The Wheels On The Bus Go 'Round & 'Round

December 30-31, 2005

Like any other day that I was leaving for a trip, I woke up feeling certain that I had budgeted more than enough time to get ready. The night before, I placed all of my laundry into the washing machine, and Tamara set it to the appropriate cycle, so that as soon as I woke up in the morning I could just hit the ‘start’ button and it would, well, start. Let me start by saying that the washing machines here are not the user-friendly appliances that I have come to know and love. They are terribly small and on the front panel there are a series of buttons and knob-like indicators that are labeled with symbols rather than words—symbols that, to an untrained eye, don’t appear to have any logical connection to the washing of clothes. Even Tamara, who has used the machine time and time again, doesn’t really know what these washing machine hieroglyphics mean—her daughter taught her what to push, and she pushes without any real understanding of the science behind the buttons. Although she seems to know what she is doing, her second-guessing hesitancy cast doubt into my heart.

I woke up at 8:45 a.m. and pushed a button with a straight horizontal line above it, which in Washing-machine means ‘start’. Tamara and I had breakfast, she left to work, and I started packing. After cleaning my room, talking to my family for more than an hour, going to the supermarket, making a bag-full of food for the trip, and packing everything except for what was being washed, I made my way to the washing machine, all the while marveling at the masterful efficiency with which I handled this particular morning.

But then, an hour and a half before I was supposed to be out the door, I was faced with a catastrophe: my clothes were soaking wet and stuck in a machine that had turned itself off instead of going into ‘dryer’ mode. It wouldn’t dry and it wouldn’t open. The door only opens when the washing cycle is complete and one of the two red lights turns off. When after turning every knob that I could turn, I saw that starting the dryer was not in the stars, I decided to redirect my efforts to halting the operation altogether. In a bit of a panic, I started pushing the ambiguously labeled buttons. I pushed the start button—nothing. I turned the washing knob, then the drying knob—nothing, nothing. I pushed the ‘start’ button again, thereby turning on the worst-case-scenario: the whole cycle started from the beginning, flooding my clothes with a new burst of water. I frantically started calling Tamara to figure out what I should do, but she was not to be found. In a nervous frenzy, I called Nazee, but she could provide naught but emotional support because, aside from the fact that the washing machine buttons are undecipherable, they are also different on every machine. Time was running short and my clothes were soaking wet and stuck, mid-cycle, in a possessed washing machine. I finally reached Tamara, whose washing machine expertise I will never doubt again. She calmly talked me through getting the machine to start drying, but, alas, the machines here don’t have the drying capacity necessary to dry an entire load of laundry in 40 minutes. This, however, was still a leap forward, as the door could now be opened. After staring at my spinning clothes for 10 minutes—an activity that, I am convinced, can lead to the development of a vast array of neurological disorders—I flung the door open and took everything out. I threw all of my clothes onto the heaters and chairs and took to the futile task of drying my favorite jeans with a blow dryer. I don’t think anyone will disagree that this was probably not the most efficient use of my time. Nonetheless, I stuck our little blue blow-dryer into one pant leg, and just as I was thinking about how clever I was, the blow-dryer overheated and died. This, I decided, could only happen to me.

In the mist of my dismay, Tamara came home, and we started ironing my most essential articles of clothing in order to bring their moisture level down a few notches to ‘damp’. But there was no time. I inhaled a piece of chicken, packed my wet clothes into plastic bags and threw them into my suitcase. I was supposed to meet Nazee and her daughter Tina at 3:00 p.m. so that we could get to the bus at 3:30 and depart at 4:00 and I was running more than a half an hour late. Tamara accompanied me to the metro station to prevent me from having a panic attack. When I got to the meeting point at 3:30, Tina was the only one there to meet me—Nazee had rushed off to the bus to make sure that the driver didn’t scalp our tickets. Running, pushing and shoving, Tina and I made it to the bus by 3:50. Long live my small red suitcase whose tiny plastic wheels survived the bumpy, puddle- ravaged road.

While everyone else boarded with relative ease, placing their things in the overhead compartment and settling down, we made much more of a raucous. People couldn’t help but watch us: out of breath, trying to fit our numerous carry-on bags into the full over head and small under-seat compartments, elbowing people in the face while trying to take off our huge coats in the small aisle, figuring out who would be responsible for the food bag, etc. Relieved to have made it onto the bus, I plopped down and caught my breath.

