I do not regret at all that I went to the States in 2009; I had to return a little earlier, but that's not a big deal. It would have been scary to give up the trip, which I almost did throughout the entire winter of early 2009. Every day I would decide to go, then decide not to go. I'll start from the place where I said goodbye to my mom. In the morning I woke up unusually, finally catching that feeling of anticipation of something significant. It was very timely. I don't remember what happened in the first half of the day, but I remember what happened shortly before departure. Two hours before leaving, I packed my sports bag, which I later regretted very much, I'll explain why later. I walk around the room looking out the window. I look at the houses and factories and think that I probably won't see this familiar view for a long time. I walk around double-checking everything. I look at the clock, that's it, five minutes left, well, it's started. I get dressed, mom is standing nearby in the hallway as usual, watching me get ready, only this time I realize that I might be getting ready for a very long time. I put on sunglasses, looked in the mirror. Mom and I hugged tightly. At that moment, I felt uneasy, a paranoid thought crossed my mind that it might be forever. Bag on my shoulder, I went out into the hallway, went outside, friends were already waiting in the yard. Kolyan and Sanya drove me to the airport. We stood there at the entrance for a bit, had a smoke, and that was it, I flew off. The next part of the narrative will be from the place where I am in America. True, I could tell a lot about traveling through various cities like Kiev or Moscow, but that would take too long. The only thing I will tell about my travels is how I was almost turned away at Sheremetyevo. At the check-in counter in Sheremetyevo, the check-in clerk asks: - Are you flying on a Green Card? - No. On an exchange program. - Where are you flying to? - To such and such a place. - Unfortunately, I cannot check you in for the flight. For me, this was furious. Shock. I had done everything, spent a year and a half doing all this stuff, collecting certificates, gathering all sorts of papers, permits, reinstating myself at the institute, paying a ton of money, sold my car, sorted everything out. In short, it turned out that she had some other information about me in her computer, saying that I was flying to California, and I had supposedly given her false information. In short, I realized at that moment that I shouldn't argue with her because it would only get worse. I calmly ask what the matter is, say that it's some kind of mistake, show all the documents, speak to her very politely, but not servilely, and in the end, everything worked out. I don't know what I would have done if she had sent me back to the city; I hadn't slept for a day, I had just enough money for the States for the first time, no one in Moscow, the bag pressing mercilessly on my shoulder... I exit JFK airport in New York! I am in America! ...Inside, for some reason, there was no such feeling. There was a strange feeling of anxiety because some suspicious individuals were scurrying back and forth. I flew alone, as there were no other students on the plane. And I hadn't managed to arrange anything with anyone for these dates in advance via the internet. Arseny was supposed to arrive, but a day later. At the airport, I start looking for students like me. It was sunny, the time was about six in the evening. Summer. Surprisingly, it wasn't very crowded. In the end, I found some girls from Russia and helped them get to Manhattan. Tip: It's better to go from JFK airport to Jamaica Station on the AirTrain, which runs directly from JFK, and then take the subway from Jamaica. It will cost about eight dollars in total, but I didn't know about that, so I took a bus back then. On the bus, I immediately spotted two black guys, guys my age, they were sitting in the very last seat of the bus, I walked up to them and started talking, in short, they were amused by me, probably)) but while we were riding, I chatted with them about something the whole way, only they were probably amused by my English. I asked them when to get off in Manhattan, they, by the way, stubbornly said Manhatn, such a dialect... I got off in Manhattan in the area of the MetLife skyscraper. Here, by the way, that feeling of pleasant anxiety appeared in my body, that, well, I'm in America! I even remember exactly when... When I was walking down the bus aisle with my bag to the exit and looked through the bus windows at the street and saw the sidewalk and a purely American spirit, an atmosphere, I don't know how to describe it... in short, that now I would step out and take the first step, as if a person is stepping onto the moon, hehe))).... Such a feeling is probably familiar to many. It was right in this place that I regretted taking a sports bag. After two days of wandering through countries and cities, through airports and streets, I was so fucking tired of carrying it on my shoulder that I thought I would collapse right here on some street and fall asleep.. Tip: You also need to prepare physically, and not get drunk before departure, although that's my opinion, all my acquaintances celebrated their departure and so did I))) Do not take sports bags, take bags on wheels with a handle. "Heave-ho!" I said to myself and, in a half-bent position, moved forward along the street.. By the way, I cheered up a bit here, because I'm in America!!! I immediately realized the trick: I need to move to the square urgently, at that moment I was still alone. I immediately remembered the brochure that INTEX gives to all students before departure; it helped me a lot in the States. In it, I found a list of hostels (cheap lodging, dormitory type, 4 people per room, minimal amenities (for those who don't know)), spotted the street on a sign, 42nd Street.. found the nearest hostel to this place and went to look for it. I had to search for a long time because it's not at all necessary that the house number must be on the building, it might just not be there, the streets are long.. On the way, I encountered various individuals, a woman with golden hair on a bike was delivering some stuff around the local area, helped me with