Этим небольшим постом я бы хотела открыть рубрику интересных слов и выражений.

Меня всегда интересовали языки, более того, языковые тонкости, которые можно смаковать до бесконечности, поскольку именно они делают язык уникальным, живым и неповторимым.

Сегодня мой язык - французский. После английского, изучение френча это одно удовольствие. Грамматика кружится в вальсе с лексикой, новые фигуры речи как глоток свежего воздуха! Я люблю английский за его прямую простоту, по крайней мере, таков его современный вариант. Французский же совсем другое дело, как русский, он оставляет возможность для маневра, скрытого поддекста, легкой иронии, всего чего так сложно добиться с дубовым английским.

И все же к делу. Слово, которое привлекло мое внимание на этот раз это чаевые. Понятное дело, что это "деньги на чай" по-русски.
По-французски чаевые это pourboire, дословно "на выпивку", то есть французы не так скромны как мы.
По-английски, чаевые это tips, и этимиологический словарь помог мне найти его происхождение. To tip - глагол из воровского жаргона, что-то типа "давать на лапу", потерявший сейчас свой первоначальный смыл.
А в Японии оставлять чаевые не принято, поэтому у них и слова такого нет:)

 

Today I made a very interesting experiment. You should do it too because it's fun: type "to buy" in your own language in google and check out the most popular search results.

For Russian it's "купить" - and here we get the top 5:

1. iPad/ iPhone 4

2. квартира в Москве (apartment in Moscow)

3. диплом (university diploma)

4. доменое имя (domain name)
5. авто (car)

It's interesting, isn't it? Even though a couple iPad and iPhone was even more predictable than Papa Noel for Christmas; some positions leave some place for imagination.

Like let's say university diploma. What the heck with it? Like everything else, education is for sale in Russia. The sites offering "diplomas of the best quality for affordable price" want to inspire you: "You need a social position? You want to build a successful career? Make a step forward to your future - order our diploma. Quality guaranteed." In the end, it doesn't surprise me why some Russian politicians can't spell "Russia" without making a mistake. (it's Rusia for them) :p

For domain name it's a new story. Starting from 11/11/2010 you can register domain names written in Russian (using Cyrillic transliteration). For example http://www.россия.рф/ is a perfectly working url now. This new thing made big agiotage on the web; some lawsuits have already set over it. Like for ownership of "авто.рф" name. Coming back to our Google top 5, you can guess why.

Now you see how one simple google search can tell you something interesting about the country. Especially if this country is Russia!

If you are still having round Matreshka face on your t-shirt/bag/trinket - well, my advise to you - take it off immediately coz it's getting old. Yeah, Matreshka was and always will be the dearest Russian girl but leave it to the tourists and set your eyes on Dymkovskaya igrushka - (Dymkovsky toy) - traditional Russian art - not so well known to the wide public yet. Not yet..

  

Valentin Yudashkin, famous Russian designer was the first to discover this gold mine, presenting collection inspired by colorful toys at the Spring 2011 Haute Couture Week in Paris. 

I think, the designs are just fabulous - joyful and so much fun! Love them!

Russian Language - one of the richest in the world in terms of lexical units, but still there's no decent word for calling your "boyfriend". This problem has been following me all my life.

Really, when you think of it, we have only four words you can use when talking about your sweetheart. That are : парень, молодой человек, мальчик и бойфренд.

Парень  - means "a guy", some male age between 5 and 55. You are joking of course if call someone парень at 55, but still you can. When talking about your boyfriend you can say "мой парень" which would define your rights over him, my guy. Still not so convincing and not elegant at all.

Молодой человек - literally means "young person". Well, sure your boyfriend is young (and handsome) but still you don't want to call your sweetheart a young person, right? But молодой человек is one of the most commonly used words for the "boyfriend" in Russian!!! Sometimes you can see it in magazines written like "мч" (bf) - it's in the abbreviation often used by girls complaining about their мч and asking for advise. In the end, i think, молодой человек is too long word to say.

Мой мальчик - "my boy" - can be referred to a boy between age 1-12 as well as to your boyfriend. Here you always use possessive pronoun "мой" otherwise it'd sound too weird.. Anyway, out of three evils, I think, this is the least one. Actually, I even like how it sound - fond and loving :)

Бойфренд - spelling of "boyfriend" in Cyrillic is the most popular choice among the young people now but since it's not Russian, we won't consider it.

In any case it really bugs me - why oh why there's no decent word in Russian for your dearest one??? One of my friends made a brilliant guess : "Of course there's no "boyfriend" in Russian - because you didn't have one back in history. There were boys and girls and they were brought up separately under the watchful eye of the nannies ; after came time of matchmaking and BOOM you were married at the age of 16 with 17-year-old husband on hands - what boyfriend are you talking about???" 

Maybe she is right, but 100 years could have changed something...

Today I want to post about my personal hero - Natalia Vodianova - Russian supermodel and founder of the Naked Heart Foundation, a philanthropic organisation that builds modern playgrounds in the rural cities of Russia.

Born in Nizhny Novgorod, Natalia Vodianova grew up in a poor district of the city with her mother and two half sisters, one of whom has cerebral palsy. As a teenager, Vodianova helped her mother sell fruits on the street and later set up her own fruit stand with a friend to help her family out of poverty. She couldn't finish school because of that.

At the age of 15, Natalia was advised to enroll in a modelling academy, at 17 was chosen by famous Viva Model agency, getting one-way ticket to Paris.

Natalya raised up on the top modeling industry like a rocket - baby face with the eyes of the wolf. In different periods of her career she worked for Calvin Klein, Louis Vuitton, Yves Saint Laurent, Chanel, L'Oréal, David Yurman, Marc Jacobs and others.

