What's In A Name?

As with most large cities, the origin behind the name of Russia's capital is rife with different theories. Most folk tend to point towards the principal feature of Moscow (Москва - Massk-va, the stress being on the first syllable edit: no it's not, it's on the second, whoops! If a vowel in Russian isn't stressed, then it's not pronounced the way it should. So, for example, an unstressed "o" sounds like "ah") - its river, which is called the Moskva River. Naming a city according to its proximity to a geographical feature isn't exactly inspired. Regardless, what's the root of Москва?

According to some ancient Baltic languages (possibly Mordovian or Finno-Ugric), Москва could have come - via a slight mutation - from their words for 'dark' or 'muddy'. Another simply points to 'bear-river'. However, I was told a far more entertaining tale the other day regarding the origin of Москва. But first a little preamble.

In 1147, Prince Yury Dolgoruky of Rostov founded what would be later known as Moscow and set up a wooden kremlin there (кремль krem-l). Nowadays when you say the word Kremlin, most folk will associate it as the center of Russian government. What it actually means is something close to the word 'fortress'. Even though it got burned down a couple of times, Moscow has always had its kremlin in the same place.

So, if we believe my friend's account, Dolgoruky for whatever reason allegedly had an obsession with the word мост (mawst) or 'bridge'. It's not exactly a complete stretch of the imagination, there's a great big river there, and the prince probably did want a bridge. Over time, Dolgoruky kept saying мост, eventually leading to him dropping the 't' from the word.

Then, one day, while he was standing by the river, a frog (лягушка - lya-goosh-ka) leapt up the bank and croaked. Seeing as this was a Slavic frog, he did not 'ribbit'. In Russian, the onomatopaeia for a frog's croak is квак (kvak). Dogs (собака - soh-bah-ka), incidentally, do not go woof, they go гаф-гаф (gaff-gaff); pigs (свиня - sveen-yah) go хрунь (khroon); horses (лошадь - low-shad) go огого (oh-go-go); but cats (кот - cot) still go miaow regardless of language.

Dolgoruky's "мос" and the frog's "квак" came together in that moment, and thus was born Москва.

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In other news, spring has decided to rear its slush-coloured head. Proof of this was demonstrated beautifully by a coworker, who suddenly noticed that his wristwatch actually had a glow-in-the-dark dial. It had been so gloomy over the past few months that it simply wasn't absorbing any light until now.

Tango continues unabated. There was a special concert a couple of weekends ago at the Central House of Artists, during which the instructors of the school I go to performed.



Also performing were two Argentine maestros, Omar Caceres and Vidala Barboza, who stole the show (sorry, Anton). The way they moved so fluidly on stage pretty much confirms that all they do in Buenos Aires is just drink and shag. Apologies for the autofocus on this one; my camera had a mind of its own for the first 20 seconds.



There are more videos from the event on youtube, which you can find by clicking this link.

Swim City

No man drowns if he perseveres in praying to God, and can swim.
- Russian proverb

Until last weekend I haven't been swimming (плавание plah-van-i-yeh) in at least two years. This is mostly due to the fact that I banjaxed my shoulder, effectively putting an end to any front crawl (кроль k-rawl) shenanigans, but I can still do the breast stroke (брасс brass) without any major repercussions. So where other than overpriced fitness centres can one go for a dip in the Russian capital, I hear you cry?

Well, there are far worse places than Чайка (Chai-ka lit. "seagull"), which is an open-air swimming pool (бассейн bah-say'n). Unfortunately, finding a decent picture of the complex is difficult, mostly because it shares its name with a rather famous - and incredibly depressing - play by Anton Chekhov. Fortunately, Google maps comes to the rescue.


View Larger Map

What you might also be asking is why on earth is someone going to an open-air swimming in the middle of a Russian winter? To that I don't really have an answer. I have a picture, though, courtesy of Alexander Baranov's flickr account.


Admittedly the temperature at the time that photo was taken was -20 at night. The coldest I've been there was when it was roughly -10 two weekends ago. And no, the pool is not -10, it's about +25 in the water.

Typical of Russian bureaucracy, in order to actually use the pool, you need to go and get something called a медицинская справка (med-it-sin-sky-ya sprav-kah) which is a doctor's certificate.

