PROSAIC DEMIURGIC

Tverskaya-ku

Well, I went home to LA for ten days, played a little poker, played a little ultimate, stored as much vitamin D as my body and the Southern California sun would allow, collected a number of comforts of home I'd been missing (peanut butter; vegetable peeler; wife) and returned "home" to Moscow. Know what? Even though I put that word in quotes, it did very much feel like coming back home. Back home to street signs and billboards I can increasingly diminishingly fail to understand. Back to temperature norms such that any day that's dry and above 40 degrees makes me think, "Wow, nice day." Back to not one, but now hallelujah two jobs, between which I am now perilously close to too busy, which is exactly the sort of peril I need to keep my days interesting and engaging. Back to Moscow: crazy, smoky, noisy, weird, intense Moscow.  

Speaking of noisy Moscow, I was walking on Tverskaya Boulevard today with Maxx -- actually we walked it end to end, where one end is defined as "near our flat" and the other as "Red Square" -- and I noted that you always know you're on Tverskaya because the drone of passing automobiles never, ever stops. Worse, the boulevard is bracketed by big buildings on both sides, so that all that zizzing engine noise is reflected and amplified back and forth across the street. As the saying goes, "You know you're on Tverskaya when you can't hear yourself think."

You may, however, be inspired to compose a haiku for Tverskaya, thus:

Oh incessant drone

White noise of a dead TV

I can hear the ocean

Anyway, it's great to be back, or weird to be back, or something. For those of you who were wondering where the hell the posts have been, I'm sorry -- я огорченн-- I've been taken over by events.

More (sooner or) later, -jv

Freedom is Intimate

I've had this scrap of paper on my desk for several weeks now. It reads, "Freedom is intimate," a description I heard about the state of liberty in modern Russian. Everyone agrees that the country has much more freedom than in Soviet times, but still there are constraints. Like, you know, no real elections, and a tangle of bureaucracy that turns everything from opening a bank account to visiting a clinic into a morass of red (no pun intended) tape. And there's still this fear -- you can feel it -- of attracting the notice of anyone in authority. You keep your head down, keep your profile low, and enjoy your freedom in the privacy of your own home... in the privacy of your own mind.

At the same time, there's intense pride in Rodina -- Mother Russia -- which you also see everywhere you look, from unabashed support for the recent war in Georgia to a certain schadenfreude directed at the American economic collapse. Not that the collapse hasn't hit home here. The Russian stock market is in the same shambles as ours. The ruble is sinking against, well, every conceivable currency. And the free-falling price of oil has erased, like, half the nation's wealth almost overnight. Belts are tightening. Ambitious projects are being put on hold. No one knows what tomorrow will bring, but you can't say that the streets are flooded with optimists right now.

Know what's going to fix it, and I mean all of it? An Obama presidency. I'm not talking about anything Obama might actually do as president -- though I personally think he'll work wonders -- but rather the ripple effect that his election will have throughout the world. What everyone needs now, and I'm talking about everyone from Smolensk to Santa Monica, is a reason to hope, a reason to believe that things will get better, and we can put this mess behind us. Obama is the reason to hope, not because he's special -- though, again, I think he is -- but just because he represents change, a clean slate, a chance to start over.

America needs this. The world needs this. Even Russia, which views America with a certain gleeful disdain these days, needs this. We all need to be able to look at America as a place that's capable of change, capable of maturity, capable of common sense, capable of the simple human act of electing a black man to its highest office. If we get Obama, we get all of this. We get a fresh start, and a new platform upon which to start rebuilding our plans and expectations.

We get McCain, it's all over. I truly believe that the only thing keeping the world's gloom at bay is the hope of Obama and the fresh start. If America elects McCain, that hope will be dashed, and gloom will sink into depression -- both mental and financial -- so fast it'll make your head spin. And the whirlpool will take us all down...

