“All I’m hearing is Spanish. One in three peoples is speaking Spanish,” Arkady Petrov says on the beach at Olive Park. “I’m hearing Carlos. Ricardo. I thought this was supposed to be Polish city. Like Poland. How come I not hear any Polish here? Where are the Poles? Where do they live?
This afternoon Yuri, who looks like Mickey Rooney with a lot of white hair, has gone to the hotel to rest. But Arkady, who looks like a cross between the Frugal Gourmet and Lenin, wanted to fulfill his lifelong dream of swimming in Lake Michigan. “Two weeks ago, I swim in the Volga,” Arkady says. “Now I will go home and tell my wife and everyone I see I swim in Michigan Lake.”
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Once they got to Chicago, it turned out that the real problem was a lack of spending money. The Soviet government had refused to exchange their rubles for dollars, but being troupers–and optimists–they came anyway, ready to depend on the kindness of strangers. Strangers like the Hyatt Hotel and Rich Melman–the kinds of strangers City Hall can contact in a pinch.
“Yuri is convinced that women run Chicago life,” says Dialla, a 33-year-old Russian interpreter from Streeterville who is on hand to help Yuri and Arkady during their stay. Today–day one of the jazz fest–happens to be the 14th anniversary of her coming to Chicago. Director of Special Events Kathy Osterman is swirling around the city’s hospitality tent, adjacent to the bandshell, with her beau, radio and TV personality Bruce DuMont. “Where are the Russians? Where are the Russians?” she asks frantically. After the ticket snafu in New York, everyone connected with the fest worries about the Russians.
“Oh-h-h-h,” says Yuri. “Light, Light.” He points to the label on the bottle. “‘Light’ pays the musicians.”
“This was not recommended by the American Embassy,” says Yuri through Dialla. “They were like our bureaucrats in the old days.”
