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Dear Readers,
Here is a two-fer. I feel bad that I haven't posted in a while and this experience is definitely blog worthy.

Last night I got back from a quick trip abroad. I landed in Sheremetevo II at about 7:15 pm. I did the experienced travelers mad dash to the passport control lines. I get into a line about 8 folks deep, pretty good as passport control lines go, but I have still estimate about a hour's wait. To my right are two very short lines, "For holders of electronic passports" and "For diplomats". I am for sure not a diplomat, but because I have a bar code on my year-old passport, maybe I do, in fact, hold an electronic passport. I ask the nice lady in the green uniform and she says (to her credit), stand in any line. I take her to mean any line but the two aforementioned lines.

However, I keep scanning the electronic line to see if there are any Americans over there. If so, I am going to make the jump. At that moment, the perky blonde with a ponytail and tortoise-shell glasses at the head of the electronic line, pulls out a passport in that unmistakable US-only dark blue. I am slipping, I should have pegged her as American 20 minutes ago. I move over into my new line, 3 back from the front, instantaneously bypassing 5 folks in my old line. The two Germans behind me line jump as well, so now the electronic line is beginning to fill up. 4 smarter Germans, decide to take their changes and jump to the now empty "Diplomats". They get through, good information to have, but like everything else in Russia, that rule may not hold the next time I go through passport control.

Back to me. I make it to the passport desk and get Ivan "I do not want to be here and I really don't want you in my country" Ivanov. I say hello in Russian, he ignores me. Well, at least I didn't smile at him. Now we play the "how-long-can-I get-you-to-stand-here-while-I-ask-inane-irrelevant-questions-because-I-can" game. After the 3rd question, he is up 17-3. He claims he cannot speak English (working passport control?, okay).
"Where do you live?" -- Moscow-- eyebrows raise above his forehead.
"What are you doing here?" - I am a Fellow.
"What is your professional specialty?" -- Marketing.
"What flight were you on?" -- 220.
"From Stockholm?" -- No, from your Aunt Rita's house (I said that to myself).

Then he just sits there doing nothing, waving my passport back and forth. After the third wave, he notices that the cover and the picture have started to separate.
"What happened here?" -- It got wet.
"What happened?"-- IT....GOT....WET!!
"So what happened?" -- WET, WET, WET. I spilled water on it and it got wet.
"Well, we have a problem." I am sputtering mad -- we have a problem? I just left this god-forsaken country 4 days ago, no problem. No one wants to voluntarily come to this country. Why, why do I always get a hard time at passport control? I showed my US drivers license, dude I am an American citizen, all the paper work and my multi-entry visa are in order, I have been traveling for 25 hours. What is the bleeping problem?

Let me re-phrase: "What is the problem that I can resolve at 8 pm at night standing in front of you at passport control?" Either we don't have a problem or send me back (gladly I would go) to civilization, meaning the US via Sweden (beautiful, glorious, cultured, Sweden). He shows the offending passport to his "menedzer" who fingers the passport for another few minutes, then hands it back to Ivan. Stamp, stamp, stamp. Flings the passport back to me and says "You need to get your passport fixed." Thanks, Ivan. Only in Russia.

I make my way to baggage claim to find utter chaos. The conveyer belt is stopped, no airport personnel to be found and bags are literally everywhere. On the floor, on the belt, on the other side of the conveyer belt, still in the back, behind the curtain. It looked like they let the monkeys from the Samsonite commercial loose on our luggage. I see my luggage on the other side of the conveyer belt. Retrieving my luggage necessitates me climbing up and over the belt, praying all the while that it does not restart in mid-climb. I get my bags and make my way to and through customs. The customs guy just waves me through and I am off to find a taxi.

Official taxis cost R1300 ($50) from the airport to the city but you can get as low as R700. I try for R800 and get no takers. I have two wheeled luggage pieces, a big bag and a purse. I am fast running out of options. Finally, a guy with a really manic look in his eye agrees to my R800 offer.

He takes my big wheelie and starts sprinting towards his car. I am having a tough time keeping up. He passes about 30 cars and leads me to a dark corner of the building. Damn, I don't have my mace and this fool is about to jack me for my paper. He knows that I have at least R800. I am getting real nervous when he hits the stairs and starts climbing. I get it now, he just dropped someone off and is going to double-dip with me, which is why he agreed to my price. He picked up his fare on the incoming passenger. Anything he gets from me is gravy. OK.

