Good morning Samara!

A loud, high-pitched trill cut the air with increasing frequency – the phone. After some fumbling over the bed-stand, I finally stopped it by growling into the receiver in a raspy voice, “Heelloo,” and immediately covered my mouth, wishing to swallow it. Too late. “Dobroe utro. Vy prosily vas rasbudit v sem chasov.” (Good morning. You asked for a wake up call at seven o’clock.) My Russian faculties jerked wide awake by this calamity of English thought, I thanked the attendant in Russian, jammed down the receiver and collapsed, only to jerk up again and dial the company’s number. A flat male voice filled the ear-piece, “This is company KBM.” Thereafter, my ears were drowned in a deluge of the most sincere apologies, first from the man, then from HR manager, Irina: they were under the impression that I was arriving tomorrow.

To change the green, or “bucks” as they called them here with much bravado, I dragged my feet to the station’s Sberbank kiosk where a frail pensioner with a floral kerchief on her head patiently huddled over the counter, her bony fingers rustling along a thin pocket-book wrapped with a plastic bag. After she had received her pension, this “babulia” (grandma) profusely thanked the cashier whom she tenderly called “dochenka” (daughter) and crawled away on her old swollen legs. I stepped up to the counter. The cashier requested my passport together with the money and closely examined the bills, holding them up to the ceiling bulb and turning over multiple times while I anxiously tapped my foot on the floor for what seemed like an eternity. Beginning to fear that she would detain me on some ludicrous fraud suspicions I tried to calm myself with the improbability of drawing fraudulent money from a Swiss bank and racked my rumpled memory for times it may have been left unattended. Up to the cot nap it was stashed inside a velvet sachet and safely pinned to the inner belt of my jeans by my caring mother, where it rubbed against my hip bone as a constant reminder. To my relief the cashier acquiesced and retreated the dollars into her desk. I made a note to find a non-state owned banking venue with slightly more sophisticated fraud detection equipment.

The driver arrived just in time as I settled my hotel bill. His name was Fedia, and he was extremely fat, resembling a round balloon in his blue striped t-shirt. Fedia gazed at me absent-mindedly through blue googly orbs of a child. He had somewhat of an aerial presence. Had he worn suspenders and a propeller on his back, Fedia could have floated off into thin air like Lindgren’s mischievous Karlsson, one of my favorite cartoon heroes who led his quiet Swedish friend into all sorts of naughty adventures. Although a cross-generational hit in the USSR enjoyed by mother and I alike when we were children, Karlsson was banned from the US until the 1960s for fear of inciting children against their parents. Apparently USSR wasn’t the place where good-natured mischief was taken for dangerous provocation.

Karlssonesque Fedia had been working for KBM for two years, prior to which, as he proudly stated, he was the personal driver of an American VP at Yukos. Excited to have met someone tied to what we saw in the West as Russia’s business martyr, I bombarded him with questions, trying to sniff out any insider knowledge on Yukos management. Alas, all my prying attempts were in vain: Fedia didn’t delve into the details and heartily assured me of Yukos’ pre-expropriation greatness. After Khodorkovsky was thrown in jail Fedia was let go along with many others, and found his current job at KBM. We moved on to the subject of micro-lending, which I mentioned was very successful in Kyrgyzstan. Fedia retorted that all Samara’s bazaars were full of Kyrgyz and Tajiks these days, and took pouty offense at this conversation attempt, adding that the level of Russian entrepreneurship was quite different from Kyrgyz. Apparently my innocent remark had opened up a sensitive subject on Central Asian migrants here. We left the conversation at that and I gazed out onto the dusty Samara streets. Deep down though, I was itching to get to the bottom of these entrepreneurial differences as Fedia called them, and would soon learn all about them through my field experiences.

