Greetings! If you are missing warm heart-to-heart talks and family secrets, you are welcome to a new edition of the program “Family Album”. Today we are going to the bathhouse, visiting the Voloshin family.
The Voloshin family is 21 years old. During all this time a lot has happened – from professional to personal growth, victories and defeats, but they have gone through all this together thanks to mutual love and support, they have instilled in their children Mihail and Nika passion for sports, perseverance and confidence that they will succeed.
– So, today we’re visiting the Voloshin family. Misha, Nika, Dima, Vika – hello! I would never allow myself to start a conversation with you like that, but it came out of Dima’s mouth, sorry. Yes, let daddy be quiet today, let’s talk to other members of his family and tell – again, this is Dima’s quote – well, tell me, how is it living with a crazy dad? He said it, it wasn’t me, but I noticed these beautiful teacups. Vika, tell me where you got them, because it’s an interesting story, you went shopping for sofas and you bought the cups.
– We were walking in the showroom and saw these beautiful cups on the shelf, 12 of them, and I just asked, I said, do you sell them? They said no, and then they said, well, basically, if you like them so much, we can sell them to you.
– $500 apiece, you can have them.
– They look great here in this interior and are a delight to our guests.
– Your love is 21 years old, right?
– Our love with Dima
– Your love with Dima is 21 years old.
– 22.
– Turning 22 in a month.
– Let’s recall the day your hearts met.
– I suggest that, for the first time in our family’s history, we hear this story from the children.
– I remember this story from beginning to end. I mean, every year…
– What’s the most interesting part of this story?
– The most interesting is the story itself, the whole story, I mean I actually like it from beginning to end. The first two dates, I was told about them because they were the most interesting, and then they moved in together, that’s it. They’ve been together ever since.
– You mean, together after two dates?
– Yes.
– How was the first date?
– The first date as I remember was to introduce them for business. Mom was an economist. So, dad apparently had to do some bookkeeping and a friend of Mom’s introduced them. What?
– Yeah, that’s right.
– Isn’t that right? I’ll tell you as I remember it. And they went to McDonald’s, I think it was just the three of them: mom, dad, and my mom’s childhood friend. And it’s like it’s time to pay, and Dad realizes he has no money, and he’s a man, sitting with two girls. And he just feels someone slide 20 dollars on his knee. It was mom, she gave him the money to pay. And he’s like, “I’m paying the bill.” And he said that he realized at that moment that she was the right woman. That she would always be there for him, she could make him feel like a man, support him.
– What about the second date?
– Second date was when dad…
– Decided to give back the 20 dollars?
– Decided to cut a dashing figure. I remember he was not wearing his glasses, and he’s got a very bad eyesight, I think.
– Minus 500 or so.
– Right, minus 500. And they went for a walk in the park and dad decided to buy flowers, mom was waiting for him. 10 minutes went by, 15 minutes, and mom was still waiting on a bench. You didn’t have phones then.
– It was the year 2002.
– Mom kept waiting, then she realized that he must have ditched her, something had happened, she didn’t understand what, she was upset. She got up from the bench where they were sitting, went towards the flower shops and saw him running with a bunch of flowers. He looked at her and ran away in the opposite direction. Mom was shocked, standing there like – Is it ok at all? I don’t remember how the story ended, but then you guys kind of got back together.
– Do you remember? How did the story end?
– Did the flowers reach their destination, Vika?
– Yes, they did, because Dima came to the bench, I went up the street, but I realized that it couldn’t end like this, you know, wrong.
– She left. She saw me running away, so she left, too.
– No, I went up to these pay phones, there were public phones back then. You could use a card to call someone.
– They were still around then, weren’t they?
– They were, and I called my friend and I said I had an interesting experience. I was like, this is the first time in my life, when a man looks at me, smiles and then takes to his heels, just runs away from me. And I say, I have never had this before, it’s not clear what, why and how. It’s a question I still have to this moment in my life. I mean, that’s probably what fuels our feelings, this question: What else will happen now? I came back, I saw Dima. And Dima’s reaction was, “You wanted to test me like that, you left?” And we had our first conflict.
– No way!
– Yeah, I didn’t have my glasses on, I just didn’t see her. I looked past her and I just ran. I was looking to buy a lighter. As she was approaching, I said, “Yeah, that’s a woman’s thing, you wanted to see how I would behave.”
– It was almost like: Hello Vava, can you imagine, right?
