RUSSIA
TURNED ON ITS SIDE
LOOKS LIKE A PHILLY PHANATIC
CLUB-FOOTED
IF THAT’S WHAT A CLUBFOOT LOOKS LIKE

THIS IS HOW I FEEL HERE
OR AT LEAST
THE BEST I COULD COMMUNICATE
BUT AFTERWARDS
I MAY
FEEL
DIFFERENTLY

Counterculture reduced from an ideal
or maybe lifestyle
to
blacknpinknskullsnsadness
‘sadness’
these girls cuddle teddy bears on streets
call it ‘dressing emo’

The front strands of her hair are dyed black
the area around her eyes is colored black
her fingernails are painted black
her hood is on her face

She’s got an iPod
4th generation and it is black
she is at this party and she is wearing headphones
stares out windows
eats some chocolate she bought

In Russia they say ‘эмо’
sounds like eh-mo
funny to think 30-80GB of music
all of it shit
probably.

I got out of the train, stepped out into the evening cold. I was in ‘Taiga’, the city named after the forest, or perhaps vice versa. This city connects Tomsk with the Trans-Siberian line. I had two hours. I walked up onto the overhead crossing in order to snap a few shots with my cameraphone as the sun was setting. A man asked me for a cigarette and I said no. He then said something else I didn’t understand, then smiled and laughed at me when I told him I didn’t understand him. Then he said, ‘don’t worry about it, you’re still young.’ I wonder what it was that he said that I wasn’t supposed to worry about.

[I like the way snow looks as the sun is going down.]

Inside the train station, I sat and read “The Crossing” by Cormac McCarthy. I had noticed that there was a gathering of people drinking lots of milk. The women were plainly dressed, all in long skirts and without makeup. I assumed they were conservative and religious. I was right. The youngest one came and sat next to me, brown hair, freckles, glasses, face like an anthropomorphic rodent, but in a good way, like the Whos in Dr. Seuss books.

‘Hello I’m from the dsf;kahsdoiaekjadhsfkjahweoiy
‘I’m sorry I didn’t understand.
‘I’m from afsd;jkahsdfhkj christian asdkljasd. We’ve traveling to Tomsk, how about you
‘I’m going to Krasnoyarsk, for a conference.
‘Are you a teacher?
‘Yes, I’m an English teacher, in Tomsk.
‘You’re not Russian?
‘No, I’m American.

[The green of the trains became more intense under the light of the setting sun. Almost electric. They shine against the blue of the snow and the redorange of the sky.]

‘What is your religion?
‘I’m an atheist.
‘Really? Then what happens when you die? Do you go to heaven or hell.
‘I think nothing happens. I think you die, and then there’s nothing.

[I had a desire to find the center of town, I had a few hours, I could make it there and back. Looking each way on top of the metal crossover bridge was disorienting. There wasn’t one way that looked as though it lead to the center. If I wanted to find it, I would have to ask. The sun had almost set. I didn’t want to ask, so I went into the train station instead.]

They tried to convert me right then and there, the whole lot of them. Told me they have so much fun when they sing and dance and praise god together. Asked me to play the guitar with them. There were so many. They frowned when I said that Jesus was just a regular guy who happened to be convinced that he was the son of god. I still think he made major changes to the morality of westerners. That answer wasn’t good enough cause he wasn’t the son of God to me.

‘Listen, it was nice meeting you, but I have to go
‘You should give us your number.
‘So that…..
‘We can call you and invite you to our church in Tomsk.
‘No. I have to go now. Goodbye.

They all waved goodbye. It was dark outside now. I crossed the crossover bridge in darkness to get onto my train. It was hot. Everyone was sleeping. I made my bed and put on my headphones and felt the gentle rocking and shifting of the train. Two hours.

[If I ever go back to Taiga again, I swear I’ll find the center.]

I was just about ready to leave when the pounding started on the door. Heavy, rhythmic, coupled with my name  shouted in a heavily affected Russian accent ‘БРЕНДАН’ (pound pound pound). I opened the door.

