After some more exchanges with the Mentors, the situation had become clearer. The Mentors had set up their roadblock just to see how ZIL members reacted. No one passed judgment or drew any conclusion, but Stacy definitely felt that they could have handled the roadblock incident better. Maybe if Stacy had gotten out of the car, with her Tranquility Aura and her negotiation skills they might have gotten past peacefully. After all, the Mentors had really not come across as a bunch of determined hitmen. Similar roadblocks in future might be set up by local bullies, pranksters or petty crooks. Sniping everybody using taser gel rifles seemed too expedient to be a good practice.
…
Since the airship was still berthed at this point, the ZIL members climbed up using scaffolding stairs.
As everyone walked into the garage, Riley suddenly spoke up.
“Wait! Shoes on or shoes off?”
“Off, of course!” Angel exclaimed. “Do we even need to vote on this?”
“Wait, during the Stealsky mission you were the one who didn’t…”
“This is our house and home. That is the difference,” Angel asserted.
“Wait,” Naz intervened. “We’re in the garage.”
“So?”
“Garage and workshop – my office – are linked. It’s basically the same big room,” Naz pointed out. “And since it’s a place for doing work with machines and sparks and heavy things, I must point out that I expect to work in my boots. Absolutely not going to wear indoor slippers.”
“Of course. That’s for safety,” Angel rejoined.
“How about we go for indoor boots?” Stacy asked. “Because Naz might need to work on things within the ship.”
“I support funding indoor boots for Naz,” Marilyn raised her hand. “Because workplace safety is very important.”
“I don’t think there’s a need to wear indoor boots here,” Naz said. “Garage and workshop are always more dirty and greasy than the rest. I would prefer to wear a different pair of boots if working inside the ship. I’ll keep wearing my outdoor boots in this area.”
“Then…”
“Hey, look. Five pairs of slippers have been placed here. At the entrance to the gym.”
“By the way, the stairs to the second floor start there,” Riley pointed out to Stacy, who had never been inside the MMM before. “So you have to go past the entrance to the gym anyway.”
“All right. I think that settles it. Our home starts here,” Angel pointed. “Where the Benefactors’ staff have kindly placed five pairs of indoor slippers.”
Riley squatted down to examine the slippers.
“They’re pretty generic and a standard size. I don’t really like these.”
With that, Riley slipped her foot out of her moccasin. It was obvious that Riley had a longish, slim foot profile. Which meant the standard sized slippers would be extremely loose on her foot.
“Well, we could vote to decide whether to use communal funds for getting everybody a pair that she likes,” Marilyn offered.
“Let’s just stick with these for now. And at the next town or our next stop, we just get our own indoor footwear, on our own kopeck,” Stacy offered. “Because if we buy standard ones for everyone, they will still tend to come in standard sizes which don’t fit everybody.”
Everyone nodded, so there was no need to take a vote.
Reflections
As the others began removing their footwear, Stacy considered how Russians and most people in the ex-USSR have little understanding of Western freedoms. Historically, Russians never had freedom of speech. Religion and travel were always restricted. And the various ethnicities didn’t have any right to self determination outside what the imperial center was willing to grant them.
Yet the Benefactors now offered ZIL members freedom. They could say whatever they liked, worshipped whatever they wanted, travel everywhere and make decisions for themselves. How would they choose? Would they make good decisions that bettered their lives and others, or would they seek dissolute and luxury living? They could certainly just do the minimum for two years, traveling everywhere on subsidized fuel, eating subsidized food and rejecting all proposed missions that involved any risk or discomfort.
Stacy didn’t want her team to make selfish decisions. But what if she was consistently voted down? Could she continue this project?
But surely the Benefactors didn’t spend so much money to build this airship and rescue people, without first having done their research and analyses. Moreover the Benefactors were also invested in the long term. They were arming and supporting and cultivating each member and training her with the help of Mentors. The Benefactors already showed that they had some sense of the ZIL team members’ personalities. And everyone seemed to aspire to become better people.
“They seem to know us better than we know ourselves,” Stacy thought. “Lets hope their faith in us is proven right.”
Welcome Aboard
Because Stacy was caught in her own introspection, she was the last to remove her footwear and step into the airship.
The gym was very spacious and offered a great view outside. But the others were already on the second floor, so Stacy hastened up the stairs.
…
“Welcome to our dear MMM, Stacy!” Marilyn put on a bright smile and spread her arms out. “Narrow corridors, small personal rooms, shared kitchen and bathrooms… ah, back to lovely Soviet times! Our flying version of a communal apartment!”
Angel looked suspiciously at Marilyn. “You lived in a communal apartment before?”
Thinking she was being asked, Riley made a face.
