WHAT'S IT LIKE LIVING IN RUSSIA TODAY?

Interesting...new life in the thread. I need to go back, read and catch-up.

Accommodation in Russia (part 1)

Virago, it was a pleasure to read your words . I was about to ask you to repeat it in writing, but you already wrote it!
When I started posting I had some doubts whether this would interest someone but me. So, if it does I will go on...

From the questions you are asking one may conclude that you have already heard a lot about some Russian customs and traditions. Have you ever been to Russia? How did you become interested in the Russian culture, language, way of life etc.?

This has always been a sore subject here... As devil Woland (a personage in "Master and Margarita" novel by Mikhail Bulgakov) said: " What has corrupted Muscovites is the accommodation issue". SCoates has already given you a short answer, which to a certain extent is correct:

In reply to this I could only say there are different apartments and different houses. There can be lots of variations I will not enumerate. If somebody has much money they would change an old house or an apartment in a small town for an apartment in Moscow. If somebody has very much money they would move to a house in the suburbs of Moscow preferably in a walled-in and guarded village where inhabitants have the same (i.e. very high) social status. Such sort of villages is a particularly good place for discussions over a bottle of Dom Perignon that Russians are excessively accustomed to patronage by the state and not inclined to believe in democracy principles and free market .

In order to make you understand the problem better I need to give a brief history of the matter. So it is going to be a long posting again.
(to be continued )

Accommodation in Russia (part 2)
( Continued...)
In cities of the Russian Empire so-called “Decent People” lived in houses or huge (from the present-day point of view) apartments while the “Base Estate” lived in barracks, basements etc. After the 1917 revolution and the Civil War the “Upper Classes” were “asked” to squash up. That is why a “communal apartment” inhabited by several families was a very typical lodging in the early decades of the Soviet Union. A family could occupy one or two rooms there. You can form an impression of this period if you read Bulgakov’s “The Heart of a Dog” (a second reference to this author already).

Under Stalin houses in private possession could be met in rural areas only. All the rest was a state property. Those in the rank of a minister (or, if we use the term of that era, a “people’s commissary”) were allotted state-owed houses. But those houses changed tenants too often... A self-contained flat was also a privilege for prominent scientists, artists, managers and engineers who worked in the most important industries, etc. The urban population lived mainly in “communal apartments” quarrelling about shared kitchens, bathrooms etc. Please note here that all the horror of the Stalinist regime was that only a minority of the victims had actually been political dissidents, lots of people had suffered from squeals by envious fellow-workers and neighbours .

Until now vast apartments in the buildings of the late 40’s - early 50’s (so-called “Stalin Houses”) are considered to be the best because the quality of their construction was really exceptional. But they built very few of them and the cost of it used to be high. The situation with shared apartments persisted until Nikita Khrushchev’s massive housing programme. Under Khrushchev Moscow grew twice in size (if not even more). It was the beginning of the Soviet “box like” style in architecture (and later not only in houses’ shape). Houses were fabricated out of standard concrete blocks where each block was an entire wall of a future room, with its doors and windows. The purpose of this program was building as many houses as possible and at a minimum cost. Khrushchev’s favourite was a five-storey house because I heard that he himself had been convinced that this sort of construction would have had more chances to survive (compared to a higher edifice) in the event Americans had wished to drop nuclear bombs on Soviet cities some day (weird!). But quite the opposite, these “Khrushchevkies” (this is how we call them here) are of poor quality and they fell like houses of cards when there was an earthquake in Armenia in late 80’s. Though there is a more practical explanation of the reason why the first series of these buildings were not higher than 5 floors: taller houses required elevators but this could have increased the cost of housebuilding. In any event the purpose was attained and shared apartments became more an exception than a rule since then. Later on they started to erect higher and more solid buildings with thicker walls while the model of residential construction remained the same: mass production of concrete blocks for a subsequent mounting of 9, then 12 and later 16-storey buildings in large “bedroom communities”. For low cost housing it is still the same.
(to be continued )

Accommodation in Russia (part 3)
( Continued...)
Here are a couple of pictures of typical residential areas. The first one looks a bit gloomy, maybe because it displays blocks of flats that were presumably built in the 70’s, and now we have learnt that we were terribly suppressed by the commies over that period :