Americans know how much is riding on this election in America. I don't think they have any idea how much is riding on the outcome everywhere. The world used to have faith in American elections, until Bush stole one and then stole another. Now we have a chance to restore that faith, but if this election goes against us, either because it's stolen or because the American electorate is too stupid or scared to elect a black man, then it's three strikes and we're out. America will be worse than irrelevant. In the eyes of the world, it will be a failed state.

Love us or hate us, the world is at our mercy. Nothing shows this more clearly than how "our" economic crisis became everyone's economic crisis, in just a matter of weeks. Call it globalization, or call it economic interdependency, I don't care. All I know -- and I know this from my long experience of working overseas -- is that every country has two cultures, its own culture, and America's culture, imported through television and films. They know our country much better than we know any of theirs. They have their eyes upon us, always. And they're watching us now.

They're looking to see which way, by our votes, we intend to take the world: up, with Obama, or down, with McCain. I imagine you've already decided whom to vote for (hell, you've probably already voted), but if you haven't, please, when you vote, consider America's place in the world. People who live in places where votes mean nothing (like Russia) are counting on America to prove -- desperate for America to prove -- that there's still a place where votes mean something.

We got us into this mess. It's up to us to get us out.  

And now, my Halloween costume.

More later, -jv

I Love It When My Clothes Smell Like Barf

So, yeah, I went to the Canadian Ambassador's crib for dinner, and that was great. We had traditional Russian food, including borscht, which tastes exactly like beet soup, which it is, or no, not exactly beet soup, more like tomato soup but made with beets. Also had caviar: little unborn shad roe that will never grow up to be salmon or sturgeon or whatever caviar eggs grow into if they're not harvested and jarred first. I wonder if right-to-lifers have trouble eating fish eggs. Viewed through a certain filter, it's almost cannibalism, like, but whatever.

And was there vodka? Oh, hell yeah, there was vodka. When is there not vodka in Russia? They use vodka to celebrate everything here, including, uh... "Hey, look! We have vodka!" I'm told that there's an old Russian saying, something like, "Beer without vodka is just a waste of money." They don't say the same thing about borscht, but whatever.

My cultural education extended far beyond Russia's borders that night, for in attendance were the Canadian Ambassador to the Czech Republic, and the Canadian Ambassador to Kazakhstan, and the Australian Ambassador to Russia, and a guy who was sufficiently vague about his embassy brief to make me think he was a spook, but whatever. Anyway, I learned much about, particularly, Kazhakstan that I didn't know before (not, you'll notice, how to spell it, but whatever -- which seems to be my catch-phrase for this post). For instance, did you know that you Almaty is the capital of Kazak-whatever? Well, it's not. In 1997, they built a brand new one, Astana. Don't call it Astana bid Laden. That pisses off the locals. But (all together now) whatever.

The capital used to be Almaty (and don't call it Christ Almaty because... well, whatever)  and even though it no longer is, you can still get -- and I KNOW you didn't know this -- some killer kimchee there. "Kimchee?" you say, "Isn't that the national dish of Korea?" Right you are! But since 1937, when Stalin decided to internally deport some 100,000 Korean nationals from their homes in the Far East to, yep, Kazahawhozits, there has been a large and lively Korean population in Almaty and elsewhere in the K-place. And here's something else I'll bet you didn't know: If you were being internally deported during the 1930s, you and your friends all hoped you'd get deported to KazzyStazzy, there to work in the gold or uranium mines, because if you didn't get deported there, you were likely getting deported to Siberia, which, as you might imagine, makes deportation to Kazakhstan (ha! nailed it!) seem like a day trip to Catalina.

And finally I learned this. Throughout the former Soviet Asian republics, in fact, throughout the Persian Middle East, all the way down to Bahrain, there's a certain brand of laundry detergent that's called "snow" in Farsi. And how does "snow" look when it's written in English letters? You got it, campers...

"Mom, my clothes are really dirty! Put an extra half a cup of Barf in the wash!"

I'm eight years old. What can I tell you?

