Миша Чинков - Кауч

I think Jose is one heck of a toxic guy.

I meet Nadya at the “Teatralnaya” metro station. On the way home, we try to get to know each other better, but the unbearable metro noise puts in its two cents. Nadya tells me about the meeting with her friends – they've just seen each other. I’m playing my card straight away by telling about my life in the States.

Nadya lives with her husband Dima and a dog named Sky – a reference to Luke Skywalker from the Star Wars. They work all round about film industry, usually as camera operators. Also, Nadya earns money from photoshoots and wedding photography. They live on mortgage in a new built three-room apartment in a residential complex near Podolsk. Because of urbanization metastases, their Podolsk propiska transformed into Moscow propiska 15 15 The Russian word propiska is difficult to translate into any foreign language because the practice of requiring residence permits of its own citizens is a strictly Russian invention. The need for these permits is one of Russia's most enduring phenomena, required that citizens carry passports and be registered at their place of residence. . I spend three nights in their apartment, they provide me with a free room loaded with different stuff. Two years afterwards Nadya would give birth to a boy and this room would become the children's room.

Next day I spend walking between museums and pretend to be a minor to get free tickets. I come back in the evening – happy and tired. Nadya is cooking “frounchosa”, some kind of Moscow delicacy I’ve never heard of. We’re having dinner with her friend who came a couple of hours ago. Sky runs into the room. Nadya hugs him. I manage to take a picture with my Nikon D3200.

– [Nadya]: Misha, where did you have lunch today?

– [Me]: In Burger King.

– [Nadya]: I’m sorry.

During our last evening together, we walk around Kolomenskoye. They tell me about their wedding here, show photos on the phone. We are fooling around with my camera and make some nice photos. Their speech is full of historical facts about Moscow and its overall charms. The guys belong to the sort of people who are mad in love with the capital. Our conversation flows into political history direction: there we find ourselves on the opposite sides of the barricades, though mutual respect and common sense help us keep the conversation cool.

I think Moscow and Muscovites seem to be very delightful.

At the weekend, I go to Moscow to see Rammstein live. Jose is busy moving to a new apartment, Nadya and Dima don’t host anymore. I go for the third round of looking for a friendly soul with a couch in the capital.

“Yeah, feel free to come over. Ul. Vvedenskogo, 11-2. 89061328907. Call me a couple of days in advance”.

Having arrived at Belyayevo metro station, I’m waiting for Yan and Julia in a sub. They should be picking me up in a minute after their visit to parents. Yan doesn’t pick up the phone. I’m trembling from anxiety and cold in the subway. It’s raining cats and dogs today in Moscow, and not a single umbrella in the world would save you from it. After an hour of waiting, we find each other. On the way home, we share a single umbrella between three of us.

Yan and Julia – young family from Makhachkala. Yan has a creative job in a public agency, Julia works in catering service and air travel. They have a three years old daughter. She spends this weekend at grandmother. Julia is pregnant with the second baby. Once again, CouchSurfing blows my mind with the people who are ready to support others, think out of the box, act and help. Guys, you have a little daughter, never mind pregnancy – why would even host some guy from Penza? Perhaps, guys wish an interesting life with little routine, too.

After the last sleepless night when I caught a marshrutka on M5 highway and a busy day I got to spend in the Capital, my sleep is sound and steady. In the morning I have a tea with cookies and the vibe is positive. My soaked clothes are already dry. On the background I hear music by GROMYKA. They occasionally got on their concert a couple of weeks ago, and it stuck to them ever since.

GROMYKA’s soviet-wave sound fits perfectly here: a residential complex with high panel buildings, summer, shiny morning, green trees outside, metro station fifteen minutes away. Turns out you can bring out stagnated art from the archives, make a little polishing in a modern way, and it’s going to sound good.

Rammstein's concert ends up at midnight, BlaBlaCar to Penza sets off at 6 a.m.. I am to choose between a nighttime stroll around sleeping Moscow and an attempt to get enough sleep for the next working week, and I choose the second option: I come to Yan and Julia at 1 a.m. and sleep for a few hours. Accidentally, I woke up Yan when I was leaving the apartment.

– [Me, whispering]: Guys, thank you so much for how cool you are.

– [Yan, half-awake]: Peace))

In short, it turned out to be cozy – like staying with friends.

Golden Ring Ultra Trail – marathon race in Suzdal – is a closed circle with the start and finish lines at a wood hotel. On Sunday, I’m going to run this circle 50 km long. I guess I should’ve booked a bed in the city, had a good sleep before the marathon start at 7 a.m.. In reality, I’m looking for a couch in Vladimir, separated from Suzdal with an hour-long road by car. Gosha is kind of shitting me in VK 16 16 VK is a social media network launched by Russians after Facebook to mimic its features chat. He doesn’t pick up the phone a good half of the day. On the one hand, he doesn’t own me anything. On the other, I’m getting a bit nervous since things go not the way I planned.

