RUBbette Wives & Housework, si man

[Lena and Igor 5]

I found an uncovered whole chicken in the fridge yesterday morning before going to work. Also. She sets removes carrots from their bags (peeled type) and sets them out on a plate on the counter to dry and breathe for a day or two. Leftovers are always still in pots or pans on the stove the next morning. All of the zip lock bags have disappeared. The same goes for the tupperware bowls. After 3 months here, Lena finally began to use the clothes dryer. The dishwasher...forget about it! Waste of "electric."

[ONA 133]

Yeah right. Alla gets milk from a cow she knows personally and will not buy milk in plastic containers, she knows the chickens she gets eggs from, buys fresh vegetables and meat, nothing from a box or can. No cake mixes, pancake mixes etc. (I buy some of that stuff but she will not eat it) She WILL eat some types of sausage, but not the usual smoked sausage we are used to, it has to be "sausage like in Ukraine"

She will find a way to avoid chemical food, I promise you.

I do not complain about anything thatgets IN the refrigerator. The problem is getting it IN there rather than being left on the counter or stove

I understand the concerns about milk, eggs etc. I don't understand the sausage thing, because sausages in Ukraine and Russia are made of God knows what, God knows how. I will use some mixes for baking, I don't see anything wrong with them - it's just that somebody pre-mixed different kinds of flour and sugar for me.

I don't see where is the refrigerator problem comes from. I haven't seen a family n Russia or Ukraine, who would leave something on the counter. It seems very very weird to me.

There really are so many fewer preservatives in all the food in Ukraine - a paradox, because the food does seem to last longer with less care (bread for example).

Bread lasts longer in Ukraine? Russian/Ukrainian bread is only good for a couple of days. Here, if it's just out of the bakery, it will be good for about the same time... While sandwich bread and potato rolls can be good for a couple of weeks...

[Lena and Igor 5]

OCD? :-)

[Gary and Alla 3,694]

I understand the concerns about milk, eggs etc. I don't understand the sausage thing, because sausages in Ukraine and Russia are made of God knows what, God knows how. I will use some mixes for baking, I don't see anything wrong with them - it's just that somebody pre-mixed different kinds of flour and sugar for me.

I don't see where is the refrigerator problem comes from. I haven't seen a family n Russia or Ukraine, who would leave something on the counter. It seems very very weird to me.

Bread lasts longer in Ukraine? Russian/Ukrainian bread is only good for a couple of days. Here, if it's just out of the bakery, it will be good for about the same time... While sandwich bread and potato rolls can be good for a couple of weeks...

Odd, just about every man here married to a Ukrainian or Russian woman says the same thing, food left on the counter or stove...and she did not start doing it when we moved here. As far as sausage goes, I cannot explain everything! But she will not eat "Jimmy Dean" or Kolbasa unless it is like the "kind in Ukraine" The local grocery store makes in house sausages, so she will buy those.

Alla does not like any mixes, she has her recipes for cakes (she is baking one right now!) and makes everything from scratch and even makes sure the flour is unbleached, not "enriched" and does not have any "chemicals"

She will not use pancake mix even...she makes blini from scratch. If she buys juice she bys the ones that say "Ingredients: Orange Juice" Or "Apples" or she makes her own "compote"

Edited December 3, 2011 by Gary and Alla

[visaveteran1 33]

Russia is Cipro country...

Whenever I went to the FSU, I always got my Travel Doctor to give me a couple courses of Ciprofloxacin, a strong anti-bacterial drug....and I used it. I believe they use Cipro to treat Anthrax, so it's powerful.

Imodium is a joke trying to stand-up to Russian food bacteria, but Cipro won the Cold War in my stomach. The Russians are not high on the list of cleanliness...and I saw that first hand. My first Russian lady revealed why Russian men prefer wearing black...it helps hide the dirt and filth on their clothes. She was so anti-black pants she got angry when I wore a pair of CLEAN black jeans. But I digress...

My estranged wife ran a pretty greasy and funky kitchen like her fellow Soviet era sisters. The unnecessary overuse of oils and butter in frying foods used to make me crazy. I'd sit and listen to the sizzling oil firing-off grease bullets like an exploding ammo dump. I don't think they use the oven very often in Russia...all the serious food action takes place topside off the burners.

