Tuesday, December 6, 2011

Have you met George? (1)


I want to share with you something about myself, something that made me the person I am. Trust me, it was not an easy decision. I was debating for a while whether I should reveal some personal things on not. Having given it more thought though I'm hoping that you'll find it interesting and won't use it against me in the future.

My life began in Moscow, Russia. I don’t recall any extraordinary happenings in my earlier days. I was generally a happy kid; although my parents might argue that I was a bit oaf a hand-full, and at times quite stubborn. I remember being told that I was an angel, but only when I was asleep...a

Now that I think of it, the most memorable early life moments included my uncle, he was the most adventurous of the family and always came up with ways to entertain and excite me (from parachuting a pair of goggles when I came to visit him to flipping his kayak twice, once with me in it). He used to take me travelling every summer, kayaking through less explored parts of Russia and camping. It was a blast!

Unfortunately, the end of stability happened early for me, coinciding with some major changes in the country at the time. The wave of major transformation swept across the country ripping it apart and causing some major overnight changes. I was only 9 when it happened and to me those things were more entertaining than anything else. Tanks on a street one day, change of government the next week and snipers on the roofs the day after. The more direct impact happened when the 1000%+ inflation hit, all of a sudden I remember that certain staple foods simply disappeared from our table. At the time I didn’t quite understand why we can’t have my favorite- cheese. I remember having to go to stores to line up for cooking oil and getting a number written on my hand to mark the place in line (1168)...

Then it hit even closer to home, our family rapidly fell apart. It turned out that my dad’s salary went from being quite decent to provide for a family of four to peanuts as he was working for a government research institution. My mom, on the other hand, was giving private lessons in high-school and was doing well. The fact that she became the main bread winner put a lot of pressure on the family. It was unfortunate when it happened, as I was only 11 and my sister 3. I don’t think our family was unique in that respect though, the whole country was going through an incredibly stressful time. 

 I made a choice to stay with my dad and the next thing I remember were the hardships of the next few years. I remember the winter of ’93 was particularly a tough one, I recall having to eat spoiled spaghetti with milk every morning before school and complaining about bugs swimming and being told that those were just sugar bits. I don’t think I perceived it as being a hardship at a time, just thought of it as a peculiarity. Funny how the prospective differs when you are younger and don’t know any better.

Not sure if parent’s divorce affected me much, just remember being sad and not sure why things happened the way they did. Before the split up my mom used to take me and sister on “dates” and I remember being quite irritated after the split-up when I understood that the guy was not “just” a friend. I actually originally stayed with my mom and the guy was really trying to be mean to me and get rid of me. I got the message…

When I think back, I think I really grew up mentally during the period. It was an accelerated school of life. I also recall feeling rather strange at school. I never “fit in” I tried smoking and let that go after a year as I realized that I was doing it for social purpose rather than actually enjoying it.

I’ve never felt like something was missing, my dad tried really hard to provide for me doing some odd jobs here and there. One day he’d be selling carpets, the next day he’d be a courier and the next month would be working as a laborer in construction. It must’ve been really tough for him just to provide enough for us to have food on the table every day. A different set of challenges, to say the least, really puts things into prospective… My granny on the other hand went through WWII in Russia and always recalls being starved and as the result always tries to eat as much as possible as a matter of habit. My dad had his own very tough period in life where everything he was used to went away and he was left with no income and a kid.

I went to a very good school in Moscow and the only strange feeling I had was that my classmates had infinitely more things than me. The moments I recall from my schooling in Moscow were winning marathon and another schooling competition. Other than that I struggled with school, mostly because I couldn’t see the purpose of doing exercises and spending time learning. I was getting all average marks and some teachers actually told my father that I was not capable of learning and he should hope that I become anything in life. Having said that, other teachers saw through my aloofness and said that I was one of the most capable students but I’ve never bothered to study so never got to realize the potential.

I was average student in all areas except math, in which I all of a sudden got near the top of the class towards the end of high school, to everyone’s surprise. To me it was quite apparent thought. One semester I was sick for a long time and accidentally spend more time than usual studying. I passed with a flying colors and realized that it was not only quite easy to do math but also enjoyable to be featured as a top students. That was the very first example when recognition pushed me forward.

The years went by and my dad gradually recovered and found something that could pay for our bills on a more of a permanent basis. He got a stall in downtown Moscow selling books and magazines. It was a small business but a decently profitable and my uncle got involved as well. Together they were able to gradually grow and make it more successful.

At the same time they saw an opportunity for another small business nearby. They didn’t want to be distracted from their own one so they gave me an opportunity to try it. It was selling joke ids (i.e. ID of an alcoholic or an ID for a lazy bum, Russian humor is slightly different from Western one). The business was doing well and I spend summers and time after school running this venture. I found it was one of the most fun things that I’ve done. Considering I was only 13, I had an early start in business world: sales, managing merchandize, figuring out profits. To say that I really enjoyed it would be a big understatement.

At the same time I had couple of interesting side lessons like dealing with mafia one day and drunk special forces marines another day. Police would occasionally pick me up and put me into police station for running the business underage. The normal rules of doing business clearly didn’t work! When I was 14 I learned that gambling is not good after losing a day’s salary in a slots machine, since day I stayed away from gambling. 

This concludes the part 1 ;)) of my journey. 

Hope you have enjoyed it,
George



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