Moscow Archives - Los Cuadernos de Julia

May is blossoming slowly this year, and May evening is cold and dry. We haven’t had enough rain, so the leaves are taking time to appear.

I’m going to resurrect my Neighbourhood Cam and Moscow Cam rubrics to get you acquainted with my native places. I will also update some posts where the text was previously lacking, to make them more informative and enjoyable.

The place in the photo (which was actually taken in 2018) is within a 10-minute walk from my house, right opposite the place where I taught English and French for four years. In the vicinity are a few shops, many blocks of flats, a church, and two railway stations.

On May evenings like that in the picture one always wants to slow down. The sunset is about to begin, and, as the evening is cold, the sky is going to turn purple-red. The wind is getting chillier, the cars are few, and so are people. I usually take in this cool air and gaze on the horizon as if it were my personal Waterloo Sunset. I know I am in Paradise here, although it was only recently that my district has become resplendent and posh in some aspects. But I like it this way.

I visited Britain for the first time 15 years ago, spending a month there, from early July till early August. In November I visited again, and in September 2003 I flew into what had become my seven-year period of life in England.

When I was returning home in 2010, my mother wondered if I missed any food. I craved some very special dairy products, but that was that.

I missed sunsets and some Moscow districts most.

Sunsets have always been spellbinding where I live. My grandma and I used to sit on our balcony on the 5th floor, enjoying the dramatic changes of colour and its intensity. Watching the horizont melting in subliminal gold or erupting in passionate union of red and purple couldn’t possibly have left my imagination untouched by the divine revelation. It took me years to admit that I was a believer, and sunsets were a reference point for my nascent faith in the 2000s.

What about you? What do you miss when you are away or alone?

To give you an idea of what I’m waxing lyrical about, here are some sunset photos from my neighbourhood.

Image credit: Julia Shuvalova