Chillin' Out

So much for hot showers - my hot water has been shut off.

Before you start to panic and wonder whether or not I've been able to pay my bills, let me assure you that I knew this was coming. I wasn't expecting it until the weekend, but hey, the sooner it's shut off, the sooner it will be turned back on, right?

The shutting off of hot water is an age-old summer tradtion here in Russia. This is so the city can clean, repair, or replace the millions of miles of pipes which supply the millions of Muscovites with hot water throughout the rest of the year. The average time frame for this minor inconvenience is three weeks. You know you've lived in Russia too long when.....you start to plan your annual vacation around the time that your hot water is supposed to be shut off.

No one seems to be exempt from this event, although it doesn't occur simultaneously across the city. This is a good thing, because it means that while my water runs cold, my friend at the next metro station still has hot water, and she has assured me that she has no problem with my hopping over from time to time to clean up.

Many a modern person chooses to invest in a home water heater. I have one too - it's called a kitchen stove. Yes, my home water heating is accomplished the good old-fashined way - boiling great vats of water, and then filling up a basin in the bath.

While I don't particularly enjoy this summer sanitation cycle, I'm grateful that it's only for a few weeks. The year I lived in Vladimir, our hot water was shut off at the end of May, and didn't return until Aug. 1 - the day I moved to Moscow!