes and tomatoes.

Hungry cattle wended their way through the town streets, leaving behind manure and a sense of fatigue and never-ending days. Sheep were slaughtered by butchers on the main street, tied up on the pavement where they could see their fate in the fates of necks chopped before theirs.  Chickens were sold live, and carried home by their feet.  Everything was bought amid the din of a huge, bustling bazaar which opened at 5am.  Azeri music blared on stereos, together with Turkish, Russian and Georgian pop.

Schools ran on shoe-string budgets, with paint peeling from walls and the stench of the toilets pervading entire floors.  The hospital was visited by stray dogs and cats, cobwebs hung throughout the dank grey corridors, and it felt a visceral shock to the system to actually see people coming there to get treated to feel better.

Unemployed men littered the streets, whiling away hours in teahouses that women were better off not even looking into for fear of appearing wanton.  Women worked their fingers to the bone, slaving over troughs filled with laundry, preserves and dirty dishes.  Hard working men and women in offices faced electrical outages, gas outages, internet outages and general scarcity to get their jobs done.  The only fax machine in town was in the mayor’s office.  Life was, in a word, hard.

I loved this town, and I didn’t, too.

But most of all, when the days were hard and long, and when I was reeling from the unforgiving and harsh beating the sun doled out every summer, night and day, I would look south, beyond the confines of town, out to the blue waves of the Armenian mountains, and I would drink in the sight and imagine the fresh, wet, cool smell of those beautiful mountains.  And I would dream of going there.

Otar, my friend’s wonderful father, who took care of me as if I’d been adopted into the family, wondered at my fascination.  When I announced to all and sundry that I would spend the upcoming Saturday walking to the border with Armenia, some 39 kilometers away, he was tickled pink but also curious.

“Why, Ruth?” he asked, finally, as he said goodbye to me (and my sitemate who I’d corralled to join me on the trek).  ”Why do you want to walk to the Armenian border?”

I thought for a moment.  ”Because it’s something I can’t do in America.”

Little did I know that one day I’d be on the other side of that self-same border, desperate to return over those now accursed Armenian crags back to my dusty little town from which war had torn me.

*** the photo is from the gorgeous town of Sighnaghi, which is to the east of Tbilisi.  My town remains unnamed thus far in my blog, but was south of Tbilisi.

***I returned after the war was officially ended three weeks later, this time not as a Peace Corps Volunteer, but as an independent citizen, volunteering without the aegis of a sponsoring institution.