SOURCE: The St. Petersburg Times
DATE: Issue #990 (58), Friday, July 30, 2004
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TITLE: Car Belonging to Missing City Journalist Recovered
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: A car belonging to missing St. Petersburg journalist Maxim Maximov was found parked outside Nakhodka, a store near the St. Petersburg Hotel, the Agency of Journalistic Investigations reports.
Maximov's Ford Escort had been reported missing together with the reporter, who has not been seen since June 29.
It was spotted by a policeman, who said he had started paying attention to cars after he saw a photo of Maximov's car published in newspaper Tainy Sovetnik, the agency said.
The car was covered with dust, indicating it had not been used for a long time. It also appeared that the screw holes to which the license plate is fixedwere slightly damaged, but AJI is not sure this damage is related to Maximov's disappearance.
"The car's alarm was switched on, which suggests Maximov parked it there," Alexander Gorshkov, AJI deputy head, said Thursday in a telephone interview. "The car is covered with dust, but I'd say it hasn't been sitting there a whole month.
"There are no indications that it [Maximov's disappearance] is connected to his professional activity," he said. "And suggestions that it could be related to his reports on the case of [the assassinated State Duma deputy Galina] Starovoitova just sound silly.
"It's a very strange case," Gorshkov added. "Anything is possible and a person could be killed by some damn idiots for 3 rubles, but why would they hid the body? And at the time of the day he disappeared [in the evening], especially."
Interfax reported Thursday that there were signs someone had tried to alter the numbers on the car's engine, which police said was an indication someone had wanted to steal it.
But Gorshkov said the police were mistaken.
Maximov, 41, a special correspondent for the city's Gorod magazine, worked from 1998 until last year for AJI.
The time that Maximov disappeared has been narrowed down to between 7:35 p.m. and 8:25 p.m. when the last call to his cell phone was recorded somewhere within a 300 meter radius of the Chernyshevskaya metro station, journalists investigating the disappearance said at a news conference Wednesday.
A colleague who had earlier arranged a meeting with Maximov at the nearby Kolobok restaurant and was waiting for him there made the call, they said.
AJI journalists searched all yards around the Chernyshevskaya metro station, but found no trace of Maximov.
A cell phone that had belonged to Maximov, but without a SIM-card was found after it was sold on the Yunona market at beginning of July by a young person who probably had some connection to the journalist's disappearance, AJI said.
"[Maximov] could have had no more than $100 to $150 on him," Andrei Konstantinov, head of AJI said at the briefing. "It appears that his money, which he kept in a safe at a bank, has not been touched."
Konstantinov said this contradicted a statement from the City Prosecutor's Office that one of the reasons for Maximov's disappearance could have been an attempt to steal $12,000 in cash that was part of a real estate transaction.
The prosecutor's office has concluded that "Maximov's disappearance has a criminal character," and has opened a case of murder under the Criminal Code.
Fifteen journalists have been killed in Russia since 2000, when President Vladimir Putin came to power, including U.S. citizen and Forbes magazine editor Paul Klebnikov, who was assassinated July 9.
According to the International Committee to Protect Journalists, Russia is in the top 10 most dangerous countries for journalists to work in, a rating it shares with such countries as Cuba, Iraq, Palestine and Zimbabwe.
TITLE: Tourism Surging 1 Year On
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: At the height of the tourist season and a year after St. Petersburg captivated the world as it celebrated its 300th anniversary, top local hotels report high occupancy but warn of more empty rooms in the future.
Lyuba Aprelikova, director of sales and marketing at the 102-room Renaissance St. Petersburg Baltic Hotel, which opened on May 11, said high room rates may keep tourists away, especially without the city promoting itself well.
"Last year was exceptional as everybody could see," Aprelikova said. "Because travel groups had no possibility to come to St. Petersburg in May and June, they postponed their visits to July and August."
To compensate for the reduced revenues, hotels, in general, have raised their rates for the high season this year, she said.
When the Renaissance hotel, part of the Marriott holding, opened, its room rates were listed as $350 per night. Yana Lakizina, PR and marketing manager of the Grand Hotel Europe, said there is a danger that the city in general, will become very expensive. This concerns not only the hotels but also theaters, restaurants and cultural institutions, she said.
Aprelikova said that on some days last month demand for rooms in the top hotels was four to five times more than the rooms they had, but July and August are much slower than last year.
"Speaking to our partners, we receive comments that St. Petersburg has become less popular for several main reasons," Aprelikova said. "As a destination, it is much more expensive in high season than alternative European locations, such as Prague, Berlin, Barcelona; there is still a big challenge in the process of receiving visas for Russia; it is rather problematic to arrange proper tours to the museums, which are overcrowded despite increased prices."
Michael Walsh, general manager of the Angleterre hotel, said occupancy rates are generally holding up against last year - which was much stronger than in 2002.
Lakizina reported an increase in occupancy compared to last year.
"Of course, May and June are higher compared to last year," she said.
Last year officials taking part in the 300th anniversary celebrations made mass bookings for their guests. This meant the hotels had to turn down bookings from private tour groups. But the hotels did not achieve 100-percent occupancy because quite a few of the official guests did not show up.
"In May 2003 we had 63 percent occupancy compared to 78 percent this year and in June 2003 we had 85 percent compared to 90.5 percent this year. This year occupancy is even higher than in 2002, especially June and July: In June 2002, we had 88 percent against 90.5 percent this year," Lakizina said.
Walsh said the city has the attractions to retain its popularity as a fashionable destination - and even grow to become one of the great destinations in Europe - but this will depend on the effort and will of the city.
Thomas Noll, general manager of the Corinthia Nevskij Palace Hotel, said the hotel has been fully booked all summer and the results for the rest of the year have been above expectations.
So where is St. Petersburg heading: is the city going to remain a fashionable destination or is a decline inevitable?
Noll is optimistic. "St. Petersburg will remain fashionable provided the investments for improvements in the city continue," he said.
Most experts agree that for St. Petersburg to maintain its popularity, city authorities should work on easing the visa process and improving safety for tourists.
"It is important that the police would at least clean the main tourist sites from beggars and drunks sleeping on pavements in front of hotels," Noll said.
Ala Osmond, director of sales and marketing at the Astoria hotel listed visas, expensive travel costs and negative press coverage as the top three factors keeping more people from visiting St. Petersburg.
"The visa problem is not as bad as before but expensive flight costs, lack of flights in peak periods and the increasingly negative international coverage of street crime, especially those involving authorities, do affect the situation," Osmond said.
The environment, too, is a focus of complaints. Many travelers are disappointed by the polluted air, the smelly exhaust gases in traffic jams, poor quality of water and garbage piled on the streets.
"Attention must be given to environmental issues, such as garbage removal, car exhaust pollution, and so forth," Noll said.
Leading local hotels are working on various marketing initiatives, participating in large tourist exhibitions, promoting the city as a destination and striving to increase low-season occupancy through the "White Days" program.
But, as Aprelikova said, much more could be achieved on that front, if the tourism sector joined forces with the city authorities.
Europe's Lakizina concurs. "The uncoordinated actions of the participants of the local travel market are leading to a negative image of the city in the eyes of potential visitors," she said. "The city and the hotel should consolidate their budgets in order to promote the city as a destination."
Aprelikova said: "We now are still on the wave of the 300th anniversary popularity, but if the city does not continue to promote itself and if the amount of unsatisfied customers continues to grow, eventually it will result in a decrease in demand."
Osmond said the momentum built up by the anniversary should not be allowed to die.
"I also think that the world has become a far smaller place - there are many places people will not travel to for fear of safety, and people are constantly looking for a new travel experience."
Osmond said Russia needs to be promoted comprehensively.
"Until a Russian Tourist Board is created, we won't be able to offer a consistent message," she said. "If left to the city alone, there should be more recognition of the importance of tourism for the economy of the entire city - not just hotels and other businesses involved."
Alexander Prokhorenko, head of the external relations committee of the city government, told reporters last month that tourism revenues - including both incoming and outgoing tourism - account for 10 percent of the city budget. This figure was calculated on the basis of taxes paid by tourism companies in the city, he said.
However, his mention of how important it is to the city didn't stop local authorities from slashing the city budget for tourism development in 2004 by more than 80 percent, with just $200,000 to be spent promoting the city this year.
Angleterre's Walsh said there is a strong need for a proper tourist board that is funded properly.
"There is no need to reinvent the wheel - just copy what cities such as London or Paris have done," Walsh suggests. "Even an old industrial town in England such as Manchester has put into place a good tourist board and their tourism has boomed - think what we could do here!"
TITLE: Prosecutors Asked to Probe Ultranationalist Newspaper
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: St. Petersburg city prosecutors are being asked to investigate an ultra-nationalist newspaper that printed articles identified by slain city racism expert Nikolai Girenko as breaking laws on inciting racial hatred.
A statement by a nationalist group called Russian Republic, which claimed responsibility for Girenko's murder, said his evidence about the newspaper's articles was one of the reasons why the group had sentenced him to death.
Girenko, head of the St. Petersburg Commission for the Rights of National Minorities, was shot through the door of his city apartment on June 17.
Ruslan Linkov, head of the city branch of the Democratic Russia party, has asked prosecutors to investigate newspaper Nashe Otechstvo, or Our Fatherland, which Linkov says is openly anti-Semitic.
"On the first page of the paper, right under its logo there are the words that appear to be the slogan of the National Mighty Party of Russia, which says 'National Mighty Party of Russia is the party of those who are ready to fight against the Jewish yoke,'" Linkov wrote in his letter to prosecutors.
"The first column on page 2 of the paper contains an assertion that [President Vladimir] Putin chooses [members of the government] depending on whether they are Jewish or Freemasons' and there is an assertion that 'citizen Putin was appointed to be Russian President by a Zionist Council'" he added.
It is Linkov's second attempt to get city prosecutors to clamp down on the paper.
"Last month I sent them a letter, but the prosecutor's office redirected it to the local office of the Culture and Press Ministry, which has done nothing about it," Linkov said Wednesday in an interview. "Now I have filed another request to the prosecutor's office asking it to open a criminal case. According to the law they have to initiate a case or give a reason to refuse. We'll see how it goes."
Previous examinations of articles published in the paper have resulted in Nashe Otechstvo editor Yevgeny Shchekotikhin being prosecuted.
Launched in January 1993 by Shchekotikhin, a St. Petersburg-based publisher, Nashe Otechestvo has a circulation of 3,500 copies. It is not clear how frequently the paper is published. It prints no contact information except for a mailbox of the state postal service. Shchekotickhin could not be reached for comment.
In 1997, an investigation by the prosecutor's office found that Shchekotikhin had incited racial hatred in his publication, but he was pardoned under an amnesty issued in connection with the 50th anniversary of World War II. In 1998, a city court issued an official warning to Shchekotikhin after examining another article published in Nashe Otechestvo.
Girenko provided expert evaluations in both cases.
