by Val M Karren
As I was not assigned a tour group by Irina, but just worked as an interpreter for passengers while on board, I took a stroll through Kazan after we docked, while the groups boarded busses and went to see churches and mosques. Once in the center of the old city, I visited the barber and did some shopping at the bazaar for the basics that I had left behind in Nizhniy. While the choice of clothes, shoes, and sandals was almost endless, the quality was pitiful. I could have bought an entirely new wardrobe for the prices being asked, but walked away with some locally made slacks and a few button-down shirts of both light materials and light colors. I purchased a single disposable razor and a small bar of shaving soap, a toothbrush and a small sampler tube of Aquafresh labeled fully in German, and a bottle of shampoo. I looked for deodorant but there just wasn’t any to be found. With my hair so short a basic comb was all I needed. I bought a cheap backpack to carry it all in and then strolled through the town that I had missed last year due to my medical misadventures. The city was being restored after decades of neglect. Scaffolding and street works were ubiquitous. There was a distinctly different feeling in this city than other Volga towns. While I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, it felt like Kazan was perhaps just a bit more ‘free’ than Nizhniy and Moscow. How exactly I couldn’t tell. Maybe it was all in my head. Maybe I was feeling liberated in the warm sunshine, my hair buzzed off, away from my studies and the mess I had made for myself in that icy cold apartment on Prospect Lenina. It was good to be on the river again.
As it was Monday morning I was glad I was out of Nizhniy and was safe. I thought about calling Yuilia. I decided it was best not to call as who knows who would be listening. Surely the FSB had her phone tapped by now and were waiting for me to make contact again. Were Mr. P.’s goons camped out in front of my apartment window, harassing Babushka and Raiya every day? For all they knew I was still hiding out in Nizhniy. They were probably watching Hans’s apartment too. I felt guilty for bringing this on my friends. I wanted to fix it somehow instead of running away and hiding. As I walked through Kazan back to the river station, I thought about how I might be able to get in contact with everybody to let them know I was safe without revealing where I was and without putting them in any further danger. Perhaps I could send a postcard? I would be long gone from that town before it reached them. Perhaps I could even be out of Russia before anybody could intercept it. Why take the risk? Perhaps it was just better to call once I was out of Russia. I vacillated back and forth about what to do. My thoughts weighed me down as I boarded the trusted Zhukov again in the early afternoon. I sat alone on the deck in the sunshine in my new clothes and enjoyed the warm, dry breeze. The boat was deserted except for the crew.
“Pyotr? Is that you? I didn’t recognize you dressed like a Russian man.”
I pulled my cap off from over my eyes and face that was shielding them from the bright sun as I lazed on deck. Lara was standing above me in her working uniform. I smiled a lazy smile and put the hat back on my face. The sun was brilliant that afternoon. Her blouse ruffled in the warm breeze.
“And what did you do to your hair?” she sounded horrified.
I sat up and put the cap on my head.
She was dumbfounded. “You look completely different. I only recognized you because of the bandage on your arm.”
“Sorry, but I hadn’t brought the right clothes with me on the trip. I bought some new threads at the bazaar,” I explained.
“Yes, it certainly looks that way,” she chuckled, referring with amusement to the poor quality of the vestments.
“Why did you cut your beautiful hair?” she asked again.
“Did you like it the other way? I thought boys in Russia shouldn’t have long hair…,” I was teasing her a bit.
“Well, yes, but you’re not Russian. It looked wonderful on you,” she was being sincere.
“I thought so too, but it was too hot. Needed a summer style,” I grinned and removed the cap to show her my bristly head again.
“You look like a soldier,” she puffed and sat down on a deck chair opposite me in a bit of disgust.
“Do I really look that different?” I asked again getting an idea.
“I would have walked right past you had I not see that bandage there under your short sleeve,” she affirmed. “All that is missing is a cheap wrist watch.”
“I can get one!” I said triumphantly.