At one of the receptions she met Justin Trevor Berkeley Portman, a British property heir and half-brother of the 10th Viscount Portman. Who said that Cinderella was just a fairy tale? But I guess she's just sick of this comparison already! :) They got married in 2001 in St.Petersburg. Now Natalya is a happy mother or three beautiful kids (and she still keeps working!).

After the birth of the second child, daughter Neva, she founded Naked Heart Foundation, a philanthropic organisation that strives to provide a safe and inspiring environment in which to play for every child living in urban Russia. She was inspired to found the charity after visiting Russia with her son Lucas and finding there were no suitable places for children to play. The organisation built its first play park in Nizhny Novgorod. It has since built nearly 38 more.

In 2010, Natalia Vodyanova became an ambassador for Hear the World, a global campaign that seeks to raise awareness of the topic of hearing and hearing loss and to promote good hearing all over the world.

I have read many publications about Natalya in Russia, of course she is very famous here, as well as her interviews for American Vanity Fair and Vogue. I love this brave woman, because it needs a lot of bravery to do charity in Russia. Sounds paradoxical but true - it needs a lot of bravery to stand against the bureaucracy and the local administration of the rural Russian cities. She also tries not to miss the openings of the playgrounds, visiting every city personally.

Great woman. I want to be like her when I grow up :)

Today I got my friend asking me about Vladivostok - Russia's largest port city, final stop of the 7 day-long Trans-Siberian trip.

And here we go, Vladivostok!

Unfortunately for me, I have never been there - and you can guess why. Born in the middle of Russia - I rarely had the occasion to travel 8000 km to the very Far East of our huge country! Nevertheless, after browsing the web and asking met in Japan aborigines, I came to the conclusion - if you want to try Russia and if you are located in the region (China, Koreas, Japan) - Vladik definitely must be on your program. Even though Vladivostok is much closer to Asia geographically, being mainly packed with right-hand Japanese cars, it still remains true Russian city to it's very core. And you don't want to miss this one!

There are several ways to get to Vladivostok (info from www.waytorussia.net)

Ferries To / From Japan:
From July to October a ferry runs twice a week to Fushiki, near Toyama. Prices go from $230 US (including meals) and higher for the forty-plus hour trip outside the cabin on the deck ($330 US return). Cabins start at $530 US one way and $804 US return. Check out more at www.bisintour.com

Ferries To / From South Korea: 
There are two trips a week in winter, three in summer. Check it out at www.dungchunferry.co.kr

Vladivostok airport
International arrival or departure by air will likely to be through Korea, China, or Japan. You’ll find quite a few flights to various cities in China, and a few per week to Japan and Korea (Seoul, Pusan). Vladivostok Air (http://www.vladavia.ru/avia_eng/) has a flight on Thursdays to Hanoi, Vietnam, returning Fridays.

And of course, it will be the final destination of your grand Trans-Siberian journey around Russia! ;)

Today I got a question about Russia-Japan relations. Hmmm.. Okay, here we go!

In 1701, one unlucky Japanese trading ship got in the storm near Kamchatka, Russian Far East. The crew of the ship and its captain named Denbei (Jap. 伝兵衛) was rescued by native inhabitants. Denbei was conveyed to Moscow for the meeting with Russian Emperor Peter the Great. Peter was impressed by erudition of the guest and ordered to open Japanese language school in Moscow where Denbei was assigned as a senior teacher. Only 35 years later Russian ships for the first time reached Japan.

Throughout the history he relations between the Empire of Japan and the Russian Empire were mostly hostile due to the conflicting territorial expansions of both empires.

The first Russian-Japanese agreement was about the status of Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands in the 1855. Since then political relations between the countries has always been under the shadow of Kuril Islands problem.

The Kuril Islands  is a volcanic archipelago that stretches approximately 1,300 km northeast from Hokkaidō, Japan, to Kamchatka, Russia, separating the Sea of Okhotsk from the North Pacific Ocean. There are 56 islands and many more minor rocks. The islands have rich reserves of mineral resources. There's about 2000 tonnes of Gold, 9000 tonnes of Silver, 40 mln tonnes of Titanium, 273 mln tonnes of Iron.

According to the agreement of 1855, Russia was holding all the islands except for 4 that belonged to Japan. In 1875 Russia gave up all the rights to the Kuril Islands in favor of Japan in exchange of full control over Sakhalin. After defeat of Japan in the World War II, Russia demanded full control over the Kurils. From that time Russia demands that all The Kuril Islands is inseparable territory of Russia. Japan insists that 4 South Kuril islands, historically inhabited by Japanese, belong to Japan.

According to the ITAR-TASS news agency, the new Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan says he will energetically develop political and economic relations with Russia.   

Prime Minister Kan said that he would energetically address Japan’s ties with Russia and would "push the wheels of the cart forward", both in the field of politics and economics, so as to eventually conclude a peace treaty and settle the issue of the northern territories, the biggest problem in Japanese-Russian relations. 

Let's hope for the best because now, in this no-win situation for both countries, it's very difficult if not impossible to to build trustful and friendly relationships between the nations.

In my next posts I will tell more about economical and cultural ties between Russia and Japan.

It's just Russia ...

That's the answer you will probably hear many times trying to solve the mystery of this largest piece of land, where law is not always absolute truth, where you can make friends for life and lose everything playing cards in Trans-Siberian train, where you wake up in the morning and ask yourself a question like "%^$@! and, as a matter of fact, where I am?"

Here in this blog I want to open doors to Russia to my old and new friends. Ask me questions about everything that interests you about Russia - language, culture, food - anything! Let's make this blog happening together!

So here we go!

Welcome to Russia!