Stories about Russia from April, 2006
Russia: Moscow Prepares For Summer
Snowsquare.com reports on how Moscow prepares for the summer.
Belarus & Russia: Traffic Police Stories
Due to certain unprofessionalism and corruption in their ranks, traffic police feature prominently in jokes and contemporary urban folklore of the former Soviet states. Below are three actual stories and reactions to them, posted in LiveJournal this month (translated from Russian). *** Minsk, Belarus (April 6, 2006) – This story...
Russia: Funding to Hamas
Tim Newman of White Sun of the Desert reports that Russia is planning to provide financial aid to Hamas: “For the last few years, much of Russia’s foreign policy has been a two step process: 1) See what the US is doing. 2) Do the opposite.”
Russia: Moscow's VIP World
Snowsquare.com takes a look at Moscow's VIP market. Also noted is a special Orthodox Easter feature for cell phones.
Russia: Komsomol
Sean Guillory writes about Komsomol and its influence on today's political youth movements in Russia.
Russia: Sexist Beer Ad and Subway Laws
Megan Case takes a picture of a sexist beer ad in a St. Petersburg subway train – and gets fined for doing it. Konstantin Dlutskiy of Russian Marketing Blog comments on this ad.
Russia: LJ/ZheZhe
Sergey Belyakov of Travel Russia! (formerly known as RUBLog) posts a note on the Russian LiveJournal world: ZheZhe, as it is known in Russian, is currently 274,763 users strong.
Russia: Chechen Children's Mysterious Illness
Bob Granico of Publius Pundit is calling to international health organizations to examine the Chechen children affected by a mysterious illness and investigate its causes: “Given that the children are not recovering, and that there is so much distrust on both sides of the issue, outside medical help is drastically...
North Korea: Migrant vulnerability
Kotaji blogger blogs on the rough and tough lives of North Korean lumberjacks and construction workers in the eastern corners of Russia.
Russia: Cell-Phone Protest in Chechnya
David McDuff A Step At A Time posts his translation of an article by Umalt Chadayev on a rally that took place in Grozny to protest against poor quality of local mobile network.
Russia: British Explorer Detained
Tim Newman of White Sun of the Desert writes about an obstacle on the route of Karl Bushby, a British explorer in his eighth year of walking around the world: he has been detained in Russia for entering the country without an entry visa.
Tajikistan: Working in Russia
“Tajik Boy” writes about racist attacks on foreigners in Russia, a situation that worries the many Tajiks who work in Russia or have a relative who does. He says that neither the Russian nor the Tajik governments pay enough attention to the situation.
Moldova: Russia Bans Moldovan Wine Imports
Peter Myers of Adventures in Moldova writes about Moldovan wine industry and the potentially disastrous consequences of Russia's ban of wine imports from Moldova.
Russia: Protest Over Racist Murder
David McDuff of A Step At A Time cites a report on a protest rally that took place in St. Petersburg yesterday, following the recent murder of a Senegalese student.
Russia: VDNKh
Snowsquare.com posts pictures and text from the All-Russian Exhibition Center in Moscow, formerly known as VDNKh.
Russia: Comedian Mikhail Zadornov
W. Shedd of The Accidental Russophile posts a bio of Russian comedian Mikhail Zadornov and supplies a translation of two of his pieces: a Soviet-time “Conversation of a Rest Home Deputy Director with Guests on the Day of Their Arrival” and a more recent one, “Russian business, or the Eighth...
Russia: Sibir Airline Image Revamp
Konstantin Dlutskiy of Russian Marketing Blog writes about Sibir Airline's new identity – and its new name: S7, or – if you listen to the airline's flight attendants – “Ass Seven.”
Russia: Grigoriy Oster
Raffi Aftandelian of maaskva: nashimi glazami translates a few poems by the Russian children's poet Grigoriy Oster, author of the Harmful Advice: A Book for Naughty Children and Their Parents.
Kazakhstan: A Triumph for Russia
Vilhelm Konnander says that the deal that Kazakhstan recently signed to increase oil exports to Russia is a tremendous geopolitical triumph for Moscow.
Russia: Gorbachev's Intentions
Bob Granico of Publius Pundit points out how the Western media misinterpret Mikhail Gorbachev's intentions: “Gorbachev, in reality, worked hard during his time in power to preserve the Soviet Union, and he never intended for the captive republics to gain independence.”
Russia: Cheap’n’early DVDs
Konstantin Dlutskiy of Russian Marketing Blog reports on the long-awaited alternative to pirated DVDs: “Cheap’n’early DVDs from Universal Pictures cost 150-200 rubles per disc (~$5,5 – $7,2). They are of lower quality and are released only four weeks after the first night.”