A Brown Man in Russia by Vijay Menon

Author:Vijay Menon [Menon, Vijay]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 3978-1-91141-477-3
Publisher: Glagoslav Publications

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* One half of ’the infamous’ Mobb Deep, a hip-hop duo out of New York City.

Chapter 12: Laughing at you or with you?

December 18-19, 2013

Trans-Siberian Railway → Tyumen, Russia

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We woke up the following morning at the crack of dawn — which, for Russia in the middle of winter, meant that it was already almost noon.

Slava had previously roused and was hurriedly packing up his belongings. His stop was imminently approaching, and he would be disembarking shortly.

It was a bittersweet moment. Just like that, our first real Russian acquaintance was on his way. We exchanged email information, said our farewells, and embraced as the train ground slowly to a temporary halt.

“Promise to stay in touch!” he said with a wry smile as he hopped off the train.

“Da svidahnia!” we replied in unison.

Goodbye!

While we were sad to see our new friend depart, we were eager to continue our journey. We were getting closer to Tyumen, the site that would mark our first official excursion onto Siberian soil. For the time being, though, we settled into our now slightly more capacious compartment and passed the time amicably between chatter and chess.

We tried to bask in the tranquility of the barren, sparse landscape that passed us by. But even with the door to our cabin closed shut, we found that our halcyon space was continually disturbed by persistently loud noises from the neighboring compartment. While we had simply tuned them out while Slava was around, we found the distractions increasingly difficult to ignore in his absence.

There was no doubt that this rambunctious behavior was at least in part induced by alcohol. Indeed, a teetotaler would find the journey on the Trans-Siberian to be unpalatable, if not overtly odious.

Abstinent we were not — in fact, Avi, Jeremy, and I were far from it. But I don’t believe any of us were truly prepared for the remarkable level of abject drunkenness we would encounter on the train. On the Trans-Siberian — nay, in Russia as a whole — alcohol is just as ubiquitous as water flowing from a tap.

Anyone who has been on a plane is familiar with the pouches of water that come with a meal, replete with an easy-to-use horizontal peel-off top. In Russia, vodka is routinely served in these same pre-packaged containers — as available, and almost as cheap, as plain spring water itself.

It is a quotidian sight to the average Russian, but jarring to most anyone else — and certainly to a group of American twenty-somethings. You will encounter people downing pouches of vodka in a rote, cursory, and almost mechanical manner at most any time of the day.

Breakfast? With vodka. Lunch? With vodka. Skipping a meal? Acceptable.

But god forbid if you skimp on the vodka.

It was a way of life, and it showed. Not simply in the auditory sense of the cacophony of drunken chaos. Nor only in the visual sense of the quasi-comical but simultaneously concerning imbalance of the permanently tottering boozehound.

But also in the statistics themselves.

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