She waved her hands at me in disgust and muttered, “Phoo! Phoo!” as Russians do to their dogs when they are misbehaving.
After a short pause in the conversation, she asked directly, “Why did you not pack the right clothes, Pyotr?”
“Dear doctor, I am not supposed to be on this boat. I am actually hiding on this boat from the people who robbed me, beat me, broke into and destroyed my apartment and fire bombed a university building, all to keep me quiet,” I explained in an overdone gracious voice. I then switched to a more serious tone. “So I grabbed a few things and I ran. Luckily, the Zhukov was in port when I was running away from the fellow who beat me the first time. I had not planned to be here. I planned to be in the United States by now, but couldn’t make it to the train station without getting caught. I don’t know what they’ll do to me if they catch me again.”
“Kolya was serious then. You did get beaten by thugs,” she concluded.
“Yes. And I don’t think they’ll stop looking for me. So I have to get out of Russia as soon as I can,” I admitted with defeat in my voice. “I can’t go back to Nizhniy.”
“Do you live there, in Nizhniy Novgorod?” she asked surprised.
“Yes, I am a student there,” I affirmed.
“I also finished nursing school at NGU,” she announced. “I live there with my grandmother.”
I had another idea come to my head, but I sat and listened patiently to her story.
For the next few days I didn’t shave my face. Even though I had purchased a razor and shaving soap in Kazan, looking in the mirror at the three days of growth on my chin and jaw on Tuesday morning, I decided to let it grow. It was growing in as a red beard even though my hair was a dark brown. Maybe it was the full warm sun for several days in a row that gave it a tinge. It was certainly the sun that had given my face and neck a good tan. I had spent several days on the deck of the boat taking in as much sunshine as possible. The white, pasty, winter look was gone and I was turning rather brown in my face and arms. I continued to let the beard grow.
During our day stop in Samara I snuck off to the bazaar or street side markets during the guided tours and bought myself a track suit, flip flop sandals and a pair of classless sunglasses. A simple silver wire frame with shades. In Saratov, I didn’t have to look far as vendors came to the river station to sell their wares to the tourists and I was able to buy a cheap gold wrist watch with a white face, gold hands and no numbers, and an old soldier’s field glasses. The watch had to be wound each day to tell time twenty-four hours later and the lenses of the binoculars were heavily scratched. By the time we arrived into Volgograd it was nearly impossible to tell me apart from the other local punks loitering around the docks in multi-colored, jerry-rigged Ladas smoking cigarettes and drinking cheap beer from chunky brown glass bottles with no labels. My transformation had been complete, except for my body language.
Where the Volga river spills out onto the southern Russia steppes is one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen. One is not quite sure where the earth and the river meet as the high steep banks melt away after the city of Saratov and there is nothing but arid rolling plains and dramatic skies filled with tall white clouds. One can literally watch a thunderstorm roll in, roll over and roll out and disappear over the horizon. There is nothing on the land to obscure one’s view of the horizon—nor anything on it. The weather in Volgograd is warm and arid, and in the summer time only warm breezes blow. Along the banks of the river, tall, slim poplar trees sway in the warm breezes from the steppe and make a calming, gentle rustling noise that sweeps up and down the river. The mor
nings are bright, clear and fresh and the morning sun quickly heats the stones on the river, welcoming the afternoon strollers and sun worshipers. On the riverbank the men strip to the waist and lay on the grassy banks of the Mother Volga and the young women stroll in wispy sundresses that flutter around their bare legs in the warm breeze.
In Volgograd after a warm day of bus tours, we bid farewell to one batch of tourists in the afternoon and had the night off, until ten in the morning to relax and rest until the next group arrived for their voyage from Volgograd to Moscow - via Nizhniy Novgorod. After a few shots of vodka, Nikolai was loose enough to help me perfect the walk, the squat and the deep guttural talk of the street punk. After a few more shots we were strolling around the bar, bow legged, to the hysterical laughter of our colleagues as we perfected the lazy drawl, the long O’s of the Volga vagrant and sitting on chairs with our legs wide open, slouched with a look of complete incredulousness on our faces, not caring if Tsar Nicholas himself had just been raised from the dead. Between shots of Pepsi and vodka I practiced squatting in the corner for twenty minutes at a time until my knees went numb or until Kolya fell over half drunk laughing his head off. My beard had fully grown in and was as red as an Irishman’s.
