Meat & two veg, role expectations

I few weeks ago I was at a park in Moscow with the heir to my fortune. He was standing at the bottom of a slide looking up. At the top of the slide was an older boy of about four, holding a plastic truck that he wanted to send down the slide. I felt a bit afraid as if he sent it down (as much fun as it would be) , it would hit my son in the face, so I told the boy (in English) to wait. His Russian mother heard me and said in perfect English "he is not stupid, he won't send it down the slide" . I felt embarrassed but also indignant as how could I know he would not do it? I was just protecting my son from an accident. After all, kids are kids and they can be well behaved or total hooligans.

I got chatting with this Russian mum. She spoke perfect English and seemed nice. She explained to me she had three kids and an English husband. We chatted for a long time, it was so nice for me to be able to talk to another person and parent as I often go to the park and sit alone, ex communicated and cut off from the other parents all of which are Russian and mums or nannies of the kids that play there. I asked her if I could have her mobile number and she gave it to me. I felt happy, as I am always keen to meet new people and make new friends for me and my son. The fact that this person was female was not important to me.

I sent her a text later asking her if she wanted to meet there another time. Then to my surprise, I had a text back saying her husband 'would not like it' and could I not text her! This amazed me as I was only trying to be friendly. A week later I invited another parent (a mum) to my place for coffee after she had emailed me asking to meet me. She accepted my invite then the next day sent me an abrupt text saying she had no time to come and sorry. I found this a bit odd. Was she also afraid of her husbands reaction?

I have meat and two veg, I am male, 'me cave man'. I am no demi god, I am in my 40's, although not pig ugly! Was it my gender or maybe they just did not like me? I will never know. Why should my gender be an issue if it was indeed my gender? Were their husbands the jealous types? Why do women marry jealous men? I was jealous when I was younger and dumped by ex girlfriends because of my jealousy, why do these women tolerate it? Why do people have role stereotypes? Why are men expected to be the providers? We live in difficult hard times, couples do what they can to adapt and survive. Roles have become blurred and changed. I miss work and would happily provide for my family, but life circumstances have not allowed that to happen. I have a sense of shame and guilt but my wife's career has taken us abroad and the pay is good. I wish it were different. Not because of roles expectations but because I feel useless. I would change it tomorrow if I could, if only to give my wife a deserved break from the grind of work.

Being a stay at home dad in another country, in a big strange city, is lonely, it can be very tough, each day is hard. Trying to make friends with other people and other people who are parents and the opposite sex is also rather tough. Stay at home dads go against expected 'norms' and against expected roles. Women in some expat parent groups allow men into their groups but at the same time keep a healthy distance and keep within their own hen circles, the male roosters are allowed in to peck at the corn scraps.It not so unlike the animal kingdom between males and females.

I do miss male company but I only usually mix with women here that I do not know (or know very well), apart from a greeting nod or acknowledgment at the play ground and I cannot peck the corn with them as I am cave man and don't speak their language, in every sense of the word. Perhaps males and females are very different creatures in thought and expectation. An interesting sociological issue, nest ce pas?

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Dreams of chickens

My wife is finding  her job very hard. She starts at nine and arrives home at nine. I won't say what her job is or where she works but lets just say her employer does not follow the same pattern as other employers here in Moscow. She is exhausted, hardly seeing her child except at breakfast and at weekends. She also goes to work some weekends. She has zero management support and we get very little benefits from being here. I can't see any point staying here longer than is needed. The pay is good and more than she would get back home, but is money everything when life quality is bad?

I dream of getting my hands dirty, feeling the soil between my fingers, growing my own carrots, marrows, potatoes and beans, keeping chickens and animals and living on and from the land. I dream of a place in the country, It need not be England and could be anywhere. We could buy a small place with land for cash. My wife considers the countryside to be beyond the reach of a McDonald's or metro. She would rather live in a city than the countryside. I am the dreamer, a romantic she is the realist and the accountant. Chalk and cheese. I am impulsive, she is sensible. My star sign is Gemini.

I don't think we will stay here for too long, its too hard mentally, financially and socially to cope with. I think if we had an end date in sight, we would enjoy Russia more and see some more places outside Moscow, however the end date could be three years if we wanted it to be and we don't want it to be. I think two years here will be enough.

It colder now and rains have come, Christmas will soon be here and Moscow shuts down for ten days. Russians don't celebrate our traditional Christmas. I hope it snows soon. I love the stillness of snow, it brings with it a peace and serenity that you cannot find at other times, the whiteness and silence, even in a big city like Moscow.

