The Dethroning of Luzhkov

In the twelve or so years I spent studying Russian, as well as going to and from Moscow, there was always one constant: Yury Luzhkov. For the past eighteen years Luzhkov was the mayor of Moscow. But earlier this week, during Dmitry Medvedev's trip to China to rub shoulders with potential Hu Jintao replacements, the head of state held a press conference, during which he told the media that he had just signed a decree removing Luzhkov from office over "loss of confidence". He added that, as head of state, he cannot work with a regional head he does not trust. Michele Berdy has an interesting insight into the affair in her column on translating Russian over at the Moscow Times concerning Medvedev's choice of words.

Luzhkov is not a popular man, especially among the gay community, whom he has repeatedly condemned for their so-called satanic activities and happily dispatched the police to knock the shit out of them every time they tried to hold an "unsanctioned" demonstration anywhere in the city, though specifically on Triumfalnaya Square, where one can find the statue of renowned poet Mayakovsky...


...but it wasn't always this way with Luzhkov. He did do a lot for the capital. After the USSR went belly up in the 90s, Moscow was in chaos, and Luzhkov's indefatigable management skills came to the fore and managed to turn the place from potentially becoming a swamp to one of the most opulent capitals on the planet.

Urban regeneration was his forte, and for the first few years he pulled it off. In the vid up top you'll see the big gold Cathedral of Christ the Saviour (Храм Христа Спасителя Khram Khree-sta Spa-see-tell-ya). The colossal structure was reconstructed under his watch (it got torn down in the 1930s). He had restored the city, and then some.

...But then things started to go wrong (well, not really for Luzhkov). Luzhkov slowly shifted from being a manager to a political figure, not to mention the sums of money that were being accumulated from the massive construction projects.

Of course, people in office in Russia aren't permitted to have any financial interests, but it would have been a terrible shame to let all those business contacts go to waste. That's where Luzkhov's wife came in.

Unlike her spouse, Yelena Baturina has no such problem with trivial issues like political accountability. Although it's never been declared officially, it's fair to assume that her construction firm wouldn't have been behind so many of Moscow's many sky-scraping eyesores had it not been for her proximity to the highest executive power in Moscow.

Speaking of eyesores, Luzhkov is also partly responsible for the most obnoxious statue in Moscow.

This 90-meter-tall behemoth is meant to be in memory of Peter the Great, and was constructed by the equally obnoxious "artist" Zurab Tsereteli, who just happens to be (surprise surprise) a close friend of Luzhkov. I think we're a seeing a pattern emerging.

Regardless of the slightly undemocratic deposition, it was more than ample time for him to be booted out. His stay in the mayor's office was way past any acceptable term, though I suspect Michael Bloomberg may have been taking notes.

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In other news, I've been lax in visiting the gym, mostly due to laziness combined with the fact that I have achieved more or less what I set out to do. Honestly speaking, the place is pretty lame and the membership is running out soon. The fact that there are so many men doing those previously-mentioned thrusting motions in tight shorts (on more than one occasion I've even seen punters do some form of bizarre tapdance as a warm up) in front of me while I'm on the treadmill makes me feel I've wandered onto the set of a really crap gay softcore porno-comedy. The receptionist is cute, though.

I believe there's a nicer (read: more expensive) gym up the road.

[Husband & wife pic by Misha Japaridze/Associated Press, found in this Guardian article, the rest are mine :P]

A Tale of Two Cities

This entry has been a long time coming, for a whole bunch of reasons. I have alluded beforehand to the subject of problems that foreigners have working overseas. I kept putting it off because each time I attempted to write on this particular matter, I ended up descending into sweeping generalizations about the locals (which is boring, and it's been done to death by scummy nincompoops in various print media), or go into detailed explanation about how there are moments just before going to sleep or waking up whereupon a moment's reflection on my current situation nearly manifests itself into a "WHAT THE FUCK AM I DOING HERE?" cold sweat scream (which is depressing, and it's been done to death by scummy nincompoops in various print media). And that's not the route I want to go down, naturally. But after visiting both Shanghai in December and Paris in March I feel as though I can come back to this topic, and subsequently tackle those two issues.

What am I trying to get at, you might ask? Well my overarching point is that, regardless of where you are, or wherever you go, you're still going to have problems. So without further ado, the following are the three main differences which stuck out during my little Parisian jaunt that support my observations.

Race

Yes, Eurodisney is just outside Paris – but there’s no point in going. Paris is kinda like London – people of all creeds and colors have descended on the place, and a short trip on its metro (which is rather unnerving as it is not a particularly smooth form of travel) is like seeing every single nationality in the world in one go. And they are all really, really well dressed to boot. Had I not brought the jacket I’m wearing in the photos on flickr, I’d have felt like a right arsehole wandering the streets.

Conversely, Moscow is predominantly white, and their fashion sense leaves much to be desired. Blame communism for that one (the clothes, not that it’s all whitey).

In addition, there’s an undercurrent of accepted racism in Russia, but delving into that topic would mean revisiting how scummy the police are here and their habit of beating to death anyone with remotely non-European features. That’s not to say Paris doesn’t have its own problems with race.