The Canadian Ambassador keeps a box of Barf around for comic relief -- I'm telling you, this is my kind of guy. I got him to pose for a picture with his personal Barf, but I don't know... maybe it violates embassy protocols to post a picture of His Excellency with Barf, so I've cleverly disguised him with '08s rocker Debby Harry who, I'm pretty sure, won't mind posing with Barf.

All in all, a splendid time was had by all. I ate beets, drank vodka, talked Barf. What's not to like? I hope and trust that I acquitted myself sufficiently well not to earn a place on the Canadian Embassy black list, though this picture here might very well yield that outcome.

But whatever.

More later, -jv

Free Range Cigarettes

There's a game I play when I'm walking the streets of Moscow. I call it "free range cigarettes," and it's based on the inexplicable (or maybe slightly explicable) fact that Russians drop a lot of unsmoked cigarettes on the ground. Perhaps this is because, as I've previously noted, cigarettes are the only thing sold on the cheap in this town, and so have, literally, throw-away value. Or maybe it reflects Muscovites' habit of CONSTANTLY smoking while they walk, while also juggling cell phones, purses or briefcases, and -- increasingly as autumn deepens -- foul weather accessories like umbrellas. In any case, if you're attentive to your surroundings, you soon start to notice these free range cigarettes littering the sidewalks (among, of course, the countless cigarette corpses). I find that I spot an average of three or four virgin butts during any given walk of decent duration.

I'm sure you'll agree that counting unsmoked cigarettes is a pretty dumb game, but there's a little more to it than that. See, Muscovites also abandon their loose change. This is not at all surprising, for the ruble is worth $.04, and with kopeks running 100 to the ruble, your dropped 5 kopek and 10 kopek coins are just not worth the effort to stoop and pick up. So they get abandoned, too. Call it free range change.  

Free range coins are more plentiful than free range cigarettes, but they camouflage better, and so are harder to spot. When I go walkabout, I keep score to see whether the cigarettes or coins will win the day.

Yes, it's true. I have some time on my hands.

Actually, these days I've started playing a different game. It's called "reading."

See, I'm finally starting to crack the code of the Russian alphabet -- not much more than a letter at a time, but at least to the point where deciphering, say, a single storefront sign, is an challenging but not impossible task. This is a big step forward for me. One thing I HATED about Moscow when I first got here was how little there was for me to read and understand. I'm a slave to words, this we know, and not being able to derive meaning from the words around me was kind of driving me crazy. I think that's why I cast my eyes downward in the first place and discovered all the free range whatever. Now, though, that I'm starting to get the primitive hang of Cyrillic (a B is a V and a P is an R and a C is an S, and don't even ask me about the little thing that looks like a spider). I decipher signs with a kind of childish delight ("Cafe!" "Flowers!" "No Parking!") These days when I walk, I lift my eyes up. It makes my walks more interesting.

But I haven't forgotten about free range cigarettes or the little lost kopeks, alone and abandoned on Moscow's gray and gloomy streets. I've even started collecting the kopeks. They're worthless to Muscovites, but they're poker chips to me.

In other news, here's the view out my window on this gray and gloomy October day...

... and an accompanying haiku, called Geosynchronous Anchor:

 

satellite dishes

yearn for word from southern skies

soon the snow will fall

 

More later, -jv

Feeling Deep Googled

So yesterday was Sunday and I went out to play in an outdoor pick-up game of ultimate frisbee. It was an iffy proposition: Moscow’s autumn skies were typically leaden and threatening, and I knew I couldn’t play without getting wet, possibly very wet, and cold, possibly very cold. But, hell, it was ultimate, and as with poker or writing, even bad ultimate is better than no ultimate, so I improvised my best foul-weather gear and headed out.

I had discovered this particular group of ultimate players through research on the web, of course, and had reached out to the listed contacts for more information about the where and when of the game.

