Lex Libertas

As I stepped out of the shower on Friday, I heard a very loud, rather frightening, knocking on my front door. I hurriedly dried myself, and put on some clothes. Looking frazzled, and still with wet hair, I answered and was greeted with a torrent of angry Russian. The few words I caught were “2nd Floor” “under you” and “water.” I pieced together that my showering was leaking again.

A couple of months ago, the same room complained, and the plumber came up here and messed around with some stuff. I told the new girl that she should go down and write it in the request book. I couldn’t for several reasons, not the least of which being that I have no idea how to write this complaint in Russian. She left, miffed, but satisfied, and I went about my day as usual.

When I came back in the evening, I had completely forgotten about the morning incident. So when I walked into the bathroom for the first time, I was surprised to see my tash can moved, and the curtain dragged into the sink. I looked around, perplexed, and then saw what was lining the shower base.

It looks like some creature from a horror film is oozing out of the base, working it’s way up the walls to cover my room. Apparently, it was this fellow’s first time using this foam, because it’s far from uniform. All things considered, I really don’t think it’s going to help. I think the problem was in the piping, but I hope I’m wrong. That way it’ll have been fixed.

The major downside, I no longer have any space at all to set my soap and shampoo. Instead they have to float around the in bottom. The drain doesn’t work too well, so they literally sail all over. Quite annoying.

While the vast majority of Russians that I have come into contact with have cell phones, phone booths are still prevalent and used. You can’t use them by putting change in, you have to buy a phone card. They come in various denominations. None of this is too radical, Western Europe is pretty much the same.

There is, however, a Russian peculiarity. When making a call from a pay phone, after the other person picks up, you have to press a button to activate your handset. If you don’t, the other person keeps saying “Allio,” while you reply “It’s me!” Both parties get progressively louder, thinking the problem is one of poor reception, until the person you called finally hangs up in frustration, thinking themselves the subject of a prank call.

This was the scene the first several times I used the pay phones. At first, I didn’t know about the button, and now I usually remember to press it. If anyone has any explanation as to why the Russian phones work this way, I would love to hear it. Often, life over here is way more complicated than it needs to be.

In a related artifical shortage: In the dorm, we have three pay phones. Used to be only two, but they just installed a third one in a side hallway. Of these three phones, guess how many work. If you said zero (Bug), you’d be close. Only one of the three works.

Why go to the trouble of installing a third, non-working phone? I would have preferred to have that effort spent on fixing the second one.

I once spent one whole hour waiting in the lobby for a girl to get off the phone. Waiting, I could feel the mounting blood pressure listening to this girl blab on and on. I’m an ascetic when it comes to the phone. I hate talking on it, I use it simply for communication to arrange things. If I want to just talk, I’ll call to set up some face time, but I can’t stand more than a minute or two of holding the thing to my ear.

About a half hour through, she hung up, and my heart fluttered with happiness. I had been standing this whole time about three feet away from her, staring (such is the phone/hall way positioned). She looked at me, then picked the phone back up again and dialed. I was ready to go postal.

Common decency would stipulate that if someone was waiting for 30 minutes, and you had finished one call but needed another, that you would give the other person a chance to use the phone in between. Especially if you had another half-hour call to make!!

Oh, the things I need to work through with a therapist.

Russia is not the most tolerant place on Earth. While back home, I’m still waiting for my “white privilige” check to arrive in the mail, this is one place where my appearance has benefited me (unlike in the American higher education system).

What I’m about to describe, obviously, doesn’t apply to all Russians. To date I’ve met some very accepting and open people. However, there is a definite racist strain in Russian society.

This shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone who’s studied Russia’s historical treatment of Jews. It is the country that invented the pogrom, and forged the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. However, I can’t really speak about anti-Semitism in Russia, because I have yet to meet a single Russian Jew over here. Basically, the Russian jewry, starting in the 70’s, said “Screw you guys, I’m goin’ home.” Home meant Israel and the US. Things seem to be improving, as some are in fact returning to Mother Russia.

Those singled out most for harassment are blacks. There are quite a few African students here on scholarship, most I’ve met are at the Mining University (mineral extraction, oil, etc…). In my experiences in France, the US, and here, Africans are, as these things go, about the single friendliest bunch around. I’m also always happy to meet Africans, because they usually speak either English or French, both languages that I actually speak.

