Queen Victoria and the accordion

In holiday seasons like these, my thoughts often drift towards home and the gatherings of family and friends. Our previous flat was very quiet – which was nice, but it also meant that I never heard evidence of others around me enjoying the camaraderie of holidays in the home. Last night was the start of a 4-day weekend celebrating the 20^th anniversary of Kazakhstan’s independence. The living room above where I am currently camped had a crowd of people over, including many children with happy little feet, and there was laughter, boisterous conversation and let’s-see-who-can-jump-off-the-highest-piece-of-furniture games. Pretending I was at home among the chaos of my large family, I was finally able to trick myself into drifting off to sleep. I was just at that crucial tipping point between wakefulness and sleep when I was jolted awake by an extra-ordinary noise from above. An accordion? Really? But it’s midnight!

Yes. An accordion, belting out what I can only describe as a Russian polka complete with obligatory foot stomping. Then came the melancholic slow verse where a roomful of very enthusiastic, but non-musical singers joined in. Even though I wasn’t there, I could see their faces. The far off look in their eye as they were transported to another time, a time of war and famine and general hardship, but a time that was better because it was in their youth. Reveling in suffering, enjoying the deep emotion of an awareness of being alive; a mix of heart–thumping joy and gut-wrenching sorrow that the Russian culture does so well. I don’t quite know how to describe it. Perhaps this language of the “stiff upper lippers” is ill-equipped to do so. But there must be a Slavic ancestor or two in my blood, because I was able to lie there and wallow in the pathos. At least, for a few rounds of verses and choruses! As the clock rolled past 1:00, however, the part of my blood-line that I share with Queen Victoria took over. "We were not amused."

The real way to handle a stuck accelerator!

You can find instructions for pretty much anything on the internet these days. Type a few words into google and soon you find yourself learning about all kinds of things. One of my latest searches turned up this little gem from ehow.com:

"How to Handle a Stuck Gas Pedal. Although not a common occurrance, your throttle linkage can get stuck, making your car go faster even though you've taken your foot off the gas pedal."

The interesting thing about this search was that I was looking for information AFTER the fact, mostly trying to find out WHY a gas pedal would get stuck, but imagine how happy I was to find that I had done everything right when it does!

eHow's first suggestion: Don't panic. {Check!}
Here's my internal feed while cruising on the new flat road just at the city limits, on the way to Yesun:
"Mmmm, nice new smooth road, city limit sign coming up, time to crank it up to "out-of-city-bumpless-road-speed"... {foot presses accelerator down a little}...
"Hmmm, that's funny, I didn't know we had cruise control... wait, we don't." {head turns to colleague only to see that she has gone into "smooth-road-nap-mode"}
"Nah, I can't let something interesting like this pass without comment..."
{out loud}
"Hey - check this out. Freddy's driving himself! Look, no feet!" {car continues to cruise, speedo nudges towards 80km/h}
{internal again}
"... ok, hmm... this is really happening, I have no control over this gas pedal. It's stuck down..."

Time to follow the rest of the Instructions

• 1 Shift to neutral {check} and turn off the ignition {nope - didn't do it. Other car adventures have taught me that braking and steering happen best when engine is on! Ehow does helpfully clarify:} You'll lose all power, including power steering.
• 2 Turn on your emergency lights to warn other drivers. {check}
• 3 Apply your brakes, but keep coasting. {check}
• 4 Search the roadway for a safe place to pull over. {check - they've just widened this nice new road and put in wide gravel shoulders, and its Saturday, at lunch... it's all pretty much safe!}
• 5 Pull off the road cautiously. {check - then turned off ignition}
• 6 Locate an emergency roadside phone to get assistance. {oh, ehow,... if only you knew how good it could be...}

If I could rewrite point 6 it would look something like this:

a) Pull out cell phone, find "FavMech" in your contact list.
b) Tell your favourite mechanic what has happened and that you're on the outskirts of town.
c) Listen patiently while he tells you what to look at under the hood, then wait for the magic words as he realises you're not really understanding all the car-related Russian verbs and nouns he just threw at you: "Ok - just stay there, I'll be right there"...

We never did go to Yesun that day - by the time we would have got there, we would have had to turn around and drive back - and we still don't know WHY the gas pedal got stuck, or how it unstuck itself ... but I do know that I can handle myself coolly under pressure. I also know that my new haircut suits me - my favourite mechanic told me so :)