The Russia Thread
05-23-2019, 01:09 AM
I see you guys are discussing living/moving to a Tier 2 Russian city, I lived in Volgograd for more than 2 years, this is the info I posted about the city a while ago, I hope it helps someone. After Volgograd I moved to Saint Petersburg, I can answer questions about both. Here it is:
This is a short data sheet on Volgograd - волгоград (former Stalingrad), Russia.
This will be my first data sheet and English is not my first language, so if the structure of my writing is not the best or if there are grammatical mistakes or misspellings I apologize in advance.
I’ll tell you guys a few things about myself:
I’m a mid-late thirties guy originally from southern Europe, I have lived in several countries in Europe and I’m currently in Asia. I’m around 183cm or 6ft and I used to be in good shape but I haven’t worked out for some time now.
My experience in Volgograd:
I lived there from September 2013 until November 2015, afterwards I moved to Saint Petersburg. In both cities I worked as a language teacher, my income for Russian standards was quite decent but I was no baller.
The City:
First named Tsaritsyn, then Stalingrad after the USSR’s Prime Minister and then Volgograd after WWII. Volgograd means the city on the (river) Volga. Volgograd is in south west Russia and has a population of around one million people, the city is quite long and it’s parallel to the river Volga.
Volgograd, being quite near for Russian standards to the Caucasus, has a pretty large community of people originally from Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Chechnya, Abkhazia etc.
Volgograd is not a beautiful city, most of it is made of Communist blocks built right after the battle of Stalingrad and during the 50’s, 60’s etc. There are a couple of nice long streets, ie the alley of the heroes аллея героев being one of them.
The weather:
It’s Russia so in winter it’s going to be freezing cold, plenty of ice and snow. Winter generally starts in November and it ends in April or sometimes even in May. In summer it can get really hot and sunny. I recommend visiting Volgograd in May or in September.
How to get there:
I personally took a train Simferopol in Crimea, at the time Crimea was part of the Ukraine, not it’s part of Russia (no politics here, just pointing that out), it was a very long train ride, if I remember correctly it was like 26 hours. The train was old, hot, smelly and crowded but a really eye-opening experience.
The Food:
There are some foreign restaurants in Volgograd, mostly Italian and some German, I used to like the food and beer at Bamber on Ulitsa Sovetskaya, 20, near the embarkment, or the pizza in Rimini on Ulitsa Gagarina, 9, near the planetarium, saying so, there were not many foreign food options in the city, perhaps now the situation has changed (I left this city almost three years ago). The fact of hosting a large community of people from the Caucasus also means there are plenty of restaurant that offer Georgian and Armenian food, Sashlik, Georgian wine etc were quite nice.
The girls:
I bet this is what most people wanted to read about. Yes, the girls were gorgeous, really high average when compared to western girls. I’ve read a lot about the three date rule in Russia and so on, I can confirm that ONS were not the rule in Volgograd, I had some but not many. Generally I had to date the girls a few times to seal the deal, I’d say if I had met the girls from the internet then the bang might have happened sooner but not always.
I used to use Mamba and Badoo for most of my bangs, Tinder was not that popular back then. Meeting girls in bars or clubs was fairly easy, given they knew I was a westerner and quite exotic, having an apartment by myself in the city center also helped big time.
Bars/clubs:
I used to go to the bars by the pier quite often, near the main street in town, Ulitsa Lenina, there was a little bar, Mischka, that was the place to be during the week. I found that Volgograd’s nightlife was pretty weak but a city of its size, I guess the fact that most people didn’t have much money to go out didn’t help.
Conclusion:
I had a blast in Russia, I really did. As I said earlier on, I left Volgograd after two years, mostly because the city didn’t have much to offer. I moved to Saint Petersburg but I was disappointed and left after a few months. I now live in Asia and I love it. I plan to stay here for many years. I’ll be happy to answer any questions.
Pictures 1 and 2: Mamayev Kurgan with the statue of the Motherland, inside Mamayev Kurgan.
Pictures 3 and 4: The Volga.
Picture 5: Little church in the city center
Picture 6: T34 soviet tank on display, photo taken in the city center, as well.
Picture 7: One of the main squares in town, commemorating the 426 anniversary of the city of Volgograd.
