56 minutes 40 seconds

I hesitated to publish this particular entry because of the chain reaction it may cause in some people's minds. In the end I decided that this account of my life a year out wouldn't be complete without it. So here we have the beginning of a friendship from my vantage point.

What's in a name? Everything. I'm not totally sure of the year, but I think it was either '98 or '99. I was in high school and wondering how I could keep playing music once I got myself gradumacated. A youth orchestra that I'd heard of was giving a concert and I decided to go. Unfortunately, the director decided to have some major health problems and the orchestra concert was non-existent. As they say in show business, the show must go on. A bunch of the musicians threw together a solo concert. A few of the pieces were originals by a young Spanish composer - all of them pretty, but not cheesy. Somebody retold the story behind one such piece. It was the last day before the New Year holiday at a boarding school. There was a party happening. Some reconstruction had been underway and a wall was half way finished. Somehow the partially finished brick wall was knocked over and underneath the rubble was a girl. She died. Merry Christmas. Her name was Elena.

Occasionally you meet someone that just kind of clicks with you. "My grandmother used to say to me, 'You can count the number of your true friends on the fingers of one hand,'" reads the first line of a text about classes of friends I use with my Level 3 students. If the text is accurate, then over the past few weeks one of the available Troy-friend positions has been filled. Elena is just that kind of a friend, I think.

Before elaborating further, I would like to clarify that while yes, spending extended amounts of time with a member of the opposite sex does present challenges (for example, I have no concept of the discomfort high heels cause while walking in sand), it doesn't have to. A month or so ago a buddy and I were chatting on the Internet and the subject came up of dating somebody younger than you. He is in his mid-20s and we were hypothesizing about somebody in his position dating a 15 or 16-year-old girl. At first the thought was a bit strange, but as we talked I could see the logic. If the guy is a gentleman, there is not necessarily a problem. Relevance? Already many of you have raised questions about Troy and his new friend. I just wanted to pose another option that is at least as plausible.

So what goes into the promotion of your average Kaliningrad girl into the elite circle of Troy's intimate friends? If the truth be known, I haven't a clue myself. That isn't exciting to read about though, so here is one possibility.

Requirement number one: innately be Russian, yet not. What is the definition of a Russian? Thanks to a chilly war back a few years ago and the wealth of jokes and stereotypes which sprouted from it, Communism is a start. What is the Communist color? Red. That is true, but the red vein goes back farther than the Revolution. Long ago, red was the color associated with beauty and fondness. A few years ago I bought some Russian children's books on ebay. One was pretty old and every page had an abundance of red on it, particularly the objects important for the story. Also, the words for beautiful and red are very similar, but I am not an etymologist so don't know if there actually is a connection.

Is Elena red? Yes, very much so - from her hair to her customary coat to her freckled face. Okay, so now we've established that she is Russian. How about the yet not part? I don't want to generalize and say that all Russian chicks are bad nuts, but she seems to have a different core. Yeah, yeah, she has a reputation for not being the most punctual person and I get the impression that as a schoolgirl, the school part wasn't always at the top of her to-do list. Beneath that though is something similar to Chris Gekker's (my former trumpet teacher) concept of the perfect trumpet sound. Take a steel ball and then put cotton all around it. At first glance it looks/sounds soft, simple, sweet. Yet the more time one spends staring/listening to it, the weight within radiates its mass and makes the cotton come alive or disappear altogether, depending on the situation. Elena, the person, is a force to be reckoned with but this is only obvious after the cotton is both ignored and studied simultaneously. In the words of our favorite ogre, onions and layers...people and layers. Elena's inner layers are made of a different material altogether than your average Kaliningrad girl.

That was a whole lot of gibber-jabber about requirement one. Rather than make up some more mumbo-jumbo about something I don't quite understand, I'll jump back in time eight months or so. After church one cold Saturday morning, I boarded the bus bound for school. Who should come along but Elena. We talked on the bus ride back to town. Mostly she talked and I nodded and smiled. (Note: I should be ashamed of myself for my habit of nodding when I'm clueless about what is being said.) I did understand that soon she would be beginning to work as the baby-sitter for my boss. And that she would be attending a different church from then on out. From that time I saw her only occasionally when I stopped by to speak with the boss.

Difficult to stay when things started to change (my personal journal has been dead since shortly after I arrived), but I'd have to guess that it was sometime around 10:53 on the morning of June 25 when one of the young dudes at church asked me to help out with a wedding in a month or so. I agreed. The only problem was I had only been to the rehearsal location once. That one time was mid-September. Lady luck shown her face on me and for maybe the third time ever, Elena came to the Saturday afternoon English class. That was my ticket to the rehearsal location. Me being on the hungry side and she having some cookies to share was nice.