"Girenko N.M., a dedicated and incorrigible enemy of the Russian people, has been convicted and will suffer the maximum penalty, execution," says Conviction No. 1 issued by the self-styled military court of the Russian Republic, posted on pro-Kremlin Strana.ru web site.
The statement is dated June 12.
The conviction was signed by Vladimir Popov, who calls himself the supreme leader of the Russian Republic. In an interview given to local media, Popov said the statement was merely a sentence and the organization had no connection to the killing. He was, nevertheless, glad that someone had carried out the sentence, he added.
The City Prosecutor's Office has said the sentence would be used in the investigation of Girenko's murder, but no one has yet been charged with the murder.
Almost a week after Linkov's second request was issued, the prosecutor's office department that deals with cases of national hatred said it had not received it.
"I don't know what would be done with that. I have not received anything like this yet," said Sergei Zelentsov, the city prosecutor's senior assistant, said Wednesday in a telephone interview.
Zelentsov refused to comment further.
"Prosecutors could say the reason they are not active enough is that the current legislation on the issue is not perfect," Yuly Rybakov, a former State Duma lawmaker who dealt with human rights issues at the Duma from 1993 to 2003, said Wednesday in a telephone interview.
"I remember that when we were filing draft amendments on the section on national hatred in the Criminal Code we faced constant resistance from both the Kremlin and the General Prosecutor's Office," he said.
Rybakov said authorities have succeeded in blurring the legislation with amendments that make it difficult to convict people of race-based crimes.
"The law doesn't give an exact definition of nationalism and national hatred," he said. "As for convictions, people can be prosecuted only for inciting someone to kill somebody and it has to be shown that the instigation was made to a specific killer."
"But I'm sure if somebody showed up on the street with a poster saying 'Kill the President,' the prosecutor's office would find legal reasons to detain that person immediately," Rybakov added.
TITLE: No Show by Yabloko Activists
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW - Young activists from the Yabloko party, who were detained Tuesday for staging an unsanctioned protest at FSB headquarters, refused to show up for a court hearing Wednesday, Ekho Moskvy radio reported.
"It's our own form of protest," Ilya Yashin, the head of Yabloko's youth wing, told the radio station. "The way we were detained ... was not compatible with any legal norm."
Two young Yabloko party activists Alexei Kozhin, 19, and Irina Vorobyova, 21, were hospitalized from injuries sustained during their detention by the FSB, Yabloko spokesman Sergei Kozakov said.
Yashin was among nine demonstrators detained out of the 15 who participated.
NTV television footage showed protesters throwing balloons filled with red paint at a plaque on the building's wall honoring Yury Andropov, a former KGB chief and Soviet leader.
They also unfurled a banner reading, "Down With Police Autocracy."
TITLE: Pensioners, Veterans Rally for Benefits
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - A gray-haired crowd of more than 2,000 protesters - many of them ill and impoverished and some in wheelchairs - gathered Thursday on Ploshchad Revolutsii to demand that the government abandon plans to convert their Soviet-style social benefits into cash payments.
Protesters rallied in the hammering July sun for more than an hour, holding placards that called the government's legislation "genocide." A World War II veteran waved a sign that read, "Hitler took our youth, Yeltsin and Putin took our old age."
Pensioners and veterans were joined by disabled people and hundreds of Chernobyl cleanup workers, who were bused into Moscow from cities as far away as Arkhangelsk and Rostov-on-Don. They were exposed to heavy radiation when cleaning up after the 1986 nuclear disaster, and are currently entitled to free medical care, public transportation and vacations in sanitoriums.
Another group came to raise awareness about the needs of those affected by another nuclear disaster at a secret weapons facility known as Mayak in 1957.
The protest also drew supporters of every major political party except United Russia. Police said there were at least 2,500 people on the square across from the State Duma.
Thursday's rally was the second this month against legislation that would cancel benefits for some of the poorest sectors of the population. The benefits would be replaced with direct monthly payments of 800 rubles ($27) to 3,500 rubles ($120), but many fear the money would not make up for the lost privileges.
The Duma has passed the legislation in a first reading and is scheduled to vote in the key second reading next week.
Government officials say that cash payments would be more fair because not everyone can take full advantage of the free services.
Some political analysts say public outrage over the bill is seriously damaging Putin's popularity. The president's approval rating dipped below 50 percent earlier this month for the first time since his election in 2000, according to a poll by the Public Opinion Foundation.
Some protesters had more general grievances. Alexei Konyashin, a 19-year-old student with a two-day beard, carried a sign that read simply, "I Hate Putin."
Vyacheslav Shutkov, 62, was among the former Mayak workers who joined the protest.
"I think the castrophe at Mayak is more terrible than Chernobyl, simply because nobody knows about it," he said. "Everything's been covered up. We don't get any benefits."
An explosion in 1957 at the top-secret nuclear weapons plant spread a radioactive cloud over hundreds of kilometers in the Urals.
TITLE: Many Support Censorship
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW - Seventy-one percent of ordinary Russians and 41 percent of journalists say they would approve of some media censorship, a new study by polling agency Romir Monitoring says.
Such high numbers suggest that censorship is not taken to mean a resurrection of black marker-wielding censors who dictated to newsrooms what could and could not be printed.
Instead, according to a Romir spokesman cited by Vremya Novostei on Wednesday, what people support is censorship against pornography; in other words, "moral-ethical censorship."
Boris Makarenko, of the Center for Political Technologies, told the newspaper this is largely due to a lack of tolerance for "deviant behavior." For example, he said, "Many who say they are for censorship don't want to see homosexuals on television, at least not before midnight."
The study comes in startling contrast to the 29th article of the Constitution, which guarantees a lack of censorship, Romir general director Andrei Milyokhin told reporters this week.
The 20-page study, available in Russian on the site www.romir.ru, indicates that journalists are more pessimistic than the population at-large when it comes to freedom of speech in Russia today: 42 percent of ordinary Russians and 78 percent of journalists worry that the media are not sufficiently free.
TITLE: IN BRIEF
TEXT: Lessons in Smiling?
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) -Russians and citizens of St. Petersburg smile far too little, Interfax quoted writer Danil Granin as saying Thursday at a roundtable on the theme of "Gloomy St. Petersburg: why its citizens smile so little.
Granin said that a smile is acquired and that people need to learn good manners before they will see smiles around them, the report said.
Producer Andrei Maximov said "a smile is a national idea and we need to organize an national advertising campaign around it."
Actor Oleg Basilashvili said people's smiles were genuine on Victory Day in 1945, but people use smiles to distance themselves from reality, the report said.
City Crime Rate Rises
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - The number of crimes registered in St. Petersburg rose 9 percent in the first half of 2004, Interfax reported Tuesday.
The 461 murders committed in the first six months, represented a 24.6 percent increase on last year, Interfax quoted deputy city prosecutor Alexander Zhukov as saying.
Zhukov said about 40 percent of murders are domestic-related and committed by people intoxicated with alcohol. About 70 percent of crimes are solved, he added.
Easier Privatization
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - The government plans to introduce amendments to the law on privatization to make the process of privatizing the nation's cultural heritage easier, Interfax reported Thursday.
Economic Development and Trade Minister German Gref was quoted as saying special auctions that would allow the government to earn more from privatization should be held.
Gref said amendments allowing this to happen should become law by the end of this year.
Robbery Suspect Held
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - St. Petersburg police have detained a 29-year-old city resident on suspicion of robbing a citizen of Cameroon, Interfax reported Thursday.
Police said the victim was attacked last Friday at 2 a.m. The foreigner had flagged down a gypsy cab on Ulitsa Laboratornaya. The driver, Vladimir Gorelov, let the passenger get into the car, then threatened him at knifepoint, and extorted 3,000 rubles ($100) from him, the report said.
Hummers Go on Sale
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - St. Petersburg's exclusive dealer of Hummer H2, OOO Atlant-M-Baltika, began sales of Hummer cars in St. Petersburg on Thursday, Interfax reported.
Hummers are assembled at the Avtotor plant in Kaliningrad, in a form adapted to Russian conditions. About 60 Hummers are to be delivered to St. Petersburg by the end of the year.
Avtotor started mass production of Hummer-2s last month, under the agreement with General Motors corporation. The minimum price of such autos is $86,500.
Call to Unify Rent, Fees
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - City officials want rental payments to incorporate the payments for communal housing services, Interfax reported Thursday.
Sergei Sevryukov, head of the city property department in the city's Kirov district, said that people who have communal debts usually also have rent arrears to pay.
The chief district accountant Larisa Yegorenkova said apartments, whose residents have owed debts on communal services for 2 1/2 years, should be sold to pay the debt.
TITLE: Putin Aide Named Head of Rosneft
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - The man widely believed to have spearheaded the legal assault on Yukos was handed the chairmanship of Rosneft on Tuesday, just as Russia's last state-owned oil major appears to be positioning itself for the upcoming forced-liquidation of Yukos' main production unit.
Igor Sechin, who has worked with Putin for a decade and is now the deputy head of his administration, replaces former energy minister Igor Yusufov. Sechin joined the 11-member board of Rosneft, the nation's seventh largest crude producer at 400,000 barrels a day, last month.
Political and market analysts alike said the appointment is a clear signal from the Kremlin that intends to further tighten its grip on big business in general and the oil industry in particular.
"Sechin's appointment can mean only one thing - that the state is now officially increasing its influence over business structures," said Alexei Mukhin, head of Center for Political Information think tank.
Sechin has been "actively lobbying" Rosneft's interests for the last year, Mukhin said.
Kremlin-friendly companies such as Gazprom, Rosneft and Surgutneftegaz are considered to be the top contenders for Yuganskneftegaz, which accounts for 60 percent of Yukos' total production and 10 percent of Russia's. The government last week froze the company's shares and announced that it would soon sell them to pay off Yukos' $7 billion back-tax bill.
"It all becomes clear if you remember those telephone conversations that Sechin and [Rosneft CEO Sergei] Bogdanchikov had a year ago," said independent political analyst Andrei Piontkovksky.
Last July, Kompromat.ru published what it claimed were transcripts of conversations between the two in which Sechin promises to "take care of the chief," referring to jailed Yukos founder Mikhail Khodorkovsky.
Although relatively small compared to Yuganskneftegaz, Rosneft, which has long been considered nothing but "the remnants [of the old oil monopoly] that nobody wanted," has recently "developed an identity," said Steven O'Sullivan, co-head of research at investment bank United Financial Group.
O'Sullivan said Sechin's appointment "makes Rosneft a definite contender" for Yuganskneftegaz and any other Yukos asset that becomes available. "[It] reflects government's interest in Rosneft as a vehicle for the state" he said.
Mukhin went further, predicting that Rosneft and state-owned gas monopoly Gazprom, which are already working closely together on a number of projects, will end up with as much as 80 percent of Yukos.
