Stereotypes – Anna’s Out of Town News

A Russian Definition of Feminism?

A friend linked me to the poll featured in the online version of the Russian Cosmopolitan.

The question reads: “Who is a feminist?” Check out the only potential answers:

-A woman who doesn’t wear bras.

-A woman who has bad luck with men

-A lesbian

-Condoleezza Rice

That’s deep, isn’t it? If you weren’t upset enough, here is more:
— The other polls that website features appear to be more or less serious, so it was not a New Year-induced hangover joke.

— The magazine’s primary audience is women, so it was not a poll published by some chauvinist publication, which would have at least made more sense. It was apparently published under the “a poll for him” category, but I have strong feeling it was the women who voted, since they are the ones who visit the site.

NB: Please don’t think that Condoleezza Rice is listed there as a role model. Russian mass media enjoy mocking her personal life, so no, she is not perceived as a successful woman.

To get to see what the other readers thought, I had to vote. To have to pick one of these extremely intelligent option was embarrassing enough, but the results made me go look in the family tree for some proof I was not a Russian.

Guess what? Almost five thousand readers voted. And here is what they picked:
-A woman who doesn’t wear bras — 8.7%

-A woman who has bad luck with men — 58.49%

-A lesbian — 6.81%

-Condoleezza Rice — 26.01%.

So to be a feminist, you have to be single. Or wait, it must be the other way around. You get dumped, get bitter, and get a feminism handbook.

I guess readers of the Russian Cosmo would rather be married with one in four chances of being domestically abused by their husbands (Amnesty International figures from here) than be a secretary of state.

What (Russian) Women Want

I had a girls’ night in a few days ago. There were seven of us. We all have Russian passports that we use extensively to travel and sometimes to study abroad. Three of us currently attend colleges abroad, the other four are at school in Russia. Together, we have two foreign and three Russian boyfriends; two of us just got out of relationships. Between us, we speak eleven languages and one dialect. All in all, we were just your average group friends catching up with it each other.

And, as always happens, we talked about what we want in life. One of us wanted more Versace in her closet; another just got addicted to thrift stores. One felt like she needed a more caring boyfriend, while another wanted a more romantic one; a third had just decided to be single for a while. One was excited about starting her Master’s, the other one was tired of doing her bachelor’s, another one just discovered she wanted to be in the academia. One wanted to travel more, and two of us wanted to stop traveling obsessively and to spend more time at home instead.

Out of seven friends, all of us aimed for different things. Sometimes our targets overlapped, but most of the time they contradicted each other. So what is it that women really want?

I asked myself that question because someone recently found my blog by searching for “what Russian women want.” To investigate, I typed in that same exact phrase on an internet search engine. And something curious came up.

According to Google, all Russian women strive for one thing: a marriage with a foreigner. The first link that came up stated “All Russian Women Want to Escape from Russia” — with an only intention of finding a foreign partner, of course. All other top nine search results are clearly about what men want: most are dating agencies, including the one that promises to regale foreign men with “Russian Girls of Model Quality.” Once a man finds that model-quality Russian Woman, getting her full attention is easy. Two guides aid one in doing that: a “Russian Brides Cyber Guide” and “Russian Brides or How To Marry a Russian Woman” (correct punctuation is clearly not a way to go). If your Russian woman is stubborn and is not willing to give in to your cyber charming skills, there is an ultimate weapon — Russian cuisine recipes. Because we all know a way to a Russian woman’s heart is through her stomach.

The ‘Russian woman’ as been turned into a brand by the internet. I am surprised no one has registered the Russian Woman trademark yet. (Or has someone?)

Clearly, we have no other desires but to popularize ourselves with handsome foreign strangers who will whip out their cyber guides, make us borsch, and will then whisk us away from our homeland. Do women in other cultures have a better digital reputation?

