MY FRIEND MITYAI
On the stretch from Kara-Gug to the large hub station of Asanovo in the Omsk-Chelyabinsk passenger train, made up of old, antediluvian wagons filled to the gunnels with a motley bunch of people moving from one place to another, I met my sidekick in my further travels to the Ural, and the first friend in my life, whom I loved with my orphan’s heart as if he were my brother. I met him in a quite unexpected place, or rather we were introduced – in the train vestibule. I don’t know what got into me, but some devil made me take my profiles to the last wagon, at that time I already knew that it was dangerous. The ferocious conductor grabbed me there and dragged me by my collar into the back vestibule of his wagon, in the train holding cell. Pushing me into the dark dungeon on w
