I still had to bring Tasha her key back, since she had to
leave in the morning for work while I was still asleep. We met near
the Kharkiv planetarium, a building a block off one of the main
streets, towering high in some sort of Soviet pride of science and
stars. I imagined scores of Pioneers, children in red scarves and
brown uniforms, surrounding the building in the past, weaving in and
out of the lines to gaze at the artificial lights in dreams that one
of them might be the next Yuri Gagarin. I stood outside the
planetarium in the dark. It was only five in the afternoon, but the
winter dusk had already settled in, making it seem like a late night
KGB drop. Tasha came running up the hill and hugged me in greeting.
“Here's your key.”
“Did you get your ticket?” she asked.
“There was quite a line. I mean, an insane line,” I said. “I spent all day at the place. But I got it eventually.”
“You know, you could have just gotten your ticket online. I thought that's what you were going to do.”
“There's a webpage for that?” I asked.
“It's even in English. That's what all the foreigners do, I thought.” She was smiling, laughing.
“Your last boyfriend was in the Peace Corps here, so he probably knew a little bit more than I do.”
“True,” she said.
“What's the website?”
“E-kvytok.com.ua,” she said. “You should use that. You can charge to your credit card too.”
“Ah,” I said. “Thanks. Good to know for next time. Anyways, I've got to get going.” We hugged again. I wanted to hold her longer, but it seemed it would be awkward to do so outside the planetarium.
“I'll see you in Kiev then,” she said, smiling. “We've got a lot to do there. Go to that shisha place you were talking about, and that gay club I was talking about.” We left each other, like two planets that were momentarily aligned continuing on their orbit, rocketing towards the sun at different speeds.
I went to the squat. Andrei was already there, cleaning the place and making pizzas. He worked there for Dasha as a kind of club operator, keeping everything clean and making food for dinner. I liked these little communal life that I kept running across, from Kharkiv to Berlin. They gave me confidence in human existence that I didn't have in the overbearing world of the corporations. Granted, they were in nature parasitic, relying on the products and services of corporations in order to exist. If everyone were aware of what freedoms could be had outside of the corporate sphere, then there would be no comforts left. I'm not saying that in communes nobody works – everybody works and at times, much harder. But their work seems all that much more satisfactory. Even in traveling, I find myself cleaning dishes, picking things up, cooking, performing accordion and trying to make life easier for those I'm staying with. I don't consider these things work, but they are. They're all services that cost a person time, or money, if the person pays another to do such. All of economics runs off of this exchange principal of labor – a principal I was still working off of, even using couchsurfing. Labor, however, doesn't have to be demeaning or degrading; it can be fulfilling. There are certainly those in the modern system that feel they have a fulfilling position – and they do. Maybe even, it is better to live that way. But I'm not so lucky to be one of those that finds happiness in slavery.
My new roommate in Kiev, Sasha, called me. “Shawn, where are you? We have been waiting here at the apartment for you.”
“I thought you said that you wouldn't be home on Thursday, so to come on Friday, yeah?”
“No, we said on the 5th,” he said. “It is the 5th now. Shawn, you see, the problem is that we are going to Kharkiv on Friday night.”
“Well, what time does your train get in?” I asked.
“It gets in at 11:30 at night,” he said. That meant the train got in after I left.
“Are there any other roommates?”
“There is Steve, the American, but the problem is that Saturday is Orthodox Christmas and he is very religious, so probably he will be gone all day.”
“Oh,” I said.
“So how are you going to get the key? Can you get here tomorrow?”
“I'll see what I can do.” I hung up the phone, somewhat saddened. I was hoping to party all night with the crew at the squat and then to leave the next day. I voiced my problem and thoughts out loud to Andrei, “Maybe I could stay with you guys for a couple of drinks, then go off and get a train for tonight. Or I could get a later train for tomorrow night.” I decided to try the first idea and if that failed, then the second. I waited a little while until a reasonable time to go, thinking that if I was able to change the tickets, then I could just wait at the station or at a nearby coffee shop. At the squat, people kept coming in. First Tasha, then Dima with a large smile, Misha with a striped sweater. They kept coming. They were gathering to play pub trivia.