– Like in that movie, Yakin is taking me to Gagra.
– I gave you a tooth on our next date.
– Yeah, he came to see me next time, fell out of the minibus because it was…
– I literally fell out.
– He fell out of the minibus because it was full and he kind of got off not very well. He nearly fell into my arms, and he said, wait, I have a present for you. Of course, I had a fantasy, I thought, oh wow, and what is it, what is it? And he pulled out half a tooth from his pocket and said, “My tooth fell out today and I’m giving it to you.”
– We’ve lived happily ever since.
– There was a hint in that, because his next phrase was-keep it, because you’ll be telling your grandchildren about it and you’ll have something to show them.
– Well, I haven’t heard of such an original proposal, of accepting one’s hand.
– Hand and tooth.
– Hand and tooth. Does it happen that you get together at this table or another table together, and then dad comes up with some new idea, and you say, “Dad, that’s a load of crap. Sorry.”?
– Honestly, well, more than half of the times, dad comes in and says some nonsense.
– But you can only see what’s gonna make a hit, right?
– I mean, sometimes it’s nonsense. But out of this there’s always a diamond in the rough, when you’re like – this is it. Yeah, dad, that’s great.
– In between Nika said that you have some kind of eight-year cycles.
– I don’t know exactly how many years, but I know about cycles.
– Six-year.
– Six-year cycles. The whole country watched Dmitri Voloshin conquer various distances and 60 kilometers or 100-something kilometers, you ran some kind of ultramarathon, remind me.
– Oh, a lot of ultra marathons, are you talking about the cold one?
– Yeah at -65, I mean, it was a very radical, radical test of strength, yeah. Nika told me that period is over.
– That’s right.
– Even now Nika and I were talking about it. I said, “Dad’s had enough of running, now Daddy wants to lie down.
– To warm up, he’s got frozen, he needs to warm up.
– He’s got frozen, and wants to lie down and warm up. Is it really so now that Dmitri Voloshin runs at most once a week and then you have to force yourself?
– Close to the truth, but I walk barefoot a lot now. I’m giving up the automobile. I just walk around the city barefoot.
– Why does a man suddenly decide to walk barefoot?
– Well, I gave up running after Oymyakon, that cold super run. I realized that the challenge game can become dangerous by now, because next is already a test for life and death, – this is the first point, and the second insight I had – I realized that I can do anything that comes into my head, and so this game became no longer interesting. And then I got a knee injury. That is, I fell at one point unluckily, right against the curb and did some treatments, physiotherapy, traveled to other countries, but no one could do anything. Until one day I read that it is very useful to run barefoot. After a month I realized that my knee bothered me less and I liked running so much that I decided not just to run, but also walk, and started to walk barefoot and that’s when I got high. I realized it’s my new passion, barefoot passion has been there for the fifth year now. For me every walk to the office is an adventure, because I walk on cold asphalt, on hot asphalt, on dust, on grass, on water sometimes. I feel the pebbles, sometimes I even walk on glass, nothing happens. I can’t drift somewhere in the sky; I am always here and now. I mean, walking barefoot is very grounding, earthing to the maximum.
– Well, there’s something primal about it.
– That’s wild, primal. My wife is afraid that in a few years I’ll be running around Chisinau naked, shaggy and dirty.
– Well, I can’t help but find out…
– My opinion?
– Your opinion and reaction. Yeah, I mean, like it was. Well, okay, like just another one of my husband’s tricks that’s probably gonna blow over.
– At the beginning I thought it would end soon. It was the first 2 years.
– Or was it like, well, Dima…
– That’s how it was for the first 2 years.
– Oh, 2 years, I thought about 2 days.
– No, the first two years. It was like that. Well, that’s the kind of game that’s fun, he likes that.
– You let him play any of those games, don’t you?
– Yeah, it makes him happy. I can’t stop him from being happy. There you go.
– You can, but you don’t, thank you for that.
– Yeah, there are certain events where I wish he’d put on that jacket, put on those shoes, so he’d fit in.
– Well, there was an event where Dima wore a jacket and jeans, but he was barefoot. I saw this picture.
– Yeah, right.
– I saw it, it was a wedding picture.
– Let’s tell the truth, I’ve only worn shoes once in the last five years, and that was my wedding with Vika.
– The second wedding.
– The anniversary.
– Yeah, the anniversary, the third one.
– The third one. Now Nika’s future path has already been chosen – it is neuropsychology.
