Moscow Life

It's 2 a.m . I can't sleep ..Ganna has the TV on stadium loud as per and in the flat above my room he's beating her again. She cries and she screams , she moves from room to room to avoid him. For short while there's silence and then it all starts again. It eventually it all stops ,daylight breaks and it's just another Moscow day.

Having never ever lived in apartments before the sounds of others so disturbingly close is totally unfamiliar to me. Although having said that,at home when a next door neighbour had her man around i christened her Orca. I was going to complain but thankfully the relationship was a short one. My 'babies' bedrooms were next to hers and they were old enough to know what she was doing. Whilst her lover delighted in her trick pelvis , my kids didn't (and shouldn't) have had have their sleep interrupted when Mr &MS WeWannaBePornStars got busy.

Anyway,the sounds of daily goings on in apartments here are sometimes make uncomfortable listening. Where i lived previously there was a women who sobbed enough to make you heartbreak the first time you heard her and her complaints about her money-grabbing family.The you come to realise that this woman is a harridan ( whose vicious tongue could earn her a gold medal in the Nasty Mouth Olympics) , is house-bound and her family have the patience of Job.

The wife-beater and his wife are still together . A truce will be had for a couple of weeks and his fists will be out again.

Of, course I'm conflicted. I'm not at home where i have full command of the host language and I wouldn't worry about calling the police. I know the system there . Over here the police are a different kettle of fish and 'trust' is not a word that springs to mind when people speak to me about them. So, you listen to the screams , the sobbing and pleading.... helpless.Shocked into the realisation, that all you can do is wait and hope that the beating that you're hearing this time won't be as long as the last.

As a woman to hear another woman cry like that at the hands of a bully is unpleasant to say the least . I lived with a bully once. 'Fortunately' he only physically assaulted me once .... the rest was psychological torment at which he aimed ( and still does) to make himself the master. I got out of the situation but i remember the years i spent thinking hoping things would get better. They never did no matter what i did, so i spent the last years of my marriage in a quiet rage until i used that energy to save myself and my kids. As a consequence i have had some amazing journeys and blessings and so have the kids.I hope that one day the woman upstairs realises someday soon that there is more to life than a fists and tears.