Anna King - Russia: The Essential Guide to Customs & Culture

The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes.

Adapted from Marcel Proust, Remembrance of Things Past.

ISBN 978 1 78702 868 5

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A CIP catalogue entry for this book is available from the British Library

First published in Great Britain

by Kuperard, an imprint of Bravo Ltd

59 Hutton Grove, London N12 8DS

Tel: +44 (0) 20 8446 2440

www.culturesmart.co.uk

Inquiries:

Design Bobby Birchall

Printed in Turkey

The Culture Smart! series is continuing to expand. All Culture Smart! guides are available as e-books, and many as audio books. For further information and latest titles visit www.culturesmart.co.uk

ANNA KING is the Russian-born CEO of 3CN Enterprises and a pioneer in the field of cross-cultural risk assessment and management. She advises major corporations, international organizations, and government departments. She has an M.Phil. from Cambridge University and is a visiting lecturer at universities across the globe. Anna has lived and worked in forty-five countries, including Russia, where she worked in Moscow, St. Petersburg, and Siberia. She speaks eight languages and is the author of four books and numerous articles.

GRACE CUDDIHY is a translator and editor with a B.A. in History and Russian from Trinity College Dublin and an M.A. in Russian and Post-Soviet Politics from Londons School of Slavonic and East European Studies. After winning a scholarship to Moscow State University, she worked in Russia as a governess, an English teacher, an editor at The Moscow Times, and a frontline editor and translator at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum. She has been a consultant on the Russian education market, and has run workshops for the Russian Central Bank. Other clients are Skoltech, the Strelka Institute, and the Russian Academy of Sciences.

COVID-19

The coronavirus pandemic of 2020 affected millions of people around the world, causing unprecedented social and economic disruption. As the impact of this global crisis continues to unfold, in many countries social norms are being challenged, and enduring changes will be reflected in future editions of Culture Smart! titles.

Russia is the largest country in the world, and one of the most enigmatic, complex, and difficult countries to write about. Several stereotypical impressions of Russia are imprinted on our psychebe it an unsmiling babushka in a thin, shabby coat and headscarf or a glamorous model swathed in furs; the echoing crunch of boots on parade in Red Square, or the featherlight grace of ballerinas in Tchaikovskys Nutcracker; the gold Rolex of a nouveau riche, or the shining domes of the Sergiyev Posad Lavra, the spiritual center of the Russian Orthodox Church.

Everything in Russia is about contradictions, from its Eurasian geographical position and extremes of climate to its changing living standards and conflicting values.

Russias military and political power, as well as the rich contribution of its art and culture, are the result of an inner dynamic not always understood by outsiders. The Russian language and the Russian Orthodox religion are unique; Russian history is tragic; and the people are unpredictable.

It would, of course, be wrong to generalize or to try to pack 144 million people into a single box, extending from Europe to the Pacific. The Muscovite will not behave in the same way as the Cossack from the southern region of Kuban, the hunter from the Far North, or the factory worker in the Urals. And yet politicians, writers, and philosophers keep returning to the enigma of the Russian soul, and referring to the uniquely Russian way of behavior and development. Despite the undoubted regional differences there is a shared base of history, tradition, and values.

Travelers to Russia seek answers to the same questions: What should I expect? How do I make friends? Are there any particular ways of conducting business? Are there things that I should avoid? This completely revised edition of Culture Smart! Russia sets out to help you become a more perceptive and tolerant traveler, and to make your trip more personally fulfilling. It explores the connections between Russias turbulent past and its paradoxical present. Using illustrative anecdotes it describes present-day values and attitudes, and offers practical advice on what to expect and how to behave in different social circumstances. It aims to reintroduce the Russian people to you, their generosity, what they believe, aspire to, and feel, how they entertain, and how they conduct business. If your curiosity extends beyond matryoshka, troika, and balalaika, this book is for you.

Dobro pozhalovat!