As we drove into my apartment block I noticed that all building entrances in the yard were fortified by heavy bar-coded doors. A fetid odor of dust, sweat and cat excrement permeated my entrance. I sincerely hoped that it didn’t seep into the apartment. The apartment itself was a fortress with three massive locks on two entrance doors, and bars on all windows as well as the balcony entrance, which was also secured by two serious locks. Fortunately, the apartment smelled and appeared clean. Its walls were covered in popular beige wall-paper, and synthetic carpets were spread over wood-patterned linoleum floors – the hallmark of those who couldn’t afford Persians on parquet. A beige faux Persian proudly graced the living/bedroom, while the kitchen floor was gobbled up in a synthetic orange distortion of Art Deco. Returning to these motifs called forth bitter-sweet yearnings of my play-mates’ apartments back in the Soviet days. Beige must have been the most practical of wall-papers for nearly all my friends had it with dizzying floral variations, while their linoleum patterns, identical to the ones of my new abode, were excellent for in-door hop-scotch. It was not uncommon to hang the heavy popular Persians on walls, and many of my now New Kazakh friends had beige Persian backgrounds in their black and white facebook kid photos. Our apartment, of course, was the one that didn’t conform to others, fault of what I took for my mothers’ strange tastes at the time. Her minimalist eye eschewed wall-paper for boring off-white paint, and above all insisted on floors of wood, foregoing the funky linoleum patterns. The Persians were her only point of surrender, as she had no choice but to spread them so as not to offend grandma who went to great pains of bribery and deceit in procuring real ones for her wedding. If not exactly stepping back into my Bishkek home, this was certainly like coming to live with one of my long-time playmates, whose colorful homes had often mesmerized my child self.

Just like in my hotel, the apartment’s living/bedroom was organized around a vast empty space that was encircled by a beige “stenka” (wall) construction of a cupboard/bookcase unit and a mirrored wardrobe. Strawberry motif glasses flanked empty crystal vases on upper cupboard tiers while books on sex and success mixed with miniature Russian Vogues on lower shelves. Violent thrillers filled the nearby TV stand. I asked Fedia if the owner had recently lived here, but he told me that the apartment has been rented to foreigners for some time, prompting some fuzzy musings on whether these things were placed here by my host, who gently anticipated what Russians viewed as key drivers of American culture – sex, violence and success. Of course these popular American conceptions were big taboo in Soviet times, where violence was swept under the rug while success was against the communist norm. Sexual intercourse, or “polovoi act,” was literally translated as a “floor” act, and sexology replaced by sexopathology in the USSR. In the first televised US-USSR cultural exchange during glasnost, the Soviet representative proudly asserted that we didn’t have sex in USSR, we only had love. The flagrant rebellion against this kitsch marriage of love and sex in the promiscuous characters of my favorite dissident author, Milan Kundera, was now beginning to make sense. I was finally beginning to understand his infidels’ freedom, and moreover, the warning against this dangerous association perhaps to blame for early marriages and divorces among mother’s peers. Perhaps the contemporary interest in sex, violence and success was a way of casting off the veil of communist past for a fresher, freer and more honest take on reality even if it was through the pre-conceived norms of the West.

Fedia broke off this dreamy reverie by reminding me that it was time to head to the office and meet my new colleagues. Also on the outskirts of Samara, the office was close to our clients most of whom traded in small goods and produce. We dipped off one dusty road onto another and turned into a long, narrow yard. Our fresh white building gleamed amidst soot-covered houses with peeling paint, rotting windows and lines of laundry drying in over-grown grassy yards. The massive ministry-style cabinet doors on the first floor suggested that it must have belonged to the nomenclature. All doors were closed and upholstered in sound-muffling black leather, no doubt requiring Herculean strength to pry open. Two (out of six) electric bulbs shed light upon this solemn hall, forming an electric halo around Lenin’s head at the opposite end. The marble bust of our great leader regally rested between two fire extinguishers, becoming the biggest light source in the hall. His smooth round forehead deflected rays all the way to the entrance, touching us with its luminous boldness. KBM’s second floor premises were filled with bustling handymen putting on the last touches of renovation. The office was a cheerful contrast of glass doors and pastel walls – the American open door, team-work struggle against Soviet bureaucracy evident in its open spaces, soft colors and glass, if not open, doors.

Bill, the soft-spoken Texan CEO, welcomed me with a profanity-laced apology about the driver “fuck-up” and introduced his second in command, Jake, another mid-Westerner from Arizona. Raising children with Russian wives, Bill and Jake had sunk their roots in Samara and only traveled to the US for Christmas, briefly trading biting Russian winters for the south-Western dry heat. As their wives were not in any hurry to chase their dream in America, the two rough cowboys were out taming Russia’s Wild Wild East instead. They seemed to quite like Detroit Russian-style. My next introduction was to CFO Valerii, a withering workaholic whose slight, hunched-over frame summoned up a fleeting memory of my uncle Vania. The memory flitted on the surface since I was never close to my uncle due to raging wars between grandma and his wife, as a consequence of which neither she nor we were to set foot in each others’ houses. Our day in uncle Vania weary life was Saturday, when he came over with my cousin Misha and silently putted around our fruit and vegetable garden while Misha and I trailed him with mischief on our minds. But back to Valerii – he gravely assured me that those responsible for my driver arrangements would be “punished,” and it took much effort and pleading to dissuade this grand inquisitor from punishing anyone for the mix-up.