Usually, whenever I come across an African, in the course of standard getting to know you conversation, we happen across the topic of “How do you like Russia?” Which invariably leads to me saying something like “well, they’re not the friendliest people.” To which I get the obvious response of, “if you think they’re not friendly, how do you think I feel.”

I meet a student from Zambia a couple of months ago, and I saw that he had a scar on his cheek. It’s from when a group of skinheads attacked him in the middle of the day, in the midst of downtown. (A note for the Americans. In Europe, downtown tends to be the nice, safe part of the city, and the suburbs are the rough areas. The exact opposite of the way we think of things.)

Blacks are followed closely by Asians in this unfortunate top ten list. There are also a lot of Chinese here on scholarship, and the ones I’ve talked to say they don’t go out at night. They don’t even feel comfortable in groups.

Lest you think it was only foreigners, Russians also have a severe distaste for Caucasians. Again for the Americans, that doesn’t mean “white” like our race labelers back home would have us believe, it means from the Caucasus, a mountain chain in between Russia and the Middle East. Chechnya is located in this area.

To give you a taste of how Russians feel about Caucasians, every single Russian girl I’ve talked to about them has flat out told me that they don’t like them, even though some of them have never actually known one. The Russian stretch of the Caucasus is Muslim, and the treatment of women is about what you’d expect. However, as a male, I’ve never had any problems with Caucasians, and they’ve been, on average, much friendlier than ethnic Russians. And to top it off, they have some amazing food.

For example, one of my good friends here is Dagestani, and when I went on the metro with him, he was stopped by the police on the way in, and on the way out. Anyways, the point of the story is that Caucasians (especially Chechens) know what it’s like to get the short end of the racism stick. So I was shocked when I saw two Chechen friends of mine physically harass some black students.
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Yet another example of government’s infringement on the free market, and it’s resulting negative effects on the consumers.

U.S. radio broadcasters have asked federal regulators to bar rival satellite radio services from offering content tailored to local markets, according to a petition obtained on Friday.

The broadcasters’ group demanded that the Federal Communications Commission, which licenses satellite services, explicitly ban their rivals from using any technology to offer content in one area that is different from another location.

A newer, better product comes along, and the old companies ask the government for protection against competition. Same old story, and it just ends up hurting the consumers.

Each floor in the dorm has a дежурная (dezhurnaya), basically a “floor lady.” She’s the one who brings new sheets, and takes care of various administrative details. Mine is very nice, but she speaks really fast.

Today, she came in and the only words I caught were “birthday year.” I’m thinking to myself, “birthday year. What on earth could that mean? Is is some Russian holiday? How do they know what my birthday year is? Wait, when would a ‘birthday year’ be celebrated?” Then she slowed down and asked, “what year were you born in?” Ah, so that was it.

Fair enough, I responded correctly, and gave the year of my roommate as well. She then proceeded to talk fast at me, again. The only word I’m picking out is “elevator.” When my face contorted into a mask of utter confusion, she understood that I didn’t understand, and said “wait, I’ll show you.”

Out comes a folder with color pictures of fire extinguishers, and pictures of what I imagine are the instructions on how to use them. Oddly enough, one of the pictures was of a little boy running with his clothes on fire. I guess that “stop, drop, and roll” doesn’t translate nicely into Russian. Although, since practically everything in this language rhymes (especially verb endings), it wouldn’t be too dificult to translate.

I finally understand that new fire extinguishers have been put in the hallways by the elveators, and that I am to go read the instructions. Before leaving me, she says that I must sign saying that I had read the instructions. Fine. Then she tells me to sign for my roommate as well. Fine. After all, friends of mine over here have had to sign official documents for me, so it’s just karma working it’s way around.

Since last week, they’ve been “working” on the dorm building. This means that half of the outlets in each room don’t work. Specifically, those would be the outlets that the stove and fridge are plugged into.