I googled my other ethnicity — Ukrainians. A quick Google search — and the terrible truth is revealed. Ukrainian women have the same interests as the Russian ones. They are clearly desperate to leave Ukraine by means of being with a foreign man. The second top search result proclaimed “A Million Young Ukrainian Women Want to Leave Their Country.” All the other ones in top ten had to do with dating. But sadly, instead of advertising hot foreigners to the Ukrainian users, they promote hot nubile Eastern Europeans.

The unexpected outcome of my experiment can be to some extent explained by the Beautiful Docile Eastern European Woman Stereotype. But what about other nationalities? I explored two other ethnic backgrounds of mine: the Finnish and the (Outer) Mongolians.

Mongolian women seem to be less obsessed with finding a foreign husband than the Russians and the Ukrainians. Despite three in four top results advertising photos that show off the looks and the beauty of “Mongolian Women, Mongolian Girls, Mongolian Singles,” women in Mongolia clearly have other interests. Apart from dancing, (as YouTube video illustrates) they unfortunately have a variety of issues, including cross-border sex work in China. Fortunately, some ngo’s like the Mongolian Women Fund help those who need help.

It turns out Finnish women have needs and interests drastically different from their ex-Communist counterparts. Top two results claim Finnish women “want from a relationship same things other women want: loyalty, company, love.” At the same time, they also “appreciate sexual affairs which are safe and yet exciting.” The other interests were spread from from women in parliament to home visits of public health nurses to hysterectomy to infertility treatment and to the original Mel Gibson movie with Finnish subtitles.

I subjected American women to the same search that the other aforementioned nationalities underwent. (I assumed Google would treat “American” as a synonym to “US-American.”) The US is supposedly a melting pot of all cultures, so the women there should have have interests representative of all the women worldwide. My logic was rather faulty.

American women appear to be more health- and politics-conscious than anyone else. Four out of ten top links deal with health and wellness. Four links discuss what American women want in politics and society. One link is about women traveling. The top search result comes as a bit of a shock.

“The fact is that control-top granny pants are simply not a substitute for regular exercise, thoughtful grooming and a healthy diet. Certainly not if you’re single and interested in men.” Here is what single American women want — to look good.

Surprisingly for such a politically correct and litigious country, the article, originally published in The Times, compares nothing else but how well-groomed American and British girls are. Those American women who naively believe that men should like women for their personality, not their looks, will have to find consolation in the fact that American girls are said to be better groomed overall.

It’s highly debatable if a google search in English is an accurate reflection of needs and values of societal group, whether in an English-speaking country or worldwide. It is remarkable that men, not women, wrote and designed most of the search results that came up. I am not writing this post under the aegis of feminism. But I would like to know if all those men actually bothered to ask women what they want. I bet if they did, the search results would look drastically different.

Shopping in Kiev: Ukrainian Wives and iPhones

As I was walking down Kreschatik, Kiev’s main street, I saw a billboard in English that targets foreign men.

Conveniently for visiting foreign men who fell prey to Ukrainian women’s charms, you can now get a Ukrainian wife while doing sightseeing. The company’s office is right there, on Kreschatik, so you can quickly get a brand-new wife, a “fast visa,” and then keep exploring Kiev. For those who want to accessorize their newly acquired wives, iPhones are sold two or three buildings down from the billboard. By the way, iPhones are not officially sold in Ukraine, but the store doesn’t seem to care, openly selling them on Kreschatik for three times the US price.

I wonder how much Ukrainian women are worth these days. I was really tempted to call Joe, the “American manager” of the Ukrainian wives, but I can’t pull off sounding like a man. My boyfriend refused to partake in this. Anyone wants to give me a hand?

“Russian Seasons” at JFK — the Russian Interns Are Coming!