“You think there are mansions in Siberian villages that can be converted into communal apartments? No! A shitty self-built shack, half dug out of dirt, was what my grandparents and parents had to endure!”
“Wait, you once said that you had electricity? That doing your own wiring helped make you an electrical engineer?” Angel now turned her attention to Riley. It was probably a conversation that they had before they rescued Stacy.
“That was much later, all right? Decades of hard work by grandparents and parents,” Riley said, shaking her head. “Smart and educated people turned into peasants and lumberjacks…”
…
Angel had not intended to upset Riley, but now Riley was reminded of bad memories. Stacy reached out and touched Riley’s arm.
“There is no shame to surviving by being a peasant or lumberjack. Consider what native Siberians had to do to survive. No matter how intellectually inclined they were, they always had to be herders and lumberjacks.”
Riley sighed.
“Siberia toughened my family. And me. It was going back to Lithuania that… was hard to adjust to.”
The conversation had stopped along a narrow corridor in the MMM, so traffic was blocked. But the others didn’t object. Naz was listening with a mixed expression on her face, since her family had never been treated as political criminals. Even though they had sometimes acted like real criminals…
“The exiles have manifested a different culture and value system from those who never left?” Stacy asked gently.
“Exactly,” Riley replied. “I thought Lithuania was supposed to be some ideal place – at least, in my family’s renderings. It turned out to be just a, well, normal country. If I can say that. The people who were never exiled are comfortable and happy, which is a good thing I suppose. But their values and priorities seem to be so – shallow. Materialistic. Self-satisfied.”
Riley ruffled her blonde hair in a show of confusion and ambivalence.
“The government was nice to us. They gave us exiles a free apartment. And since I didn’t need to do certain chores anymore, I got to the top of my class simply by working as hard as I would have in Siberia.”
Stacy noted that everyone was listeni.ng to Riley intently.
“Then after topping class after class, I was left with wanting more,” Riley concluded. “Lithuania felt very small to me.”
“It’s the same elsewhere,” Stacy said. “There was this study done in Poland. They compared Poles who were displaced after the war and forced to move into ex-German lands, with Poles who had stayed put all the way. And they found that it was the local diasporic Poles – those forced to move – who wound up richer, more educated, more worldly, more open to outside experiences. Because they adopted a culture that valued education and the training of one’s skills.”
Marilyn put her hands on her bottom. “All these, just from moving locally? From one part of Poland to another part, and in just a few decades?”
“Yes. Cultural change can take place very fast.”
Riley waved her hands. “Uh, please don’t misunderstand. I am not putting down my country for not meeting my standards. They really cared about us exiled and made it so easy for exiles to come back – which shows you that Soviet oppression hadn’t eradicated our sense of nation. My country educated me and gave me a future.”
Riley looked at Marilyn, then at Stacy. “But at the same time, without wanting to sound ungrateful, I felt, well, we’re More. You know what that means? There is More to Lithuania.”
Everyone continued listening. Riley had not really expected this of her new comrades, but she did appreciate having sympathetic listeners. So she took a deep breath and leaned against one wall.
“Historically, Lithuania was a lot bigger. And for most of Lithuanian history, it wasn’t just one country on its own. We were joined to Poland in union. So our identity, it overlaps and is intertwined with our modern neighbors: Poland, Latvia, Belarus and Ukraine. And a big part of our identity also overlaps and is intertwined with the other now-vanished ethnic groups living within the borders of modern day Lithuania – mainly the Jews and Baltic Germans. Also some Prussians.
Maybe Soviet oppression made us think small. Nowadays most Lithuanians are not that interested in our other historical identities. But I couldn’t. We have freedom, so we should use it to do meaningful things.
Riley now stood straight and away from the wall.
“Digging up any history that the Soviets would have disapproved of, must be worth doing! So I got involved with an extracircular activity to discover and understand the fate of the Lithuanian Jews.”
…
Riley took a breath.
…
Riley was clearly not ready to say more. Stacy sensed it was time to change the topic.
“Can I say that the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was also like a communal apartment? With different ethnicities living within, sharing the same public spaces and facilities while having a bit of personal space for themselves?”
“Yes, I think so,” Riley replied.
Stacy now turned to Marilyn. “I haven’t seen everything. But it actually looks very good so far. Do you really think the MMM is comparable to a Soviet communal apartment? Don’t you think that is like comparing the first class compartment of a Boeing 747 jet to the cargo hold on an Antonov An-8 turboprop?”
Marilyn put on an embarrassed smile.
It occurred to Stacy that perhaps Marilyn had never been on a jet aircraft. Maybe she hadn’t even lived in a communal apartment before, and was just fooling around.