I returned to the train station, this time with all of my luggage, which I had worked down to being just my accordion and my Soviet Red Army pack. I knew the routine now. I had to avoid, at all cost, the regular ticket desks for Ukrainians. I first looked for the international desk, it was already closed. Then I went the information desk and asked about the trains leaving. Tonight's train was already booked. But there was a train coming through at one and another at one thirty. I weighed my options and then called Sasha back.
“Look, would it be possible to just meet you here in Kharkiv?” I asked. “Then I could get the key from you when you get here and I could take the next train out.”
“Yes, of course, that is possible,” he said. In truth, I had to repeat this a few times, so that my voice was clear over the din of the train station, with the constant conversations and mechanical announcements being broadcast through the air. After we agreed on the drop, I went to the Ukrainian ticket lines, knowing that I was going to be waiting for another hour while the people back at the squat continued on their own party.
While I stood in line, another old person who couldn't read Ukrainian asked me if this was the right line. “I guess,” I told her back. “It seems to me they're always the wrong line, so they all must be the right one, yeah?” She looked back at me as though I were talking nonsense.
The minutes turned into half hours and the half hours turned into hours. But I was glad for two things, that at least I wasn't constantly switching lines because the clerks were going on breaks, like the problem I had the day before. Also, I wasn't in Georgia where no line existed, since Georgians are incapable of the concept of waiting for one's own turn. In Georgia, even when you talk to a bank teller, Georgians try to jump ahead of you by addressing the bank teller while you have already begun discussing your business. “Waiting is for other people,” one Georgian told me once.
I had to go to the restroom. The lady in front of me promised to save my position. I raced across the train station to the only men's restroom, ran past the stern looking babushka with the broom and used the urinal. When I made it back, some ten minutes later, I noticed the line had barely moved.
When I at last got to the front of the line, I told the clerk, “I bought the wrong ticket. Can I exchange it for the train that leaves tomorrow at midnight?”
“I can give you a refund here, but you'll have to go to the office outside to buy next day tickets. We sell only today's tickets here. Do you understand?”
“Yes, of course,” I told her, while telling myself, “I understand that this whole ticketing system is bullshit.” It was a surprise to me that the entire train system seemed pretty efficient – the trains were always on the dot in timing and they were fairly comfortable. But for the ticketing! I left with my money back in my hand and made it back to the squat.
“Did you get your ticket?” she asked.
“There was quite a line. I mean, an insane line,” I said. “I spent all day at the place. But I got it eventually.”
“You know, you could have just gotten your ticket online. I thought that's what you were going to do.”
“There's a webpage for that?” I asked.
“It's even in English. That's what all the foreigners do, I thought.” She was smiling, laughing.
“Your last boyfriend was in the Peace Corps here, so he probably knew a little bit more than I do.”
“True,” she said.
“What's the website?”
“E-kvytok.com.ua,” she said. “You should use that. You can charge to your credit card too.”
“Ah,” I said. “Thanks. Good to know for next time. Anyways, I've got to get going.” We hugged again. I wanted to hold her longer, but it seemed it would be awkward to do so outside the planetarium.
“I'll see you in Kiev then,” she said, smiling. “We've got a lot to do there. Go to that shisha place you were talking about, and that gay club I was talking about.” We left each other, like two planets that were momentarily aligned continuing on their orbit, rocketing towards the sun at different speeds.
I went to the squat. Andrei was already there, cleaning the place and making pizzas. He worked there for Dasha as a kind of club operator, keeping everything clean and making food for dinner. I liked these little communal life that I kept running across, from Kharkiv to Berlin. They gave me confidence in human existence that I didn't have in the overbearing world of the corporations. Granted, they were in nature parasitic, relying on the products and services of corporations in order to exist. If everyone were aware of what freedoms could be had outside of the corporate sphere, then there would be no comforts left. I'm not saying that in communes nobody works – everybody works and at times, much harder. But their work seems all that much more satisfactory. Even in traveling, I find myself cleaning dishes, picking things up, cooking, performing accordion and trying to make life easier for those I'm staying with. I don't consider these things work, but they are. They're all services that cost a person time, or money, if the person pays another to do such. All of economics runs off of this exchange principal of labor – a principal I was still working off of, even using couchsurfing. Labor, however, doesn't have to be demeaning or degrading; it can be fulfilling. There are certainly those in the modern system that feel they have a fulfilling position – and they do. Maybe even, it is better to live that way. But I'm not so lucky to be one of those that finds happiness in slavery.