– At first it was very difficult for me to choose a profession to study, because I had an idea that I would choose a profession and I would have to work for it all my life, and I would only be a psychologist. As soon as I realized that the world is changing so fast now that I can go to study for six months or a year, and if I don’t like it, I will go to another field. That is, I can always change something in my life and I’m really interested in psychology. I’ll try to understand what neuropsychology is, maybe I’ll become a psychoanalyst.
– Misha’s an eighth grader already. Do you do a lot of sports?
– Yes.
– Swimming, as far as your mom told me, swimming, what else, running?
– Swimming, running, biking.
– I noticed how close your kids are to each other, how Misha and Nika are friends. It wasn’t an accident that I asked what their age difference was, they’re 5 years apart. Has it always been like this?
– I can tell you from my perspective.
– And Mishka can tell you from his.
– There was an interesting story, can I tell it? I really wanted a brother, exactly a brother, and I remember my mom and I went on some excursion to a monastery, right?
– It was a monastery.
– And there was a big icon of some saint, I don’t remember exactly which one.
– St. Nicholas.
– I asked mom, why do they light candles? Mom said they make a wish. I took a candle; mom gave me a candle. I said, God, please give me a brother. I lit the candle and then Misha was born. And since then, I haven’t really gotten along with him. I honestly don’t remember what happened. I must have been jealous of him as a child, that I was the only one in the family, all the attention was mine.
– It turns out that just when Nika was going to first grade, Misha was two years old.
– That’s the breaking point.
– I mean, it’s supposed to be all about the daughter, and here it is.
– She was just stunned that there were other characters who got all the attention.
– We had a moment, when Dima’s brother came to visit us, and it’s already established that when a child is born in the family, you get a big toy. When Nika was born, he gave her a white bunny.
– A huge one?
– A huge one. And we already knew we were having Misha, so he brought a big bear. And for Nika, he brought a teddy bear with a Tetris and radio inside.
– A little one.
– Since from his adult understanding it would be much more interesting for Nika, because she’s grown up. But Nika got the things otherwise. Like here’s a little bear cub and this big bear. I think that’s probably what she imagined.
– Here’s the gift and the extra.
– I mean, he came to our house with this big bear, and Nika ran up, reaching for it, and he said no, it’s your brother’s, and the revenge was about 10 years long.
– I am very happy that he keeps no offense against me and that we are doing well now. He defends me in front of our parents, in front of my friends, when we fight about something. He says no, Nika’s good, Nika’s cool. That’s what I appreciate, that he cares for me, that we have such a strong brotherly love.
– Let’s move from love for each other to love for this country, because Dima you are not from here.
– Right.
– As far as I know, you came from Ukraine. How long ago was it and why?
– Back in 1986, my father was a serviceman. I was born in the Belgorod Dnestrovsk region, then my father was transferred to Floresti to serve and we moved there together with the whole family, so I graduated from the Floresti secondary school. After that I entered the Polytechnic Institute in Chisinau. In 2000 my parents left for Orenburg, they are both from Orenburg and they invited me to come with them, but I decided to stay. I was left alone here, I had no language, no job, no friends, no name, nothing.
– Then why did you decide to stay? You had nothing to lose.
– Because by that time I had already fallen in love with this country, I realized that there are prospects for development here, because you know Orenburg is bigger than Chisinau. But it’s still a Russian backwater, it’s still a province and nothing can be done about it. Our capital is small, but it’s the capital of the state. So, I realized that there are prospects and I clung to the Moldovan land with my hands and feet, I said I’m not going anywhere from here and it took me about 10 years to prove that I belong here, because my mom kept telling me every year, quit everything, come here, you’ll never make it.
– She used to call every week, right. Well, now she is very proud, now she realizes that the path Dima chose is his path and it is the only way he could be fulfilled. We are proud, too.
– Where are your roots from? Were you born here or did you also come to Moldova?
– No, I was born here, I’m from Donduseni.
– I see that these 10 years, this period of proof and formation, all these years you were always there for Dmitri.
– Yes.
– And you never once had the desire, the thought that it’s enough?
– Well, yeah…
– Well, she had a bad example. I’m not first time married, this is my second wife and my first wife left me because I’m a loser, she didn’t see any prospects in me. She said, “I’m done, I’m out of here.” I was left alone, I said, well, thank God. I started to move on.
– How long did your first marriage last?