It’s useful to remember that the web works both ways…

Less than five minutes after I arrived, this eager young guy came up to me and asked if I was “the poker American.” Well, I don’t think of myself as “the” poker anything, but he made it clear that he knew of all the poker books I’ve written, and wondered if I’d hold a “poker masterclass” for him and his buddies, because apparently poker is big in Russian ultimate circles right now. Of course I agreed; teaching “masterclasses” to avid amateurs can be a great bankroll builder. However, let’s not get carried away with ourselves, JV. Russians can be mad gamblers, and to play with them is to strap oneself in for a certain kind of ride. I may be able to beat them at my game, but it’s an open question whether I can beat them at theirs, or take sufficient control to make them play mine.

Anyway, a few minutes later I was talking to someone else about my experience so far in Moscow. “I know all about it,” he said. “I’ve read your blog.” Really? Hmm.

And then, yet later – get this – someone asked me, “How’s your hip?” My what, now? It seems this guy had Googled me so deeply that he’d found an article I’d written on the subject of my artificial hip. It appeared last year in US News & World Report, and, apparently, yet lives on online.

So… they know about my poker, my blog, my artificial hip. That’s some good spycraft. I doubt an American ultimate host would investigate his guest so fully. In any case, the whole experience left me feeling honored, flattered… and a little creeped out. I have to remind myself that what happens in cyberspace stays in cyberspace – until it’s downloaded and distributed halfway ‘round the world. I should remember that every little bit of fact or brutal honesty about me that makes its way to the web continues to resonate and radiate there, like signals of old television shows still making their long broadcast journeys to distant stars. I should learn, in other words, to keep my big yap shut.

Well, some lessons you just don’t learn. So today I want to talk about what it means to feel special and humble, and how I try to hold these two ideas in my head at the same time. Did I tell you that next week I'm dining with the Canadian Ambassador? We crossed paths, and hit it off, and now I've received and invitation to embassy-dine. I have to tell you, the invitation makes me feel pretty damn special. What is it about me that lands such invitations in my lap? What is it about me that inspires Russian ultimate players to deep-Google my ass? What is it about me that earns me gigs like this in the first place? I don’t know, but I do know this: I’m willing to own that feeling; I’m willing to feel special. I strive to feel humble, too. I strive to remind myself – I’m reminding myself now – that everything I have and everything I am, including whatever specialness exists in me, derives from gifts that came to me for free, beginning with the gift of life. I strive to remember the difference between fearing you’re not worthy and knowing you’re not worthy. In the former state, you walk around in constant terror of “being found out.” In the latter state, you can accept what people offer you – the flattery of a deep Google or the adventure of an ambassadorial dine – without getting lost inside your own swelled head.

Two thoughts now come to mind: “How can I experience ego death if everyone keeps telling me how wonderful I am?” and “The universe loves me – all I have to do is love it back.” The question posed by the first line is answered by the second. If I always remember that my ego – major fucking ego that it is – is only part of a greater whole, and that higher powers guide me, illuminate me, and bring me gifts, then I can feel special and humble at the same time.

And by the way, can there be any doubt by now that this Moscow experience is being good for me? Apart from the fact that it’s just extraordinarily cool – how many ambassadors invite me to dine in LA? – it’s forcing me (or let’s say inviting me) to confront myself in new and interesting ways. It’s testing me in a crucible of hard work and alien circumstance. I like being tested. I like knowing who, exactly (or, okay, who approximately) I really am. And if I can’t resist sharing the fruits of my investigation with lurking readers who will likely quote me back to me next time we’re together at ultimate, well, like I said, some lessons you just don’t learn.

More later, -jv

A Haiku for My Job

Deflower writers.

Build sets on factory bones.

What shovel you? Smoke!

 

And then some pictures...

The aforementioned factory bones.

A cell phone tragedy.

Big-ass statues from Soviet times.

And yet more factory bones.

Truth, this is where we're supposed to be making television in just seven weeks' time. I said, "In America, we couldn't even pull building permits in seven weeks' time."

They said, "Building permits?"

So we shall see. I'm solemnly assured that shooting will begin on December 1. Oh yeah? I'm setting the over/under line at October 8, and taking the over. Anyone want my action?

