Total Failure

Spring 2023, Ann Arbor, Michigan:
I finally gave up on the idea that that the feature film I had shot in summer 2021 (my first, after 25 shorts) could be salvaged enough to submit to festivals or gain distribution. It was heartbreaking.

The First Invitation

Then I got a text from my son, who lives in Nagoya, Japan with his Japanese wife and three children, inviting me to come visit for 10 days. Then he upped it to 3 weeks. I told myself that if he raised it beyond a month, I would just not come back to America. Soon it went to 6 weeks, and finally to 3 months, so I got rid ot all my belongings, sold my car, and flew to Japan.

The Setup

Eight months earlier, one afternoon I suddenly got an urge to take a walk—something I usually did in the evening. On my way back, I saw a young man heading toward me who looked exactly like church pictures of Jesus. An odd but playful thought popped into my head—that I should greet him with “Namaste.” I did, and he replied, “Do you remember me?”

I did. I had known him two years earlier in Toastmasters groups, when he was an accountant with a buzz cut. He was on his way to Asia to have adventures based around an online organization that placed volunteers with groups around the world that provided room and board in return for work. I told a friend of mine at the time that I felt this encounter would be life-changing, but by now I had more or less forgotten it.

During the previous year I had met a guy who spent six months of each year in India, and who gave me a book called Shantaram. It was 800 pages—too long for me—and it sat on a shelf in my apartment for months. Finally one day I picked it up and started to read it. I was mesmerized, and developed a vague notion that India might be a cool place to visit.

Japan

I spent a glorious 3 months in Japan with my three grandkids, and my son and his wife. When my 90-day visa expired, I left for Mumbai.

India—the Reminder

After a week in a Mumbai slum (one of the nicer ones) I went to the northern hill city of Dharamshala, which was much cooler. I couldn’t remember the name of the website “Jesus” had told me about, and Google searches didn’t turn it up. One day a monsoon rain hit, and I ducked under the canopy of a cafe for cover. While I was waiting, an American guy popped in on his way up some stairs to a restaurant. He was the only American I’d seen, and I struck up a conversation—mainly because he looked a lot like my key grip, whom I’d worked with on 25 short films as well as the feature.
We went up to the restaurant together and talked for three hours, during which time he happened to mention—without my asking—both the Shantaram book and the website offering room and board for volunteer labor.

I joined the website’s membership and went to Delhi.

The Second Invitation

Shortly thereafter, a 20-year-old woman from northern India approached me on the volunteer site and asked if I wanted to be traveling companions—a feature promoted on the site. I thought it was odd for her to ask me, of all people, but I decided to stay open. Her name was Maya, and she spoke fluent French and Chinese, as well as English. She was in Dharamshala. Delhi was hot and boring, so I went back to meet her.
Maya had found a cheap but cool place for us to stay run by a colorful Tibetan lady—separate rooms, of course. We instantly felt like old friends, and traveled through India for several weeks, as she wanted to get to know her country better. She planned the itinerary.

We eventually ended up in Gujarat (west India) teaching English at a large Hindu school. Which was a huge coincidence, because the school had contacted me on the site earlier asking me to come teach there, but I declined, as it was several hundred miles from Dharamshala.

The Third Invitation

The Gujarat school was where I met Sasha, a lively 27-year-old Russian woman who was a pianist and music teacher. The three of us became fast friends, and Sasha invited me to come visit her and her Spanish boyfriend in Petrozavodsk, Russia, near Finland. Because she had such a joyful energy I decided to take her up on her offer—ignoring warnings of friends (and the U.S. State Department) that it was unsafe.

If I was going to go to Russia, I should learn the language, so I started studying from a Kindle book. I had also taken a year of Russian in college many years before and remembered the Cyrillic alphabet, and not much else.

A volunteer assignment in the Philippines landed me teaching English at a surfing camp to a dozen very interesting Russians. During a stay in Da Nang, Vietnam, I made friends with some more Russians, who were friendly and cultured.

On a language exchange site I met a beautiful redhead whose profile looked sassy but who turned out to be both shy and eager at the same time. That was Mila. (She went back to her natural blonde before I met her in person.) I adored her from the very beginning. Neither her English nor my Russian was very advanced. Each hour-long video chat was a joy, but we were each tired at the end from the effort.

Subsequent travels took me back to India, then to Armenia and Georgia—both former Soviet states where Russian is still a second language.

I had decided I would take the legendary Trans-Siberian Railway across Russia an a 3-week trip west to east. After spending a month with Sasha and Juan, I took a train to Moscow.

The Final Invitation

By this time Mila and I had spoken twice weekly for 8 months. She had said she would like to accompany me on my train trip for the last 10 days, to Vladivostok. But her dog Nika got sick, so instead she invited me to come stay with her for a week or two. I decided to skip the train, and flew directly to see her in Siberia (Novosibirsk) on July 1, 2024.

On day 3 we were lying down on her fold-out sofa watching a movie, when I felt I had to hold her hand, and that if I didn’t do it in that moment, I never would. She neither smacked me nor withdrew her hand. We finished watching the movie, and then she slept on the sofa and I slept in her bed, as Russian hospitality dictates. The next day, as we were hiking through the forest on the way to a riverside beach, she took my hand and said, “Maybe you could be like my boyfriend.”
That fall Mila’s beautiful yellow Labrador died, of old age. We like to think Nika was keeping Mila company until I could arrive. Mila had her own successful B2B business for 15 years that enabled her to buy a nice apartment (in the U.S. we would say “condo”). She phased that out (since it was geographically tied to Novosibirsk), and in May 2025 we moved to Moscow. Mila now works an office job, doing something that she likes and that is similar to her previous business, and the bus and metro are only one minute from the new apartment we moved into in May 2026. 

Happily Ever After

On July 27, 2026 we got married online, thanks to the State of Utah. It’s valid in most countries, and it’s valid for her spousal visa application.

We plan to move to New York State sometime in late 2027 or early 2028, contingent on whenever Trump’s “no-more-visas” (to a 75-country list—not just Russia) is successfully challenged in the courts. (One such Trump order has already been reversed.)

I work on my scripts every weekday, stopping when Mila comes home. I am looking forward to the day I sell my first script—and 2nd, 3rd…7th, 8th!—and Mila can quit her job and return to painting, a talent she revived in 2024 at my urging, but doesn’t have time to fully pursue. (She also has a university degree in Fashion Design.)

In the meantime, every day together with Mila is happily ever after!