I blogged several times about the complexity of Russian Women — Western men relationships. I wrote about the mail-order Russian bride websites; I made fun of the scammers who rip off Western men looking for such a bride; and I wrote how these societal trends make some Russian women, including myself, uncomfortable when they are abroad. To get an outsider’s perspective (which, surprisingly, turned into an insider’s perspective), I asked my dear friend Arnie Zambrano to write a guest post for me. I know he is interested in finding an Eastern European soulmate. Over a course of a recent MSN conversation, his “Russian Intern Season” at JFK (which is where I actually met him) came up. So here’s what he has to say:

(please note — I may not agree with the author’s opinion (especially about the Ukrainians :)) ), I asked Arnie to write it as his personal opinion on an interesting phenomenon).

Every year around June, I anticipate the hoards of pretty Eastern European girls who will come through the gates of JFK. To see them makes me truly happy that I work for an international airline and get to spend time at an international terminal. Even though I’ve been working in JFK for 3 years, every year, I still look forward to the Russian Intern Season as much as a child anticipates Christmas.

So what is the Russian Intern Season?

It’s the time when Russians and other Eastern Europeans send many 18-24 year old girls to the United States to work here for 3-9 months. Thanks to an agreement with the United States and Eastern Europe, CCUSA (Camp Counselors USA) hand-picks (or so the rumor has it) only the best looking women out there (some men participate, too, but I am not interested) to work in the US. They work as camp counselors — or work other similar jobs. For over 90% of them, it’s their first time in the states (and even abroad), so these young ladies are looking for a friend to get them oriented. That’s where I come in.

I’m the pioneer of my personal Russian Intern Season (RIS) at JFK. The young post-Soviet ladies flock to the specially organized JFK’s CCUSA’s desk. For the first 3-5 days, they are free to do whatever they please, so here’s your (and mine) chance to charm a pretty Eastern European!

I started the RIS when I got sick and tired of American women (I’m American, but find our women too arrogant high maintenance — compared to the Eastern European ladies). It’s simply standing at the carousels (after I do my job for an airline, of course) and having to pick the most amazingly looking girl in the intern group. At times it’s so hard, since there are so many great ones to choose from. Most of them are Russian, but there are also Ukrainians, Moldovians, Armenians, Georgians, Kazakhstan, Belarusians etc. And I am the first American man they can talk to. You can’t get more “fresh off the boat” than that.

Why do I like these Eastern European ladies so much? Unlike American women, they don’t ask to take them to expensive restaurant or to take them shopping! Perfect date material.

It is remarkable how you can identify a nationality of an Eastern European female by the way she talks to you. And no, I don’t mean an accent. Here’s my personal classification:

–Ukrainians: Wear Blue T-shirts. When you start a conversation with them, they look at you in a confused manner. [Note from Anna — as a half-Ukrainian myself, I find it hard to believe, but oh well].

–Russians: Wear red T-shirts. When start a conversation with them, most of them give you that nice warm smile; they generally have so many interesting things to say. Overall they are very glad that you are talking to them no matter the situation.

–This year, however, the new hot thing are the Kazakhstanis (T-shirt color: orange). They are brought over here by boatful, and I love spending time with them. It definitely makes after work hours and my days off much more entertaining.

Any Ukrainian reading this post is probably thinking “Why does this author hate Ukrainians?” I know there are some nice ones out there. I personally have been lucky to meet a select few. But it seems that they’re keeping all the nice and sweet ones in Ukraine. (Guess the Ukrainian guys want to keep their nice women for themselves — good for them). Unfortunately, so far, I haven’t had any luck in meeting a nice Ukrainian intern. So I stay away from the blue-clad crowd.

Most of the girls don’t stay in NYC for too long; some of them are here for only one or two days. Then they go off to their respective workplaces, which could be as close as Ocean City, NJ (3 hour drive from New York) to San Diego, CA (6 hour plane ride). But for an adventurer like me that’s what makes it more entertaining. I met a couple of Kazakh girls and spent a couple of days with them before they went off to Los Angeles, CA. I was planning on going to LA in a 3 weeks time anyway. Now I have someone with whom to hang out over there (in case you’re wondering how I can afford to travel, working for an airline gets one cheap or even free flights).

