I wrote these a while back as part of a writer's workshop. They detail a few episodes of my time living in as a student in Nizhni Novgorod, Russia in the fall of 1998. I posted them to my Facebook page last week, but thought they might be a good read here as well. Apologies if you are seeing these twice.
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| Ludmilla (Mama), Masha, Masha's husband Sasha, and Katya |
“GEE-ELL! Zaftrak!”
My Russian mama’s high voice rudely pierced my sleep-addled brain.
“Okay!” I called back. I rolled onto my side, staring at the mille
fleur pattern of the Persian rug on the wall across from the bed. Groaning a little, I got up, smoothing the
blanket encased in the top sheet, trying the make the diamond shaped hole in
the middle lie smooth. I pulled the
rug-like bedspread up over the large square pillow and headed down the dark
narrow hallway, past the pink leather padded inner front door to the kitchen on
the left.
Mama
was dressed in her at-home robe, the salmon colored ruffles hanging limply
where the halves crossed her body. Her
short faded blond hair was sticking up at odd angles and again I felt guilty
for displacing Mama to the fold-out couch for half a semester. I never had anything to say about it,
however. Mama had installed me in
Katya’s room, Katya in her room and taken the couch for herself before I even
arrived to stay. The couch was a typical
Russian foldout—the precursor to the futon.
It was padded and covered with a brown fleecy slipcover and unfolded
flat for sleeping.
Mama
bustled around the kitchen finishing breakfast.
Mama cooks very different than my mother, but I like nearly everything
Mama makes. My own mother measures most
things with teaspoon and cup measures.
Mama throws a little of this, a pinch of that, a saucer of flour and voila— a dense dough results. Mama pats the dough into little balls,
flattens them with the palm of her hand and fries in them in the skillet. Five minutes later, the golden glistening
disks sat on my plate, smothered in homemade blackberry jam and smetana, the
thin kind of sour cream that Russians eat with nearly everything.
Mama went to the pantry closet in the hall that
also doubled as a coat closet and pulled down a new jar of compote, the tiny
Russian apples preserved and floating on the top. Mmm, my favorite. Mama poured me a glass and then sat down in
the opposite chair to eat her own breakfast.
Mama didn’t speak any English, but tried to speak slowly for her
American daughter and they had a halting conversation about the planned
activities for the day. I was nearly
finished when Katya shuffled in, wearing a T-shirt and underpants, her gangly
legs bare and her feet shoved into a pair of ratty slippers. I stood up to make room for Katya at the
small table and brought my dishes to the sink.
Picking up the baking soda from the sink, I poured a little in my hand,
made a paste and added mustard powder from the box perched precariously on the
sink ledge. I set about washing my
dishes with the paste in my hands. Soap of champions, I thought. As I washed, I remembered the conversation
with Mama the night before.
Mama had
come home from her job at the bank, and was rummaging in the freezing balcony
for some item of food that was stored there because the refrigerator was too
small. Emerging from between a stack of pots and pans with a home-canned jar in
hand, Mama asked me if I would like to have kooreetsa for supper. Kooreesta,
kooreesta, I thought frantically. I
know I should know the word, but blank on the meaning. I look desperately at Mama. Mama asks again and tries hand motions. "Minutchko," I say, and run into my
room for dictionary. K…ka…kee…kooreetsa:
chicken! Holding my finger on the entry
I show Mama and say yes, kooretsa would be fine. Mama giggles like a schoolgirl and tries out
the English word on her tongue. “CHEE-ken.” She grinned, her blue eyes twinkling. I smile now, rinsing off the gritty residue
from the plate and my hands and heads for the shower.
**
Marjory came over
for supper and Mama made pizza.
Or, at least Mama’s version of
pizza, which was more like a pirogi with toppings. She thinks the only thing Americans eat is
pizza. I kept thinking I should
introduce her to a good old-fashioned casserole. She was giggling in that high-pitched
chortle of hers as she pulled the long pan out of the oven. “PEE-tsa!”
she kept exclaiming with glee, followed by peals of laughter. Mama was pretty proud of herself.
**
After
a long and hard search, I finally bought a coat. It was camel colored wool and ankle-length
with a big floppy hood. The matching
camel lining was quilted and made the coat sit heavy on my shoulders. It had eight matching buttons up the front in
a neat rectangle, a ninth button holding the collar together. I had an ivory beret and a hand-loomed
crocheted scarf that I’d bought from a babushka selling them along the
road. Mama had been asking for days if I
had found a coat yet—my old pea coat had been deemed insufficient two weeks
ago. In the interim, Mama pulled an old
fur beast out of the closet and made me wear it when I went out. I hated it.
I stepped up my search for a coat in short order after that. I gleefully wore my new coat home, the beast
stuffed into my satchel. I nonchalantly hung the lovely new garment in the coat
closet. I was studying in my room when
Mama came home from work.
“Ooohh!”
she exclaimed from the hallway, her voice piercing the stillness. I jumped a little. It had been silent in the flat for
hours. I poked my head into the
hallway. She was standing in front of
the hallway vanity examining my coat, her own coat still on her back and her
feet still shod in outdoor boots. She
giggled and asked me where I got it. I
remembered the name of the store but told her the street it was located on
instead. She ran a hand over the quilted
lining in approval. “Will this be warm
enough—maybe this is a fall coat.” She
mused more to herself that to me. “Oh
no,” I put in. “This is very warm.” I shoved up my sweater sleeve a couple of
inches to reveal two layers of long underwear.
“I wear many clothes.” I got out.
She smiled at me again and hung the coat in the closet. Turning she said,
“How
much did you pay for it?” Uh-oh. Numbers weren’t my strong suit in either
language. I tried and failed to say it
in Russian. Mama tried to tell me how
much she had paid for her last coat and I blinked dumbly at her. Mama went into Katya’s room for a minute and
emerged with a calculator. I grinned
with relief. Something I could use! I punched in the price of the coat and
converted it to dollars. She did the
same to tell me the price she’d paid.
About the same. I felt good about
that. She smiled at me again, the
language barrier making things awkward again.
She congratulated me again and I mumbled thanks and went back to my room
to study.
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| Me and my lovely coat, outside the flat, November 1998 |
The
phone rang a lot that evening. Mama’s voice trilled in the hallway. Her sister called, her daughter called, some
friends called. Everyone got to hear the
whole story of my coat, including the price.
I gave up studying and listened in, smiling at her mother’s pride.
