“My potty-mouth got me in trouble, Sis. Yes, again.”
I’d been in Transnistria for ten seconds—fresh off the marshrutka (minibus) from Chisinau, Moldova—when this guy at the bus stop started chatting me up in Russian. I don’t speak Russian.
“Sorry, do you speak English?”
I never got his name, but let’s call him Igor. That’s a great villain’s name. For all you Igors out there reading this, mea culpa dude.
Igor immediately started naming different countries, to find out where I was from. When I told him I was American, he said “American jazz” and kept repeating the name of an American jazz musician, that I didn’t recognize. I tried to be polite, “oh yeah, that’s great” I said smiling.
What’s that, Kim? Where the hell is Transnistria? Good question. Transnistria is a self-proclaimed country that nobody recognizes, in between Moldova and Ukraine in eastern Europe. When the USSR broke up, Transnistria—with Russia’s help—fought a brief war with Moldova, and has been a “frozen conflict” zone ever since. Definitely one of the world’s weird places.
At the bus stop, as I started to put both of my backpacks on, Igor grabbed one of them. At first, I thought he was trying to help me lift my forty-pound pack. But he was just trying to stop me. When I had both backpacks secured and I started walking away, Igor grabbed my arm! I yanked it out of his grip.
He was yakking away in Russian the whole time, but he wasn’t warm and fuzzy. He was belligerent. It was eleven o’clock in the morning, and I didn’t smell alcohol on his breath, so I wasn’t thinking he was a drunkard.
He moved to block my path, so I juked left and crossed the street—in the middle of traffic—hoping to shake him.
No luck. He was glued to me, in one-on-one coverage (no help from the free safety). So, I stopped in the middle of the street, and shot off an F-bomb.
“WTF, dude?!” I threw in ‘dude’ to show some So Cal hospitality.
Big mistake.
Now Igor’s panties were REALLY bunched up. He started yelling, “fuck … fuck!” He didn’t speak English, except for a few choice words, including the F word. On the other side of the street he continued yelling.
An old lady walked by us, and I pleaded, “little help here?” She said something to him, which he completely ignored, and continued on her way. I searched for my Airbnb apartment, with dickhead right on my heels the whole time.
A couple with their baby in a stroller walked by. I asked the man if he spoke English. “Yes, a little” he replied.
Hallelujah! The man called my landlord (I didn’t have a local SIM card) and said, “she’ll be here in five minutes.”
I thanked him and asked, “what is this guy saying in Russian, what does he want?”
“He keeps saying ‘this is a pen, this is a pen’ … don’t worry about him, he’s just drunk.”
“This is a pen??” Did Igor want discounted English lessons?!
My savior took his family into their apartment. I walked away from Igor, toward the apartment complex’s playground. Igor followed me and started yelling “five minutes … five minutes.”
Alright, that’s enough.
Igor had been hassling me for about a half-hour now. I walked into the playground, and if Igor got in my face again, I was going to drop my backpacks and go Conor McGregor on him.
Say what, Sis? Who’s Conor McGregor?
He’s a fierce, MMA fighter, with an inflated sense of self-worth, and a big mouth. Just like me. Except for the MMA part.
Luckily my landlord’s assistant showed up before Igor stepped into The Octagon. But she didn’t speak a word of English, so I couldn’t get an explanation of what exactly the drunkard wanted.
As my landlord’s assistant unlocked the downstairs entryway to the apartment block, Igor tried to follow us upstairs. She finally got forceful and prevented him from entering.
Before she closed the door, I stupidly gave Igor one last “go away.” He screamed at me “go home!”
Welcome to Transnistria.