"If until today Rosneft's plans [to buy Yukos assets] were nothing but a rumor, now I have no doubt it will happen," Mukhin said.
Rosneft secured a $500 million syndicated loan from ABN Amro at the end of May, fueling speculation that it was gearing up to take over parts of Yukos, but the company has repeatedly denied having acquisition plans.
In March, Rosneft allegedly borrowed an additional $450 million from Sberbank, Vedomosti reported, but the company refused to confirm or deny it.
TITLE: 2005 Privatization Target Confirmed at $1.4Bln
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - The government expects privatization to bring in at least 40 billion rubles ($1.38 billion) next year, the Economic Development and Trade Ministry said Wednesday.
That sum includes the sale of a yet-to-be-specified stake in state-controlled telephone giant Svyazinvest. The Cabinet will discuss the 2005 privatization plan Thursday, though decisions related to Svyazinvest may follow later in the year, said Yevgeny Ditrikh, deputy head of the ministry's department of property and land relations. The state expects to receive at least $1 billion for a stake in Svyazinvest, he said.
According to various proposals under discussion, the stake could be anywhere from 25 percent to 75 percent minus one share. In 1997, Mustcom, a consortium led by financier George Soros and Interros head Vladimir Potanin, paid $1.875 billion for 25 percent plus one share in Svyazinvest. Earlier this year, Soros reportedly sold at least part of his stake in Mustcom to New York-based billionaire Len Blavatnik for about $700 million.
Overall, the government is considering the privatization of 1,324 state-owned enterprises and stakes it holds in 566 joint-stock companies. But the lion's share of expected revenues will come from only a handful of sales. The main cash generators - aside from the Svyazinvest stake - are expected to be the sales of a 17.81 percent stake in Magnitogorsk Iron and Steel Works for at least 8 billion rubles ($275 million); a 20 percent stake in Novorossiisk Sea Trading Port for 3 billion rubles; and a 20 percent stake in Tuapse Trading Port on the Black Sea for 900 million rubles.
Although not included in the 2005 privatization plan, Ditrikh said the government is not ruling out the sale of its 51.17 percent share in Aeroflot. It was unclear Wednesday when this decision will be made. In the financial sector the government is considering selling a number of stakes including 75 percent of Transkreditbank, which serves Russian Railways Co., and 25 percent plus one share of insurer Rosgosstrakh, Interfax reported, citing the text of the 2005 privatization plan. The rest of Rosgosstrakh is controlled by Troika Dialog investment bank.
TITLE: Beer Festival to Support Local Brews
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: Only local breweries will be allowed to participate in the sixth St. Petersburg Beer Festival, which is expected to attract over 150,000 people to Krestovsky Island on Saturday.
This is the first year that imported beer will be excluded, which should aid the promotion of St. Petersburg's numerous brands, Yury Rakov, deputy head of the city government's committee for economic development said Wednesday at a news conference. The beer industry rakes in over 4 percent of the annual revenue to the city budget, Rakov said.
The festival does not bring profits to the brewing companies, said Andrei Rukavishnikov, marketing director of Baltika, one of the festivals four main sponsors.
No sales revenues made at the festival can cover the enormous organizing costs, and the festival is rather a "charity event," Rukavishnikov said. It is a gift that the leading breweries will be happy to continue presenting to the city, he said. Rukavishnikov refused to reveal Baltika's expenditure on the festival.
The festival's other sponsors are Vena Brewing Co., Stepan Razin, and Heineken, represented by its Russian brand Bochkaryov.
PIVOGRAD
Each brewery will occupy a quarter of the festival's total area, called Pivograd, or Beer Town. Baltika's quarter will feature Baltika No.3, Russia's most popular beer, according to the Moscow Festival's survey polls, and Baltika No.8, which won the 2004 Brewing Industry International Awards held this May in London. Baltika's Parnas brand, previously available only in bottles, will be offered in barrels.
Baltika's quarter will also have St. Petersburg's Zenit club give a master class as part of the festival's program.
Baltika produced 16 million hectoliters of beer last year, 1 million out of which were exported, with the company accounting for 22 percent of the Russia's beer market.
Vena, co-owned by Baltic Beverages Holding and Carlsberg Breweries A/S with 49.9 percent each, will offer Nevskoye Light, Russia's first low-calorie brand, targeted at female consumers.
Accounting for nearly half of the city's beer sales, Vena will also offer its recent hits - premium Triumph, non-alcoholic Kronverk, Tuborg Green and the light-alcoholic beverage Morsberry.
The city's oldest brewery, Stepan Razin, will feature its Petrovskoye brand, which accounts for 18 percent share of St. Petersburg's sales, Razin's PR manager Vladimir Gronsky said. Stepan Razin, marking its 210-anniversary next year, views the festival as the start of the company's celebration season.
Named after a famous Russian rebel who lived at the dawn of the Romanov dynasty, Stepan Razin will offer festival visitors the chance to have their pictures taken with a stylization of Razin throwing a kidnapped Persian princess in the Volga River.
Meanwhile, Vena invited Triplex to perform sound tracks to the nation's newly beloved bandit epics, Brigade and Boomer.
DRINKING CULTURE
"The beer festival should help improve the city's culture of beer drinking," said Batika's Rukavishnikov. In the West, he said, 40 percent of beer is consumed at pubs.
St. Petersburg still lacks a corresponding number of outdoor cafes and good pubs, Rukavishnikov said. The situation is changing for the better as breweries heavily invest in summer pavilions, providing them free of charge to the beer dealers.
Both Baltika and Vena, headquartered in St. Petersburg, view Moscow as their next strategic market.
Baltika, Vena and Heineken reported their growth rates largely exceed the national industry growth rates. At Baltika alone, the sales went up 14 percent in the second quarter of 2004 compared to the same period last year, while the national market's growth rates merely crossed the mark of 6.8 percent.
TITLE: Faltering Real Estate Prices Pose Questions
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: The city's consumer real estate price growth has slowed down, said St. Petersburg Realty, a real estate agency monitoring the market.
It will become clear at the end of August - beginning of September whether this is a stable pattern or a temporary phase, analysts say.
St. Petersburg Realty's overview of the past six months in the local market, named the traditional seasonal demand decline, the overheated growth rates - 40 percent per year, according to Business News Agency - and the recent banking crisis, as the causes of the present slowdown. The market of newly built housing reacted promptly, while the secondary market was more inert.
The slowdown was abrupt, but not unexpected, the overview said. By the beginning of autumn, with the seasonal factor out of the game, the true picture will be restored. St. Petersburg Realty predicts the price growth to resume, but at a slower pace of 1.5 to 2 percent per month.
Over the previous period of active price growth during the past two years, the city real estate market became very unbalanced, which led to a difference of up to $350 per square meter between comparable apartments.
The situation was aggravated by the recent regulations requiring construction companies to pay infrastructure fees and sell at least 10 percent of the new apartments to the city, which left no room for price maneuvers, the overview said.
The amount of construction in the city may decrease and move to the Oblast. Within a few years, economy class housing construction projects may be launched in Murino, Kudrovo and Vsevolozhsk, following the experience of the Moscow region that ranks second in Russia in construction rates after Moscow.
The demand in the secondary land market, where speculative offers may prove more interesting to investors than the land offered at the official auctions, is also expected to grow.
The pressing issue in St. Petersburg today is the lack of housing loans, leading construction companies to invent surrogate schemes to replace financial institutes, St. Petersburg Realty said. The present banking system, "getting itself into a tizzy," is unable to cultivate trust among private investors, the overview said.
In the opinion of Western experts, Russia is distancing itself from the course of essential reforms in the banking sector.
The Central Bank will be paying 100,000 rubles (2,750 euros) to the clients of those banks that went bankrupt during the latest banking crisis, called a "psychosis" by the Union of Russian Banks.
Meanwhile, weak banks should have been altogether cleared from the market, a German financial daily Handelsblatt wrote last week. Out of 1,329 Russian banks, two thirds do not make profits. The rest receive revenues from non-transparent financial operations abroad. According to Handelsblatt's data, 400 financial institutions providing loans in the country do not have the required net worth of at least 1 billion euros.
"Should the necessary [capital] concentration be delayed even further, the economy will see no real growth," said Christof Ruehl, World Bank's expert on Russia.
TITLE: Oblast Doubts Rosneft Plans
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: Leningrad Oblast administration said it doubts that oil major Rosneft will stick to its plans of building an oil treatment plant and terminal in the area.
"It's been over a year since the agreement for construction was signed by the administration and the two participating companies, Rosneft and Surgutneftegaz, "said the Oblast Vice Governor Grigory Dvas in a statement on Tuesday. "Up until May we saw Rosneft's representatives actively working with the administration staff, but now they've disappeared," he said.
Rosneft's representatives said that the decision about the company's plans in the Oblast rests heavily with the second project partner. Surgutneftegaz said in May that the company is canceling its construction plans, because it did not consider the project's $3.5 billion investment economically justifiable.
"We did not receive an official notification from Surgut, and for now I can not say that our plans in the area have changed," said Rosneft's PR representative Dmitry Panteleyev to Delovoi Peterburg on Thursday.
TITLE: Beer Producers and Ad Agents Agree on Social Responsibility
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: A social partnership agreement was signed in Moscow on Thursday between the Union of Russian Brewers and Russian Communication Agents Association or RCAA.
The Union of Russian Brewers, which encompasses over 80 percent of the country's beer manufacturers and the RCAA, with 100 advertising agencies as members, agreed to "voluntarily accept the obligations to make their marketing more socially responsible." The obligations will include a ban on appealing to audiences below 18 and drawing direct comparisons between beer drinking and social status, physical and mental abilities.
The agreement was signed as an alternative to the government's bill limiting beer advertisement, to be passed in its second reading at the State Duma on Saturday.
"Neither brewers, nor advertisement experts were consulted before the new bill was developed. As a result, we may get yet another law that is impossible to apply," said Baltika's marketing director Andrei Rukavishnikov.
Among other things, the bill prohibits the use of human and animal images in beer advertisement.
The Union of Russian Brewers includes over 100 brewers. In late 2001, Sun Interbrew, Indian-Belgian-owned second largest brewery in Russia, was expelled from the Union for its aggressive television commercials of the Klinskoye beer brand.
TITLE: Baltika Opens A Glasgow Spot
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: St. Petersburg-based Baltika, Russia's leading brewery, and its British partner CPL Entertainment plan to open a pub in Glasgow in September, Vedomosti reported Wednesday.
CPL Entertainment, an owner of six pubs in Glasgow, will invest $3 million in the project with an expected payback period of about 36 months. Baltika will supply the beer.
The pub, called Stavka, will be able to accommodate up to 600 people and sell the brewery's leading Baltika No. 3 beer for $5.5 a pint, which is about 15 percent higher than the price for a pint of a British beer.
If the venture is successful, Baltika may open up to 30 pubs in Great Britain by the end of 2005, Vedomosti quoted Baltika's export director Dmitry Kistev.