More later, -jv 

Place Like Home, No?

So I was playing poker at the Scandinavia Restaurant near Pushkin Square with a mixed group of American and Canadian expats, plus the odd Dane or Dutchman and one very odd Brit. I had reached the end of my evening and was taking my leave when one of them said, by way of farewell, “Welcome home.”

Another one who’s drunk the Kool-Aid, I thought. They seem to abound.

What prompted this thought was the realization, based on only a short time here, that there are quite a few expatriates who have been a long time here, and have, not to put too fine a point on it, no intention to leave. They have found in Moscow a kind of Wild East fantasy world where they can make not just a living but a life. I don’t begrudge them this; I just wish they’d quite trying to cram it down my throat.

Example from that same poker game. A guy literally said to me (though in fairness he was already quite drunk), “So, since you’ve come to Moscow, what’s the dirtiest thing you’ve done?” The dirtiest thing I’ve done? Really? I said, “Dude, you’ve got the wrong guy.” Seriously. The only remotely off-the-reservation thing I’ve done is stay up all night watching wildly-out-of-time-zone baseball playoff games on satellite TV. Yet to hear this guy tell it, if I play my cards right, and spend my rubles in staggering amounts, I can visit places in Moscow that would make a Bangkok hooker blush. Maybe. But trust me, I can wait to find out.

So then here’s the difference between those who have gone native and those who have not. It’s simple when you think about it, really, and really self-selecting. Guys who come here and love it, stay. Guys who come here and don’t love it, leave. So the guys you meet here tend to be the ones who love it, and who loudly extol its virtues of cold vodka, hot chicks, and a cloak of mystery that keeps it all from the prying eyes of loved ones back home.

And note that I keep saying guys, guys, guys. I think there’s a very strong correlation between maleness and Moscow’s appeal. I suspect – in some cases I know – that these guys have wives and children back home. Of course the families don’t come with; that wouldn’t be expedient. But behind expedience lies a darker truth. These men – these guys – really like their freedom. They like being six thousand miles from those prying eyes. And if they want to get drunk at the banya or spend a month’s salary at a strip club or pick up a mistress on the side, who’s to stop them; who’s to know? So for some of them, the place becomes Las Vegas writ large: no rules, no consequences.

At least none we can discern from here.

Meanwhile, back at my prosaic life, I visit no strip joint; I don’t even stick my nose in casinos. While I’m always on the lookout for a good poker game, I content myself with this home-away-from-home game among the expats. I don’t have the bankroll for casino poker here, and even if I did, it would be a bad gamble. As a rule, you shouldn’t play poker when you don’t know your foes’ language and don’t have enough of the local dosh to play the game right. Now, this is a rule I’ve broken in the past, and may, in fairness, eventually break here. For the time being, though, I’m content to follow the Law of Inverse Neon (which I just made up):

The more neon a place has out front,

the less likely it is to be good for you.

I am, it must be said, starting to feel more at ease here, if not exactly at home. I mean, I have found a regular poker game, and I am watching all the baseball I can stand (though what it’s doing to my body clock – oy vey!) And hey, I’ve even hooked up with a local ultimate frisbee team. They play the game indoors at this time of year around here, and while I’m not historically a fan of indoor ultimate, in a way it suits me balky lower extremities, for the indoor version requires more quickness and finesse, and less flat-out running, than its outdoor counterpart.

The weird part about playing ultimate here is how I arrive at team practice. All the other players are like ultimate players everywhere: young, a little scruffy, chronically under-employed. They have that counterculture feel that any ultimate player will instantly recognize as the ultimate vibe. Now here I come, twice their age, thrice their income, and delivered to the game by my own private driver – who waits patiently for me to finish so he can drive me home to my furnished-and-paid-for downtown apartment. They ride home sweaty on the subway; I sit in the back of a posh sedan. Through their eyes, I must look like a luxury crisis on wheels. Through their eyes, I must have drunk the Kool-Aid.

