December 11, 2007

I’m ready to not be a tourist. To not be a foreigner. A couple days ago I had a foreigner experience that made me so ready to jump on that plane to Frankfurt (from where I’ll catch another to New York). I had gone to the bazaar with two friends, Jenny and Danny, and spent some time regrouping myself in the hotel after making my final purchases. I declined a lunch invitation to nap. I’m a terrible napper- I ended up just looking at pictures and getting really bored and starving. So I took myself over to the “mall” (it’s a mall, it’s just a really small one so it almost doesn’t count) across the street and headed straight for the food court.

There’s this fast-food place in Russia called Teremoke, and I wish we had them in the states. Well, almost. They make bleeni, which essentially is the Russian crepe, very delicious. My first introduction to bleeni was in St. Petersburg and, rather than risking raw meat or scary fish scales, I decided to go the safe route of mixed berry bleeni. YUM. But ever since then I’ve never wanted to try anything else. So when I went a couple days ago I decided to branch out of my mixed berry bleeni world and try something different- strawberry. I know, really rocking the boat with that one. And I really only picked it because there was a picture of it, so I didn’t really have to do any translation in my head to figure out what to order. So easy!

But when the cashier rung me up the price was three times that of mixed berry- instead of the traditional $2 or $3, it was over $6. Huh. Are strawberries rare in Moscow this time of year? Weird. So I paid, just because I was too tired to say, “Forget it, excuse me, I’d like mixed berry instead.”

I’m not sure what compelled me to do what I did next, but I walked down to look again at the picture of the strawberry bleeni I had ordered. But I’m glad I did. That’s when I realized I had actually ordered caviar.

So now I understand why I paid so much for my lunch, but I desperately wanted them to say, “Wait a minute, we’re all out of fish eggs!” But by the time I looked at the cook, contemplating a desperate yell of, “Stop! No caviar! Please, mixed berry! I didn’t know!” I saw that he had already folded the bleeni over, which an astute observer would know means the caviar is already in there. Too late now. And as I continued my mental effort to find a way out of the fish treat and get a fruit one instead, I saw the cook spoon caviar out of a little tuna-like can and plop it onto the pure bleeni. NO!!! I hadn’t been too late. But now I knew for sure that the caviar was definitely in the food.

When they gave me what I had mistakenly paid for, I took it out with me as I returned to my hotel, dejected and alone. I thought I’d heard before that someone in my group liked caviar, so I figured I’d find them and offer them my food. But I saw a big dog on the way back. I held out my food to him; he didn’t budge. What?! Not even a homeless dog will eat this? He had a change of heart as I walked away, but returned to his previous good sense when I set it on the ground for him; he sniffed and walked away. Okay, well, I definitely can’t offer this to any people now that a street dog has touched it. In the end I left it on the ground next to a trash can in the hope that some truly desperate soul, whether person or animal, would be able to, if not enjoy it, then at least scarf it down, maybe following it swiftly with a shot or two of vodka.

I’m afraid I don’t like caviar.