TITLE: FSB Not Taking Its Terrorism Alarms Seriously
TEXT: For more than a week, national and local media have been kicking around news of a possible imminent attack by Chechen terrorists on a St. Petersburg clinic or hospital, according to a recent FSB warning.
Television and newspapers tell chilling tales of how hospital staff around the city are on high alert and show policemen guarding entrances with machineguns, training exercises on how to bolster security if there are explosions. They quote nurses who reported to the police that they "saw two men looking like they came from Caucasus, filming the building with a camera from a Lada car."
This would all have to be taken seriously if I did not believe that law enforcement agencies are merely manipulating the public. Unfortunately, that is what I thought after watching the NTV evening news on Monday.
One report showed a policeman stopping an ambulance as it drove up to a hospital. He opened a door, glanced inside for not more than 3 seconds and let it drive on. He didn't bother to check if there was something suspicious under the seats or look under the car, which is one of the most important things to do in such conditions.
It is widely known that in order to do this security units have special mirrors that allow checking if anything is hidden on the bottom of the chassis. But, apart from carrying guns and having an extremely serious expression on their faces, the police don't appear to be taking any threat seriously.
Another weird thing happened when I tried to get comment on the issue from the local FSB, which local media said was the source of the warning.
My attempt to get hold of FSB officials early on Friday afternoon failed in a way that I can't explain.
I tried seven different numbers, including those of the FSB press service, the reception desk of the St. Petersburg and Leningrad Oblast FSB head, the anti-terrorism department, and the duty officer.
Nobody picked up the phone.
One could have a guessed that they were all out of the office providing anti-terrorism measures, but where was the officer on duty, who has to receive reports from St. Petersburg citizens on any suspicious things they noticed in the city and hand over the information to responsible officials?
I began to think that my phonebook was out of date, but, after checking against the most recent one, I saw the numbers have not changed. Another guess could be that all the local FSB officials took sudden holidays and went to their dachas outside of the city for their own safety.
Another explanation could be that the "terrorist alert" is just a large-scale training operation initiated by local special security forces to justify their work.
This is what had been suggested this week by Fontanka.ru website, which is usually well informed about the activity of the city's law enforcers.
The site says the local FSB leaked the warning, not only to check if the public is prepared for terrorist attacks, but also to see the reaction in the media. At the same time, Fontanka.ru points out the police was probably not informed that this was an exercise and treated the information as if the threat is real.
This interpretation seems to be credible when one considers the behavior of the FSB in many cases of its recent history.
It is enough to remember the "training" incident of 1999 in the city of Ryazan when bags that allegedly contained explosives were found in an apartment building and people evacuated in the middle of the night.
There are still as many questions about this case as about the whole story of explosions of apartment blocks in Volgodonsk and Moscow that killed more than 300 civilians the same year. One thing is clear: The FSB is very good at staging different questionable situations.
If that is the case, my suggestion to FSB staff is to leave an officer on duty while they are all away, at least and do not deal with hexogen in populated areas.
Use sugar only, please.
TITLE: finland's musical, magical castle
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: SAVONLINNA, Finland - When you see the rotund towers of Olavinlinna, even from far away, you feel the magic instantly. The closer you get, the stronger the vibe, and when you finally enter this magnificent 15th century castle looming above a tiny island in Savonlinna, Southern Finland, you are dying to know the story.
Every summer, the imposing castle houses the month-long Savonlinna Opera Festival, Finland's prime annual operatic event, and one of the most renowned opera events around the world. This year, the event stretches from July 9 through Aug. 7. With shows performed in the castle's large courtyard, surrounded by turrets and bastions, and serene views over the Saimaa Lake, the festival, delicately juxtaposing art, history and nature could hardly have a better setting.
And when the guide tells you that Olavinlinna, with its distinct medieval feel, romantic and mystical flair, has the most poetic legend behind it, you already feel prepared.
Sanna Vainikainen, a tri-lingual guide at the castle, said the legend dates back to the 15th or 16th century, when Olavinlinna was controlled by Swedes and tells the love story of a Swedish girl and a Russian officer.
Ingel, the daughter of the castle's Swedish commandant, was in love with a handsome Russian officer. A jealous and unsuccessful rival, a Swedish officer at the castle, found out about the romance and staged a trick against the lovers. He set the castle's gate ajar to lure the Russians into the fortress. The Russians fell for the bait and launched an attack but predictably failed as the evil man was watching them from the start and raised the alarm in time.
The investigation as to who could have opened the door yielded no result yet Ingel's affair with the Russian officer became public. The girl was declared guilty and buried alive in the castle wall.
Mysteriously, decades later a rowanberry tree grew from the castle's vertical wall, a dozen meters above the ground. It was then people remembered that the girl had been bricked up in the wall with a branch of rowanberry tree in her hand.
"We believe that its white flowers symbolize Ingel's innocence, while the red berries stand for her blood," Vainikainen said. "The tree grew over three meters high but broke off during a severe storm in 1950s. Amazingly, people who once saw it, still come back and often ask about it."
The ghost balcony peering over the Olavinlinna's main hall, is associated with the doomed lovers. As the story has it, every full moon, nearing midnight, the pair are seen meeting on the gallery.
Vainikainen said the couple don't actually reveal themselves and keep quiet. "Those who sense their presence, just tell us that they strongly felt there was someone else at the hall," the guide explains. "Some of our staff heard random squeaks and rustles on the balcony but the main thing is that special chilly feeling."
The fortress was founded in 1475 by a Danish knight Eik Axelsson Tott, and takes its name from St. Olav, the castle's patron saint. On St. Olav's Day, July 29, entrance is free to the castle but be warned that it gets very crowded.
"The main purpose of the castle was that it originally served as a junction for the Swedish-Danish union to be more protected from the Slavic principalities," Vainikainen said.
But throughout its history the fortress changed hands several times, first going to the Russians in 1714, when it was conquered by the army of Peter the Great.
The Russians added much to the castle including several bastions and one fort, named after renowned commander Alexander Suvorov, who served there for about two years in late 18th century. Since 1973 the castle has been connected to the mainland by a pontoon bridge; before then it could only be reached by boat and was well protected.
"Even a frog couldn't jump into this castle," Field Marshall Suvorov said of Olavinlinna. Interestingly enough, these days the Suvorov bastion serves as a dressing room for performers at the opera festival which now brings fame to the castle, and audiences are not allowed to enter it. Legends abound about this bastion too. The castle had a ram as its mascot, and once upon a time the enemy attempted to sneak into the fortress and attack it. But a storm suddenly struck, and lightning razored the sky, exposing the castle's walls. The enemy saw a horned ram, took it for for the devil personified, and ran away.
In 1809, when Finland was annexed by the Russian Empire, the castle lost its military importance, and since 1847 served only civilian purposes. It has hosted the Savonlinna Opera festival, one of the oldest in Europe, since 1912.
Initially called a "Singing Festival", it was established by renowned Finnish soprano Aino Ackte, who first encountered the castle in 1907 when she attended a patriotic meeting there. The singer's trained ear immediately recognized the tremendous potential of the romantic, excellently preserved castle in both atmospheric and acoustic terms.
Ackte's original brainchild, however, didn't survive the First World War but was revived in 1967 as the Savonlinna Music Days festival.
Now, the one-month-long festival is a prestigious European musical event, showcasing fresh interpretations of operatic jewels, like Verdi's "Aida," Wagner's "The Flying Dutchman," and Offenbach's "The Tales of Hoffmann," as well as unveiling contemporary Finnish classical music.
The courtyard-turned-hall, accommodating 2,200 people, is covered by a moveable plastic roof first installed in 1987. Not only does it protect audiences from intrusive mosquitos but plays a key role in the venue's amazing acoustics. Paavo Suokko, the festival's senior adviser, said the roof cost 2.5 million euros to make, and an additional 300,000 euros is spent every spring to re-mount it after a winter break. "The echo in the hall is 1.8 seconds, which is ideal for opera, and we are very proud of the acoustics," Suokko said. "The words can be distinguished very well from any seat."
Here in St. Petersburg, the artistic director of the Mariinsky Theater, Valery Gergie, admitted at a recent news conference that it was the example of Savonlinna that inspired him to organize performances in historical castles and monasteries in the outskirts of the city including at the Vyborg Castle, the Ivangorod Fortress and the Uspensky Monastery in Tikhvin. Visually, the Mariinsky shows have been typically successful yet the poor acoustics at the locales has sometimes destroyed the performances. For the performance of Rimsky-Korsakov's "The Tale of the Invisible City of Kitezh" in Tikhvin, earler this month, the artists even had to use microphones.
Every year in Savonlinna meanwhile, the festival welcomes up to 60,000 people. About 80 percent are Finns but the event is quickly gaining international recognition. People speaking German, English, French, Italian and Russian can be heared during the interval.
The festival's symphony orchestra, assembled from the country's finest musicians, does some touring outside the festival, which also helps to establish contacts with other companies.
"Every year we have a guest company, which brings over both their national operas and works from the classical operatic repertoire," said Jukka Pohjolainen, marketing director of the Savonlinna Opera Festival. "The Mariinsky Theater performed here in 1995 and 1996, while this year we have the Latvian National Opera. Latvia joined the European Union this year, and this invitation is our welcome gesture into the cultural integration."
The town of Savonlinna, noted for its spa and peaceful scenery, was a popular resort among wealthy Russians before the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917. These days Russians are, once again, waking up to the lake region's treasures.
Moscow's Bolshoi Theater launched its own event in the Olavinlinna castle three years ago: during the first week of June the Muscovites come to the shores of Saimaa Lake for an annual ballet fiesta, showcasing their most acclaimed productions. As Paavo Suokko points out, getaway trips from St. Petersburg are becoming more and more common, with Russians becoming interested in renting local dachas.
"In terms of culture you surpass us, but in terms of nature we are stronger, " Suokko smiles, referring to parallels and ties between St. Petersburg and Savonlinna.
The region's environment is reminiscent of landscape of Karelia, yet the lakes (there are 60,000 of them in the area) are surprisingly blue. Hedgehogs and squirrels cross the road side by side with locals. It is so peaceful that, remarkably enough, Savonlinna dogs don't seem to bark. "They are brought up that way - not to disturb the people around," explains Irina Santto, a Finnish diplomat in St. Petersburg. "This spirit of respect does make a difference."
Links: http://www.operafestival.fi
TITLE: chernov's choice
TEXT: GEZ-21, or the Gallery of Experimental Sound, part of the Pushkinskaya 10 arts center, is closing temporarily in line with a number of other local clubs, who think that August is a bad month for holding concerts because the public tends to go on holiday away from the city during this time of year. But before the venue closes its doors until September, there will be one last concert of improvized music from a saxophone duo made up of Nikolai Rubanov of Auktsyon and Berlin-based Vlad Bystrov on Saturday.