Fortunately, you don't need to go to some small hovel on the other side of the city for the scrap of paper that gets handed out for nearly everything and would probably be simple enough to falsify. There's a special office inside the complex where three ladies sit doing nothing but processing said scraps of paper and taking people's blood pressure all day. A few more form-signings and payments at the cashier later, one eventually gets to the changing rooms, which is where things start to get really Soviet.

First off you have to forfeit your медицинская справка to someone sitting in a small booth in exchange for a locker token (don't worry, you get it back later). Once you find your locker, you'll be presented with an odd sight.

Unlike a typical coin-operated lock and key mechanism found elsewhere, Chaika's lockers have four dials on them, both on the inside and the outside of the locker door. On the inside you clunk the dials into whatever code you want - which you later match on the outside to open it. Obviously you don't have the dials on the outside be the same as the ones on the inside, but the trick is trying to remember whatever 4 digit code you came up with. On the upside it means you don't have to worry about having to dive down three meters to get your key from the deep end.

Now I hope you brought a plastic bag (пакет pah-ket) with you, as well as a pair of flip flops (тапки tap-ki), a swim cap (шапочка для плавания sha-potch-ka d'lya pla-van-i-ya), goggles (защитные очки zah-sheet-ny-ye atch-key), a towel (полотенце po-lo-ten-tsye) and some shower gel (гель для душа gel d'lya doo-sha), because you'll be needing all that later.

Before taking the plunge, like at any pool you need to take a shower. Usually showers have the valve by the pipe connected to the shower head. Not so in Chaika. The valve is on the floor, which you have to stand on to operate.

Getting into the main Olympic-standard pool is actually kinda cool, though in the West it might be seen as a gross safety violation. You step into a small pool connected to the outside ,which is obstructed by a barrier that you then have to swim under. I suspect it's primarily a measure to keep the cold out of the shower area.

So once you've stuck on your swim cap and swum under the barrier, you're out in the open. And you better keep swimming, because even though the water is warm, the air above is still pretty cold.

Once you're sick of the pool, it's time to hit the sauna, though that involves having to walk outside around the pool.

[Writing about a Russian sauna/banya requires a whole other entry, so we'll skip this part for now. ]

After leaving the sauna, take a cold shower and then head round to another, much smaller pool. Now don't worry, this one's indoors. There's probably a very specific name for this bit, and if I knew it I'd post pictures because of how awesome it is.

You can only exit the pool from one side, the other side is up against a wall. About three meters up the side of that wall is a sort of gutter from which blasts a torrent of water. There are about ten of these things along the length of the pool. It sounds odd, but for the full Chaika experience you need to stand under one of these waterfalls and let it beat down on your back and shoulders. Bizarrely, it's the same as if someone were massaging you, and is ridiculously relaxing. And then you go back into the sauna and repeat the process a couple of times, and then outside to another pool in the open to come down from the whole experience.

Hopefully, by the end of all this, you are not dead.

In closing and in keeping with tradition I leave with a video of "Russian Rocket" Alexander Popov, who set the world record for the 50m freestyle in 2000.



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In other news I was at an extremely odd recital at some performance artist's apartment last night. His name is German Vinogradov and he is a strange man. How I actually managed to end up at such a bizarre event should best be saved for another day, or wiped from memory altogether. I do not recommend looking him up on YouTube.

Also, Moscow's new mayor Sergey Sobyanin has come under fire for supposedly lax snow-clearing efforts in the capital. Already there are mumblings about the good old days of Luzhkov. I can't honestly see the difference between this year and last year's winter.

Edit (February 13, 2011): I managed to find this little gem of Tango instructors Anton and Anya practising a routine.

You Know When You've Been Tango'd

I guess I should own up to those scant few who don't already know: I have been going to tango lessons for the past month or so.

It's part of an attempt to make up for me not going to the gym any more, though ironically the practice hall is even closer than the gym to my apartment. The school is called To Tango, and it teaches the Argentine form of Tango. The school even has a website. Here's a picture of instructors Anton and Anna ripped from the site:

Anton is a fantastically cool guy, and he also speaks English, which is useful seeing as I'm the only foreigner in attendance. Unfortunately, Anton has been on tango sabbatical to Buenos Aires for the past few weeks, leaving us to Gennady and Lena. I don't have any pictures of Gena, but he has danced far longer than Anton, so the class is in good hands.