I will most likely end up marrying a sweet Russian girl, but she has to be a Russian-Russian, not a Russian-American. I can’t stand Russian-American women. They are aware of how Eastern Europeanly beautiful they are, plus they’re extra snobby, since they were born in the US. My Russian-American co-worker is a perfect example. She manipulates all the guys in doing favors for her, makes them spend money on gifts, and, simply put, walks all over them. (She even admitted that she made my friend, who is blindly in love with her buy, her a Prada handbag… and they were not even dating!!) On the other hand her Russian mom also lives in the US. Being born in Russia, she’s such a great person. I am not attracted to her (not my age category, really), but if I had a choice between a Russian-American daughter and her Russian mom, I’d go for the latter. I am worried that if I marry a Russian, which is want I really want to do, my children will be the product of the same thing I hate!

Sometimes, I look at the Russian Brides websites, and I can’t help but laugh at all these ridiculous fees that they add on just to talk to her and see a picture. You even have to pay anywhere from $1000-$5000 to have her sent to the USA. If I were someone looking for a Russian Bride, I wouldn’t need to go further than JFK. Just stand outside the international terminal during the Russian Intern Season — and have your pick. Most of them are extra friendly, but good luck with the blue-wearing Ukrainians. (On a side note, if you’re on the internet all day looking for Russian Brides, get a life!)

By the way, if you for some reason are not attracted to the Eastern-European looks, there is also my Brazilian Intern Season. Lots of (hot) Brazilians come from Disney World to go shopping in New York. Sadly, only few speak English, but with my knowledge of Spanish, English, French and Italian, I can pick up a great percentage of what they’re saying. To anyone else, you’re out of luck.

I’m off taking a Russian girl to Coney Island, thank you CCUSA 😀

Latvian Ex-President Encounters a Heated Debate at Pierson: A Very Belated Post

This post is way overdue, but better late than never.

At Pierson College’s Master’s Tea, Latvia’s ex-President Vaira Vike-Freiberga participated in a talk with the crowd constisting mostly of Yale grad students and professors. A couple of Russian undergrad students, including myself, were present.

In Russia, Dr. Vike-Freiberga is usually portrayed as a stern, anti-Russian leader who made miserable the lives of many Russians living in Latvia. I went to that meeting hoping that maybe Russian media actually exaggerated their portrayal.

Dr. Vike-Freiberga is a very charismatic, well-spoken lady who seems to be able to make the audience happy. In the beginning, she talked a lot about Latvian history and of it being annexed and occupied by the USSR. Most Russian media disagree with that, but I believe she absolutely right describing the Soviets as ruthless invaders. The USSR (NOT Russia) did invade Latvia. But a side note: isn’t’ this how most of the world history is made anyway?

Dr. Vike-Freiberga’s hostility towards USSR/Russia is sadly based on her country’s history in general and her family’s history in particular. At the same time, Russians suffered just as much (and, as one of the guest who was siding with the Latvians admitted in a private discussion after a talk, Russians had suffered much more). Her family was escaped to Germany to avoid the Nazis; my grandfathers, both in Russia and Ukraine, were killed in the concentration camps.

During her two terms at the office, Latvia joined the EU and NATO – which is a big achievement for a post-Soviet country. Well that’s all warm and fuzzy and the audience was feeling happy for a small nation re-gaining its national sovereignty and pride.

Things got heated when the issue of the Russians in Latvia was raised. 20% of the Latvian population are Russian. Many never learned a word of Latvian, because they simply never had to. Everybody (including ethnic Latvians) spoke Russian in the USSR, of which Latvia used to be part. Schools and universities were taught in Russian; office and government work was done in Russian. Latvian was one of the official national languages of the USSR — along with Russian. Any Russian speaker has as many rights to speak Russian in Latvia as he did to speak Latvian. Most preferred Russian though, since it was a lingua franca of all fifteen republics of the USSR. In many mixed Russian-Latvian marriages, Russian was a language of choice for spouses and children.

