The Adventures of Kesha the Russian Boy

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Have you ever taken the lift with the doors open? Oh, you're missing out. It's an indescribable feeling. I don't remember who taught us this little trick, probably some older boys in the building. But this is what we did: we headed inside the lift, closing the outside door but not the inside one. Then, we would push our arms to both sides of the lift wall and, feeling steady, would lift up our feet to hang there. The lift senses that there's no one there anymore, and so will wait until someone presses the button on another floor. Next, your partner in crime (which you need to arrange beforehand) would press the button on another floor and the lift would shoot off and the metal bars from the elevator shift would flash before our eyes. If we got dizzy (which was a common occurrence), then we'd just drop back down to the floor and the lift would stop dead. No need to worry, the ride's not over yet, you'll be off again soon.

There's another trick «for the older ones». Why? Because you want to keep the outside door open too. To do this, your partner needs to get in place before pressing the button to call the lift. They must:

1) Open the outer door;

2) Reach behind the wall and find the little switch that senses when the doors are open or closed. Switch it so the system thinks the doors are closed (when actually, they're open). Then, reach into the elevator shaft to find the lever and pull it out;

3) Then, they can twist this lever clockwise to tighten it and put it in the «outside door is closed» position;

4) Then, the doors will stay like that until you undo the lever. So, your partner can go up all the floors, doing this, leaving all the doors open;

5) All that's left if for you to fly up all the floors in the lift, watching all the open doors fly past you!

When these new modern lifts with automatic doors came out in the 00s, parents everywhere breathed a sigh of relief. Now our children will not be able to get themselves into such danger. The elevator shaft isn't a playground, no sir.

But what I'd give for another go right now! Especially with the new mod cons…

1992. The tunnel under the bridge

No less dangerous were our little walks through the tunnel under the main road. That's where the river Petritsa flowed through. We used to go there all the time. What on earth for? First of all, there were lots of crayfish. I didn't catch any of them, but the boys I was with managed to. I was just afraid to stick my hands under the stones – what if it bit me! Even now I would think twice before doing that…

Second of all, me and my friends had made a dam there. I'm not really sure what it was for, but we took joy in the making of it. It was quite fun wading through the wet mud against the current; we had to be resourceful, trying not to drop our building materials but also not falling into the water ourselves. We didn't always get it right, so quite often our spare parts would float off downstream or we'd lose them. We'd finish the day soaked, wet all the way through, stood in this raging stream. We'd walk home, tails between our legs. When mum always asked «Why are you so wet?» I told her the standard lie «I fell in a puddle…» If she had seen this «puddle», I'd have got a clip around the ear.

1992. Bike theft

One day, my list of fibs I used to tell my mum grew one lie longer. It was about a stolen bike. Not my bike, I was the one who stole it… Not exactly GTA, of course, but these criminal acts were barefaced, committed in broad daylight. And the thing was that I was forbidden to ride a bicycle, because, well, the roads were chaos! Gena from flat 36 would drive around in his cherry-coloured Lada Zhiguli[9 - A car designed and manufactured in the Soviet Union.] and there would be at least three Zaporozhets[10 - A series of rear-wheel-drive superminis from the Soviet Union.], including ours, out on the road each hour…

And suddenly there it was, the transport of my dreams. A kind of confusion came over me, an inner tightness at the same time as a rush of determination and a passionate desire. It was impossible to resist. I wanted it and that was enough.

Within just fifteen seconds of riding the stolen bike I saw a whole spectrum of emotions: it went from euphoria, to joy, to lightness, anxiety, burden, fear, and finally horror. The latter was so depressing that I immediately parked the bike behind the khrushchyovka[11 - A type of low-cost, brick or concrete-panelled apartment block of three to five floors. They were common in the Soviet Union during the early 1960s, named after then-leader of the USSR, Nikita Khrushchev.] opposite us. And immediately the horror turned into annoyance, then even into anger. With that, I ripped off the spoke nipples and threw them into the bush. If I couldn't enjoy it, nobody could!

The next day, my friend's father had a polite conversation with me, trying to nip anything like that in the bud. It was very embarrassing, and I couldn't say anything, not even the standard «I won't do it again.» I muttered something to myself, and they let me go. I didn't do it again. At least not with bikes. You know, it's busy out there, with all these cars about…

1993. Prawns and dentists

Though not criminal, it was dangerous of me to try and catch prawns underneath an abandoned building. It was when I was at the Oleg Koshevoy summer camp in Yepatoria. Of course, we didn't realise it was so dangerous, but that's another story…

When we were caught red-handed, the supervisors made a note of our names. In the evening, they cooked us these shrimps and made us eat them. The next morning, we were sent before the Comrades' Court[12 - A special form of collective justice that existed in the Soviet Union.]. It was quite the event, you know, but there was an issue: someone lost that list with our names on. The teachers asked us to own up and stand up. All the culprits stood up, except me. I just sat there. What was it to me? Nothing to do with me what they got up to. My mates whispered to me, «Get up!» But I couldn't. I was an excellent student and an exemplary little lad. I was the first to «perfectly» make the bed, the first to brush my teeth… You name the Soviet summer camp activity, I excelled in it. So, I didn't own up.