We get to his car, a dirty, dusty, wheezy Lada of indeterminate color. I conspicuously get the license plate number while he is loading my bags into the trunk and send an SMS to two of my fellow Fellows. I may be going native, but I am not going crazy; precaution whenever possible. We get in the car and I notice that the guy does not have any icons in the car. Well he doesn't seem drunk, more like high, just plain crazy or hyper and he does know where my street is. Off we go. About 35 seconds into the trip, he tries to pull into a gas station, but it is closed. I look over at the dash to see how much gas he has, and every, single light was blazing. Damn, damn, damn. 'Cause if we run out of gas, I will most certainly have to walk.

We wheeze along for another few klicks or so until we come to a lit gas station. Cabbie pulls in, gases up and the fumes must have done something for/to him because now he is in full manic glory. He floors the poor Lada, which, amazingly eventually responds. Now, at the Lada's top speed, Cabbie starts looking for a cigarette lighter. This search entails long moments with his head under the dash board. I spend these same long moments praying to God that the other cars just seem that close. After a while he finds a lighter and I start breathing normally, but not for long. This guy is an unbelievably ballsy driver. With cabbies that can drive like this, why isn't NASCAR, IRL, etc overwhelmed with Russians. This guy has the wheezy Lada screaming top speed down the Leningrad Shosse, through tunnels and underpasses and all I can think about is he better not Princess Diana me. I am not sure how much of his life he is interested in preserving, so that fact that he would go out with me is probably not a deterrent.

Anyway, we make it to big train station by my house. Cabbie pulls over to "consult a map". I am on the phone with my husband. I tell Cabbie that I know the way, and while I am still on the phone, he jumps out of the car and -- no lie-- takes a whizz right next to the cab, in the middle of the street, in the middle of 4 lanes of traffic!!!! No, he didn't. Yes, the hell he did.

He jumps back in to the cab like a new man and proceeds on to my house. I am five minutes from home and I spend this time thinking how I can I get my bags out without him touching me or anything I own. Damn, damn, damn. We make it to my street and I jump out of the car, real quick and cat-like, but it was for naught. The trunk is stuck and Cabbie has to fitz with the lock. I reach for both bags but he, too, is cat-like and grabs the big one before I can reach it. Right before he puts the bag down on the street, he spits right in front of the truck. The wheel of my suitcase misses the spittle by centimeters. My adrenaline glands are completely empty by now. I feel wrung out and shaky. I pay Cabbie, smile my goodbye and let myself in the front door. Only in Russia. Only, only in Russia.

Baby, I'm A Star

Dear Readers,
In case you haven't noticed, Moscow is a very, very strange city. Well, the strangeness continues. Last week, my friend "B" and an acquaintance from Ghana were just hanging out on Old Arbat Street. A woman approached them and asked if they were American. When B said that he was in fact, an American, the woman asked if they would agree to test for a voice dubbing part in a film.

B exchanges numbers with the woman and gets the directors name. He looks the name up on the internet and finds that the guy died a few years ago. At this point, B is suspicious enough to say forget and not go. I convince B that it would be, at worst, hilarious and, at best, a foray into a new career :-)

B had mentioned that they may need some other American sounding voices and had a part for a woman, so I and another colleague "A" accompany B to the screen test. Besides, in Moscow, when travelling to new places, it is always good to go with a friend (or several).

We get down to Mosfilm -- which is Russia's version of Hollywood, where we meet Ella the producers assistant, I guess, we never got a business card or anything.

So Ella takes us to the producer who "had lived in the US for a long time, is fluent in English and can recognize an American accent". The guy is a pleasant enough fellow, but his English is at least 4 metro stops from fluent. He gives us the 30-second down and dirty about the film: A light-weight Russian boxer falls in love with a heavy-weight American boxer's girlfriend. He writes her a letter confessing his love. The American boxer, of course, finds out and wants to fight the Russian boxer. The two boxers meet in a climatic match at the end of the movie. The title of the film is roughly translated "Weeble-Wobble".

After this synopsis, I am thinking this film has Oscar buzz all over it.

Then, the director gives B the line that he needs to read:

"I am going to kick your ass, bitch."

Now, I am thinking Cannes Film Festival, here we come. Plus, I can hardly breath from laughing so hard.

B, a professional through and through, goes into the sound booth and nails it on like the third or fourth take.

Then they ask me to read for the part of the girlfriend.
The first line of the clip is "Vanya, Vanya, Vanya".
The second line is "You won me fair and square, I will marry you".
Third line " We can have sex anyway you want". FULL STOP.