The internet in Moscow

We have been having problems with out Russian Internet provider for almost a year. We took them on recommendation from the letting agent who found the shoe box we live in.

The link keeps disconnecting. Its a wireless connection via a key and a box and provides the web to a desk top computer and to a lap top computer. Streaming is a gamble as one day it works and the next it freezes stops and starts. The company have a help centre and you can call or send an email. I sent one of many emails to them yesterday to complain about the link. On their site it says they can dial in and fix it. Below is the reply I got. I am a customer and in no way a computer expert or an IT engineer. The response is true and not a joke. I have removed the last name of the help desk person that sent me the email.

Thier email to me the customer in reply to my help desk report:

Hello

Please, let us know next things:
-          The result of the speed test: http://speedtest.msk.yota.ru/; - MAC address of your device and your login; - Level of your signal (CINR/RSSI); - Version of Yota Access and version of driver (you can check it in “settings”); - An operating system (XP/Vista/ other, installed service packs, 32/64 bit); - Browser, Antivirus software, firewall; - If you are using software for Virtual network interface creation; - Address of incident with maximum precision (number of your floor/ total amount of floors in your building, where do windows look out, the location of Yota device in the room); - Time and date of the incident beginning; - If the device was working earlier in the same conditions; - If the incident takes place only on one PC; or you’ve tested it on different computers and the result was the same; Also, please let us know the number of your BS ID, to get it, please, follow next instructions: - For USB-modem/Express card: click with the mouse cursor on the blue window of Yota Access for it to come to the foreground, then press shift+ctrl+alt+F1 simultaneously. Enter 1234 in the appeared window and then press Enter, click “File” -> “Start”, in the appeared window you will find the BS ID line. - For Notebooks: open Yota Access -> Settings -> Information -> Report ("Отчет"), copy information from the appeared window and paste it in the letter. _______ Best regards, Aleksey. Expert service group

Parenthood, knocks and learning

Being a parent is a learning process and I think made harder if you are a man doing the job full time and in another city and in another country not your own. I was not nervous about having our child but I have learnt on the job. The other day, junior was standing upright in a shopping trolley (cart) while we shopped in Moscow, my wife had one trolley for shopping and I had an empty one for junior as its easier than carrying him and I was lazy too take the pushchair (stroller). We went outside and I was pushing the trolley along uneven bricks on a path outside the supermarket. The trolley suddenly hit an uneven brick and junior flew out, flipped over and landed on his bum. It was almost like an acrobat in a circus.

I picked him up and he screamed and cried for a while then fell asleep in the car. There seems to be no real damage. I think kids are fairly tough when it comes to knocks and accidents but I really should be more careful.

I worry so much about what the future holds for my child in this big bad world of ours. How do you allow a child to be a "child", yet retain his or hers innocence but still be street wise and street smart. We live in a world of child bullies, bad teachers and pedophiles how do we protect them? How do we teach them to know danger? how do we teach them to have a sense of fear or a sixth sense for bad and harm? I grew up in suburban England in the 1970's where kids rode their bikes in the roads, we went to play in the woods, we played on the swings and we came to no harm and we met no bad people. I can't say its the same for children today whatever their city, village, background or country. I think the worries really go up a gear when they go to kindergarten and then to school.

Will I be around to help him and guide him in the future? I really hope so. I don't think I am alone in these fears and I think every sensible caring parents feels the same in different degrees of worry but mine borders neurosis. Without sounding cheesy, I think anyone who has a child or children is blessed and anyone that treats their children badly in anyway is not worthy of their freedom or parenthood. I know parents can be over protective, while some are not protective enough, how do you find a good balance? Here ends my serious post dear reader.Tips appreciated.

See below it is an inspiration to us all.

Domodedovo airport Moscow

I thought I would offer some kind of customer experience of using this airport in Russia. I have not had the experience of using others here in Moscow, although I did visit Russia about ten years ago and airports have advanced a lot since those days. When I arrived and left from Russia in the past it was like something from a movie like Midnight Cowboy. Nowadays, you still have to wait in line behind yellow lines to get your passport examined by miserable men and women and they still stamp them when arriving and leaving but controls seem fast and are not too much of a headache.