Before me stood my downstairs neighbor, Alex. We generally don’t see each other much, we generally don’t talk much besides exchanging pleasantries on the stairs from time to time. Most of our conversations occur when the sound of people at my parties becomes unbearable for him on Friday/Saturday nights and he comes upstairs in order to ask us to be quieter. Usually he’s very civil, tonight he didn’t seem so civil and I had no people over to my apartment. I was confused.

Alex was visibly drunk. There were stains on his roughly knit shirt. He was carrying a large jar in each hand. One appeared to be filled with tomatoes; the other, with berries and a berry colored liquid that appeared alcoholic. Behind him stood a young man, early teens, pre-pubescent mustache. He was looking at the ground. On Alex’s shoulder was a cat.

-Brendan! I’ve come today to celebrate with you! I’ve brought my son and my cat!
-Alex, I was just about to head out, I’m meeting friends
-Nonsense! Today is the day of defenders of our nation, we have to drink!

He entered, entourage in tow. He led us into the living room. Let the cat go. She immediately ran into my room and under the bed. He sat down heavily, looked about him.

-Brendan, this is my son ________. He is fourteen years old. I wanted him to meet the American.
-Hello _______ I’m Brendan. How are you?
-….I’m fine….thanks
-Brendan! my son, he is a very good one. He studies hard, gets good grades, studies German.
-You study German?
-Yes….a little.
-Versteht dein Vater Deutsch?
-….um….Nein.
-Ist alles okay?
-Ja.

_________ wasn’t making eye contact, looked a little uncomfortable. I pitied him.

-Brendan! You can speak German?
-Yes, I lived in Germany for about two years.
-You are, you are, a person of the world.
-Thank you Alex, I appreciate the complement.
-You….and I….are people of the world.
-Yes we are Alex, yes we are.

He looked at me for a few seconds without saying anything. His eyes watery with drink.

And red. He seemed lost in thought for a few seconds. He blinked, shook his head.

-Brendan! Do you have shot glasses?
-Yes, just a second.

I walked into the kitchen and started washing the few shot glasses I had for us to use. I didn’t notice that he had followed me in.

-Brendan! Do you have a knife?
-Yes, just a second

I handed him the biggest knife I had, thinking he was going to use it to cut some bread for us to eat. Instead, he started to play with it, flipping it between fingers, lunging.

-Do you know how to do that?
-No, I don’t. In America, we don’t have required military service
-I was a member of the military, during the soviet times. Do you know the USSR?
-Yes, of course.
-I know how to kill with this knife, I know how to kill with lots of things. Do you know how to kill?
-Well, I guess with a knife it’s not so hard, but…

Alex lunged at me, put the knife near my throat, told me not to worry.

-I am in complete control.

He was drunk; I was afraid. Not that he intended to kill me, but that in his drunkenness he would stab me. I tried to make my way out of the kitchen. Get out [of this situation]. Invited him to come with me. We headed back to the living room.

Alex took the lid off of one of the jars. Told me it was called ‘Nastoika’. Told me his grandfather made it.

-Is it like Vodka?
-No, much better, it’s made at home, my grandfather made this.
-Distilled?
-Yes, distilled, distilled!
-With berries?
-Yes! With berries! Let us drink!

He poured from the jar into two shot glasses. His son looked on silently. Looked embarrassed. The cat was missing. We drank. It was delicious. It was like vodka without so much burn and was filled with the sweet flavor of berries. It went down easily.

-Alex, this is the most delicious thing I have ever drank.
-Only Russians know how, you don’t have this in America. You can’t find this anywhere else.
-That’s probably true.

We drank again, Alex opened up the jar of Tomatoes, put one on the table. He took out the knife I had given him and tried to cut it. The tomato ended up all over the floor. He took another one, bit into it. The juice and brine ran down his face and onto his shirt. The air was permeated with the  smell. He offered me one and I refused.

-You don’t like tomatoes? My grandmother pickled them.
-I can’t eat them, I’m allergic

I lied. I just don’t like pickled tomatoes.

-So you were in the army?
-Yes for a long time. They taught us how to kill in the army, kill Americans. Americans are barbarians! Kill them!

-Really?
-Of course, it was the cold war. Americans were taught the same, ‘Kill Russians’!
-I don’t know if that’s totally true
-Of course it’s true, it was the cold war.