This picture is somewhat more cheerful; these seem to be recent constructions:

(to be continued )

Accommodation in Russia (part 4)
( Continued...)
As I have already indicated most premises used to be a state (formally municipal) property in USSR. Certain buildings were constructed for the account of enterprises or condominiums and therefore belonged to them. Apartments were granted free of charge (with the exception of those in condominiums). Their size depended on official space-per-person standards, privileges given to war veterans etc., limits allocated to enterprises and suchlike officialdom. If somebody had less they were entitled to apply for better housing but years could pass before people were able to move in. If some family members moved out or died, there could appear excessive space, but the security of residence principle was adhered and nobody could even think of asking such families to move to a smaller apartment because of the surplus (only the rent could slightly rise). Public property in housing resulted in inability to trade in realty or leave it to successors if they were not registered as living in the same apartment. All moves, merges and separations were made via state-controlled exchanges (often multistage ones, and some had unofficial businesses assisting people in finding good options). The “residence permit” stamps in our identity cards (for some reason known as “internal passports”) used to have very great importance: in order to deprive a person with this stamp of the right to live at the address indicated there, a long and hard legal procedure was required. Everybody was registered an address with police and therefore had a “residence permit”, they could lose it only if sentenced to prison.
(to be continued )

Wow, SerSo, thank you so much for the pictures and the response!

SerSo Wrote:
When I started posting I had some doubts whether this would interest someone but me. So, if it does I will go on...

Please, do continue.


SerSo Wrote:
From the questions you are asking one may conclude that you have already heard a lot about some Russian customs and traditions. Have you ever been to Russia? How did you become interested in the Russian culture, language, way of life etc.?

I have not been to Russia yet. I would love to visit. I cannot respond properly to the rest of your question right now as I am late and should be gone already. (But I wanted to say thank you for the post and pictures!) I will answer completely next post.

Virago

SerSo Wrote:



I'm sorry to say I've never been to Russia. I would very much like to visit. Why am I interested? Hmm. I think that to many Americans, Russia is a fascinating and mysterious place. Most of us do not know a great deal about Russia, one of the reasons being that the Soviet regime was a secretive one. Not many people traveled there, and to meet a Russian person in America was less common than meeting, for instance, an Italian person or a Spanish person. At least this is true in the town I live in. So, the lack of information was enough to make me curious about what life was like in your country.

Before I began searching for information, I knew very little. When I thought of Russia, I thought of snow. Snow, coats, ushankas, and vodka. That's about it. So, I wanted to know more because I knew so little. The more I learned, the more interested I became. I think that people are people the world over, but your culture is different from mine in a lot of ways. As an example:


A few years ago I saw a television show on Russian foods. The American hosting the show traveled to Moscow and met his guide. Together they visited several different restaurants, showing a variety of Russian foods. He also went to an open market with a Russian woman who bought items to make Borscht. They made it in her kitchen at home. It was a very interesting program. One of the best parts of the show was that the American host was taken to a Banya. There, he and his guide had vodka and some food while in the Banya, then a woman came with, well, with what I would call switches - thin branches from a tree. She not so gently slapped them across the back of the American host while he lay on his stomach. Then, the host had to go jump into the freezing lake. I had to laugh. I thought they must be making fun of the dumb American and telling him this is tradition! But, I have learned that this actually is a very relaxing thing to do. I have not learned this from experience. I don't even know what it would take to get me to jump into a freezing lake!

Another difference that really caught my interested was the use of patronymic and familiar names. I think I mentioned before that we don't have this custom here. While we do have nicknames, it's not at all the same. If we shorten a given name in America, it really is just a shorter version of the name. A man named "Timothy" might be called "Tim", a woman named "Suzanne" might be called "Suz", but there are no tender versions or friendly versions of the name. In Russia, it seems the familiar names are almost an endearment. I have really enjoyed trying to learn the different familiar names and the appropriate usage for each of them. It can be confusing, but I'm catching on.

