You are trying to buy a pair of plain, black unadorned winter boots but you can only find the ones in metallic or animal print or with numerous unnecessary bits of metal and you think – well, that’s quite nice, you know a little bit of shine and sparkle would brighten up these grey days, besides, animal print is making something of a comeback, I’ve heard…..

…..you want to buy a new top and you find yourself fingering something sequin-encrusted and brightly coloured and you think – well, that’s quite nice, you know a little bit of colour and sparkle would brighten things up a bit.  In your pre-Kiev life you would have been allergic to colour and sparkle.

A tip for handling the above two points – before you commit to fripperies like colour, sparkle, unnecessary metal bits, even animal print, ask yourself – is this nice or have I been here too long? – and the inevitable answer will be – yes I have.  Alternatively take a friend who’s been in Kiev less than 6 months and the answer will be – yes you have.

You have the trazillionth power cut, the fridge rattles to a halt and you think – oh that’s ok I’ll just put everything outside on the windowsill, it’s cold enough.  And you think it’s quite an adventure – like training for camping or something uncivilised…..

…..and when the fridge fails to come back on again after aforementioned powercut, you don’t bother reporting it to your landlord because you’ll be told it will take a week for the ‘fridge master’ to come and look at it, you can’t be bothered to argue about it and anyway, you know that if you just wait a while, perhaps give the fridge a kick – it’ll probably shudder back into life again in a day or so.

You have the ten trazillionth power cut and you think – oh; no tv, no kettle, no computer, no internet, no hoover, no washing machine, no dishwasher, no lights – and you feel almost grateful that you have an excuse to get out of the apartment on a shitty Kiev-grey day because you can’t even read or make yourself a cup of tea or do the hoovering (who am I kidding?) to keep warm…..

…..and then you think – oh well there are people worse off than us, at least we have a roof over our heads and can afford to go out for a cup of tea blah blah blah.

You go out for lunch with some girlfriends and the most devoushka-y devoushka walks in, unzips her metallic blouson and reveals her buttfloss.  Your table express their disgust but secretly you think – ooh, well if I had a figure like that I think I might be tempted to expose a bit of buttfloss too.

And to cap it all off, you find the remnants of a tramp’s dinner in the stairwell (because they are barred from the cellar, but they still manage to get in the main doors and huddle up to the big radiator at night) – orange peel, empty beer bottles, cigarette butts. Whereupon MDF (the fearsome tramp-scaring warrior) says – well, I don’t mind them being here but they could at least take their rubbish away with them in the morning.

Then you know it’s time to go home.