The following weekend was probably described a bit too much in detail already (prior post), so I'll make my additions short. I enjoyed Saturday evening's concert with Kostya (brother), Elena (sister), and Vika (cousin). When I bid them farewell, they promised to call me for the concert the following evening, and never did. Sunday afternoon when I saw Putin in his Benz-stretch, Elena was about 15 meters away on the other side of the street unbeknown to either of us.

More or less so far, we'd only happened to be in the same place when doing things. Then I offered to walk her to the bus stop one evening when I stopped by the boss's place. The conversation was nice and I asked for a repeat sometime else when she wanted company. Several days passed and then the phone rang. For the past two weeks, practically every day we have had a nice walk and talk. Last Friday evening was interesting, so I'll talk about that stroll.

We decided to try and rehearse a piece of music we wanted to play together. I had remembered that the music college closed at ten, so we came a half hour before closing time. My memory ain't what she used to be, so we came and the building was already locked. Stopping back at my place, I deposited my trumpet and then we headed in the direction of the bus stop. A light rain began to fall, but rain is nice and I asked what was on tap at home for Elena. Nothing too exciting, so we decided to walk. This turned out to not be such a good idea from the clothing department perspective, but from every other perspective, it was a blast. The rain picked up a little bit and this coupled with poor lighting and worse sidewalks made avoiding the swimming pool sized puddles a challenge. So why avoid them? Jump, splash, giggle, repeat. Eventually her home was in sight and I was clueless as to where I actually was. She offered to walk me back to the bus stop, but that seemed crazy and I crossed my fingers as she explained how to get back. A rather wet evening finished as I promised to call saying I got home safely (not the safest region).

Well, I knew which direction my home was, but some of the finer points of the route got lost on me. Thirty minutes later, I decided I better call and say that I would soon be home, so as not to cause any un-needed worry. The phone rang and a modem picked up. I tried again and the lady told me I had the wrong number. Oh well, homeward ho! I stopped by a store to buy some milk and finally got home a few minutes into the Sabbath. I had only gotten my shoes off when the phone rang. Standing in my sopping clothes and still with raincoat donned, I picked it up. "Why didn't you call me?!" "You gave me the wrong number." "Oops. How long have you been home?" "Not too long." The milk was sitting on the ground. Don't ask me what else we had to talk about, but we talked about it for a good little while. A few days prior I had stayed up late IMing a student and she told me a Russian lullaby. Cheating a little bit, I found the scrap of paper where I had copied it and recited some good night wish about birds and fish. Conversation finished, shoes with three days worth of drying ahead of them, and milk still sitting on the floor, my bed beckoned and eventually I heeded its call.

Saturday evening at rehearsal, there was a small shock waiting for me: Elena told me the amount of time we spoke the prior evening - 56 minutes and 40 seconds. The way I see it, this could mean any number of things, but I am choosing to view it as the juxtaposition of a person with a digital display on their phone and a good memory for numbers. If hearts are involved and I'm too blind or naive to recognize it, consider this my apology.

When I set out to write this entry, I thought it would be relatively easy to jot down a few thoughts about my new friend and why I value her friendship and gift of time. Re-reading the results, I must say that I'm not terribly happy with it in terms of readability, logical progression, or representing the reality. Rather then censor what I am unhappy with, I'll serve it up for your viewing pleasure. Sometimes thoughts, whether perfectly formulated or colorless, green, and sleepless, are better shared than kept.

A Gala Affair

It was fine indeed. Unbeknown to me when I signed up for this gig, every Russian city has a date that is declared 'City Day'. For Kaliningrad, this day is July 4. Being an American, I am used to enjoying family, friends, fireworks, et cetera then. Yesterday I was hunting for a nice article on the Internet to give a brief description of what took place in my town this weekend, but what I found was rather shocking and will be dealt with in a future blog entry. Synopsis: 2005 marks the 750th recorded year of the existence of this spot of land as a prominent European city. For the first 690 or so it was known as Königsberg, and only following the war became Kaliningrad, a Russian city. Because the days fell the way they did this year, July 1-3 were declared the official holiday celebration and July 4 relegated to normal work.

