October 30 - Day 43

In Russia they say, ‘Nothing is allowed and everything is possible.’ It is the best expression I have found to date to describe the bizarre dichotomy that is the reality of living here. Everything is a contradiction and nothing makes sense. ­­­At 6:30 this morning I was startled out of my sleep by the sound of someone violently trying to break into my room. It scared me to death but for some reason my instinct was to bolt, half asleep, to the door to track down the intruder. The culprit was a sketchy looking construction worker who just shrugged and smirked at me when I tried to ask through broken English/Russian and heated hand gestures as to what in the hell he thought he was doing. In Russian they literally have no word or expression to define personal privacy. It is a concept completely foreign to them and as such I have become quite familiar with these types of violations. We have absolutely no space that is sacred and people come and go through our personal areas at their leisure. This was only one in a series of incidents in the past few days (others included Jenna having money stolen from her room while she was at class and Will being walked in on while he was showering in a locked bathroom by a construction worker who was clearly expecting to find a woman on the other side of the door) and I was left to begin my day on edge with an intense feeling of loathing towards the general populous that makes up this city. It has been a difficult few weeks in terms of the cultural differences and the hardest part is not feeling safe because I have yet to feel like I understand how to negotiate the city. It was an aggravating morning so I decided use my extra long break as an opportunity to explore areas of Moscow I had never visited. I started to walk and the further away from the center I got, the more the people started resemble real human beings rather than fashion models and the more the edges of the city’s atmosphere began to soften. My breathing became easier, deeper and my gaze began to open. I realized people on the streets were actually making eye contact with me, even smiling. One man passed me on the street and said ‘Hello. How are you?’ in English, then giggled and kept on walking. I was so startled it took me a second to recognize how American I clearly looked. I walked for hours, stopping to eat lunch in a park and watched mothers with their little children play on the massive clown statues that lined the boulevard. On my way back I got completely lost but I didn’t even think to panic. Somehow the Russian knowledge I had buried deep within my brain made its way to the surface and I was able to ask a Militia for directions entirely in Russian. There was something overwhelmingly empowering about being entirely self-reliant and I could clearly feel how much I have missed my independence. It was strange but during my walk I began to feel for the first time like this was a kind of home rather than a tourist destination. I had missed the interactions with real people just trying to live their lives rather than the polished façade of the Tverskaiya regulars. It was such a beautiful afternoon, so peaceful, so invigorating that all but dissolved my morning’s animosity and left me believing once again that in Russia, as in life, despite what you know or understand, anything is possible.