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Synopsis of My Russian Adventures
(The shorter alternative to my Russian
journals)
By Winston Wu (WWu777us@yahoo.com)
www.happierabroad.com/Articles.htm
For those who do not
wish to read the hundreds of pages of my Europe/Russia trip journals, here’s a shorter
alternative – a synopsis with the main highlights in chronological order.
First Trip 2002
-
Arrived in
- The first lady, Olga, had gorgeous looks but had an empty personality, as well as a spoiled high maintenance attitude.
- Olga ended up ditching me for another man she met at a social tour before I arrived, which I found out by accident when I went to a marriage agency office to get more introductions. There, I met Olga’s sister’s fiancé, who explained everything to me.
- With time to spare, I go out on some guided tours with two guys I meet at a hostel, Jason and Jesus. Together, we all have instant brotherly comraderie and synergy.
-
While touring the
-
After a few days, Natasha’s tour
bus takes her out of
-
While in
-
In
-
This continues on when we visit
her grandmother in the village too. When
we return to
- But then an opportunity comes for me to get a piece of her sexy tanned hardbody. With her parents out of town, we make a semi-sex for money deal, which includes one photo, and begin. Both of us used each other during this. Afterward, Julia is elated and wishes to make more such deals.
- The next day, Julia introduces me to her friend Katya, a stunningly gorgeous blonde full of charisma, whom I found even more attractive than Julia.
- On a roll, I arrange a similar make out deal with Katya, and we commence. A photo was included as well.
- The following day, I decided I had enough of these emotionally draining episodes, and decide to leave. Julia and her family give me a very warm goodbye, and escort me to the train station.
-
I arrive in
-
In
-
After a few days in
-
After a long train ride, I arrive
in
- Elena and I have some mentality conflicts, and I find that I’m too drained from the past few weeks to even focus on her anyway. And when she finds out that I visited other women before her, she quickly loses interest in me anyway.
-
We decide to part as friends. After a long, deep philosophical talk in the
park, she escorts me to the train station to go to
-
In
-
After a few days, her mom takes
her to
-
Next, I head to the
- There, I visit a marriage agency to arrange my meeting with my next backup girl, Irina. When she arrives, she greets me and we go for a long walk through parks and zoos.
- That night, a fantasy of mine comes true. I bring a sex worker to my room, and she lets me video tape the whole thing!
- The next day, Irina escorts me to her home in the village on the hilly outskirts, to meet her parents and stay with her. The village, Perenalvoe, is situated next to an army training fort.
- Unfortunately though, Irina and I don’t hit it off. She acts disinterested, passive, and aloof toward me. So I decide to leave. Before I do though, her father shows me around the army fort and on top of a tank.
-
Back in
-
On my last day, I visit
-
The next day, I board a train
heading for
-
From
Second Trip 2003
-
I arrive in
-
There, I visit a long-time pen
pal, Vika, whom I had platonic relations with.
She shows me around beautiful
-
After about a week, I prepare to
take a train to
-
I arrive in
- The next few days turns out to be a flop. First, she puts us in two separate hotel rooms at my expense. How romantic. Then she acts masculine and rough, making her unattractive to me, and was nowhere as tender and warm as she was last year. She was also rude, clumsy, reckless with my money, and prudish toward me in regard to physical affection and intimacy. And she was demanding expensive taxi rides and restaurants at my expense, but I was getting nothing out of it - no physical intimacy and no stimulating conversation either. Furthermore, we didn’t seem to have any chemistry or connection, physically or mentally. And on top of that, I was too sick and weak to even deal with it all, making me irritable instead.
-
We ended up parting on cold terms,
and I was glad to be rid of her, who was becoming a pocket-leecher on me for
nothing. She though, assumed that I
would be coming to her home city of
- Relieved, I headed to my hostel to do things my way. There, I contacted Olga, an English speaking Russian girl I met from a dating site. We arrange to meet.
- I liked Olga a lot. She was intelligent, sweet, charming, yet serious, and with self-respect and maturity. I found her company to be very pleasant. And unlike Natasha, she wasn’t reckless or high maintenance, and was glad to ride the metro, showing me around. She seemed fond of me too. But there was a limit to my attraction to her, for I didn’t find her feminine enough for me, for some reason.