Friday, July 1

This day began a few minutes before midnight when my mobile phone rang. It was a friend asking if I wanted to go to the sea. I asked when. He said immediately. I thought, "Crazy Russian!" but said "Okay, let's go!" About five minutes into this first day of revelry, I put one toe into the frigid waters of the Baltic Sea and then ran in. The water was warm (that is a joke). Actually, it did feel quite warm after a few minutes, but I noticed that all of my toes were white when we got back to the car. Don't worry about the toes, I have poor circulation to the extremities on occasion.

A few hours later I woke up. Having decided to purchase a new digital camera for the weekend, I made my way to the other side of town where I hoped I would find the shop open. It wasn't, so I hightailed it back to my apartment, or more precisely my street. About 100 meters away is King's Gate, the entrance to the main historic city (Königsberg was actually comprised of three cities). This building was only half-way leveled during the war and about four months ago reconstruction began. For what reasons I'm not totally sure, but this was the place chosen as the kick off. It was actually pretty impressive and I stored up some fine images in my memory. On the front of the building are three statues of former famous Königsbergites which were also renovated. A giant banner was draped over the whole facade of the building. When the mayor gave the word, it was dropped, but naturally (this is Russia, you know) it got stuck on the scepter of one statue and it wasn't until a full 10 minutes after the program finished that the banner was finally untangled. I chuckled to myself as I watched the whole thing. Yes, we may be in the midst of Europe geographically, but the mentality and Russian soul is very much alive a part of which is the beloved Russkaya systema.

I grabbed a bite to eat at home and made a plan for the day. The next stop was a few other camera shops. They were open, but did not have any models that I was interested in buying. Meandering about for a bit led me to the foot of Dom Sovietov (translation: Soviet's House). I have intentionally not mentioned it or shown photographs yet as I wanted to put a collage together. So, what is this magnificent building? Allow me to retell a joke: A visitor to my city hires a guide to show him all around. After seeing everything, he points to the monstrous vacant building pretty much smack-dab in the center and asks what it is. The tour guide responds, "Oh that? I don't know." Built roughly 30 years ago, this mammoth building has never been occupied. Then a few months ago, activity on it began. Right now one side is painted and with new windows. At the base is the largest square in the city, making it a logical place for concerts. My personal theory is that the powers that be want to warm people up to this relic of drab Soviet existence and what better way than gazing at it all weekend.

Whatever the reason, my first evening (and the subsequent two) were spent in its shadow (or more accurately, lack thereof - my nose and one ear are burnt). Many local groups did their thing on the stage. The announcer dude was really excellent and did his job well during the down time between acts. I don't remember everything that happened, but afterward I was thoroughly impressed with the talent (especially of Kaliningrad's youth). I kept looking for any student of mine (past or present) on the stage. Finally, I found one in the circus act. He was doing the trick where you climb the ladder and walk around on it - pretty impressive. For a minute or two, I considered cutting him some slack due to the hectic schedule he must have had in preparing for this performance. Then I smacked myself and repeated my high school band director's motto - "Excuses are like noses, everybody's got one." (Incidentally, I just failed the poor kid today.) The dancers were hot - everything from modern rock to ballet. The choir sang a bit clichéd rendition of the opening to Orff's Carmina Burana. And now it escapes me, but I think the opening theme song was some ripoff of a John Williams CD. Overall the program was excellent. An interesting perk that I don't think the announcer had planned for was missing children. During the time I was there, three kids lost their parents, and then when I left a man lost all three of his kids. For many the word holiday and the word drunk are synonymous, which leads to many lost things/people.

I ate back at my flat, and called home. I thought there would be enough time for a brief nap, but had to hustle back to the center for the fireworks. Quite lovely. When I came back to my apartment, I hopped online to check the never-ending torrent of email and saw a buddy online that I talked to for a bit.

Saturday, July 2

As a result of staying up until 2 the last night, I didn't hear my alarm too well. By the time I glanced at the clock, I wouldn't have made it to church until after the choir sang. I decided it was better to not go at all and after making my plan for the day, set out to explore the city. My legs, tired from standing for nearly four hours the day before in one place (in addition to walking all over the city), were tired from the get go. I noticed people walking the 'wrong-way' on my street so I followed the crowd. About 50 meters from my house there were metal detectors like you have in the airport in the middle of the street. That seemed strange to me, but I didn't think much of it. (I should have because I could've seen a few Presidents had I entered.) Oh well, I continued to the main square where I wasn't in time to one of the concerts I wanted to hear, but looked around a bit at all the souvenirs being sold.

