Russia, 2019
Dani had pinned a place called “Pyshechnaya” on the map—apparently just the Russian word for “donut shop.” In Saint Petersburg now, we couldn’t find it.
We passed a security kiosk in our wandering. The guard nodded at us as we passed, but he stepped out of his booth now to investigate.
He squinted at the English spelling and sounded it out slowly under his breath.
“R… i…”
Suddenly he nodded.
“Ahhh. Pysh-ehch-naya.”
He pointed farther down the avenue and launched into rapid directions we could not follow. Then he pointed again, left, then held up two fingers.
I nodded as though I understood.
Regardless, we followed his gesture, and soon saw the shop’s name written in pink neon lights hanging behind the window of a store. Looking past them, we saw pink walls, pink ceilings, and white latticework trim. Standing-height tables filled the narrow room inside, each shared by multiple groups eating donuts and drinking coffee beneath the pink glow of the window lights.
Dani opened the door, and we stepped into the “Donut Shop.”
~
Three or four people ahead of us in line. Out of curiosity, we watched what they ordered. Easy, because they sold old-fashioned donuts covered in powdered sugar and coffee: nothing else. Each person in front walked away with stacks of the sugary pastries: a single person might buy between two and six, a group of two might order eight to ten, and a group of four might split twenty. We decided on splitting four.
Dani approached the counter when our turn arrived. The woman attending it wore a pink dress with a white apron and matching cap that matched the walls. She looked tired, like someone who had started working at three or four in the morning. Flour and sugar covered her arms and clothes. Looking behind her, I saw burlap sacks of ingredients stacked against the wall.
“Yes?” Her eyes met my wife’s.
Dani held out four fingers. The woman nodded and stacked four donuts on a paper plate. Then she pointed at a ten-gallon igloo thermos of coffee on the counter. I held out two fingers this time, and she filled two paper cups with fold-out handles.
The woman typed “24” on a nearby calculator.
I handed her a 10,000-ruble banknote and an apologetic look, but she accepted it without complaint and gave me a fistful of smaller bills as change. I didn’t bother to count
Dani then took our feast to one of the standing tables under the pink glow of the window.
The donuts had no frosting and no filling, just a light powdering of sugar on golden batter. The coffee, though, was somehow sweeter. We finished all four before it had cooled enough to try.
I glanced at the table next to us—two women sharing a stack of twelve—then back at Dani, powdered sugar still clinging to her gloves and jacket.
“Tomorrow, we try for six?”