So why bring this up now? Well, the past two lessons have made me realize that I can't possibly dance in a crappy pair of dress shoes for much longer, so I went out and bought a proper pair today. Hopefully these will stop me from ruining my knees.

Shiny.

Tango is... challenging, but it sure as hell is fun and I heartily recommend it to you all. Even though I suck right now, at least I'm picking up various dance vocabulary along the way, such as: осанка (oh-san-ka) which means "posture"; ось (oz) which means "pivot" or "axis"; шаг (shag) which means "step"; and поворачивать (po-vo-rah-chi-vat) which means "to turn" among many others.

So far I'm only doing the basic technique classes (базовая техника, baz-oh-vai-ya tekh-ni-kah) once a week, which last two hours. With time I'll maybe join the other group classes later in the week, and pluck up the courage to take part in a milonga. While it might sound like a dignified event, from what I gather with conversations with classmates, folk just get shitfaced and dance with each other for three or four minutes at a time.

And in that time, you live, you love, you die - or so Gena tells us.

Play us off, Gotan Project

Can’t Stop the Gop(nik)

Over the past two weeks I have probably gone to the cinema far more than I should. A new job schedule has (finally) allowed me to return home without feeling brain-dead and able to do something semi-intellectual. Conveniently, a film festival was in town. In fact, there’s a British film festival that just started as well, but I unfortunately missed a screening of Chris Morris’ Four Lions last night (it’s showing again on Sunday, so here’s hoping I can nab a seat).

The theme of the 2-in-1 film festival was fairly general – art movies here, comedies there, foreign flicks thrown in for good measure – and the three films I managed to catch were vastly different [Special thanks to Kseniya and Aleksey, by the way, for abusing their influence with the organizers and giving me free tickets].

Другое Небо/Another Sky (Dmitry Mamuliya, 2010)

Probably best to start with the crap and end on a high note. Другое Небо (Droo-goy-ye Nye-boh) is an enormously depressing piece about chain-smoking estranged husband & father Ali from Central Asia who comes to Moscow in search of his wife. His nine-year-old son tags along. Nothing good happens to any of them, put bluntly.

To those not aware of the problems “guest workers” (or “gastarbeiteri” as the Russians stole it from the Germans) face in Moscow, Another Sky highlights their plight and shows off the supposed monotony of their existence in the capital. Truth be told, it was just plain boring – mostly because shots lingered on the side of the father’s head walking down streets and corridors, and he barely utters a word throughout. The first five times are fine, we get the message: it’s shitty and that’s the life some of them have. Is it necessary that the whole film be an exposition-less snooze-a-thon? Can’t there at least be a semblance of a story?

The director held a Q&A afterwards. He was wearing a scarf indoors. Groan. Though if I understood what was said correctly afterwards, various guest-workers and typical locations were used in the film (rather than being shot in, say, Mosfilm Studios). Too bad the production didn’t bother to delve into the topic further, as I mentioned in previous posts that Slavic (or “White”) Russians don’t exactly have good attitudes towards the Southern Caucasians or their Asian neighbours.

Неглубокая могила/Shallow Grave (Danny Boyle, 1994)

Before Trainspotting, Danny Boyle shot Shallow Grave. I got slight waves of nostalgia, as it was filmed in Edinburgh, plus there was a cèilidh scene (Scottish line dancing, essentially, except fun).

One of the three protagonists, Kerry Fox (who plays a doctor), was in town to present the movie. Ewan McGregor (an obnoxious journo who never shuts up) and Christopher Eccleston (a straight-laced accountant who “always gets the job done”) have since gone on to bigger things.

It’s a well-paced flick, and Eccleston does a wonderful job of making the rest of the cast feel paranoid as he becomes more and more unstable after new flatmate Keith Allen’s unexpected death by overdose in their apartment. Well worth watching.

Гоп-стоп/Hold Up (Pavel Bardin, 2010)

Before Гоп-стоп (Gop-Stop), Pavel Bardin shot the film “Russia 88” (2009), which was a fake documentary about Russian neo-Nazi skinheads. I’ve not seen it myself, but it was both fairly well-received and banned from being screened in Russia.

