Sometimes I Think About the DVDs My Dad Used to Bring Me

I barely saw my dad growing up.

I know what you're probably imagining: a stereotypical Eastern European childhood with an absent father — or worse, a present one. It wasn’t either of these things, though.

He worked for one of the biggest industrial companies in the country and spent most of his time away from us. Before remote work meant Zoom calls, his version meant training programmes, fieldwork, and constant travel. He was the first person in our family to visit Moscow and Saint Petersburg. Back then, it felt like someone had gone to the Moon, no less.

From his endless trips, he brought gifts, of course: toys, books, sweets. One of my most treasured possessions, though, was a trapeze-shaped jewellery box carved from pure malachite. A tiny bronze lizard in a tinier crown rested on its lid, echoing the legends of the Urals. Long before I owned anything made of gold, it felt impossibly luxurious.

As I got older, though, choosing gifts became more difficult. Eventually, my dad caught on and started bringing me nerdier things instead. One time, after a trip to Moscow and Saint Petersburg, he came home with two DVDs.

They came in thick cardboard cases, one red and one green. The red one contained video tours of Moscow — its museums, river, and monuments. The green one was devoted to St. Petersburg.

I picked the green DVD first.

I'd watch it in the quiet evenings of my room, sometimes on a loop. The cinematography felt elegant, the narrator's voice calm and assured. I fell in love with the canals of St. Petersburg, with its Western architecture, and with a reality that seemed infinitely more beautiful than what I saw outside.

It was the first time I felt another life calling to me.

My favourite part of the DVD was always the tour of the Russian Museum, containing the world’s largest collection of Russian fine art. Every single time, somewhere in the middle, just as I was becoming completely absorbed, the DVD — that traitor! — would freeze. I'd sigh, get up, eject the disc, breathe on it, wipe it on my sleeve, and try again. It never worked. Whether I'd scratched it myself or it had always been damaged, I never found out.

I devoured whatever scraps of culture the DVD managed to show me, feeling both bitter and grateful at the same time. I imagined that one day, (all grown up and beautiful, of course) I'd go to St. Petersburg and visit every single museum there is myself.

Spoiler alert: I never actually made it to St. Petersburg.

I did make it to Moscow, though, and my favourite museum there remains the Museum of Russian Impressionism, independent and wonderful.

Sometimes I think about the encyclopaedias and DVDs my dad brought me. Long before the internet became a window onto everything — and I mean everything — those were my little windows. They gave me glimpses of the cultural life I’d already begun imagining for myself.

I was always hungry for beauty.

The Louvre, for example, — a museum I now occasionally roll my eyes at — was once a painful dream. Once, while visiting a classmate, she showed me a glossy art book filled with photographs from the Louvre. It was expensive, so, naturally, I wasn't allowed to borrow it. I'd flip through the pages as quickly as I could sitting on that couch of hers, afraid that lingering too long would make me want it even more. Call me avoidant, but only when it comes to things I can't have.

I'm writing this in Paris, after visiting nearly every major exhibition there is at the moment and already waiting for the next ones.

At the time, it felt unbearably unfair that that broken DVD would always freeze just before the interesting (in my opinion) part of the tour started.

It taught me something in the end, though — longing can be its own education. Those lagging museum tours, the dog-eared encyclopaedias with non-glossy pages, the gifts my father carried home from cities that seemed as distant as the Moon — they made me hungry for beauty long before I knew I'd spend my life chasing it.

Don’t know whether my dad ever thought twice about those DVDs — I still do.