David Burghardt

Russia is finally starting to crawl back to work after almost two weeks of rough binging and doing nothing else. The holiday season is rough on everyone and not just expats…

Each time New Year’s rolls around, Russians get excited because they get at least 10 days off in a row because of holidays (talk about a long weekend!). These are festive times, not just because it’s the beginning of a new year, but because one more holiday falls right after it: Christmas. Yes, Christmas here in Russia comes after New Year’s.

Being an expat, I get the advantage of doubling the festivities of Christmas and New Year’s. Christian Christmas is December 25, but Russian Orthodox Christmas is on January 7 because the Church follows the old Julian Calendar and not the Gregorian, which we are accustomed to. The same applies to New Year’s, but what the Russians call “Old New Year” (again according to the Gregorian Calendar) celebrated on January 13 is no longer a federal holiday.

So what do Russians do from December 31 through January 10? Some choose to take off somewhere warm and enjoy “the long weekend” in warm spots that are easy to get to from Russia, for example to Thailand, Vietnam, Israel, Spain or Egypt, like many of my coworkers and friends did. Others take off for ski resorts in Russia’s south or in Finland, Austria, France, or Italy to try out the “foreign snow.” 

Others line up events one right after the other at friends’ or relatives’ homes, or plan parties and get-togethers in restaurants and bars, or take time to hit the theaters to watch a movie or a performance somewhere. Then there is always the “after parties” once you’ve escaped from one of those venues to continue celebrating with a different crowd in a different setting. Dinner parties are numerous and it’s like having a new Thanksgiving Day for over a week with tables practically collapsing from the amount of food and drink on them. People go wild because you don’t have to get up and go to work the next morning…or the morning after that, and so on, without any responsibilities because almost all businesses, including banks, are closed in Russia (with the exception of grocery stores, retail outlets, and news agencies)…until January 10.

There are pluses and minuses to being off for so long. For one, there is actually no traffic in Moscow and never a crowd on public transportation especially in the mornings. People are cheery, or at least it seems so because they just might be a little inebriated. Most people are all dressed up going to one event or another, so that’s always good to see. People smile and greet you with a wish of the appropriate holiday. Evenings can be a bit of a minus as your neighbors in the apartment complex are holding loud wild parties that last throughout the night into the wee hours of the morning and fireworks continue to be shot off in courtyards throughout the night for days after New Year’s is well into its second week.

Most of the partiers are noticeable after 11:00 in the evening up until 6:00 in the morning after the nightclubs close, which is an ugly sight to see if you are traveling to work (sober) early in the morning.

Slowly but surely people begin waking up to the fact they have to work and usually by January 12 or 13, things are pretty much back in the swing of things, though everyone looks more groggy than rested from all of their time off. And once you get back to the working environment, the first couple of days are spent talking to all of your coworkers and sharing what each other did during the holidays…that is if you can remember. I estimate that by Monday, everyone will be back in the saddle and Moscow will again be bustling along with its horrendous traffic jams (can’t wait!).

I now have an entire year to recuperate…hope everyone is enjoying 2012, our last year according to the Mayans! Good Luck!