Hold Up isn’t exactly a good translation of the title. The word “gopnik” in the blog title is Russia’s word for someone of the lower class i.e. ned, spide, steek, towny or scally depending on where you’re from in the UK. Essentially the stereotypical image of individuals dressed in garish tracksuits who hang around in playgrounds drinking Buckfast or White Lightning.

Ironically, while Gop-Stop features aforesaid scummy gopniks as the lead characters, the tone is the polar opposite to Bardin’s previous flick. Even though the film is loaded with obscure cultural references, most of which I could barely understand, I still found it hilarious. Needless to say, the locals who were in attendance howled with laughter.

Gop-Stop is the tale of down-and-out gopnik Vasya, played by Pyotr Fyodorov (who bears an uncanny resemblance to Colin Farrell) and his close friend who embark on an absurd Robin Hood-esque scheme against the oppressive local mayor, who has spent most of his term embezzling the money of the taxpayers. I wonder where they got that idea from?

Sometimes the Russian definition of comedy tends to be a guy on stage holding a clipboard, who announces “Two Russians go to Las Vegas” and then reads out a list of the hijinx they get up to. Gop-Stop completely quashes that image, proving that writers here are equally capable of dumb-but-fun screenplays that need not really on one nationality as its audience to be successful. Russian slapstick is not high art by any means, but it sure as hell was infinitely more entertaining than Another Sky.

Bizarrely, on the night, the film was being screened twice. After we came out of the hall, it turned out the second showing was for cast, crew and guests only. It was slightly bizarre seeing the same people that I had just watched for the past hour and a half standing in front of me. Pyotr Fyodorov remained in character and was dressed up in an ugly tracksuit for the premiere.

Социа́льная Сеть/The Social Network (David Fincher, 2010)

This wasn’t part of the festival, though it has just been released in Russia. It might be a bit of a stretch to define it as “the film of the decade” that some reviewers have already said, but the combination of Fincher’s direction, Aaron Sorkin’s writing, and the score by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross made for a fantastic experience.

It should be noted that, while it’s been called “the Facebook movie”, it has very little to do with the website itself. Instead, the story (based on the mouthful of a book “The Accidental Billionaires: The Founding of Facebook, A Tale of Sex, Money, Genius, and Betrayal”) focuses on the actions of the main players – how the site was spawned from Mark Zuckerberg being dumped and drunkenly taking out his frustrations through his skills as a programmer – and the sacrifices they have made along the way in pursuit of fortune.

Regrettably I had the misfortune of only getting to see the Russian dub, but I still walked out of the cinema satisfied. Reznor’s style shines throughout, especially when the second major scene hits.

And who would have thought Justin Timberlake would nearly steal the show with his sleazy, narcissistic portrayal of Sean Parker, one of the founders of peer-to-peer file sharing service Napster?

The overall moral of the story is, while the facts might likely have been skewed and overdramatized on the way to the projector, we are all human and are equally fragile. It’s not exactly a feel-good movie, but in spite of the success of Zuckerberg et al., they all get their comeuppance one way or another, be it being sued for 500 million dollars, or simply being dumped by your girlfriend for being a jerk.

= = = = = = =

Last night on the way back from work one man was walking around in the chilly autumn air topless very slowly, albeit with his coat hanging down around his elbows. Later, on the way to the local grocery store, there was a man sliding around on his arse for no apparent reason. He didn’t look crippled at all; something had just possessed him to propel himself across the asphalt with his hands. Seat of trousers be damned.

That’s it for now.

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]

Singing in the Rain

So, for the first time ever, Irish super rock group U2 and its lead singer’s ego came to Moscow two weeks-ish ago to play at Luzhniki stadium, which is the same venue where the Champions League final took place in 2008.I had no real inclination to see them by myself (cue some locals shocked in disbelief at the fact that I didn’t want to see fellow Irishmen perform), but a last minute invitation swayed me. Plus it was an opportunity to see whether all the mocking of Bono by South Park and Family Guy is really warranted or not.

The only other time I had been at Luzhniki was in the summer of 2007 for the Metallica concert, which was pretty terrible. Not because of Metallica, they’re alright, but because of Luzhniki itself. As a concert venue it’s dreadful, as you can barely hear a damn thing in the stands (which is where I was at the time) because it echoes all over the place. But more importantly, the whole place was riddled with Moscow’s police force (or, rather, the Милициа - Militsia).