the direction, some black guy helped me, a cola seller on a rolling cart helped me, in the end, with God's help, BEFORE DARK!!! I managed to find shelter. Tip: In Manhattan, there are streets and avenues. Avenues run along the island, and streets are perpendicular to them! This is in case you suddenly need to find something!)) I rented a hostel for 42 bucks, if anyone needs it, this hostel is located in the very heart of the island, practically on Times Square, it's called BigAppleHostel, I don't remember the address, it's about half a minute's walk from Times Square. "Finally home," I thought, but I was wrong, although I was still alone in the room, at night in the deepest phase of sleep, my sleep was periodically disturbed by all sorts of individuals, of course, they hardly understood the Russian profanity with which I was actually covering them) But I think I managed to get enough sleep, I woke up around ten. The thought appeared to call home to Russia. On the first floor, there was a phone from which you could call using cards. For those who don't know, I explain the system there is like this. You buy cards for an average of 5 bucks, it has a Toll-free number and a PIN code. I didn't really understand the time system, with some cards you can talk for more than an hour, others last for a couple of minutes. You dial the toll-free number, then enter the PIN code, and then the phone number in Russia. It's better, as I already said, to buy an unlimited cell phone with international calling capability. Mom picked up the phone, I said that everything was fine, that I had arrived without incident. And finally, after I had slept, I could go and finally see the States. Right there on the first floor of the hostel, I met Sasha, we hit it off immediately, didn't delay for long, immediately agreed to go on excursions today, and the next day to go to work. We left the hostel and decided to have lunch somewhere, went into some diner next to the hostel, yeah, the prices didn't please us. But literally five minutes later we were sitting at McDonald's on Times Square, I was eating a Burrito, and Shurik some egg hamburger. Sanyok and I started communicating immediately, even in the hostel we found a common language, well, it's understandable, what an occasion!!! We are in the States. So we are sitting at McDonald's sharing impressions. We look down at the people walking, the weather is sunny, the mood is good. We are in anticipation of a big day. Everything is super. After breakfast, we moved along a simple route, first we decided to look at the Empire State Building, then visit the Statue of Liberty. That's what we did. On this day, we walked along Broadway, were at the Empire State Building, at the Statue of Liberty, in various parks... and so on. In the evening at the Hostel, we found the internet and opening my VKontakte page, I saw a message from Senya... And the backstory was that we were supposed to meet at the Empire State Building at such and such a time, I walked around, he wasn't there.. and after that in the hostel I read a message on VKontakte: ya tebya ne na shol u empire state building perezvoni srochno 89647..... I remembered that I had a phone card, I rush to the phone, dial all the numbers, it turns out that I only have 30 seconds for the conversation. I wait... Silence.. I wait.. Silence again... And here are the beeps.. Arseny picks up the phone, yells something into the receiver, I interrupt him, say that the hostel is near Times Square, House number, I try to remember the street.. the connection is abruptly interrupted: Subscriber is out of network coverage area))))).. A little upset, I went to the kitchen, no connection with Senya, nothing, we'll meet at work in Congers, I thought, and then Senya drives into the hostel. Hehe, how did you find it, what's what... and so on. In short, everything was starting off smoothly... The next morning in the hostel, what I was afraid of happened, I got sick. Fever, weakness, everyone is familiar with these symptoms, but there's nothing to do, we started getting ready for Congers. At the same time, we stopped by to buy phones, opened debit cards at the bank, and took another quick look at the area. Yes, and in the hostel, we spent the night four of us, Senya, me, and Sasha, and there was some little black dwarf with us. Black... fucking hell. I've never seen blacker. In the end, it turned out that he was a representative of some tribe at the UN. Mda... UN in the hostel)))) that's heat... ))) well, he's generally a super guy, friendly! He showed us photos from his places.. fucking hell, places. Some kind of backwater. I felt very bad, with a fever and a heavy bag on my shoulder, I still completed everything we had planned for that day. By the way, I'll tell you useful information about opening cards! If you have a debit card and the balance is zero or lower, then each purchase will come with a $35 fee! If the balance is negative or zero, do not make purchases. I once, not knowing this, made purchases, as a result, my fees accumulated to $300, and I bought a couple of cans of cola a few times, some food, in general, each purchase was no more than $5. And they opened the card for us without any problems. We opened cards at Bank of America – a good, proven bank. The spacious, bright hall of Bank of America was bright, it was sunny and nice outside, the weather that day was amazing. In the bank, we were met by a girl of about 27, pleasant appearance, medium height, black hair. As it turned out later, she is from Afghanistan. With us, and there were three of us at that time: Arseny, Sasha, and me, she was very polite and friendly. The girl asked us if I could help you with anything, we said why we came. In the end, opening the cards took about 1 hour for two, Sasha did not open a card, justifying this by saying that he wants to open a card on the spot not far from work. Alexander intended to go to the State of Maine... At the end of the procedure, she brought us temporary, but already ready-to-use cards, within a month, ready cards with our names should have arrived at the address we provided. We provided our work address. The cards arrived a month later. If you are sure that you will live in one place for more than a month, then I think you can also provide