This “work” started the day after I stocked up on yogurt. Once every other week or so I go to the store where I can get Danissimo relatively cheaply, and I buy 12-15 of them. I then sort and stack them in the fridge, very nicely. Of course, when the power to the fridge goes out, I still have about 11 of the little things sitting in there, rotting. I ate as many as I could to at least get some benefit out of my investment, but considered everything else lost, including some salads, frozen vegetables, and vareneki (non meat-filled raviolis).

There are also signs up all around warning us not to use extension cords to plug the fridge and stove into the outlets in the room. Apparently this is a very real fire danger, and I believe them. This “work” is rumored to go on for a month. A month of no cooking in, and by default, lots of eating out.

In addition to the half room outage, the laundromat is off-line. This meant that I had to return to the old, pre-February ways of going to the other dorm to do laundry 1,2. Because of various circumstances, I put it off until today, when I absolutely had to do the laundry. I literally had no clean clothes, and not even any “semi-clean” or “not-dirty” clothes. If you’ve ever lived on your own, you know how desperate the situation is if you’re out of “semi-clean” and “not-dirty” clothes.

Unfortunately, about ten other people from the dorm all picked today to do laundry, but they decided to leave about 5 minutes before me. Which meant that I was dead last in line. In a place with only two dryers. Luckliy, most Russians don’t use the dryers, and there were five washing machines. I left my dorm at 7, and got back at 11. Par for the laundry course. Of course, one cycle in the dryers never dries anything, and my clothes come out moist. So now, my bathroom and closet are covered in drying underwear, socks, and t-shirts. In 8 hours, I hope that at least one set containing each of those objects will be dry. Otherwise, I’m in for a cold walk to the university.

Tomorrow, part of this “work” will include a massive power surge, so signs are up telling us to unplug all our appliances from the two working sockets. But hey, I’ve had hot water for the past three consecutive days. That alone merits praise, and keeps the other stuff from getting me down too much. Oh wait, I’ve probably jinxed it.

The California state government is absurd:

The department late last year fined a Sacramento Valley nonprofit group $33,000, in part because it used student volunteers to help clear a stream bed.

The problem has its roots in the decades-old prevailing wage law, first adopted to prevent nonunion contractors from underbidding union shops on public works projects. More recent law and rulings on what constitutes a volunteer, and a broadened definition of publics works, prompted the state to start cracking down on nonprofits that have the temerity to try to save the taxpayers money.

Your Questions Answered

Answers to all those questions that led people to Sgt. Stryker’s site.

The 213 Things Skippy is No Longer Allowed to Do in the U.S. Army

Why 213? Too much time off from work I imagine. Brief sampling:

Not allowed to add ‘In accordance with the prophesy’ to the end of answers I give to a question an officer asks me.

Must never call an SAS a ‘Wanker’.

Must not tell any officer that I am smarter than they are, especially if it’s true.

Never tell a German soldier that ‘We kicked your ass in World War 2!’

The Irish MPs are not after ‘Me frosted lucky charms’.

Our supply Sgt is ‘Sgt Watkins’ not ‘Sugar Daddy’.

Not allowed to yell ‘Take that Cobra’ at the rifle range.

�The Giant Space Ants’ are not at the top of my chain of command.

If one soldier has a 2nd Lt bar on his uniform, and I have an E-4 on mine It means he outranks me. It does not mean �I have been promoted three more times than you’.

Should not show up at the front gate wearing part of a Russian uniform, messily drunk.

Even if my commander did it.

Now that the snow has all melted, I’m noticing something about the city I didn’t before. Sure, I always knew it was really dirty. Most people here complain about the air quality, but coming from Los Angeles, I think it’s quite fresh. In winter the snow on the street was a very dark brown, and usually stained your clothing.

But now that there’s no snow to soak up and absorb the dirt, the city has become an, at times, continuous dust devil. The wind seems to have picked up, especially near the waterfront, and since the city is, for the most part arranged like a grid, certain streets have become wind tunnels. Coupled with the vast amounts of dirt and dust, I’m often walking with my eyes partially or fully closed.

I’m particularly cautious after an incident a year and a half ago when a speck of dust entrenched itself behind my eyelid, and it took a medical bill of $500 dollars to get it out. Granted, the doctor I first went to at the school center should have just flipped my eyelid over to check, but she didn’t. So to try and figure out why my cornea was all scratched-up, I had to go to the emergency room and went through an “eye irrigation,” eye numbing and dyeing. After all these expensive procedures, the doctor finally flipped over my eyelid and removed the whatever.