- With my birthday coming up, I decide to visit Julia of Cherepovets again, for fun, since I felt that with her wild, crazy, and charismatic personality, she would be the funnest person to celebrate my birthday with. Plus I wanted to see her mesmerizing girlfriend Katya again too, whom I paid to make out with last year. I was stoked on her, and hoped to have some relations with the girl of my dreams, which she looked like.
- On my birthday, I got more than what I wished for. Not only did I meet Katya again, who joined us to go to a nightclub, but when she found out that I was seeking a Russian bride, she offered to be my bride! We got engaged instantly. So on my birthday, I got engaged to the girl of my dreams! I felt like a blessed king.
- Afterward, I didn’t know whether to feel like the luckiest guy in the world, or the biggest fool, having gotten engaged to a girl I only knew for two days total.
- For about a week, we all celebrated and partied a lot, going to nightclubs and discos almost every night (at my expense though) and while doing so, discussed my future life and plans with Katya, and the details of our wedding as well. Julia’s English speaking Latvian friend, Sandra came along to translate between us. Everywhere we went together, many men would look at us in envy, flattering my ego, as I had never had such an experience before. I felt like I was on top of the world. Sometimes, after the nightclub, we would go to a banya and sauna to cool down.
-
After about a week, we decided to
head to
- There, it turns out that the first step in the fiancée visa process is for me to go back to the states and apply through the Immigration and Naturalization Services (INS) department to petition for an alien fiancée. So at this point, we can do nothing further. Katya looked somewhat disappointed and expressionless.
- That day, after Katya pressured me into buying expensive new boots and a purse for her at an upscale mall, I begin to get the sinking feeling that I’m being used and made a mistake in pursuing serious relations with her. My conscience and dignity were bruised and giving me bad signs. But my desire to maintain relations with my fantasy girl led me to stick it out, hoping it would get better, rationalizing away all contrary evidence and red flags in her behavior.
-
That night, Julia leaves after
visiting her Spanish sugar daddy Felix, going home to
- The next day, Katya has a cold sociopathic look about her, and pressures me into buying her an expensive new jacket to match her new boots and purse. I dislike the idea at first, but being too nice and eager to please, I comply, though reluctantly.
-
When she finally left that night
to take the train back to
-
After she left, I felt relieved,
as I did with Natasha, for the stranglehold over my pocket book was finally
gone, and I was free to do things my way once again without pressure. And I realized that Katya as well as Julia
were too emotionally draining to be around, and therefore I was crazy to think
that a marriage could work out with Katya, who was probably using me either for
gifts or for a visa to the
-
After I contact Olga again in
-
Next, I prepared to head east
toward
-
After the long train ride to
- There, I also meet another girl I knew from the internet, Oksana, a pleasant girl as well. One night, a lawyer named Igor whom I met on the train invites me out to meet a beautiful girl named Elena and a few others at a cafe dance area. I fall for the gorgeous brunette Elena, and dance the night away with her, but she seemed quiet, passive, and non-expressive.
-
I end up liking
-
After a few days, I left
- That night, Alena finally showed up, but acted flighty and indecisive. Although she proposed many plans with me, she flaked out the next day and refused to take any of my phone calls. So I focused on Gulechka instead.
- Later that night, I ordered a sex worker to come to my room, and again, she let me video tape it, making my fantasy come true a second time.
- Gulechka turned out to be a nice quiet reserved girl, easygoing and honest. But I wasn’t that attracted to her, and she moved way too slowly, so I had little interest in her, though she tried to persuade me to stay longer, shocked that I wanted to leave already.
-
I was supposed to go to
- But it wasn’t to be. When she arrived, she insisted on bringing me back to Cherepovets with her that night, instead of staying overnight with me in Moscow, making up some bogus reason. That day, we ate at an American restaurant, went to a museum, and an amusement park afterward.