That evening before bed, like I always did, I took a stroll along the entire railing of the top deck. It was a calming practice I had picked up the summer prior and it felt natural to do it again. I padded around the deck in my gangster flip flops and track suit; slap, swish, slap, swish. While I rounded the stern of the boat, I noticed Lara staring out across the water into the city lights. A warm breeze was blowing through her shoulder length sandy brown hair. She was off duty like the rest of us for a shore-visit or other horseplay.
I greeted her in proper Russian, not in the street slang I was practicing in the bar, “Good evening, doctor.”
“Good evening, Pyotr.” she looked briefly at me and then looked away.
“We missed you tonight. Did you go for dinner in the city?” I inquired.
“No, I don’t know anybody here. This is only my second voyage,” she replied in a business like way.
“OK. Would you like to join me for a nightcap in the bar?” I invited.
“No thank you. I don’t like sharing a drink with a street urchin,” she glanced me up and down. I reached to zip up the track suit jacket and hide the undershirt. I stood quietly for a moment.
“Pytor. Do you think I’m a fool? Do you not think that I know what you’re doing? And don’t you realize how stupid and dangerous it is?” she blurted out with no warning.
“Lara, I’m not asking you to do anything. Why are you so upset?” I protested.
“You’re asking me to stand by and watch you get picked up by those thugs again and get beaten so nobody can recognize your face anymore! You won’t fool people for long, you know!” she was rather emotional and turned away.
“I only have to fool them for maybe four or five hours until I can get on a train and make it to Moscow. I’m not going back to my apartment. I won’t be going back to school. I just have to blend in long enough to get from the river station into the train station without somebody recognizing Peter Turner. That’s it!” I explained. I’m very confident it will work!”
“Why don’t you just get on a flight from Volgograd and go direct to Moscow? That way you don’t have to go back to Nizhniy at all,” she proffered.
“I’ve thought about that. But the one place that they will check my passport and visa will be at the airports. I don’t have permission to be on this boat, I don’t have permission to be in Volgograd. I don’t have permission to even be out of the Nizhegorodskiy Province. If I tried to get on a plane here, in Volgograd, they’d collar me so fast. I know, almost for sure, that my name is already on an FSB watch list. If any border guard sees my visa, that it’s not in order, and checks his latest national alerts, they’ll have me either way. At least sneaking through Nizhniy, I have a chance to make it to Moscow without getting picked up,” I explained earnestly.
“How will I know…” she stopped herself short, “How will we know if you’ve made it?”
“Lara, I’m sorry. I didn’t know you were this concerned about me. I can always send you a postcard or call your grandmother from Moscow to let you know,” I offered.
“Maybe I could come with you, just to make sure?” she half whispered looking me in the face.
“Don’t be silly. Why would a beautiful woman like you be walking arm in arm with a street punk? That would only call attention to me, just as if I put on my orange rain coat again. If I don’t go as a street punk they will make me from a hundred meters. There is no other way,” I rebutted.
“Is there any way I can help you? I could not bear it to think of you being beaten again. What they did to you the first time without even trying was horrible!” she shuddered.
“Well, if you really want to help me…,” I left the possibility hanging in the air. Lara turned to me to hear my suggestion, “will you have your grandmother call a few people for me in Nizhniy and give them a message from me?” I asked skeptically.
“I can ask her. I will talk to her tomorrow morning from the captain’s telephone on the bridge before we depart tomorrow afternoon. Please let me know who you need to call and what the message is,” she replied resolutely.
