September 7th | 7 сентября

9.30 a.m. - Ana's apartment

• At night, I noticed that my dreams are much more vivacious, since I'm in Russia. Like if I was going from black and white movies to color ones, or from mono to stereo, 2D to 3D.

10 a.m. - =

• Making Armenian coffee, just like girls showed me.
• It might be interesting to film how it's made. Making pictures is relevant when words are to many or lacking to explain something.
• Tonight, the clothes I chose to travel with will be useful. My derby shoes, my pants, and my shirt will make me presentable as a good boy for the diner with Lissa's parents.
• Reading Dominique Blanc emails. It feels like a lot of work opportunities have an activist purpose. Wondering how "Racism" and "Feminism" topics are treated here, in Russia.

10.18 a.m. - =

• Ana and Gemma prepare their day. Music is played in the apartement, thanks to "Alissa" (the equiavelent of Alexa, or Echo).

10.40 a.m. - =

• Writing to Sarah, a friend from graduate school. I link her my telegram channel and a summary of my research idea. Should do the same to some of the teachers from school that I have in my contact list.
• Connected to the house Wifi, so when I play "Les Sardines" de Patrick Sebastien on Yandex music, the hole apartment can enjoy it.

11.07 a.m. - =

• Looking at France24 news application. There is a debate on the use of uranium ammo by Americans, in the conflict.

11.21 a.m. - =

• Girls go to work. My opinion is asked about an outfit.

1 p.m. - =

• Might be intersting to meet musicians or artists that would be up to visit and work in Paris for some collaborative projects, events.
• Texting a Russian friend living in Paris. He's Vassia, and he creates theater plays. I met him while organising rave parties. I ask if he knows some nice clubs in Moscow.

1.51 p.m. - =

• I get lost on internet trying to understand the meaning of "Cheeki Breeky". I think it's an expression and a joke at the same time. When I search at it on Yandex, I come across pictures of the videogame "Stalker", or other things with anime style. I keep trying to understand, but I do not manage to. I just feel like an old person trying to understand what the youngsters are laughing about. Understanding jokes is important. It means you're in.
• Vassia's answers: I should try Mutabor, Pole, and Bounce. Mutabor is the club of his friends, ans he is talking about an invite.

2.18 p.m. - =

• My Russian teacher from Paris answered. I did not manage to send her my telegram links (blocked by her email address). But she wrote me back, and that is positive.

2.34 p.m. - =

• Vassia added me to a telegram channel of more than 250 people. I asked him if he knew people that would be interested in participating in some underground events in Paris. This group seems to exist in order to put creative people from Moscow in contact. Vassia is the administrator of the group. He just asked if someone wanted to bring me to a party.

2.56 p.m. - =

• It seem like in the city, an important part of the ethnographic work also take place on digital networks. How to properly incorporate that into ethnography?
• Probably people from Vassia's telegram group know the creative friends of Ana, from cinema. But I did not ask or mentioned it. I wouldn't be surprised if the two groups of contacts know each other.

4.47 p.m. - =

• Browsing Vassia's telegram channel participants. In the middle of them, I notice a Russian friend from my undergraduate years in Toulouse. Olga. I haven't talked to her in years. She is a theater actress. I write her.

5.26 p.m. - =

• I get the restaurant address where I will meet Lissa's parents. The plan is to eat there, then meet the girls at a bar, and then go to meet one of Vassia's friend to a club.
• Olga answers. She finds the situation funny.
• Ana sends me a picture of Enver Mamedov, and compares it to my telegram picture. She says we look alike.

6.53 p.m. - =

• A guy from the Telegram canal invites me to a club September 12th. I wanted to leave on this day, but I'll ask Ana one or two more nights.
• Lissa's parents are working a bit later so I'll join them around 7.30 p.m.

Later, before 7.30 p.m. — On the taxi to the restaurant — From memory

• The taxi speaks english. He studied in Blagavechtchensk. Did engineer studies there. Apartments might be cheaper to rent than in Moscow. He wanted to join the army, but somewhere else. I ask him about chinese and Russian relationships there. It's been a long time since he hasen't been. He was there around 2003-2006 I think. His friends used to cross the border to go drink cheap beers. At this time, merchants were extorted and had to pay in order to not have any issues. According to him, those that were doing this are now at the top of government. Tipping the guy.