a home address, although I'm not sure. After all the business, we returned to the hostel, picked up our bags, said goodbye to Sasha, and moved towards the Bus Station, where we successfully bought a ticket, got on the bus, and headed to our place of work... On the bus, I already felt extremely miserable, the temperature was only rising. Plus, in American buses, air conditioners work furiously. We sat in the last row of seats, I was sitting on the right, or rather lying down. The last row is wide, resembles a sofa. I looked out the window at all the splendor of New York architecture and realized that I had reached where I had wanted to go for so long. Giant traffic jams on the Highway were moving surprisingly fast. I became convinced that the system of high-speed highways in America is arranged very reasonably. The system of American highways, which Roosevelt built, permeates the entire country. Thanks to which you can get from point A to point B quite quickly. The fact is that on Highways, traffic is high-speed, there are no intersections for most of the road, you always drive straight. To turn somewhere, there are so-called Exits. Turns to the right. Plus, they are very wide. But despite all this, the traffic jams there are not childish. But unlike Russian traffic jams, they almost never stand still. We arrived at our destination in an hour and a half, and surprisingly, the fever pill helped me reliably. The bus driver dropped us off at our request in a town called Congers near a school. The weather was excellent, the sun was shining, and it was very bright. Congers turned out to be a very cute, cozy American town with a population of 8,000 people. Neat paths, purely American shops, short-mown lawns – the passion of Americans, by the way. All this created a very favorable atmosphere. Our task at that moment was quite banal: - find an employer. On the way, we met stoned local kids with red eyes, Mexicans at an auto repair shop who looked at us with suspicion, and an uncle in an old car who kindly eventually delivered us to the place. Approaching the place, we immediately spotted three guys sitting on the curb. They were dressed in gray t-shirts. I immediately realized that these were Russian guys just like us who had come to work here and were already working. Subsequently, they became my roommates. We certainly talked with them, who is from where, how the work is, and other details. A very relevant topic arose on the agenda: Housing. It was solved very confidently, a Motel was located right near the work. About half an hour later, the fourth, fifth, and sixth guys arrived from work. In the end, Senya and I teamed up with guys from Volzhsky and Ukraine. And we lived five of us in one room. Having successfully found roommates as we planned, we solved the first task. The second task, even more important, was work. The next day we went, like everyone else, to work by 9 am. Kevin, our boss, was a pure American and had a very original figure, ordinary shoulders combined with a huge butt twice as wide, subsequently, personally for me, as an employer, he was very satisfactory. Kevin gave us some papers to sign, gave us work clothes, gave us keys to check in and out. And drove us to work. Everything was going according to a clearly outlined plan, when suddenly I saw something unforgettable for the first time in my life... Stopping at an intersection, we are calmly waiting for the green light, when suddenly Kevin yells: Oh my god!!! In front of us, perpendicular to our road, a Jeep SUV turns right, and another Jeep flies into its right rear part at high speed. The damaged car flies to the other side of the road, flips over, and hangs on its side... I definitely couldn't expect such a thing. In the end, we were the first to drive up to the victim, got out of the car. We started helping! Moreover, Arseny and I were dressed identically in identical gray shorts and t-shirts, we probably looked like some kind of rescuers. I heroically pulled the driver out of the car. The driver was a Woman, she eventually was the culprit of the accident. The first day at work went well. We arrived at a huge warehouse, assembled large wooden crates. In the evening we walked to the store, talked. The next day was the same. After some time, we were taken on a trip. Our work consisted of loading and unloading furniture, packing things, assembling crates, and working in the warehouse. All this was paid 10 bucks an hour. What I like most about America is that they pay more and once a week. I received my first check exactly a week after starting work. The amount was normal, 300 bucks and change, for Russia a salary of 300 dollars a week is just excellent. And in America, and especially in New York, it's almost nothing. In the end, we received more, on average from 500 to 700 bucks a week. Subsequently, we got up very early for work, sometimes arrived very late, traveled to different places, mainly New York State and nearby states. But the main place of our work was the picturesque closed-type military town of West Point. A most picturesque place, a most cozy place to live, and besides, very calm, zero crime. In general, it's unreal, I liked it very much. Sometimes during breaks between work, we went out to smoke on the street. And just imagine, you stand on the road, everything is green everywhere, the landscape is excellent, everything is very neat, houses, sidewalks, everything is impeccably clean. You stand, catch the silence, and sometimes you can hear a fly flying, or hear something distant. There I understood why Americans are so calm when someone comes to them, says: Can I come in, and enters without even wiping their boots, walks on carpets in boots. Because it's so clean there that you can lick the asphalt and you'll remain clean. A lot of things happened later: The police stopped us, we often went to the park.. an excellent park, by the way, Rockland park, played football with Sri Lanka, I went to Boston, to New York, Manhattan... fuck it.. center of the world, damn it... I got drunk in a Pub until I lost my memory, a lot of other things that you can't even retell. But I absolutely do not regret that I went. I can say that the USA and Russia are not very similar in many things.. but in some, definitely. Fury, in a word..