Moscow lives deep in me.

It’s the city where I learned to navigate crowds before I learned to cross the street on my own. The place where I waited for trams in the snow, counted metro stations like chapters in a book, and walked through late summer evenings that smelled like linden trees and warm asphalt.

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I grew up with its rhythm — the steady hum of morning rush hours, the silence of snow falling on old courtyards, the echo of footsteps in underground tunnels painted with light and stone. I didn’t notice the beauty back then. It was just there, part of the background, like the voice of a loved one you always recognize, even from far away.

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There were corners I always returned to — a small coffee shop on a side street, quiet alleys with peeling pastel facades, rooftops where the city felt softer, almost tender. There was always movement, but never too fast to miss the moment.

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Moscow holds all my firsts. First metro ride, first heartbreak, first feeling of being small in a big, living world. And still, it never felt cold to me — not even in the dead of winter. The warmth was in the people, in long conversations over tea, in the way the city wraps around you without asking anything in return.

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It’s not a postcard. It’s a memory that breathes.