7.30 p.m. - Lissa's parents apartment - From memory

• I was waiting in front of the restaurant we planed to go to, when I receive a phone call from Lissa's mother. I'm invited to go meet them directly to the apartement. They live next door. So they give me the code, and I get upstairs. I meet them, and we start talking in the living room. We sit around the coffee table and start chatting about Moscow, how I met Lissa, what I like to do, what they do, how it is to live in Moscow, what is going on with politics, what my project is about, the events I like to organise in Paris. We actually eat there. Mushrooms from the datcha and a dish of vegetables with toast. And some italian smoked ham that we wonder how it got here.
• Kitchen talk (and it has a specific name in Russian that I did not took in note) is talking to family or close relatives about politics, but not in a compliant way. Kitchen talk, is a moment when you talk real about politics and therefore, when you criticise it. Only with people you trust, most of the time family members. We do not kitchen talk at this moment. But we are clear about the fact that we do not understand what is happening. The father is feeling like it's a come back to old times and that it could cause the collapse of the country. He is a doctor, a Muscovite ("москвич") and traveled a lot by plane to sell medical equipment. The mother, Mila, was an english teacher and knows french. She wrote a book about detectives, and the intelligentsia ambiance of the 90's, I think. First, the book was online, then it has been printed. I've been drinking some wine and cognac, and by the end of the dinner I start to feel dizzy. Mila, texted her pupil to try to get me some contacts.
• The papers on doors: So the neighbours apartment have papers pinned on their doors. Some of them cumulate three to five due payments. Lissa's father explains that these are people that left the country because of its situation. It's payment due to the government. He has seen these papers pinned on more and more doors in the building.
• Lissa's father shows me some abstracts of a tv series where the four main characters get into a night train from Moscow to St-Pertersbourg. First they are in some higher class of trains and they step of it to smoke a cigarette. But it's a small station with only a one minute stop. So the train leaves in front of their eyes, with all their stuff in it. After some time they manage to get into another kind of train, an open wagon, whith verry limited privacy. Lissa's father tells me that this is what I will be confronted with. Their will be drunk people falling from the higher beds and the train attendant will sit with me and talk football while asking if I need any special drink (spirituals).
• To end the dinner, we share a glass of cognac. I'm not used to cognac. Feels like France produces it mainly for export. I get my stuff and we all head downstairs. Some pictures are taken. In the first place I wanted to walk to the metro, but it was raining so I ordered a taxi. When I hop in the back and close the door, I give a last look to my hosts trough the tinted glass of the car. Since it is tinted I ain't sure they see me, but I see Lissa's mother making a cross sign in direction of the car. I wouldn't catch if it was from left to right or, the other way.

Around midnight - In taxi - From memory

• I head to a cocktail bar called "Le Bijou". I will meet Ana, Gemma, and other friends of them there. I was supposed to get there earlier.

Around 00.20 a.m. - Cocktail bar "Le Bijou" - From memory

• I meet Sasha and Ana's boyfriend. He speaks english. I get a drink or two, I do not remember. We share a good moment. I get to know the two I haven't met yet. We are almost alone in the bar, since I'm late, and it is about to close, at 1 a.m.

1 a.m. - In taxi

• We all leave the bar and go to Ana's apartment.

1.35 a.m. - Ana's apartment - From notes

• I took quick notes from the night. I feel like it is going to be a long one for me.
• It's been two years since Lissa's parents haven't seen her. They miss her terribly.
• In train, I should be drinking my own vodka, and not other people vodka. Exception if it's the train attendant that makes the proposition.
• Lissa has called in the middle of the dinner. She was on the speakerphone and we talked French, English, Russian. She was playing videogames, and her boyfriend Kostia was already back in Amsterdam.
• Last toast was to our friendship. (dinner)
• Lissa's parents own other apartments.
• We are now in the kitchen, drinking and talking.

Reflexions

• "Anthropology work is a conversation". It feels like an important part of the work is done when talking about the field to people. We formulate what we do and try to make it as coherent as possible. We sometimes get new questions, new insights, new tracks to explore, new books to read... And since there are so many books... It's manly in the conversation with those who read them that it is possible to get steered. On top of that, I know I lack the bibliography.
• This telegram channel might be a good idea in regard to the circumstances I'm in now. It's a freestyle; I do not have a teacher nor a university backing me, no paper saying that I am in a school or anything. This word production is, for now, my only way of legitimating myself.
• If no Russian and French university wants to collaborate via some kind of bilateral agreement, It might be one of the resort I'll have to take, along with maintaining unofficial correspondence between teachers from France and Russia, or also China. I'm thinking about the MSU-BIT university. But I ain't sure about the fact that they have an anthropology department.