Domodedovo is not bad. Its big, clean and has many check in desks. The food is expensive and can of beer will cost you about 250 rubles. A basic salad will be over ten pounds. The the down side is it takes ages to get to and to leave the airport by taxi. The police hang about outside the airport and will not allow cars to park there, so being collected by taxi will be hard since they often can't park. You will also be hassled by countless men offering you a taxi, be careful you could be given a city tour and charged 1000's of Rubles. The airport in summer was hot this year and the air con was not working so it was hotter inside than outside. Perhaps the air con units were never installed or were stolen? nothing would surprise me here.  Watch out for pickpockets and hold onto your things, most of the police look uninterested in their jobs and mostly sit about smoking and I have even seen some buying beer from the airport shop.

Generally its a good airport but allow at least two to three hours to get there if travelling from the centre of Moscow.

Good points:

1 Many check-in desks
2 Free baggage trollys
3 Modern
4 Clean

Bad points:

1 Chaotic baggage claim and slow baggage delivery
2 Expensive shops
3 Slow passport controls and security checks
4 Taxi driver hassle when you arrive
5 Bad drop off and pick up points outside the arrivals

A year in Moscow

We have been here for one year now. We arrived in September, experienced a very cold freak winter, a move to a new flat and a new city, experienced a freak baking summer with chocking smoke and terrorist bombs on the metro, the death of our family cat when he fell from the window and a new life for me as a stay at home dad.

Time is a funny thing when you are in a situation you do not enjoy. Days seem like months and months seem like years, tick tock as the clock ticks slowly by. Moscow  is a strange place, big, bold and dirty. Huge tower block flats stretch as far as the eye can see when you arrive by plane looking down on the Moscow region from your arm chair in the sky. Roads are huge with four to five lanes in each direction. The roads are chocked with cars. People drive top of the range cars with blacked out windows but crawl along the roads at a snails pace, stuck in the traffic all in a hurry, all with a mission. People walk the streets in a hurry, men spit and blow there noses on the floor, you must walk with your eyes on the ground to avoid walking on these bodily deposits.

Flat prices are crazy you get very little for your money and the quality is poor. They advertise flats as being "western standard" when in fact the standard is normal to poor. Russian police stand about on the streets with fat guts, shirt buttons undone, fag in mouth, hat tipped back at an angle, looking to take your money for any offense real or imagined if your skin is dark or brown. Supermarkets are packed and stressful experiences. The expat community is large and varied. There are many Americans here as well as other nationalities all living in their own areas and communities all here on an agenda. Many are on large pay packages with all the benefits that go with it, free rent, free medical cover, free childcare, free schooling. Don't come here unless you have those perks. We did and are struggling to get by, but life takes you where it takes you.

Moscow really is another planet and do not come here with expectations and always expect the unexpected. Love it or hate it. I am still searching for the positive here and have not yet found it but I will keep looking under every rock and in every possibility. Try not to let depression get to you if you are stuck at home, depression can eat you alive and swallow you up without mercy. Make friends and get out, take regular breaks out of Russia, you will need to as often as possible. Stay here for as little time as you can, get in, save money and get out as fast as time will allow you.

A year in Moscow has been a long trip for me dear reader, I hope the next one goes faster.

Cheese, cars and planes

We have been away from mad Moscow for 3 very busy weeks. First to the sea in France then to Slovakia. I ate mountains of French cheeses, sea food and cakes and have returned a lot fatter than when I left hot smoky Moscow. We returned to Moscow airport yesterday. As per usual, the passport control was busy slow and there were lots of people dressed in full Scottish kilts etc which was bit surreal to see in Moscow. They must have been a group of bagpipe player's sent over at great cost to entertain Putin's or one of his merry thugs at some private political party.

Our baby bag was stolen while we waited for a the taxi. The thief would only be rich in biscuits, nappies and milk but that the second time that has happened to us in Russia We had booked a large taxi car to collect us from the airport. It was booked before we left but instead the taxi driver arrived 45 mins late in an old Honda that was not an estate car. We then had to negotiate another taxi and he strapped one of our cases into his front passenger seat and I had my child on on my lap. Child car seats here don't seem important to Russians and I am not even sure its the law for children to us them in cars here? The taxi ride back took 4 hours on a trip that should only take 45 mins in a normal city. The fight from Vienna to Moscow was just over 2 hours!

Today, there is cold heavy rain and the remont (reconstruction work)  that has been going on below our flat for over a year, still continues. The banging will go on and on and on. We will stay put in our rented Moscow flat as its cheap by many standards at 2100 euro a month the landlord seems normal and has not put the rent up. Another contractual year as begun for us from September to September for work here so we will take it one day at a time here as the thought of staying here for our 3 years contract is a hard pill to swallow and I am not sure its mentally or financially possible to think long term here in Moscow. The only positive thing I can say about coming back here is the heat and smoke have now gone but I am not happy to be back.