Yellow with a capital Y
This is my story about a little deaf girl I saw today in Simferopol. I also have a story about the deaf guy who sells knick knacks at all the local resterants, but that can wait for another entry. Read on!
Today I left my apartment five minutes earlier for no good reason. To get to the nearest marshytka stop I need to walk only a couple hundred yards from my door. As I approached the stop today I saw a girl and her mother signing (sign language) to another woman who also just walked up to the stop. With the bus almost here, the mom kissed the deaf girl and said goodbye to this new woman.
The back of the bus was full, so I sat on the bench seat that faces inward. Directly across from me sat the deaf girl and directly across from her, sitting with her back to the front of the bus, was the woman. The girl seemed very happy about something and this joy caused her to whip up the air as she signed furiously to the woman across from her. I could tell that the woman also got a chuckle out of what the little girl said, but apparently it was not appropriate "talk" for a bus crammed full of people because the older woman did the universal sign for stop--slash across the neck.
At the next stop a boy roughly the age of the deaf girl boarded the bus. I was sitting right next to the exit and I noticed him standing very close to the driver. I thought his movements odd as whenever I stood that close to the micro bus drivers, they pitched a Ukrainian bus driver fit and told me to back the hell off.
In the meantime the girl had started signing again. I noticed that most of the front of the bus was watching her closely, including myself. This wasn't too hard to understand; she was wearing a bright yellow coat and a white knit hat. The coat was quilted, long, and the color of one thousand suns blazing. I swear that this little girl's coat, combined with her contagious happiness, lit up the dark bus--this coat was Yellow with a capital Y.
Finally the boy glanced over his shoulder and noticed the girl waving at him. He didn't wave back but instead began signing to her, obviously saying something nice like, "Goodmorning, how are you? How was your breakfast? Did you get the homework done that that witch Mrs.Kolokov assigned?" Or at least that's what I thought they said.
After a bit the girl excitedly began to unwrap the plastic bag that was sitting on her lap, in order to show the boy whatever was inside of it. The boy's face lit up; I got excited too. But alas, the old woman nixed it with a stern hand gesture. At the next stop all three got off, probably at the local school for deaf kids.
Fast forward to eight at night. It is raining and gloomy and I am in need of some gum from the local gastronom. Guess who was in the store?? The deaf girl in the Yellow coat! After I bought my gum, we smiled and waved at each other.
It was Life with a capital L.