What is it about Russian Women?~Part 2a, the “beautiful.”

This is the second of my weekly series about Russian women.  The common Western notion about Russian women is either that of the babushkas, the stocky grandmothers in gray headscarves who dutifully sweep the frozen streets of Moscow–or the fantasy of long-legged Russian beauties, seductive KGB agents in a James Bond movie. Both impressions are valid.

Women are hard enough to understand in any case. To borrow Winston Churchill’s famous line about Russians, that they are “a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma,” and then further wrap a large minority of them in a bundle of fur–you have Russian women. In my book there are six kinds of Russian women: the beautiful, the babushka, the Barbie, the beaten, the bold. and now, the bewildered. Today we will touch on the beautiful.

There is a reality in the stereotypical James Bond seductress. I will flatly say that Russia has more than its share of charming and attractive women. By “attractive” I don’t mean merely the exotic physical characteristics that are so publicized. The real beauty of Russian women is under the surface where they often contain an elusive self-confidence, a seductive charm, a depth and strength uncommon in others. There is an enigmatic self-awareness in their eyes¾a pride, perhaps a secret¾certainly nothing inconsequential.

As you walk the streets or look at the faces at a bus stop or in the Metro, you often see this same feminine mystery. But they are not aloof. There is a curiosity and willingness to return a quick smile or hold a gaze for that fraction of a second that asks a question–or suggests a danger. They love life, which is hard to explain considering how hard life can be in Russia.

More on the beautiful next week.

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“You know the fact!”

“You know the fact! I am the best. I wear Levis and Nikes”

                                                                                   An unknown Russian boy

These words were scribbled by a child in small English letters on the yellow brick wall of a residential Moscow building near where I lived in 1994. That says more about the future of Russia than any academic think tank with their computer generated prophesies based on arguable statistics. There is the quest for global status in those scribbles of the young. And in the end (and the end may be down the road a bit) it is the young that count. That is where the promise lies—with those who can wear Levis and Nikes and still be Russian. That is “the fact.”

On one of those early post-Soviet days, walking down the Old Arbat, just after Mayor Luzhkov had banned the street kiosks and the pandering of KGB uniforms and Lenin T-shirts, I was approached by a small boy with a big bag. The boy, about ten, furtively looked over both shoulders to assure no police were watching, and pulled out of his plastic bag a matryoshka doll so badly painted I thought it was done by a dyspeptic. He said in near perfect English, “Look at this beautiful matryoshka doll, only $5.99.”

I said, “This is the ugliest matryoshka doll I have ever seen.”

“Then how about $4.99?” he snapped back.

“No, you could not pay me to take this doll.”

He quickly dropped it back into the bag and pulled out an equally ugly lacquer box, smiling, “Then how about this beautiful box.”

“That is worse than the doll. What is your name?

“Peter.”

“Well, Peter, you tell the guys who sent you out with this trash to give you really good dolls and boxes and you will make them and you rich.” He puffed up with pride and looked over his shoulder again to see if his mentors were watching. I continued, “When you grow up, you come see me, and I will give you a good job, because you are a great salesman.” He stuffed his ugly box into the bag with the ugly doll and ran off to tell his bosses of his promising future. That boy will go far in the new Russia—or anywhere.

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The Captain from Yakutia

Russia, for all its drama and unpredictability, is full of humor—yes, humor. It was 1998, the time of, what’s her name? Monica Lewinsky. It was winter and I was drinking a Dr. Pepper and eating almonds in the departure lounge of Sheremetyevo I, waiting for Transaero Flight 141 to St. Petersburg when our group was approached by a short man in the uniform of a captain of the MVD, the police arm of the Ministry of Interior (like the KGB). He had short cut gray hair and an Asian face.

“I heard you speaking English, who is the American here?” he said. My friends were quiet. I pointed to me.

He grabbed my arm and faced me straight on, enveloping me in an alcoholic mist, and said, “I have something important to tell you. You take this message to Bill Clinton. You tell him the people of Yakutia are behind him 100%.” He held my arm tighter, “If we had such a man in the Kremlin, we would know that he was healthy and able to govern.” (This was the time of Yeltsin.)

His two friends tried to pull him away as his plane was leaving for his far-away home, but he shoved them away. “You are welcome in Yakutia.” He scribbled his name, Vladimir, and phone number on a scrap of paper. His friends dragged him away.

He struggled back and said, “You bring no money, just come to Yakutia where the cleanest river in Russia runs. Seven hundred kilometers and you can see to the bottom all the way. Come in July when the ice has melted.” Three big friends hauled him away.

He escaped again and bounded back up the stairs and grabbed me, “No, bring a dollar fifty.”

“What for?”  I asked,

“For the rowboat,” he said. He again scribbled his name and address on the backside of the same scrap of paper.

I said, “I know that river flows north, and I am afraid I will not be able to row south fast enough before it freezes again. But, thanks.”

 Four guys pushed him down the stairs for the plane to Yakutsk, where it must have been minus sixty degrees that time of the year and where they only have diamonds and bears. I neglected to pass this on to Bill Clinton, but no doubt he would have been comforted to hear this message.

Excerpted from “Walking on Ice, An American Businessman in Russia”