expat – Finding Eden

Making Moscow Home

So I’ve been having some major issues dealing with seasonal affective depression alongside homesickness and I made it significantly worse by visiting my warm, sunny, amazing home over the holidays and then coming back in the middle of JANUARY.

In an effort to be more mindful and thankful for my current living situation (and to help mitigate my depression) I’ve been actively trying to notice the really great things about Moscow.

Honestly there aren’t that many amazing things in Moscow- a few cool attractions, but mostly its just really easy to make it home.

Public transportation is AWESOME. I’m hesitant about busses everywhere I go because they have been terrible everywhere I’ve lived. They take forever, they don’t go where you need, they cost more than it’s worth when you can just walk. But the busses here are incredible, especially in conjunction with the metros which are laid out really nicely and run every 1 or 2 minutes!!! Everything works on a Troika card which you can refill on an app and it’s so cheap. And even when you don’t feel like taking public transportation, taxis are SO affordable. Infinitely better than anywhere in the US or Italy at least. Slightly more expensive than China though.

Grocery stores are EVERYWHERE. From the front door of my building I can get to 3 grocery stores in under a 5 minute walk. And within a 10 minute walk I can get to an Ашан megastore (but I think that was just the luck of the draw because there are only 3 of them in Moscow). And I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again, you can find practically ANYTHING you might need/want in a Moscow store.

Heating and hot water are better than you could possibly imagine. When we were in Milan, it was SO COLD, but heating was SO expensive, so we never turned it on, we just wandered around our apartment wrapped in blankets. Its way colder in Moscow, so I was worried about our heating bill, but then I found out that the heat is set by the GOVERNMENT?!?!? (Apparently they set the interior temp based on last year’s temps that day, so sometimes it gets too hot and we have to open a window.) The heater in our house doesn’t even have an option to adjust it. It’s always so nice and toasty warm, and all of our utilities together have never been more than $30 a month. Also you know how in winter you always seem to run out of hot water? Not in Moscow. Unlimited SCALDING hot water- instantly. Seriously, it’s so hot you can burn yourself, and I still forget all the time and turn it all the way to maximum hot.

Drying clothes indoors is MAGIC? Because heaters are always running full blast the air inside is super dry. If you put sopping wet clothes on a drying rack indoors, they’ll be bone dry within 24 hours. For reference if you’ve never lived somewhere without a dryer, out on the balcony in the wind in Milan, it still took 2-4 days, and longer indoors. (Side note, dryers are horrible for the environment and you should try to airdry as much as possible! It makes such a difference and it’s way better for your clothes!) This super dry air makes everything really shocky though- way too much static electricity. I work in a kindergarten and I always forget that its so shocky and I feel horrible when I shock my babies on the face or head.

It’s easy, it’s accesible, its cushy, it’s comfy, it’s cheap. I would probably recommend living in Russia if I was being honest! As long as you don’t mind snow and can pick up a tiny bit of Russian, you’ll settle right in!

Groceries You Can’t Find in Moscow

Grocery stores are absolutely one of my major passions. It’s one of the most fun things about living in another country and its a great way to really “be” more local.

Before you move to or just visit another country, people (I’m sure) will come up to you and offer advice; what to expect, etc. In my experience they are wrong. I don’t know if I’m listening to the wrong people or what, but if someone says I can’t find something, then I always do, and if they say its easy to find it never is! So you can choose whether or not to believe me, but I swear this is the honest-to-God truth (at least it is true in 2019).

Before coming to Russia, I was told that food would be incredibly bland. Absolutely not true. They told me when I tried to cook I wouldn’t be able to find any good spices and that I should bring some taco seasoning/mexican spice blends with me from Arizona to use “when I got tired of eating boiled potatoes.” Wrong on both levels- Russian food is delicious and healthy! Also I found every spice I could want in the grocery stores as well as Mexican seasoning and taco blends. They also have tortillas and salsa!

I had another lady go out of her way to tell me that I wouldn’t be able to make chocolate chip cookies here. I asked in a forum if there were any American Expats in Russia with advice for what I would miss and she said she couldn’t find chocolate chips and vanilla anywhere here. It wasn’t hard. The baking aisle has both. Although I will grant that the chocolate chips are a little bit overpriced compared to how cheap a regular chocolate bar is. Also vanilla is a little bit different here. In the states we sell big bottles of brown imitation or real vanilla. In Moscow, however, they sell it in little droppers of clear liquid that is SUPER strong. It’s different, but it’ll definitely fill your need for vanilla flavoring.

I have been told by Russians here that you can find “anything you could ever want” in Moscow and it might be a little bit harder in St. Petersburg, and definitely harder out in the sticks. And it has mostly been true. Grocery stores in Moscow have been amazing. They have all the best parts of European grocery stores without missing out on any important American imports.

Stores in Moscow have a far better range of products and imports than the rest of Europe I think. They have peanut butter, they have donuts, frozen pizzas and chicken nuggets! They have salad dressings and grape juice (albeit it’s not great). They have ziploc bags when the rest of Europe doesn’t. I even found rootbeer in a regular store here! I’m still looking for ranch dressing and stuffing mix, but I’m sure they’ll turn up.

One thing you would expect them to have but they don’t though, is brown sugar. They technically do, but it’s weird. It’s not packed brown molasses sugar. It’s light brown granulated raw sugar. Not great for baking but not a big deal to live without.

I’ve heard talk of an American import store inside of the American embassy. Apparently you have to make an appointment to go shopping there, it sounds very secretive and fun- I’ll fill you in when I finally go.

*Baking Powder* This is one of those things that’s hit or miss wherever you go, so I usually just play it safe and bring some with me. Italy had something CALLED baking powder, but really it was baking soda. Everywhere has baking soda, and it is definitely possible to substitute, I just don’t like to. You can get baking powder in Moscow though. It comes in little packages and it is called Разрыхлитель теста just know that on a lot of packaging fonts, the T changes to a lowercase m. Couldn’t tell you why. It’s super frustrating when you’re trying to learn.

There are always a few things I miss from the states, (like American milk) but Russia ticks most of my boxes. So don’t worry about not being able to find the things you want in Moscow grocery stores- they’re likely to have it and lots of other fun things to discover.

When I leave Russia there will definitely be things I will miss too- like the amazing selection of pickled things, the variety of dishes featuring beets, and the delicious prepared котлета which is just ground meat and minced veggies and spices in a giant meatball shape.