thejkt

i was on the night shift.
we drove a few hundred feet of unsupported ice tunnel about 40 feet below the surface: a 6 feet wide – 10 feet tall utility corridor.
it got insulated pipes in the walls with pipes for water and sewer: to and from the station to rodriguez wells 1000ft away.

it was crazy. like being on another planet.
and great food!!!

I’d never left the country.
in fact, i was the first in my family to have a passport, to leave the US on a civilian craft.
I had a trunk with me when I went through customs, a trunk we bought at sears.
the girls that were on the same program with me were head to toe in columbia and patagonia with futuristic backpacks.

there was seven of us, i was the only guy.
we lived in this dorm at one of the last stops on the sprawling moscow metro.
after unpacking our gear and wanting to go out onto the streets, we walked up to the metro stop, vykhino. it was hopping. old babushkas selling cigarettes and homemade vodka and dildoes.
fist fights, loud russian music, little kiosks selling everything we needed.
they had a deliciously greasy street food, a cheese empanada kind of thing called a chuberek.
while we scarfed the golden chessy pockets, i turned around and saw a circle of russian militzia, local police, army, wearing ak47s and drinking vodka.
i’d never been that close to that many guns before.
i wanted to reach out and grab it and have one of my american friends click a photo of me with a kalishnikov.

when we got home we met david, a weird californian who’d left LA and traveled overland to the southern tip of south america over 7-8 years teaching english.

he welcomed us, and told us one bit of advice:

when you get attacked, harassed or molested by a group of gypsy children, just grab one at random and punch them in the face.

at offended as I was hearing this, i wasn’t too proud to thank him a few weeks later when i had to use his advice, and it worked.

moscow is a crazy place, great for long aimless urban walking, the juxtaposition of old and new, and writers.

favorite spot: the mayakovsky museum, or bulgakov’s apartment on the garden ring.