Reflections at Thousands of Feet

(On an airplane)
Flying over the clouds, at the level of the sunrise as I fly towards Australia on my way to New Zealand. Simultaneously can’t believe that I’m out of Russia, or that it exists and I was ever there.

The approximately 30 hours that I spent in the US made me realize some of the differences with Russia. First of all, people smile when you smile at them, almost always. Also, the standard of living is just so luxurious; the large living space, availability of such a wide range of goods and at such high qualities… Generally just the richness and, even, largess of America. Of course, its not just America, perhaps generally the West.
Also, the South African (who lives in Saudi Arabia) that I sat next to on the plane, as we were flying into San Francisco remarked about the flatness of the city. The airport is quite far from the city center, and SF itself is more built up, but he was completely right. American cities, compared to Russian or European ones (and, obviously, with exceptions) are flat. The huge amount of space available really meant the massive spread of cities across the land, rather than vertically. In Russia, having more than enough land as the largest country in the world, was limited by climate and communism that favored industry and the worker over the farmer to develop up rather than out. It was strange to walk around in Berkeley and feel the space, skies unfilled with apartment buildings. The sense of space was incredible, and must contribute to the association of America with ‘freedom’, the freedom to move.
It has also been a return to customer service. On the British Airways flight from St. Petersburg to London, the group of us were incredibly impressed with the friendly flight attendants; service with a smile. But really, they were of normal flight attendant standard; it was us who had changed our expectations. I know I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again; as far as my experience goes, the Russian people are friendly at heart, and extremely hospitable, but they are not quite so in public. In public, they are restrained and impersonal, and this is not necessarily a bad thing.

The sun is shining fully brightly into my eyes now, and the light is pure as it rides over the clouds. As it rose the light and colors were intensive, their limited light concentrated and emanating slowly over the lake of misty cloud cloud, broken by islands of the fluffier stuff. Oh, the magic of the dawn!

There is a little curl of ice on the bottom of my window that reminds me of Russia, in its crystalline winter-locked beauty.