Red Club, which is on holiday now, parted ways with its long-time art director, Claire Yalakas, who is widely seen as the person who helped to form the venue's strong music program which drew audiences to the place despite the annoying searches at the door and its uncomfortable interior. Rumor has it, however, that the club's artistic policy will not change much, and it is scheduled to reopen on Aug. 27 with a concert from Dva Samaliota.
This Friday, Dva Samaliota, who recently released the album "Ka-Ra-Bas," will perform at Moloko.
The Kinks-influenced band Wine is scheduled to perform at Fish Fabrique, also on Friday.
Meanwhile, it seems that the most interesting events take place somewhere else.
New York's latest musical sensation Scissor Sisters will play its one-off Russian concert in Moscow in mid-August. Described as "the coolest band on the face of the planet" by NME, the postmodern disco quintet, which released its eponymous debut album earlier this year, will rock the Moscow's Hermitage Gardens on Aug. 14.
Lambchop, an unique alt-country band from Nashville, Tennessee, will play Moscow's 16 Tons bar and concert venue on Aug. 18. David Byrne, who performed locally earlier this month, covered Lambchop's song "The Man Who Loved Beer" on his most recent album "Grown Backwards."
This Saturday, a dozen St. Petersburg bands as well as five from the U.K. will celebrate the Fender Stratocaster guitar's 50th anniversary at the free Miller Fender Fest on Bolotnaya Ploshchad in Moscow.
The legendary solid-body electric guitar designed by U.S. inventor Leo Fender was used by the best-known names in rock including Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton, Bob Dylan and Keith Richards.
St. Petersburg's Markscheider Kunst, Deadushki, Billy's Band will play at the Fender Fest, among others.
From the U.K. comes Kaiser Chiefs, a band often compared to Britain's other recent musical sensation, Franz Ferdinand. Hailing from Leeds, Kaiser Chiefs has yet to release an album but its single "Oh My God" has been recently named "The Single of the Week" by NME.
The other British bands taking part in Fender Fest are the glam-rock King Adora from Birmingham, the Scottish psychedelic/folk band Mystery Juice and no-frills punk band Gold Blade from Manchester.
Finally, Nashestviye (Invasion), the Nashe Radio-promoted festival of Russian rock will be headlined by Leningrad on Aug. 7. Leningrad, one of Russia's leading bands, is still "banned" in Moscow and the Moskovskaya Oblast because Moscow Mayor Yury Luzhkov's reportedly dislikes Sergei Shnurov's lyrics, but this year the festival will take place in a village near Tver, where Luzhkov has no power.
- By Sergey Chernov
TITLE: smooth but not so sophisticated
PUBLISHER: Special to The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: Cafe/Club Velvet on the corner of Professor Popov and Aptekarsky streets lies just north of the Botanical Garden on the Petrograd side. Originally established by Peter the Great in 1714 as a "pharmaceutical garden" for growing medicinal herbs and rare plants, the garden is both an ordered landscape of walkways lined with exotic plants and flowers and a dense forest with bogs, crumbling bridges, and a massive greenhouse.
If you exit the garden and turn left a large V in red paint is visible just beyond the intersection. What could it possibly mean? It means "Velvet" and as far as I know is not a veiled reference to Thomas Pynchon's debut novel. It means luxury and decadence, a refashioning of the color red which has long been associated not with velvet but with revolution. Either way it's enough to draw you in.
The menu at Cafe Velvet is modest (aside from the large selection of alcohol and tea) with a small selection of sushi and what is loosely referred to as "European" cuisine. When I went the sushi chef was ill, perhaps a bad omen meaning that that part of the menu was not available.
But there are plenty of other fish and seafood options. The mussels are baked either in a piquant sauce with red wine or in garlic herb butter and come in dozen or half dozen portions. The mussels in garlic butter (half a dozen for 180 rubles, $6.20, or a dozen for 340 rubles, $11.70) were fresh, plump, and well seasoned - some even too salty. You'll have to order bread to get the remaining butter out of each shell, as it does not come compliments of the house. One order, two rustic multi-grain rolls - something unusual in this city - is 30 rubles ($1.03).
The tuna salad (125 rubles, $4.31) was less successful. A combination of red and white tuna, salmon, lettuce, peas, and potatoes, everything was diced so small it was hard to tell what was what. The idea of keeping things whole so you can really taste and see what you're eating hasn't made its way to Russia yet.
I think the tuna salad would be significantly better if the lettuce was in whole leaves, the tomatoes simply halved or quartered, the potatoes grilled, and the fish seared and served rare atop the lettuce. In the case of Velvet it seems the task was to achieve sameness in size and shape rather than bring out the flavor of the food.
The Hungarian salad (105 rubles, $3.62) with Chinese cabbage, sausage, peppers, mustard, and oil was similar in form to the tuna salad but fared better because of the ingredients. The mustard vinaigrette was light and I must say I was pleased to be eating a salad without mayonnaise, not having asked for it to be withheld. There's also a Greek salad (100 rubles, $3.44) with feta, tomatoes, and salad greens and salad cypriano (85 rubles, $2.89) with cucumbers, gouda, ham, Bulgarian pepper, and mayonnaise.
There are a number of soups including a cream soup with spinach (75 rubles, $2.58) that looked like a large bowl of pistachio pudding. I think perhaps that instead of the spinach serving as the thickener with a bit of flour too much cream was used or it was over worked. Cream soup can be rich and almost a meal by itself but it should still be soup, with the cream ideally being added at the end and the vegetables serving as the base. There's also a cheese soup (80 rubles, $2,75), fish solyanka (hearty soup for 135 rubles, $4.65), and meat solyanka (105 rubles, $3.62).
The salmon shashlyk (grilled pieces of salmon for 200 rubles, $6.89) served with a remoulade (a mustard dressing) was cooked perfectly - not at all dried out. The fish was delicate it broke apart just removing it from the skewer and seasoned simply with dill and lemon. There's also a steak with demi-glaze (wine stock) for 200 rubles ($6.89) and the standard Beef Stroganoff for 190 rubles ($6.55). And, though I didn't have a chance to try them, the pork or lamb ribs with "velvet" sauce are for the more daring. The sauce is made with honey, prunes, apricot, and red wine.
The bar menu is extensive with everything from grappa, calvados, cognac, and whiskey to wine, champagne, and fresh squeezed juice. You can choose between a tall glass of freshly squeezed mandarin juice (100 rubles, $3.44) or a glass of the Chilean sunrise shiraz (180 rubles, $6.20). Bottles of wine range from 1,250 rubles ($43) to 900 rubles ($31).
And indeed Velvet appears to be more a place to sit and have a drink either outside under the red awning or inside where a large flat screen television playing pop music videos will keep you entertained if your company fails to. The TV is a symbol of empty space and I think in a sense that's what Cafe/Club Velvet is trying to create. The style is art deco but not very comfortable and a bit too clean. But it's new and it always takes a while for a place to feel like it's lived in, or in the case of a restaurant at least visited frequently.
Anyway, I recommend sitting outside. It's one of the more pleasant spots I've found in the city and a good place to have a drink after emerging from the garden.
Cafe/Club Velvet, 7 Ulitsa Professora Popova. Tel: 347 6593. Menu in Russian and English. Cash only. Open Monday-Thursday from 11 a.m. through 12 p.m., Friday-Saturday 12 p.m. through 2 a.m., Sunday 1 p.m. through 11 p.m. Dinner for two: 1,500 rubles ($51).
TITLE: 'a driver for vera' stalls on ignition
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: If charming or intriguing bete noir patriarchs, like the Godfather in Francis Ford Coppola's trilogy, usually turn up in crime-related movies in Hollywood, in Russia they are often heroes of political melodramas. Instead of gangsters there's the KGB, for the family - the Party, and for ill-gotten glamour there is a luxury of a kind only a political elite can arrange. The new Russian movie "Voditel Dlya Veri" ("A Driver for Vera"), which opened in St. Petersburg last week (see Screens on this page for details) presents a society that should not have existed, in theory anyway, in a communist country: a rich circle of military men having a perfectly hedonistic time of it in Crimea, much in the manner of playboys in jazz age America - cocktail parties on yachts, house servants, and gleaming, jet-black Chaika luxury cars.
The plot of "A Driver for Vera" is remiscent of Nikita Mikhalkov's Oscar-winning "Burnt by the Sun", only it is set 30 years on in the 1960s. Having survived the Stalin-era, Kremlin favourite General Serov (Bogdan Stupka), receives a warning on the grapevine about plots to topple his position. Like a mosquito, the new presidential office of Khrushchev is looking for blood to atone for mistakes of the past, and hence secure its own day. Meanwhile the General has a more personal dilemma to resolve, in that his brash, spoilt daughter Vera, played by Yelena Babenko, has got pregnant, but is unwilling to disclose by whom.
Time to arrange for one happy-go-lucky sergeant Victor (Igor Petrenko) to be transferred from Moscow into the general services of the haughty Vera and to "do all the bidding that you ask of me." To the Vera who imagines herself a prima donna and has a justified complex about her limp, this upstart is initially "a servant" who is told to speak only when spoken to. And what would Vera talk to this pauper sergeant about when she has an abortion to arrange, a drink problem to maintain, and the figure of a spiky, near-psychotic self-destructionist to cut? Naturally, romance ensues.
Were this a simple love-story with the Black Sea, cliffs, a mountain setting, etc., the film would be like the aesthetically-pleasing but empty "Captain Corelli's Mandolin" of Nicholas Cage-Penelope Cruz shame. Luckily, director and screen-writer Pavel Chukhrai does not leave out the politics, and the story cleverly plays on the informant atmosphere of the age: the constant and unpredictable sniping of the secret services into which Victor is reluctantly drawn, the young sergeant's ambitions to make it in the ranks, and his choices in love.
As soon as an aide to the General, the slippery KGB agent Savelyev (Andrei Panin) rolls up sleeves as a Machiavellian master of fates, promising a place in Moscow's top military academy for Victor, the temper of all main characters start to fluctuate, jealousies for Victor's love between the General's daughter and the maid heighten to a near-suicide, and the palatial ease of the General's life is emotionally, politically, and literally shattered.
Unfortunately, the complexities of the relationships depicted in "A Driver for Vera" are not always ambiguous for the right reasons. It is one of the film's few failings that the sergeant's emotions and real motives are lost in the sandy dunes of Petrenko's pretty-boy face and eyes. Playing the energetic, happy naif, forcing a smile through times when there could be tears works only to a point. And beyond that, there need to be tears, or some animation at least to indicate Victor's mood, clarify his sentiments towards the General's daughter, explain his violent reaction to the maid's teasing in the manner of a Neanderthal grab-and-shag on the bunk beds...and certainly, to justify an ending so shattering. Victor's last words are already infamous in the movie world, and verge on the ridiculous.