Eventually, Gosha and Katya pick me up in the center of Vladimir near café at 10 p.m.. Nine hours left until the marathon. They agree to help me: wake up at 5 a.m. on Sunday and give me a ride to Suzdal. They don’t mind some strolling in the morning, why not. At least that’s what they say. I’m glad I’ve got more time for sleeping.

On the way to Suzdal we get to know each other better. Gosha and Katya are a young family. Gosha is working in a local urbanistic organization as a creative director. Katya is a graphic designer in a web studio. The guys are enjoying millennial life in their small hometown:

●

tons of little things made for the native city;

●

hanging out in one specific hip café;

●

a rock band formed with friends;

●

daily care of grandpas and grandmas;

●

spacious apartment in a new built residential block;

●

occasional trips to Europe;

●

experiments with looks: Katya has dreads, while Gosha has ear tunnels.

Leaving the car, I give the guys a hundred rubles, which can afford you nothing but a cup of tasteless coffee. I come to the starting line just two minutes before the marathon. After I cross the finishing line, my body dissolves in euphoria.

I think that was the very case when a simple “thanks” doesn’t work when you’d like to express how grateful you are to hosts.

May holidays are coming soon, I feel I want to go somewhere. Let’s see what the map has to offer near Penza. Nizhniy Novgorod, Kazan, Samara – great! I haven’t spent a month on the working place, but here I am – asking for twelve days off and hitchhiking to Nizhniy. I leave all my tasks for the next week. Colleagues don’t understand me. So do I. Where am I going and why? What’s the fuss?

I go to Nizhniy with Dima – a CEO in a firm where my mother works. Dima is from Nizhniy, his family lives there. He goes to Penza on business trips. So, he circulates here and there every week.

[Dima]: “Transport is all fucked-up: you think they are neighbor cities, but in fact they’re completely isolated from each other. Rare trains with inconvenient schedule. There used to be flights – not anymore. Much easier to go on your own – five hours, and you’re at home”.

Despite the obvious generation and social status difference, we get on really well. Dima is a down-to-earth person with a lot of interesting experience. He feels comfy with me.

– [Dima]: your mother told me you like traveling, right?

– [Me]: Well, yeah. I lived in the States, in India. A month ago I came back from the trip across the Baltic countries.

– [Dima]: Sounds great! Youngsters these days live an interesting life. I remember myself at your age, in 1995. I was craving to go to Chechnya, on the front. I was overfilled with energy, aggression, turbulent years. I craved for adrenaline, something extraordinary.

– [Me, inwardly]: O tempora! o mores! 17 17 a Latin phrase that translates literally as "Oh the times! Oh the customs!

We are fully engaged in the conversation till we see the sign “Nizhniy Novgorod”. Dima left me on a bus stop somewhere on the outskirts of the city and went home to spend holidays with the family.

Nizhniy Novgorod looked terrible that day. It takes an hour for "Pazik" bus to get me to the center. That’s enough to make me feel tired and disappointed in this city. There I find myself in Bolshaya Pokrovskaya Street – a typical Arbat of a Russian city. It’s cold, grey and rainy outside. The only interesting place I see is “Dodo Pizza” which we still don’t have in Penza. I come to the coastline and see the huge Volga River. That doesn’t cheer me up either.

Before the night falls, I take a ride to Sputnik Street, where my host Petya lives. The same hour-long road by the same “Pazik” bus. There’s a metro in this city, but I doubt it leads anywhere. I go downstairs to take a couple stock pictures in the concourse and go back to the nearest bus stop. On my way there, I nervously check the job messenger. As always, there are problems and the work day hasn’t finished yet. I express my numerous apologies to the colleagues for the inconvenience, justifying my absence by “family matters”.

Petya saves my evening. Petya is different from all my previous Russian hosts: he is a hippie – not a yuppie. He keeps his way of life minimalistic: no furniture except mattress and a computer table. He doesn’t show any barriers nor any warm-up questions in conversation. Right from the start, our conversation transforms into a flow of interesting thoughts and I feel gripped by his words.

[Petya]: “Cities are depressing: noise, dirt, jams, angry people. I’ve recently come back from Kola Peninsula. I really liked it there. We spent a week in a lodge of an old, kind man. Around us – nothing but nature. It was cold, yeah, but nevertheless – I was happy there”.

Petya is a truck driver in a local transport company, putting away money on a trip to Crimea. He’s planning to get there on “Harley” he’s just bought. He wants to live in Crimea in a tent with his friends, jump naked from the rocks, feed on sun rays and feel united with the mother-nature. He even looks like Tarzan: long curly hair, athletic, loose khaki-colored clothes. He doesn’t go to the gym – he is naturally well-built.

Before going to bed, Petya plays music from his VK account. That’s how I learn about indie band Alvvays which I would then quarter among my favorites. They disbanded even before our meeting. All they released were two albums. The song “Marry me, Archie” would find its way to my soul, romanticizing the image of a one-woman man.