These days when Latvia is a sovereign state, there is a clear attempt on the government’s part to oust Russians and Russian speakers out of the country. This campaign was largely initiated by Dr. Vike-Freiberga, who (coincidentally, of course) possesses an interest in linguistics and Latvian folklore.

Now, in order to obtain a job, the Russians have to pass what Dr. Vike-Freiberga referred to at that meeting as ” a minimal language proficiency exam.” She also claimed that “if someone lives in a country, they should speak a language of that country.” That “minimal” exam requires fluency in a language. And most developed countries have either no state language (e.g., the U.S, where people manage to live without speaking a word of English and where speaking Spanish is often an essential skill for employment in some parts of the country), or state programs that allow immigrants to learn the language (Germany, Israel, you name it).

Interestingly enough, after my questions to Dr. Vike-Freiberga, several Yalies approached me to discuss the issue. Russia was often portrayed as “the evil one” in this case, but many Yalies changed their understanding of the matter after that meeting. Yay for breaking stereotypes!

How (Not) to Date a Russian Woman

There are only four things one needs to know to date a Russian woman: her age, height, weight and bra cup size. Who cares about all those old-fashioned things like personality, values and sense of humor anyway?

No, this is not just a misogynist statement by an old-school chauvinist. It is what many men in Western Europe seem to believe. I got to see an interesting catalog in Germany once: a thick volume filled with photographs of Slavic (mostly blond and blue-eyed) women in the most alluring of poses. Next to each photograph, there was a reference number one would need to contact the agency and the four aforementioned essential figures. If you are a bored Western European man and tired of the picky women around you, why not flip through a catalog and order a docile Eastern European who would be so happy to live in your developed country that she would cook, clean your house, and raise your kids 24/7?

For those brave enough to deal with the bureaucracy and get a Russian tourist visa, there is an even better option: a bride fair. All one needs to do is board that flight to Russia (usually Moscow and St. Petersburg), where he would be taken to an epitome of the social gatherings. Many charming Russian women would try to charm him in hopes that he would pick her as a potential life partner.

In fact, if one is too lazy to order a catalog or leave his home, there are plenty of resources online. Try googling a “Russian woman.” The first link that comes up lures one to the joys of marrying a Russian woman: “Meet Single Russian Women for Marriage: Mail Order Brides.” There are another 2,200,000 links to websites relating to Russian women. I am too lazy to go through all of them, but the top ten results are directly related to dating. A Google search for a “Russian bride” yields 881,000 results. The search for an exact word combination provides one with a whopping number of links: 711,000.

So why this Russian women frenzy? According to Mr MacCarthy, an American owner of the Ukraine-based marriage agency Mat-rimony.com, “Ukrainian girls and Russian women are very beautiful, well educated and are renowned for their strong traditional values of maintaining a home and raising a family.” If one reads along the line, this praise would sound something like this: “Russian and Ukrainian women, mostly the ones living in the poor provincial citizens, are desperate to get out of their countries where chauvinism prevails and an insane percentage of men are alcoholics. But the desperate situation many of them find themselves in is actually great for us Western men. We can come and lure them with our foreign passports and a promise of a nicer life. It is a fair exchange: we get free household help and they get a chance to get out of their countries.”

Even though there many countries where women face poverty and violations of their rights, the post-Soviet countries are especially attractive as the source of potential wives to the single Westerners. Slavic women conform to the Western beauty standards: everyone who has been to Moscow knows there is an immensely high density of tall, thin, blonde women per square meter of malls. Most “Russian wives” come from Russia, Ukraine and Belarus. The population in these countries displays a traditional Slavic look. Among the other post-Soviet countries, Latvia and Lithuania enjoy membership in the EU, so their women can live in a Western European aka civilized country without marrying a sleazy foreigner. The Central Asian countries like Azerbaijan and Tajikistan are predominantly Muslim, which makes their women less attractive on the mail order brides market.

