On the evening before our wedding, Nataliya Petrovna came over to the apartment to wish us well and to interrogate me. Neither of Nastya’s parents knew me very well and they needed to make sure their daughter was making the right decision. It must have seemed odd to them that someone from an affluent country would travel all that way to marry a Siberian girl. British men also have a reputation in Russia for treating women badly and spending their wives’ money. Russian men are gentlemen in comparison; they do things like holding doors open and take off a woman’s coat for her when she gets home. I told her that although there had been a few short periods where I had little or no work, I had a pretty sound work-ethic, and though I had never taken off a woman’s coat, it wouldn’t be a hardship. She seemed satisfied with that but still asked ‘Are there no women in Wales?’ to which I replied ‘Yes, dozens of them.’ Her final question was ‘Scientists have said that a person’s life partner is usually born within a few miles of them; what do you think of this?’ My answer was ‘Scientists also once said that the world was flat.’ The discussion was over.
The one thing we had overlooked and almost completely forgotten was our need to find an official translator for our nuptials; the law stated that we must have one as my Russian was appalling, and still is. On the evening before our wedding we emailed everyone in the vicinity who could speak both languages and might be free. It was a tall order as most translators work Monday to Friday. Our savior came in the shape of Kostya, a Russian missionary who had travelled the world doing good deeds. He didn’t even want paying, although we bought him a box of chocolates for his kindly efforts.
The morning of the wedding felt like any other morning. We wore jeans, shirts, new boots, and normal winter coats, and I took a black ushanka just in case it snowed. We caught a taxi as we were worried all the buses might have magically disappeared, and so we arrived in plenty of time. Kostya came by foot and arrived five minutes after us. The wedding ceremony was very simple. We sat in plastic chairs opposite a wooden desk in the same back office where we had registered two days before. A woman in smart casual dress read through the laws and official stuff of marriage; Kostya translated; we said ‘I do’ and it was done. Nastya shed a few tears while I tried to contain my nervous laughter. The certificate, which seemed to have been printed before we arrived, was handed to me, as I was now the ‘head of the family’. We were wished good luck and farewell and left the office no more than fifteen minutes after we had entered.
Although, legally, we had to use the international wedding court, we could have had another much larger church ceremony afterwards. Most weddings in Krasnoyarsk are lavish affairs, with showy receptions, that finish with a limousine sightseeing tour of the city. Siberian newlyweds simply love posing for the camera and like to have their picture taken near the Yenisei as well as some of the older, Orthodox church buildings. By contrast our wedding had been very modest, to the point that we neglected to take any pictures at all. I had worried that our small ceremony might not have been enough for Nastya, but each time we spoke about it she affirmed that she didn’t care to waste lots of money on one single day, when we had a whole future together to look forward to.
To celebrate our marriage, Nastya and I had decided that we would locate one of the very few Irish bars in Krasnoyarsk and have a pint of Guinness. What better way is there to celebrate? It took us a few hours to find one and once we did we discovered that it wouldn’t be open until 1 p.m., which left us an hour to kill. Nastya knew of a café conveniently close so we went there for a betrothal breakfast while we waited; this was a mistake. The café, albeit modern, sold the usual type of mush found in most Russian cafés. We ordered mashed potato that was poured out of a machine like a drinks dispenser, and two portions of some kind of meat type thing which was as bland as roasted cardboard. The Irish bar wasn’t much better. Yes it was decked out in green garb with Irish pictures on the walls, but there wasn’t an Irishman in sight; we had to put our coats in the cloakroom (at the time I assumed this was in case we carried weapons, but later I learned it’s standard across Russia), and not only was the pint poured to the little white marker line below the top of the glass, but each pint was a fiver. Still, I will never forget that drink. It was real Guinness, and we were newlyweds enjoying a pint of the good stuff, early on a Friday afternoon, in an Eastern Siberia that was still covered in snow. That one pint really hit the spot, so we collected our coats and went home, where we fell onto the bed and slept for the rest of the afternoon. I woke in the early evening to find Nastya, Nataliya Petrovna, Dima (my new brother-in-law), and several other distant relations preparing food in the kitchen and living room. Now we were going to celebrate Russian-style. In our wedding preparations Nastya and I had completely missed the need to throw a party, let alone invite family over, because we had been consumed with obtaining the right paperwork and getting me to Siberia.
The impromptu wedding banquet consisted of deer meat, hunted and killed by my now father-in-law Boris, and cooked in a variety of different ways by my now mother-in-law Nataliya Petrovna; and contrary to what we think of the Russians in the West it wasn’t a boozy affair. Collectively we enjoyed two or three bottles of champagne before we called it a night. Nastya and I were left to put the dishes away and mop up the remnants of the large honey cake someone had bought instead of a wedding cake. There are a few customs in Russia when it comes to marriage, one being a large wedding pie that only the newlyweds can eat, and the one who devours the most is supposed to be the boss of the marriage from there on in. We didn’t observe this or any other custom. It’s not that we didn’t want a wedding pie, because I especially wanted one, it was simply that in the rush to get married, with all the worry about documents, stamps and registration papers, we forgot to think about any of the things we would have enjoyed after the wedding, like giant pies and parties.
ii. Dissolution of the Soviet Union
Before deciding on my voyage to Krasnoyarsk, Nastya and I had discussed getting married in Copenhagen, because we wouldn’t have had to jump through hoops to obtain visas, and a company there offered an attractive wedding package for couples who lived in separate countries. At the last minute Nastya changed her mind, thinking it would be better for us to marry in her city so I could also get to know it a little, which would help us decide where we would spend our future. I had never heard of the city before. My knowledge of Russian geography was limited, as in I couldn’t have told you where Moscow was if my life depended on it. It was only after I landed that Nastya informed me that I was bang, smack in the middle of Siberia. When we had courted online and in Paris, all of our talk was about being together, being apart, and missing each other. Later we spoke of legal matters: visas and certificates. In all that time, I hadn’t actually given a thought to asking where Krasnoyarsk was, or even looking it up on the map; and consequently found myself in the most central part of Russia not really knowing where I was in the world. Which may sound a bit foolish, but after Nastya and I fell in love, I would have taken a flight anywhere as long as she was waiting for me there. There had been too many failed romantic affairs in my mid-twenties, where I hadn’t the guts to take a leap of faith. I’m not sure why that was, but I do know that with Nastya it felt easier to let go of who I was, or had been, and forget my possessions and my limited view of the world. Meeting Natsya had enabled me to break free of the internal restraints that had broken hearts, including my own, in the past.