наш сосед--Our Neighbor

So, just a few days ago, I was home alone with the girls. It was evening, and I had just gotten done giving both girls a bath when I heard our door bell ring. (It actually is the sound of birds chirping...weird, I know) The door bell didn't just ring once, it rang twice and then it sounded like someone was just holding in the button. I had to unlock three doors to see who it was. I wasn't ready for what was to come. Mind you, I was standing in my reindeer pj pants and INDIANA t-shirt (could I be more American?!). My neighbor, or I thought it was at this point, started yelling at me. I caught some words she was saying, but I was too flustered to even try to put all the Russian words into sentences in my head. All I know was that she was standing outside our door (the door that goes to our apartment and hers) pointing to the door handle and yelling...in Russian...fast Russian. I told her I only understood a little Russian and I only spoke a little Russian. I don't think she cared because on she went. She must not have seen the cute little 4 month old in my arms or the cute little 2 year old standing at our door in her flannel purple flower pjs. The door handle had broken, but not by me. I wasn't sure how to tell her that I didn't do it. I just said I didn't know and I was sorry. She eventually stopped and just shook her head in frustration and kept talking to herself under her breath. Probably said something like, "Stupid, Americans", but I don't look American so who knows what she was saying! Anyway, the girls and I went quietly back into the house until Philip came home.

The door cannot be opened from the outside unless you leave it just a little opened. It needs to be fixed. We decided just to leave it a little opened because we didn't want our lovely neighbor to be locked out. Yesterday we went out and came back to find the door shut and locked. I thought, "Great, now we have to ring our neighbor to let us in!" We rang her door bell and waited. Out came an old lady chatting on her phone. She unlocked the door and then started talking to us in Russian. We started up a conversation...well as much as we could. It was her daughter that I "met" the other day. This lady lives in the apartment, but had spent the summer at her dacha (summer house...no probably not the kind of summer house you are thinking of). She said all kinds of things to us, only half we could barely understand, but we just stood there and smiled and said what we could. She loved the girls. Later that night we had our leadership team over to our house and she came out to see what was going on...(not uncommon I suppose of some older women). Some of our team members talked to her (they are Russian, so obviously they could communicate with her more clearly). She is really chatty and has an old dog. I mean old! Anyway, she talked about the people who used to live where we are living and how she helped them out and how they just left. It wasn't a good situation I guess. She ended up giving us some veggies from her dacha!
I think our neighbor turned out to be pretty nice...and chatty. Pray for us as we have opportunities to talk her in the coming days and months.