Janne Drangsholt - The Marvelous Misadventures of Ingrid Winter

Peter, who clearly wanted to distinguish himself as an urbane sophisticate, walked right up to Ivan and kissed him on both cheeks with a passion that seemed to confuse even the Russian. Ingvill and I each received our kiss on the hand, without knowing for sure if this was the norm in Russia or if it was a response to the intensity of Peter’s greeting. Ingvill blushed anyway and then snorted awkwardly. That kiss on the hand might be the only bodily contact she’d had so far this year.

Which was probably also why she insisted on leading the way, next to her new Russian friend, while Peter and I brought up the rear.

“Who actually is this Ivan guy?” I asked.

“I’m not entirely sure,” Peter replied. “The chair said he was the one who contacted us, not vice versa. Norway’s been trying for years, you know, to set up some form of collaboration with the state university without success. So we were surprised when they suddenly showed some interest.”

“Is he a historian?”

“No, a philosophy professor. Analytical philosophy, I think.”

“Wittgenstein?”

“No idea.”

In the car we found out that Ivan preferred to work with Heidegger.

“I’ve done quite a bit of work on Heidegger as well,” I explained. “In my dissertation, for example. Loads of Heidegger. ‘The turn’ or, well, die Kehre as I’m sure you know it, Logos, Being—the whole shebang. I’m studying Tehom from a literary criticism perspective, and it’s interesting how Heidegger’s concept of Dasein helps to illuminate that.”

Ivan didn’t respond, but said something to Ingvill, who was sitting in the front seat because she claimed the back made her carsick. I couldn’t hear what he said, but it was obviously something amusing, because they both giggled about it for a long time.

I looked out the window. We were just passing a gigantic statue of Lenin. Vladimir looked like he was running at full speed. Probably rushing off to communize something.

“What kind of building was that behind the Lenin statue?” I asked.

No answer.

I repeated the question.

“Please don’t bother me while I’m driving,” Ivan chided. “There’s a lot of traffic. I need to focus.”

He kept chatting with Ingvill. I turned to look out the window again.

“Is that Nevsky Prospect?” Peter asked, aiming his question generally at the front seat.

“No,” said Ivan.

“Oh, I see,” said Peter. “It’s quite cold out, isn’t it? On the plane they said it was only fifteen degrees! Good thing I brought my coat.”

“This isn’t cold.”

“It feels a little chilly,” Peter insisted.

“Not cold.”

“Fine.”

After a while we drove over a river.

“Is this the Neva?” Peter asked. “I’ve been so looking forward to seeing the Neva. Tossing and turning like a sick man in his troubled bed. Isn’t that how the Pushkin poem goes?”

“No,” Ivan said. “Not poem. Not Neva.”

At that, Peter finally gave up. The two of us in the backseat sat looking out our windows. The two in front kept chatting and giggling.

They actually giggled so much that thirty minutes later when we had to say good-bye to our thin-haired Russian guide, Ingvill looked as if it were the end of the world. She did light up again, however, when she realized that he would be coming back in a few hours to take us to dinner.

For my part I was just immensely relieved that it hadn’t occurred to the university that they could ask us to share rooms, so as the others entered the elevator I hurriedly said good-bye and headed off to look for the stairs.

My room was on the fourth floor and was large and turquoise and had a double bed, a chaise longue, a desk, and some big mirrors that looked like the ones you would find in an interrogation room. I lay down on the bed with my head turned toward the windows and watched heavy snowflakes drift down toward the gray canal, the gray cars, and the gray pavement. Even though it was well below freezing the snow didn’t seem to be sticking. It swirled into random drifts, piling up near the walls of buildings, railings, or other obstacles but didn’t settle on the ground the way normal snow does. This was busy snow. Or some distinctively Russian variety. Matrix snow.

I should shower.

I should call home.

I should work.

Instead I lay there idly following the journey of the snowflakes with my eyes.

A few hours later we stood in the lobby again waiting for Ivan. Ingvill had poked a few more bobby pins into her hair, applied bright-pink lipstick, and put on a felted wool dress with a big heart on the chest. Peter had gotten out his tweed suit in addition to wearing something that resembled a cowboy hat on his head.

“Was that in your suitcase?” I asked, impressed.

“Indeed it was,” he said. “In its own box. It’s an urban bowler. Pretty stylish, wouldn’t you agree?”

“Yes,” I said. “Very nice.”

A second later, Ivan walked up with three paper bags in hand, but stopped short at the sight of Peter.

“Cowboy hat no good,” he said.

“It’s an urban bowler.”

“Like a cowboy.”

“No, like an urban—”

“Like a cowboy!”

“This is a neutral menswear hat,” Peter objected and looked to me. “Don’t you agree? Not something you would wear out on the prairie, so to speak.”

He chuckled at the image.

“Well, it does look a little like a cowboy hat,” I reluctantly conceded.

“It’s not a cowboy hat,” Peter hissed.

“Peter,” Ingvill said, “if Ivan doesn’t want you to wear the cowboy hat, I think we should respect that. If we want to establish a mutually respectful relationship, we need to be sensitive to cultural differences. OK?”

“Fine,” muttered Peter with a quiet hmph .

“Here,” said Ivan and handed each of us a bag.

“What is it?”

“Present.”

I peeked into my bag, which contained a box of mints, a map of the city, and a bottle. Could it be vodka? The thought turned my stomach. The only time I’d ever drunk vodka was at a family reunion for Bjørnar’s family in Østfold. They didn’t serve any alcohol until well into the evening, and when it finally came, there was only cognac or vodka to choose between. The last thing I remembered was Bjørnar throwing up into a plastic bag containing a copy of Dante’s Inferno and a Sony Sports Walkman, while I threw up all over the bed in the guest room at his aunt’s house.

“Peripheral neuropathy,” I whispered to a miffed Peter as we walked to the restaurant ten minutes later.

“What’s that?”

“It’s a fairly widespread problem in Russia, because of the high rate of vodka consumption. It damages the peripheral nervous system and people can lose sensation in their hands or feet.”

“Sounds about right.”

“I don’t like Ivan.”

“Me, either.”

“But we probably should have brought him a gift,” I said. “Maybe we could pay for his meal at the restaurant?”

“I don’t care,” said Peter. “My head is cold. My urban bowler was specially designed for cold weather.”

And it was cold out, no doubt about it. The snowflakes continued to fall from the sky, and there was hardly anyone out and about. Just us. A group of people who didn’t actually know each other and didn’t want to get to know each other, either, but who had to be together because some PR adviser had come up with words like internationalization .

Innovation.

Synergy.

Cold.

Death.

Luckily the restaurant was surprisingly warm and cozy. It was situated in multiple rooms that you entered via hallways and little doorways in what appeared to be a converted apartment or maybe even multiple apartments that had been combined. We sat down at a low coffee table, the kind you would have found in most homes in the seventies, which was surrounded by a big sofa with matching armchairs to further emphasize the hominess.