Flats

Hearing about the flat-finding process in Paris genuinely shocked me. Central (“traditional”) Paris, which is made up of twenty arrondissements (districts), is demarcated by the Peripherique ring road. Here’s a map:



From what I learned, trying to build/bulldoze any property in central Paris is a big no no, as it is either protected as a World Heritage site (granted, the buildings are pretty, feel free to look at the stupid number of photos I took on flickr) or the level of French bureaucracy makes the whole thing not worth a developer’s while.

What does this mean, then? It means that the housing market is heavily steeped in the landlord’s favor. Why? Because, in reality, there is only a certain amount of places available within the Peripherique. It’s not like Moscow, where Mayor Luzhkov will happily allow his fugly wife to knock over several acres of people’s homes to make way for obscene skyscrapers and further dilute the market.

As such, people seeking flats to rent anywhere in twenty of Paris’ central districts – forget about buying a property – have to accept the appalling fact that they will not only have to pay an exorbitant sum of money per month (if they even get a place), but will also need to fork out some serious cash up front as a deposit.

When my friend told me this (I may have the exact specifics wrong, as we were probably drinking red wine at the time, but the figure is not an exaggeration) to get a two-room flat along with another fellow, he had to pay a year’s rent in advance as a deposit up front. How much is that, you ask? At least TEN THOUSAND EURO.

Never in my life have I heard anything as bad as that. I lived in Glasgow for four years, been screwed around by dodgy Bangladeshi landlords, letting agencies, energy companies, and even the goddamn city council on more than one occasion – but they were mere trifles compared to my friend’s experience.

Still… those boulangeries…

On my side, I’ve had few problems finding a flat in Moscow, and I don’t really have any horror stories to tell of. There are a bunch of expat-friendly websites (expat.ru, redtape.ru, flatmates.ru) that can facilitate the flat/roommate-finding process. Agents are generally efficient and abundant as well, though some landlords will happily try to fuck over clueless Westerners.

Dogs

Within the first few minutes of walking around Paris, it became absolutely clear that the French did not have a revolution just so they could clean up dog shit. There is a frightening amount of the stuff. Not so much in the fancier parts of central Paris like the Marais or Montmarte. Yet up until that point, I couldn't recall the last time I'd stepped in crap on a city street. It's not happened to me in Moscow, that’s for sure, likely due to the fact that the migrant street cleaners do an insanely good job at keeping the place tidy. Having said that, I will likely step in some after I’m finished with this post.

But Moscow has its own dog issues - strays. And I don't mean the saccharine "Aww look at the fuzzy wuzzy's widdle face." I'm talking about actual packs of dogs that occupy courtyards and parks around apartment blocks. Dogs that put families off from taking their children anywhere near the playgrounds. Dogs that roam the streets and will actually attack passersby. Dogs that aren’t pets, they’re vermin.

Sure, bleeding heart liberals kick up a fuss about the city administration rounding them up and exterminating them (I believe there was a big surge prior to last year’s Eurovision Song Contest, which Moscow hosted) as a temporary solution but, pray tell, what’s the alternative? Implementing that unrealistic neutering program that was much talked about?

Thankfully, a phenomenon already exists that partially deals with the flea-ridden mongrels – the weather. Come winter, temperatures drop so low that the majority of mutts simply get killed off, only to start breeding like rabbits and quickly tear up the city again come springtime.

In case it’s not clear from reading the last two paragraphs – my stance on Moscow’s stray dogs is pretty firm. I’d rather have a dead undomesticated animal on my conscience than being witness to a friend or coworker being attacked in front of me. I’ve been fortunate enough that such a thing hasn’t happened, but coworkers have shared too many stories to simply brush it off as an unlikely occurrence…


…Anyway, what I mean by all this is that Moscow has problems, but so does Paris. As an expat working abroad, you might think that you can run amok with a bottle of stout in defiance of the locals. For a brief amount of time, at least in Moscow, it’s possible to do so. But it comes to a point where you realize that the place is not perfect, and suddenly the idea of working in Paris becomes appealing.

However, having spent so much time in Paris – which was a bit of a mistake on my part, but I was damned if I was going to fart around Moscow for two weeks – and seeing what my friends’ lives are like there, they’re not much different to my own. They too sometimes get fed up with their surroundings.

I have managed to accept the fact that the brief sensations of loneliness and the doubts about my current way of life are not exclusive either to me, or to my location – be it Moscow, Paris, Shanghai, Glasgow or Belfast. It’s a given that has to be tolerated. Those that can’t and move on to the next place invariably end up going through the motions again once the novelty has worn off.

As such, I feel I can officially lay this topic to rest and move on to writing about something more meaningful – like Moscow’s numerous stripclubs.

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In other news, there was a gay pride march (sort of – it was more like small groups of people streaking, but fully clothed and holding placards in various places for a few minutes at a time) on the day of the Eurovision Song Contest, but Peter Tatchell didn’t get punched this time by a Moscow riot cop, so no one cared too much.

I also had a wisdom tooth removed, which made me a bit cranky. My hot water went off the day after it got extracted. Double trouble.