I  contemplated this idea, thought about the other conflicts going on during the cold war, [troubles with] Cuba, Korea, Vietnam. Russia wasn’t so important to us that our only military focus was their destruction. (is that really so??)

-Brendan, We were taught to kill, to kill Americans. I know how to kill with anything. With this spoon, this fork. With my hands. With my gun. Do you want to see my gun?
-Your gun?
-Yes, my gun, I have many of them. I was in the army.
-Um, really?
-Yes, _________! Go get my gun and bring it up here.

His son looked at him, got up and went into my bedroom. He emerged about thirty seconds later with the cat. He walked out the door. I figured we wouldn’t be seeing him again.

-We were taught that Americans were Barbarians. Now I see you, I know that’s not true.
-Why is that?
-Look at you? You don’t know how to kill. You went to college, you came to Russia to teach Russian students English.
-I guess I do know how to kill, but I don’t think I would be able to.
-That’s what I mean. You aren’t a barbarian, you speak English and German and Russian, and you’ve lived in a foreign country.
-That’s true, I guess.
-Let’s drink to that!
-Okay, let’s

He poured two more shots, we drank. We [then] drank three or four more shots together, commenting on the quality of the Nastoika.  The door opened. A broad woman stood in the door. Tense. She walked into the living room, stood by the doorway.

-Alex! What are you doing here?
-I’m drinking with my American friend! It’s a holiday, we’re celebrating!

They descended into Russian beyond my understanding. From what I gathered, she was furious that he had asked their son to bring a gun upstairs, and wanted him to come home. He protested that he was just sharing a drink with his friend and that it was a holiday. He would do what she wanted tomorrow. She left. We drank again

-To people of the world!
-Yes, Alex.

My phone rang, my friends who I was supposed to meet were wondering where I was. I didn’t answer, but I sent a message that my neighbor came over and that maybe they should come over and join us/help me. Alex had been here a while, he was making me very uncomfortable.

-I’ve killed people.
-Really?
-Yes, I don’t know how many, but I know it was many.
-How does it feel?
-I don’t know. I don’t think about those things.
-Do you feel sad?
-No.

We drank another shot. He ate another tomato. The brine was all over the table.

-I don’t think about it because that’s how it happened. I didn’t think. I just acted the way I was trained.
-Oh.

He stabbed the table with the knife. His eyes scanned the room, landed on my mandolin.

-Balalaika! You play the Balalaika!
-It’s actually not a balalaika. It’s a mandolin
-What’s that?
-Sort of like a balalaika.
-You play it? You can play songs on it?
-Yes.
-Play!
-Play what?
-I’ll tell you what

I went over and got the mandolin from its case. I sat down. There was a knock on the door.

-Who’s that?
-My friend Yana, I told her to come over
-Is she your girlfriend?
-No, a friend

I let Yana in. She walked in and sat down on the chair opposite the couch where Alex sat. They introduced themselves

-You’re very beautiful
-Thanks
-My wife, she is beautiful too, but she’s getting fat. But you couldn’t have me if you wanted to.
-Well, that’s okay
-She has a full fur coat, I own lots of stores. I have lots of money.

Yana looked at me. She understood.

-Are you going to play a song?
-Yes, he is!

Alex started to sing. He told me to play along. I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to do. Then I recognized the song as one often sang by Russians at my parties. I remembered the chords. Alex grabbed the knife and stood up to dance. He sang off key, stumbled, thrusted and twirled the knife. Danced about the room. His voice filled the room, the knife flashed with the reflections of the lights above it. It was beautiful. I played on.

Later, he would fall asleep on my couch, try to call and invite his friends over, say dirty things to Yana. Eventually Yana would have to explain to him that he needed to go home to his wife because she and I had ‘lovers’ activities’. He would leave, and Yana and I would look at each other in disbelief, start to clean up. The apartment would smell like brine for the rest of the week.

It was probably the most absurd thing that I had seen/heard in a while, the ‘DJ’ in this Warsaw basement bar was making a ‘shicka-shicka’ sound into the microphone in rhythm to the music, in what appeared a very lame attempt at beatboxing along with the music. At that point I wondered two things: a.) did he actually think that it sounded good? and b.) why on earth did he decide that the best sound to use in order to accompany the music was a half-assed maraca? Looking at K and the Australian and the other Australian they all seemed to agree, and we all imitated him and laughed.