That was at UCLA, which has one of the best hospitals in the world, and it’s the place they take the president if he’s wounded West of the Missippi River. I’m not at UCLA anymore, I’m in Russia. And as far as they’ve come in the past decade, I’m trying to stay away from the medicial facilities.

For the first time since I arrived here in November, I walked around outside today without my coat on. Not even a sweater, just strolling around the edges of the island in a t-shirt. It wasn’t hot, and sometimes, especially with the wind, it bordered on cold, but in general it was comfortable.

By the way, comfortable, “удобно” (udobna), is a word that is used in Russian for a whole lot more than we do in English. It’s often used when we would say “convenient,” or “pleasant.” I have a feeling that when I return to the states, I’ll also be using “comfortable” more than I should. Just a warning to y’all back home.

Oh right, and it was about 44 Farenheit today. Back home I would be bundled up with a sweater, jacket, hat, and earmuffs at that temperature. But here it’s an excuse to parade along the waterfront in a shiny t-shirt. No, there’s no particular reason that the t-shirt should be shiny, but the one I was wearing today happened to be.

I finally found an internet cafe where they play Counter Strike … all the time. It took 5 months of psuedo-semi kind of intense searching, and it paid off. Not only do I like the game, but it’s an environment where I can hear and use Russian on a regular basis. Seriously, one of the main reasons I was able to learn French as well as I did in as short a time as I did was because of the fact that I basically lived in cyber cafes. The only problem is that the cafe is a considerable distance from my dorm. Oh well, I’ll probably stop by every couple of days. Can’t tomorrow, it’s Badfeit.

2004 is shaping up to be a pretty important year. NATO has just expanded from 19 to 26, the EU will expand from 15 to 25, and Iraq will regain sovereignty.

I finally had my first banya experience. Everybody’s been trying to get me to go for some time now, apparently it’s a staple of life for many over here. With stories like “You instantly go from 90 Celsius to 0C, and then they beat you with reeds,” I was trying to put it off for as long as possible.

Essentially, a banya is like a sauna plus. Besides the dark, little wooden room, there are also other rooms. It’s like renting a mini appartment for a couple of hours. You can either go to a public one, with radom people, or you can get a private one with friends. The banya I went to had a main room with a dining table, couches, and a television. There was also a bathroom with two showers, and a bedroom. Gee, I wonder what that’s for?

I can’t tell a difference, but apparently the banya’s sweatroom differs from a sauna in that it’s wetter. I don’t know enough to really have an opinion, but they seem exactly the same to me. It’s a tiny wooden room with two levels of bench, and a small thing with hot coals over which you pour water to get the room up to ridiculously hot temperatures. There was a thermometer in mine which read 82 Celsius. Admittedly, it was right over the steam generator, but I didn’t think that the human body could operate in temperatures that high.

Depending on your group, you either go into the sauna naked or wearing a towel, I rented a sheet and did my best Caesar impression. Occasionally we would leave the sauna and some would douse themselves in freezing cold water from the shower. Then we’d take a break and relax in the tv room. The other banya in this place was larger, meant for 10 people, and it has a swimming pool and billiards table. Ours was meant for 4 - 5 people.

I didn’t enjoy the experience. I don’t particularly like the heat, and intentionally making myself sweat, unless through activity, is an incomprehensible concept for me. The supposed justifications are 1. it feels good, and 2. it’s healthy. They think that we “sweat out our toxins.” I’m not up on the science, but I don’t buy that claim. We sweat out salt and water, two things that are actually pretty good for out body, and only kicked out when we need to cool down. Also, part of the banya ritual is being hit on the back with reeds. This “stimulates circulation.” While that might be true, because blood would rush to the injured part of the body, I don’t understand why inducing this response is a good thing.

In short, not my cup of tea.

Soon I’ll be able to add Poland and Bulgaria, further solidifying my hold on the East. I suppose it says a bit about me that the first thing I think of when I look at this map is Axis and Allies.

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