– Five years, we had no kids, thank God, so it’s cool to have some experience. The main thing is not to mess up there, to understand exactly what you need. That’s why I probably fell in love so fast, because my beloved, she’s the antipode of my first wife.
– Each of you has school, university, career, love.
– Already.
– It’s already here
– Already.
– Love, sports. Do you have any traditions that you never give up in your family? Something that everyone has to cancel for because of, I don’t know, a birthday or Christmas or some other holiday?
– Every Wednesday, 7:00 p.m.
– 7:00 p.m.
– 7 p.m., no matter what, whether you’re somewhere in Floresti where you decided to go to remember your childhood, you broke your leg, it doesn’t matter. 7:00 p.m. sharp, we’re supposed to get together, it’s family night. We’re sitting around chatting. We’re actually a little bit angry because, you know, there are times when you want to reschedule, bad mood, but I’m very grateful to my dad for coming up with this. Because over time, when you get used to it, you get into this system, you really appreciate it, because all week long, we manage to only exchange a few words with each other. And here we sit and talk.
– Even though you live in the same apartment.
– Yeah, but still, dad, mom, everybody’s busy, everybody, Misha’s got workouts all the time.
– Stuff, homewok, devices.
– And then we’re just like this, dad’s already made a habit of putting the cell phones in a heap.
– We have a lot of board games if we’re at home.
– So, is it just your family time or do some of your friends come over?
– At first, we could invite friends, but we decided it’s a family day. We are supposed to socialize with family, not friends.
– Well, they do sneak in once in a while.
– When we invited friends, adults would talk to adults, children would talk to children, but there was no main contact. So, we excluded friends, we gather and it can be at home, it can be in a cafe somewhere, it doesn’t matter.
– Lately it’s more often at home.
– Why Wednesday? Why 7:00 p.m.? Tell me.
– It was dad’s idea.
– Dad’s idea? By the way, first dad suggested the idea, then you had to accept it?
– Well, it’s a question of accepting or not accepting, it’s like we need some kind of family tradition and dad just said, let’s do it on Wednesday.
– Why on Wednesday? It’s very simple, because on Thursdays, you know that for the last 3 years, I’m not available on Thursdays, I am here. Here I come on Thursdays, we gather here with friends and I turn off offices, relatives. She loses her husband on Thursdays, they become orphans, all of me doesn’t exist. So, I started to go like this every Thursday, every Thursday without exception, as everything I do, I try to do dramatically. And at some point, I started to feel remorse. I decided, so that I wouldn’t have a guilty conscience on Thursday, so that I would be OK, I would hang out with them on Wednesday, get full, give myself away, and go with my friends on Thursday with a clear conscience.
– Did you know this truth?
– I did.
– Today is a day of revelations.
– For the last six months, he’s been voicing that it’s cool that Wednesday is like a family day, because Thursday he’s here most of the time. And since he’s developing this as a bathhouse complex, he’s here in the morning working, he’s not resting anyway, and then on Friday there’s some more activities again. In fact, I like that there is such a day, because children will grow up, they will have their own children, but it will remain, dinner with parents. Let’s say we have dinner with the parents on Wednesday, at the parents’ place. It’ll still work and we’ll see each other more often that way.
– I think that’s a great idea. Okay, so that’s Thursday, Dima, that’s your day, no one touches you on that day?
– No one, not even my wife. I say call me if the house is on fire, or if the kids are in a mess, I mean, you gotta get them out of jail, I don’t know, then call me. If not, don’t call me, I’m not here.
– And what are you doing this day?
– Well, I’m not going to tell you on camera, I’m trying to change the picture. I have a lot of projects; I have a lot of work and my brain just goes blank. I try to turn my attention to something else. For example, last Thursday I was carrying stones. We’re opening a new Japanese complex here and there are big granite stones and I’ve been hauling stones for hours with the guys. And here, can you see?
– Uh-huh.
– I don’t know how to show you. I can’t show you my middle finger. You see, I broke my finger and the nail’s coming off. But it’s a change of activity, you know, I mean, hauling rocks, running a company. It helps me on Friday to come out a little bit renewed, plus steam, plus contrast treatments, rest, socializing and I come out new. My week starts on Friday.
– Vika, your world and your time, does it revolve around Dima or do you have your own independent life, business, affairs, rest and maybe even also your own day, when you rest and you are not there?