Two hours into our trip, one of the bus’s tires blew out. We were pulled over for more than an hour—an hour in which I tried not to think about how in the world our drivers were going to change a tire on a huge bus full of people, in the black cold night. I also tried not to think about what kind of spare tire they had, whether it would hold out, and, if we lost a tire so early on, did they have enough spare tires to last a 22-hour trip.

Later that night, we made our first stop. There was a small strip of establishments, all of which were very much in order: eatery, tire shop, bathroom. Like any other profit-reaping enterprise, the restroom came fully equipped with a cashier and a receipt-printing machine. Upon paying 10 rubles ($.30), you are free to rip off a few sheets from the community toilet paper roll, and get in line. As soon as I walked in, I knew exactly what kind of bathroom this was: the kind with no toilets. Inside the stalls, patrons can find an elevated platform with a hole in it—that’s it. Although for men this may seem like the optimal arrangement, it’s really not.

After the bathroom we walked past the tire shop and into the small restaurant. Inside there were two counters with separate cash registers and equally unorganized lines. In a connected but separate section, there were a good number of tables with plastic chairs, a scantily clad Christmas tree and a gargantuan flat screen TV, which seemed anachronistic for this small, middle-of-nowhere place that harked back to another time. Everyone was in a hurry to get back on their respective busses, so the atmosphere was tense and rushed. It wasn’t clear why there were separate cash registers and where we were to order what. Finding no answers, we picked the shortest line and stuck to it. The cashier was counting the change for the woman in front of us when a man intruded, waving a 10-ruble bill. His accent revealed that he was from somewhere in the caucuses—perhaps Armenia or Digistan.

“Lady!” he said. “Please, I don’t need any change, just give me some salt.” He threw his 10-ruble bill onto the counter like big money.

“Salt? Do you want a whole pack?” she asked surprised.

“A pack, a pinch, I don’t care. Just give me some salt,” he said with a sardonic swagger, which made it unclear if he was drunk or just strange.

“He wants salt?” came another voice from behind the wall that was behind the counter.

“Yes, I just want some salt. Please, somebody give a man some salt!” He looked around and smiled mischievously, making it quite clear that he intended to be obnoxious and was, in fact, rather pleased with his performance.

A small, confused, sharp-eyed woman came out from behind the wall holding a box of salt. She handed it to the man and (irritated) asked him to return it when he had used as much of it as he needed. He took the box from her, looking at it with the proud eyes of a new father, and emitted a loud, pompous ‘Thank You,’ to which he attached a small bow of the head.

We ordered our tea and water, and while we waited for our change, he returned, but this time with 20 rubles.

“Lady!” he said. “Please, I don’t need any change, just give me some bread!” His tone would imply that he had already asked for the bread several times and had been ignored.

“What kind?” she asked, neglecting us and other customers for this one boisterous patron.

“Black, white, grey…I don’t care! Just give a man some bread!” Although his manner was unrefined, there was a playful undertone that made it clear that he intended no harm.

A woman appeared holding two loaves of bread and asked sarcastically “Where’s the man that needs bread for his salt?”

“Thank you,” he said with a flirtatious smile.

We drank our tea, ate our chocolate, debated why the above man wanted to pay for salt when there was a salt-shaker on every table, and meandered back to the counter to buy bottled water for the road. During this second trip to the counter, I discovered a sink in a small separate room directly across from one of the glass counters. This little room had no door, and was rather banal except for a sign hanging above the sink:

Please!
Wash only your hands
You are located in a café

Пожалуйста!
Мойте только Руки
вы находитесь в кафе

Naturally, we started discussing what could have prompted the restaurant owner to put up such a sign. We were so amused that I decided to take a picture, only to realize that my camera was on the bus and time was short. So, I did the next most logical thing: I forced Tina to wash her hands for five minutes while I, ever so inconspicuously, tore the sign off the wall.