K and I had arrived in Poland the day previous via train from Berlin. The train ride had been essentially uneventful, in fact there we didn’t even know that we had crossed the border until we were startled awake by a man yelling at us in a language we didn’t understand (GDE PRSYZYWSYZYSYZY?) In fact, this was the first country I had been in a long time where I felt utterly incapable in the native language, so I felt a little timid as we exited the train into the concrete monolith that is the Warsaw main train station. I surely felt intimidated.

These fears disappeared quickly, though as soon as we realized that Polish sounded a hell of a lot like Russian, just with more ‘sh’ and ‘zh’ and ‘dz’ shoved in there for good measure. We could read signs. I’m sure I baffled more than one Polish citizen when they would ask me a question in Polish and I would reply in English, not knowing how to otherwise.

Warsaw is not a super interesting city, very soviet/industrial looking towards the center complete with an additional ‘sister’ type building in the middle looking very much like its Moscovian counterparts. But tucked away near the river is the old city, mostly rebuilt after the war. I was absolutely charmed by the lights/xmas/new year’s feelings in the air.

stalin wuz here

see how pretty? old city Warsaw

But we weren’t there just for tourism, we were on a quest to eat at one of the fated ‘milk bars’ that we had heard about.

What is a milk bar (Mleczny Bar)? At first I thought of the popular image conjured up by multiple viewings of A Clockwork Orange, but this is not the case whatsoever. I guess the best way to describe it would be a small cafeteria type thing. What I mean by that is that it’s a small place usually very spartanly decorated in the most charmingly post-soviet fashion that serves food and drink for really cheap prices. The food is simple, but delicious and satisfying. You can basically get soup, a main course, and a coffee for something like 5 dollars. Even better is the diverse clientele, everyone from students to old ladies to single mothers to workers are there.

luv u milk bar in warsaw

Even better, no one who works there speaks any English, being that these places are not the usual tourist magnets. So K and I found ourselves hilariously struggling with the language at the counter. Luckily a lot of the food words are the same or at least recognizable. We got our orders out, were served our food, and say down to eat a delicious meal.

Why Milk Bar? This is not based in any actual fact, but my belief is that they are called milk bars because they are supposed to be the antithesis to ‘beer bars’. At least in Russian, the traditional word for bar is actually the adjectival form of the word beer, so I wouldn’t be surprised if Polish had a similar archaic form (everyone just says ‘bar’ now). Also, in a lot of the Slavic literature I’ve read, it seems that milk is considered the cultural antithesis of beer. Thus I decided that they are called milk bars to distinguish them as the opposite of a beer bar, meaning that they are for real food and nutrition and not for getting drunk.

nothing like a good gulash w/buckwheat

I also now see the presence of a milk bar in A Clockwork Orange as an additional reference to Slavic culture in the novel, beyond the extensive use of Russian words to make up their ‘slang’. Feel smarter/more cultured now.

I could be completely wrong. It could make for a good thesis though.

For additional understanding, read Too Loud a Solitude by Bohumil Hrabal/watch A Clockwork Orange again

luv this book

thnx behindthehype.com/stanley kubrick

during my nervous breakdown i want to have a blogger present

I bought and read during my nervous breakdown i want to have a biographer present and liked it, deeply identifying with Gorrell’s depression / anxiety / alienation. I was initially struck by the speaker’s strange world. Relationships are distant, frustrated; thoughts dash from the super personal of “i continued avoiding eye contact / because when I looked at your eyes, i couldn’t resist smiling” to fantasies of mutual space travel and suicide, and later to global apocalypse (mostly at the hands of the speaker but in one case thanks to clone aliens). The poems are often strange but more often than not they are grounded in the real, in a person thinking strange things. I imagine the speaker in ‘reality’ saying, “with a calm facial expression i will expand / into a giant flesh thing / the size of a volcano / and roll over seattle and head south” rather than it actually happening. The speaker is imagining. “Halloween Party” engages that sense of imagination but in a slightly different way, with the speaker stating, “Casey is a bird, Timothy is a Karate Kid, and John is a giant / floating emoticon…”. This is plausible; it’s a Halloween party. However, this poem is the one place for me where the book takes a turn for the really unreal:

Casey crouches on the carpet in the middle of people and

flies around the room making bird noises and hits some

curtains and hits a lamp and lands on a window sill with her

body pressed against the glass and flaps her wings a little.

