One Track Mind: Transamerican Hobo Adventures

Serge Zbrizher (center) and Baby Cat, “Maria” in hand, (far right) with fellow “hobos” in Portland.

By Tamara Zbrizher
Published: December 10, 2008

I was driving to Newark, smiling uncontrollably, burritos waiting for my little brother, Serge, who’s back from hopping freight trains. Philly to Portland, Oregon in two months with $200 in his pocket…thank Oden he didn’t get arrested this time.

He was lying on the train car, being hot, when he looked down to see a cop’s face. ‘Why is there a cop on a moving train,’ he thought, and then it hit him: I’m really fucked.

“We got pulled off the train, get hand cuffed and shoved against the fence,” said my brother as he slowly realized he was in Virginia. “They found my brass knuckles and weed.” A month later, we took a trip to Virginia to go to court. Thank the public defender with the flawless head of hair, Serge got off with a small fine.

“It’s all worth it,” he said, recalling a time he rolled along a thunderstorm, somewhere in Utah. “I look out and I’m in the middle of the ocean and I couldn’t understand what was going on. All I can see is water on both sides of me. I felt like I was a sailor somewhere far at sea. Then I look up and there are more stars than I ever hoped to see in my life. It was so beautiful that it scared me: laying there, looking up at the sky, being soaked in rain, thinking: everything shitty that’s ever happened to me has been worth it to see this.”

I pulled up to Newark Penn Station and spotted two too-tanned, too-dirty boys. Serge leaned in to hug me, and Baby Cat (his partner in crime) dove into the back seat. An overwhelming smell of sweat and dirt, which has been baking onto their skin for weeks, filled my nostrils.

“How often did you guys shower?” I exclaimed while rolling the windows down.

“Probably never,” responded Baby Cat. “I like my own stink. Everyone has their own, and when a million people smell the same, it gets kind of boring. You know?”

This hobo lifestyle wasn’t always a way of life for these intrepid, young explorers. Serge Zbrizher was a freshman psychology major at our very own Kean University.

“I didn’t want to live a linear life: going to school and working, being tied down,” said Serge, who spent a few semesters not going to class before realizing school just wasn’t for him. “It seems like there is so much going on everywhere else that I could be experiencing.” He hooked up with Baby Cat, who wanted to “get away from reality” and everyone else who “is just a bunch of pussies,” and hit the road.

Three months after their big return, the three of us sat in the kitchen of my apartment. Baby Cat, a 5’5”/100 lb Cranford native, drank wine and rapped about his day. (He’s gots some rhymes.) Serge sipped whiskey and coke, playing “Maria,” his acoustic guitar.

“A gift from these two sluts,” said Baby Cat. “We partied with them at this really rich house […], MTV generation type kids, a bunch of wieners, but they gave us the guitar.” Maria wasn’t the only gift from the road.

“All the kids were really creative and got joy out of having people at the house,” said Serge, remembering a Chicago collective he stayed at. “They trusted us with their house, gave us food, hung out with us, and made it a point to get to know us.”

One Utah stranger gave them pizza and shelter because she was working on a pamphlet for the homeless: They “talked about politics and religion.”

I tell Serge that scary movies start out that way.

“Most of the time we were traveling with a group of four or more people, so the strangers had more to worry about then we did,” explained Serge. “Plus you can usually judge a person’s character pretty easily.” Serge played some folksy tune while Baby Cat adds raspy vocals. That’s how they passed the hours on the road, waiting for trains.
“How do you hop onto it?” I asked.

“You just run and hop onto anything you can,” replies Baby Cat. “A cart or a platform...boxcar is the best. You can have a party in there.”

The wine was gone, the whiskey on its way too. I told them that school awaits me in the morning. They both called me lame.

“I think the best thing about all of it, is living without the concept of time and being outside more then being inside,” said Serge. “You feel better when you wake up. There is so much more outside than you can ever get from indoors: Walking a lot every day, never looking for anything to do, just doing what you need to do, not working for the sake of having money, but working for food.”

“Nah man! Train-hopping is like a fucking video game,” added Baby Cat as they put on their coats and walked out the door. “The most fun video game you’ve ever played, where you dress up like a ninja and hide in bushes and your power-ups are whiskey bottles and blunts!”

(Top Left) Baby Cat huddled on a
train car, traveling across America.

(Bottom Right) One of the many
trains that they took across America.