-
Back in
-
With not much else to do, I took
Julia’s suggestion of going to
-
Julia and I go to
-
I meet a cool guy named Vadim in
an internet café there, and we begin hanging out, along with his girlfriend
Olga. They are the perfect excuse for me
to start avoiding Julia and Elena. Soon
Julia leaves to go to
-
I had planned to join Julia in
-
In
- We spend a few days together. I grow fond of her as I did with Olga. She was sweet, intelligent, well mannered and well behaved. Again, I noticed the contrast between her comfortable pleasant elegant aura vs the dangerous flighty aura of fiancée Katya, which opens my eyes and makes me realize the folly of my ways. At that point, I decide to get rid of fiancée Katya, but not before I try to play her back.
-
After a few days, I ride the train
to
- For some reason, Katya acts different from before. Her demeanor seems wicked and sinister, and looks at me as if I’m some kind of joke to her. I also get the feeling that she’s plotting something dangerous against me.
- Again, she continually breaks her promises to have sex, which causes animosity and quarrel between us, which only intensify as time goes on.
- Finally, we have sex one morning, but due to lack of chemistry and our feelings of animosity, it isn’t very good.
- Then we relocate to Izailovsky Park Hotel complex. There, on the verge of breaking up, we meet a man named Yanis, who promises to reconcile us both. Thus, the infamous “The Negotiator Scam” begins, a black comedy fiasco which you can read about in full at www.happierabroad.com/The_Negotiator_Scam.htm or in brief at www.happierabroad.com/Russian_Scams.htm
- During the “Negotiator Scam”, Yanis, Katya, and Julia conspire to con me out of hundreds of dollars, which only partially succeeds. The next morning, I find the “smoking gun” accidentally, which revealed that Katya not only assisted the con man in swindling me, but received her cut, and had sex with him in a separate hotel room as well, thus committing two crimes, assisted THEFT and INFIDELITY, in one swoop.
- Humiliated, shamed, and shocked, I soon flee the scene, glad to be rid of Katya and Julia finally, and relieved that my inner conflict over Katya was over as well.
- After going to Cherepovets first to pick up my luggage from Julia’s home, I head to St. Petersburg to take the train to Latvia, to apply for a new Russian visa, for mine was about to expire. Upon returning, I planned to follow my original plan of cities and women to visit, which changed by the Katya fiasco.
-
Arriving in
-
While waiting for my new Russian
visa, I head up to
-
Back in
-
With my new month long visa, I
return to
- We didn’t get along at all. She was stoic, expressionless, too skinny, weird, and not very attractive. We soon parted.
- Disappointed that night, I order a sex worker, who turned out to be a pretty petite slim brunette. We have great sex.
-
Next, I headed over to
-
- Next, I meet a girl in a supermarket who tours the city with me for a while, before asking me to buy a mobile phone for her as a birthday present. When I refuse, I never hear from her again.
-
I then pay a visit to
- After about five days together though, with the heated passion growing, she suddenly stops seeing me for no reason, first claiming that her grandmother was sick, then that she didn’t think we were compatible cause her feelings for me weren’t strong enough.
- Disheartened, I get another introduction, Oksana, who turns out to be sweet and nice, but I wasn’t terribly attracted to her. We have a nice time together though, and she is a likable person.
-
When I leave, I head back to
-
Back in
-
When I return to
-
So I hung out with this spacey,
alternative, masseuse hippie girl named Anya, and ended up going with her to
- The camps and events there were fun and free spirited, but I ended up spending most of my time with a Chi Gong Group there, having deep conversations around the campfire until morning.
-
The next day, I miss my afternoon
train with Anya back to
-
Back in
- After a long train ride south, I arrive in a warm sizzling city with magnificent monuments and positive energy. I immediately had a good feeling about the place.
- On my first day, I met three blonde girls. First, I met this friendly woman named Olga on the street, who had a very bubbly personality and showed me around the waterfront. Then I headed over to Volzhsky, a nearby small city where Anastasya agency set me up to meet a lady on my list, also named Olga. I found her very attractive and sexy, but she was shy and passive, and showed a little interest in me. That night, I meet two sisters at a waterfront café. We drank together, flirted, and hung out.
-
The next day, I meet two more
gorgeous girls, Katya and then later
- The day after, I head over to Volzhsky to meet Olga again, who takes me to Mama Kurgan, the site of the Russian version of the Statue of Liberty, though larger. The monument turned out to be impressive and glorious, filling you with awe.
