We finally made it!

We made it! We finally made it to Mother Russia :)

I feel like it took a ridiculously long time to get here (and I am not just talking about the flight), but the longer I am here the more I realize that I will need to become fond of that feeling. We have now been here for a little over two weeks and are finally getting over jet lag and are slowly becoming comfortable with Moscow life.

I thought my life in El Salvador would have somewhat prepared me for life in Moscow, but boy was I wrong! It is a completely different thing to be a child growing up in a foreign country. When you are a child your parents take care of everything for you and you don't worry about things like -

 * The only English speakers you can find so far in a city of 12 million+ work in Starbucks. (But thank goodness there is a Starbucks, even if it doesn't have white mochas...)

* You can't read anything - signs, directions, metro, food labels and packaging - unless you sit down and jam pack learning the entire Cyrillic alphabet in a couple hours because your life depends on it. (I am actually exaggerating a bit - the metro has a few signs with the Latin Alphabet)

 * You can't wash a load of laundry until you spend a couple hours downloading manuals of the UK version that is a similar model because the model in your apartment is only sold in Russia and only has Russian manuals. Same goes for the dishwasher, microwave and oven (although I got lucky with the oven by clicking buttons and turning dials all over the place). And for those of you laughing that us "engineers" can't get these appliances to work....they are not "self explanatory", nor do they look anything like the amazingly wonderful, oversized American appliances I miss dearly (I will eventually post some pictures because everything here seems to be kid size compared to the stuff we have in suburban America). Each appliance deserves its own blog post and so does the shower.

 *You can't eat without paying 2-3 times the price you are used to paying for a meal at a restaurant and that is if you are lucky enough to get an english menu or go to McDonalds where Chicken McNuggets are "cheeecken" in all languages. French fries, unfortunately do not translate, but we managed to order some with lots of pointing. (and for the record, I hadn't eaten at a McD's in years until i got here but somehow it makes me feel like I am back home)

*OR you can't eat without walking to the grocery store where it is just as overwhelming because everything is written in Cyrillic. Thankfully fruit, vegetables and bread look the same all over the world :) Although the bread....hahahaha...to get the stuff we are used to we buy the "American Sandwich Bread". Otherwise the bread is also kid sized.

The list could go on, but these are the items that stick out because I have quickly realized my new life will include A LOT of grocery store trips - like every other day, lots of laundry - because you can only wash about 3 shirts and 1 pair of pants at at time in a cycle that takes about 7.5 hrs and automatically wrinkles your clothes really well, and lots of cooking from scratch :)

 The only way I have come this far in comfort in just two weeks, is that A's company arranged someone to help us with the transition. We have the sweetest person taking us around to visit apartments, stores, shops, restaurants, etc. She has given us so many pointers in all these areas and I am forever grateful for her!

 Now quickly back to my life in El Salvador vs. Russia - I think it did prepare me with an adventurous spirit and a positive attitude. Even though the transition into living here has been a little overwhelming we are looking forward to it and are happy we made the decision to move here.