Day Two
Wake uuuuup!!! It's 9:00 AM. "Yeah, gotta get up!" I'm trying to stick to the diet I started back in Moscow. For breakfast: cereal with nuts and raisins, soaked in kefir (I can't have milk), butter and cheese sandwiches (instead of cottage cheese), grapefruit-flavored green tea (so delicious, I've only started drinking it in such quantities here), sometimes nut butter (nothing special, but I bought it, so I have to eat it), and DanActive (they don't have Actimel here, but they have this. Basically the same thing, just "no fat"—Americans are obsessed with cutting fat in every conceivable way, but they rarely do it systematically. They'll eat burgers and donuts, wash it down with Coke, and finish with a DanActive, like, "There, I'm watching my weight and health").
Today is a full day of work. Maybe they'll let me cut some meat. I'll introduce the main characters now so I don't have to keep explaining:
ADILIO - Honduras, my boss, a good guy like many gauchos, helps me out a lot, loves Spanish and Mexican music, wears a black shirt;
EDUARDO - Brazil, my teacher, does jiu-jitsu, 43 years old, built like a tank;
PACO - Brazil, grills meat, always cuts a piece just right and shares if you want;
NATALIA - Brazil, Helber's best friend, a bit chubby but pleasant;
ANDRE - Brazil, one of the 3 managers, understanding, sociable, just a good person;
DAVID - Mexico, one of the 3 managers, cunning, likes to hug girls when his wife isn't around, sees me and Vova and yells: "Russians!", a bit "slippery";
MATTHEW - Brazil, waiter, a bit overweight, which makes him the target of constant jokes, but otherwise he's like Oblomov, just with a desire to work;
VLADIMIR - a Russian guy from Magnitogorsk, helps with everything, explains things, we've become good friends;
HELBER - Brazil, gay, chatty, can ask you anything he wants, offer you anything, ready to tell you what, how, and with whom he's been.
On the very first day of "real work," I ran into one not-so-"joyful" customer. Two guys came in with a grandmother, one was quite large, curly hair, potato nose, glasses. So, this guy started teasing me: that the meat was burnt, my English sounded weird, etc. I ignored him, of course, because: a) he's a customer, and the customer is always right; b) I have to work here until September; c) what do I care, let him say what he wants, life has already punished him enough. As Sasha told me later, "let him eat and say whatever he wants, the main thing for me is the money." Another girl, when I brought her pork sausages (she was with her boyfriend), asked: "Sausages? Whose sausages?" Her boyfriend replied: "Sausages? Oh! Good! She loves sausages, this is just for her!" I naturally laughed along with him (see rule a)).
Actually, it's not hot in my uniform, there's AC everywhere, but I'm wearing boots. And when it's +30 outside and you're in boots on your feet all day, they start to swell. At first, it was hard, and I asked to go home an hour early. Andre didn't mind, and I happily left my "almost real" workday. As mentioned above, there are many Southerners in Atlanta. Being on the subway, I was the second (!!!) white person! Everyone else was Southern. It feels unusual, of course, especially after Russia. Upon arrival (50 mins from work to home), we headed to the Kroger store in Sasha's car. I knew Americans loved to eat, but not to this extent. Super cheap products, even without converting to rubles (say, 500g of M&M's for $7, bread for $1.5-3, but don't forget the average salary is $9-10 an hour), others are cheap even when converted (Pringles $1.3, milk (3.8L) about $3). You know, I like buying large packs—they last longer and are cheaper, but they... Can you imagine dry cat or dog food in a huge bag (about 16 kg)? Well, they sell chocolate balls and cereal for humans in the same size containers here! 12-liter buckets of ice cream, 5-liter juices. Also, they don't sell drinks individually in large stores, just 1 bottle. You have to buy 12 bottles of 0.6L or 12 cans of Coke. Everything is by the pack. Although it's clear, Americans are too lazy to make an extra trip to the store. Just like I was after midnight when we got back from the store. Tomorrow, some worries awaited me, not related to me, but directly concerning me. It's important, in my opinion, to do the things you can do with quality, so you won't be ashamed of your work later and can say: yes, I did this!