I am not going to say that line. I can't say that line. I am a feminist, a married woman of a certain age with kids (girls, no less). So, no way. I think my exact quote was "hell to the no." The director was very understanding. He said that if I didn't want to do it, I wouldn't do a good job so don't push me. The session ended and we left. As we were walking out, I called my husband to get confirmation of my original decision not to do it. To my complete shock, my husband chastised me for not doing it. He actually said "don't be such a punk." Who knew after 10 years of marriage, he could still surprise me?

So on Friday, back to the studio I go. This time the Russian boxer's coach (the "Mickey" role in Rocky) is overdubbing his lines. I watch for 2 hours as this guy walks through the process of re-recording his own lines. The work is obviously difficult. So difficult that I am really doubting my ability to do this. I am not a professional and now, I am not laughing.

I run out of time and cannot stay to record my lines because I am hosting a birthday part a colleague at my apartment. I am told to return on Monday and do both the screen test, and if the producer likes me, the recording as well. We set the time for 6 pm.

In the interim, I am scheduled for a business meeting at 5 pm across town. Ella calls me at 2 pm on Monday and I tell her that I have a business meeting at 5pm and will not be able to make the meeting at 6. Maybe 6:30 pm.

This leads to a series of funny and very Russian conversations. Ella "forgets" that I told her I had a business meeting. I was meeting with the folks who pay my rent and salary while I am here, so they get priority on my time.

She starts calling me at 6:05 asking me to hurry. Since I am taking public transportation, I find that request completely asinine. What does she want me to do, tell the metro driver to go faster, the bus driver to ignore the traffic and traffic laws? But as I am acculturating, I tell her " I will try to hurry". In the process of hurrying (e.g. waiting for the bus to arrive after my 5 stop metro ride), she calls me back again and asks for a status on the hurrying. I tell her I am still in the process of trying. She asks me to take a car. I remind the native Moskvichka that it is rush hour and if I take a car, I will never, ever get there. Plus, who exactly is going to pay for the car? So I continue my telepathic conversation with the bus driver, urging her to hurry through the traffic. I guess I should have used my telepathy to move the other drivers out of the bus' way, but I am not powerful enough to do that yet.

I actually don't get to Mosfilm until close to 7pm -- my telepathy still needs a lot of work.

So I get there and everyone, the director, producer, sound guys are all waiting for me. I go right into the sound booth. They have, quite nicely, provided me with a translator. He also overdubbed some lines for another American character in the film. During his wait for me, he wrote out my lines. Boy was I surprised when I saw that the third line had even more dialogue. It now read:

"We can have sex anywhere you want, but I am on top".

Okey-dokey and here we go.

At this point I am committed, so I start the process. It takes me several takes to get the first line. Dubbing is like yoga, there is a lot to think about -- starting the line in sync with the time stamp, matching up the tempo and volume of my speech with the actor's lips and finally emoting, stressing certain words etc. As I said before, I am not a professional actor, so it was a little tough, but after about 10 minutes, I got the hang of it. I progressed through the 2nd line with very little problem.

The third line, yeah, that one, was problematic. The actress starts talking off screen, so I didn't have a visual cue as backup if I miss the time stamp. She also didn't deliver the line with the right inflection, so the line syncs up badly. My translator and I are discussing the problem during playback and I say to him, in a whisper, "Its not my fault, she didn't deliver the line correctly. I cannot make chicken salad out of chicken sh*t." At this point, my inner diva is in full bloom.

My translator, and new friend Michael, is a professional actor. He gives me some guidance on delivering the line and we nail it. The director, after playing back the entire session, tells me that I need to re-record the first lines "Vanya, Vanya, Vanya" in a louder voice.

I start recording again. In the first playback, the director tells me that I am saying Tanya instead of Vanya. As a long-term English speaker I am well versed in the difference between T and V. So I record again. This time he says I got 1 Vanya and 2 Tanya's. Record again. No improvement. Now the director is a little annoyed and says he is coming into the sound booth to help me. OK, he is the experienced director, I am an amateur, I appreciate his wisdom and assistance. He comes in with a pen and a piece of paper. At the top the paper he writes in big letters V A N Y A. He jabs the word with the pen and says, "Say this". He then writes in big letters T A N Y A, crosses it out and says "Don't say this".


This is the actual copy of the "note" the director gave me.

My translator and I just look at each other, then burst out laughing. I am laughing so hard that I have trouble composing myself to finish the session. But I finally manage to pull it together. We try again, still no improvement. Then the director tells me to say "Wanya" with a "W". Two takes and 6 Wanyas later, I am finished. My 30 minute, soft-core, verbal film career is over.

I am fond of saying that life in Russia is not fun, but it is funny. This fun, funny experience is the exception that proves the rule.