MONGOLIA

I dreamt something, but I don’t know what anymore. It must have been something bad again. Bad meaning something about this journey that doesn’t work well. But I woke up, packed up, Doyle. I see two motorcycles not far from us, full of bags but with no bikers. While I’m packing, I see them coming, mounting and going away beside me. I distinguish what I think it’s an E on their plates. Spain, wow. We salute, but they don’t stop. Fuck, another chance for me to get well with somebody is riding away. I try in vain to catch them up later. They’re gone and I don’t know if we have the same road. I’d rather turn right, to Kurgan, to rob some ATM. I find it and it has a queue. I wait, enter the card, ask for five thousands. No can do, transaction rejected. OK, dude, give me three thousand. No, again. Um, lucky me there is spectacular technology in this world. I check with my phone. Account funds – ten Euro. Yupeee! I burn a transfer with the phone and here I am with money in my pocket five minutes later. Brother Gates, be praised.

I’m riding my horse and everything is perfect. This road, M51, would take us through Kazakhstan to get to Omsk. It would be much shorter this way, but the visas don’t allow this luxury. So we listen to Marcel that makes a killer route, on side roads. I don’t understand. These side roads shouldn’t be called like this. ‘Side’ here, by this example, just means it hasn’t much of traffic. But is has asphalt as in the palm of the hand. Not that there’s much asphalt in a palm, but if it was, this is how you should imagine these road looking like. It’s just perfect. I should be on a chopper here or something that would allow me to lie on my back and enjoy the landscape at low speed. My Roua would eat the road here. She’s only in my soul now and I have to be content with the riding position Doyle is offering me. I move my ass as frontward as possible, I lean as backward as possible and enjoy the view. And the ride.

I notice during one of the stops that my Doyle has got wings. Not any wings, but two pairs of them from a dragonfly that sacrificed itself on the motorcycling altar. I’m sorry for her, it wasn’t our intention, but it’s too late now. I promise her we’ll strive to use them at least as well as she did while she was still a dragonfly.

I now realize, as I’m moving forward, that ‘side roads’ means one more thing. In the Russia we’ve ridden through so far, there were gas stations every ten kilometers. Now, we’ve been riding for one hundred and nothing. The tank situation is not pink, so I’m forced to reduce speed to about 90 km/ h, for consumption’s sake. The surrounding landscape deserves my entire the attention, so I’m not embarrassed for slowing down. It’s completely deserted. There are parts of the road of tens of kilometers where I’m absolutely alone, not a living soul, not a car, nothing. And the land around me is, how should I put it, primordial. I’m thinking more often to put up the tent somewhere, except that here, besides the fear of the police flashlight, an embarrassment of brother bear starts to settle on me. I imagine him coming in and shaking the tent at about two in the morning asking for a light. No, I’m looking for a human settlement. Except this refuses to come in our way too soon. It’s deserted. In the most literal way possible. I pray to Big Chief that I get to put some gas so that I don’t have to wave the can on the side of the road, not speaking about sleeping. The road is magnificent, I repeat, I can’t complain about that. But I have a carrot as big as the beauty of the road in my ass and I shoved in there, as I haven’t found a better place for it.

Ah, finally, that blue sign with a tiny bed on it, fifteen kilometers. I got there. I stop, a gentleman welcomes me and, after the traditional where-are-you-from and where-do-you-go-to, he invites me to dinner. Yes, spasiba, but I want to find a bed first. The Russian, as you go deeper in the East, seems to get harder to be understood in the official locations, such as places you eat, so harder that not even the body language is understood. I say to the madam at the bar that I … hands under head. And niznaiu. A gentleman translates to her and tells me to follow him. We go outside and he shows me where, praise him. I find it. Double room, again, oh me. We take it, as it’s about ten Euro, as double as it is. I have another option, with shower, at about thirty Euro, but I say no. I decorate the room according to the well-known boots-jacket-socks-trousers design and I go to the bathroom across the hallway to take a shower in the sink. It’s blana. And then I go to eat. Borsch, of course, and some chicken with mashed potatoes. Plus beer. Sum up – less than two Euro. Then I retire to my room. And in five minutes someone is knocking at the door and, moreover, is trying the handle. Then I hear something about Romania on the hallway. I open up. Lady and gentlemen, hang on, fasten your seatbelts, let your chairs on the back. Star Trek begins.

