Russian friend: Vadim

I kind of knew he won’t agree to let me take his picture, I tried to take out my camera very casually, pretending I wanted to just check something on it but he already started to cover his face, also pretending he just wanted to touch his face, and asked me:“You are not trying to take my picture, are you?”

Immediately I answered:“No.” then I clicked the shutter without checking the viewfinder. And I laughed out loud.

But the picture failed :(

x

I arrived in Oslo Bussterminal which is not far from the hostel I stayed, my CS host Yiannis was really kind he met me up and showed me around briefly. He showed me to my hostel and I decided to put down my backpack quickly and then continue to hang out with him. I had problem opening the doors since they have special electronic locks. I managed to open the door leads to the corridor but struggled again to open the room’s door, Vadim came and opened up for me. There are other 3 people in the room but no one was talking, everyone looked a bit of awkward being in a same room with strangers. I went in awkwardly too, checking empty beds but got confused. Vadim came and told me which bed weren’t occupied whereas other roommates kept quiet. I chose the one near to the window, which happened to be right under him.

I put everything down, thanked Vadim and left to Yiannis’ place. Yiannis and I had simple dinner and some nice chat, then I went back to hostel wanted to catch some sleep.

The room was empty. The sky was still bright despite it was already 10:30pm. I got a feeling I might not able to sleep although I was really tired, I changed my clothes anyway, hiding under the blanket. Vadim came in when I was changing, he saw me pulling out clothes under the blanket, he apologized and turned away. I told him he didn’t need to avoid since I was under a blanket. We started to chat politely, and he came to sit on the sofa right beside me. I was actually still changing but he came too close that I was too embarrass to continue so I stopped, covering myself with blanket.

Since we both thought we probably couldn’t sleep with the bright sky, I suggested to go out somewhere to get some drinks. I had actually taken my contact lenses out and had on my thick glasses, my skin was bare with only night moisturizer on, what I wore was a slough shirt comfortable enough to sleep. I felt really bad to go out like that but I did it anyway, Vadim told me not to worry it was Ok (and I found out he was just being polite afterwards). So this is the first time I went to the town centre of Oslo, in Karl Johan Gate, I didn’t imagine the city happened to be this small.

I could tell that we both felt more relax not being in a closed up space, we started to talk much more casually on the way.

x

“What is your name?”

“Vadim. It means ‘leader’ in Russian.”

“I see.”

“I saw your tattoo on your leg, what flower is that?”

“It is a chrysanthemum.”

“Oh I know that flower.”

x

The chat went really hilarious and honest afterwards. At a point he took out his hair band showed off his long hair gave a long look into my eye. I was suppose to be amaze looking at his handsome move but I couldn’t help and laughed out.

We chatted about girls ad boys, about how to make eye contact to opposite sex. We didn’t even drinking much, I had a bottle of beer and he had juice. He told me he just been through a party which he had ‘coke’ in his alcohol, and he told me Coke originally had cocaine in it that was how it named. Lots of random topics we were talking about that I got really confused that it doesn’t felt like a first meet.

He actually reminds me a lot about Taka, that both of them are very aware of how handsome looking they are, always trying to hint that they are cool in a very cute way, I felt really hilarious:

“You remind me a lot about one of my Japanese friend. You both have similar characteristic.”

“Is he as sexy as me?”

“Mmmmm.. yes, he is. He thinks he is, just like you.” LOL

“Hey, that is rude! This girl? without make up?” he tried to tease me back, this is how I knew he was being polite that I looked Ok with the ready-for-bed look.

x

Finally the sky turned dark, it felt early but when we checked the time it was pass 1am. We decided to head back.

“Am I walking too fast?”

“Not at all. I am good in walking fast.”

“I noticed that on the way we walked just now.”

Vadim walks even faster that he started to hop. I protested that wasn’t a walk anymore, it’s a run. He taught me how to make long eye contact on the way back. To be really confident and look into other’s eye deeply. This had been troubling me a lot that I couldn’t really look at people, that a lot of my friends had been complaining too. I had tried out to look at people a little bit longer but can’t help to think it is rude to keep looking. I tried to practice but forgot so very often, I found myself looking at somewhere else and keep moving my eye sight nervously, as before.

The way Vadim left was really ‘Taka-ish’ too, he mentioned that he need some time for himself to read some books, and he stood up suddenly, threw me a good bye eyeing and walked away into some other part of the hostel. Left me alone there wondering, ‘How the hell that I manage to meet all dramatically weird unreal and kind of handsome guys in the world?’

In my very own way of Chinese translation:
‘为什么我经常碰到就像在电视剧里才看到的老是自认为自己很酷的奇怪英俊男？’

There are actually another characteristic Taka and Vadim shared but it might be too hurtful to tell them, that most of the people around tempt to avoid them cause they are a bit weird. I noticed that other roommates didn’t really talk to Vadim while they talked to me more often, but he didn’t seem to be bothered. They are both don’t bother at all to socialize.

x

So this is a story that might started out potentially romantic but ruined easily by my non-romantically characteristic. I ruined all the romance attempt. Something must have wrong with me.