Mongolia

Radigan Neuhalfen
self-portrait

Mongolia

Mongolia, Ulaanbaatar

Gandan Monastery

Lenin
Ulaanbaatar Hotel

Sukhbaatar
Sukhbaatar Square

Mongolia

Russia, Siberia

We have nothing better to do with our lives than ride across Siberia on a train.

Russia, Ural

horse wagon

archaeological dig

Israel, Tel Aviv

Was in a park in Tel Aviv a few days ago. A little old guy hobbled over and sat next to me on the bench. He was talking to me in Hebrew. I responded in English. He said, “I don’t speak English, you don’t speak Hebrew,” and raised his hands in exasperation. We sat in silence a while. Then I asked if he spoke Russian.

He said, “You speak Russian?! I asked you if you spoke Russian!”

I said I hadn’t heard him. So then he began to talk. He told me he was from Poland. He had worked in a Russian store a while and learned Russian. Then he had worked in a factory in Germany, and he showed me the five-digit number tattooed on his left forearm. Immediately after that he came to Israel and served in the Israeli army. He had been in Israel 50 years now. He had sons and daughters and grandsons and granddaughters. He asked me how long I was going to be in Israel. Leaving in a few days, I said.

“To where?”

“Russia.”

“Why do you want to go there?” he said. “Why not stay in Israel?”

“I don’t speak Hebrew,” I said with a smile.

“So? Stay here and you’ll learn it. I didn’t speak Hebrew when I arrived, and I learned it.”

“I could,” I said, and nodded.

We sat in silence a while again. Then he got up and hobbled off.

Israel, Sephoris

archaeological dig

Israel

Greece, Athens

Former Yugoslav Republic Of Macedonia, Skopje

Helicopters flying around today – USA choppers – at least two Apaches and one transport. Tonight, dropped the hotel room key down the squat-type toilet.

Turkey, Gallipoli

Anzac Cove

"Those heroes that shed their blood
and lost their lives...
you are now lying in the soil of a friendly country.
Therefore rest in peace.
There is no difference between the Johnnies
and the Mehmets to us where they lie side by side
here in this country of ours...
You, the mothers,
who sent their sons from far away countries
wipe away your tears;
your sons are now lying in our bosom
and are in peace.
After having lost their lives on this land they have
become our sons as well."

Atatürk 1934

Turkey, Istanbul

Sea of Marmara, Istanbul harbor

Black Sea

Ukraine, Crimea

Ukraine, Crimea

Lenin

Ukraine, Crimea

Estonia, Tallinn

Radigan Neuhalfen

Russia, Moscow

Radigan Neuhalfen

Russia

Russia, Moscow

Here I could identify cultural misunderstanding.

Poland, Warsaw

band from Norway

"To the Heroes of Warsaw 1939-1945"

Russia, Moscow

I have a bust of Lenin on my desk and a flag of Deicide over my window. (“Behead the Prophet!”)

I’ve been asked by so many Russians if I was afraid to come here. Then they tell one of the countless stories of some friend travelling to the States, and after seeing the American news, calling home in a panic to ask when chaos erupted in Russia.

The biggest international news story of 1997 was the death of Princess Di. Meanwhile, try to find someone informed about the civil war in Tangiers.

Went to this Moroccan hang-out. Clean, bright, and packed, mostly African and Mid-Eastern expats. Soccer on the wide screen. Two big spindles of lamb’s meat getting sliced up for shuarmas. A tile brazier with a coal fire roasting shishkabobs of four different kinds of meat. A bar in the back with a big tattooed Russian bartender and his big-breasted sidekick. French, Arabic, Russian, and English diluting the air.

Russia, Moscow

“Watch out for the bulldozer.”

“Hello my friend, do you want to buy some army stuff?”

“Ostarozhno, dvyeri zakrivayetsya.”

Russia, Moscow

Today went to the Sporta Zal Mir. Guys playing ping-pong. But then I noticed they were really good. World champions have trained there.

Russia, Moscow

“Lenin. Rodina. Sotsializm.”

[“Lenin. Motherland. Socialism.”]

Russia, St. Petersburg

Was walking one day, the first week here, and saw a submarine. Just sitting on dry land. I’d seen the marker for it earlier on a map, so I knew what it was. But just all of a sudden, there it was. It’s a museum. So near our obshyezhitiye. Podvodnaya lodka.

Russia, St. Petersburg

Went to the banya today. It was on Nevsky Prospect. Went with Eric, my roommate, and Dyenic, who is a friend of Faruk, who is a friend of Muktar, who are both Nigerians studying in St. Petersburg. I met Muktar on the bus the first week we were here. Dyenic is from Nizhnetavorsk, a town of about 300,000 in western Siberia. I think the banya would be better next to a fjord or frozen lake. Eric and I went looking for Dyenic yesterday. Got off the elevator on the 11th floor of his building, he lives on the 13th (Faruk lives on the 11th; we’d gone to the wrong floor), and saw a gun. A man (20-something) was pointing a pistol at another 20-something man. Eric and I got off the elevator, the man put the small-calibre automatic in his jacket pocket and the two of them got on the elevator, the elevator doors closed.

Russia, St. Petersburg

This is a dirty town.

Russia, St. Petersburg

Second day in St. Petersburg. Walked on the Gulf of Finland this evening. Surreal. Had a bus tour of the city today. The rest of the town is exactly like Novosibirsk.

Netherlands, Schiphol Airport

Sitting at the gate, waiting to go to St. Petersburg.

Netherlands, Leiden

Netherlands, Leiden

House quiet. Cars passing.

U.S.A., Minnesota, St. Paul

Called Leonid and Galena. Hadn’t met with them for several weeks, because Leonid’s mother was sick. Talked with Leonid. He said, “Many things have changed,” and that his mother was dead. Told him I was going to Russia, leaving December 28. Then graduating. Probably won’t see them again for a long time.