Later these mates launched a campaign of blame against me, and then a terrible punishment. A couple of days later, we were taken to the dentist for a routine check-up. I wanted to go among the first so I could finish earlier. But I was pushed to the back of the queue. Here it was: public shaming in all its glory. I had to wait for a couple of hours and then, when I had almost reached the front of the queue, I lost my nerve, turned around, and left.

The next day, my counsellor caught me by the hand and marched me back to the dentist. She put me in a chair and asked me to open my mouth. It was already scary, but bearable. But when they put cotton wool on one of my teeth, I started to panic and ask her not to hurt me. I sat there for a minute and the kind woman promised that it would not hurt. She pulled out the cotton wool and I began to stutter on about injections, drilling, and so on. When I was really nervous, that lady showed me the cotton wool, upon which lay a baby tooth.

I couldn't believe my eyes, so I asked, «Is that all?»

«That's all!» Said the lady, calmly and even a little sloppy. And off I went…

1994. Kitten of dreams

But prawn, bikes, and milk teeth… That's nothing. Here's a very serious tale that got out of hand. Everything else pales into insignificance and seems like childish fun by comparison…

Ever since I was a child, I had dreamed of having a kitten. A small, fluffy, grey kitten. One day we even got one, but it cried all night, and my stepfather insisted on returning it to its mother.

I was about eight or nine years old. One day, out on another one of my walks, I was walking down some stairs and, through the broken window between the eighth and ninth floors, I saw the kitten of my dreams on a windowsill. I calmly came up to him and stroked him. And what do you think I did next? Did I take it home? Did I take care of this kitten? No. I threw it out of the window onto the street…

Yes, that's right, through the window. You know, those apartment blocks have these little openings for various kinds of needs. I guess this was one of them…

What happened next was even stranger. I almost immediately forgot about it. I calmly continued about my business, slowly planning my new day. I realised what I had done only when I went outside. The kitten was coming towards me, meowing and limping. I, in my childish naivety, had been sure that it would just have splatted into a flat cake – and that's all… So that's how it happened… I felt ashamed and ran away.

А lot of things happened in my life. But I am not as sad and ashamed of anything as for what I did to this kitten. Even making corrections for childish stupidity and curiosity, I can find neither an explanation for the act, nor an excuse for myself. If I had the opportunity to correct just one episode in my life, it would definitely be this one.

1996. Gorodki and a gas mask

Yeah, that was a pretty serious mistake to make. But life goes on and so does my moderately criminal track record. Now let's switch from pets to items. It was summer, I was at a sanatorium in Stupino, outside of Moscow, and I was in a bad crowd.

Well, they weren't that bad, but they did force me to climb into someone else's shed. It fit snugly against the fence of the sanitorium. So I broke in, and heroically retrieved one gas mask and Gorodki set[13 - An old Russian folk sport similar in concept to bowling. The aim of the game is to knock out groups of skittles arranged in various patterns by throwing a bat at them.]. The gas mask was lost quickly – hidden under a pillow and successfully seized by unidentified persons. But we played Gorodki for ages. When the adults asked where we got it from, our official story was «I got it for my birthday».

So, yeah, they tricked me again but I recovered quickly. When I was getting ready to go home, I started to gather it up to take it with me. The band of lads started pressuring me to leave it behind for others. Of course, I was hardly going to do that. It was a matter of principle! I said: «It's my birthday present, why the questions? Do you want to discuss it with the adults?» And as a result, I took it home, which I am still childishly happy about.

At least one lesson was learned from this. Later, I realised I could smell bad crowds a mile off and always avoided them, not getting involved in any confrontations.

1996. But I don't want to go to school!

Hooliganism was later replaced by social protests. Perhaps the latter logically ran from the former. In the sixth grade, when I was about 12, I gave myself a holiday of disobedience. I'd told my mother that I would not go to school that day. And, would you believe, I really didn't go. With mum's permission, of course!

In fact, I was surprised by my mother's sensitivity and the understanding with which she accepted this riot of mine, because everything happened spontaneously and in the moment. There was no apparent reason for this behaviour. No tests or exams were scheduled for that day, I hadn't fallen out with anyone in my class. It was an unexpected whim. Or really, I needed to be alone and think about something.