The moment you arrive at Sportivnaya Metro Station, you will see them standing around grumpily watching the platform. The moment you leave the station, you are confronted with the first of many rows of them.

This pattern repeats all the way towards the stadium, where you have to pass through at least two security checks before you even get a glimpse of the interior.

Admittedly, trying to keep several thousand people in a small area in some sort of order is a logistical nightmare, and the Militsia did pull it off despite being extremely menacing. To be fair, I’ve seen worse in Glasgow (Up Front Security are a particularly charming bunch). But none of it was particularly relaxing.

Given my previous experience at Luzhniki, I had very low expectations in the run up to being graced by Bono’s presence, and I was genuinely surprised… but not by U2. When the support group came on, I had a very odd sense of déjà vu.

It took a few seconds to register, but it turned out that, of all people, Snow Patrol was the warm-up act. And even without fancy audio visual equipment and costumes (lead singer Gary Lightbody was scruffy as usual) they were far more entertaining than the main act. Mostly because of this moment…

…After their set was done with, at least another hour was spent standing around, taking in the pleasant atmosphere of being intimidated by the local law enforcement while watching roadies do all sorts of things on the stage that was specially made for the 360° tour.

Eventually Bono, The Edge and the two other guys no one else cares about came out to the tune of David Bowie’s “Ground Control to Major Tom”. I’m not sure if it’s their “thing”, like how Metallica always kicks off its gigs with The Good, the Bad and the Ugly’s “The Ecstasy of Gold” by Ennio Morricone. If you’ve not heard the track in question then, well, make up for it now.

I think it’s fair to say that Morricone is more effective in kicking off a rock concert than Bono’s crooning of “Singing in the Rain” as it had actually started raining the moment the lot of them walked on stage, which didn’t stop until we left. And yes, I got soaked.

Despite not owning a single CD, I pretty much recognized every single song played on the night because – unless folk are unaware at the dilemma major artists are facing nowadays – U2 weren’t there to promote anything new. All these guys now have to go on tour to keep going.

It’s not like the old days where you would have to sell a million copies to go to number one. With music downloads and the ubiquity of iTunes, U2 et al. simply can’t sustain themselves on record sales alone. This is why the Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan are constantly on tour, and will do so until Keith Richards can’t drool over the frets anymore.

And who wins here? Well, the Russians do. An ever-increasing number of bands are flocking to Russia. Elton John was here with his Red Piano recently. Madonna was in St. Petersburg. The Prodigy can’t get enough of Moscow’s money. Looking at the billboards outside my balcony right now, I can see that ZZ Top, Placebo and Sheryl Crow are incoming.

Yet I digress. Truthfully, the gig wasn’t the best because, despite playing their timeless hits, the four Irishmen didn’t exactly rock out. It was more about the spectacle of the thing. All the flashing lights, all the camera angles, all the moving bits of the stage etcetera.

But what was both disappointing and baffling was Bono fulfilling the South Park/Family Guy prophecies of acting like the biggest tit on the planet. At one point there was a pre-recording by one of the dudes on the International Space Station reciting what I think was a stanza or two of one piece, which was followed by Bono holding his arm up and head down like the Black Power salute at the 1968 Olympics saying something along the lines of “Frank De Winne up der in the Inter-nash-un-al Spays Stay-shun, folks. Guys, just, y’know, keep ah-skin questions. Just keep findin’ ahnsers…”

…to the bemusement of all Russians in attendance. And then Desmond Tutu appeared on screen with an equally cryptic statement. And then the first four articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights scrolled up.

A bunch of other surreal stuff appeared on the big screen, which was eventually closed off by an appearance of people carrying Amnesty International Chinese lanterns to Dylan’s “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door”, co-sung with the vocalist of Russian band DDT and noted activist Yury Shevchuk.

Afterwards it was a tiresome trek back to the metro station with several hundred other soaking wet people. Upon (eventually) returning home I jumped in the shower before gulping down a large glass of Chilean red.

[Photo of Bono found at Alf Broflovski’s flickr profile.]