Due to the way an education system functions, most Russian women get at least a bachelor’s degree; many speak at least one foreign language decently. A traditionally patriarchal society tells women they should know how to clean and cook. In fact, 99% of Russian schools have mandatory housekeeping classes for girls, where they are taught how to cook, clean and sew. Most women get married fairly early (usually in their very early 20’s) and they are taught by the society to obey their husbands. Even though most women work nowadays, the glass ceiling is ever-present; a woman is expected to take care of the household and make money. It is still very rare for a husband to help his wife with any household work (unless it involves opening a can of beer). No wonder the average Russian woman can be so attracted to the possibility of marrying a foreigner.

According to some of my sociologist friends, many Russian women who marry a foreigner out of material reasons end up getting divorced after they get their new foreign citizenship. In the meantime, they often manage to get an education and a job. Many of them end up finding a man who is interested in things other than their similarity to Victoria’s Secret models.

Even though I have not been living in Russia for a long time, I go back on a regular basis. Last year, I was unwillingly exposed to a family reunion. At one point, a distance relative of mine, an accomplished diplomat, asked me what I wanted to do in the future. I told him I was in the process of applying to colleges. He proceeded to ask me what my intended major was. Political science, I said. Everything went quiet. All the patriarchs of the family were looking at me as if I suddenly declared I was a lesbian (another pet peeve in the Russian culture). Then that diplomat relative of mine used the main argument against my career choice: “But you are a WOMAN.”

I was lucky because I did not have to stay in that country. But I can certainly imagine that if I had had to work amongst misogynists like him I might have contemplated going online and posting my profile on one of those online dating websites. Anything to escape a life like that of so many Russian women, so severely and tragically limited by backward perceptions of my gender.

Hot and Sexually Harassed: A Russian Woman Abroad

I saw a new issue of “Playboy” today. I wasn’t looking for one (fake-breasted naked airbrushed females are not really my type), but the 18+ magazines were closest to the entrance of the store where I was hoping to get my daily fix of chocolate . The cover boasted of pictures of 16 hot Russians inside. A couple of other glossy magazines had photographs and headings involving (somewhat dressed) Russian models. So is Russian the new hot?

When I travel, I often experience a strange dichotomy surrounding Russian women. We are supposed to be hot, but easy. Put another way, we are supposed to be hot, but ready to sell ourselves to anyone who comes from a more developed country in the hopes of securing a man who would take us away from the cold Siberian nightmare of our lives. I don’t have a problem with being called hot, it’s the second part of that stereotype that bothers me.

The only country ever to have rejected my visa application was the Philippines. I was going to school in Hong Kong and looking for a place to spend my senior year’s spring break. The Philippines seemed like an interesting option, so I bought a Lonely Planet and went to the embassy. I had a valid student visa in Hong Kong (which is pretty difficult to get in terms of background checks etc), many visas in Asia, plus plenty of other visas from less exotic locales (the visas for which are notoriously difficult to get, e.g, Germany and the US). The embassy’s website suggested I brought along all the usual paperwork — an application, airplane tickets, hotel reservations, and a bank statement, stating I had $200 in my account.

The lady I met at the embassy took one look at my passport. After that, she handed it back to me saying that I wouldn’t be issued a visa. She didn’t bother looking at my paperwork. After I demanded explanation, she said I didn’t have enough money (without even looking at my bank statement). I asked her how much I needed to have in my account. When she said it was $200, I told her I had more than that. Then she said $400. I had that. Then she said, oh wait, it’s $800 for you, without explaining how I was different form other applicants. Well, I had that.
She kept doubling he amount until I asked her if I was ever going to get that damn visa. She said no. So I want and bought a Lonely Planet on Cambodia instead. The vacation was awesome.

