trainshopping

Russia is a special country. I feel it especially strong when I commute to Moscow as I live in a suburb. During 30 minutes I can buy various useless things e.g. books which explain how to download music for free, how to cure yourself with the help of herbs . I can also buy illegal DVDs which contain 16 films on 1 disc for only 100 rubles(2 pounds), beer, chocolate, socks etc. I call such pastime trainshopping. Sometimes there are warnings in the trains telling not to buy anything from illegal sellers as it is a risk to purchase  bad quality goods. Nobody pays attention to it and keeps on buying. Actually these sellers may be fined for their activity but I haven't heard of any cases.Why?Because I live in a  country of such strict rules which can be so easily avoided by paying bribe to authorities.

Most of the times it's very annoying to be adverstised all that crap. I just turn volume up on my Ipod and try to concentrate on my reading though sometimes the sellers can be real fun. Some of them are outstanding actors who are able to persuade buying things that nobody needs.

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what is it all about...

I live in Moscow, Russia. Some people in Europe still think that there are bears in the streets and people do nothing except drinking vodka. These are banal stereotypes but some people are quite right that Russia differs a lot from developed countries.Although I was told at school that Russia is developed country, I would say that it's country of the second world. Still, life here is a bit better than in Africa, at least I hope so because I've never been there to judge like this.

Life in big cities like Moscow and St Petersburg is not so bad.  But if you came even to fringes of Moscow suburb, you would see that it's so depressing to live there. It usually takes its inhabitants 2-3 hours to get to work as many of them work in Moscow because it's nearly impossible to find a good job in suburb. I'm talking about towns near Moscow, so you can imagine what's happening in small Russian towns which are 200 km and more from here.

To be continued...