An empty barren desk was waiting for me in the accounting department, a large room with six foot ceilings presided over by Valerii. I breathed in the space, a relief from New York’s crusty gray cubicles. Air and sunlight poured in through large open windows, a welcome change from tepid air-conditioning and non-flinching neon lights. Park Avenue’s steel and glass sheath had given way to Rebellion Road’s sumptuous greenery. No longer was I an office rat feverishly spinning the wheel of spreadsheets under a neon bulb, but a field mouse maddeningly dashing about bazaars by daylight!

Valerii’s second in command, Lubov (Love), and six other accountants were sitting at various desks and entering information into non-functioning databases. IT people shuffled in and out to look at their computers. A rather energetic woman, Lubov raced to the IT department, then to Bill with a shrill litany on working conditions, “Our database is not working again! My subordinates can’t do anything until ten o’clock and then it goes off and on throughout the day! How can we work like this?! What kinds of conditions are these for working?!”

Lubov’s laments aside, the only perceptible sounds in the room were those of fingers drumming on key boards and a faint medley of Marilyn Manson, Metallica and Russian folk pouring from Valerii’s laptop. From time to time people whispered about accounting issues over the phone. When Lubov returned, one of the girls, Valia, was helping another with her computer, thus prompting another torrent of fury, “Valia, what are you doing?! Why are you helping her?! Are you being paid to help other people here?! Go back to your desk and do your work! Helping others is not allowed in our establishment!” Valia patiently withered through the outbreak. Perhaps realizing that reproaching friendly Valia was hurting her already suffering standing in others’ eyes, Lubov cooed in softer tones, “Valechka, we have to stop all this socializing and being nice to people. We must concentrate on doing our, not others’, work.”

Lubov was the full-bodied apparition of Soviet authoritarianism in her mid-forties. Her thin brows furrowed, thread lips pursed and button-hole nose perpetually flaring outrage, she was primarily occupied with checking on others, screaming into the phone and making unquestionable rules. After Valia, Lubov had directed her offensive on HR manager Irina, using the slip-up with my arrival as a special occasion, “Irina, I’ve had it with your incompetence! How many times do I need to tell you, Bill needs this visa?! He needs it today! He needs it now!” She banged the phone against the receiver, picked it up, and proceeded to two more such conversations. When she finally put the phone down Valerii dared to relay Bill’s criticism of her work, prompting a screeching retreat, “Otsepis!” – a strange rendition of “Leave me alone” literally translated as “Unchain yourself from me”. Valerii reminded Lubov that he was her supervisor, but she continued to beat retreat, “Otsepis! Otsepis ot menia!”

While I more or less dropped my jaw at Lubov’s dramatic antics, none of the people around me paid the least attention to them, not even raising their eyes at her tantrums. I later learned that those fortunate enough not to work in her department dismissed Lubov’s shouting and gesticulations with good-natured humor. I stepped out to make some tea in the kitchen and happened to overhear some office supervisors gossiping with local branch director, Askar.
“Who made this rule?” asked Askar.
“Lubov,” responded the supervisor, “When I emailed her asking if it wasn’t perhaps possible to speed up the process, she responded with “I told you it takes TWO DAYS!” ”
Another supervisor smiled and said, “How do you know, maybe she meant it like this, “I told you it takes two days.” ”
“No, the two days were all capitalized letters.” Everyone laughed.