After making another precautionary trip to bathroom, we got on the bus and drove off. On the bus I befriended three people, or rather, I should say, they befriended me. I was tired and had no desire to make new friends, but there was no escaping them. Next to me sat a stylish girl named Zhenya (don’t try to pronounce it...all of your attempts will be fruitless). She had scrunchy blond hair with dark highlights, a round face and a white down jacket. She was a few years older than me, and found it necessary to show me pictures (both on her digital camera and on her cell phone) of her entire family and all of her coworkers. This would be bearable if her camera had a smaller memory card. Behind us: Liza and Denis, a young couple in their early 20s. Neither of the three seemed to have anything interesting to say and yet they prattled for what seemed like hours, and I was stuck like a fly in their web of nonsensical chatter. And that was not the worst of it. In order for everyone to have access to this spellbinding conversation, Zhenya and I had to turn around and face backwards. I am already prone to motion sickness and this arrangement only sharpened the sensation. I wanted to excuse myself from the dialogue but there was not enough time between words, thoughts, or sentences for me to do so without interrupting someone. Finally, feeling that if I did not rudely turn around, I might rudely do something else, I interrupted. “I’m sorry friends,” I announced, “but I must turn around as I am feeling sick.” I quickly plugged my ears with headphones and closed my eyes thereby giving the illusion that I had fallen asleep in a matter of seconds and was therefore not to be bothered. Relieved to be free, I slowly fell asleep. Later, when Nazee and I discussed my prosaic new ‘friends’, and Nazee referred to the conversation (which she overheard from two rows away) I realized that although I had in fact taken part in the previous night’s affair, and had emitted my fair share of nods and sounds that would confirm that I was listening, I hadn’t heard anything they said. All of my energies were funneled into calming my nausea and thinking up an escape plan.

The next morning, in a half-daze, I felt the bus slowing down. I was expecting to open my eyes and see another restaurant or cafe, but no such thing was to be seen. In front of the bus was nothing but a half-standing auto repair shop. We climbed out of the bus hoping to find a bathroom. I must say that, although it wasn’t quite as cold as Moscow and there was no snow, the strong wind made being outside almost unbearable. We saw some of the women from our bus heading up a small dirt hill and, like well-trained cattle, we followed. On top of the hill was a dilapidated wooden port-o-potty-type structure: inside, were the bare ground and a bottomless pit, which peeked out from back wall. I had already decided for myself that this was not an option, but Nazee wanted to take a closer look, so we started up the hill. As we made our way to the top, we saw that one woman, who apparently couldn’t wait, decided to relieve herself next to it instead of inside of it—right on top of the hill for everyone to see. This pushed even Nazee over the edge and we quickly made our descent back to the bus. We overheard passengers, who were also dissatisfied with the restroom facility, ask the driver if there would be another more suitable stop coming up, to which he replied, annoyed, that we would stop again ‘soon’. Just before getting on the bus, I noticed that my brand new boots were completely covered in dirt. I tried to clean them off only to find that the hill had not been covered in dirt, but rather a clay-like mud, which had hardened on my shoes.

We got back on the bus, and assuming that we would be stopping soon, didn’t bothered settling down too comfortably. Two and a half hours later, the passengers, us included, were getting restless. Everyone was starving and in dire need of a restroom. People started walking up to the front of the bus asking when and where we would be stopping. When another half hour passed, people started losing it. We all started breathing easier when we saw civilization ahead—a whole row of cafés and shops—but the tension escalated even further when our bus driver flew right by them. This was the end of the line for everyone, and I was afraid that the situation might escalate into violence.

Finally, three hours after our last stop, he pulled off the road in front of a traktir (a small roadside restaurant). We all rushed out of the bus in search of the bathroom. We walked inside behind another woman from our bus, who was dressed in a fancy fur coat and high heels.

“Where is the bathroom," she asked with a denigrating tone.

“Outside,” answered a man.

“We were promised civilized bathrooms,” she said glowering at him. Then, she turned around furiously and with a pretentious flip of her coat, stormed out of the traktir. We followed and quickly encountered three outhouses. Although they were regal when compared to the wooden shack on the hill, they left much to be desired. This time we had to make a choice: it was either this or a bladder infection. If I were confident that I could receive professional medical attention, I might have picked the latter, but it was too risky. And so, we stood in line and observed the reactions of each woman as she opened the ‘stall’ door: after opening the door, any given woman would take an instinctive step in, only to be thrust out by a stench, a description of which exceeds the lexical capacity of the English language. Then she would gather herself, roll up her pant legs, take a deep breath of air, and hesitantly make her way in. We laughed—until it was our turn. After two minutes inside the booth, I felt as though I needed to be quarantined and thoroughly boiled before I could be released back out into society. But being as no such service was available, I had to settle for the next best thing: washing my hands with ice cold water and liquid in a bottle, which I could only assume was soap. This, too, was outside and with no paper towels and a broken dryer, my hands went completely numb in the cold air.