- That evening, Olga comes to my hotel room, and our passion erupts, resulting in physical intimacy. I was elated to score with someone I was so strongly attracted to.
- However, the next day, she becomes cold and distant to me, perhaps regretting what happened the day before.
-
Feeling a little let down, I go
meet
- The next day, I move into a nice flat owned by Brad’s wife’s family. Then I meet Irina again from Karmen agency. She warms up to me and I could feel her attraction to me, but I had mixed feelings about her. After that, I go see Olga in Volzhsky again, but she continues to give me the cold treatment, so I let her go, sadly.
-
The following day, Katya bombshell
(the nickname I gave her) takes me to the famous
- One day, when I went to Karmen agency to meet Irina, I saw this breathtakingly surreal blonde woman named Natalia, who was there to meet another man. Since I was with my date though, I couldn’t do anything about it.
- Amazingly though, I accidentally run into Natalia on the street two days later, and stop her to declare my interest in her, informing her about my availability. She reciprocates and we begin dating.
- For Natalia, I ditch my upcoming weekend plans with Irina, to be with her, whom I was head over heels for.
- On our first date, Natalia and I were on a night boat cruise on the river, where we kissed intensely and passionately. It was like a dream come true.
- The next few days, I find Natalia very intelligent, analytical, and deep. We seem to be a great match.
- But after three days, Natalia suddenly dumps me, giving me suspicious reasons, which remain a mystery to this day.
-
For the rest of my time in
-
I see Irina, whom I had ditched
for Natalia, one more time as well, trying to conceal my guilt. But it was too late to re-establish anything
with her, for I had to leave the day after for
-
The next day, a girl I met earlier
escorts me to the train station to head back to
-
Back in
- That evening, in the middle of July, I take the many bags I stored in a hostel luggage room, and take a taxi to the airport.
- After spending the night in the airport, I leave the next morning sadly, pondering the significance and meaning of the whole 6 month journey, and wondering when or if I would return again.
Third Trip 2004-2005
-
This time, over a year after the
end of my second trip, my third trip began three months late, delayed due to
being in
-
My journey began in August by
flying to
-
After about 5 days, I continued on
my way to
-
In
-
Nevertheless, soon, due to my
outgoingness and aggressive flirtatiousness, I began meeting and dating more
girls in
-
Originally, my plan was to be here
3 to 5 days and then take the train way down south to
-
Oddly, this delay went on another
six weeks. During that time, the only
time I left
- When I returned, I tested to see if I could get paying work in Moscow, instead of my originally planned volunteer work in Izhevsk in exchange for accommodations.To my surprise, I found that my skills were in demand, as I began receiving a lot of interviews. Though I went to them out of curiosity, I was soon accepted for two jobs - a journalist position at a European corporate real estate gazette, and an English teaching position. Although my purpose of seeking work there was a mere experimentation, it instead led me into a commitment. Now my original plans were definitely altered, thus creating a huge inner conflict in me.
- I was now in an odd situation, unprecedented and
unforeseen. Staying in
- Asking my reader list for feedback, I heard a lot of
good arguments from both sides, those suggesting I stay in
- The conflict in me came down to feeling like I was
tampering with the natural flow of destiny, as if I was stepping outside a safe
path that destiny lay before me to risk reaping dire consequences, which put me
in danger, vs. remaining to feel extreme anxiety and guilt over breaking my
promises to others. Somehow, I knew that
I leaned toward relieving myself of the latter, and would be looking for
excuses to go that way.
- And that’s just what I did. Eventually, after justifying to myself that I
could return to
- First, I headed to
- However, Vadim’s intentions were way less than
sincere or benign, and it went totally beyond what I could imagine. I thought I knew this guy, but I was dead
wrong, in ways I had never imagined.
Thus, the infamous “Private Police” scam began, the second of the group
scams against me (the first being the “Negotiator Scam” mentioned in the
synopsis of the second trip). Conspired
by Vadim and his friends, he, whom I considered my close friend and brother,
played an active role in it. Suffice to
say, Vadim also used drugs (marijuana I think) which might explain his
sociopathic behavior and lack of conscience.
