Tuesday, August 22, 2006
A Real Date
We agreed to meet the next day at the MirBurger, the big Turkish hamburger joint on the main promenade of the city, which was as good a place as any to meet since there wasn’t a large selection of decent eateries in Tashkent. I ran directly from the office, finding her sitting in the back alone at a table deeply into a trashy detective called “My Favorite Bitch.” As always, she was dressed in a pair of jeans and a tight jacket. She looked smart; she had just come from her computer classes at the institute. She didn’t notice as I walked up to her from behind, put my hand on her shoulder, but she did not react with a start. I sat beside her and kissed her on the mouth, excited to be close to her again, and for the first time, out of the context of a bar or of alcohol, without loud music blaring or me intoxicated. Instead, in this most civilized of environment we talked quietly over coffee and cigarettes.
She was taking computer classes several days a week at the institute, studying to become a computer programmer. For now, she told me, she had a little business of her own – the nature of which both amused me and also concerned me slightly -- it was an online dating service helping local girls find foreign husbands; Yulia would translate correspondences for them, assist them with Internet usage, since many of the local girls were not computer literate and would help the men with logistics such as booking flights, coordinating visas, arranging meetings, excursions and even wedding arrangements at the local marriage registry. Russian brides were still a pretty hot commodity on the world market, and Yulia had hooked into a profitable market. Not once or twice, did I witness one of these first face-to-face meetings in the various restaurants, clubs, bars and hotels in Tashkent, where an often not remarkable American man from some provincial town would be with his lovely, barely-English-speaking Natasha trying to make conversation. Sometimes there were men on a mission who would come to meet with several girls while in Tashkent, picking one from the selection to be his bride. Yulia didn’t think much of foreign men. Or of foreign women, for that matter -- which were not like the svelte, beautiful and demure local girls, simply looking for a way to get out of this country with no prospects and into a better life. Marriage was one of the ways out. And each party emerged the winner. But in the back of my head, I wondered what prospects Yulia imagined for herself and I couldn’t help but wonder if she might see me as a ticket out. But I was still too entranced by Yulia to let it worry me too much. Even in public, I couldn’t help but reach across the table to kiss her, hold her small hands, and ask her if she ever thought to set herself up into a foreign marriage.
She had been married once –unofficially, she said. Her parents were killed in an automobile accident when she was 16 and she began seeing an older Azerbaijani man. I said that I was sorry to hear about her parents, but she looked sad for a moment and continued speaking, without much expression of emotion. It was hard for me after that to get this fact out of my head, but I didn’t know how to bring it up again, to ask all the questions I had about her parents’ death and growing up without parents at age 16. I understood a little better why she was so hardened, so tough.
At that point, I saw Alan Lincoln, an American diplomat, walking past the large windows in the MirBurger and doing a double take at us. He was a pleasant enough guy, who I was on familiar terms with, but he was notorious for his big mouth among the expatriate community. He waved at me slowly with a confused look on his face.
“Who was that?” Yulia asked me.
“Just an American guy I know,” I said. I really did have the sense that she didn’t care much for foreigners, but then again, I also sensed that she didn’t care much for anyone, for humanity as a whole. In fact, I was even amazed that she liked me at all, at least enough to be with me, sleep with me, spend time with me. ¶ 12:13 AM
We agreed to meet the next day at the MirBurger, the big Turkish hamburger joint on the main promenade of the city, which was as good a place as any to meet since there wasn’t a large selection of decent eateries in Tashkent. I ran directly from the office, finding her sitting in the back alone at a table deeply into a trashy detective called “My Favorite Bitch.” As always, she was dressed in a pair of jeans and a tight jacket. She looked smart; she had just come from her computer classes at the institute. She didn’t notice as I walked up to her from behind, put my hand on her shoulder, but she did not react with a start. I sat beside her and kissed her on the mouth, excited to be close to her again, and for the first time, out of the context of a bar or of alcohol, without loud music blaring or me intoxicated. Instead, in this most civilized of environment we talked quietly over coffee and cigarettes.
She was taking computer classes several days a week at the institute, studying to become a computer programmer. For now, she told me, she had a little business of her own – the nature of which both amused me and also concerned me slightly -- it was an online dating service helping local girls find foreign husbands; Yulia would translate correspondences for them, assist them with Internet usage, since many of the local girls were not computer literate and would help the men with logistics such as booking flights, coordinating visas, arranging meetings, excursions and even wedding arrangements at the local marriage registry. Russian brides were still a pretty hot commodity on the world market, and Yulia had hooked into a profitable market. Not once or twice, did I witness one of these first face-to-face meetings in the various restaurants, clubs, bars and hotels in Tashkent, where an often not remarkable American man from some provincial town would be with his lovely, barely-English-speaking Natasha trying to make conversation. Sometimes there were men on a mission who would come to meet with several girls while in Tashkent, picking one from the selection to be his bride. Yulia didn’t think much of foreign men. Or of foreign women, for that matter -- which were not like the svelte, beautiful and demure local girls, simply looking for a way to get out of this country with no prospects and into a better life. Marriage was one of the ways out. And each party emerged the winner. But in the back of my head, I wondered what prospects Yulia imagined for herself and I couldn’t help but wonder if she might see me as a ticket out. But I was still too entranced by Yulia to let it worry me too much. Even in public, I couldn’t help but reach across the table to kiss her, hold her small hands, and ask her if she ever thought to set herself up into a foreign marriage.
She had been married once –unofficially, she said. Her parents were killed in an automobile accident when she was 16 and she began seeing an older Azerbaijani man. I said that I was sorry to hear about her parents, but she looked sad for a moment and continued speaking, without much expression of emotion. It was hard for me after that to get this fact out of my head, but I didn’t know how to bring it up again, to ask all the questions I had about her parents’ death and growing up without parents at age 16. I understood a little better why she was so hardened, so tough.
At that point, I saw Alan Lincoln, an American diplomat, walking past the large windows in the MirBurger and doing a double take at us. He was a pleasant enough guy, who I was on familiar terms with, but he was notorious for his big mouth among the expatriate community. He waved at me slowly with a confused look on his face.
“Who was that?” Yulia asked me.
“Just an American guy I know,” I said. I really did have the sense that she didn’t care much for foreigners, but then again, I also sensed that she didn’t care much for anyone, for humanity as a whole. In fact, I was even amazed that she liked me at all, at least enough to be with me, sleep with me, spend time with me. ¶ 12:13 AM
