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I actually picked up a bit of Farsi – enough to avoid screwing up my order at a chaikhana, anyway. Y'know, it's nuts just how much sugar Afghans like to dump in a cup! Then again, I was stationed in Baghlan Province; sugar beets are a big deal there, industry-wise. Personally, I'd go for a plate of dried fruit over straight up sucrose.
With that first serving of shir chai, where you really get those whiffs of saffron and cardamom, I kinda imagine that's how sipping nectar is like when you're a butterfly. Or a shershen, ha…
My dad grew up in Kirghizia near Kant – and no, it wasn't named after der Herr Philosoph. Apparently, it means "sugar" in Kyrgyz. Town had a refinery there, too, but his own folks were in the wool trade going back to the time of Tsar Alexander – the one who kicked Napoleon's Corsican ass. But with the entire collectivization thing going on, my grandparents were deported from Evpatoria to Southern Kazakhstan in 1931. After Stalin died – and I say rest in piss to that son of a bitch! – the family got permission to pull up stakes and move across the border for greener pastures.
It's kinda funny to imagine my old man doing shepherd stuff on horseback, but that's exactly what he got up to as a kid whenever school was out of session. In the end, though, it was the iron horse that stole his heart, so he went to study at the Ural Transport Engineering Institute.
But back then, he'd be up there in the hills riding just as good as any nomad, or so he claims. All I know is he can keep up with Agnia on the topic of horseflesh. As for me, the only horsepower I care about is the kind I can get out of a machine. Still, I'm glad Pops gets along alright with my lady. Unlike some people…
When me and Agnia started dating in 1993, that year she was volunteering in the City Day parade. And my God, I can't tell you enough just how amazing she looked in cavalry costume! It wasn't only the embroidery on her indigo coat that was splendid – she had an Achselband, these huge white feathers on her cap, and a sabre at her side. Never did a woman look more gallant than astride a fine steed.
Pretty fond of the Bashkort horse, my Agnia is. They're useful for just about any work outdoors. And tasty, too. Damn, I definitely could go for some beshbarmak right about now…
So yeah, you gotta admit tsarist getup is hella fancy. But there's a whole host of other aspects to do with the times that ought to stay in the past. From where I'm standing, modern day monarchists are outright weirdos. You hear these hardcore Orthodox types go on about the divine right of kings or how much they boohoo over the Bolsheviks executing the imperial family.
I don't see any appeal in sucking off corpse cock just because there happened to be a crown attached to it at one point. But I'm willing to bet the priests make a fuckton of money from fleecing all these pilgrims who crawl out of the woodwork every year for that Romanov memorial march here in Ëburg.
It's not about feeling contrite – the cassocks are out to sell tripe.
Red or White – both can go hang themselves as far as I care. Hard to balance what good either side had done when you consider all the masses who got screwed over by their policies. You know what they say: God's in His heaven, the tsar's seat is so far away, and his boyars bumblefuck everything down on earth.
When I was young, I spent a few summers visiting my dad's folks in Kyrgyzstan. You see, me and Szayel weren't exactly eligible to join in on the typical red necktie vacations that the kids from families with clean records got. After the Berlin Wall came down, that branch had the idea to get transplanted to Germany; as for us, we mostly stuck it out and made ends meet. But I still make trips to the Chuy Valley. Plenty of tourists come flocking to see the sights and partake in the natural delights…
Me, well, I like to mix business with pleasure sometimes. There's a special plant that the Chuy Valley is thick with: wild cannabis. The THC concentration in this stuff is incredible, and it's all growing free for grabs, God bless! Of course, the law men are absolutely against letting product come off the stem. But you know how it is: when there's a will, there's a way.
Bribe money, for instance; you grease a few palms, you get the kill-switch on their vigilance. A bunch of other tricks for shipping come to mind, but that's a trade secret. Heh.
As much as the front line can be an awful place, it's also where the truth of mankind reveals itself. In the urban jungle, we tell lies to ourselves and to each other all day long just to get through the week. They can be little ones, or painfully huge with consequences the politicians are all too ready to handwave for the sake of "progress" or platitudes like "the greater good" and "peace on earth". Instead of thinking about the hard things, the masses prefer to stick their heads in the sand and let the media bury atrocities under a deluge of nonsense.
I don't mean to say a soldier simply sees the light and becomes any better for it – far from it. All the bad on the battlefield… the filth sticks to you like a second skin.
As for off the field, well, guys get bored out of their wits and start doing all sorts of crazy stuff for kicks. You're at the mercy of whoever is up the totem pole above you, and you can count on these assholes being doped up to the gills.
On base, cruelty is a sport and the officers are useless as referees. Those jackals might even jump in to join the fun themselves.
I picked up a disgusting smoking habit over in afgan. I'm not talking just coffin nails that the commissary dispensed under some shite tobacco label. Anyone could get hold of hash or opium so long as they had something to barter – whether that's guns, mags, or tin cans of slop for rations.
Of course, we wouldn't simply hand out live rounds to the locals; that would be irresponsible! So what we did was dump the cartridges in a bucket of water to cook over a fire and then go hawking duds.
For all that I shit over serving out time in the army, I gotta admit it sure was some crash course on economics. I learned more in country than I ever did from reading Marxist theory! Cash, goods, contraband – those were what occupied a soldier's mind more than anything else… even death. We all wanted to take home souvenirs, courtesy of the global market. So don't go believing anybody honestly volunteered out of the goodness of their hearts to "help bring socialist aid" to the DRA.
Now, it's damn good advice when people say "never get high on your own supply". Lucky for me, my dad knew all the signs of a pothead and beat the devil out of me after I was demobilized. Tough love, y'know, going through detox, but I'm glad I managed to kick the habit before our country had gone to go the dogs. Doesn't mean I won't enjoy the rare blunt every now and then; I just don't wanna be bested by that little old poppy flower. Made me realize I had to be a lot more careful about what I put into my body…
Call me a hypocrite all you like. The way I see things, the kind of trash who's too weak to get off the needle… well, they get what's coming to them. But the end point of the supply chain really is no business of mine. The greater shame, I'd say, lies in letting a good opportunity slip out of grasp.
If a certain destination happens to fall on my route, it's no inconvenience at all for me to add a little something extra on my rig's load. You got a problem? Then kindly fuck off.