My kitchen was fully stocked with baggies, foil wrap, wax paper, plastic containers, etc., typical to the American home...but they all went pretty much unused. (Tupperware could never make it in the FSU). Cooked food sat on the stove-top or unwrapped inside the fridge. Towards the end, I ate only food I prepared with a few exceptions when I made a judgment the food was unlikely to give me food poisoning.

If you've ever had real food poisoning, you'll never forget it. The docs can trace the source to the exact food that nailed you. In my case it was rice...yes, rice. I ate at a friend's "favorite" Vietnamese restaurant. Vietnam! Not again! Wounded! This time the Purple Heart came from yesterday's rice being served today. Probably sat out all night and offered to lucky diners like me for lunch.

Now that I'm alone again, the kitchen is quiet and clean...well, at least I'm working to get it clean. My range hood and microwave were coated with grease. Man!

BTW, Cipro also knocked off a urinary infection I started to get when I went into the hot tub at the spa my wife took me to in her city. I had enough Cipro to fight the infection until I got stateside. I'm telling you, Cipro is a travel "must have."

Edited December 4, 2011 by visaveteran1

[Neonred 3,579]

Ditto on the food left out on the stove over night. It happens here all the time. I usually try to put the left overs away at night before heading off to bed.

Last night the pot of soup she made stayed out all night.

[TBoneTX 45,654]

Ciprofloxacin, a strong anti-bacterial drug

Oh, si si si man. I'm a big fan of antibiotics, whether for travel or for home use, to knock out impending illnesses before they blossom. Some people say to me, "You'll change the bacterial balance in your stomach and be in BIG trouble" (not a concern if one avoids overdosing or nonprescribed use longer than a week) or "You'll become resistant to antibiotics and regret it when you really need them." To this last, I say, "Perhaps, man, but till then, any bug that bites me dies a horrible death, ciao man!"

I am a happy man/dude/husband tonight, si man: For the second consecutive night, I (si man, I) loaded the dishwasher and ran the loads, so the stuff will be finished and done right. I also rescued the lint-trap after noticing that Someone had run yet another "quick wash" of something. Although I face four grueling laundry-loads tomorrow, life is somehow still grand, whee man.

ETA: Earlier today, Mrs. T-B. went with me to my office to put together a new desk chair. From box-opening to completion, she took 33 minutes, wow man. The salesman at the office store said that someone who'd never done it before would take 45 minutes to an hour to do it. I had told Mrs. T-B. this in advance; she knew that she was on the clock. In gratitude, I treated her to a greasy double cheeseburger at McDonald's, cheap man.

Edited December 4, 2011 by TBoneTX

[Gary and Alla 3,694]

Ditto on the food left out on the stove over night. It happens here all the time. I usually try to put the left overs away at night before heading off to bed.

Last night the pot of soup she made stayed out all night.

This is no joke, I make sure I am the last one to bed and check the kitchen before going to bed. Both Alla and Pasha will take things out of the refrigerator (the 5 gallon bucket of borscht for example) take what they want and leave the pot on the stove!

Alla claims I have OCD about putting things in the refrigerator.

Sergey worked at McDonald's not this summer, but last summer and he said "they are just crazy" about bacteria! Alla's thought was "McDonalds worries about bacteria? What about the horrible food?"

I have heard from many people, mostly Ukrainians, that Russians are not as clean as Ukrainians. I know that Alla is very clean and our kitchen is very clean and dare I "make a mess" I get the whole "you have to respect my work" lecture.

It was always one of the HUGE disconnects I saw in Ukraine and have never figured out to this day...every house I went into was CLEAN, spotlessly clean. But outside was so dirty, trashy, broken, messed up, no elevators work, taxi's with no doors, water doesn't work 2-3 times per week, electricity goes out...WHY? Every morning the Babushka squads would be out sweeping the trash with their homemade twig brooms (which I eventually understood was the Ukrainian equivilent of a "coffee cloche" the men played chess and the women swept the sidewalk and complained about men) and every night the wild dogs rip all the trash apart again and scatter it everywhere for the Babushkas to clean. It is like some sort of perpetual cooperative. Our bathrooms at home are "so clean they flash!" and if you go to a public restroom in Ukraine...OMG!!!!!!!! OMG!!!!!!!!!!