Quickly getting my bearings, my mother gave me a list of chores for the day and rushed off to work. After spending the whole day doing household chores and having worn myself out, I'd knocked some sense into myself. I never acted out like that again. No wonder they say that hard work ennobles a person…

2001. Smoking on the first day back at school

Not going to school is one thing, but to let down your class leader[14 - Your main teacher that stayed with you throughout school, much like a form tutor in the UK.] on the first day of school is quite another. After all, in Russia, we all go back to school on 1

September and line up in the playground. It's all quite a spectacle for everyone involved. I couldn't miss it.

In those days I smoked quite often. It was trendy, cool and new. I still steal a cigarette every now and again, although much less often, maybe five or six a year. Smoking is no longer new or fashionable, but it still looks cool. Especially when it's not often.

So there we were, first day back, 1st September. People were rushing around, running here, there, reading this, reading that. Why not to go for a smoke? Why not, I thought, and started smoking in the back row. In a flash, my eyes met those of the class leader…

I still wonder at Mr Yuriy Yarkin's restraint that day, it was solid, soldier-like, like that of a Lieutenant Colonel. In fact, he had been in the military before becoming a schoolteacher. I'd like to have even a fraction of that kind of restraint. He didn't even say anything to me: his eyes did the talking. They said, «You, my boy, are making a mistake…».

I didn't argue with him – if said I was in the wrong, I was in the wrong. I wasn't a baby anymore, I understood everything indeed…

Chapter 5. 1990. First Disappointments amp; Grievances

1990. «I want to be able to fly!»

Frustrations and resentments are a subtler matter than just mischief and messing around. Disappointments bring down one's inner world, and resentments distort it, deforming your personality. At the age of five or six, I had been lied to. It was a big lie. And it was my family who did it.

One day, I told my mother all about my dream: «I want to fly!» The new school term was coming up and my mother «explained» to me that «if you want to fly, you first need to read 30… no… 50 pages per day…» So, I read 70 or even 100 pages.

Before I knew it, I was starting to be able fly. Very quickly there was a feeling of lightness and airiness, as if I was floating, but for some reason I just couldn't get off the ground. Apparently, I read a lot, but not carefully enough, I thought. I pushed a little harder. Time passed, and I never learned to fly. Well, what can I say? A young boy getting first place for reading speed in primary school is very rare. It was a point of pride for me, and all good things, as you know, have to be paid for…

1993. «It wasn't me!»

These disappointments were just the beginning, and the next serious one was waiting for me at the end of my first year at school, when I was about eight. An ABC book for a first grader is what the Bible is to Christians. And one day my copybook had two pages glued together. Where the Russian letter «Щ» is, which sounds like «Shch». It had a picture of a puppy, in Russian «Shchenok». When they had been glued together and how – I had no idea. The mystery remains until this day.

Our first lesson was reading. My turn came, and I needed to read the text from the pages that had been stuck. I asked the boy sitting next to me, Edik, to help me. «No,» he said, «use your ABC book.» A technical difficulty.

Our teacher Ms. Tatiana Lazarevna was already quite old and the epitome of a strict Soviet teacher. I almost wrote «caregiver», but that doesn't quite fit the bill. She always set the bar high in terms of morals and education. The technical difficulties I was facing were absolutely unacceptable for her, and she quickly pounced on me.

Just 20 seconds later, I was standing in front of the whole class next to her desk, testifying to what had happened. To her, the story sounded unconvincing, it fell apart with lies. Her verdict was clear and sharp: to stand all day in front of the class until I could confess. I wouldn't admit to something I didn't do, even now. I remember how I was going mental inside, and I stood all day. The next day I had to come into school with my mother.

But it turned out to really make my day, because it so happened that the place I was forced to stand was straight ahead of Lena Khryashcheva – my super crush. So, even if I had glued these pages together myself, I would never have admitted it. I'd have stood there gladly all day long.

1993. Russian grammar

It turned out that this first incident with my teacher hadn't been enough and she wanted more the next year. I'll be honest, it was because I used to get mixed up with my grammar. I struggle to this day, but then it was a much bigger problem.

For example, to make the word «November» into an adjective would make it «Novemberish» (I promise, that's a real word in Russian). Except I used to write Novemborish. Or for December, I'd write Decemborish. You see? So I often failed our homework miserably, to the point where my work was read out in front of the whole class! The teacher's pet, the good boy, doesn't even know his grammar!

The stutter, which had almost disappeared, quickly came back. I don't know if it was visible from the outside, but from the inside I was all burning with blue flames. It was that day when a persistent dislike for this subject began to form, and in four years' time it would be fixed definitively. I'll tell you about that later…

1997. Not guilty and moving schools

There were no more special incidents, and gradually the end of the sixth grade came. And then a very hurtful and unfair story happened to me. One of the key moments that defined my future life path.