It was only later that I realized why I wasn’t issued a visa. It was because I was a Russian, over 18 and unmarried. I am sure that my being blond didn’t help, either. Apparently, many Russian prostitutes use Hong Kong and China as gateways to the Philippines. I can understand why the embassy was prejudiced against Russian females; the problem was that I had a valid and oh-so-hard to get student visa in Hong Kong, not to mention student and tourist visas to other countries Did they really think I had spent several years in comfortable and wealthy Hong Kong, going to one of their most prestigious schools so that I could trick them all and find a very desirable prostitution job in the poor and politically unstable Philippines?

When I was enjoying the aforementioned vacation in Cambodia, a (blonde) Russian-speaking friend of mine and I went to what that Lonely Planet termed “the coolest nightclub in Phnom Penh.” (If anyone is there and looking for a creepy place to meet affluent kids of the corrupted Cambodian politicians and the Western European students sex-touring around Southeast Asia, Heart of Darkness is the place to be). While hanging out with friends, two guys approached us and asked where we were from. They seemed sober (by Southeast Asian standards) and nice and we didn’t feel like leaving just yet, so we decided to be polite and answer. We said we were from Hong Kong. They obviously didn’t believe us. As we showed them our Hong Kong IDs and laughed about it, they asked us where we were actually from. Russia, we said (both of us are not, but it’s easier than explaining all the geopolitical details). The very moment we did, the guys started openly hitting on us in a very feisty manner. We had no choice but to leave.

I went to Thailand for a winter break once. In order to avoid the traditional elephant-riding-beach-strutting-cocktail-drinking
experience, I stayed with a Thai friend and her twin sister. It was great while we stayed in Bangkok and went to several places not frequented by tourists. I experienced the wonderful Thai hospitality, great food (very different from the Americanized kind, let me assure
you) and the joys of communicating with the locals. And then we went to Pattaya. It is a buzzing tourist city located in a lovely part of Thailand. The problem is that it is buzzing with Russians. There are numerous charter flights from Russia and other post-Soviet republics to this city. As I was walking down the street with my Thai friend, her sister and their Thai boyfriend, speaking English to them, I got to hear many catcalls in broken Russian addressed at me. At first, I was puzzled. How did they know I was Russian? I was not wearing a skimpy mini skirt, a bikini top or high heels (a very common uniform for many Russian women in Thailand; I am not being negative, anyone who has been there would confirm this). I was speaking (almost accent-free) English to my friends. So how in the world did they know ?

The answer was simple. There were so many blonde Russian women around that the local machos got accustomed to yelling suggestive phrases in Russian to any remotely blonde female passing by. Apparently, many were quite eager to be entertained by a hot Thai man. No wonder they got excited every time someone blonde passed by. (In defense of Russian women, Russian men acted even worse in Thailand. One got to see many (sadly, mostly Russian-speaking) old, fat, bald, wedding-band-wearing hairy men with two or three Thai girls clinging to them walking the streets of Pattaya).

While there are many Russian women who to go to Thailand to sell themselves, for many, like me, the only sex-related objects of interest are the phallic shrines. Those who fall in the latter category are often victimized by the adventurous local and foreign men. Many of my friends learned to say they are from somewhere else upon being inquired about their country of origin. Germany is always a good choice (many Germans are blond), although Finland (another country with a very blond
population) works best for me. Chances are, no one know enough about Finland or speaks Finnish to find the truth. (Although on a recent flight from Amsterdam to New York, an overly enthusiastic middle-aged man started blabbering away in Finnish; I had to admit I only have Finnish ancestors and don’t speak a language).

I am excited to go back to Hong Kong this summer. It is one of the few cities where there are almost no negative stereotypes about Russian women. But before I get there, I will be carefully hiding my passport and avoiding mention of my Russian nationality to anyone I meet along the way.