A Real Prokhorovshchina

Whenever I travel abroad, I try not to run into fellow Russians. This is simply because their khamsky (rude, boorish) behavior tends to make me blush with shame. 

In airplanes, they drink themselves to oblivion, yell at stewards, ignore rules about the use of mobile phones, get up out of their seats to grab their carry-on luggage before the plane has pulled into the gate, try to skip check-in lines, etc. 

It is much the same picture at foreign health resorts. To wit: this past November I vacationed at such a resort in Egypt and, as we say, “I was ready to fall through the Earth from shame.” Some of my khamsky compatriots, you see, were abusing of the resort’s all-inclusive regime. One such khamsky Russky (who could have used a breath mint) would line up at the bar as early as 9:40 am (it opened at 10 am). Then, without so much as a “hello” or a “please,” order 10 (free) beers from the Egyptian bartender. One day, fed up with such boorishness a la russe the bartender put 10 beers on a tray and, with a sardonic smile, handed it to the tourist while uttering, “Welcome to Egypt.”

Then there was the embarrassing fight over beach mattresses. A German septuagenarian was carrying off two mattresses, when a Russian lady came up to her, grabbed one of the mattresses, declaring “Why would you need two mattresses? Give me one!”

The German pensioner asked me to intervene, to explain that she had paid cash for “zwei matrazen,” but the Russian had determined that the mattresses must be part of the “all included,” so she had a right to at least one. 

The fierce battle over the mattress soon reminded me of the World War II tank battle near Prokhorovka in 1943. And, like the battle at Prokhorovka, this one was won by the Russians. The German gave up eine matraze. Proud of the 60-year-old tank victory, I was deeply ashamed of my compatriot’s mattress trophy.

Soon after I returned from Egypt, we heard about the vicissitudes of another Russian tourist abroad. Mikhail Prokhorov, whose family name is a disgrace to the village of Prokhorovka, was arrested by French police in a crackdown on a suspected prostitution ring at a swank Alpine ski resort – Courchevel. Prokhorov is the 41-year-old chief executive of Norilsk Nickel (see story, page 50), and is ranked No. 89 on Forbes magazine’s 2006 list of the world’s richest people. Inquisitive minds can get more detailed information on the Internet, but here is my version of the events. 

A deficit of snow in European resorts kept our oligarch from skiing. So he focused on an indoor sport: chasing women. But in doing so, he made at least three mistakes (aside from allegedly engaging in illegal activity).

First, as Al Pacino’s character so aptly put it in The Recruit, “Rule #1: never get caught.” And Prokhorov surely got caught like a callow boy caught cheating on a written exam.

Second, as many in our media pointed out, his actions were unpatriotic. Why Courchevel when there is Krasnaya Polyana in Sochi (which could use some publicity while it bids for the 2014 Winter Olympics)?! Surely economic considerations were not foremost on Prokhorov’s mind. The head of Russia’s mining giant Norilsk Nickel surely does not “nickel and dime” when it comes to his own pleasures, but he should be thinking about creating jobs at home before investing abroad. 

Third, if, despite being rich and powerful, you have a base need to pay for such affections, rather than earn them, you should at least have the intelligence to realize that such sleazy womanizing is safer at home. Our militia never raid VIP brothels, and the worst that could happen is you get videotaped with girls a la former Prosecutor General Yuri Skuratov. But then that sort of thing requires a special sanction from at least the head of the FSB (who, at the time of Skuratov, we recall, was Vladimir Putin). And it would seem that Norilsk Nickel has all its “ducks in a row” in that regard. For now, anyway.  

So it was that the politically incorrect (but legally adept) French police caught a rather big fish in their net this past January. And the embarrassed oligarch spent a few days in jail.

Given the sordid history of the privatization of Norilsk Nickel by Prokhorov and his partner Vladimir Potanin, Prokhorov probably deserved a much lengthier stay behind bars. But, still, a Russian billionaire in a French cell? Great! Or as French kids like to say in their lyceen slang, “Nickel!” 

Perhaps the nickel-rich oligarch will behave himself next time he is abroad. I hope so, because the inappropriate behavior of Prokhorov and all other khamsky Russkys – which from now on I will be calling “prokhorovshchina” (copyright pending) – reflects poorly on the rest of us whenever we travel.