– Monday. Well, it didn’t come about because I chose it, like if it’s a person’s choice here, when Thursday is a bath day. As for Monday, I have it lined up probably also because of the family, I’m still around my kids, I’m around my spouse.
– Are you a true mom?
– Mom cooks good food, everyone responds differently.
– So you are the kind of woman who has time for everything and everyone?
– I don’t always have enough time, but I try, I mean, I still have gaps because I want to work, I want to be successful, I want to be a good mom, I want to hear everyone in part. I had an experience when I heard Nika when she was 15, and I realized that I need to get to know her.
– Uh-huh.
– Because I had my own idea of what a kid needs.
– At 15 years old.
– At 15, yes, she had her own understanding, that is, she wanted to be heard, maybe seen from the other side, and here we were rebuilding this contact. So, I try to spend time with everyone in part.
– What was the last thing you had to research, read, dig to answer a question? Let’s say maybe Misha comes in, says, “Mom, I want some advice. And you realize…
– No, he’s more with dad now, so he comes to dad for advice.
– And Nika comes to you?
– Sure, she does.
– Nika, for example, comes and says, mom, you know I want your advice, and you realize from years of experience that you don’t know the answer to her questions.
– It can be hard, yeah. And I’ve learned to say I don’t know. I had a moment where I realized that I wanted my children to always see me as a knowing and understanding figure, like someone to lean on. I’m strong, I can move mountains. And at one point I realized that no, this is not the right thing. That I need to relax, they should see me this way, too, because I am a real person, that is, I have the right to it and not only the right, it is my nature as well as theirs. Because in fact in the same way I show them an example that they do not have to be liked by everybody, to be perfect, to conform to some norms, that is, that they can be different as nature, that is.
– It’s okay to be imperfect.
– Right.
– You know what I’d like to ask you now, that you, Vika, say to Dima: “Dima, I’m grateful to you for…”, and Dima say: “Vika, I’m grateful to you for…” One-two words, not a sentence.
– I’m grateful for Vika’s patience and support.
– And I am thankful to you, Dima, for having depth. I mean everything that happens in our lives, for our two children. Here’s Misha showing me.
– Two words, one.
– Two words. I thought you were showing one or two kids. I realized this year that I’ve lived three or four lives. I mean, all the events, everything that happened in our lives, the intensity. I’m grateful to Dima for this intensity, because he always stirs up the spark in me, the interest in life. He involves me in some projects, involves me in some interesting projects, and it is worth a lot. I’m lucky in that respect.
– Now it’s your turn, guys. Mom, Dad, thank you for…
– It’s hard. In a nutshell, you’re going to say something different from what you wanted to say.
– Say it in five.
– In five, say it like mom.
– And mom didn’t say everything, mom has a lot more to say.
– I was not allowed to say, okay.
– Mom, thank you for your incredible support, really, for trying to understand me, it’s very important to me. Dad, thank you so much for showing your love for me. It’s important for me to feel that you’re there for me, that you give me a lot of opportunities. I’m gonna cry.
– We cried together at your graduation, remember?
– Oh, can I tell the story?
– Tell it.
– I’m definitely gonna cry. Well, the school waltz is supposed to be a dance with some of your classmates, and I didn’t get someone to dance with. Dad was on his way to training and came up to the ceremony, and was like, what’s going to happen here? I gotta run. I said, well, now there’s gonna be a waltz, the official part and you are free to go. It was not so important to me. He asked, who are you dancing with? I said, I’m not dancing with anyone. He said, what do you mean – you not dancing with anyone? He took my hand saying we’re going to dance. He really pulled me out, I mean, everybody danced the moves they’ve rehearsed. And we just went improvising.
– That’s what happened at the graduation ceremony, isn’t it?
– Yes, at school, we just danced with him and tears flowed, it’s such an important moment in the girl’s relationship with her father. It was incredible.
– It was touching for everyone.
– I can say this is the happiest moment of my life. I don’t know, right now it’s still aflame.
– Misha, say thank you to mom and dad.
– Well, thanks to my dad for raising me. Mom, thank you for really giving me a lot of time and attention, thank you.
– Thank you so much for having us in your cozy home. And you have such a warm, cozy family, you want to come to visit. Indeed, it’s very warm, very nice. Thank you very much for that.
– Thank you very much.
– Thank you.
– Thank you very much for spending this time with us on Journal TV. Let me remind you that today we were visiting the Voloshin family. Follow us on social media and remember that family is the greatest value you have!