My new roommate in Kiev, Sasha, called me. “Shawn, where are you? We have been waiting here at the apartment for you.”
“I thought you said that you wouldn't be home on Thursday, so to come on Friday, yeah?”
“No, we said on the 5th,” he said. “It is the 5th now. Shawn, you see, the problem is that we are going to Kharkiv on Friday night.”
“Well, what time does your train get in?” I asked.
“It gets in at 11:30 at night,” he said. That meant the train got in after I left.
“Are there any other roommates?”
“There is Steve, the American, but the problem is that Saturday is Orthodox Christmas and he is very religious, so probably he will be gone all day.”
“Oh,” I said.
“So how are you going to get the key? Can you get here tomorrow?”
“I'll see what I can do.” I hung up the phone, somewhat saddened. I was hoping to party all night with the crew at the squat and then to leave the next day. I voiced my problem and thoughts out loud to Andrei, “Maybe I could stay with you guys for a couple of drinks, then go off and get a train for tonight. Or I could get a later train for tomorrow night.” I decided to try the first idea and if that failed, then the second. I waited a little while until a reasonable time to go, thinking that if I was able to change the tickets, then I could just wait at the station or at a nearby coffee shop. At the squat, people kept coming in. First Tasha, then Dima with a large smile, Misha with a striped sweater. They kept coming. They were gathering to play pub trivia.
I returned to the train station, this time with all of my luggage, which I had worked down to being just my accordion and my Soviet Red Army pack. I knew the routine now. I had to avoid, at all cost, the regular ticket desks for Ukrainians. I first looked for the international desk, it was already closed. Then I went the information desk and asked about the trains leaving. Tonight's train was already booked. But there was a train coming through at one and another at one thirty. I weighed my options and then called Sasha back.
“Look, would it be possible to just meet you here in Kharkiv?” I asked. “Then I could get the key from you when you get here and I could take the next train out.”
“Yes, of course, that is possible,” he said. In truth, I had to repeat this a few times, so that my voice was clear over the din of the train station, with the constant conversations and mechanical announcements being broadcast through the air. After we agreed on the drop, I went to the Ukrainian ticket lines, knowing that I was going to be waiting for another hour while the people back at the squat continued on their own party.
While I stood in line, another old person who couldn't read Ukrainian asked me if this was the right line. “I guess,” I told her back. “It seems to me they're always the wrong line, so they all must be the right one, yeah?” She looked back at me as though I were talking nonsense.
The minutes turned into half hours and the half hours turned into hours. But I was glad for two things, that at least I wasn't constantly switching lines because the clerks were going on breaks, like the problem I had the day before. Also, I wasn't in Georgia where no line existed, since Georgians are incapable of the concept of waiting for one's own turn. In Georgia, even when you talk to a bank teller, Georgians try to jump ahead of you by addressing the bank teller while you have already begun discussing your business. “Waiting is for other people,” one Georgian told me once.
I had to go to the restroom. The lady in front of me promised to save my position. I raced across the train station to the only men's restroom, ran past the stern looking babushka with the broom and used the urinal. When I made it back, some ten minutes later, I noticed the line had barely moved.
When I at last got to the front of the line, I told the clerk, “I bought the wrong ticket. Can I exchange it for the train that leaves tomorrow at midnight?”
“I can give you a refund here, but you'll have to go to the office outside to buy next day tickets. We sell only today's tickets here. Do you understand?”
“Yes, of course,” I told her, while telling myself, “I understand that this whole ticketing system is bullshit.” It was a surprise to me that the entire train system seemed pretty efficient – the trains were always on the dot in timing and they were fairly comfortable. But for the ticketing! I left with my money back in my hand and made it back to the squat.
so why didn't you just book the next day ticket on line using the web page your last hostess gave you?
ReplyDeleteBecause you can't exchange or refund tickets online. You can only book them.
Delete