In high school, they voted me "Most Likely to Become A Communist". They always had some way or another to identify those few who were concerned with world issues, whether it be human rights, the environment or any number of causes.
In college, I once again was stereotyped as the liberal. I wore sweats to class, took Russian as my language and faithfully read the editorial page of the New York Times.
With the way I was brought up, I truly believed that I could make a difference. And so I tried to, with every thing I did. I saw the world's problems as my own, and let them affect me as if they were.
I wrote letters to my senators about the pollution on our beaches; I didn't buy Exxon because of the Valdez; I worn a black armband to support the students in Tianamen Square. When the Wall came down, I was brought to tears with happiness and thought that maybe things were really coming together.
Thank you New York Times, Peter Jennings and CNN.
...Then I went to Russia.
I couldn't stand being so far away from these things that were rocking the course of world history. I was living through an amazing part of history, and I knew it. I had to get where the action was ...go to the problem for a change, rather than bringing it to me.
And so I went as a student to St. Petersburg for a semester. Near perfect timing: just two weeks after the failed coup (two weeks to late, as many of the students in my group thought). I was going to live through the transition, feeling the changes beneath my own feet. I would do my best to blend in and really experience all that was going on.
In Petersburg, we walked the streets after class, soaking up all that was Russia. The old tsarist architecture, soldiers in the streets, lines for bread, Pepsi and icecream. We rode the metros, walked through the markets, went to the symphony at night and talked in cafes till the early morning hour. Even with all of this, something was still out of place.
Us, we were told.
Everywhere we went, the natives were able to identify us immediately. Black marketeers hassled us to trade money. On the bread lines, they asked me if my hotel ran out of bread. And in the markets, some vendors wouldn't sell us fruits, saying "This is for our people. Your country can feed its own."
My Americanness had become a tattoo I couldn't hide or wash away. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't become Russian even for a day. People greeted my feet, not me.
"The American shoes are the giveaway!" I thought. And so I traded my Nikes for an old beat-up pair of work boots.
Then they greeted my face, but still immediately knew I was not one of them. Perhaps my face was not scarred with the lines of hard work and years of waiting hours on line in the snow for a warm piece of bread. Russians were sure a good judge of character, or at least nationality.
I felt let down. I had come with such high hopes of being able to identify with these people, and ride the rocky road of change along with them. But I was only going through the motions. Like a safety helmet, I wore my Americanness to keep me from cracking up. First hand Russian realities can be like pavement at 65 mph, and deep down inside, I didn't want to crash.
Perhaps it just wasn't possible at all. My Russian friend Andrei once said that if he wanted, he could come to America and be an American. But I could never become a Russian in Russia. "You're just born Russian. There's no other way to do it," he said.
I guess he was right. This one I had to play from the sidelines.
Four months and a good cup of coffee later, I find myself once again watching the evening news in my Downtown, U.S.A. apartment, wondering, working.
I still bother myself with other people's problems, although always with that safe distance between. There's only so close you can get to a problem if its not your own. And I can't change the world, but I can change the world in me. But I try.
I can always put on my red white and blue helmet and save myself from crashing when someone else doesn't know how to fly their own plane.
But that doesn't mean I can't still try to teach them how to fly...
cfh
March 24, 1992
© Comet Consulting / Colleen F. Halley
Last Updated: November 23, 1999
Contact: cfhalley@madriver.com