Tale of Ana Chapman. The spy who befriended me

I never really knew Ana. I didn’t know her for many reasons. I had been acquainted with her only for a few months after we accidentally met at a dinner. Though we did end up meeting a few times afterwards, and became friends of sort. Most importantly I had little knowledge of who she really is. Her story had some holes. But everyone’s story has holes. She never explained why she kept coming to the US repeatedly over years despite having no obvious business or family ties. But I didn’t inquire too much. I thought maybe it was for love. She will share with me when she wants to. Or perhaps it was for mere curiosity of visiting the (still) most important country in the world. After all I have been a global nomad for a few years, visiting all kinds of esoteric places, for no other reason, apart from curiosity.


And her business model seemed a little bizarre. How can someone who just has arrived from Russia, set up a successful online real estate business flogging New York City real estate to Russians abroad? But she explained that her website was merely pulling the information that already exists on the web, filters it and customizes it for the rich Russian audience. I didn’t inquire further.


I was meeting with a long time client and now friend, Greg, for dinner at a Michelin-rated restaurant on Central Park South. It was that dreadful evening in NYC when howling winds kicked up a storm I have never seen in my 14 years of living here. My hurricane proof $40 umbrella did not stand up to the task. The city was a graveyard of broken and abandoned umbrellas that night. Some sticking out of garbage bins like sinister Frankensteinian metallic claws. Still I was excited to be going out that night. I had invited a love interest to the dinner; Margery.


I met Margery for the first time in a quintessential New York way – while reading a book in a coffee shop. She caught my attention right away. She was tall, had thick blond hair, and deep blue eyes. She had catalog worthy legs and perfectly shaped pointy nose. She also had a girlish charm and the endearing demeanor of an irritable child. But as I learned later she also had some deep seeded anger issues, emanating from her fractured relationship with her divorced parents, especially her loving yet verbally abusive father. I knew that attractive as she might be, she would not be a candidate for serious dating. Her interest in me was also passing and superficial. She thought I looked like Andre Agassi – her biggest teenage crush. It was a relationship of mutual lust and convenience.


Greg’s wife was away for a few days and I knew he enjoyed observing the New York scene, and was not above some innocent flirtation with the women. We can all use validation regardless of how happily married to a beautiful woman we might be. I invited a friend/acquaintance of mine to dinner – a club promoter name Nell. He used to let us into hottest clubs (most likely he got a cut of the hyper-expensive bottle service we paid for). Nell always had a gaggle of women around him. Very often these were girls from Long Island or Europe (as my more prudish friends disparagingly called B&T and Eurotrash), enamored by New York and looking to party in hot clubs. Majority of them were airheads. But once in a while I would meet someone whip-smart that would completely defy my stereotype.


Margery and I got to the restaurant first, completely soaked. The maître d’ quickly escorted us to umbrella and coat check-in so we don’t wet the expensive rugs. A few minutes later Nell arrived. He was with this quiet, almost demure girl, Ana Chapman. I thought it was an unusual name for a Russian girl that did not live in the US long. Then he hurried to mention that he has another friend coming who is a famous Romanian opera singer; Ivona. He showed me her picture. While not my type, she was a beautiful svelte girl with (as I would hear later) a voice to match.



This gathering did not have a remotely intellectual or purposeful bent. It was purely an orgy of senses; an opportunity to eat delectable food, at a top restaurant, in the company of stunningly beautiful women. Nell is a very likable fellow. Very unlike the jaded & arrogant club promoters you meet anywhere, let alone New York. As a Phllippino who grew up in Italy, he retained the Asian humility, yet developed the Italian penchant for high life (on others’ dime in this case).


Ivona arrived, and we were stunned. By the friend who came with her. Marissa was a green eyed beauty who worked in Private Wealth Management of JP Morgan; a job I figured she got through connections of her father, not to mention ravishing looks. Not that she was not smart. But in the brutally competitive field of asset gathering, her looks would qualify her for the job more easily than even Einstein.


