Breakfast

It’s official. I’ve been on a VIP list. I managed to bag two free tickets to a film at the fanciest cinema in Krasnoyarsk. A friend of a colleague is involved with the film festival. I went with Olga, because I hadn’t seen her for a while. We sauntered in five minutes late and I said to the woman at the desk

‘*a cough cough*, I believe I’m on the uh… the guest list.’

It was kind of disappointing that there were only five other people in the cinema, but it still counts as a VIP list, so I don’t care. Nothing can take that away from me.

The film was called A Dog Called Money. It was a gentle, contemplative documentary about the work and travel of musician PJ Harvey. Music + travel = a sick film. It’s obvious really. There were the occasional bleak scenes, but even these managed also to be uplifting, or even funny. In one scene, a black teenager from a rough area on the east coast of the States gave the cameraman a tour of his neighbourhood. Pretty much every spot he pointed out was marked by the murder of a relative or friend, and the flippancy with which he said ‘oh and I nearly died here a couple times’, managed to be both appalling and slightly funny in an absurd kind of way. I know that sounds callous, but I don’t think it’s just me. It’s like the scenes in Joker where horrifying violence, when combined with dramatic irony or a dumb joke about a guy with dwarfism not being able to reach a lock, becomes uncomfortably funny. Anyway, it was an interesting film, highly recommend.

When someone asks me about the differences between Russian and British culture, I always struggle to think of any. Because they’re actually pretty minute when you think about them. Ok, Russians don’t tend to live in detached or semi-detached houses but that’s the only huge one that springs to mind. Everything else is either too small to notice, or it’s a sort of ‘ooh and by the way…’ But one thing really stands out, and it continues to baffle me. Breakfast. I didn’t realise it, but we are limited in what we can eat for breakfast in Britain. Cereal, porridge, fruit, fry up, pancakes, pastries, yoghurt, or toast. That’s pretty much your lot. Here, anything’s fair game. Literally anything. Any. Thing. That bit of fried chicken that you couldn’t finish last night? Breakfast. Zuchinis stuffed with minced beef, pork, and cheese? Break. Fast. Pizza that’s been lying around in your flat for two days? That’s yer breakfast that is. Bit of lemonade in the fridge? Perrrfect. Breakfast. Pancakes are stuffed with cottage cheese, sour cream, sugar, and lemon all mixed together. Muffins are baked with cottage cheese. In fact, come to think of it, everything is made with cottage cheese. So, to recap: anything is breakfast, particularly if it has cottage cheese in it.

Now I don’t know about you, but the thought of that makes me throw up in my mouth just a little bit. But it seems that Russians don’t think about it this way. Just doesn’t occur to them. For them, it’s just breakfast. Regardless of what ‘it’ happens to be. It’s probably still a viable breakfast.

So when Dima and Olga invited me for breakfast the next morning, I, unthinkingly, said ‘hell yes’. It wasn’t until we’d walked into a truly grim fast food buffet canteen thing that I realised I’d wandered into a trap. I’d pictured some granola, maybe a pain au chocolat. And here I was, confronted with soup, some more soup, cottage cheese pancakes, and some wibbly wobbly pink stuff. It was too late to back-pedal. I went for meat soup with a dollop of sour cream, and potato pancake, also with sour cream. After I’d said ‘this just isn’t breakfast’ for the fifth time, Olga asked ‘why not?’ I spluttered for a bit.

‘Well, breakfast is… like cereal or porridge. It can’t just be anything.’

‘Why not?’

‘Well you need gentle, easily digestible stuff when you’ve just woken up.’

‘Like what?’

‘Well, stuff that isn’t too sweet or meaty or… or cheesy.’

‘Like what?’

‘Cereal. Fry up, or pancakes.’

Olga lifted up one of her oozy cottage cheese and raisin pancakes. ‘This is a pancake.’

‘Nope. No it isn’t.’

‘So you can have sweet stuff like pancakes, meat like fried breakfast, cereal or fruit. I don’t get why you can’t just have meat soup.’

‘YOU JUST CAN’T! IT’S NOT BREAKFAST. BREAKFAST OLGA!’

Dima looked at me, concerned. ‘I guess we eat stuff like this because, in Russia, we believe that you should start the day by eating something filling. Something that will carry you through the day.’

‘Yeah, we say that in Britain too.’

‘So why don’t you eat meat soup?’ His face was a mask of confusion.

‘IT. ISN’T. BREAKFAST!!!!!!!’

You can tell me if I’m wrong, but I think I won that argument.

I mean. It's not, is it?