Since Kaliningrad really is a seaport at heart, there were boats. Big boats, old boats, new boats, and many other kinds of boats. At the waterfront there really wasn't all that much interesting to watch, so I sat down and watched it for awhile. I found the ponies more interesting. Maybe 5 or 6 horses and ponies were available to give rides to people. They kept whinnying to each other and I thought that was funny.

Back at Dom Sovietov, I listened to some wind ensembles from different places. A few were rather good. One interesting one from Germany had all the musicians playing some trumpet-like instrument. I'm not sure exactly what it was, but there was some kind of valve they switched on the bottom that changed the instrument. My guess is that it was like some valveless horn with two sets of tubes, but I don't know. The director had them doing all these funky horn moves which, although interesting, made me rather sorry for the poor musicians.

The band from Moscow was really fine - it was nice to hear some real musicians for a change. I didn't stay for all of their tunes because of that wedding I agreed to be in. Another rehearsal. This time I managed to find the way there myself with only going one bus stop too far. It is funny for me that the skit I am in is all about not understanding a different language. The first time we read it last week, I thought I understood what was going on. But after going through it a second time, I realized that I was clueless. It turns out (according to my current understanding) that two girls are walking along the street talking about future husbands when up walks me, a visiting foreigner to ask for directions. One girl claims to understand English and translates incorrectly what I say. At the end of the conversation, I think I've found directions to some place and both girls think that I am marrying one of them. A bit of role-reversal - they are the supposed to be the foolish ones, but after rereading it, I claim the part of the fool for myself.

A couple of us decided to head back to Dom Sovietov for the evening concert. Let me tell you, that was fun in the first degree! In America, my Russian teacher encouraged us to listen to Russian radio stations via the Internet. On occasion I did, but generally avoided them because I thought the music was hokey. Well, either the music has improved in the past year or my musical discrimination has become desegregated because I enjoy most of the songs played on the radio over here. Saturday's concert was billed as an All-Star event. It really lived up to its expectation. Most groups only sang one song with a few doing two and the concert lasted almost three hours. And the people on stage were not just your average Joe Schmoe Musician, they were the creme of the crop Russian pop stars. One of the people with me was a teenage girl and she was singing at the top of her lungs with the icons of her youth. That was cool to watch. And the people - I had never been someplace with so many people before! The announcer said 70,000 were in attendance.

From the technical side of things, this concert was on a different level. On both Friday and Sunday, the miking and lighting cables from the stage to the sound booth were strung aerially, but on Saturday, under a little cable runway. This was probably because of the videoing done on Saturday (there was a camera on one of those huge booms that swings all over the place to get better shots). Also the announcers were famous people I've seen on national television before. I'm wondering whether that concert will be broadcast later. For all of the zero readers currently living in Russia, please leave a comment and let me know if you see a Kaliningrad All Star concert on the television schedule.

When everything finished I had to cross the crowd to get home. Along the way I met one of my students. He is a need-to-be in-charge kind of guy, so I hung out with him and his inebriated friend who took second place in the arm wrestling competition earlier that day for a while at Night Life 2005. My dancing skills are out of practice. When they headed off elsewhere the body builder dude saw the boom used for videoing the event that the roadies were disassembling and started to do pull-ups on it. The frantic people on the other end thought the thing had come alive and held on for dear life. It was funny. Anyhow, getting home a little later then I had planned I bedded down.

Sunday, July 3

I slept in. Actually, the girlfriend woke me up at around 9 something in the morning. We talked and parted on a not so sweet note, so I went back to bed. Instead of heading out to see the last celebratory day, I stayed in the apartment. Fortunately I do have some fruits from my labor - the floors are cleaned, my bathroom spotless, and my clothes clean. Not bad if I say so myself. Now that I have a clean apartment, I need to find somebody to come over and make it dirty!

My mission when I finally got out was to find a souvenir from the day of celebration. I wound up getting a plate-sized model of the King's Gate with 750 written on it. A nice little thing for about four bucks. Before I succeeded in finding this, I was waiting to cross the street but the police guy wouldn't let anybody cross. It seemed really strange. First one police car would come, then a few minutes later, the next. After maybe 7 police cars I gave up trying to figure out what was happening. Then it came, a huge escort with armored vehicles, etc. And maybe the sixth car of fifty or so was a black Mercedes limousine. He was looking out the other window and waving, but I am sure that I saw the back of President Putin's head. Immediately going from the annoyed dude standing at the crosswalk I changed into the hand-waving dweeb hoping for a glimpse of my adopted commander-in-chief.