Misha is at my door. And I’m gonna spend the entire evening with him. He’s thrashed and he has a pure smile. I guess he’s forty something years old, blue eyes and wedding ring on the left ring finger. He talks to me for about ten minutes, only he knows what he’s saying, we take a picture of ourselves with his mobile phone and then we say goodnight. For another ten minutes, then… knock in the door and I hear a ‘Mihai?’. I open and… Mishaaaaaa!!! I understand that he’s going to eat something and he asks me if I want to come with him. Nooo… I have something to write, and I’ve eaten, spasiba. I close the door and I feel like slapping myself. What in the name of God do I have to write and can’t wait? I take the beer I took to go and I go downstairs. No sign of my Misha. I go outside. And… Mishaaaaaaa!!!

I have a beer on which it says ‘something 3’. He explains something to me about seven but besides him drinking seven of those I don’t understand a thing. Misha goes away and returns with a beer just like mine, except it says ‘something 7’ on this one. That’s where I got it wrong. He says three is for beginners, but seven should be good for me. He stays a little while and then brings two more. One for me again. I try to say that I’d go to bed after this which I’m holding, but he says that I don’t have to drink it, but take it with me for when I feel like drinking it. Andrei comes to us. An exquisite conversation takes place. I don’t understand a thing and Misha asks Andrei to translate for me, every time he notices that. The language Andrei knows better than Misha is somewhere in the hands. He knows to gesticulate better. So Andrei makes me understand, still in Russian, but with improved gesture. Well, better than Misha anyway. Then a walk is proposed and I happily accept. They show me gas pipes on houses and tell me this is what they do for a leaving. It’s alright, taken into account that I’ve understood they’re drivers earlier. We hear a bang! behind us. The hood of a car had just opened and hit the windshield. On the move. Misha tells me to picture-picture. I take picture and he asks if this happens in Romania also. I say no, as it’s the first time I witness a scene like this. He answers: ‘in Russia… all the time’ and we all laugh. We walk back, and Andrei goes ahead. I remain with Misha on the path and for about half an hour he keeps telling me stories while we stand there. Stories in Russian. I don’t understand a thing, but I find it very cool. I’m looking at him and I’m amazed. He gives me his number and tells me to not hesitate to call him if I have any problem within an area of three hundred kilometers around. It sounds great, taken into account we don’t get each other at all. Then he asks me to go with him to the place where he rabota. I strive to explain to him that I want to sleep, but he insists. He insists somehow nicely, I admit. Misha is a sweet. I feel like hugging him. He’s so honest and simple. And how nice he explains to me and I don’t understand anything. And he calls someone every five minutes to ask for translation guidance and he hangs up without finding anything. OK, Misha, let’s go. We enter a block of flats in construction, into an apartment in construction, into a kitchen where few people are drinking. Misha introduces me. This is the moment I knock them out with the next thing. Them, in turn: Alex. And I: from Alexander. Alexei, from Aliosha, Jgheni, from Eugeniy. I’m appreciated at my true value of Russian speaker. More beer is poured, and I drink. I have to. It’s the pride of my nation at stake.

I hardly manage to convince Misha I do need some sleep and I go to my room, after long embraces. Ten minutes pass and… Mishaaaaaaaa!!! He’s at my door with a beer and a smoked fish. I eat it while I listen to his stories in Russian and I don’t understand. He’s a genuine wonder this Misha of mine. He’s leaving. Five minutes, then… Mishaaaaaaa!!! He’s again at the door. He just wants to tell me a story.

I listen very carefully and we laugh, laugh, laugh. I tell him again I want to go to sleep, but I have to pee first. He invites me to pee in his room, across the hallway. How can I refuse something like this? I enter the bathroom and he shows me the shower, where I’m invited tomorrow. Ah, Misha. We hug once more and this time I’m determined not to open again. I don’t have to, as Misha has probably fallen asleep.

What a beautiful evening, made in Russia.

In the morning, when the sleep was sweet… knock, knock, Mihaaaaai! Misha, ah, why don’t you let me sleep and respect my code of being the last that leaves from these motels in the morning? Nope, he insists. I open, in my underpants. It’s about nine in the morning. My Misha is fresh like a flower and he tells me I have to wake up, as the road is waiting for me and he has to rabota. We hug, we kiss, we say goodbye, but he offers me a cooking book in Russian before. Needless to say I only understand the punctuation marks in it. I pack, go down, drink a cola and leave. I stop first at the block of flats where Misha and I were last night. I look for him in the kitchen, to say a proper goodbye, as I wasn’t getting too much earlier. Few workers hang around on the stairs. I ask: Misha? They shrug in a choir. I go upstairs, knock at the door beyond which I was yesterday and a lady opens. Misha? Misha, who? She seems to hear this name for the first time in her life. Misha isn’t here. I have to comfort myself with the thought that Misha understood more than I did from that goodbye in the morning.

Spasiba, Misha, you make Russia home for me.