The institute should not “last” forever. You need to finish it in order not to be an eternal student. Sometimes it seems that “this” is forever, and so completely “unexpectedly” you see a diploma in your hands, and after a couple of weeks you realize that the time has come to leave your student dormitory, which has become native during five years, and to find a new home, preferably quicker and cheaper one. Having learned from a classmate that I can rent an apartment for 800 rubles in Tomilino near Moscow, I joyfully rejected the thought of a very expensive room in Moscow and cheerfully headed for the Kazan station.

The first disappointment was that at Tomilino, trains stop once an hour or even less. Having bought a ticket to Tomilino, I saw it only from the window of the car. A restaurant “Country” and small private houses along the road flew by. The train at full speed carried me further towards Golutvin. I still don’t know what kind of city it is, but then they explained to me that the city of Voskresensk appears under this name. Well, I’m not surprised at the oddities anymore. After leaving the walls of the alma mother, everything changes so rapidly that for a while you cease to understand what is happening to you.

Having traveled about fifty kilometers from the capital, I got off at the first station that came across. “Sovkhoz,” (State Farm in English) I read, and was very surprised. The people went along the path past the huge summer cottages, looking more like wooden mansions. Soon I was among the miserable and shabby panel five-story buildings. All Moscow region, it seems, is built up with these houses of cards, as if in punishment for being close to Moscow and the “cheapness” of the area. But I wouldn’t want to live in one.

True, they didn’t let me in. Long inquiries about whether anyone is leasing an apartment here did not give a positive result. True, one kind girl led me almost by the hand to the door of the apartment that her brother had once rented. The door was opened by a cheerful woman of about thirty. “No, this apartment is already occupied,” she replied. I did not continue to rush through other people’s doors and went to the station. 600-700 rubles a month, of course, is an interesting price, but it exists only in secret conversations, but to strangers, it is not available.

My second trip to the Moscow region took place a week later. I bravely bought a ticket to Golutvin, hoping to rent already definitely an apartment there at a low price - after all, at such a distance from the capital, very few people will bargain fervently for a hundred rubles, because of which I started to save. But I got out of the electric train this time at the Bronnitsy station. Right there, my tourist patience burst. Residents of the village located at this station sluggishly reacted to my inquiries, and only two teenagers volunteered to take me to places of possible rental housing. They vividly participated in my research and sympathized with the failures. All the “villagers” seemed to have conspired and answered, “No, we don’t know.” I went from there my way.

And finally, after about a week, on Saturday, I set off on a new quest. This time I was drifted to the village of Trofimovo. The train, as it turned out, stops on this platform once an hour, and therefore there was no reason to rush back in a hurry. One woman also came out there by accident, but from the opposite side of the platform another woman warned her about “the danger” to get lost for half a day to no avail, and she, having seen the train approaching from the opposite side, ran across the railroad tracks and got on it so that from Konobeevo station she would return to Golutvin much faster than directly in an hour.

I hit the road in search of adventure. An even field spread out before me. Birds sang in sunny heights and green grass swayed around. In the distance, mysteriously stood a village in which, I felt, the success awaited me. But it was not there. Two old women and an old man pointed me to a house that they said was empty. They said that they would probably lease me a housing there. I came there. The dog barked loudly. Soon a young woman came out and stared at me with dislike and undisguised suspicion.

I told her the purpose of my visit. “Oh, no, there are poor conditions, there is no gas and electricity, the floor is rotten and I won’t let you into the house.” Soon her mother came out, and then two completely sullen men. They looked so hostile, as if some terrible danger was coming from me, and therefore, wanting to prevent it, they were preparing for defense. Naturally, I preferred not to annoy them anymore and headed for where they showed - to the village of “multi-apartment” houses, or rather, the old long two-story boxes, which you can probably see today only in such a terrible wilderness.

There was nothing new: all the same refusals and instructions that it is impossible to rent anything. By the way, that unfriendly woman suddenly began asking me, using "thou": "Do thou really wantest to rent a house here? And why in Trofimovo?" She and the family still did not believe in my pure intentions.

The train to Moscow carried me away from the inhospitable village. I no longer wanted to rent an apartment in these places, and did not get off in Konobeevo to return to Voskresensk - that was the name of the town, which was listed under the name Golutvin, as a woman explained to me on the platform. I simply did not want to spend an hour and a half on a one-way trip, and so I completely lost the desire to continue this venture. However, I got off in Bronnitsy and tried to visit a familiar woman who asked me to call her on Sunday.

She was not at home, but I still had a good time. The girl on the bike, last time flashed nearby, told me "hello." I greeted her in return, somewhat surprised. I met a very drunk young woman who said she would lease me a room in Moscow or half a house here for a thousand two hundred roubles. Her no less drunk husband noticed that this was not true and "Lyuda messed up something." He turned out to be her age and looked thirty years old at the most.

Together with him, we went to a longhouse, in which, according to him, something could be rented out. But soon the owner arrived at the ancient Moskvich-2140 and said that he wasn’t leasing anything and he already had tenants. My new "comrade", who had become very tired during the brief joint moving along the village streets, quite unexpectedly demanded that I reward him for this hard work, and I gave him twenty rubles, what pleasantly surprised him.

In short, he left me his phone number and asked to call - in case if he finds out where and what I can rent at that station. We just broke out best friends, and I went to Moscow. During this day, I got a good tan, because I spent a lot of time walking in the open sun. Moreover, I had a great rest and then recalled this unusual adventure with pleasure.