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1I still can’t find my wallet and if I don’t locate it in another minute or two I’ll have to leave without it and anyway, I’ve already looked everywhere. Now my body continues the search but my mind reviews a mental worksheet: How to Survive in Moscow for 24 Hours Without a Wallet: I can buy things with my phone, I already have my passport for ID, I do have some cash but won’t be able to get more without a debit card, that part, it occurs to me, is not ideal, and just at the moment, lying on my stomach, lifting up the bedskirt, I find it, slid under the bed. Damn cat.
2
3I rush to the train station and make it in time, walk into my cabin on the sleeper car, and though its for four persons with two bunk beds on either side, it was empty when I booked it just an hour ago, and it’s still empty now, so it looks like I’m going to have it all to myself. After all, I was the last person on the train. The light is on and the door is shut. The room is stuffy and I open the window, cold air pours in and refreshes me. 
4
5I prepare my things: First I put sheets on my bed, then set almonds and chocolate next to my pillow, place a bottle of water on a a night stand, and slide a sleeping mask under my pillow for later. I put my backpack on a luggage shelf for the night, put my headphones in, connect my phone to the American football match that’s being played live in the afternoon on the other half of the world, undress, take a sleeping pill, watch a few American football plays and a lot of American advertisements, send some anxiolytic-influenced messages, and drift off to sleep. 
6
7Vague and distant images appear somewhere in my consciousness as we course through the snowy winter night. A lullaby of heavy steel wheels constantly grinding against track, and a slight side-to-side shifting, gentle, and slight up-and-down bouncing rock me to sleep along the way. I’m awoken from my slumber by a conductor tapping me on the arm. “Treidtsat meenut!” he tells me, before hurrying to alert the next cabin. We’ll arrive in 30 minutes. My cabin is bright, tinted a cool winter blue, and I gather my things, put on my coat and hat, take a drink of water, and step out onto the platform of the brisk Moscow morning. 
8
9Alex’s message suggests that we meet at Tverskaya, but given that it’s only a station away from Mayakovskaya, the most beautiful station in all of Russia, and one he possibly hadn’t seen, I suggest we meet there instead. After 20 minutes on the metro, I arrive first and snap a couple photos before they turn up. Alex shakes my hand, gives me a big smile; I kiss Ksusha on the cheek, and she tries to put on a cheerful face. Alex had warned be she was feeling ill, and she looks it.
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11We make our way to breakfast, a crowded little food court with corridors narrow enough to feel Asian except its too clean and modern and doesn’t have a strong enough odour of fish. I order Thai, they order Mexican, and we sit and chat about their flight tomorrow, about Thailand, Phuket, kickboxing classes they’ll be taking. Once we’ve finished, we discuss our plan for the day. They’ve already been here the entire weekend and they’re looking to have a relaxing day, no sightseeing, no heavy partying, home by 9 and a flight at 6 am tomorrow. I start to wonder if I’ve made a mistake taking the overnight train, just to return home this evening on another overnight train after a lazy day mozying about. But I say nothing and we decide to take a walk to a street I’d seen in photos, with bright holiday decorations all over. 
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13We’d call them Christmas decorations, but here they’re New Years decorations. Same same, but different. As we turn a corner, I let out a gasp. Shiny bright lights are draped endlessly over the pedestrian street as crowds of people walk to and fro, stopping to take photos, darting in and out of beautifully decorated shops, slipping on ice and snow. It’s an atmosphere you wouldn’t expect in Russia if you’d never been there. 
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15People liked to say that Moscow had changed ever since the World Cup. “We realised we aren’t that bad,” a local friend had told me a month earlier, laughing, only somewhat joking. The event and the positive attention it received gave them hope, he supposed. Maybe it was true. This certainly wasn’t the Moscow I’d first discovered upon my first trip here 10 years ago.
16I snap some more photos. Alex and Ksusha wait patiently, but it’s cold and the wind is carrying tiny bits of ice and snow into my face, into my eyes, and Ksusha is sick. “Let’s find somewhere to go inside?” I offer. There’s a bar nearby that they know, they were there on Saturday, and we head that way. Nobody is there because it’s 1pm on a Monday, and they each order a beer, I order some kind of Schnapps, made in Riga. It’s sounds vaguely festive, but when I take my first sip, it’s awful. Festive, but awful. Ksusha takes a sip and confirms. “That’s disgusting,” she moans, with a chuckle.