Still, the line between love and hate was but a hair-thin thread for Lubov, whose temper made wide pendulum swings between the two extremes. One moment she ominously hailed insults and threats, the next she smiled and cooed beaming like the sun after a storm. Once she had unleashed her wrath Lubov didn’t seem to hold her anger against others. She may have even felt ashamed about her public outbursts, for after up-braiding Valia she brought us all chocolates from the kitchen and took to clucking over her “sweet” young accountants like a hen over her brood. Valia became ill in the afternoon and Lubov sent her home with medicine, calling her tenderly “my little one” and wishing the best of recovery. Her compassionate tenderness became infectious, and Lubov’s caresses seemed to be compensating for the insults. With this mix of anger and compassion Lubov was but a conflicting jumble of emotions and guilt, ready to ignite at any moment into their most extreme and pure forms.

My dazed study of office relations was suddenly halted by Bill, who invited me to lunch together with Jake and Valerii. Both fluent in Russian, Bill and Jake chatted with Valerii in heavy but understandable accents, and Bill sprinkled his Russian with traditional phrases like “Bo-ozhe moi” (My God), sighing in the middle like an old Russian man. As soon as they were in each others’ company, the two wholesome Americans united in solidarity on what must have been their favorite topic – the US presidential race. Valerii and I feigned interest in their heated debate on the merits of Hilary versus Obama. We drove to some Russian restaurant where I picked on traditional Russian soup “borsht” and Central Asian kebab “shashlyk” while listening to their US-Russia comparisons. As Russian MTV blared American rap and R&B on a plasma screen in front of our table, I couldn’t help but steal glances at familiar clips, but found surprises even there. Jake signed to one of the songs and told me that it was performed by a Tatar in the style of legendary American pimp, Snoop Dogg. Leggy Russian beauties barely covered by skimpy minis that looked more like belts than skirts on their hips, were dancing around a silver convertible, while an afroed Algerian-looking man rapped away in what my woozy self identified as Russian. This Russian Snoop wanna-be turned out more manly and muscular than his original, whose long haggard frame and luscious locks had an uncanny drag feel.

In the evening I set about to explore the nearby supermarket “1 Kopeika” (1 Cent), looking forward to local non-plastic vegetables very much missed since moving out of Central Asia. “Dlia zhitelei rodnogo goroda!” (For dwellers of our native town!): proudly announced a large banner hanging above the entrance, its fraternizing “zhiteli” (dwellers) and familial cadence of “rodnoi” (of same roots) making me feel like its dusty citizen. But when the doors slid open, my hopeful sentimentalities gave way to a bleak reality of dirty neon-lit aisles filled with rummaged sale bins. The meat and poultry section looked like a time capsule of ice-age meats and packets of frozen peas, while the carelessly thrown dairy products busted out of their packaging on the shelves. All vegetables, even onions and potatoes that typically lasted a long time, had a soft rubbery texture, and tomatoes exuded a vile sour smell, oozing liquid. A former boss’ concern harkened back. After I had devolved to him my noble quest of banking to the poor and the romantic search for dissident art in Russia, he furrowed his brow and asked, “But, what will you eat there?”
I returned his worry with puzzlement, “I’m sure that they have food there just like anywhere else. We never had problems with food in Kyrgyzstan.”
He then mused on his early nineties student exchange in Russia, “It was terrible, all the shops we went to were completely empty, not a single vegetable, not even an apple, could you find on the shelves. I don’t think I had any vegetables during my stay. I ate chicken liver for breakfast.” Back in his glass office, I had laughed off these food horror tales as a mere bogy of the tourist mind, and heartily assured him that I certainly wouldn’t starve or eat chicken liver for breakfast. After my super-market experience I realized that his worry wasn’t completely unfounded. Still, times had changed, and Samara as I saw it had long passed its post-Soviet deficits and depressions. Produce aside, the market was busting with other goods and there was no dearth of grains, oils and pastas, or of countless varieties of chips, sodas and other Western snacks.

Back in my fortress I instinctively rolled up the carpets and breathed in the free empty space. An all-fours mop inspection revealed clandestine spider-webs whose inhabitants scurried away from my powerful thuds. Blue Tilex spray dispelled a fine film of dust on the walls of the bathroom, which as typical of Russian apartments, didn’t have a sink – just a bathtub and a toilet, making me resign to washing hands and brushing teeth over the tub. The cleaning exercise unearthed traces of globalization even in this working class BRIC haven. Made in China was imprinted on everything from dish towels to the Russian Neva water boiler, which bore an English “Made in Rose Factory, Guangdong China” label next to the Neva logo. Evidently, Russia’s main industry players had also benefited from China just as much as the small-time consumers on Sunday bazaar.