- You can read about the “Private Police Scam” in full
at www.happierabroad.com/The_Private_Police_Scam.htm
with addendums and reader comments, or in brief at www.happierabroad.com/Russian_Scams.htm.
- In a nutshell, Vadim and his cohorts used two girls
from a disco to come over and steal my camcorder. There was no way I could have seen it
coming. The next day, he committed
extortion by forcing me to give him and his co-conspirators 300 dollars,
claiming it was the fee for their “private police” firm to retrieve it from the
black market. The scheme was very
elaborate, and involved fake police badges and police reports from Vadim’s
friend. With no other choice (since I
would have had to spend 300 dollars to get a new one anyway) I complied
reluctantly, knowing that something fishy and shady was going on, but refusing
to believe that my own trusted friend would be involved in this. After some hours of paying the fictitious
“fee”, I got my camcorder back.
- But it wasn’t over though. The next night, Vadim arranged to have me
ambushed by an attacker in a dark section of a park, which he led me into. The attacker, who jumped out suddenly,
attempted to steal my backpack with the camcorder inside, so that Vadim would
have a reason to ask me for another “fee” again. Fortunately, the plan failed, as I fought
hard to hold onto it, and the attacker fled, though leaving me bruised and
shaken up. The obvious give-away in this
was that Vadim lied about being hit in the stomach so that he couldn’t help me
during the attack, and the sheer improbability that one man would come out and
attack two men with no weapons.
- Soon after that, I left
- In spite of all he did, Vadim and Julia’s friend
Elena, who showed up unexpectedly, saw me off at the bus station and gave me a
warm goodbye. Next, I headed toward
- I found
-
- However, that night, when I went to check out the
café/bar on the boat, this super friendly and flirtatious cute blonde came to
join me. As it turned out, she was a
“working girl” but I liked her cause she was attractive, charming, and we
seemed to have some chemistry. So I took
Tanya up on her solicitation. I made a
deal with her which was 100 dollars (3000 roubles) for all night, about 8
hours.
- However, when Tanya took the money and came back, she
was like a different person. Her makeup
was gone, and she spoke like a run-down girl with a coarse deep voice, rather
than the charming, sweet person she was before.
- Things got much worse. Our sexual styles conflicted, and she constantly
argued with me over everything. I
managed to just barely climax in her.
Then, to my horror, she reneged on our deal, pretending not to even
remember it. She claimed that I had only
paid for two hours, and that if I wanted all night, I would have to shell out
another hundred dollars. In angry
righteous protest, I reminded her that we already made the deal, which was even
partially written down, so there was no misunderstanding or excuse.
- Thus, the infamous “All night sex feud in
- Unable to resolve this diplomatically, I had the
security guardsman come in to get his help.
Surely, I thought, he would listen to reason, since this was a simple
clear cut case. However, it turned out
that since he got a cut of Tanya’s earnings, he had a vested interest in her
ability to scam more money out of me, making him far less than unbiased. Though he tried every way he could, he failed
to persuade me to pay double, since on every point and issue, I made my solid
indisputable case. It was a mere matter
of her breaking the deal, which warranted a partial refund, or else her follow
through on the rest of it. Tanya would
accept neither, only more money. Though
the guardsman attempted to persuade me that perhaps I misunderstood the price
and time, it was in vain, for the deal had been made in writing, so no
misunderstanding was possible. And he
knew it too. Knowing that he was in a
no-win situation, the guardsman looked up above, as if asking God for what to
do.
- Finally, when I threatened to report her scam and his
support of it to the hotel administration staff, the guardsman gave up and
left. From the rest of the night til
morning, Tanya slept with me in gloomy reluctance, giving me no more
intimacy. Instead, she repeatedly
muttered, “500 roubles please” throughout the night, even while
half-asleep. But being a tough and righteous
cookie that I am, I refused to give in out of principle.
- I can honestly say that after that, I lost nearly all
my trust and respect for Russians, seeing how even the nice mainstream ones
(such as the hotel guardsman) lacked even the most basic morals of right and
wrong, fairness, integrity, honor, etc., sacrificing all those traits even for
a little profit. From then on, I would
never view Russians the same, or given them the benefit of the doubt ever
again.