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18Somehow Alex and I get into a long conversation about socialism, CEO pay, whether a corporation should be responsible to its shareholders or to its employees and its customers. Its only my first drink and I’m certainly not drunk, if anything, just a little tired, and I easily direct the conversation, bringing Alex around to my points like an expert matador leads a bull. As I’m talking, I occasionally glance at Ksusha, trying to keep her feeling involved in the conversation, but it’s clear she’s bored and she hasn’t said anything in 5, 10, then 15 minutes, the entire time I’m thinking that we’d better wrap this up soon, but Alex keeps it alive, again and again. Finally, after it’s clear we’ve reached a stalemate, I suggest we agree to disagree, and stress the points of overlap where we do agree, and move on, much to the delight of the barman, who, by now is very tired of hearing an animated debate in English about how low-skilled workers are not paid enough and have a shitty life. I’m not sure what’s worse: if he understands English, or if he doesn’t. 
19The discussion of our next move starts with me saying “So, what do you guys wanna do now? I don’t really feel like having another drink,” and ends with us deciding to find another bar for the next drink. Ksusha isn’t too interested in Moscow, isn’t too interested in being outside, doesn’t want to go home. It seems she isn’t really too interested in anything, except drinking more. So we head to the metro and go to the next station. 
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21As we look at the map, I see that the ryumochnaya is in one direction, and Red Square is in the other. I interject and ask if they mind if I head to Red Square, snap some photos, then meet them back at the bar, and they agree and we exit the station in different directions. 
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23I’m not sure I’m going the right way until I come across a big park with winding pathways. It’s new I guess, I don’t remember it up until this past summer. I was in Moscow for the World Cup final and met two girls in the street. It was late and I still had a couple hours until my train ride, and they were happy to meet a foreign guy who spoke a bit of Russian and they brought me here. I remember how captivating the view was, the first time I saw it. In October, the night before I flew to Greece, I was brought here again one evening, a girl’s birthday, and after the party finished and everybody went home, we left the restaurant and went for a walk, sat here for a long time and looked out at the cathedrals, the walls and buildings of Red Square. 
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25But now, in winter, snow coming down almost sideways, nobody sits at the big theatre overlooking the city’s most famous buildings. Instead, people dot the wandering paths, trudging through the snow, their heads down. I like the feeling of the cold against my face, and it’s nice to have a little silence after the energetic conversation with Alex. I trudge on and finally come to Red Square. I pass the iconic St. Basil’s, snow stuck to the tops of its onion domes, and stop at a large installation, part Christmas market, part carnival. Everything is lit up impossibly bright. It’s now four in the afternoon but dusk has already settled over the short Russian winter day, and the lights are incredible. A big merry-go-round is lined in bright LED lights and I can’t imagine how children could sit on those frozen metal saddles, but there they are, there is even a queue, and there is music and children are shouting, laughing, crying, and so many families, and strollers churn up snow in their wheels, leaving chaotic tracks all over the little fair, and even though the Russian holidays don’t start for another week, there’s a warm Christmas buzz around everything, an electricity and energy in the air. I wander through the market and mothers and grandmothers and sisters buy all kinds of colourful winter candy treats for themselves, for their children, and men push strollers and some waddle through the snow with children on their shoulders Finally though, I’m feeling the sting of the cold against my face, inside my boots, and Alex had messaged that they’d found the bar, and I’d been gone a while now. I don’t want to be rude. I send him a voice message (it’s far too cold to type) that I’ll be there in 20 minutes, and I set off. 
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27The route takes me through another long walking street with department stores towering over me on either side with colourful red and white and green decorations in their windows, and there are magnificent white lights hung all over the walkway, and then I find the bar, dark and red and drab, and I walk inside, ignore the waitres who asks something in Russian which I don’t understand, and I find them and take a seat across from them at a booth. It’s a low-budget bar-café, with cheap drinks and simple food items, and the waitress asks me what I want. Alex, gives me the beer run down: There is light and dark. I tell him I’ll have something else, it’s too early for beers, I’ll get too drunk. But a cocktail would be nice. I glance at the menu. The first cocktail listed is a “samogoon.” I can’t remember the contents but it sounds vaguely Russian, I think I recall Dostoevsky writing about this drink, and it’s about time I tried it. I’ve been living here for three years now, after all. “Russian moonshine,” Ksusha tells me.
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29The bar is decorated with wallpaper of various Soviet memorabilia: newspapers, then portaits of the former First Secretaries of the Communist Party, and then old handwritten letters, and in our section, diplomas of all sorts: certificates for completions of school, various trainings, courses, and all of these, the newspapers and letters and diplomas and photos of old party leaders are lined up side by side and stuck to the wall. An old painting of Stalin hangs in the middle of the room between the other communist leaders, and there’s a shelf with a row books, hundreds of them. “Cozy place,” I mutter, nodding. 