Burning Down The House

So last Sunday (15th) was amusing. Actually, the previous Wednesday (11th) was genuinely entertaining, as I attended my friend Dima's wedding, which was an absolutely wonderful day and I'll write about it later. A couple of hundred pics are on flickr from the day.

But something happened on my way to Dima's wedding, which took place at the Дворец Бракосочетания (Dvor-ets Brak-oh-so-shey-tan-i-ya lit. Palace of Marriage) which is more or less the same as ЗАГС (Zags an acronym for what is essentially a Registry Office, but everyone says Zags for short). A few doors up from mine an apartment was on fire and the firemen (пожарники po-zhar-ni-key) were busily blasting it from a cherry picker.

"That's interesting," I thought, as the apartment itself was part of the same building I live in. Most apartment buildings in Moscow have multiple подъезды (pod-yez-dh lit. um... well, езд comes from a verb of motion, but it means entrance). I was in a rush to get to the other side of town where the registry office is at, but after seeing the burly Russians attacking the blaze I became plagued by the idea that I might not have an apartment to come back to after all the wedding fun times. My fears didn't manifest themselves, and my apartment was fine after I came back home at two in the morning.

That was, of course, until Sunday. Coming back at about three in the afternoon - I can't recall what I had been doing before then - I noticed the apartment stairwell stank of what could best be described as burnt plastic. Подъезды smell funny most of the time, usually of stale piss because tramps have a tendency to pass out on the stairs in the winter, but this time round it was especially pungeant.

One astute neighbour also noticed the stench, and was pacing up and down the stairs looking for the source. I became paranoid and started feeling the floors of my apartment wondering if any of the parquet had suddenly become especially hot (not easy to tell when your apartment is hot to begin with given the recent heatwave). And wouldn't you know it? The apartment directly below mine was actually on fire.

By the time I had realized it was probably the right moment to vacate the place, I heard a colossal banging from downstairs. Firemen were already there and were attempting to force their way in with a crowbar, hose at the ready (meaning I couldn't really get past, but I guess I could have jumped off my balcony, which is only about twenty-five feet from the ground). Then I got a phonecall from one of my Russian friends who lives nearby, inquiring, "Umm, Ben, there's smoke coming from one of the windows of your building, are you alright?"

At that point I noticed that some burly firemen on a crane were peering through my balcony window at me to see if I was alright and rudely hung up on my friend to chat with them.

Given the sturdiness of doors you find in some Russian apartment buildings like the one I'm in (where the ceiling is about three meters high), the crowbar wasn't sufficient, prompting the appearance of an enormous diesel-powered angle grinder to saw through the bolts, which made a hilarious amount of noise.

Obviously, no one was in the apartment at the time. In fact, I can't recall the last time I had seen someone entering or exiting the place in the past year, so I suspect it may have been an electrical fault. I'm vaguely sure I heard mentions of an electric blanket, which might have explained the initial stench.

Anyway, the fire was put out relatively quickly. No towering inferno, I regret to disappoint, just a stairwell full of smoke (ironic, given the fact that the thick amount of smog that had descended on Moscow over the past fortnight had finally lifted). A fireman came in to inspect my place afterward and found no smoke or soot damage, and merely said that I should just leave the window open for a while.

Oddly enough, my friend who called me earlier was still waiting down on the street, which was nice, but, because of his particularly unique character, I was wondering if he was less interested in seeing me safe and well and instead more excited by the prospect of me emerging from the подъезд half on fire. He simply grinned when I later made this observation.

Not wanting to enjoy the stench of burnt plastic, I left the building for a few hours to both get a drink and let the excitement die down.

A few days later, I encountered a couple of my immediate neighbours talking by the lift. Unfortunately for them, who weren't present on the day it happened, it turned out that the fire had kicked off underneath theirs, and that there was some sort of soot damage here and there in the apartment. Although most of the apartments are uniform, a lot of them used to be all one large thing, called a коммуналка (com-oo-nal-ka lit. a short form of communal apartment) in which several families would live. After the Soviet Union died, a lot of these apartments were split up.

The flat below me, however, hadn't been completely rearranged as the ones above, and covered the same area of the two apartments above i.e. mine and my neighbours'.

But anyway, no lives lost and mostly superficial damage. Here's to the next disaster. Perhaps something less dramatic, though, like the power outage in four of St. Petersburg's city districts last night.