[Gary and Alla 3,694]

Oh, si si si man. I'm a big fan of antibiotics, whether for travel or for home use, to knock out impending illnesses before they blossom. Some people say to me, "You'll change the bacterial balance in your stomach and be in BIG trouble" (not a concern if one avoids overdosing or nonprescribed use longer than a week) or "You'll become resistant to antibiotics and regret it when you really need them." To this last, I say, "Perhaps, man, but till then, any bug that bites me dies a horrible death, ciao man!"

I am a happy man/dude/husband tonight, si man: For the second consecutive night, I (si man, I) loaded the dishwasher and ran the loads, so the stuff will be finished and done right. I also rescued the lint-trap after noticing that Someone had run yet another "quick wash" of something. Although I face four grueling laundry-loads tomorrow, life is somehow still grand, whee man.

ETA: Earlier today, Mrs. T-B. went with me to my office to put together a new desk chair. From box-opening to completion, she took 33 minutes, wow man. The salesman at the office store said that someone who'd never done it before would take 45 minutes to an hour to do it. I had told Mrs. T-B. this in advance; she knew that she was on the clock. In gratitude, I treated her to a greasy double cheeseburger at McDonald's, cheap man.

Alla would NEVER put together a chair. Ever. If the salesman told her it would take her 45 minutes she would laugh. She could get the salesman to put it together for her in about 2 minutes though.

[Neonred 3,579]

Ditto on the food left out on the stove over night. It happens here all the time. I usually try to put the left overs away at night before heading off to bed.

Last night the pot of soup she made stayed out all night.

Oh hell, what was I thinking. I wrote this last night before heading off to bed. Get up this morning and to the kitchen to make coffee and what do I see in the sink? A package of uncooked sausage, room temperature. Guess what I'm having for dinner tonight? Sausage and Cipro.

[baron555 934]

It was always one of the HUGE disconnects I saw in Ukraine and have never figured out to this day...every house I went into was CLEAN, spotlessly clean. But outside was so dirty, trashy, broken, messed up, no elevators work, taxi's with no doors, water doesn't work 2-3 times per week, electricity goes out...WHY? Every morning the Babushka squads would be out sweeping the trash with their homemade twig brooms (which I eventually understood was the Ukrainian equivilent of a "coffee cloche" the men played chess and the women swept the sidewalk and complained about men) and every night the wild dogs rip all the trash apart again and scatter it everywhere for the Babushkas to clean. It is like some sort of perpetual cooperative. Our bathrooms at home are "so clean they flash!" and if you go to a public restroom in Ukraine...OMG!!!!!!!! OMG!!!!!!!!!!

Yes, saw the same thing in Kiev when we were there. An endless cycle!! Nature's balance.

[baron555 934]

Odd, just about every man here married to a Ukrainian or Russian woman says the same thing, food left on the counter or stove...and she did not start doing it when we moved here. As far as sausage goes, I cannot explain everything! But she will not eat "Jimmy Dean" or Kolbasa unless it is like the "kind in Ukraine" The local grocery store makes in house sausages, so she will buy those.

Alla does not like any mixes, she has her recipes for cakes (she is baking one right now!) and makes everything from scratch and even makes sure the flour is unbleached, not "enriched" and does not have any "chemicals"

She will not use pancake mix even...she makes blini from scratch. If she buys juice she bys the ones that say "Ingredients: Orange Juice" Or "Apples" or she makes her own "compote"

My Alla (Russian) was prone early on to leave food out (or out for a long time) and hadn't figured it out......but now she does not. She also discovered that my freezer bag sealing machine and our ice chest really does work and fish that we purchase from the wholesaler downtown will remain just as fresh months later. She's a freezer sealer freak now !!!!

She'll eat Jimmy Deans sausage.....it's one staple of "Papa's Breakfast" which she loves (and Leonid too) and is one camping favorite (Papa cooks breakfast while she tends to Leonid and breaks down the inside of the tent when leaving.)

She likes Pancakes using mix but will always make her own bilini from scratch. Ziplocs or uses plastic storage containers like mad also.

[Lena and Igor 5]

Home shoes, home clothes, pyjama, street shoes, street clothes...I guess I haven't been livin right ALL these years.

[Bad_Daddy 2,209]

My Alla (Russian) was prone early on to leave food out (or out for a long time) and hadn't figured it out......but now she does not. She also discovered that my freezer bag sealing machine and our ice chest really does work and fish that we purchase from the wholesaler downtown will remain just as fresh months later. She's a freezer sealer freak now !!!!