In contrast, the temperamental swings and swagger of Vera are particularly well kept-up throughout the film by Babenko. From the hugging of a teddy in moments of despair, to the raging demolition of the furniture, or the Hitchcock-esque suspense as Vera waves scissors in front of her abdomen mulling over abortion plans, Babenko keeps the character believable, engaging, and open to sympathy.
Chukhrai may indeed have been thinking of Mikhalkov's film and its success abroad when writing and planning "A Driver for Vera". The bitter, tragic theme of the Soviet state's whimsical nature, is added to with mellifluous tunes, lush, panning shots of Crimean poppy fields, narrow town avenues, and authentically reproduced conditions of '60s Soviet life. The film's lens looks wide and gazes critical. And with just such lenses in favor at the Academy, "A Driver for Vera"'s tally of a Golden Rose awards from Russian movie-fest Kinotavre may yet be improved on.
TITLE: remembering stalin's favorite actor
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: Nikolai Cherkasov may not have been the best of fathers, but his son still cherishes the actor's memory.
When Josef Stalin banned the second part of Sergei Eisenstein's film "Ivan the Terrible," Nikolai Cherkasov, who played the title role, went to see the Soviet leader. Although the legendary director also came along, it was Cherkasov who did the talking. As a result, Stalin passed the film with a few changes.
Dubbed the Russian Gary Cooper for his resemblance to the Hollywood star, Cherkasov became well-known in the West after playing the title roles in Eisenstein's "Alexander Nevsky" (1938) and the two-part "Ivan the Terrible," released in 1945 and 1958. Yet he died feeling that he had been rejected by the Soviet theater establishment, say his son and grandson, who have set up a small museum to him in his former dacha.
Neither the son, Andrei, nor the grandson, Nikolai, went into the acting profession, and Andrei admits that he rarely saw his father, who was always busy with movie shoots or theater rehearsals. But that hasn't dissuaded him from storing and displaying a collection of memorabilia in a room of the actor's dacha in Komarovo, a village outside St. Petersburg.
Hanging from the wall in the one-room museum are Polish-language movie posters and the shield and helmet that the actor used for his title role in Grigory Kozintsev's "Don Quixote." Books about Cherkasov and videotapes of his performances line a shelf.
A 1947 caricature drawn by the famous Kukryniksy trio of Soviet cartoonists shows the actor standing in a pinstriped suit in front of a full-length mirror.
Staring back at him are some of his most famous characters, Alexander Nevsky, Ivan the Terrible and Professor Polezhayev from the 1937 film "Baltic Deputy," based on the life of Russian scientist Kliment Timiryazev.
The dacha in Komarovo, a sought-after suburb of Leningrad, was one of the many privileges granted to Cherkasov, a member of the Communist Party who enjoyed official approval for most of his life. "He was very famous in the Soviet Union," Andrei said. "He needed only to make a telephone call to clear up any question."
In the run-up to the siege of Leningrad in World War II, Cherkasov and other actors from the city were sent on tour to Novosibirsk to escape the blockade. However, Cherkasov was part of a delegation of actors that managed to land in a military plane in 1942, bringing food to the ravaged city.
His pull with the authorities came in handy when the second part of Eisenstein's "Ivan the Terrible" failed to please the movie-loving Stalin. The leader is said to have liked Part One, but saw his mirror image in the cruel tsar of the second half and banned the film completely. Part Two was released only after Eisenstein and Stalin were dead, while fragments from the never-completed Part Three were released in 1988.
"Stalin liked my father. He was the only one he was prepared to speak to," the actor's son said. "Stalin didn't like Eisenstein - he was too clever for him."
However, Cherkasov was not a close associate of the reclusive leader. "They met only two or three times," Andrei added.
The son of a railway clerk, Cherkasov joined the troupe of the Mariinsky Theater as an extra at the age of 15. He loved singing, idolized the bass Fyodor Shalyapin and studied mime and dance.
After joining the Leningrad Youth Theater in 1926, he won the role of Don Quixote, a part he was to reprise many years later in Kozintsev's celebrated 1957 film.
Cherkasov got his start in the movies as a supporting actor in a 1927 film about the life of Alexander Pushkin called "The Poet and the Tsar."
But it was only in the 1930s that he went big time, starring as a top scientist in "Baltic Deputy"; as the writer Maxim Gorky in the biopic "Lenin in 1918"; and in the title role of "Alexander Nevsky."
Starring in Sergei Eisenstein's iconic films, Nikolai Cherkasov became the face of Soviet cinema in the 1930s and '40s. Although the actor played in over 40 films, his most fruitful relationship was with the director Eisenstein. "Eisenstein gave him a wonderful nickname - Bogovenchany Aktyor or God-anointed actor," Naum Kleiman, director of Moscow's Cinema Museum, said last week. "Eisenstein was very well attuned to the nature of his talent, this ability to be both tragic and eccentric at the same time."
Cherkasov's grandson Nikolai echoed Kleiman's observations. "Eisenstein was his favorite film director and he was [Eisenstein's] favorite actor," he said. "They suited each other very well. Eisenstein was very demanding and precise - he knew exactly what he wanted an actor to do and [Cherkasov] was able to understand what Eisenstein wanted."
In the 1950s Cherkasov even portrayed U.S. president Franklin D. Roosevelt in two films about the Battle of Stalingrad.
Nikolai, a systems administrator at St. Petersburg's Biomedical Institute, is devoted to his grandfather's legacy. In his spare time, he maintains a web site devoted to his grandfather's career, featuring a timeline and photographs from the family archive.
However eager Cherkasov's descendants may be to honor the actor's artistic legacy, though, they have little personal insight into the man himself. Rather than spending time with his son, the actor mainly concentrated on his work, leaving all the homemaking decisions to his wife Nina.
"He paid no attention to me... He was very busy all the time," Andrei said. "When I was very young, he took me to the piano, he played some tunes, [but] he realized that I had no ear for music and he lost any interest in me after that."
When he was not tending to his acting career, Cherkasov served as a deputy in the Supreme Soviet and headed the Leningrad Theater Society. It was only as his health declined that the actor settled down, which is why most of Andrei's memories are from his final years.
"When I remember him, he was very tired because he was ill," Andrei said. "When he came home, he was very silent. But if somebody came to visit he began to be brilliant. Immediately, he was very emotional."
While Cherkasov continued acting in films until a year before his death in 1966, his career ended relatively ignominiously, his son recalled. Dismissed unexpectedly from Leningrad's Pushkin Theater, now called the Alexandrinsky, the actor never fully recovered from the blow.
According to Andrei, the dismissal occurred after Cherkasov stepped in to prevent his wife, also an actress, from being cut from the theater's ranks. Approaching the artistic director, Cherkasov suggested his salary be cut so that his wife could stay. Instead, he, too, was let go. "When he came home from the theater, he lay in bed for several days," his son recalled. The family believes that the shock he endured from this episode contributed to his early death from emphysema at the age of 63.
"There was an incident at the end of Lenin's life when Lenin was ill and Stalin spoke badly of [Lenin's wife] Krupskaya," Andrei said. "My father considered himself to be in a similar situation...I remember that he [said] that he was a member of the party and that Lenin for him was an ideal."
Cherkasov was buried in the Alexander Nevsky Cemetery, named after the hero he had played in the 1938 movie. To this day, the family preserves a photograph of the thousands of mourners who gathered on Nevsky Prospekt to pay the actor their last respects.
TITLE: after the war, battles continued
PUBLISHER: Special to The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: Of the numerous books that have been written about Josef Stalin, relatively few have focused on the twilight years of his dictatorship, from the end of World War II to his death in March 1953. Those works that do address this period tend to depict Stalin as an increasingly paranoid figure, struggling to cling to health and power as his deputies jockey for position to succeed him. In "Cold Peace: Stalin and the Soviet Ruling Circle, 1945-1953," historians Yoram Gorlizki and Oleg Khlevniuk challenge the prevailing version, using formerly unavailable archive material to shed light on the internal workings of the top Soviet leadership during Stalin's final years. They attempt to show a clear political logic to Stalin's behavior, however irrational it may seem, and dispel the notion that there were ever any serious contenders to usurp him (or even conspirators to kill him).
Following the war, Gorlizki and Khlevniuk contend, Stalin's consistent aim was to consolidate the Soviet Union's status as a superpower, and, in the face of growing decrepitude, to maintain his hold as leader of that power. The authors describe how Stalin created a dual political order: informal and personalized in some spheres, orderly and institutionalized in others. Realizing, for example, that he no longer had the energy to oversee many aspects of government, Stalin initiated key organizational changes, setting up a Council of Ministers to manage the economy, while he and his inner circle in the Politburo concentrated on a smaller set of policy issues, among them state security, ideology and foreign affairs. Unlike the Politburo, the Council of Ministers met regularly, worked to deadlines on individual assignments with a clear division of labor and suffered minimal interference from Stalin - except when economic issues touched on matters of state.
The other side of this arrangement was a Politburo entirely obedient to Stalin's whims, comprising five members in 1945 and 10 by 1953, including Stalin himself, two long-standing colleagues in Vyacheslav Molotov and Anastas Mikoyan, and younger members, such as Lavrenty Beria and Nikita Khrushchev. In contrast to the Council of Ministers, Stalin personally selected the Politburo's membership, set its agendas, fashioned its procedures and organized the locations and timings of its meetings to suit himself. Often, meetings would take place in the dining room of Stalin's dacha in the early hours of the morning - and when not dining with the leader, Politburo members were often phoned by Stalin's secretary as late as 4 or 5 a.m. to be told that Stalin had gone to bed and that they, too, could leave their desks and go home.
A Yugoslav envoy who visited Stalin during this period described how a significant part of Soviet policy was shaped at these dinners. "It all resembled," he wrote, "a patriarchal family with a crotchety head who made his kinsfolk apprehensive." Gorlizki and Khlevniuk term Stalin's style of leadership "neo-patrimonial" in that he attempted to combine a modern, committee-based system of administration with a more primitive method of rule based on personal fealty.
After World War II, Stalin moved quickly to reassert his authority over his deputies, who had come to enjoy a measure of autonomy in their respective fields as the war took its toll on the dictator's health and stamina. Within a year, Stalin launched a series of savage attacks on every member of the Politburo, using a variety of methods to intimidate them, including face-to-face confrontations, demotions, assaults on allies and the threat of physical repression. In each case, the victim was required to apologize speedily and abjectly, usually in writing. Mikoyan, for example, after being blamed by Stalin for grain shortages that crippled the country in 1946, issued this cringing statement: "Of course, neither I nor others can frame questions quite like you [Stalin]. I shall devote all my energy so that I may learn from you how to work correctly. I shall do all I can to draw the lessons from your stern criticism, so that it is turned to good use in my further work under your fatherly guidance."
