OK - time to walk the walk

So the die has been cast; Little England it is.

I'm not going to say it's 'alright'; from what I can see right now what is happening in and to the UK is most definitely Not Alright, but I'm trying to remain optimistic.  To that end, if you voted 'Leave' last Thursday I would really, really, love it if you could explain why you did so.

In fact, I'm begging; please, please, please, tell me why you voted 'Leave' - without using any of the already debunked pre-referendum promises or that load of old toss phrase 'take back control' - and I will listen.

I promise not to judge, I promise not to argue with you.  I am simply looking for positive, realistic, and quantifiable reasons for your vote - surely it shouldn't be that hard to come up with some?

Little England or Great Britain?

No prizes for guessing this fact, but I'm voting Remain in Thursday's referendum on the UK's membership of the EU.

It seems like common sense to me to do that, but just in case it doesn't to you, I'm going to tell you what's led me to make this decision.

I suspect that, like me, you've felt bombarded by the figures and the stats that both sides of the debate have been throwing out in the last few weeks, so I'm not even going to start with the financial benefits or otherwise (although what are we, Area 51 Conspiracy Theorists?  The 'Leave' camp seems to expect us to join them in ignoring the advice to Remain flooding out from an overwhelming majority of highly trained and respected organisations and individuals, just because it doesn't fit their Brexit agenda,)

And in any case, financial reasons aside, there are plenty of other reasons why I think it's important for Britain to stay a part of the EU.

• Europe does not have a stellar history of peaceful internal negotiation.  One or other - or more - of it's nation states were either at outright war with each other, or planning to be so, for about 1000 years before the end of World War II, so 70 years of peace in Europe is not to be taken lightly. The nations in the EU bloc - including the UK - are stronger together than they are apart; anything else is crazy.  And if you think that a repeat of World Wars I and II just 'couldn't happen again', take note: that's exactly - EXACTLY - what the population of Europe thought the last two times around.

• Putin thinks we should vote 'Leave'.  He's rubbing his hands at the prospect, in fact.  If that doesn't give you pause, I don't know what would.  The analogy of a predator separating the weakest animal from it's herd is not irrelevant here, I think.  And I don't want to be that weakened animal, forced to make trade and visa agreements (because don't think for a moment that the two would be separate in negotiations with Mother Russia) that are not to our advantage.

• I've lived in a country where citizens do not have the right to visa-free travel to Europe.  Lucky enough to be exempt from that, I still saw how difficult it was for Russians to work in or to travel to EU countries, and the hoops they had to jump through.  Mind you, if we're going to get friendly with the Russians if we leave the EU, there's always the Crimea for two weeks every summer if we can't get to France, Spain or Italy, I suppose...

Now I come to think of it, I have yet to meet a returned expat in the UK who wants to vote anything other than 'Remain'.  Perhaps that's because we've seen the alternatives to living outside Europe firsthand, and don't rate them very highly.  Ultimately it comes down to this, for me at least: we can stay in the EU and work towards making life better for all 500 million of it's citizens - starting with you, and your family - or we can Leave.  Quit.  Run away.  Pull up the drawbridge.  Take our ball and go home to play alone, like the sulky child who doesn't want to share their cake at the birthday party.  Behave like Little Englanders.

Personally, I think we're better than that.  Personally, I prefer to behave like a Great Briton.


Every vote counts in this referendum.  If you're planning on putting a cross in the 'Remain' box, please make sure you get down to the polling to do so on Thursday.

Life, Laundry

It's a wonderful thing, this expat lifestyle. It causes you to cross paths with people from so many different backgrounds and cultures in a way that you might never have done if you'd stayed put in your country of origin.

After a while, you notice certain similarities in lifestyle and expectations between different nationalities and begin to understand some of the reasons behind them. The French, for example, really do eat a more civilized diet than some of the rest of us. The Italians really do have a flair for interior design. And the North Americans often have a way of doing barbecues that those of us who grew up in slightly rainier climates can only look upon and marvel.

Now, I like to believe that family life in Western Europe is equipped with the majority of the modern conveniences a 21st-century family would need, from Wi-Fi in every room through increasingly huge fridge-freezers to 200 channels on the TV (very few of which carry much worth watching). And Moscow life, in most expat homes, is much the same. Sure, there may be a higher level of dirt to clean up (inescapable when there are power stations inside the city and so many cars on the roads), and it may take longer to get things done simply because this is such an enormous city, but overall the home-based domestic burden is not so dissimilar here to the one I coped with back in London.

Take the laundry, for example. "Back home" we have what I would call perfectly acceptably sized washers and driers, and the same is true here. Or at least, they seem so, to those of us who have never lived in the U.S.

But North Americans seem to have something of an obsession with the laundry facilities here in Moscow. New arrivals — if the subject comes up — express disbelief at the size of the drums in washing machines and tumble dryers that are standard in Moscow homes, complaining that they have to do the laundry every day just to keep up with their family's demands.

I was always confused by this particular complaint because, well, yeah. That's what you do — what you have to do — with two or more children, isn't it? It was only when a (non-North American) friend told me of her experiences in the U.S. this summer, when she came face-to-face with the laundry facilities in some average American homes, that it finally started to make sense to me. These machines, she tells me, are so big that most families can do an entire week's coloured wash in one go. So big, in fact, that her 6-year-old son could fit inside. (Don't try this at home, folks.)

Which, I have to admit, does rather put the daily juggling act that those of us living in Moscow need to do with our whites, coloureds and darks, into perspective.

OK, North American brethren. Finally, I get it. You are officially allowed to be flummoxed by the laundry situation.



This post first appeared on my other blog, 'Diaries of a Moscow Mum' over on The Moscow Times Online.