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31Just then the waitress returns and she’s discussing something with Ksusha which at first seems to have nothing to do with me, and the message only reaches me non-chalantly, as if by chance, that the bar does not have samogon. Our indifferent waitress tells a by-now somewhat drunk Ksusha, who, at some point, decides perhaps she ough to mention it to me. I shrug and look at the menu. The next cocktail option contains mors. A sort of cranberry compote. It’s usually served with vodka, and it’s pretty good. I order that, only to be told that it doesn’t come with vodka. What does it come with? Spiyrt. Spiyrt? Yes. A sort of pure alcohol. 100%. Or maybe 90. Ksusha laughs. Alex orders one as well. And so does Ksusha. The waitress almost walks away before I catch her. “And a chicken Kiev please.” With that, the waitress disappears, and we settle into conversation. 
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33Alex has an intense expression, but Ksusha’s head seems to be swaying a bit. For the most part I’m disregarding her and Alex and I discuss all sorts of controversial topics. Aging women and their biological clocks, the role of attractiveness in a woman’s overall desirability, whether Russian or Ukrainian women are more traditional, and then the waitress brings our drinks, three dark red concotions of pure alcohol and cranberry compote, and three shots which I was unaware had been ordered. I take one sniff and I know it’s the horseradish one that Alex, Ksusha, and Russians in general are so fond of, and I make a face and drop my head down and Alex and Ksusha start laughing and I feel like we’re in that silent Japanese game show where they’re not allowed to talk or laugh but they can’t stop laughing and then they have to undergo terrible punishments like drink horseradish-flavoured vodka. “No,” I insist, “no,” looking at Ksusha, the more determined one. “There is no way. No way. I’m not touching it.” I slide the shot glass towards Ksusha, next to the her own. “You take this one. I’ll order something else.” 
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35Alex is impatient to get this horseradish hell into him so I propose a compromise and they each take a horseradish shit shot and I drink half of my pure alcohol compote and after a minute of wincing, everyone’s shoulders relax a little, eyes become a bit glazed, and Alex and I return into a meandering, avante-garde sort of conversation about society and sexuality and morality and cross-culturalism. Ksusha goes to the toilet and we discuss the future, or lackthereof, of their relationship, and I’m alerted of her return when Alex widens his eyes, glances abruptly over my right shoulder, and without words, shoots me a look that says, “Let’s change the subject.” “And anyway, yeah that’s how I got arrested on a boat when I was in university,” I tell him, a complete non-sequitor, and Ksusha suspects nothing. I motion to the remaining horseradish vodka shot remaining in front of her, and she downs it, wearily, and that probably wasn’t a good decision but then the waitress brings my chicken Kiev and we order another round of shots, I should take at least one with them, and Ksusha begins to unravel as I eat my juicy breaded chicken breast. 
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37She points a finger at me, sticks it as far as towards my chest as she can reach from her booth across the table, and begins a long rant. She slurs that I am a bad foreigner, my Russian is poor, the girl I’m seeing only likes me for my money, doesn’t love me, and how could she? Ksusha asks accusatory questions, what are my plans for her, and what do I want from her and what are my plans for life in general, and why am I living in Russia? The alcohol has calmed my nerves and it’s all pretty entertaining, certainly better than Ksusha’s usual tripe, but my bladder is going to explode and I mutter, with self-deprecation, “This is the part when you’ve drank way too much and you have to stand up but you don’t want it to be completely obvious that you’re shitfaced,” and I actually do alright and Ksusha yells, loudly, for all the tables around us to hear, “You don’t look like you’re drunk at all!” I wander, dazed through the bar, recalling nothing, and manage to find the toilet after some searching.
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39The toilet is a momentary respite, I take stock of the usual anarchist/communist/punk stickers,some in Russian but most in English, and then I flush, fix my hair, compose myself as best I can before walking blindly back to our booth, again getting lost in the maze of dive bar booths along the way, and then I’ve found our table, crash into my seat, and I pull it together, look up at my friends across the booth and mumble, slowly, “Ksusha, you were in the middle of tearing me apart when I had to get up to pee. Please, continue.” 
40She does but I continually remain just out of striking distance of her barrage, again the matador, this time with an outright malicious bull, and I manage to dodge, distract, divert, and deny, and finally, just like the exhausted bull comes to his knees and gives himself up, Ksusha’s head comes to rest on the table and that is the last that of her for the rest of the evening. Alex is still good to go though, and he comes thrashing out of the gates, bucking wildly about socialism and inequities and the evils of white men, despite both of us being white men, and I treat him just the same as I treat Ksusha and finally, both of us blind and wide-eyed, Ksusha now drooling on the table, I suggest that, perhaps we should get the bill and take her home, and this is totally novel idea which Alex had not considered, but now does seem quite reasonable, and the bill arrives and there’s cash flying all over, six drunk hands, simple addition now quite an abstract concept, but Alex says it’s all sorted and we spill out the door towards the hotel. 
