Another month of summer has come to an end, and, as usual, it passed incredibly quickly and was full of events. This summer feels very different from previous ones because it has been filled with meetings, trips, work, and all kinds of new experiences. As a result, my adaptation is moving much faster and feels far more alive than I expected. But let me tell you everything in order.
July began, quite rightly, as the month of the FIFA World Cup. For Austria, the tournament turned out to be interesting. On the one hand, the team managed to get through the group stage. On the other, it lost to Argentina and Spain. Those were serious opponents, so there was no great shame in losing to them.
It was nice to meet friends in different places, watch football together, support various countries, and feel part of this international life. This is completely different from how distant the rest of the world once seemed to me when I lived in Russia. Now I am simply part of it.
Another pleasant surprise in July 2026 was the large city festival on the Danube. This free event usually lasts three days and, according to the organisers, attracts more than a million visitors. The festival really became exactly the kind of summer madness you expect from a major outdoor event. I will definitely write a separate report about it.
In general, July 2026 was full of music. Besides the large festival, we attended an emotional and personally important concert by the American pop star LP. The show was fantastic, slightly too hot, and incredibly intense. I managed to film most of the songs, take a photo with LP, and simply have a great time.
Another major event was an unexpected trip to the wonderful city of Rome. This time, Julia and I went there for a special reason: to celebrate our friend’s birthday. The way we spent those days definitely deserves a separate article with plenty of bright photographs.
Our adventures did not end there. July gave me a genuine dream come true: I finally attended a concert by the American star Marilyn Manson. He may be a controversial artist for many people, but he was and remains part of my youth. There was no chance I could miss his show. I will definitely prepare a large video report and explain how everything went. Spoiler: extremely well!
The month also brought many smaller events that were still important to me. We visited friends at their house to grill shashlik over charcoal. As a reminder, in Austria you can only light an open fire in specially designated areas or on private property. So, to satisfy my cultural and historical need for shashlik, we had to visit our friends. It was a warm and friendly evening, and most importantly, the meat turned out delicious.
The month also brought an encounter that ended well but still caused me a great deal of negative emotion. We went to the Russian embassy to collect our second international passports. Even the thirty minutes we had to spend inside Russian bureaucracy seriously damaged my mood. The entire time, you feel powerless and somehow lower in status. Sadly, we do not get to choose our homeland.
Apart from that, July was bright, busy, fun, wild, and unmistakably summery. Julia and I walked around the city a lot and visited our favourite places in Vienna to enjoy the warm evenings. All of this creates new and positive memories that gradually form a sense of home and belonging to the city. This is how my adaptation continues: faster in some areas, more slowly in others, but certainly moving in the right direction. Here in Austria, I feel like a happy person who has found himself again.
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