The Super Bowl and Freezing Small Children

There is good and bad news out of Moscow this week.

First the bad news. Apparently the new Americans in the building (yes, that's us) inadvertently shut off the heat of a section of the building in the six floors above us, causing the small children in those rooms to be very, very cold. How did we find this out? Because this morning at 8:30 the building handyman was at our door! He was a very nice man, but he was speaking Russian at about 90-miles-per-hour! If you know me at all you know that I am not particularly a morning person anyway and on the days where I have my lesson at 9am it is all I can do to speak Russian at that time of day, let alone try to figure out what someone is saying to me. So, picture yourself standing in front of a fire hose and that is a little of what I felt like.

Now we had a really good reason for turning off the heat (honestly we did.) Even though the temperatures have hardly risen above freezing since we moved here in October. Our apartment is heated by a series of radiators. There is at least one in each room and they make our apartment unbearably hot...especially in our bedroom. Usually we keep the windows open all of the time and that helps some, but it also creates a wind tunnel in the apartment and doors are constantly slamming shut, etc. Anyway, several weeks ago I developed a very bad cough that seemed to be aggravated by the dry heat of the radiators and sleeping with the window open at night, so since the radiator in our bedroom has valves on it (all but one other don't have any control at all) I decided to shut off the heat so that we did not have to open the bedroom window at night.

If Paul Harvey were here he would now tell you the rest of the story...apparently the radiators in the building snake through the walls in an s-like pattern that go upward from one floor to the next. So the kitchen heat is tied to the kitchen heat on all 14 floors, the living rooms are tied together, etc. You get the idea. Unfortunately somewhere in the six floors of rooms above us live small, small children who for several weeks have been suffering because the radiator in their room was not working. This was a bad way to start the day.

However, I suppose some good has come out of this. The best news is that today's temps were around 36-degrees, so it was not that cold. Secondly, we met the handyman and how have his name and number in case we ever need him for anything. (I wish we had that in December when the electricity was off for four days.) And, I was able to communicate with the handyman, though if you were him you probably thought I spoke like a retarded caveman and was only slightly more literate than if I had been using a series of grunts and clicks.

Now for the good news of the week...

Today we received a package from Miss Spicy's Sunday School Class at Westminster Baptist Church, the church where I was raised. It took two months to get here, but we were thrilled to see the many goodies from the States. The kids were especially excited and they have spent the rest of the afternoon playing with their new gifts. We are so grateful when people back home demonstrate their love for us with special treats like Orville Reddenbacher popcorn, Hot Wheels, and a box of new crayons!

And finally...thanks to a generous gift from our family at Christmas we have been able to share the treasure of watching American television with our mission friends here in Moscow. Early Monday morning (around 1am) around 25 people descended on our tiny apartment to eat chili and other snacks and watch the Super Bowl. We had a great time and were very thankful to not have language lessons later that morning! We love our Moscow mission family and enjoy spending time with them every chance we get. It really was a great time. The photos below are from our party.



It is Russian custom to take off your shoes as you enter someone's home. (And if you saw the mud, snow, ice and other muck that we walk in every day you would understand where that custom came from.) This picture is from our entryway and more than 24 pairs of shoes.


A shot from our living room. There were more people in other rooms too!


Long about the 3rd quarter I needed a little catnap on the couch in the hallway.

I hope that you are having a good week and that the people living in the apartment below you have not turned off the heat.

Blessings,
Marc