Journal Entry: Quotes from New Friends

Just a brief collection of fabulous quotes from the friends we’ve made along the way…

Alice (Moscow):

Alice is to the right, in the Wonder Woman T-Shirt.

About five minutes after we met our host for the stay in Moscow. Alice says: “I’m so tired this morning. I was out late last night with my colleagues at a bar. It was my first day at work, and this Southern guy—you know, the guys from Kazakh.” Takes a deep puff from her cigarette. The smoke curls around her tattooed wrists.“And this Southern guy grabbed my ass. I broke his nose.”

Us: “What?”

Alice: “Oh yeah. I chased him down—look at my nails, I broke them because I grabbed him by the shirt—and I punched him three times in the face. I broke his nose, there was blood on his face.  I hope he thinks twice—no, three times, before he does this again.”

We stare at her in awe and admiration.

Anton (Moscow):

Took us to a relatively isolated area to watch the sunset, where we had to keep quiet so as not to disturb other residents.“Don’t worry, everything will be alright. But now…shut your mouth.”

“If you come to Russia to do good things, Russia will be good to you. But if you come to Russia to do bad things…we will kill you.”

• Julia’s addition: “You are lucky if you die in your sleep.”

Because Anton’s English wasn’t fluent, he used a lot of short commands to get his point across. We were constantly hearing “No, stop there. Sit down. Turn around. Get on the bike.” It was like having a very strict Russian drill sergeant.

Anton, Sasha, and Nika.

Marcelo (Train to Yekaterinburg):

“I woke up at 6am [on the train], but I saw Melody sleeping and it gave me strength. It’s possible to sleep in this place!”

Eats a hamburger, the first food of the day in Yekaterinburg. “Ah. Now this city is much better.”

Tatyana (Train to Krasnoyarsk):

Tatyana, Arsenii, and Julia on the train.

“Have you been to Crimea?”

• Avery: “Like…near Ukraine?”
• Tatyana: “Ah yes, near Ukraine. But since 2014, it is Russia!”
• Melody and I laugh nervously.

Arsenii (Train to Krasnoyarsk):

Arsenii and Julia.

“German rap is even worse [than Russian rap]. They all sound like they want to kill you, or…” They all broke into a discussion in Russian, but we heard the words ‘fascist’ and ‘Hitler.’

• Tatyana: “They have the line ‘from the heart to the sun’.” She mimicked the ‘Heil Hitler’ hand raise.
• Melody: Yeah that’s…not good.

On Omsk (Train to Krasnoyarsk)::

Arsensii: We are getting near to Omsk. It is a weird city.

Julia: Yes, it is a Russian meme-city.

Avery: Why?

Julia: Because all sorts of crazy things happen in Omsk. There was a corpse on a beach, and people swam all around it. It was there for three days! This is Omsk news story, their news day.

 

Tatyana: In Omsk they have cheese called amitchka. It is cheese with sweet flavors.

Arsensii: Disgusting. But with beer, it is okay.

 

Arsensii: Once, there was a popular rap star who died in Florida, but the magazines all said he was seen at the train station in Omsk after he died.

As we get off at Omsk.

Avery: Okay, hope we don’t die at this rest stop!

Arsensii: Your body will appear in Florida.