July 11, 2019

Swipe Me! Eat Me! Watch Me!


Swipe Me! Eat Me! Watch Me!
Ukha, of which there was much this week. Wikimedia Commons

Throwback Thursday

Peter Tchaikovsky
Peter Tchaikovsky. / Wikimedia Commons

On July 11, 1877, Peter Tchaikovsky wrote a letter — one that was never published due to the censorship of his personal correspondence. Tchaikovsky’s letters were censored for a variety of reasons, some to eliminate references to his homosexuality, but others for far more mundane reasons, like swearing. Read more about Tchaikovsky’s letters here on Russian Life. {subscription required}


Adventurous Ads and Conspicuous Consumption

1. 1 swipe = 1 vote. One Yabloko Party member running for Petersburg city deputy is literally making himself attractive to voters. He created a Tinder profile where he markets himself as Deputy Charming to voters’ Cinderella. It’s a great publicity stunt, of course, but there’s more to it than that. Most social media platforms, like VKontakte, have strict rules about political campaigns, whereas Tinder provides all the “hyperlocal targeting” and none of the strings (if you’re outside the U.S, that is). Plus, we’re not going to lie — it feels good getting swiped right on Tinder.

Candidate's Tinder profile
But the real question is, why 642 “Earth and Universe”? Earth is already part of the universe. / Tinder

2. Quiet flows the Don, and tasty flows the fish soup. On July 6, fans of fish soup congregated at the Donskaya Ukha Festival, a cultural initiative of the Rostov regional government that marks its twelfth year this year. Ukha, which is claimed as a local invention by Rostov region, is made from freshwater fish, potatoes, tomatoes, and herbs. Sounds simple, right? But don’t be deceived: the festival this year featured no fewer than twenty different kinds of ukha, one of which was cooked with a full liter of vodka. All of them draw on the Don River’s plethora of fish and Cossack culinary traditions. And of course, all of them are equally tasty.

3. Surf’s up! In Petersburg, you can do many things with liquids: You can drink, or if you’re feeling especially adventurous, you can go wakeboarding in the streets. After an evening of unusually heavy rains, one Petersburger hooked himself to the back of a car and performed daring stunts while the car drove him along. Don’t test the waters on your own, though. It turned out that the Petersburger is a professional wakeboarder who did it for an ad. Compared to him, the rest of us are kids in floaties.

Man wakeboarding in Petersburg street
Taming the mythic Petersburg floods. / mike_milenin

Blog Spotlight

Everyone knows Leo Tolstoy was a great writer, but did you know he was also a mediocre biker? Find out more in this blog post from June, and feel better about the fact that you probably bike better than Tolstoy.

In Odder News

Robot waving Tatarstan flag
Welcome to Kazan! / Kazan’ Kriminal’naya
  • Have you ever liked Pushkin’s poetry so much that you wanted to eat it? Then take heart: the Pushkin Museum’s café in Moscow now serves dishes named for Pushkin quotes.

Quote of the Week

“We beg you not to fall into the ash dump in the pursuit of selfies!”

— The Siberian Generating Company, warning tourists not to get too close to a picturesque but mildly toxic turquoise ash-dumping lake

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Some of our Books

Murder at the Dacha
July 01, 2013

Murder at the Dacha

Senior Lieutenant Pavel Matyushkin has a problem. Several, actually. Not the least of them is the fact that a powerful Soviet boss has been murdered, and Matyushkin's surly commander has given him an unreasonably short time frame to close the case.

The Moscow Eccentric
December 01, 2016

The Moscow Eccentric

Advance reviewers are calling this new translation "a coup" and "a remarkable achievement." This rediscovered gem of a novel by one of Russia's finest writers explores some of the thorniest issues of the early twentieth century.

Jews in Service to the Tsar
October 09, 2011

Jews in Service to the Tsar

Benjamin Disraeli advised, “Read no history: nothing but biography, for that is life without theory.” With Jews in Service to the Tsar, Lev Berdnikov offers us 28 biographies spanning five centuries of Russian Jewish history, and each portrait opens a new window onto the history of Eastern Europe’s Jews, illuminating dark corners and challenging widely-held conceptions about the role of Jews in Russian history.

A Taste of Russia
November 01, 2012

A Taste of Russia

The definitive modern cookbook on Russian cuisine has been totally updated and redesigned in a 30th Anniversary Edition. Layering superbly researched recipes with informative essays on the dishes' rich historical and cultural context, A Taste of Russia includes over 200 recipes on everything from borshch to blini, from Salmon Coulibiac to Beef Stew with Rum, from Marinated Mushrooms to Walnut-honey Filled Pies. A Taste of Russia shows off the best that Russian cooking has to offer. Full of great quotes from Russian literature about Russian food and designed in a convenient wide format that stays open during use.

Davai! The Russians and Their Vodka
November 01, 2012

Davai! The Russians and Their Vodka

In this comprehensive, quixotic and addictive book, Edwin Trommelen explores all facets of the Russian obsession with vodka. Peering chiefly through the lenses of history and literature, Trommelen offers up an appropriately complex, rich and bittersweet portrait, based on great respect for Russian culture.

93 Untranslatable Russian Words
December 01, 2008

93 Untranslatable Russian Words

Every language has concepts, ideas, words and idioms that are nearly impossible to translate into another language. This book looks at nearly 100 such Russian words and offers paths to their understanding and translation by way of examples from literature and everyday life. Difficult to translate words and concepts are introduced with dictionary definitions, then elucidated with citations from literature, speech and prose, helping the student of Russian comprehend the word/concept in context.

Marooned in Moscow
May 01, 2011

Marooned in Moscow

This gripping autobiography plays out against the backdrop of Russia's bloody Civil War, and was one of the first Western eyewitness accounts of life in post-revolutionary Russia. Marooned in Moscow provides a fascinating account of one woman's entry into war-torn Russia in early 1920, first-person impressions of many in the top Soviet leadership, and accounts of the author's increasingly dangerous work as a journalist and spy, to say nothing of her work on behalf of prisoners, her two arrests, and her eventual ten-month-long imprisonment, including in the infamous Lubyanka prison. It is a veritable encyclopedia of life in Russia in the early 1920s.

Driving Down Russia's Spine
June 01, 2016

Driving Down Russia's Spine

The story of the epic Spine of Russia trip, intertwining fascinating subject profiles with digressions into historical and cultural themes relevant to understanding modern Russia. 

The Latchkey Murders
July 01, 2015

The Latchkey Murders

Senior Lieutenant Pavel Matyushkin is back on the case in this prequel to the popular mystery Murder at the Dacha, in which a serial killer is on the loose in Khrushchev’s Moscow...

At the Circus
January 01, 2013

At the Circus

This wonderful novella by Alexander Kuprin tells the story of the wrestler Arbuzov and his battle against a renowned American wrestler. Rich in detail and characterization, At the Circus brims with excitement and life. You can smell the sawdust in the big top, see the vivid and colorful characters, sense the tension build as Arbuzov readies to face off against the American.

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