Love and Lunching

I've really hit the meeting cool people jackpot here in Moscow. There is no other way I would survive being away from Hubs for long periods. The other day, I had lunch with one of my cool people and I feel that I should share because the whole experience pretty much sums up what living in Moscow is like.

It started off easy enough, I suggested a cafe that another friend had discovered, so we start walking the right direction. Only we took a wrong turn somewhere, not enough to get us lost, but enough to not be able to find our destination. Oops. Sorry.

So, my friend suggests a place that she's familiar with and off we go. Only we walk a few blocks and she says that maybe it's not the right direction. Oops. Again. Here we are, Red Square in the background, an American and a Canadian walking in circles trying to find a place to sit and eat.

We were close to La Cantina, so we headed there and sat on the patio ready to people-watch and chat. And what a great time we had chatting! And that's the cool part about meeting people overseas. So many similarities. You can't hear or tell a story without the other person laughing before the punchline because we both know the end of the story. We swapped market shopping stories, language barrier stories and husband stories. (All good, Hubs...) And there's a connection. Because I get bullied into buying fruit that I don't want too. And I don't know what to say either when someone starts chattering on in Russian. And I love my husband so much that none of it matters, just like my friend. I won't say that other people don't understand what its like to make sacrifices that don't feel like sacrifices because the love and affection you feel for that person drowns out the rest, but she understood that concept specifically in the way that I did. In the pack your things, tell your friends and family goodbye and hang on.

We ended up staying on the patio for close to four hours talking, laughing and making plans. All the while being interrupted by various transients as they pass by. One spoke English, kind of. It was more like drunk-anese because every time I thought we understood what he was saying, he threw us for a loop. By far the hardest one to get rid of. Other than that, it was an assortment of Babushkas and transients chattering away in Russian. Thinking about it now, I guess I would target the two English-speaking women on a patio for four hours straight on a Thursday.

We ordered the business lunch. These things are awesome. Only 250 rubles ($8) and it comes with soup, a salad and an entree. Today's special was salmon soup, Greek salad and tilapia with rice. Everything was so good leading up to the entree, and I was so wrapped up in conversation that I took the biggest bight of tilapia I could fit on a fork. And thats when I bit down on multiple bones. Now, it doesn't help that I am married to a master fisherman who's filleting skills are out of this world, but I just can't handle bones in my fish. Yuck. Yuck. Yuck. However, if you're on a diet, it is better to have some because you eat very slowly. Like one half-inch flake at a time slowly. Regardless, a delicious meal.

Not ready for our lunch chat to be over, we ordered coffee. Five minutes later, a gentleman at another table ordered coffee and got his in a couple minutes. Thirty minutes later, another gentleman ordered coffee and promptly received his. Eventually, we decided that we should ask again and sure enough, got our coffee. Service in Moscow is so different. Our waitor didn't even blink an eye when we ordered coffee for the second time. Meh. No big deal.

So. To sum up our afternoon... We got lost. Twice. Found a patio with Red Square within our view. Two panhandlers later we received our meal. The preparation was different than I'm used to. Three panhandlers and a drunk later we asked for coffee. Five stories, one panhandler and a second request for coffee later we received said coffee. Ten missed calls and messages collectively later we parted ways. It was a great, great day.

And this is only one instance of the good fortune I've had with great friends.

Cheers to new friends and the stories they bring to the business lunch table.