She'll eat Jimmy Deans sausage.....it's one staple of "Papa's Breakfast" which she loves (and Leonid too) and is one camping favorite (Papa cooks breakfast while she tends to Leonid and breaks down the inside of the tent when leaving.)

She likes Pancakes using mix but will always make her own bilini from scratch. Ziplocs or uses plastic storage containers like mad also.

It's pretty much the same with Kira. She watched me put the food in tupperware and baggies and she picked right up on it. She likes Krusteaz pancake mix and brownie along with Betty Crocker case mixes also.

[james&olya 1,121]

Russia is Cipro country...

Whenever I went to the FSU, I always got my Travel Doctor to give me a couple courses of Ciprofloxacin, a strong anti-bacterial drug....and I used it. I believe they use Cipro to treat Anthrax, so it's powerful.

Imodium is a joke trying to stand-up to Russian food bacteria, but Cipro won the Cold War in my stomach. The Russians are not high on the list of cleanliness...and I saw that first hand. My first Russian lady revealed why Russian men prefer wearing black...it helps hide the dirt and filth on their clothes. She was so anti-black pants she got angry when I wore a pair of CLEAN black jeans. But I digress...

My estranged wife ran a pretty greasy and funky kitchen like her fellow Soviet era sisters. The unnecessary overuse of oils and butter in frying foods used to make me crazy. I'd sit and listen to the sizzling oil firing-off grease bullets like an exploding ammo dump. I don't think they use the oven very often in Russia...all the serious food action takes place topside off the burners.

My kitchen was fully stocked with baggies, foil wrap, wax paper, plastic containers, etc., typical to the American home...but they all went pretty much unused. (Tupperware could never make it in the FSU). Cooked food sat on the stove-top or unwrapped inside the fridge. Towards the end, I ate only food I prepared with a few exceptions when I made a judgment the food was unlikely to give me food poisoning.

If you've ever had real food poisoning, you'll never forget it. The docs can trace the source to the exact food that nailed you. In my case it was rice...yes, rice. I ate at a friend's "favorite" Vietnamese restaurant. Vietnam! Not again! Wounded! This time the Purple Heart came from yesterday's rice being served today. Probably sat out all night and offered to lucky diners like me for lunch.

Now that I'm alone again, the kitchen is quiet and clean...well, at least I'm working to get it clean. My range hood and microwave were coated with grease. Man!

BTW, Cipro also knocked off a urinary infection I started to get when I went into the hot tub at the spa my wife took me to in her city. I had enough Cipro to fight the infection until I got stateside. I'm telling you, Cipro is a travel "must have."

My experience has been quite different. My trips to FSU actually revealed something about food here that I was intolerant of but didn't realize due to the omnipresent symptoms. It was not until I was in Ukraine and subsequently in Russia that I realized I did not have to have daily abdominal cramping and digestive issues. I know now to avoid certain things added to so much pre-packaged 'food' here in the US, particularly HFCS and soy protein additives. I was able to eat anything and everything over there and NOT have any digestive problems! Same here with my Olya's cooking! I did note that Ukrainian food in the restaurants was superior to Russian food, at least in the limited experience I had.

Home cleanliness was as variable there as here I think, on average they are better housekeepers than Americans but it was not universal. After seeing Kyiv, Poltava, and Kharkov I expected a similar degree of run-down 'housing project' appearance to Kazan and was astounded at what I found. While there were some typical soviet era apartment buildings, there were so many more beautiful new apartment complexes and new commercial buildings everywhere! People there seemed to take a lot more pride in the appearance of their community. I have not seen St Petersburg yet but it definitely out-does Moscow!

Olya keeps a clean kitchen and a tidy bathroom but is not excessive on the neat-freak scale. Food is never left out overnight and she likes using tupperware type containers and zip lock bags. She definitely recognizes a distinction between 'men's work' and 'women's work' but is not afraid to break out of those roles occasionally. She says that she always felt she was meant to be American and maybe she is right! I seem to have a greater appreciation of Russian culture and history than she does. She tells me I have a Russian Soul!

Cipro is a useful drug to have available when traveling. Many countries do not require a prescription, you just walk into the pharmacy (Apteka in FSU) and ask for what you want. I did this in Kazan when I got a sinus infection. I didn't speak enough Russian and they didn't speak English but when I asked for Azithromycin they replied "Azitromir?" and we were set!