Monday, August 21, 2006

"Cum doresti"

Corruption. It's everywhere, and every Moldovan knows it. But that doesn't mean that you should ever, ever, even subtly begin to imply to a person that what they're doing is corrupt. Especially when they work with buses.

I've had two experiences with transportation workers where my innocent questioning of a price has thrown people into fits. The first happened several months ago, when I wanted to buy a bus ticket from Chisinau back to my village of Mereseni. Normally, the ticket costs 10 lei. The woman in the booth told me it cost 12.

"Did the price go up?" I asked, pulling out an extra two lei.

"I'm just saying the prices!" she yelled at me through the plastic divider. She turned her computer's LCD screen so I could read it. "See! The prices changed! You think I'm pocketing this money?!"

"My God!" I responded. "Can't you see I'm already giving you the money? Here, take the money!" I bought my ticket and walked away. The woman continued, I'm sure, to have a rotten day.

The second time happened just this week. I had gotten taken a bus from Hincesti to Chisinau, a ticket that used to cost seven lei but had recently started costing nine. When we arrived in Chisinau, I gave the driver a 10 lei bill and waited for my change.

An awkward silence followed for five seconds.

"What are you still waiting for, boy?" the driver asked, already sounding agitated.

"Well, it costs nine lei from Hincesti," I said, "so I'm waiting for at least one leu."

"It's nine lei to the bus station," he said. "I took you to the center of the city. That's another leu. 10 lei."

There is something about the Romanian language in general, and in particular with bus drivers' usage of it, that eschews all semblance of politeness or understanding within the first two seconds of a confrontational situation. The tone of a Moldovan bus driver explaining how he has concocted his price is impossible to translate into English. The emotions behind it are a mix of "I can't believe you don't know how much things cost and I have to explain it to you, you idiot," "How dare you come on my bus and tell me how much every other bus ride you've taken on this route has cost you," "I make the rules on this bus and f--- you if you don't like 'em," and "Why do you have to be the one guy who has a problem with my price? You're making my life so difficult just by existing." Now, re-read the driver's previous line with your newfound Moldovan driver voice. Not fun to hear, is it?

In the face of these attitudes, it is often best to simply step down. So I left the one leu on the bus and shrugged.

"Cum doresti," I said as I turned and walked off the bus. In English, this means, "Whatever you want." Because this translation is quite innocuous, the bus driver's final words surprised me:

"SDOIIJEWLKEFWJDSCMLKKJWEEOIFJLKSMJSLKSJFOIWIEURLLSDLKFJSDFKLJ!!!!!!!!" he barked. "SI SWOKJZCLKMJCLKJOWWJFOIJFLKSJSLKFFLK!!!!!!" he added for good measure. This is not a direct transcription, since angry drivers tend to swear in Russian, and although the majority of Russian words that I know are curses, I don't know nearly enough of them to understand all of the curses that a Moldovan driver can fit inside five seconds of yelling. I was already outside of the bus by then, so to show how little I cared about the whole situation and how much he was overreacting, I raised my hands high above my head and made an "I'm not listening" noise.

"Bleh bleh bleh bleh bleh bleh bleh!" I called as I continued to walk away. Then, for good measure, I wanted to swear at him in Russian. Before I could think of the best word, though, I realized that I had already sworn at him seven times in a row; the standard American "I'm not listening" noise is best translated in Russian as "bitch".

So who won this argument? The driver who got an extra leu and screamed at the top of his lungs in order to maintain his authority on his bus, or the American who lost a leu, equivalent to eight American cents, unintentionally cursed loudly in the middle of a crowded street seven times and got to laugh afterward? I claim victory, because it was by far the best entertainment I'd ever had for just seven cents.

6 Comments:

At 4:47 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Great post! The rutiera drivers have a VERY short fuse.

 
At 12:00 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

mi-amintesc de soferul autobuzului in piata romana in bucuresti...:)

aaron

 
At 2:19 AM, Blogger Peter Myers said...

For those of you who weren't in Bucharest with me and Aaron, a particular bus driver nearly hit someone in our group (possibly Aaron), and then yelled in Romanian out the window, "What are you, Moldovan?!

This is one of the many reasons that I don't like Bucharest.

 
At 8:57 AM, Blogger Lucia said...

Peter, you are a great storyteller! I could very well relate to your experience. However, one event that made me feel the same way you did occured in Paris with a middle-eastern looking taxi driver. Therefore, I think these attitudes are more frequent among a certain 'social' class of people (e.g.service workers)

 
At 1:08 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

There are many unwritten (sometimes even unspoken) rules in Moldova. One of these rules is ?He who shall ride the buss up to the center pays one extra leu?. The driver knew it (he invented it), the driver?s friends on the same bus knew that, and all the other passengers have learned to eavesdrop to what the driver and his friends are talking on the way, thus getting informed about the ?proper procedure?.
One who does not listen to other people?s conversations on a Moldovan bus (potentially a non-Moldovan, or a ?different? Moldovan) is bound to be unaware of ?the rules?.
Now you asking him to explain a rule he made up was seen as an attempt to diminish the driver?s authority in front of the other passengers, which happens to be one of the deadly sins of a Moldovan bus passenger.
Don't ask why.

 
At 9:31 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hi, Peter! I'm Iulia from English language summer camp, remember me? You told me you have a blog where you write and i am so glad i found it! How are you doing? I see you wrote here about the camp too, oh, so many memories... I remember the inside out day... so unconfortable with the belt inside and the pockets out... but it was so much fun!!!!!
Noroc!

 

Post a Comment

<< Home