Here's some of the text that accompanies drugoi's photo report (RUS), which has generated 331 comments:

Khrushchevki of the early 1960s are being demolished in south-western Moscow. Five-story buildings, with no balconies, with tiny kitchens, [box-like toilet-and-bathroom spaces], thin walls separating the apartments, allowing residents to hear everything that's going on in their neighbors' places - their time is up. Whole blocks of pyatietazhki [five-story buildings] have been deserted by their former owners and are left face to face with powerful machinery that's methodically taking down one house after another. When excavators and bulldozers [are done with their job], nothing but a flat, empty site remains where people still lived quite recently. My contemporaries were born and grew up in these pyatietazhki, they had their children there, and these children have had the time to produce grandchildren for [their parents]. Several generations have spent their lives in khrushchoba-houses [khrushchoba derives from trushchoba, a slum, and can be loosely translated as “Khrushchev slums”]. With their help, Muscovites were rescued from factory barracks and the horrible Soviet kommunalki [communal apartments], they provided young families with their first housing and gave old people peace and hot water in their own, albeit small, bathroom. All in all, thank you, pyatietazhki.

[…]

Resettling residents of such pyatietazhki is quite an ordeal. In the years they've spent here, they've managed to assemble numerous relatives around them, close and not so, everything is intertwined in a monstrous kind of way, every family has its own history of relationships, while the number of apartments provided by the city authorities for free isn't endless. Commissions dealing with the cases of the “resettlers” constantly run into problems: some don't like the new housing, others try to get themselves bigger apartments, try to move away from their children, grandparents, ex-wives and ex-husbands with whom they share the same living space.

[…]

Andrei is the last resident of this pyatietazhka. He's been in a legal battle with the local authorities for a year now. According to him, the situation is crazy: for the past five years, he's been sharing a small two-room apartment with his ex-wife, her new husband and their five dogs. He was asking to be resettled into two rooms, at least, in communal apartments, in different locations. But the resettlement commission is offering the former spouses one two-room apartment in a new building. City court has reinforced the commission's decision. Gas has already been turned off in the [old] building, but there's still water and electricity. No one knows what to do next.

Andrei says that nearly everyone in their building had problems with resettlement. On the one hand, it's understandable that people would like to solve the most difficult of all issues - housing - in one blow, but on the other hand, the state is basically giving them living space worth hundreds of thousands dollars for free, so the battles that are raging are indeed deadly.

[…]

[photo of a woman standing by the half-demolished building, talking to another one inside the building]

- Sveta, have you by any chance seen my old sneakers somewhere around here?

[…]

They aren't resettling people from pyatietazhki to [remote areas] anymore, but are giving them apartments right here, two blocks away from their old houses.

[…]

[last photo, of a newly-built high-rise]

In this building, people from khrushchevki are starting their new lives.

Here are some of the responses to drugoi's photo report; a few are from bloggers living in other former Soviet states - Belarus, Ukraine, Lithuania:

danatjan:

Old Soviet wallpaper is the most poignant thing about the pictures of the houses being demolished.

***

el_finik:

Strange that khrushchevki in Minsk [Belarus] looked totally different - with balconies, etc. - and no one is tearing them down :)

cheremis:

A different series. In Moscow, there are pyatietazhki that aren't up for demolition - normally, they are made of bricks and have balconies. The ones in the photos were intended to be used for 40 years, and [Moscow mayor Yuri Luzhkov] is, in a way, fulfilling the plans of the Soviet government ))

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zlena:

It's even sad somehow… I was also born and grew up in a similar khrushchevka. It's my home. Though my khrushchevka is in Kyiv, and it's probably gonna be there for a long time still.

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4lynch:

Some photos are as if they were taken in Chernobyl… Beautiful!

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katerinishe:

Would be great to leave one building intact and create a museum of interior and everyday life in it. To be able, later, to recognize things that surrounded you as a child or stuff that your grandmother had.

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nito_os:

I grew up in a khrushchevka, too, and I live in it still. But here in Lithuania they aren't demolishing them, quite the opposite: they are repairing them and build an extra story on top, to pay less for repairs. Khrushchevki will survive us all!

Last August, Global Voices published a two-part introduction to Morocco's Peace Corps bloggers, also a lively and vibrant group. As Peace Corps is a two-year assignment, several volunteers have left and many more have started their service; therefore, I've caught up with both new and old to see what they're up to now.

Connie in Morocco, who is about to complete her service, is reflecting on her time in Morocco:

People ask if I think I will have changed from this experience. I hope one thing that doesn't change is how much less I will use non-renewable resources. It's amazing how one can get by without paper towels or napkins…even less TP! I recall how Mom used to save string on a ball and other means of conserving things. Maybe we are progressive if we regress to our childhood ways? I believe I will be less materialistic than before; not totally, but less. And I know that I will need to continue practicing tolerance…in reverse from here!

27MonthsWithoutBaseball reflects on the difficulty of leaving Morocco behind (literally!):

Will I be able to let more go and live more clutter-free? I hope so! In the meantime, though, I keep buying Moroccan things for my imaginary next home. As I buy things, I do try to picture how they will fit in the imaginary home. Or at least fit into this home… Joy said that when she was in Tunisia doing research she knew a lot of Peace Corps Volunteers and when they got their things home they didn’t fit. I’ll be starting more or less from scratch, so I can build around things. And what doesn’t fit will make a lovely gift!

Cory of 32n5w, who finished his service and left Morocco in the fall, recently remarked in his blog:

whenever people ask what peace corps was like, from now on, i'm going to say it was kind of like this. but not in english. and with a lot more walking.

Jenny in Morocco is also reflective, focusing on the things she's learned so far:

If there's one thing I have learned during my time in the Peace Corps, it is that there are contradictions everywhere, but this is a part of life. Once you accept these contradictions, you can see and appreciate the human experience of life. Life can be so varied and diverse on earth and I am thankful I was given this opportunity to open my eyes to the rich diversity of life.

Finally, Duncan Goes to Morocco, a new PCV just beginning his service, remarks upon the first few weeks:

It’s been two weeks since I swore in and came to live in my site. People here are getting used to me being around and ask where I was if I’m missing for a day. I spend a good amount of my time just hanging out in the center of town where people sit around when there’s nothing to do. My language is improving, but I still don’t understand a lot of what is going on, especially when people are talking to one another, and not to me. Fortunately, I found a tutor in Tounfite (my souq, or market town). I’ll be going in there once or twice a week to get tutored, check email and mail, and hang out. There are two other volunteers there, a married couple, and they are generous to me and I like them a lot, which is fortunate since I’ll be spending a lot of the next year (when they finish PC) with them.
I have been trying to meet people in other douars (communities) as well. Basically what I do is hike along the road for a while until I come to a clump of houses. Then I walk around, greeting everyone I see, hoping to get invited in for tea or food. I kind of feel like a charity case, but my method hasn’t failed me yet. I’m meeting people and establishing contacts in other communities. I feel like this work is especially important because these other douars that I’m visiting are poorer and have greater need than my douar, which is a little more centrally located. One of the people that I met said to me, “help us, we are very poor.” It’s hard to hear that because there are no big changes with Peace Corps. I think the most important and effective thing I can communicate to the people in my commune is “wash your hands after you use the bathroom and before you eat.” But that’s not really what a guy who eats bread for three meals a day wants to hear when he asks for help.