Since I didn't think the evening concert would start for awhile, I bought some food and made a nice dinner. After surfing the 'net for a bit I made my way back to Dom Sovietov. It turns out I had the times in my head wrong and missed the first half of Oleg Gazmonov. He is an old famous singer. When he finished many people cleared out and I found a place where the bricks were a little uneven and served to put me a full two inches taller than normal. While it doesn't seem like that big of a difference, at my height it meant the difference between seeing the back of the person in front or seeing people on the stage. I fought to hold my ground for the next five hours, and except for one time when people started to push, I succeeded.

Did I really need the higher ground? No, but a vertically challenged friend of mine promised to call and enjoy the concert together with me. The call never came so I got the nice view. I also got to hold my cell phone to feel the vibration if it ever came, which may have saved my phone from being snagged, but I don't know about that. After Gazmonov, a German band played. I'd never heard of Fool's Garden before, but enjoyed a few of their tunes. The lead singer knew three Russian words. And announced everything in English. All their songs were also in English. A few of the band members had a ready bottle during the concert and at one point the guitarist held it up and said, "Königsberg!" which received an enthusiastic round of applause. People really enjoyed their portion and they gave three encores. Probably the reason I like the band now is that the first of these encores was by The Carpenters.

By the time the final act of the concert got up, it was nearly eleven - so much for fireworks at midnight! Mashina Vremeni (translation: Time Machine) has been around for some time also. Their music somehow appeals to a cross-section of all ages. Maybe it is because the concert was free, maybe because of the city holiday, or maybe their lyrics connect with Russians at a deep level, but whatever the reason the demographics of that crowd were weird. Remember, I was holding my ground for the whole time, but people around me changed like an athlete changes rank socks. At one point a group of middle aged men pushed past to get closer. A few minutes later a man in his late forties that looks like a lanky high school geek later in life hopped up on the shoulders of one of his buddies and started flailing his arms wildly and waving to the lead singer. There was a mother/daughter duo next to me for a bit that were cutting a rug to the music. Nearby me at the end there was a lady not old, but more than middle-aged I'd say. She looked like the stereotypical school teacher that never married. Clearly she was way out of her comfort zone at a concert with many drunk, dancing people, but she applauded at the end of songs and even swayed back and forth a tiny bit. By the time they sang their final song, it was well past midnight.

In a poor decision of the organizers, they decided to bring out everybody responsible for organizing the weekend and introduce them to us. Finally after this came the grand finale fireworks. I read that it was the first time in Russia that a firework show had been synchronized to music. It started at 0:51 and finished at 1:07, so technically I got my fireworks for the Fourth! I've undoubtedly seen better, but these were really special to me. Why, I can't say exactly but it was one of those experiences of a lifetime. I was surrounded by more people than the prior evening and we were connected. Sure, I didn't know anybody immediately around me and my friend stood me up, but it was a blast nonetheless. It was a really strange feeling walking back to my apartment. About a ten minute walk, normally there are many people, but this time the sidewalks were packed, the streets were packed, everything was people. When the fireworks finished, the announcer dude came out and said that he would play quiet music, please leave peacefully and thanks for being a part of this, the greatest celebration in Kaliningrad's recent history. From the fire-filled sky of one mintue to the subdued voice of the otherwise vivacious announcer the next, the evening and weekend came to an end.

From an IM with a friend about three months ago comes this frame worthy saying:

pen is mightier than 1s and 0s

Applying it to my cameraless self and this historic occasion I'd like to say a few things. First, long distance photography without a hefty zoom is really only good for snapshots and not photography, so don't feel that you missed out on anything. No, you can't enjoy the pictures I took, and, more importantly, neither can I. However, when I reflect back on the weekend the memories will be more real than the 1s and 0s of my digital photos. For example, the best concert I ever played in my life was at a packed Rotary Club hall in Harare, Zimbabwe during August 2000. Magic happened there. Unfortunately, I recorded it and a few years ago dusted off the recording and listened to it. The concert sucked. I've decided to defer to my memory instead of my (hopefully improved and therefore better) ears. There are a few irreplicable photos that I would have taken. The ones that I'll miss the most are these:

• The stuck banner at the opening ceremonies
• My student doing the ladder routine with the circus
• Backside of man with an opened can of beer in his pants pocket
• Teenaged girl's exuberant face as her favorite group sings to her
• Putin's speeding Benz
• Kid on his father's shoulders trying to take a picture of the stage
• Hot air balloons taking off over sea of people
• Wide-eyed wonder of old lady at rock concert