Excerpt: A Tale of Two Countries

Full article by Jordon Shinn published in “The Daily O’Collegian,” April 2011, Stillwater, Oklahoma.

Nino Kiguradze and Bolor Bayarsaikhan occupy a small, round table at Aspen Coffee Company, their favorite café, in downtown Stillwater. It’s mid-April, and the café is warm and crowded. The two girls sit with their open laptops, textbooks and Facebook, studying — just like the other young people around them.

It could be an unlikely friendship. Nino, 24, is from Georgia and Bolor, 22, is from Mongolia. But in fact, they have a lot in common.

They are both about 6,500 miles from home.

They both grew up watching Latin soap operas and Western cartoons like “Tom and Jerry,” dubbed in Russian. And that was how they learned Russian (though they converse in English).

They both smoke the same brand of cigarettes — Marlboro Gold. The clean white 20-packs sit on the black tabletop beside their school supplies.

They are both seniors at Oklahoma State University, set to graduate in May. They are both one of only three students at OSU from their countries.

They are close friends.

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This episode is also available as a blog post: https://jordonious.wordpress.com/2021/07/22/narrative-writing-excerpt-3-stillwaters-unlikely-sisterhood/