Ihar Navitski - I lived in Russia…

© Ihar Navitski, 2020

ISBN 978-5-4498-3873-5

Created with Ridero smart publishing system

“Hello! I’m John, just John. I want to tell you, friends, about Russia. There will be no politics in my story. Just a story about how people live in a country very far from us. I don’t want to look at Russia from the point of view of “bad” – “good”. I am a simple American office worker who happened to live part of the time in Russia, to get acquainted with the foundations of Russian life, to learn their customs. I would like to tell you about this, friends.

Let’s start with how I got to Russia. My corporation became interested in the eastern market. Competitors turned their interests to the East. My boss decided to keep up with them. One fine Boston morning, Jenny invited me. She worked as the secretary of my immediate boss and part-time served as his girlfriend. I hope everyone understood what kind of services they were. Three times a week, during lunch, Jenny took a folder with papers on her desk and went to the boss’s office. There they had a “meeting.” It always lasted from fifteen to thirty minutes. Average “meeting,” isn’t it? After the deliberative procedure, Jenny always went to her room and made a cup of aromatic coffee and smoked a cigarette. The boss, still far from an old man, went to the toilet and save god anyone who got in his way with a grin or a sideways glance. All the workers already knew that after the “meeting” with Jenny you could approach the boss with a request, for example, to increase your salary. This morning, it was the “meeting” day. Jenny and I were friends. We had coffee together during breaks and chatted. I underline, we were just friends. For Jenny, I was just John. Nice guy, but no more. She was interested in the guys from Beacon Hill. Only they had access to Jenny’s body, of course, if she showed interest herself. I’ll tell you honestly, I would not mind holding a “meeting” with her, as in principle, most of the guys in our office, with the exception of Teddy. He’s obsessed with guys more. As soon as I came to work for the company, Teddy decided to include me in the list of his “girlfriends”. What happened after? Teddy got a broken nose in a nearby cafe, I was once a marine, and twice dived head into the toilet. Thus, an “agreement” on friendship and was reached between us. In the future, we even became friends, but that was after.

We are returning that Boston morning when cutie Jenny said a “terrible” secret over her morning coffee: the company sends several employees to Russia. The boss decides on the candidates. The trip promised a lot of good. Firstly, money. We all come to work to make money. It is possible for someone to sit in their pants, but I’m not one of them. I worked, and worked honestly. My office neighbor Guy, he was definitely sitting out his pants. Ah, no, I’m sorry, he also seized the moment to see the charms of Jenny or Julia, who also worked next to him. In the heat of work, the girls do not notice how the skirt was pulled above the knee and a more appetizing part of the leg became visible. They do not even notice how they stroke the fifth point with their hand, and so on. But all this is noticed by our friend Guy. With Julia, everything is clear, but what about Jenny. Here, too, everything is simple. Guy is sitting near the boss’s waiting room. At the reception is Jenny. The glass door allows you to see Jenny’s pretty legs and play Guy’s imagination. In addition to me, Guy, Teddy, Julia, Jenny and the boss, several more guys and a girl work in the department. More precisely, a woman. But they have their own team and “their own coffee.” Yes, we work together, but we have different interests. This is our team. So, during the morning coffee, I found out for myself useful information that promised, as I said above, good money. Secondly, I have long wanted to see Russia. In the infantry we were often scared by the “bear from Russia”. But it caused me a backlash. I wanted to get there and see the “bear”. I asked Jenny during the “meeting” to strongly recommend the boss to include me in the list. She answered “no problem” and already in the evening the boss and Guy called me to her. Steve, my boss, was in a good mood. I think that the “meeting” was very successful today. He said that Guy and I would fly to Russia, Moscow three days later. I nearly jumped in the chair. I honestly admit to Moscow, I knew only two cities in Russia: Moscow and Minsk. The latter, as it turned out later, was not in Russia, but in a country with a similar name, Belarus. I also visited Minsk, but more on that later. Now I was ready to kiss Jenny for the service she rendered to me. Imagine: six months in Russia, all at the expense of the company, plus an increase. Cool, isn’t it? Just how was Guy among the lucky ones? Anyways, in three days I will be in Russia.

I understood that flying with Guy to Russia, I would have to shoulder the lion’s share of the work. I was not afraid of such a prospect. I was glad to be traveling. Three days for training. For me, they ran, as if in a fog. On the third evening before departure, our friendly company: I, Guy, Julia, Jenny, Teddy, oh, yes, also Julia’s guy, by the way a very jealous macho. Poor Julia came to work several times wearing sunglasses and did not take them off all day. And why do you think she didn’t take them off. It turns out that her boyfriend was explaining to her half a night why her parents had sex in vain nine months before her birth. And all because of that handsome man at a traffic light in a red Mustang of 1973, who had the good fortune to smile at Julia. It’s good that he didn’t start doing it right away at the traffic lights. Most likely they were prevented by a police car or a lot of traffic. But this is their business. They like to be together, Julia likes Pete’s “educational” process. That’s her boyfriend’s name. I was raised in other canons. For me, a girl, especially if you share a bed with her, is a little deity to take care of. Well, come on, it’s their business. We will be back that evening before departure. Our friendly company took so many pit whiskeys that poor Guy visited the unloading room, which is in every drinking establishment, several times. I hope you understand that I mean the toilet. Then I realized that Guy took so much whiskey because he was afraid to fly. He did not advertise this information to us. The reason is clear: Steve will send another instead. But Guy is better than Teddy. So, we got drunk, Guy visited the “special” room for the third time. Departure at night. We started to say goodbye. Strange, it sounds like goodbye. I flew away for a while, I knew that I would be back. And this thought warmed me. It is good to return home after a long business trip and know that they are waiting for you. Guy was waiting for her grandmother. His parents died in a car accident 8 years ago. Greta, that was the name of his grandmother, replaced his parents. He is grateful to her for that. Always as an obedient boy calls Greta and gives an account of his whereabouts. Good boy, isn’t it? Who was waiting for me? Nobody. I was alone. My parents died a long time ago. Cancer did not spare his mother at first, then his father passed away. The army helped me bear the grief. I don’t know what I would become if it weren’t for the Marine Corps. You will not wish anyone to leave their parents when you are only 19 years old. The army did not let me go crazy with grief. I wanted to completely surrender to it, I mean the army. But mutual love did not work out for us. The reason is September 11, 2011. This day turned my mind around. I did not understand why we – the greatest country in the world, allowed the death of thousands of people.