Most of my questions are really about ordinary things. Those questions occurred to me originally because of a fictional story I'm currently writing. I have so enjoyed learning about Russian life that I have given several of my fictional characters a Russian heritage. Now, you can imagine my dilemma. Even though I write mostly for my own pleasure, it is imperative that my characters be true to life. That requires that I learn all I can about Russia, her culture and her people. Since most of what I need to know about daily life does not come from a book or an article, (although I have learned a great deal from both of those sources) I was so happy to find this discussion. I would pursue this knowledge regardless of the story I am writing - but because of the story, as I move the characters through their day and their life, questions have occurred to me that otherwise might not have.

On an unrelated note, I recognized by sight my very first word written in Cyrillic. I don't have Cyrillic font, but the word was in a photograph of Moscow - a billboard advertising a restaurant. I read the word "restaurant". Sad to be proud of such a small thing - a single word - but I am.

Hope this answers your question to some degree. If not, let me know.

Virago

If you don't mind, I'd be interested in reading some of your fiction. I figure we could catch some problems (unrussianess) you might miss.

Serso, I love your use of details...and the pics...great!

SCoates - You would certainly see some problems if you read it now. What I have thus far is an almost finished first draft - very loose first draft. If you read it as it is, you would likely want to poke your eyes out. However, I appreciate your offer to point out any "unrussianness" you might find. A solid critique is always welcome. I noticed there is a writing forum, though I haven't checked it out. Perhaps I can post at least some of it there when the times comes. Out of curiosity, do you write?

Mapleleaf - I agree with you. SerSo's details are terrific. So many things are going through my mind as I read, but I'm pacing myself.

Virago

I'll say that I do. And I would honestly like to believe that I do.

I wish I had no idea what you mean. Sadly, I know exactly what you mean.

Virago

Accommodation in Russia (part 5 - more pictures)
( Continued...)
Sorry for the long absence, but I have not finished answering Virago’s questions about accommodation in Russia. I also tried to find some more pictures on the subject. Strange enough, I searched many web sites of Russian realtors and could not find a plan of an “average” apartment. They all seem to sell villas, penthouses or elite apartments. E.g. here is a house for sale, 15km from Moscow. Instead of quoting a price the web site just offers a phone number to call in case you are interested:


So, this is nice, but not typical. This is not Russia...

I was more successful in finding pictures to display a sample of “Stalin’s architecture”. There are many of them just showing views of main Moscow streets. For instance the whole Kutozovsky avenue in Moscow is a monument of the Stalin’s era:


Now apartments in such houses are extremely expensive to buy, but this is more typical than the first example above and many common people live there since old times.

And this is an old traditional house. It is fairly general type one can meet in many Russian towns and villages. Even old parts of some cities (but not Moscow) are built up with this sort of houses.

(to be continued )

SerSo, thank you for taking the time to post new pictures and for replying so thoroughly. I appreciate that so much. The pictures are wonderful, by the way.

Virago

Would someone educate me re the election results (Ukrain..?)?
What are the reasons behind Russia's action? Also, why has the Russian leadership pursued a reversal of democratic reforms? Is it their objective to return to the autocratic days? If so, why?

Russia seems to be a beautiful place...

There are many parts of Russia that is beautiful, but that can also be said of most all countries on this planet. Most of it must be looked at through critical eyes to see how the government and society treats its citizens. Most wealthy countries have an advantage in good health care for the majority, and opportunity that does not discriminate on the basis of race or religion. What I see often in my travels are the contradictions we see is most all countries of the wealthy and the poor - even in the US of A.

Re: WHAT'S IT LIKE LIVING IN RUSSIA TODAY?


fellows, I'm in Moscow, Russia right now. Take your chance to ask on current affairs

sky marshall--

WELCOME!!! How nice of you to entertain questions.

Do your friends discuss what's going on in the Ukraine? Do they think Putin and cronies are involved in the election? Do you care if Ukraine goes toward Yuschenko?

Is your income enough to pay for necessities?

sky, First of all, Welcome to A2K. I was in Russia about five years ago when most people's income in Moscow and St Pete was around $100 per month. Has that improved considering the rate of inflation? We had mostly all professionals serving on our boat as maids, waiters, waitresses, and bar tenders, because we learned that they were able to earn more in tips in one month on a cruise boat than they can working in their profession as a doctor, lawyer, or college professor. It's somewhat the same in the Balkans where I visited back in September. Our local guide in Bucharest is a dentist.