New Year story 8. Incident in the mountains
A boring intro that you don't have to read.
A year, approximately, in 2006, I managed to buy someone else's trade union ticket to Sochi very cheaply. At the beginning of October.
And I went.
I didn't like it there.
A sanatorium frozen in the seventies, where at breakfast you could tell by the smell what was for lunch, and at dinner the smells from the kitchen informed the dinner menu.
A bed, like in a pioneer camp, a bedside table, a toilet bowl with a wooden, horseshoe-shaped seat.
Outside the territory of the sanatorium there are crowds of people who do not travel abroad for various reasons. From debt on alimony to the banal fear of a foreign land.
All cafes have the same assortment of food, drinks and chanson.
An underlying sense of danger. The distinct smell of the toilet, even on the main streets. Unsmiling muzzles in general for all the people you meet.
But what annoyed me the most was the language spoken by the locals. At first glance, they spoke Russian, but they used prepositions, tenses, conjugations and moods of verbs in the most unexpected way.
Receptionist at the resort:
- For your accommodation in a single room, you need to talk with the hostess sister.
At first I did not understand what he meant. Then I remembered that this is normal for the southern dialect.
Saleswoman in a store, looking up from her phone:
Do you want something?
No, dear. I wanted yesterday, I wanted last year, and now I want. I could say - "What do you want, sir? ". Or, if we are almost in the Caucasus - “Ra ginda, bidzho? ” *
But it's almost nonsense. Most of all, I was surprised and, in part, frightened that absolutely all the locals, turning to me with requests and suggestions, used verbs strictly in the indicative mood of the plural.
Grandma on the beach:
- Boys, girls. We buy corn.
No grandma. I buy corn, a man with a red face buys, a girl in a panama buys. And you sell it to us.
And so everywhere. We present tickets, we order drinks, we don’t go behind the chain. Etc.
And there is something commanding about it. Something like an order.
I'm not a bore. I remember and love the Alban language, which is now partly forgotten, but my brain endured it notably.
When I got used to all this and almost stopped noticing it, an incident occurred that again plunged me into an abyss of despondency and irritation.
Out of boredom, I signed up for a massage in a sanatorium. A masseuse, a kind of active, sharp fitonyasha. She was dressed in cycling pants and a half-shirt. And between these elements of clothing, instead of a cozy female belly, one could see muscle cubes.
And this creature commanded me - “Undress. Let's lie down on the couch. "
That is, I undress and she undresses. I lie down on the couch and she lies down next to me.
No way!! ! Never! Cubes instead of a belly... A woman!?! ? Yeah…
I prefer much more abundant landscapes.
A chance in the mountains
Fortunately, I met the nicest person there. Young guy. Poor as a church mouse. To save money, I did not buy potatoes, but bought instant mashed powder. He figured it was better. He was an elementary school teacher and was waiting for a place at a school in St. Petersburg due to a decree. In the meantime, he worked part-time on the “bungee”, which belonged to his relatives.
“Bungee” was a metal tower, on the pier, from which a cable was stretched down, obliquely, to the neighboring pier. The man took hold of the handrail with a roller and slid down this cable towards the neighboring pier. Before reaching 5 meters, the man slowed down on the water and did not crash on this neighboring pier.
Now such entertainment is called Zipline.
This teacher and I were sitting on the top tier of the tower. They sipped beer, instructed gloomy men and their trembling girlfriends. And children, of course.
We chatted. Sometimes they themselves moved out to cool off.
Once an hour, we were allowed to pronounce all sorts of advertising calls over the loudspeaker.
Out of boredom, I invented poetic advertising.
Here is one of my masterpieces:
Uncle!
Don't drink too early.
Drink later.
And now - bungee!!!
On the fifth day of such a paradise, there was a wild storm. The beach was closed and the bungee was not working. My new friend advised me to go to the mountains. To that pre-Olympic Krasnaya Polyana.
He said that it would definitely be cold there and persuaded me to dress warmly. But I didn't have anything warm with me.
And he gave me an old, stained padded jacket, a gray knitted hat - a cockerel from the eighties with the fashionable inscription "SPORT" and soldier's two-fingered mittens.
I looked quite picturesque in this outfit, but I was no longer afraid of the cold.
On the way, the teacher gave me another half-liter plastic bottle with homemade cognac, which was made by his relatives “For Friends”.
It was boring in the mountains. Wind. Mut. Some kind of wet-ice grain in the air.
The only thing that got me completely excited was the pumping station, on which it was written - “Rheinmetall-Borsig. 1938". Here is the quality! Removed under reparations in 1945, the station continued to operate.
I wandered a bit and found the platform of the cable car. Toy. Old. Where are the benches with a metal, lowered safety rail.
The queue was quite short. I stood up for the girl. When it was her turn, the attendant pushed me to the bench and I rode with her. Apparently, this did not please her. She crawled to the very edge and looked at me with obvious displeasure. I understand her. My tattered padded jacket and “cockerel” on my head did not make me a welcome companion.
After about ten minutes, the lift stopped. Soon enough, a lifeguard on an ATV rushed under us and yelled through a megaphone that everything was fine. That we shouldn't try to come down on our own. That everything will be fixed soon.
We hang. . . Not high, but you won't get down. The weather is bad, but I'm not cold. Reminds me of cognac. He turned to his neighbor in the most gracious way - “Madame. Since fate brought us together aunt **, would you like to take a sip of cognac?
She looked at me as if I was not me, but a monster oblo, mischievous, huge, staring and barking.
Well, that's her business. Sipped in solitude. About an hour later, I really wanted to smoke. Didn't offer to neighbor. He lit a cigarette and defiantly pushed the smoke away with his palm.
And suddenly this girl began to cry. Sobbed. Painful, hopeless and creepy.
Alarmed, I threw away the cigarette and began to bleat that I would not smoke. And I won't drink cognac. And in general I will jump, just don’t cry like that.
And she, choking, moaned that she was very scared. That she is very cold. And that she really wants to write.
Uh… I won't describe in detail this balancing act that I had to create. This is not a site format. In general terms... Everything happened on my parted knees. Face me. My quilted jacket closed the action from prying eyes. Wind. Lines from “Pippi Longstocking” by Astrid Lindgren were spinning in my head. “At first it was warm and wet, then it was cold and wet. ”
In short, neither before nor after have I had anything more intimate with anyone.
After that, of course, we bonded. They sat hugging. They drank cognac. She puffed up a couple of times. She told me her story. She came to Sochi with her husband, a two-year-old child and a young sister-in-law***.
Until this day, I heard this word, but I was sure that the sister-in-law is a special hole in the Russian stove.
The child and this relative of her husband caught the wildest dysentery. And she and her husband decided that the vacation should not be wasted. They changed. One day she sat at the head of the afflicted. She plucked lint and offered up prayers. Then her husband took over.
Today it was her turn to enjoy life. And there it is. Storm. The beach is closed. It's cold in the mountains. The neighbor is a ragged drunk.
But she said that if it wasn't for me, it would have been just a disaster, since we hung for almost two hours. And she called me a guardian angel.
Friends. I wish you all the best in the new year. And if it's lousy, I wish you a guardian angel. Just get to know him. He may come to you in the form of a bum. It's not scary. He will help. That's right.
P. S.
* Ra ginda, bijo? - Georgian. What do you want, boy?
** Tetete. - distort. French Tete-a-tete. Alone.
*** Sister-in-law. – Husband's sister.
Karoch. FSE will be s. . . s
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