I’m really interested in this passage because I first read it as Casey acting like a bird; I interpreted “flies around the room making bird noises…” as “[a drunk Casey] runs around the room quickly making bird noises”. I think this made the most sense given my impression of the book’s world. I further interpreted the party goers’ collective reaction (“Everyone stares at Casey”) as referring to her having done something disruptive but not totally unreal. But then Casey is asked, “how did you do that” and responds with bird noises. I am wondering what the intention was of this flight into the really unreal.

I should have asked this. I guess I could Gmail him about it but this seems better somehow. I’m not sure if this analytic excursion is warranted or if it is even grounded in any way. But this is how I want to describe what makes me excited about the possibilities of Gorrell’s poetry besides my initial emotional response to the work.

why are you a bird?

I was interested in interviewing Gorrell

I knew that Gorrell lived in Seattle, and furthermore surmised from his blog that he lived in a neighborhood that sort of adjoins mine. This suspicion was confirmed when my copy of dmnbiwabp showed up at my house bearing an address from a neighborhood adjoining mine.Because of this I felt irrationally connected to him. Though I had originally envisioned us chatting each other from different locations, I came to think that it would be more interesting if we Gchatted each other in the same place. Maybe even from across the same table. (We weren’t far apart, after all.) He agreed to this plan so we did it. I’m glad we did it this way because he’s already done a more interesting Gchat interview with Bostonist. I honestly had thought that this Gchat interview thing was a genuine innovation / extension of things that have inspired me.

Though we spoke words to each other before and after the interview we did not speak during the interview. Rather, we communicated via Gchat.

RPP: I guess this is how we are doing this

Brandon Scott Gorrell: it’s okay, i’ve done this type of thing before, kind of. it’s a little strange

I know. This is my way of getting out of transcription. What are you working on right now?

literature?

Yeah.

i am editing a final version of my novel. i’m trying to change the ending, kind of, for a publisher in the states that might take if it i do that. i am also working on getting all the stuff written down for another novel i recently started working on, tentatively titled ASIA.

Neat. I saw your posts on your travels. I identified with the toilet scene. Maybe that was in that short story on Muumuu’s site.

[The toilet seemed very clean but was irregularly shaped and low to the ground. It did not have a seat. I remembered that Asia had toilets where you had to squat to shit instead of sitting down. A feeling of foreboding briefly overcame me. I pulled down my pants and squatted over the toilet. I was afraid of shit somehow going into my pants. I shit a little and looked into the toilet to see if I had aimed correctly. I saw no shit. I moved my hand around in my pants and didn't feel any shit. I shit more, this time watching my ass to see the shit come out. It came out and landed in the bowl correctly and then quickly slipped into the hole out of view. I shit more and did a very loud, sustained fart. I laughed. I looked at the toilet paper holder and saw that there was no toilet paper. There was a hose next to the toilet that had a spray nozzle attached to the end of it. I felt very bad.]

Yes, it was.

Damn. Feel unprepared right now. Are from Seattle originally?

i moved here three years ago, from salt lake city, for a job writing for a reality television show, which ‘went under’ 3 months after i got here. in salt lake, i went to high school. before i was in salt lake, i was in harrisburg, PA.

Oh yay. PA. Great place…what are your impressions of Seattle?

I feel different about seattle at different times. after i got back from asia i felt that seattle was bleak. my good friend had left and i had just broken up with a girl, who i live 2 blocks away from. other times i have liked it. when i feel that i have a lot of options for distracting myself, or not being alone, i feel better about seattle. i don’t feel impressed by the city or something. i feel indifferent to seattle ‘as a city,’ i think. i feel more concerned with if i have…friend options.

I hear that it’s hard to ‘break through socially’ here or something.

people say that, but i don’t know how seattle would be any different than any other city, in terms of making friends when you’re completely alone. seems really hard in any city. you can’t just walk up to people, if you don’t have a job you have to like, go to embarrassing social functions, like readings, or something, to meet bitches. and bros..