Starving, as I always am, I ran into the traktir ready to consume an entire horse if they had one. Nazee and Tina followed and we started deciding what we wanted. There was a large TV playing one of my favorite movies of all time, and a must for New Year’s Eve: Karnolval’naya Noch’. On one hand it made me feel very at home and on the other hand it made me feel further away than ever. Nonetheless, I got to sing my favorite song Pyat’ Minut (Five Minutes) and it set the mood for the upcoming new year. At the counter stood a large, dark-skinned man in his late 40s, who spoke with a pronounced Georgian accent. When patrons ordered, he would shout at them for pronouncing the name of his dishes incorrectly or for taking too long to decide what they wanted, so we started practicing what we were going to say ahead of time. When it was our turn, Nazee stepped up to the plate:

“We’ll have three coffees and two hachapurees,[1]” she said with a courteous smile.

“Two coffees,” I jumped in. “I’ll have tea.”

“Tea!” he laughed in my direction. “They always want tea! Maybe you want soup as well? Tea and soup! Tea, soup, tea, soup!”

I had no idea what he was talking about but, since I smile infinitely more than the average Russian, he took well to me and responded with a fatherly grin.

“One hundred rubles,” he said to Nazee, and she instinctively turned to the menu (a handwritten sign to the left of the counter) to make sure he wasn’t overcharging us. He was not flattered.

“Don’t look there!” he said and tried to cover the sign with his large rough hands. “Don’t look there, look at me! Don’t look there, look at me!” Although he was yelling and slightly irritated, I could tell that he was not really angry and that he, on some level, knew that he was amusing us. He showed Nazee the check with the enumerated costs. She shot him a skeptical smile and handed him a 100-ruble bill.

“Where are you going to sit?” he asked, his eyes frantically darting around the room in search of an empty table. We also turned to look but there were none.

“You, young one,” he said to me. “Go in the other room and find a table. Look for a table or you can look for a chair: wherever there is a chair there will be a table!” He said everything so loudly, and with such urgency that I rushed into the other room, only to find eight taken tables. When I came back out, he was directing Nazee and Tina to a table where a man was sitting alone, finishing his meal. We sat down and he personally brought us our silverware, but for some reason he only brought two sets.

“What about me?” I asked courteously.

“What about me?” he imitated. “Oh, she needs a fork, too!” he said shaking his head. When we had all three sets of silverware, and discovered that they were filthy beyond use, we resorted to using the plastic forks that we had in our bag-o-food. In fear of offending our Georgian host, I tried to be as discreet as possible in distributing our bright green forks. Upon examining the forks in the light I decided that they were actually a very pleasant shade of green and very sturdy: ‘perhaps,’ I though, ‘he would like our forks so much so that he would wash them (or not) and include them in his regular silverware rotation.

Within a few minutes, they brought us our hachapurees, which looked much better than they really were and, because of their insanely high salt content, we barely managed to down one. A little boy from our bus ran into the traktir screaming “Mama, mama! The bus made beep, beep!” That was our cue and we, yet again, boarded our chariot of fire.

Finally in the home stretch, we started making more and more frequent stops, dropping people off in various small cities along the way. We were scheduled to arrive in Stavropol’ at 2:00 p.m. When at 2:00 p.m. we still had two hours to go, I started losing hope that we would make it there in time to greet the New Year. As our bus inched down the road, a dark green bus just like ours passed us and cut us off. Mr. Road Rage was the bus scheduled to arrive in Stavropol’ at 6:30 p.m. Why he was ahead of us was less important than it was irritating. But this was just what the doctor ordered for our inept driver. Fittingly, the green bus took on the role of tortoise, while our orange and grey bus became the hare. In an attempt to regain his pride, our driver poised himself for a die-hard racecar match. Clearly having forgotten that he was behind the wheel of a huge, gawky bus and not a 2006 Corvette, he drove up to our rival bus and when he was no more than 3 inches away from it, took a sharp turn into the oncoming lane, floored the gas pedal, passed the bus, and cut him off without an inch to spare. Then the time would come when we had to pull over to unload passengers, and the tortoise would pass us yet again. Our maniac driver recklessly passed even small cars on the road just to gain on him.

At 4:00 p.m. we entered Stavropol’s city limits.
[1]Hachapuree: a thin, round bread, shaped like a pizza, baked with Greek feta-like cheese inside