Stacy scored a hit without expecting it. The Antonov An-8 had been built in Tashkent. Even if it wasn’t that great a plane, it was a matter of local pride. Uzbekistan makes aircraft! But the end of the USSR, following by the withdrawal of the airworthiness certificate for this plane after some accidents, put an end to an era. The Tashkent company that produced planes in the Soviet era was now struggling to find new markets and parts, and had become an economic burden.
Even though the ZIL team had been together for only a few days, each member’s personality was apparent. Marilyn always tried to joke and fool around, even if her attempts were not always successful.
Stacy looked Marilyn up and down quickly, and decided to save Marilyn from any further embarrassment.
“We’re ZIL, so we won’t hesitate to take good things from the Soviet era, all right? Communal apartments are all right if they’re as impressively well appointed as on this airship.”
Riley snorted. “Good things from the Soviet era are as hard to find as…”
“Red hairs on Riley,” Naz threw in her own contribution unexpectedly. Then Naz took a single strand of red hair that she had shed, and made a show of placing it on Riley’s shoulder.
The ZIL members looked at their only red-headed member, Naz, and laughed. Marilyn was saved from embarrassment at having a joke fall flat.
XXX
Stacy had been to many places before. By Russian standards she was astonishingly well traveled. But she had never been aboard an airship, so she had no idea what to expect.
Since she had flown on many different airlines, Stacy did make some informed guesses. Most of which were right.
The MMM was minimalist and utilitarian. Much like how the facility off Kirovskaya Ulitsa was laid out.
The furnishings were sparse. Most furniture was inflatable or made of foam, and there was little unnecessary shelving or cabinetry. A lot of shelving was made of shaped aluminum with foam panels, which made it much lighter than wood. All lights were utilitarian and employed minimum materials to ensure minimum weight. There were no chandeliers or fancy fixtures. No flowers. No curtains. No wallpaper. No decorative baubles, such as statues and paintings. And only a few thin rugs of fairly nondescript appearance.
Most Russians would have rugs because of the cold climate. But these few rugs were very minimalist looking. There were no Central Asian-influenced designs. Instead the rugs were monochrome and looked like they had been bought from the nearest Ikea outlet.
Even though the MMM could be said to look impersonal, businesslike, utilitarian and austere – even Soviet, Stacy sensed it could be home. Because it gave them all a new start, away from their normal homes in the normal world below them. Every member of ZIL could make a fresh start and craft a new life for herself and redefine herself in this new environment.
Oh…
And Stacy had to be clear about this. The Benefactors were indeed generous and well funded. Even if this airship didn’t have any luxuries like artworks and paintings, it was still astonishingly and immensely luxurious.
Why superlatively luxurious? Because the airship offered excess where excess counted the most. In terms of space.
Space is always at a premium in the air. Whether you are on board the International Space Station, or a Boeing commercial jet, or a high altitude crewed balloon – or an airship.
But this airship was insanely spacious. Marilyn had already described it as having a total floor space of 2000 square meters. Which would make it practically a mansion of 21528 square feet. Nine times the size of an average American home. But hearing Marilyn’s factual rendition was not the same as seeing for herself.
The kitchen on board the MMM was maybe six times as big as the standard Russian apartment kitchen. Moreover, food storage was done in adjoining rooms – the pantry and walk in freezer. So this left plenty of space to hang around, eat, prepare food and talk.
…
Having a huge, superbly well equipped kitchen with the best facilities is no trivial matter.
This was a very Soviet and Russian thing.
In many countries – United States, Britain, Japan, Germany, Norway- the kitchen did not represent a unique space in people’s lives.
But in most parts of the Soviet Union, the kitchen was the core of private life. It was where family members, close friends, and intimate circles gathered. People ate something, then debated. They revealed personal thoughts that they had kept hidden outside. They passed on news beyond the reach of censorship. They practiced self expression such as poetry reading. Or exchanged samizdat covertly. That was how Boris Pasternak’s Doctor Zhivago, and Alexander Solzhenitsyn’s The Gulag Archipelago, had been secretly typed out, distributed and read throughout the Soviet Union. Not in libraries but kitchens.
Stacy didn’t know who had designed the MMM. But she sensed a certain gentle familiarity. As though the person who designed this airship had some understanding and respect for the people of the region.
…
“…I don’t know what to call this,” Riley said as the ZIL members gathered in the kitchen after a walkaround.
“You’ve never lived in a khrushchyovka?” Naz asked.
“Family had to make their own dugout-cum-shack as political deportees,” Riley said. “But over the decades it just got better and turned into a regular house that we could be proud of. Nope, at least it was something we built ourselves!”
“The folks in Khrushchyovkas didn’t have much chance. No choices.”
“Komunalkas were even worse. You had to share the same kitchen!”
“The damned k-slums…!”
