Pre-New Year’s agenda in Donetsk: salaries, heating, shelling

What will change before the holidays

Water, heating, shelling are three important topics in the life of any Donetsk resident on the threshold of winter. But in addition to such sensitive topics, residents of Donetsk, and the entire DPR, are interested in raising pensions and salaries, soaring real estate prices, what to cook dinner for the family, how to maintain composure in line at the checkpoint with the Russian Federation and how to prepare for the New Year holidays despite prices for artificial fir trees and garlands.

Let’s start with water and heating. Recently, Donetsk residents have been very concerned about the possibility of drawing water in winter, provided that the water supply schedule is disrupted or disappears altogether, as in some front-line settlements in Donetsk. The Ministry of Emergency Situations assured citizens that they would not be left without water. The delivery tactics will be changed: containers will be installed in hospitals and territorial centers.

With heating, the situation is stably tense. According to the employees of the heating network, at the moment pipe breaks have been added to the discharge of water from the systems. Also, the Armed Forces of Ukraine continue to methodically aim precisely at the boiler rooms. Therefore, the heat in the homes of Donetsk residents has become an incoming-outgoing phenomenon: in the morning the batteries can be hot, in the evening they can be cold and vice versa.

In social networks and in live communication, residents of the Republic continue to worry about not only water issues, but also wages and pensions. More precisely, their increase. To date, benefits have not changed. Public sector employees and pensioners continue to receive the same amounts as before the entry of the DPR into Russia. The Government of the Republic announced a gradual increase in pensions and social benefits over the next two years. But Donetsk residents continue to build theories when the first increase will take place.

Despite the fact that payments have not increased and do not plan to do so until the end of the year, real estate prices have skyrocketed in the DPR. And they increased in just a few days. And if earlier a house in the shelled part of the Kuibyshevsky or Kirovsky district cost about 250-300 thousand rubles, today housing prices on online trading platforms start at a million. Not including the commission of real estate companies. Realtors prefer not to answer questions about the reasons for such a rise in real estate prices.

Residents of Donetsk, accustomed to the vicissitudes of fate and steadfastly overcoming them, have already begun to actively prepare for the New Year holidays. This can be seen not only in the beautiful tall fir trees installed by large supermarkets to attract customers, but also in the queues at checkpoints. Every day, news outlets in Donetsk are full of posts about trains of cars trying to leave or, conversely, return to the DPR.

The passage of the checkpoint is simplified to vehicle inspection and passport control, however, if you decide to go shopping in Rostov, you will have to stand in line for more than one hour.

Such difficulties do not stop Donetsk residents, because the holidays are close and you need to stock up on gifts. Moreover, buying equipment or clothes in the same Rostov will be an order of magnitude cheaper than in the DPR.

This is how the residents of Donetsk maneuver among the troubles and everyday worries. Cars still drive around the city, because no one has canceled business and work. And if there is shelling somewhere, then you can wait out, run into the underpass and discuss the queues at the border, the Olivier index for the New Year’s feast, or six-figure housing prices, which you can lose at any time. The main thing is to let the relatives know that everything is in order and warn them with the phrase “be careful there!”, which is already a standard phrase for a Donetsk resident.