Ars Longa, Vita Brevis

They handed each of us three roubles and put us on a train bound for Kharkiv. When I heard the name Kharkiv the first time earlier that day, it gave rise to an image of a snow-covered suburbia with grim factories, each exhaling dark smoke under the gloomy sky — a scene I might have burrowed from an old Soviet movie I had watched in the Russian Cultural Center in Putalisadak. “The Nepali community there will soon find you a bride,” a senior remarked when I told him where I was going (only later I would learn the political motives in encouraging or discouraging the newcomers going into certain cities). Sanjeeb, my only traveling companion and a good friend, had left for Kyiv that evening. Hari, Shankar, Pramod, the other three newcomers, and soon-to-be my roommates, and I shared the compartment on the train. As the city of Moscow and its outskirts flowed further away, I vowed to stay single and focus on my study.

It was my first time away from home. I didn’t know how to interact with the outside world. I looked and behaved like a schoolboy. I was born and raised in the same house my dad and his forefathers owned. I hung out with the friends befriended a long time ago. In our neighborhoods, no locals went looking for new friends and it was always outsiders who stretched their lands and said, “Parichaya pauna?” (Can I have your introduction?). I became that outsider then and needed to learn that craft.

We arrived in Kharkiv the next morning. A lady from Kharkiv State University was at the station to take us to the hostel. The air was damp and cold even though it was only September. I found the city wet. It must have been raining all night. The roads were wide and clean and the buildings tall and identical. She took us to the hostel. Once inside (the hostel), we went to the fifth floor and checked into our room. It had 4 narrow spring beds on 4 corners of the room and a side table (tumbuchka) next to each bed and a common armoire. There was a small speaker hooked to the ceiling and, when powered on, always played classical music. In the front, there was a big window overlooking the woodland on the backside of the hostel. I opened the window to let the fresh air in. As cold air hit my face, I surveyed the lot. The ground was wet and blanketed by brown and yellow leaves, fallen from the surrounding trees, then bare and soaked by the rainwater, their tiny branches and twigs shivering in the cold wind. I wondered where and how my friends were and if they too missed me. I would move to Kyiv next year, I concluded.

Each hostel floor had a long corridor with rooms on opposite sides, one common kitchen and study room in the middle, and two restrooms — one for boys and another for girls on the opposite end of the corridor. The shower (douche) and the laundry rooms were on the first floor. There were students from South Asia, the Middle East, Africa, South America, from Eastern and even Western Europe (Portugal and Greece). In the evening, the corridor was where all the actions took place. One could hear languages and music from every corner of the world, see the colorful dresses of African tribes, smell and taste the exotic cuisines from the Arab world, and witness the hospitality and culture of the faraway lands one had never heard of. It was our mini world, where we shared our stories and dreams using more with our hands and expressions than with our limited (Russian) vocabulary. We were both participants and observers of the Soviet experiment.

The first year was to prepare us for the university by teaching the Russian language. In my class, the other students were from Ethiopia, Sudan, and Congo. They assigned my roommates a different teacher. In the room opposite us, lived 3 Greek students and one of them was Tchamis. He was charming and always greeted me with a smile. He went to the same class as my roommates. He used to come to our room to consult on his homework with my roommates and I couldn’t help but stared at him listening to every word that came from his mouth and would interject a remark whenever possible. Sometimes I made tea for him so that he would stay longer with us. Who doesn’t like attention with affection? Soon, we became friends and he would come to our room to chat with me. I would be in his room for hours. We talked about our days, about our family back home, and about the life, we had left. He learned some good and some bad Nepali words, and I Greek. He taught me a Greek song that I would sing softly at night many years later to lull Shrija and Cloe to sleep. In the morning, we would go to university together and in the afternoon we would wait for each other outside our classes to come home together. We were inseparable. If only life were so simple…

The winter came. The days became shorter and darker. The snow covered the streets, the buildings, and the parks. One evening, I met him with a girl in the corridor. “My girlfriend from Greece,” he said. I had seen her before. She lived in the same hostel and had a loud voice. He was proud when she hold his hand. After the event, he disappeared for a few days. When he reappeared, she was with him always as if glued firmly. I went to his room a few times, but, in her presence, I felt awkward. His visits to our room became infrequent. I started going to university with my roommates and came home alone. I would see them at the university or on the bus and they would smile and wave to me. When bored, I would visit my classmates from Ethiopia or Sudan and often found myself lost in thought. I would leave the room wishing their affair to end.

Hari missed his family and the comfortable life he had with his family. He used to regret coming to study at his age. The love letters that came from Kathmandu used to lift Shankar’s mood for a few days. On Friday evenings, he would go to the study room with empty sheets and come out after a few hours, drained, with pages smeared with his heart’s contents in red. Pramod would call in sick, lie down in bed wrapped in a warm blanket until our departure to the university, and then wake up leisurely, dress up and leave the hostel. He would go to the center (city) and walk all day visiting stores and buying anything he found useful. As the competition grew in my class, I focused on my studies, mostly to remain my teacher’s favorite. Each of us was learning to live without the people we loved.

The summer was approaching. The snow had melted. The days were getting brighter and longer. With green buds on the branches, the trees became alive again. The children played in the park. The babushkas came out to sit on the benches. I learned to cook rice and curry and wash cups and plates without breaking them. To study further, Pramod and I were going to Lviv, Hari and Shankar were staying in Kharkiv, and Tchamis was going to Kyiv.

It was the last day of our preparatory year. The results of our finals were already out. Everyone was excited about the upcoming vacation and most of the students were going home. It was time to celebrate our friendship. Of some I had photos, and the rest were only in our memories. In the evening, we opened a bottle of vodka. I went to every familiar room to say goodbye and in return, I got a drink and a hug. As I came out from one room to went into another, my legs became unsteadier, my vision blurrier, my attitude more outgoing, and my memory of the event scantier and sparser until it went all dark.

The next morning, I found myself sleeping on the floor. My bed was broken from, what looked like, an accident (Later I learned from my roommates that it was from my incessant jumping. Did I?) The events from last night slowly emerged. I remembered going to the Afghani room, Sudanese room, Ethiopian room, Congolese room, and Greek room. I remember entering Tchamis’s room, he and his friends sitting on the beds, open suitcases on the floor, me talking about his unfair treatment, how I used to love and care for him and how he ignored me sticking with his girlfriend as if she were a glue, his friends avoiding my angry gaze. Oh, what did I do? My face became hot and my head hurt. The memory agonized me, but it was too late. I couldn’t take those words back. Maybe it served him right. Didn’t he deserve to know what he had done to me? Now that he had seen what he had done to his once best friend, I was confident he would come, shake my hands, promise to stay in touch, and hug me. I too would apologize for last night’s ranting and would tell him that the most beautiful thing that had ever happened to me during the last year was his friendship and I would always be grateful. I stayed in my room waiting for the knock. Every sound of an approaching footstep would perk up my ears. Shame and guilt stopped me from going to his room. I walked into the corridor making him easier to find me and went back to my room leaving the door open. The knock never came. Tormented, I lay down on my broken bed and stared at the ceiling. Hari, in passing, mentioned that Tchamis had left for Greece early that morning. I turned my head to face the wall.