The Amazing Marshrutkii and Their Drivers

So, like millions of people, I take the marshrutka around the city. For those of you who don't know, a marshrutka is like a mini-bus, but it's not really a bus, it's more like a van who's main purpose is to shove in as many people as possible because more people equals more money for the driver. I can't find an appropriate word in English for this particular mode of transportation, so I'm keeping the Russian word, because it's like the word smatana or tvorog, there just isn't a comparison. A marshrutka is almost always decorated with tinsel, international flags, disco lights (I do wish I were joking about this) stuffed animals and other random paraphernalia to make it a little more cozy.

On a good day, a marshrutka will get you anywhere in the city within about twenty minutes, yes you will be slightly car-sick with the constant swerving, sudden stopping, spontaneous acceleration and an deceleration, but over all it can be very effective and time efficient.

And speaking of efficient, aside from these little automotive cultural machines, there are the drivers themselves. Most of the time they are immigrants from former Soviet states such as Georgia, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and all other 'Stans on the map which explains the unusual flags and sometimes questionable music that blares from their MP3 players. They can somehow drive, count back change, eat, and talk on the phone at the same time.  Multaskers in the States and mothers around the world would be impressed with such maneuvers. Is this dangerous? Absolutely. Is it amazing to watch? Even more so. That piled on with the occasional task of giving directions in some other language or even texting while doing seven other things would even raise the bar for the most ADHA person on the planet.

I'm always walking the line between amazed and annoyed when I get on and off marshrtukii. Like so many other things, when things work, they work great, when they don't, it just adds an extra hour to whatever you were doing. Tonight, after telling the driver three times, by two different people (myself included) they missed my stop.  It was not because they didn’t hear me or my random new friend; he just didn’t feel like stopping because the stops are only about 100 meters apart.  Well, you know what buddy?  It’s -30C (-22F) and my bus stop is 100 meters closer to my apartment, so now because you just couldn’t be bothered with pressing that petal on the left now I have to walk 500 meters.  Thank you very much.  What just really gets me is the genuine lack of…I don’t know, lack of appreciation. You would think that since it’s butt cold outside that would be kinder to each other, but alas no, it only makes them more hostile.  In the rose colored world that I live in, when conditions are bad it makes the good come out in people.  It’s also quite annoying that women who work in the deli section of the super markets, and the random guy I occasionally buy fruit from remember me, yet these same drivers that I see almost every day don’t; I mean come on, in the middle of Siberia how many Russian speaking people have an accent like mine?  Now that I am re-reading this, I realize how ego-centric and ridiculous I am sounding, but you would think that if the guy could accommodate so many things at once, he could pay enough attention to stop when he’s supposed to.   

 

On a less It’s-All-About-Me rant, I would like a moment to remind people how remarkable this profession is.  I know I was just complaining about the driver; but I usually try not to.  They do have really thankless jobs, right up there with the women who clean bathrooms or the men who chisel ice off the sidewalks. Imagine having to deal sit in traffic all day, every day, seven days a week.  Think of all those toxic fumes that are forever being pumped and blown in your face and people snarling at you simply because they too are tired and running late.  So for everyone that has a job like this, thank you.    

Today’s adventure occurred at the pool.  We all know I have issues with swimming in Russia, mainly because it’s such a pain in the ass.  Between the completely unnecessary ‘doctor exam’ (it’s laughable because the ‘doctor’ looks at your feet for twenty seconds then gives you a slip of paper that says your healthy, no mold or warts protruding from your skin) there’s the fact that you need plastic covers for your shoes, then you have to check your coat, you know, because lockers can’t really be used for storage, that’s just a crazy notion, and the list goes on.  I was already having a stressful day due to the fact of working with other people’s offspring.  Plus, I miscounted how much money I had and I was five rubles short, so I had to trek back out into the snow to get some more cash.  After returning and finally getting into the locker room, I was surprised to find yet another woman inside watching everyone.  Was this a new security guard?  If so, why?  I didn’t care, all I wanted to do was swim.

After quickly undressing and putting on my swimming suit, she came over to tell me something.  I really didn’t understand what she was saying, something about shower.  I said yes, naturally I will shower before I get in the pool…(seriously, who thought of that as a rule?  You have to get wet before you get wet? Does shower water somehow create a barrier from the evil swimming pool water?)  and then she kept repeating it.  Yes, because I clearly understood the first time.  A girl came in to assist me by saying that I had to shower before putting on my swimming suit.  Seriously?  In what universe does that make sense?  Get wet, put on swimming suit, shower again and then get in pool.  No.  Hell no.  It’s enough that I have to shower and undress in front of a room of old ladies; I’m not going to parade naked for no reason.  I laughed because I couldn’t control myself, and this made my new friend laugh.  I proceeded to ignore the old grump and go into the shower.  My bad.  No flip-flops.  Okay, this was my mistake, but it’s never really been an issue before.  Today you would have thought that I walked in with an AK-47.  Hey people, I have my magic piece of paper that says I’m healthy.  Relax. 

I was instantly happy when I dove into the water.  My muscles began to relax as I began my laps.  However my twenty second euphoria was obliterated by a babushka swimming straight towards me.  Yes, she has goggles; yes the point of goggles is to see underwater but apparently using glasses to see and avoid underwater collisions requires different training.  So because I couldn’t get out of the way fast enough, even she was clearly in error gave her a reason to yell at me.  Deep breath.  I spent the rest of my time playing a fun game called Dodge-The-Babushkii.  I swam so hard that I could barely pull myself out of the pool.  Overall, I felt great.  All of my frustrations and annoyances were left in the water; at least that was the idea.  After my shower I had to walk back into the dreaded Locker Room.  It was a crowded, disturbing sight.  Nothing is more shocking for the eyes then twenty old women standing around naked, or better yet, sitting down naked drinking tea.  I’m sure if I had been in a better more open minded frame of mind I could have appreciated their sense of liberation that we lack in America, but I was past the point of no return in terms of my cultural tolerance, so I thought it was awful.  The girl that had helped me understand the shower first-then put on swimming suit- then shower again- conversation was waiting for me.  I can’t remember what she said, but it made me laugh.  The fact that we started laughing made all the other women quiet and give us icy stares.  Oh that’s right, I forgot, laughing is also prohibited.  I said this to the girl and for whatever reason; we just started laughing even harder because it was clearly making the whole room so angry.

One woman who was pulling on the world’s saddest sweater scolded us for being loud.  My new friend that we weren’t in a church, so it wasn’t a problem.  Then another said that we should just be quiet.  Why?  In typical rebellion we just started talking louder about shoes and hair as we were getting dressed.  She told me not to worry about making them angry because they are babushkii who are always angry.  As we walked down the stairs I thanked her again for her help and apologized for getting her into trouble.  She just laughed and said that they should be thanking us because we gave them something to talk about for the rest of the day.     

Last but not least, while we were standing in line waiting to collect our coats this other woman interrupted us and told us that we were being rude because we weren’t speaking Russian.  Wow, really lady you just interrupted us to tell us that we were being rude?  Isn’t that act rude in itself?  At this point, all we could do was laugh again and say, “da, eta Rossiya!”