Yalta

I am vacationing in Crimea after a year of monotonous work at the L.I.Ph. I am alone. My friend, who traveled with me the previous year when we “traced the footsteps of Marina Tsvetaeva” in Koktebel, remains in my native city to finish her research at the Institute. The Black Sea coast is far from boring and, of course, a break with the ordinary often gives one a sharper awareness of life. I stay in Yalta and usually get up at dawn to watch the sunrise. First, the morning stars dim out, the sky behind the mountain lightens, the birds begin to chirp, whistle, twitter – to sing a hymn to the morning. And then, that daily miracle, the sun, like a ball moving in a slow motion film, emerges from behind the Au-Dag. I go to the beach. The soft golden sand is still cool. The vacationers are asleep. They will appear here after breakfast, at around ten o’clock, and there won’t be enough empty space for an apple to fall! That is my cue to leave for the mountains. As for now, the sea belongs to me. The water stings my sleep-warmed body. Where it is deep, the water appears turquoise. I swim to the distant buoys. I love to feel my awakening muscles, their suppleness, and their compliance with my every wish. I laugh. The fullness of life is splashing out of me. I am a siren and this blue-green water is my element. I can swim across the sea and get to Turkey – that mysterious land that I know from the oriental fairy tales – a land where women wear silk shalvar* and scarlet turbans. But it is burning hot and dusty there so I postpone my journey to Turkey for a cloudy day.

I return to the room I rent from a Yalta pensioner – a woman frugal with words and of solid build. It is a small room, with only an iron bed, a narrow table and a chair. Since I brought just the bare necessities, I am not tied down to domesticity and can enjoy the world around me. I can go where my eyes lead me; I can sing, laugh, become a bird! To the mountains, before the sun begins to scorch. I’ll walk in the shade of the trees in the foothills, enjoying the coolness of the rivers that flow along the mountain path. In a T-shirt, shorts, hat and running shoes, with a backpack, and my pen and notepad in my outside pocket, I will take a bottle of mineral water, black bread, cheese, and some fruit if I find any in the nearest store. Then, to the mountains! I like the movement – I like covering the distance from the city to the mountains on foot. I like the pleasant tiredness in my body after this rigorous trek, and I like to have lunch on the grass.

Sometimes, on the path as I walk to the mountains, I meet the “Savages”, the suntanned men whose smiling greeting I do not answer, knowing a response will be interpreted as an invitation. I value my solitude and I am not looking for dubious adventures, unlike my neighbor, a bored Moscow woman of middle age. I am only twenty-two, and in no hurry to become a single mother! My independence is a gift that I presented to myself in June, the first month of summer. It is my first vacation on my own. I am not accountable to my parents at home, nor to my boss at the L.I.Ph. I can write in my diary, observe, paint.

In the evenings I listen to the chirp of the cicadas near the church. Their presence proves beyond the shadow of a doubt that I am in the south, not in my native north. The twilight comes rapidly here, the silhouettes of passersby fuse with the darkness and then suddenly reappear in the glow of the street lamps. The sound of music wafts out from the show pavilions and for some reason makes me nostalgic.

I know that if I enter the church now, I will meet a red-bearded artist. I will find him kneeling before the icon of Our Lady. He is always there at this time of day. He is from Siberia, about thirty-two years old, and is quite interesting. My views shock him, and he tries to instruct me. When I ask him why artists paint angels with feminine faces but a masculine chest, he tells me angels are sexless. Then I ask, “Are they androgynous?” He becomes exasperated with my question and does not answer. He does not know that in the Hermitage there is a wonderful sculpture of a hermaphrodite and it is not exasperating at all. The red-bearded Siberian wants me to listen open-mouthed to his lectures. He is, alas, not alone! But his patriarchal views are so obtrusive that I am beginning to avoid his company. Men have been educated in this spirit for millennia and not everyone can stand up against conformity.

The month of June is drawing to a close. I have a few acquaintances. I cannot recall all of their names, but sometimes I remember a name because it fits the person who wears it like a glove. Take, for example, Yulii Barski* – this name could belong only to him. He is a tall, corpulent Muscovite with smooth, dark hair. He is fed up with life in Moscow. He swears like a trooper, not because he lacks the vocabulary of polite society, but because he thinks obscenities are witty. He is one of those among the Russian intelligentsia who “love spice”. An ordinary woman does not arouse him. He seeks vice. As he told me, describing one of his encounters, “I went up to her in a bar. Such a foreign looking bliakha. She invited me to a hotel room and offered herself in quite open terms”. Yulii doesn’t hold back anything – “She’s all set – make-up, jeans, Marlboro, but I don’t feel like it…” Then, as if he’s proud of it, Barski confides his impotence. “Say, do you want to sleep with a guy I know? Or better yet, a girl? Then I can feast my eyes on two little buns. What could be more fascinating than women’s buttocks…” I find the base cynicism of Yulii Barski amusing, but I have no desire to go on entertaining him.

I am being courted by a young fellow from Kiev just my age. He is blond, well built and the same height as I. He has come to Yalta for one month with a group of archaeologists. He is gentle. We kissed. He said, “You are my bright-eyed darling”, and “I want to have a daughter with you – a circus performer!” Things might have gone further if it had not been for his pronunciation of the aspirated “g”. Probably it is our Nothern snobbishness, but his accent spoiled my appetite. And so, I see him off to Kiev without any future plans. Two days later I return to the white nights along the Neva river.   







1* – Baggy trousers.
2* – In pre-revolutionary Russia a “barin” – was a landlord, often with a reputation for being arrogant. Barski is the adjective of this noun.