“Thank you, this will help me greatly. I am sure there are people worried about me. I left without a word,” I said with gratitude.
Lara took me by the right arm and walked with me toward the staircase. “Come, let’s have that drink…” and she tipped her head against my shoulder as my sandals said: slap, swish, slap swish across the smooth deck. “…and please take off those stupid sandals!” she laughed.
As the turbines revved up to push us northward from the moorings at Kazan on Saturday night, my heart jumped. The bow was pointed north and the next stop, and my last stop, would be Nizhniy Novgorod. It was a late Saturday evening and the sun and clouds had made a brilliant sunset in the east. Heading indoors was the last thing on my mind. Sleep, I knew, would not be possible that night. After eight days, the stiffness and pain from my bruised ribs were gone, even though the bruises still hurt when poked. Lara had dressed them just that morning again and told me for sure that nothing had been broken. The gash in my arm was closed up and getting ready to leave a manly scar. I had eaten well this last week and felt confident and ready to make the dash to the train station.
I packed my new Russian rucksack with my new clothes and my black shapka, I couldn’t be parted from it. I left my other clothes and shoes with Nikolai. Maybe his brother could use the blue jeans and shoes this fall. My beard after a week and a day looked perfect. My hair just a bit longer, but still cropped close. With the sunglasses on, the open track suit, an unlit cigarette in my mouth, my own mother wouldn’t have recognized me. I could hardly believe the mirror myself. I was ready. There was a knock at my door. I took off the glasses and hid the cigarette, as I hoped it was Lara. It was.
“I don’t know if I will get a chance to see you in the morning before you disembark. I just wanted to wish you good luck. Please don’t forget to call from Moscow. I have the next week off of work and will be home. My grandmother is almost always home. You can leave a message…” she was pining.
“Thank you. Did you get a chance to call home before we left Kazan port?” I queried.
“Yes, Grandmother spoke to the people you wanted to give messages to. She says they were all very relieved to hear you were safe. Yulia wanted to know where to find you. Baba didn’t know so she couldn’t tell her. That’s all. The man she phoned, she couldn’t understand him but he understood the message,” she reported.
“Thank you very much!” I leaned over and gave her a bristly peck on the cheek, “That’s fantastic news!”
“No thanks needed,” she replied surprised.
“Say, I don’t plan to sleep tonight. I’m too crazy. I was going to watch the stars tonight off the stern. Would you like to join me?” I inv
ited.
“Only if we can sit out of the wind,” was her only condition.
Wrapped in the blankets from the two bunks in my cabin and with warm tea in hand we sat on the deck and watched the villages and other boats pass in the night. There was no moon that night so the stars were more brilliant than usual. It felt like we could pluck the stars from the sky if we stood up and reached out for them. They sat as low as the horizon and reflected on the water in the wider stretches of the river. We watched the river locks close behind us and lift us to a new level and we watched again as the red and green flashing lights of the river’s bulwark faded behind us and around a black bend in the night. The night was all shadows and stars.
“What will you do with the information once you arrive in the USA?” she asked me serenely with her head on my shoulder.
“I suppose it’s nothing that other people don’t already know, but because it’s original material I’m sure I can use it for a thesis to finish my degree. Nobody here wants it!” I speculated.
“Why didn’t you stop when you knew it was getting dangerous?” she pushed.
“The momentum just carried me through. Every way I turned, it was just in front of me. This one mobster dominates the business community, legal and illegal. I tried to stop, but nobody would believe that I had stopped,” I explained.
“And now look at you. You’ve gone from an intelligent academic to a street urchin with a barge puller’s accent. You could fool your own mother now,” she admitted.
“You know, I was just thinking the same thing before you knocked on my door,” I said with glee.
“So, you’re having fun now?” she slapped my arm.
“Thanks for staying with me tonight. I’d be too nervous to sit alone in my cabin and watch the shadows on the water. It would have driven me crazy.” I said quietly.