Russian Blog

The two of the most frequently used words in the Russian language, the two words without which it is simply impossible to get around in Russia, even when one isn't trying to be the least polite, are actually more than just two words. I believe that anyone studying any language at all sooner or later will arrive at the point where it feels like your soul is screaming out loud for an etymologic dictionary (for those studying language but who have yet to arrive at this soul-screaming point – an etymologic dictionary explains the origin of words rather than their meaning). It does not take long when in possession of such a dictionary before one realizes that the most common greeting phrase in Russia, здравствуйте (or здравствуй, a variant which is a little less formal, yet still miles away from being as informal as the only-among-close-friends привет) actually is short for the original greeting of здрава желаю, meaning “I wish [you] health”. It can also be said that здравствуйте means “I wish you to be healthy”. Both of these meanings underline, in my opinion, the eternal Russian dread of disease. Therefore it cannot come as any surprise to anyone familiar with this culture that its people would have a greeting that means wishing everyone health all the time.

With less than two weeks to go before we’ll be holding our breaths and crossing our fingers while also crossing ourselves (Orthodox style, comrades – preferably as we stand kneeling in front of an ancient and huge icon in a northern Siberian monastery, to create just the right kind of momentous and mysterious mood) an intensive campaign to get citizens of the Russian Federation to vote is at work all over the country. And whenever there’s a movement for something, as in this case to encourage a sense of brotherly (or sisterly) concern in the individual for the country as a whole, both present and future, there’s a movement against it. In the city where I live, Yekaterinburg, known for having an active group of artists painting their negative attitude toward modern society onto the walls of innercity buildings here, they were not late to produce an anti-election campaign of their own. Their slogan? “Don’t vote”. But enough talking, here are some pictures for you to enjoy:

With as many inhabitants and as huge a territory as Russia’s, it is a country bound to exist in different versions for each and every person who has ever lived in it. To me it seems that among much of what I hear or read about Russia – be it on TV, in papers or magazines, in books, in blogs, both Russian and foreign – there is very little that I can agree with. Seldom do I hear someone speaking about this country using the same words that I would. I’ve lived in Russia since 2004, first in Saint Petersburg, later in Omsk and now in Yekaterinburg. I was born after perestrojka, which is why I obviously know next to nothing about communism and the actual conditions of living under its rule and ideals. Yet the first book I have come across that verbalizes my own Russian experience turned out to be written in 1992 about the aftermath of communism in Yugoslavia – “How We Survived Communism and Even Laughed” by Slavenka Draculic.

After one hour on the bus from Perm, located on the European side of the Urals, there is only snow and dark green pine trees outside my window as far as the eye can see. With at least one more hour to go before arriving at the museum “Perm-36”, those small villages that one passes by every once in a while along Russian highways become scarce, allowing for a lonely landscape heavy with snow under a dreary grey sky to take over. It’s late morning on a cloudy Tuesday in February, and there are hardly ten people on the bus. Suddenly the driver pulls over and stops where a smaller road starts off from the main road, shouting back at me: “This is it!” The day is not cold, it is only minus one degree Celsius, yet the wind coming from the south is strong and icy; it feels like needles hitting against my face when I stand and watch the bus taking off, leaving me alone in the middle of nowhere. The first thing I notice is the silence. Except for the occasional car passing by on the road, there is nothing out here – only snow-covered fields and tall, murky pine trees.