In the years that followed, Stalin continued to exert fierce psychological pressure on his deputies. Whenever they showed signs of independence, he slapped them down ruthlessly. Molotov was even forced to divorce his wife, who was subsequently arrested on trumped-up charges that she was linked to "Jewish nationalists." The lesson was that nobody, not even a spouse, could get in the way of a Politburo member's primary allegiance to Stalin. More important still was the demand that personal devotion to Stalin should supersede any loyalty to an "office." At the drop of a hat, Stalin could create or destroy institutional positions and all the personal incentives and authority that came with them.
Stalin established a dual political order - part informal, part unyielding - to maintain a hold over his subordinates. Although Stalin sought to inspire in the last years of his dictatorship the submissive attitude that the Politburo had displayed toward him immediately after the Great Terror, he did not plumb the same depths of brutality to achieve it. There were none of the large-scale purges of the political elite seen in the 1930s; instead, Stalin appeared to value order and continuity within his entourage. When he denounced his closest colleagues, the ensuing charade of repentance and chastisement was usually played out in front of only a small audience. If the victim was less important, Stalin's criticism might leak out into wider circles or appear in the papers.
At the same time, members of the Politburo learned not to rock the boat, knowing that any advantage they might gain from having a rival removed could not make up for the lethal climate of uncertainty and suspicion that inevitably followed. If they needed reminding of this, it came in 1950 when Stalin executed the head of the state planning agency, Nikolai Voznesensky, for allowing a trade fair to go ahead in Leningrad without permission from a high enough authority: As ever, Stalin hated any sign of autonomy in others.
Gorlizki and Khlevniuk write persuasively of how fear of Stalin's unpredictable behavior united members of the Politburo in a tacit alliance, and how their experience of working together laid the foundations of collective leadership after Stalin's death. Whereas earlier historians of this period have relied largely on newspaper articles, leaked reports and memoirs - many colored to show Khrushchev, Stalin's eventual successor, in a positive light - Gorlizki and Khlevniuk have trawled through piles of newly available Central Committee paperwork and personal correspondence to create an admirably objective and balanced account of Stalin's relationship with his ruling circle, backed up with copious notes.
For the lay reader there is, if anything, too much detail, and the book sometimes becomes bogged down in tracking the constant reorganizations and personnel changes that Stalin made to keep his subordinates on their toes. Even the personalities of the main actors become submerged eventually in this morass of intrigue, although perhaps this is how things really were: Certainly the underlying banality of Stalin's dying regime comes through strongly. Ultimately, the "cold peace" alluded to in the title is perhaps a bit too glacial to appeal to a popular readership, but for scholars seeking a hard-nosed analysis of high-level Soviet politics after the war, this book could hardly be bettered.
A former editor at The Moscow Times, Sam Thorne now freelances from Britain.
TITLE: what's going on at the manezh?
PUBLISHER: Special to The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: The Manezh Central Exhibition Hall - one of the main city venues for various types of exhibitions - annually carries out its own festival for contemporary art, permanently headed by curator Larisa Skobkina, and every year by rotation paying attention to performing or visual art. The current Fifth Festival of Performance & Experiments - which is how the organizers translate it into English - opened Tuesday and, unfortunately, to all appearances the best that can be said of the festival is that it is the only contemporary art event during the 'dead' month of August when cultural life in St Petersburg more or less grinds to a halt.
As in former years, the show doesn't lack for quantity (indeed, there are still a lot of local and foreign participants), but can be a little short on quality. As a result, when you visit the Manezh's festival you get a feeling of déjà vu. The reason for this, on the face of it, is the dramatically small budget of the event. It is not appropriately advertised - even locally - and there's no chance of attracting big names to exhibit their works.
Deeper, internal reasons for the festival's failings, a danger with even the most lavishly organized events, is a lack of curatorial direction, which leads to the festival becoming a strange mix of both professional and amateur artistic endeavors. This gets more complicated thanks to the absence of a more or less distinct concept or idea behind the event.
Curiously, despite its title, the majority of the projects in the current festival can be termed visual rather then performance art pieces. Not only that - the organizers haven't been able to help visitors by providing a fixed timetable of when the performances are due to take place.
One must assume visitors are supposed to intuitively hazard a guess as to when they occur during ten-day-run of the festival.
The visual art part of the festival includes a huge colorful installation called "LOMO DOMA - DOMA!" which consists of 20,000 small images shot by LOMO-lovers throughout Russia. A LOMO is a Russian camera brand, the remarkable international knowledge of which gave birth to the international "Lomography" movement.
This is more a socio-documentary project than an artistic experiment and is followed by a wide palette of international artists, displaying their present artistic concerns varying from globalization and European integration to identity.
The multimedia project "Lament for Steel" by British artist Adrian Palka opened the performance program of the festival.
In his performance Palka assumes the guise of a medieval alchemist, beautifully modifying by means of sound and video a rough and dead lump of steel into a light, living and fleeting work of art by "playing" it like a musical instrument.
Among other scheduled and worthwhile performances should be a piece by the ODD-Dance theater and 25 short performances about globalization by the omnipresent duet of Vyacheslav Mizin and Alexander Shaburov. Last but not least, is a promised performance by the Prigov Family Group headed by prominent Moscow artist Dmitry Prigov. Catch it if you can.
The Fifth Festival of Performance & Experiments runs through Aug. 5 at the Manezh Central Exhibition Hall. Links: www.manege.spb.ru
TITLE: the word's worth
TEXT: Zhit khorosho, a khorosho zhit — eshchyo luchshe: Life is good, and living well is even better.
You have only to look at the full title of one of Russia’s favorite films to see how much life has changed since 1966: Kavkazskaya plennitsa, ili novye priklyucheniya Shurika — ekstsentricheskaya komediya (Captive of the Caucasus, or the New Adventures of Shurik — an eccentric comedy). Alas, it will be a long time before anyone can make a lighthearted comedy about the Caucasus. If you’re tired of the usual Hollywood summer fare filling the city’s theaters, run to your local licensed video store, and take out this comedy by Leonid Gaidai. Not only will you howl at some of the funniest slapstick comedy ever made, you’ll realize that the comment you heard in the office the other day was a quote from the movie.
It all takes place in an unidentified region of the Caucasus, where Shurik has gone to collect fol klor, local sayings, rituals and ... toasts. Of course, the local folks are happy to help him with toasts, such as Vyp em za to, chtoby nashi zhelaniya vsegda sovpadali s nashimi vozmozhnostyami (Let’s drink to our desires always matching our abilities). Another long toast is about a bird that tries to fly to the sun, but its wings are burned and it falls to the earth. The toast: chtoby nikto iz nas, kak by vysoko ni letal, nikogda ne otryvalsya ot kollektiva! (So that none of us, no matter how high we fly, will ever break with the collective!) This is a good joke toast to remember for office parties.
Shurik falls in love with the beautiful Nina. Nina is asked to cut the ribbon at the opening ceremony for the new Dvorets Brakosochetaniya (Wedding Palace) and is introduced as: studentka, komsomolka, sportsmen-ka, i prosto krasavitsa! (A student, Komsomol member, sports-woman, and simply a beauty!) Don’t be surprised if someone introduces a friend this way at a party; it means: a person of many talents, and beautiful besides.
Throughout all this, Shurik, who has no head for wine, keeps slurring Pomedlennee, ya zapisyvayu! (Speak more slowly — I’m writing this down.) If you say this innocuously at a meeting when you are taking notes, your Russian colleagues may burst into laughter; they’re remembering the drunken Shurik, who says this and then grabs what he thinks is his drinking horn. Unfortunately, the horn he grabs is still attached to a bull.
As the story develops, Nina’s shifty uncle decides to sell her to a local swain for 20 sheep and a refrigerator. But first she must be kidnapped, which is ineptly carried out by a trio of hilarious lowlifes. To them we owe the immortal phrase: Zhit khorosho, a khorosho zhit — eshchyo luchshe (Life is good, and living well is even better). For those of you still troubled by nasty gender issues in Russian, you’ll enjoy: Chei tuflya? Moyo, spasibo. The meaning is: “Whose shoe is this? Mine, thank you.” But since tuflya is feminine, it should be ch ya (whose, feminine) and moya (mine, feminine) instead of this comedic mishmash of masculine-feminine-neuter. Hey, it’s a tough language.
Nina is a feisty captive, and her betrothed is a bit sorry he decided to kidnap her. But, as he points out: ili ya eyo — v ZAGS, ili ona menya — k prokuroru! (Either I take her to the registry office, or she takes me to the prosecutor’s office!). After the judge enters and the bailiff tells everyone to be seated, the bridegroom says, Spasibo, ya postoyu. (Thank you, I’ll stand.) This is another innocent phrase for the hapless foreigner: Your business partners chortle, and you can’t figure out what’s so funny.
*************
Æèòü õîðîøî, à õîðîøî æèòü — åù¸ ëó÷øå: Life is good, and living well is even better.
You have only to look at the full title of one of Russia’s favorite films to see how much life has changed since 1966: Êàâêàçñêàÿ ïëåííèöà, èëè íîâûå ïðèêëþ÷åíèÿ Øóðèêà — ýêñöåíòðè÷åñêàÿ êîìåäèÿ (Captive of the Caucasus, or the New Adventures of Shurik — an eccentric comedy). Alas, it will be a long time before anyone can make a lighthearted comedy about the Caucasus. If you’re tired of the usual Hollywood summer fare filling the city’s theaters, run to your local licensed video store, and take out this comedy by Leonid Gaidai. Not only will you howl at some of the funniest slapstick comedy ever made, you’ll realize that the comment you heard in the office the other day was a quote from the movie.
It all takes place in an unidentified region of the Caucasus, where Shurik has gone to collect ôîëüêëîð, local sayings, rituals and ... toasts. Of course, the local folks are happy to help him with toasts, such as Âûïüåì çà òî, ÷òîáû íàøè æåëàíèÿ âñåãäà ñîâïàäàëè ñ íàøèìè âîçìîæíîñòÿìè (Let’s drink to our desires always matching our abilities). Another long toast is about a bird that tries to fly to the sun, but its wings are burned and it falls to the earth. The toast: ÷òîáû íèêòî èç íàñ, êàê áû âûñîêî íè ëåòàë, íèêîãäà íå îòðûâàëñÿ îò êîëëåêòèâà! (So that none of us, no matter how high we fly, will ever break with the collective!) This is a good joke toast to remember for office parties.
Shurik falls in love with the beautiful Nina. Nina is asked to cut the ribbon at the opening ceremony for the new Äâîðåö Áðàêîñî÷åòàíèÿ (Wedding Palace) and is introduced as: ñòóäåíòêà, êîìñîìîëêà, ñïîðòñìåí-êà, è ïðîñòî êðàñàâèöà! (A student, Komsomol member, sports-woman, and simply a beauty!) Don’t be surprised if someone introduces a friend this way at a party; it means: a person of many talents, and beautiful besides.
Throughout all this, Shurik, who has no head for wine, keeps slurring Ïîìåäëåííåå, ÿ çàïèñûâàþ! (Speak more slowly — I’m writing this down.) If you say this innocuously at a meeting when you are taking notes, your Russian colleagues may burst into laughter; they’re remembering the drunken Shurik, who says this and then grabs what he thinks is his drinking horn. Unfortunately, the horn he grabs is still attached to a bull.
