Rows and rows of dachas surround big cities and march across the barren countryside. In winter, their abandoned air and dilapidated exteriors cast a depressing pall over neighborhoods, but they are busy places in warm weather. Ms. Zacharova spent last summer at her dacha growing cucumbers, potatoes, onions and other vegetables. The beautiful brunette made pickles and canned vegetables to last her and her husband through the winter. Rent and electricity are subsidized by the government.
Prices are higher in Moscow, as they are in any big city.
Sometimes salaries are not paid at all. Mrs. Sokolovskaya routinely waited two or three months to be paid. In the far corners of Russia, government workers have gone for nearly a year without a paycheck. Many educated Russians see emigration as a way out of the economic distress of the last eight years. For decades, athletes, composers and dissidents defected to Western countries to escape Soviet rule.