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Billy Joel (not so live) in Russia

While walking through Irkutsk, I was stopped short by this bit of graffiti. I didn't notice much graffiti in the town, the walls by the river notwithstanding, and I was surprised that this was what someone had chosen to tag adorn this wall.

My thoughts immediately went to his 1987 concerts in Russia. I knew little of the country then, but I remember a vague sense of excitement in the knowledge that he was there, performing for people in a country that seemed far off in the imagination.

If anything, my knowledge of the USSR was shaped by the then-recent memory of White Nights, the Mikhail Baryshnikov / Gregory Hines vehicle. In my mind I still remember the way the film introduced the characters and Hines' drunken tapping of a patriotic march. I remember too the centerpiece of the film when Baryshnikov demonstrates a beautiful pirouette that seems to go on forever, and the eventual dance partnership scenes that demonstrate their mutual understanding and agreement to work together.

I never suspected I would ever visit Russia. A friend went on an exchange program through his soccer team and I remember being jealous that he had set foot in Red Square. I asked him to bring me back a Coke bottle with cyrillic script. When he returned he brought me a Pepsi. He said he couldn't find Coke. He complained about the trip, but I was in thrall. I don't believe he ever showed me pictures.

My understanding of Russia had deepened by the time I arrived, some twenty years after my introduction through popular entertainment, and yet the country remained in large part a mystery to me. If anything, the train travel had brought me a closer understanding of the characters that populate Anton Chekhov's plays. I could imagine them on their large tracts of land and the distances that separated them from their neighbors. I could imagine the ennui and the long nights spent together alone, the trunks of trees creaking around them in the wind.

More photos of Moscow and my trip along the Trans-Siberian / Mongolian can be found at the links below:

Part one: The Trans-Siberian: Beautiful Monotony
Part two: The Trans-Mongolian: Contrasts

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Posted 18 Jan 2009   |   Photography + design © Eugene Kuo // 226.