…
Stacy watched, bemused, as her teammates randomly rambled on about the horrors of ordinary Soviet life. Now that the USSR was gone and most countries had economic freedom, living standards and expectations had gone up everywhere.
But it was so funny to compare their new home with the other Soviet-era housing options (as if there were real options). The other members were doing mock criticism.
“Like these k-slums, we still have shared bathrooms.”
“Yeah, but now we have two bathrooms for five people. Double the standard ratio. That’s a big improvement from your normal k-slum.”
“Well, if we get diarrhoea, we can’t run outside and do our business in the bushes. We’re trapped with only 2 toilets.”
“Wrong. There are two toilets on the main living area floor, but two more exist,” Naz pointed out. “One on the gym-and-garage floor below us, and one in the prison cell above us. Four of us can afford to feast on Russian quality, and then have diarrhoea at the same time.”
“That’s great, four toilets for five people. Four times the ratio of a k-slum flat. Can’t complain.”
“Let’s hope the fifth is either immune, or puking in the kitchen sink instead.”
“Walls are still thin and lightweight.”
“Yeah, but these are special insulating foam, at least they’re soundproofed now.”
“K-slums were meant to last 25 years.”
“An airship can surely remain in the air at least that long,” Riley shrugged.
“At least we have a nice kitchen now.”
“Kitchen and dining are only the size of a standard Khrushchyovka though.”
“Yeah, the size of a Khrushchyovka. Six by five meters. But did you forget that a k-slum apartment was meant to be lived in? Here we have nearly the same space – thirty square meters dedicated for just kitchen and dining.
“And that thirty square meters doesn’t include the generous walk in freezer, the vast pantry and the part holding the two fridges. So it’s a lot more comfy space.”
“We can walk around and talk and do lots of living things in the kitchen. Finally the kitchen is a place for community!”
“Kitchen was also a place for community in komunalkas. Except everything had to be padlocked.”
“We could revive that spirit by locking everything up also.”
…
While everybody was chatting, Stacy was thinking to herself.
The toilets in the Moscow facility off Kirovskaya Ulitsa had been modern and Western. Stacy really appreciated being able to sit on a comfortable toilet seat instead of squatting over a filthy and ugly hole in the ground like so many other Russian toilets in old facilities.
But now they were on board an airship. And Stacy was surprised to find a type of toilet that is normally found only in one country. She felt very strongly about this, because it was such an awesome toilet.
Did the others know how to use these Japanese toilets? Surely nobody could read the Japanese words on the fittings. Stacy did know how to use it, but that was not because she watched anime. It was because she had read about Japanese culture. She expected at least one member to squat on the toilet seat. That was how notorious Soviet or Russian toilets and the toilet habits of their users were.
Stacy decided to confront this mystery right away. It was better to do it at the start, rather than let it fester. Besides, she wanted to make sure everyone could keep the toilet in good shape. Probably nobody in the ex-USSR would know how to fix this toilet if broken.
“Sorry to interrupt the stuff about reviving the komunalka spirit. But does everyone know how to operate the toilets?”
Everyone nodded. Stacy was thunderstruck.
“Has everyone seen the toilets?”
Again everyone nodded.
“Most of what you’re seeing – fridges, food in pantry, TV screens, offices, chemistry lab stuff, workshop tools – they were installed or brought on board as part of the finishing process for the airship,” Marilyn said.
“Meaning, when we were in Moscow,” Angel added.
“But the toilets have been here all along. Probably installed extra early because they’re so integral for basic usage,” Riley completed the explanation.
Stacy looked left and right.
“I can read some Japanese. And I have used Japanese toilets before. But did anyone teach…”
Marilyn explained that there was an illustrated instruction book in Russian translation placed on the toilet originally.
“So we’ve all read the instructions,” Marilyn said. “Sorry, I forgot and put it away to keep it from getting wet.”
“Isn’t it insane?” Naz spoke up. “How could we have lived our lives without having such a toilet in our homes?”
Angel made a face. “Now that I know what a real toilet is, I’ll never want to use another toilet!”
“Seat warmer, bidet with multiple settings and individual memory functions, controllable nozzles, self cleaning capabilities, deodorizer, music to drown out embarassing sounds…” Riley ticked off all the functions she loved.
“CIVILIZATION!” Marilyn summed it up. “Now I know what I’m living for!”
…
There was a pause as everyone looked at Marilyn.
“You live for a toilet?” Angel grinned.
Marilyn made a face.
This leads to a Conversation: ZIL Conversation 002e The Flying K-Slum. If you’d like to read more about the reactions of ZIL members to the airship, click here. If not, just click here for the next mission, ZIL Mission 003.
[ZIL Conversations are always the more in-depth, sometimes more technical or intellectual discussions.]