But I haven’t, you know, and I’m not going to. I can already tell that Moscow is a place I can pass through but never stay. I know this three ways. First, I’m a pass-through kind of guy. It’s not foreignness per se that attracts me, but newness, and even Moscow will eventually get old. Second, note how my pleasures – even here – are the pleasures of home: poker, baseball, ultimate. Eventually I’ll want these things in mainline supply. Third, I have nothing to hide and no wish to stray. I love my wife, love our life, and I’m sorry to disappoint some of you, but I have no wish to acquire a hot Russian mistress. So what I’m focused on now is the fact that I have less than four weeks to go before my first home leave, and when I come back here I’m bringing Maxx with me. That’s when my party will really start. We’ll check out the Kremlin and the Hermitage together, maybe even take in the Moscow Circus. Because for the most part, my experiences never seem entirely real to me but for when I share them with her.

Except for the poker, baseball and ultimate, of course. But that’s some Kool-Aid I quaffed a long, long time ago.

More later, -jv

Starry Arbat

"Starry" is Russian for "old" because, according to the Law of False Cognates (which I just made up) the stars are old. I went down there today, camera in hand, first passing by Patriarchs' Pond...

... and a bookstore selling Russian versions of Harry Potter...

... or Fappu Dottep, as the case may be.

Starry Arbat is a walking street, as you can easily see from all the people, well, walking.

It's also kind of an arty street, peopled from end to end by artists selling from their inventory...

... or making it up as they go along.

I took this guy's picture...

... about two seconds before I noticed the "no photographs without purchase" sign, oh well. And if you think I should feel bad about that, campers, trust me that I feel no guilt about not contributing to the Russian economy. Everything here (not just here on the old Arbat but everywhere) is just unbelievably expensive. You look at some t-shirts...

... and think, "Hey, I don't have any Che gear in my wardrobe," but then they tell you that this cheap Chinese t-shirt is, like, 30 bucks, and you think, "Yeah, I can go another day without Che."

Many musicians also call the Arbat their office. This guy looks like he could use a second set of hands.

And dance acts run the gamut from hip-hop to traditional...

... to the globally ubiquitous Hare Krishnas...

... a very popular act that everyone gets into.

The Krishnas are fun to watch, but it's kind of a shame they only know the one song. "Hare Krishna, Hare Krishina, Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare." Repeat, uhm, forever.

On I strolled, past more new traditionalists...

... bunnies for sale...

... and some clown with a camera taking his own fool picture.

But I don't want you to think this was a walk without a purpose, oh no. I was on a QUEST! Somewhere here on the Arbat, I had heard, was Mecca... Nirvana... Xanadu... in other words...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

STARBUCKS!!!

Oh, sweet black nectar, is it really true? Can you really be had here on the mean streets of Moscow? 

"Yes, I can, though the ways of my people are strange."

 

And expensive, of course. Your basic malenky (small) coffee costs... wait while I do the math... $3.40. Well, I guess that's not too bad. It's about twice what you'd pay in L.A., but not much more than you'd pay in, say, a Las Vegas casino. Beans by the bag go for 250 grams for 270 rubles. How much is that in American? Well, to convert rubles to dollars, you knock off two decimal points and multiply by four, so that $10.80, but... "How many grams in a pound?" Ah, you got me. Slept through that math class, I'm afraid.

I know, let's ask the internet! The internet knows everything! Answer, 453.39. So 250 grams is somewhat more than half a pound. My Moscow beans, then, cost a little less than twice what they'd cost back home.

Needless to say, this is one purchase I did not begrudge.

What price can you put on ambrosia?

So that was my stroll on the Starry Arbat. The weather was great for walking today. Cloudy but temperate, about 60 degrees Fahrenheit (some other number in centigrade -- ask the Internet, not me). Remind me to swing back by there in December.

Not so long on Krishnas then, I bet.

