Syedyshev Oleg
Syedyshev Oleg

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Humorous Essays Based on students' memories

"All have died
except for those who are alive, and those whom we remember"Confucius

Essay 16. It's a small world

Not without a reason it is said: "It's a small world". In the most unexpected place one can meet the most unexpected person. For example, I had many various accidental meetings in my life. I will tell you about two of them. The stories are combined by the fact that both of them took place in Dubai in the hotel Burj al Arab. The difference between them is that they brought contrary emotions to me.

Richard Geer

Well, the first meeting. In the hotel Burj al Arab there are to huge escalators to go up or down from the first floor hall to the main lobby on the second floor. One day, I was hanging around the first floor waiting for my wife and checking a descending escalator. I looked at it and saw that there was Richard Gere coming down on it.

Well, I am not his fan, but the film "Pretty Woman" was one of the first I watched when the iron veil had fallen dawn. Involuntarily I made a step forward to Geer, smiled, and he came up to me, shook my hand and also smiling asked me: "Are you OK?" I gave a reply in Russian: "Vsje prekrasno!" (Everything is fine!) and we parted. I really was in a great mood. Later I was teasing Natalka that I almost had become buddies with Gere, that we had become like two birds of feather flock together, and things like that. Generally speaking, it was a wonderful topic for idle talk on vacation.

Anton Tabakov

The second meeting at the same place in Jumeirah was with Anton Tabakov. In that case I was a passionate fan of the talent of Anton Tabakov and his father.

I also with smile greeted Anton and asked: "How is OBLOMOV? How is your daddy?" (OBLOMOV is a restaurant in Moscow owned by Anton Tabakov). I do not know what I did wrong, but on Anton's face (Mother Nature rests on the talented people's children) appeared an expression of such arrogance and contempt, that my desire to talk to him absolutely disappeared.

The story was intended to be not about Gere and Tabakov Jr. I wanted to dedicate the story to Arkasha Blyakher once again. So, after the second or the third year Arkasha as if woke up after a long sleep, like the Illya Muromets (worrier, character of Russian historic epic). Only Illya Muromets went to defeat the infidel and all those whistling robbers, and Arkasha started chasing girls like crazy. No, of course not, we did not blame him, but even envied him sometimes. Arkasha was a fine talker, he was a handsome guy, that that he was red haired made him stand out right away. He had no complexes. He could start conversation on any topic and absolutely talked some ladies' heads off. Arkasha met girls in the streets, in a reading hall, on a tram, on a bus and in a cinema.

So, one day at the corner of Vesennyaya Str. and the bank of the river Tom, where there used to be a dumplings place, and later was an ice-cream cafe, well, in the very cafe Arkadiy fancied a voluptuous blonde, who was eating a huge ice-cream with currants jam. Arkasha was doing his best to impress her, though the blond was neither sending him away (she was sitting alone at the table, Arkasha practically set at her table without her permission), nor demonstrating any interest in him. And there Arkadiy made a mistake, he started lying to her and pretending that he was somebody else. And as it is well known lie is always punished. For Arkasha the blonde's words were like a bolt from the blue, when she said: "You are lying about all this, Blyakher." As it became known from reliable sources, Arkashka had quickly left and not even finished his ice-cream.

The sources were very reliable. The voluptuous blonde was my own aunt Valentina. Of course, I was telling her about my study, about my group and showed her photos. Of course, she knew Arkasha Blyakher from my stories and knew only good things about him. When he started making things up about himself, Valentina simply decided to teach him a lesson and show him his place.

I would be happy to tell the story from Arkasha's side, but he did not want to talk about that. And I asked him not directly, but through hints.

The bottom line is: it is bad to lie, and it is good not to lie.

july 10, 2011

© Copyright: Oleg Syedyshev, 2012
Publishing licence #21202100545

Translated by Viktoria Potykinato content ↑


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