I never understood what Marissa had in common with Ivona (other than the fact that her parents were from another Eastern Europe country; in fact a Baltic country at that). I still don’t know. Ivona did have a great voice. But much to my dismay she had an opportunistic mind set, and later when we got to know her better, she made little effort to hide the fact that she is looking for a boyfriend who can pay her bills and help get her a green card. Why would a woman with such talented voice not try to build her own life, and be proud of her own accomplishments? Why depend on a man for that. I would never understand. Looking to men for stability is oxymoronic, and is a lesson young girls are best left untaught.


But Ana intrigued both me and Greg. Her real estate business was either genuine at some level, or she had done enough homework that she can hoodwink two finance guys for quite some time. Ana was also pretty; with slender waist and shapely legs. The kind of legs you picture in skinny jeans. She had dyed her hair red; the color I frequently saw during my short stay in Tallinn, Estonia (I have never been to Russia). Ana and Margery were the smart girls on the table. Ivona was a show piece. I thought the same of Marissa initially, but now looking back it was perhaps my own stereotyping that made it difficult for me to look past her stunningly beautiful exterior. Maybe deep down she possessed all the intellectual and emotional attributes too. If true, then life is even more unfair than I had imagined.


The dinner was long and lively, and fueled by wine, often boisterous. Food was indeed as good as I had expected from a Michelin-rated restaurant. Ana remained rather silent, apart from her conversation with Greg, who sat besides her. Ivona seemed to have most fun, as she was getting introduced to and indoctrinated into the New York social scene. She seemed to find all this intoxicating. At one point I uttered “yum” as I salivated while biting a tasty fish h’orderve. Ivona who had not tried it yet asked me, “Is it really that good”. I uttered, “It was an explosion of flavor in my mouth”. Ivona, in a very suggestive way and her Romanian accent said, “I want an explosion of flavor in my mouth”. The table burst out in the loudest laughter. From that point, the conversation took a predictably absurd turn.


After dinner we ended up at the club du’jour of Manhattan for the evening. It was a feast for the eyes, even if I find music in clubs chaffing for the ears. The intoxication was further fueled by the fact that we had walked in with some of the best looking girls. Nothing is as easy as to stoke a shallow male ego. An observation not lost on James Bond’s stereotypical Russian female spies. Did Ana use this tactic? I don’t know for sure. But I think she could have. I will explain later.



The women were for the taking and Ivona continued to flirt with me. But I wanted to be with Margery; and admittedly I was also afraid of setting off one of her anger filled tirades lest I flirted with Ivona. I kept close to Margery, just watching the scene around me while trying to ignore the guys who were gravitating towards our table endlessly. Ana appeared very comfortable in the whole set up, and even made advances towards a good looking guy who was a friend of Nell and had a table next to ours.


I don’t recall the guy’s name, but his story I can never forget. He used to trade commodities for a bulge bracket firm that was swallowed by a large commercial bank in the Great Recession, in one of Bernanke/Geithner-engineered Sunday evening bail-outs. However, he found a more profitable trade. Online porn. And this was even before the financial crisis had set in and when commodities were still oozing money.


Ana hooked up with him that night. Later at a lunch Ana told me that he had office in Panama where he operated live interactive porn sites. Clubs were probably a recruitment center for him. While I would later find out, much to my shock and horror that she was accused of being a spy, I still wouldn’t believe that she would get into a business as demeaning.


Assuming that government’s allegations are true, why did Ana decide to become a spy? I would never know, but I think she was a thrill seeker who wanted to experience everything. While maintaining her demure demeanor, she looked strangely comfortable in every situation, including introduction to a porn boss. Perhaps she was a stoic looking for something exciting enough to jolt her out of her imperviousness. She did not come across as a nationalist. She never talked about Russia with passion, neither did she show any disdain for the US. In fact she seemed positively thrilled about New York City; one of the few things or places I felt she was excited about.



