Quote: (01-30-2013 12:50 PM)presidentcarter Wrote:
Quote: (02-28-2012 11:46 AM)ao85 Wrote:
Been here for 6 months, will agree on all of the above. The food budget really depends on whether you are picky with your food and can live off the typical Russian diet, or if you want American brands, etc, which will be at least 2x more expensive than in the US.
There is a huge demand for English teachers, I've heard stories of upwards of 60$/hour (but you have to factor in commute time and time spent getting opportunities).
Most people inherit their apartments from their parents or still live at home.
Keep in mind timing too. This place is awful during the winter...it didn't get above 10 degrees fahrenheit for 2-3 weeks straight at one point. I expect the permanent snow cover for at least another few weeks....
ao85/ON, since you've both spent time there...what would be your thoughts on living in Moscow under the following arrangement:
- $1300/month net income
- Company provided private room in shared 2-br accommodation. Most likely 45-60min from city center via metro
- Renting city-center flats on airbnb for weekends, 1-2 times a month
- Teaching English 30-40 hrs per week
- Option to convert provided housing to $300-500 extra income per month so potentialy $1600-1800, but would need to pay for my own place.
OR...a similar arrangement except in Novosibirsk, Eka, Piter, etc (probably not a huge cost-of-living differential, but more central housing location, shorter commute, being in a smaller city, and with no airbnb rental expenses on the weekends)
Possible selling point for me would be networking opportunities in Moscow - being in the economic hub may make transitioning to a better job easier later on - any thoughts on this?
$1300 isn't a suitable income for Moscow. I'll break down a few reasons why.
If you're living 45-60 minutes from the centre it's Yugo-Zapadnaya territory, or something alike. You'll be paying next to nothing to go in to the city (metro) but you'll be paying gypsy taxi drivers between 400-700 roubles to take you back. I don't know the current exchange rate but that is about $15-20 to take you back at night once the bars close (this is if you speak sufficient Russian and quickly develop the
'which taxi to choose technique'. Before that add an extra 50%) .
So, 3 nights out a week x $17.50 a time = $52.50 x 4 = $210 for the month on taxi's returning home from the bar / club after the metro has closed. That's at a good rate.
Food isn't included. Should you home cook 2 of your 3 meals of the day (for example pasta, tomato / onion / garlic sauce, small salad, 1 breast of chicken each meal) and eat the other 1 meal of the day somewhere out at a mean price of $12 (this isn't exactly a high standard meal - it might just be shopping mall pizza)....
you're still going to be spending around $20 a day on food.
$20 a day x 30 days = $600 on food for the month
Going out money. Ok, bars aren't cheap. Even if you frequent some of the dives, like Papa's Bar or Coyote Ugly, and have only 3/4 rounds of drinks without buying any of the university students any, and let's presume it's the cheaper native beer or vodka (whiskey etc is more), that's still around $20-25 for the night, and I'm being very generous with the prices here.
3 nights out at a week x 4 rounds of drinks totalling $22.50 a night = $67.50 a week x 4 weeks = $270 for going out drinks for the month. That's for 3 nights a week, in the dive bars. If you want middle or lower upper range bars like Gypsy or Rolling Stone then double the prices. Forget the high end bars. For example, if you wanted to go to a high end night, maybe Oblaka on a Thursday, where the dime pieces are, you're looking at triple the prices.
The option to convert, for an extra $300-500 a month, to your own housing is not something you want to pursue. Travesties of architecture and aesthetic principles might cost you your entire monthly income in rent alone, and the hot water still might not work on a Thursday morning. Especially in April when they begin cleaning the pipes. You might be able to find a decent shared apartment, but finding one of those willing to take you on without any guarantee of a long term rent, well, that's going to prove difficult. Again, i'm being kind. Should you even happen to find a place that is willing, the prices won't be favourable, and neither will the location.
Renting city center flats for the weekend. I haven't been on airbnb in Moscow (although i am friends with the Central / Eastern Europe airbnb main guy, who happens to be in Moscow right now, but that's another story which I'm just dropping because why not, I'm aristocratic like that and don't give a damn if your introspective being calls me out on my pretentiousness.....please don't hate me) . Ok, where was I? Right. Well, knowing the prices like i do, without having been on the airbnb website, I'd say forget this idea. Your budget is too short.
Networking opportunities? Sure. They exist. As anywhere it depends on you and your affability / ability to get what you want. It's more about looking the part than being the part. I can't stress that enough. Well, i probably could, but that sentence with the qualification will suffice.
So, $210 for taxi's, $600 for food, $270 for drinks, and we are at $1080. Now let's include daily metro travel (I'm going to unbelievably accurately and precisely estimate the amount of travelling you will do) and say it will cost circa $70 for the month. That's $70 + $1080 = $1150.
So by accounting only for 3 cheap nights out a week (travel + drinks), every day public transport travel for a month and the food for the month you have spent $1150, and that's by being disciplined on your budget of $1300. Add in other variables, and well, you're beginning to use your credit card or staying in at your shared accommodation, browsing the rooshv forum, jerking off to youjizz gangbang porn and wondering where is your Kitty and asking yourself why you went to Moscow. Or maybe you won't. It depends on your character. Then again, what doesn't? Well, my character probably doesn't. Then again, we are all guilty for each other, so, who knows?
Anyway.
You don't quite make it clear whether the $1300 per month net income is separate to or as a consequence of the 30-40 hours a week of English teaching you mentioned doing. If it is additional to the $1300, then you are closer to a wage that will enable you to live beyond a frugal manner. I'd guess teaching English would be between $20-30 an hour, so, let's say $25 an hour x 35 hours = $875. Add that to the $1300 you mentioned originally and you have a monthly income of $2175. Hmmmm. Even then, I'm afraid to say you won't be balling. You will be comfortable, though. You still would struggle to rent more than a damp studio room that is so communist era it looks like it has been instagram sepia filtered.
Despite all of this, I'd suggest you persevere and go with it. Moscow is a fantastic city for several reasons. It has a unique type of demographic. I don't mean that in a sociological sense. No. Rather, in an obtuse psychological one. The type, and variety, of character you meet in Moscow surpasses that which you meet in almost all megapolises. There isn't the variety of
nationalities that you have in London or New York, no, i don't mean this. What i mean to say is that the mind set, the way of being, the reasoning behind actions, is quite unique, often from individual to individual, but even generally so when considering the city's citizens as one. I confess, I'm explaining it terribly. I could try again, but i won't, because words will surely fail me again. It's one of those paragraphs. Still, the sentiment is genuine. Moscovites, not so much the new hipster 3 years behind London generation (18-27 year old Moscovites), but the rest of the city. From the Ukrainian to the Kazakhi to the Armenian to the Siberian. All of these that you will find in the city are attached to Moscow in some convoluted way and yet each has a way of deduction that just doesn't seem to follow the type we have in Western Europe or America. They are neither gopniks nor city types. They are, as it were, brain fevered, over educated, nostalgic, patriotic, melancholic types that are simultaneously cynical and naive. You can't fool anybody else like you can fool a Russian, but you can't fool a Russian like you can fool everybody else.
Oh, what's more. The summers are decent in Moscow.
Besides, did anybody mention the women?
Just go. You'll bang. And if you don't, well, i guess you just won't. But you probably will.