More later, -jv

Good Entireness

Hey Campers,

Today we're going to play a little game called Babel Fish. All it takes is some random text and your Babel Fish online language translator. Let's start with this email I just received from a Russian colleague.

  Джон, здравствуйте!
    Спасибо за письмо и новеллы! с удовольствием приступаем к чтению.
    Мы тоже под очень хорошим впечатлением от нашей встречи! Спасибо:) Постараемся сделать все возможное и доступное нашим познаниям в компьютерах, что Ваш регулярный адрес заработал.
    Надеюсь, как-то добрый человек переведет Вам мою записку. :)
    Всего доброго!

Babel Fishing from Russian to English, we get:

John, how do you do! Thanks for the letter and the short stories! with the pleasure we take up reading. We also under the very good impression from our encounter! Thanks:) Let us try to make all possible and accessible to our knowledge in the computers, that your regular address earned. I hope, somehow good person will transfer to you my note. :) Entire good!

So far so good. Now let’s translate it into, say, French, and then back into English. As the French say, voila!

John, how you are! Thank you for the short letter and stories! with the pleasure we take the reading. Us also under l' very good impression of our meeting! Thank you:) Let us try to make very possible and accessible to our knowledge in the computers, this your gained regular address. J' hope, nobody in way or d' another good will transfer on you my note. :) Good entirety!

Und jetzt, ins Deutsch und zurück zum Englisch.

John, Anmerkung allez vous! Merci pour La lettre and les John, how you are! Thanks for the short letter and stories! with the pleasure we take the measured value. We also under l' very good impression of our meeting! Thanks:) Let us try, very possible and accessible to form to our knowledge in the computers, these your won regular address. J' do not hope, anybody for kind or d' another Goodwillübertragung on it my note. :) Good entireness!

Now we’re getting somewhere, and by somewhere I mean nowhere. Okay, next through Korean.

[cyon] vous Anmerkung allez! Merci you the method which is this, La lettre and les [cyon] follows! where Short respects the letter and talk and thanks! where We have a side politics in pleasure and we go. l' In justice lower part also us; Our meeting quite good impression! Thanks:) We from this computer in order to form possible the address which is fixed you comes to win, are possible quite with our common senses and approach we are and do to make attempt. J' Respects a type, is who or d' Does not hope; In it different Goodwillübertragung weeks. :) Good entireness!

Now one last lap through Greek, then back home again.

[cyon] vous Anmerkung allez! Merci you the method that is this, [La] lettre and les [cyon] follows! where short respects the letter and the discussion and thanks! where we have a secondary policy in the pleasure and go. l'? In the justice our lower us separate also Good impression of meeting enough! Thanks:) From this computer so that is shaped likely the address that is determined you we came we gain, we are possible enough with common reasonable and our approach that is and makes make the effort. J'? It respects a type, they are who or d'? It does not hope In different week Goodwillübertragung. :) Good entireness!

Babel Fish! The fun game you can play at home! Send your found objects to jvx-ATsign-vorza.com.

Good entireness! -jv

Sunday Photo Safari

So I got wind of this flea market and I decided to check it out. I held in my mind, by analogy, a picture of an American flea market, where retirees fob off their castaway junk and bargains abound.

Should have remembered where I was. The prices at this flea market were ridiculous. Like a hundred bucks for a pair of used sunglasses. Cool sunglasses, but still...

Anyway, the photos were free, and here are a few I snapped.

This woman was both modeling and selling vintage wear. I hope she doesn't expect the hat to keep her as warm as the stole.

Here's the pride of the Soviet air force.

A lighter that doubles as a tank.

Some cool old radios.

And, believe it or not, a pillow.

By far my favorite photo-collectibles were these industrial safety posters. Here, I'll translate for you...

"If you are flying low across the factory floor, beware of metal scraps that can leap up and penetrate your shoe."

"Your fingers will not obtain within the gear wheels, so please do not try."

"Please to avoid peeling back the surface of your thumb."

Good times. High prices, but good times.

More later, -jv