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42In their room, clothes and toiletries are flung all over and Ksusha falls onto the bed, starts to undress before Alex stops her, and the whole thing would be a bit uncomfortable for me if I hadn’t set my hands upon a bottle of whisky on their desk, and Ksusha, now under a blanket murmurs incoherencies in an offensive tone, directed towards me, and Alex stands up and we look at each other, a little embarrassed. I hand him the bottle of whisky, he takes a swig and we put our coats on and head back out in search of the next bar. 
43After a long snowy trek through the snow, we come upon the only bar still open in the neighbourhood. The waiter sits us at an isolated booth. The bar is dark and quiet, there’s only one other group there, and the waiter informs us that they’re closing soon. Last call. I order a whisky. Alex abstains. A flight to Phuket in six hours. I’m drunk and tired and at some point Alex was on the same level, I know he was, but now he’s just staring at me hard, energetic, fiery eyes, lips almost twitching, forming his next question. That’s Alex for you.
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45“What are the holidays for you,” Alex asks. It’s dark and I’m tired and blinking, rubbing my eyes, struggling to look him in the face, but when I do he’s still staring back, intensely as ever, and I can see he wants this conversation. I hardly even know what this question means, but I think I know what he’s getting at. For the first time, it occurs to me that we are two westerners, arbitrarily living in Russia, and today was Christmas eve. Inside, I shrug. A voice inside my head says, “You’ve got to give the people what they want.” 
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47“The holidays…,” I sigh. “My parents are fighting about something, well not anymore, of course, I mean, they’re dead, but when they weren’t…you know. And my siblings are unhappy, they wanted something else for Christmas and they didn’t get it, or it’s not the right kind, and we woke our parents up to open these gifts but they’re tired, probably hungover, and they roll back over and tell us to come back in an hour, but we don’t wait and we open half of the gifts by ourselves and when our parents finally do wake up they’re furious with us, they didn’t get to watch us open the presents, and then somebody is crying and we haven’t even gone to the family party yet, you know, the big family party, with aunts and uncles and cousins and I already know there’s going to be some fight between some of my aunts, some kind of drama, and there’s going to be an argument between the uncles about whatever the current political hot topic is, and my aunt is an awful cook, maybe this year it’s some kind of dried out ham or turkey or fish, never anything good, and I’ll a bunch of snack junk food, Chex Mix or something, that’s my dinner, and my dad will be tired and he has to work tomorrow, and I’ll be co-opted by my him to ally against my mother, he manipulating me by reminding me of some new video game still waiting in the box at home to try out, so I try to convince my mother to leave but she just will not shut the fuck up, blabbering on to her sisters, some kind of phony sympathy for starving Africans, or Kosovo, or the failing health of our local priest, and eventually it will boil over and there will be some argument between my parents which will bleed out into the general atmosphere of the party and spoil whatever is left to spoil, and then we’ll go home and there will be a feeling of vague depression and disappointment about the whole thing, another underwhelming Christmas, but also, I guess, some relief, you know, cause at least it’s over.”
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49Alex is silent. He doesn’t look so intense anymore. His mouth is pressed against his fist and he looks contemplatively. He starts out with that particularly Australian way of starting a sentence with a drawn out “Yeaaah,” then continues: “I reckon it’s quite the same with myy famiy, you know. Just, the holidays, especially Christmas…I mean, you know me. Christmas is everything I hate. Materialism, religion, drama, all rolled into one. It’s like this perfect storm, this clusterfuck of shittiness. And everything that you said, that’s what it’s like. There’s always some fight. I mean, my brother and my mom don’t get along, and my mom and my dad’s mother don’t see eye to eye, and there’s this pressure on everything to be this perfect Christmas and it never is. And I just hate it.”
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51“So your family is fucked up too.”
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53“Well, they’re all alright, individually. I really like all of them, one-on-one. But when they’re all together, and it’s a holiday, and we have to do this whole thing…” Alex trails off. I take a drink of whisky. There’s a long silence. Alex is looking at me. I’m not looking back at him, or anything in particular. But I can feel his gaze. I raise my eyes from my glass and look at him. “So that’s why we’re here,” Alex says, looking out the window at the dark, snowy Moscow night. I nod slowly, tapping my glass against the table.
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55I glance at my watch. 12:30. “I’ve got to get going. Got to leave in 5 minutes. My train goes from Kurskaya.” And with that, the bill is ordered, paid, and Alex and I stand up to leave. Outside on the street, we exchange the usual goodbyes. Two people who now know each other pretty well and have been best friends for a few weeks, but probably will never see each other again. I’ve gotten pretty good at these since my male friends never stay in Russia too long. A nice train ride. A safe flight. It was great getting to know you. A hug even. And then we set out in opposite directions, into the dark and the snow. Christmas eve, Moscow, 2018.