Like all normal children, I had a best friend: Vadim Zagvozdkin. I don't know why he fought with the other boys, Artyom and Alexander, but we were old enough to be fighting over girls yet. I happened to witness them scuffling after classes outside of our school. In my opinion, it wasn't a real fight, just a bit of a show.

The next day I was called to the headmistress's office and asked to explain the situation. When I wrote it, she looked at my writing with a grimace and gave me the verdict: I had egged them on. She didn't believe my story that I was only an onlooker. Vadim's mother really fanned the flames. She said things like «you two were best friends…» The investigation of this story was slow and tedious. The last word on the subject came from our class leader, Ms. Vassa Kondratyevna, who just stopped saying hello to me.

At the beginning of the school year, my mother had offered to send me instead to the lyceum in the nearby town of Lvovskaya. I'd remembered this, and later firmly told my mother that I was moving to the Lyceum – no explanations. In Russia we have this a proverb: «He said he would, so he did.» Four months later I moved schools and started a new year.

1997. «I will never snitch on my mates!»

But that wasn't the final word on disappointments in friendships. A child with such an active life philosophy couldn't have just one friend. There were also the boys that played out in the yard. The ones with whom I started smoking in seventh grade.

We didn't smoke that much; it was mostly just to get to grips with the idea and meet modern standards. But full disclosure: I was the first to start. When my mother demanded that I tell on my partners in crime, I said «I will never snitch on my mates, matter what!» And the case was closed.

At the same time, one of my «accomplices» Alexey Antonov from the flat 35 was compromised. He snitched on everyone to his mother. All the mothers at home made a showdown of the whole thing. But Alexey told everyone that I was the traitor, because I was first exposed.

That's when our long-term friendship ended.

1998. Taras Bulba

My mood actually improved when I'd run out of friends. There were less ways to get tricked. But I had completely forgotten about my Russian Literature amp; Language teachers. Clearly I had either a lack of experience or short memory loss.

Ms. Irina Borisovna had always been friendly and kind to me. I liked her too, but a man called Taras came between our love. It was Taras Bulba from the novella by Nikolay Gogol.

I had to write an essay on this subject, but I'd forgotten about it until it was almost too late. I scribbled it down while I was at my mother's workplace, a kid's massage clinic.

This time, my grammar was perfect. It was the commas that let me down. I used them so weirdly, that some of my sentences didn't even make sense. It was just hilarious! And everybody in the class thought so to. Laughter hit 100 dB, no less.

These sentences were read out to the class, with that stuck-up teacher voice, which drew a strong, hard line under my love for this teacher and the whole subject of Russian literature. I hate it.

But hatred, I'm sure you will agree, is a bad feeling, and later fate decided to play a little game on me: my wife Maria is a Russian Language amp; Literature teacher. Yes, yes, very funny… But years later I learned about Russian postfixes, some parts of the speech and some other little things. That said, I still can't manage phonetic from the third grade, which our daughter Anfisa has already mastered. Indeed, language is not my strong point.

2000. More Pushkin

Then, Ms. Irina Borisovna went on maternity leave and she was replaced by a trained specialist. She was so awful that I can't even remember her name. Ms. Valentina, was it? At the end of the ninth grade, in five lessons in a row I was asked a question in literature class. It was on the subject of the great genius Pushkin. In the first three lessons, I answered questions about him with all that I could remember from the textbook, no worries. But then by the fourth lesson I began to struggle. Some people weren't getting any questions, I was being tortured ever time! The fifth time came and it started to drive me mad. For all five answers I got five points out of five, again, no problems. But wasn't there such a thing as too much Pushkin per pound of flesh?

I was asked a sixth time, and I publicly refused to answer.

«Don't you know?» asked the teacher.

«I know, but you've already tortured me enough. Why do I have to answer every time?» I replied.

«Right, so, obviously, you don't know. Two points.[15 - Equivalent to a D in western grading.]»

During the break, I came up to her to find out what she wanted from me, but she shrugged me off, did not listen, and said that it was impossible to change the grade she's given me. This brought my marks down, and I would be awarded a 4/5 for the term. F**k you… I thought to myself, leaving in silence. Pushkin, Pushkin, Pushkin… I get it, he's our national treasure. But you'd have thought someone else would have written something better by now…

Chapter 6. 1995. First Money

1995. Beer bottles

Pushkin, lifts, and grammar – I had bigger fish to fry. A real man needs money. A lot of money. For… crisps, chupa chups, and a little later for the collectable Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle stickers.

Сheburashka[16 - Also known as «Topple» in earlier English translations. It's a character from Russian children's literature and now a cartoon based on the 1966 story by Soviet writer Eduard Uspenskiy. The bottles were brown, just like Сheburashka, hence why we referred to the bottles this way.] beer bottles were the answer to our meaningless summer existence and the absence of any pocket money. It made us a little more confident and even more grown-up. It was fun.