Benjamin Davis's Blog, page 7
July 1, 2018
Why the U.S. is Wrong about Russians
I got sucked down the rabbit hole of Late Night Talk show host clips about Russia on YouTube. With the World Cup being here, there are endless jokes and bits being played about Russia’s lack of accommodating smiles.
While it is amusing, if they’d targeted any other country’s culture in this way, it’d be considered straight up racism. Oh well. Instead of preaching about how rude and wrong this rhetoric is, I wrote a short article for Russia Beyond about some of the positive things we can learn...
June 28, 2018
Love and Terrorism at the FIFA World Cup
New story up on Flash-365 about this woman from some Russian TV channel trying to marry my girlfriend and I at Fan Center for the FIFA World Cup in St. Petersburg. Also, made it a bit more weird cause, I can’t help myself.
A group of Iranian soccer fans shouting “olayolayolay” at 9:00 am is not my alarm clock of choice. The FIFA World Cup has come to St. Petersburg.
Y and I head for the Fan Center. At the gates they confiscate a spoon from Y’s purse before letting us in. We stop for...
June 25, 2018
5 Short Story Recommendations
5 Short Story Recommendations (repost from Telegram)
Hi everyone, it has been a while since I’ve made some short story recommendations. (For new people, I try to post five short stories I like, originally written in English, each week.)
“Harrison Bergeron” by Kurt Vonnegut: I went through a Vonnegut craze when I was in my early twenties. I own almost every novel he’s ever written, and I always enjoyed his short stories, this one in particular is wonderful. (also, if you’ve read ‘Sirens of Tit...
June 18, 2018
A Brief History of IKEA
New very story just published on The Drabble. Head on over there and give it a ‘like’ to validate my sense of humor.
March 30, 2018
My Favorite Stories from the Flash 365 Project
Hi everyone, I received some emails about the site being a bit hard to navigate and people asking for a more concise list. We created 365 stories and 365 pieces of art from October 2016-October 2017. It is a lot to sift through. So, I’ve put together a “best of” list below. Each of the […]
November 25, 2017
Turtles All the Way Down
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**Artwork by Marvel** (This fairy tale was prompted by the artwork shown above)
The Turtle was born with the world on his back.
Well–not exactly. The Turtle was born with his mother on his back, his father atop her, atop them were a series of grandfathers, grandmothers, aunts, uncles, great aunts, great uncles then great-greats of all breeds and colors and even way up at the top just below the world there was rumored to be a great-great-great. But The Turtle felt the world on his back throu...
November 7, 2017
Cheese and Handcuffs
The story that started our 365 Challenge and still one of my favorites.
I sit on the windowsill of Nikita’s old high ceilinged bedroom and stare at the wall.
“What is that?” I ask him. On the wall opposite the window is a large painting a bit like a tree’s rings. There are different designs that wrap around and around from a dot in the center. Each is in a different style and has different designs inlaid.
“Everyone who lives here paints on another ring. My ring will cover the whole...
October 26, 2017
Snip-Snip
Getting a haircut in a foreign country is like going to the dentist anywhere in the world; it sucks. Yet, I’d live in a dentist’s office before resorting to a man-bun, so I do what I have to do. I can tell that they can tell I am American before I open my mouth.
“Wash?”
I nod. They lead me over to the sinks. They place a large black plastic robe around me and sit me down. As always, there is no position that is pleasant for my neck and my head is so far back that I can’t co...
October 25, 2017
365 Days Later. — Flash 365
Day 365, the end. For those of you who didn’t know, this website was a collaborative project between Nikita Klimov and Benjamin Davis. Ben is from Massachusetts, U.S.A. and Nikita is from Moscow, Russia. They both live in St. Petersburg, Russia for some reason no one can ever seem to grasp. Since October 17th 2016, […]