Snow joke

Yesterday it snowed. A lot. From about midday for at least eight hours or so, which makes me happy for a few reasons:

1) I like snow.
2) It makes me thankful I don't need to drive in Moscow.
3) It makes a mockery out of Moscow's Mayor Yury Luzhkov's latest project.

The first point is self-explanatory. Snow is somewhat of a luxury in Ireland, and it's not too windy here, so providing you have a warm enough coat and boots, you're fine, especially if it hangs around minus fifteen/twenty (as the snow lies long enough and is less likely to become a sheet of ice). It's dry underfoot, and as long as it's not windy it's rather pleasant.

Secondly, cast your mind back to a few posts ago, where I posted a couple of pictures of a minor traffic jam. Wasn't really a jam at all, more a run of the mill tailback. My flat looks out on the ring road, and I only live about ten minutes walk away from my workplace. I was just told earlier by a comrade-in-arms that, what would normally take him about 15 minutes to drive home, took him three-and-a-half hours. The worst I have heard was six for another. Last night there were still jams and the occasional siren outside my window when I went to bed at about 11pm.

Lastly, Luzhkov, who is not exactly the most repellent politician in the world (were we to include certain African states), recently came up with a wonderful idea of how to combat such snowfall to prevent such traffic problems - cloud seeding. He believes, by cloud seeding from now until mid-March, he can save millions on the capital's street cleaners (who already do an excellent job) and probably more on lost man hours. Instead, it will allegedly cost less to have a couple of aircraft from the Russian Air Force going up and down several hundred times over the course of four months. Clearly no one there has a clue how much it costs to maintain aircraft, regardless of backhanders and subsidies.

As yesterday clearly demonstrated, this idea hasn't worked. At least I think it hasn't. I'm not sure it's been fully implemented, and even if it is, snow still has to fall elsewhere - likely onto places where people commute from outside the city, but hey - that's not Luzhkov's problem!

One thing is for sure - somebody out there doesn't like the idea that a migrant work force is cleaning up the city, and doesn't want to pay them anymore.

[Yes, I know it's a terrible headline.]

Another Day/Another Dollar

"Чим платити?" written on the billing invoice above is in Ukrainian. Although I don't speak it, the language itself is very similar to Russian, and I'm pretty sure it means "What are we paying for?" considering the article I nicked it from is about tariffs in Kiev.

It applies to my post rather neatly as , when I examined my own utility bill - known as "коммунальные услуги" (kommunaliye ooslooghee lit. "communal services") in Russian - there exists (next to the usual electricity, gas, central heating, telephone and hot water) the entry "радио" (lit. radio).

I was puzzled at first what this radio entry meant. Was it something to do with owning an actual radio like a TV license in the UK? I was mildly pissed off at first, considering I didn't have a radio initially, though I then bought a CD/MP3/Radio combo thing (which has since turned out to be a total piece of shit, prompting me to spend some 30,000 roubles - approx. 600 quid - in total on a desktop computer, but the radio still works) meaning I didn't really have any legal ground to stand on. And it's only about 38 roubles a month anyway - just over a dollar at the current exchange rate, or about 80 pence - and I don't handle my bills either (all inclusive in the rent), so I just forgot about it. Until a week ago.

In my monthly shelling out of rent to my (genuinely helpful) landlord and former engineer Giorgy, I handed over the usual scrap of paper that this time round had been obnoxiously stuck into my door handle - a technique usually reserved for pizza delivery employees - rather than slotted into my post box and, out of curiosity, asked what this radio payment actually was.

Turns out this "radio" is a leftover of mid-Soviet times, whereby nearly every apartment in built-up cities were equipped with essentially a direct line to the police for purposes of either asking for assistance, or informing on your dissident liberal neighbors. When Giorgy bought the actual flat back in the 80s, it was no longer there, yet it was still coming in on the utility bill (though back then all sorts of stuff was subsidized by the state).

So what's the big deal with this radio thing anyway? Well, put it this way: there are about 15 million people living in Moscow (legally, the actual number is higher). Granted there are not 15 million households, so let's say there are about four people on average to each residence, give or take an extra million depending on who has actually applied to get the radio thing taken off their bill. That leaves us with... umm... 3 million or so. So that's 3 million dollars a month to the state for a redundant service. Nice way to line the coffers, eh?

I don't think it's so much a case of corruption, more a catastrophic example of no one wanting to deal with the bureaucracy of the matter, so it will take nothing short of a violent coup to remove the damn thing for good.

One more thing to note on the bill, which is far less obvious as maybe not many people can actually visualize it, is not the cost of the hot water, but the actual amount you're paying for. The set amount per household (or flat, more accurately) is something like 5-6 cubic meters a month for just the hot water alone. I can't really visualize it either, but according to Giorgy (again, engineer, so he knows these things) it's an enormous amount, almost 3 or 4 times than the amount you'll ever use.

The upshot is Giorgy is endeavoring to adjust the tariffs appropriately using some sort of device for the hot water, but of course that means filling out several forms and asking some guy to come around with a meter and examine everything, then fill out some more forms.