I haven’t gone to a reading in Seattle. How’s the scene here?

i can’t really tell. yesterday i went to ‘cheap beer and prose’ at the hugo house and it was ‘completely packed.’ it was really hot, and there were a lot of girls in american apparel gear, and a lot of alternatively dressed guys….and older, wine drinking people. they were serving 16 oz. pabsts for $1. at other readings that i’ve been to in the past, it hasn’t been ‘near as crowded,’ and only local ‘staples’ have shown up, like matt briggs, or matthew simmons, or people more well-known. it seems to be getting bigger and more alternative, lately.

Oh. Sounds sweet. How often do you read in the city?

i haven’t often read since the summer, when my poetry book came out. i think i had like 4 readings over the course of 2 weeks, or something. since then i think i haven’t had any readings. i might have had one but i’m unsure. i don’t read often now.

I guess that’ll happen when you finish the novel?

yeah, that’s likely.

Who is publishing that?

3:AM PRESS is publishing it in france and the UK, and it’s being considered by another publisher here. it will come out in the spring or summer of this year, in europe.

So Europe gets to read it before we do? Damn. Is the novel ‘about you’?

yeah, they will. the novel was based on events that took place in my life from january 2008 to april 2008, i think. it was also based on how i interpreted those events. editing it now, i have tried to preserve the feelings i had during the time which the novel is based on.

Is it difficult to preserve those feelings? Are you ever tempted to radically change the work, given that you see things differently than you did then?

i think i feel as if i’ve defined those feelings, retrospectively, and have been editing on the basis of that definition. like when i was writing it originally, i didn’t really know what the main character’s issues were, or what made him feel the way he felt. after completing perhaps the 10th draft, or something, i think i felt different about things and was able to understand why the character felt certain ways. then i acted on that understanding, and have been since then. i used to kind of ‘radically’ change the work a lot, before that change occurred, that i just described, because i didn’t know what i was doing. now i feel like i know what is happening and that i just need to do certain things to make it more believable, or more readable, or something. brb.

So instead of starting again you can make it better…or something.

yes, i think so.

When did you have the sense that you knew what you were doing?

i’m not sure. awhile ago. there was one point when, over the course of a week, i think, i edited the novel from 30k words, to 15k words, based on something i had understood about what the finished novel should look like. then there was another point where i added, i think 6k words over the course of a week, that have mostly remained ‘to this day,’ and that was another event that i think represented that i understood more clearly what i should be doing.

You’ll know when it’s done?

it’s basically done. i might modify it for a publisher, but that already has like a clear goal, for me, so it will be easy to know when it’s done.

Ah. You still have a day job?

i get most of my money from a company that sells academic papers to ‘students in need.’ mostly undergraduate, masters and doctorate level papers. i write them. i get an amount of money for other freelance ‘gigs,’ such as writing for the matador travel website, and more professional ‘copy’ for some other websites. i get an amount of money from blog gimmicks and book sales and literature-related things. i don’t have a typical ‘day job’.

Does that mean you get to work from home? Or Online Coffee?

yes, it’s like 100% ‘telecommute.’

Sweet. That’s like me right now except I make zero money.

damn…

I know.

friday night…

What are you doing Friday night? PARTY.

tonight’s friday night….i’m not sure, either my ex-gf is sleeping over, or i’m chilling with clancy, probably drinking. waiting for the verdict on the ex-gf thing…

Sounds fun. Who is Clancy?

my friend. he is 25. he’s an ‘enabler.’ i need him in social situations sometimes. if i hope to meet people, i need him. his ‘superpower’ is his ability to do seemingly-retarded things that attract women toward our table and eventually make contact with them.

I feel like those are necessary. I had two of those in Philly but now I’m the closest thing to that. Which means that I talking about doing seemingly-retarded things that attract women…I think this is the bro/wingman relationship…

i like it.

I miss it. Before we wrap up. Do you have anything you want the internet to know via this interview?

you want to know my thoughts on any question, please ask me them on my formspring account: http://www.formspring.me/lydiadavis

Cool.

sweet.

I’m going to start talking……………………….

previous interviews