Back home to Moscow and new home

Today is Defender of the Fatherland Day, which has recently been renamed Men’s Day, to correspond with Women’s day in March, but the original name related to the armed services which, of course, has always been considered a very manly activity!  Anyway, this is day to celebrate men in general now.  Because it falls on a Tuesday, everyone took Monday off as well and so we had a four-day weekend, which was particularly great as we moved into our new apartment on Thursday, and although we had a long meeting on Friday, we have had time to unpack and get organized.

Although we have been back for a month I had completely lost the habit of writing, but also realized how much I missed it, but I felt so overwhelmed by everything else that I could not find the space for it.

Coming home to Moscow was a bit of a shock after our time of celebration with loved ones in warm, tropical Costa Rica!  It felt so cold and we had to wear so many clothes, going out was such an effort, compared to pulling on a swimsuit, sarong and flip-flops.  We were also adjusting to being all on our own again after being surrounded by friends and family in very close proximity for three weeks.  I think too, some of it was coming ‘home’ to Moscow, making that commitment to be here again.  The first seven months we were new, beginning it all, and now we are really here, to get our teeth into the work, and really be here.  We thought we were before, but it feels like a new level of commitment now.

Our car had been parked on the street for about six weeks and when we came home Solihin couldn’t find it!  I came out with him to look and we found it further down the street and parked parallel to the road which no one ever does as it takes up more space, it was also a meter or so away from the sidewalk.  We concluded that it must have been lifted out/moved for snow clearing and then put back again!  It was almost buried in snow and a couple of days later my task was to get it out.  We had no shovel so I used a dustpan, and it took two hours to dig it out!  I finally managed and went to do a big food shop and bought a long handled scraper and brush for cleaning snow off the car, which is essential here and it has always snowed between parking the car and using it again.

During this last week we have had so much snow, beautiful big flakes and deep powder everywhere.  There are armies of men constantly shoveling snow off the sidewalks and piling it between the cars, so our little side-street now has walls of snow on either side.  We need to buy a shovel so we can dig the car out when necessary.  These men are also on the tops of buildings shoveling snow and ice off the roofs and gutters.  The snow is so light it falls in beautiful cascades of powder, and when its sunny, like glitter, but the ice from the gutters comes down in huge chunks, so they always have someone on the ground to stop cars and people from passing underneath while it falls.  I wonder why they didn’t build roofs with a steeper incline to deal with the snow, as it is so labor intensive to have to move it all manually all the time. We are always seeing truckloads of snow being removed from the roads and near us there is a parking lot that is piled high with snow instead of cars.  The other day we saw that they have two huge iron cauldrons into which they were emptying loads of snow and melting it, I guess its cheaper than having to truck it out of the city. Everyone is saying this is the best winter Moscow has had for ten years, as there has been so much snow, it reminds everyone of their childhoods.  Apparently over the last ten years the weather has been very erratic and only had snowy periods, unlike this year where we have had snow on the ground since the beginning of December.  I must say I love it, the feeling of a real winter, and the temperatures between -6 and -15 are great.  Everyone complains if it gets too close to zero!  Colder than -15 does feel cold, you have to keep moving, but otherwise, with a good coat, hat, scarf, gloves and boots you are fine.  My wool coat was not warm enough for the very cold weather but I have managed since then with -15 and up.  We did buy shapki fur hats, at the outdoor market.  Solihin has a lovely gray Persian lamb, which all the Russians say looks like a KGB Soviet style hat, and I have the classic brown fur with ear flaps that can be tied together on top or behind, so three different ways to wear it!  A warm hat is absolutely vital here.  I have finally in this last couple of weeks of deep snow been able to wear my Sorel ‘Joan of Arctic’ boots, which I have been told are very ‘unRussian’.  The traditional boots for dry snow are vareniki, made of gray felt.

We loved our old apartment and only moved because the landlady wanted to sell it. We chose the new one, which is only a few minutes walk away so in the same neighborhood, and the bank we work for bought it so while we live in Moscow we will not have to move again.  It wasn’t until we moved in that we realized how much better this apartment is for us.  It feels much more like our home, is cosier, has a kitchen we love being in and want to cook, we are sleeping better, and it generally feels a much, much better space for us to be in.

Unfortunately we do not have internet yet, and because of the long weekend it will not be until later this week if we are lucky, or next week until we get it.  Until then, we tramp the twenty minutes through the snow to this coffee shop where they have free wifi.  It is making me realize how dependent we are on the internet, and for so much of our communication with family and work in other countries.

When we viewed the flat there was a washing machine and a dryer, but when we moved in there was just an old Italian washing machine and no dryer.  There are no English instructions so now we are trying to interpret an Italian washing machine in Russia!  The TV channels are also mostly Italian with some Arabic and a couple of English ones.  The dishwasher has digital commands in Italian too.  We have deduced that the previous tenants or the owners were Italian!

Across the street from our new flat

Wearing our shapki

View of the Kremlin, St Basils and Red Square from the bridge over Moscow River

Frozen Moscow River

Trees at Pokrovsky Vorota

People playing on the frozen pond in front of our old apartment