Despite her hectic social life, she was aloof. When we went for brunch to Extra Virgin in West Village one day she wanted a corner table, and was visibly perturbed by the table of loud Asian couples next to us. But she was also very polite; in fact exceedingly polite. She kept laughing at the loudest girl in the group who was talking at the top of her voice, about most mundane things of her life that no one in the restaurant cared to learn about. I’m less restrained in situations like this, but I just watched her reaction with amusement.


She was in very good shape, thanks to her regular regimen of yoga. She wanted me to join yoga, and even took me to her yoga school in union square. The stifling humidity of the place, and my over-committed life prevented me from going to yoga with her later.



Ana’s apartment was very close to my office in financial district. I never saw it so don’t know how ‘glitzy’ it really was, as described by the tabloids. I have a feeling the tabloids (unsurprisingly) embellished the story. What intelligence can she possibly have that would be so damning for the country. Upon a cursory reading of the papers this morning, it appears that Ana and many of her cohorts, if they were involved, were doing very low level spy work. If KGB is an investment bank, then these guys were the mail delivery men. Perhaps they were being trained to gain access to people who might have meaningful information. That brings me to another episode I had with Ana.



Ana wanted to meet up for lunch. The only nice restaurant close (very close) to her apartment I could think was Haru. During lunch she told me that she met a guy and is moving in with him. This was surprising to say the least. Especially considering that they guy was almost twice her age, divorced, with grown up kids. And she said she wanted a serious relationship with him. I never met the guy or even got to know his name. Maybe he was charming, kind, dedicated and loving enough that she was willing to overlook all that. She did not have to do this. She never seemed short of money, and even in a city littered with good looking girls (and guys) should not have problem meeting someone.


Maybe this man was someone KGB wanted to plant a mole on? (I still have a hard time believing all this). And despite everything, she did not seem like someone who would be with a man just for money. Perhaps I would never know.


A few weeks ago I hosted drinks at the Empire Hotel and invited Ana to join. She could not make it, but she later invited me to her (boyfriend’s) new apartment on 10th Ave and 30th Street (if I recall correctly). She said they have a large terrace and do barbeques there. I could not make it the first time. She invited me again about two weeks ago. This time I decided to go, but made the mistake of inviting Margery. I had forgotten that Margery had been resentful of that evening in some ways. “I’m don’t recall a dinner where I was not the hottest girl on the table. I don’t like this.” She particularly thought that Ana was weird; perhaps due to her quiet mannerism. She went into another mini episode of spastic anger. I had to cancel and apologize to Ana once again.


I was planning to invite Ana to another event in lieu of not being able to make it to her barbeques. I thought she is trying to establish a life for herself in a city she admires. She wants to have friends she can invite over, and start putting together the makings of a healthy happy family life with her new boyfriend. But this morning changed it all. The picture of Ana smiling in a green vest on what I initially thought was a street in New York (it was London), I thought it was some article about real estate or about Russian immigrants. Till I saw the headline. My heart stopped.


Ana talked at length about her relationship with the older man openly with me. She felt half-hearted about pursuing a serious relationship with someone that much older. I pointed out that if she becomes unsure of this even more while living with him, while getting emotionally attached, this would make her even more torn. Now looking back, if this guy was a business/spy relationship for her – many of other alleged cohorts were living together as couples, even bearing children! – what a miserable life to live. I also told her that if she wants to have children later and this guy doesn’t want to, then it will pose a real dilemma for her. She seemed to clearly understand this, but was still unfazed. She mentioned that she is physically very attracted to him, and I replied that if she is attracted enough that she will enjoy being with him despite all the other baggage, then she should go for it.

I don’t know why Ana tried to confide in me. I can’t imagine what she can be playing me for. She never asked me for any favor, material or otherwise. My intelligence value to her would be zilch. Perhaps she was just a lonely girl looking for someone to talk to. Or perhaps she was a very lonely spy.

If I were to see Ana again, what would I ask her? I’m not sure. Probably I would greet her with the same knowing smile that I had whenever I ran into her, or got her text. And after a while, Ana being Ana, would blurt out and start talking and tell me, essentially a stranger, her deepest fears. Except that this time she will have to be more forthright.