As the story develops, Nina’s shifty uncle decides to sell her to a local swain for 20 sheep and a refrigerator. But first she must be kidnapped, which is ineptly carried out by a trio of hilarious lowlifes. To them we owe the immortal phrase: Æèòü õîðîøî, à õîðîøî æèòü — åù¸ ëó÷øå (Life is good, and living well is even better). For those of you still troubled by nasty gender issues in Russian, you’ll enjoy: ×åé òóôëÿ? Ìî¸, ñïàñèáî. The meaning is: “Whose shoe is this? Mine, thank you.” But since òóôëÿ is feminine, it should be ÷üÿ (whose, feminine) and ìîÿ (mine, feminine) instead of this comedic mishmash of masculine-feminine-neuter. Hey, it’s a tough language.
Nina is a feisty captive, and her betrothed is a bit sorry he decided to kidnap her. But, as he points out: èëè ÿ å¸ — â ÇÀÃÑ, èëè îíà ìåíÿ — ê ïðîêóðîðó! (Either I take her to the registry office, or she takes me to the prosecutor’s office!). After the judge enters and the bailiff tells everyone to be seated, the bridegroom says, Ñïàñèáî, ÿ ïîñòîþ. (Thank you, I’ll stand.) This is another innocent phrase for the hapless foreigner: Your business partners chortle, and you can’t figure out what’s so funny.
Michele A. Berdy is a Moscow-based translator.
TITLE: Edwards Says Kerry Offers Hope
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: BOSTON - John Edwards praised John Kerry on Wednesday night as a man tested by war for national command and promised cheering Democratic National Convention delegates that their ticket will "build one America" no longer divided by income or race.
The vice presidential candidate spoke shortly before delegates formally bestowed their nomination on Kerry, the 60-year-old Massachusetts senator locked in a close race with President George W. Bush.
Republicans are "doing all they can to take this campaign for the highest office in the land down the lowest possible road," Kerry's running mate told delegates packed into the FleetCenter and a nationwide primetime television audience.
The vice presidential candidate urged the country to reject that approach and "embrace the politics of hope, the politics of what's possible because this is America, where everything is possible."
Edwards' appearance on the podium prompted the most boisterous demonstration of the convention to date. Thousands of cheering delegates held aloft identical red signs bearing his name, passed out by the boxload just before he stepped to the podium.
He evoked the themes of his campaign against Kerry in last winter's primaries to argue the case for their new political partnership.
"The truth is, we still live in two different Americas," said Edwards, the son of a Carolina mill worker and the first in his family to attend college.
Edwards' turn at the podium came a few hours after Kerry campaigned his way to the convention city and into the eager embrace of his Vietnam War crewmates. A dozen fellow veterans greeted him, including Jim Rassmann, a retired Special Forces soldier whose life Kerry saved from a muddy river in the Mekong Delta while under enemy fire.
"We're going to write the next great chapter of history in this country together," Kerry vowed at a welcome-home rally in the city that has nourished his political career for a quarter century.
Kerry's convention scriptwriters arranged for Ohio-a pivotal battleground state-to cast the delegate votes that formally put him over the top in a roll call of the states that lacked any suspense.
At the end of the night, the Democratic National Committee secretary's office tallied 4,255 votes for Kerry and 37 votes for Ohio Representative Dennis Kucinich.
In keeping with the overwhelming security arrangements for the first national political convention since the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Kerry's ferry was escorted by Coast Guard vessels armed with machine guns as it made the brief trip across the open harbor.
Bush's re-election campaign lost no time in criticizing Edwards.
"We saw John Kerry's running mate tonight portray America as a nation in decline, but the American people know we are strong and overcoming the challenges of the past three years," said spokesman Steve Schmidt. "John Kerry's extreme makeover of adding a smile to his pessimistic rhetoric cannot change his out of the mainstream record."
Like dozens of other speakers at the convention, Edwards' script stressed the overriding national security theme of the convention. He recalled Kerry's service in Vietnam a generation ago, saying he ordered his swiftboat turned around despite enemy fire and plucked a fellow American from the river to safety.
"Decisive. Strong. Is that not what we need in a commander in chief?" he asked rhetorically.
But Edwards' speech also marked something of a pivot to other issues that have received scant attention during three nights of convention oratory.
In one of the few references of the convention to Kerry's economic program, Edwards said it relies on tax hikes on Americans in the top 2 percent of income and offers the hope of benefits to millions.
"We can build an America where we no longer have two health care systems," he said. "... We can build one public school system that works for all our children.... We can create good paying jobs in America again," he added, by stopping the tax breaks that give companies an incentive to send jobs overseas.
TITLE: Suicide Car Bomb Kills 68
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: BAQOUBA, Iraq - A suicide car bomb tore through a downtown street Wednesday, killing 68 Iraqis and turning a bustling area of shops and fruit stalls into charred corpses, twisted metal and burning cars-the deadliest attack in the month since U.S. authorities handed sovereignty to an interim government.
The late morning explosion wounded 56 Iraqis, overwhelming the hospital in Baqouba, a city 55 kilometers northeast of the capital. Every bed was filled, forcing many victims to sit on the floor amid pools of blood as frantic health workers treated them. One wounded man sitting against the wall held his head in his hands and wept. People ran through the corridors searching for information on missing relatives.
"These were all innocent Iraqis, there were no Americans. What was their guilt?" one man shouted at the bomb site, pounding his head in grief. Other men screamed epithets and denounced the attackers as terrorists.
The blast, one of the deadliest single-bomb attacks since Saddam Hussein's fall more than a year ago, came just three days before the country is to convene a national conference that will choose an interim assembly-considered a crucial step toward establishing democracy.
TITLE: Bush Plugs Methane Energy
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: WASHINGTON - Hoping to export U.S. technology under the banner of fighting global warming, the Bush administration said Wednesday it will provide seed money for private companies to help other nations use their own methane gas emissions as a cheap fuel.
The plan calls for spending up to $53 million to spur companies to spend potentially billions of dollars helping transfer technology to an initial group of seven countries. Technology commonly used to remove, store and use methane to generate electricity in the United States has so far focused on landfills, natural gas and oil systems and coal mines.
Because of this, U.S. methane emissions in the United States were 5 percent lower in 2001 than in 1990.
Landfills are the biggest source of methane, 34 percent, in the United States. Methane is the main component of natural gas, and is trapped in coal and released during mining. Another big source is livestock and manure.
As a pollutant, methane ranks second behind carbon dioxide in contributing to the climate change phenomenon that scientists believe is global warming.
Methane represents 16 percent of global greenhouse emissions; carbon dioxide is 74 percent, according to the administration.
Bush administration officials were joined by representatives of India and Japan in announcing the plan Wednesday. Other countries involved are Australia, Italy, Mexico, Britain and Ukraine. Canada and Russia also sent representatives to consider joining the group.
From his ranch in Crawford, Texas, President George W. Bush said the aim is to increase energy security, improve environmental quality and reduce greenhouse gas emissions worldwide.
In Washington, administration officials described the plan as a transfer of U.S. technology to other industrialized and developing nations. The nations would create markets for a heat-trapping gas that largely goes to waste.
TITLE: IN BRIEF
TEXT: Pyongyang Criticism
SEOUL (Reuters) - Communist North Korea on Thursday accused the South of committing "a terrorist crime" when it brought in more than 450 North Korean refugees from Southeast Asia in secretive flights this week.
The North Korean body, which handles ties with South Korea, broke its silence a day after the end of a two-day operation that brought the largest arrival of refugees from the North since the 1950-53 Korean War. Seoul cloaked the exodus in secrecy partly to avoid provoking Pyongyang.
"South Korea will be held responsible for the aftermath of the operation and all forces that cooperated with it will pay a high price," the South's Yonhap news agency quoted the North Korean Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of the Fatherland as saying
French Jews Arrive
TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) - Just 10 days after Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon enraged French leaders by urging France's Jews to leave for Israel, a group of 200 French Jews arrived to start a new life in the Jewish state, with Sharon at the airport to greet them.
At a welcoming ceremony, Sharon appeared to try to correct the damage from his earlier statements, saying anti-Semitism threatens the Western world, without singling out France.
MSF to Quit Kabul
WASHINGTON (AFP) - The United States said it "regretted" a decision by Medecins Sans Frontieres to pull out of Afghanistan for security reasons and asked the aid organization to reconsider the move.
At the same time, the State Department denied MSF charges that U.S.-led stabilization forces now in Afghanistan were using humanitarian aid to further political and military goals.
In announcing the move, MSF, known in English as Doctors without Borders, blamed the Afghan government for failing to protect aid workers and chase militants who killed five of its staff last month.
It also accused the U.S.-led forces of blurring the boundaries between aid workers and military personnel and "endangering the lives of humanitarian workers and jeopardizing aid to people in need."
Moore Film Screened
CRAWFORD, Texas (Reuters) - Hundreds of people have gathered in a rural parking lot near U.S. President George W. Bush's Texas ranch to watch Michael Moore's anti-Bush documentary, "Fahrenheit 9/11," although the filmmaker cancelled plans to attend.
Sitting before a giant inflatable movie screen, filmgoers from across Texas booed and cheered as Moore's record-setting antiwar film satirically recounted Bush's controversial 2000 election and lambasted the president's response to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and his reasons for going to war in Iraq.
Moore had pledged to come to the screening, but pulled out Wednesday.
TITLE: Tyson Expected to Outclass Foe
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: LOUISVILLE, Kentucky - Danny Williams knows his place in a Mike Tyson fight.
He's the opponent, brought in to give Tyson a round or two before the inevitable happens and a Tyson left hook or right hand ends his night.
"I've been brought in as a knockover fight for Mike Tyson," Williams said.
Until fight time Friday night, Williams will play the role. When the bell rings, though, he has other plans.
"They've made a big mistake," the British heavyweight said. "I believe in my abilities and I'm relaxed and can cash in on my abilities."
That's big talk for a big man. Williams, after all, got the fight only because he would take half the money - $250,000 - that the fighter Tyson's handlers first wanted was to get.
Williams has fought only once in America, and never fought anyone with Tyson's name or reputation. Williams admits he sometimes cries in his dressing room before fights, mainly because he gets overcome with the moment.
But in his biggest moment, Williams says he has enough talent to derail Tyson's latest comeback before it begins.
"I've never had so much pressure in my life, but for some reason I'm more relaxed now than when I defended my British Commonwealth title," Williams said.
The fight is only the second for Tyson since he was stopped by Lennox Lewis in June 2002 for the heavyweight title, but it's in big contrast to his February 2003 fight with Clifford Etienne that was bizarre even by Tyson standards.
Tyson partied his way through training for that fight, then took the week off before the fight to get his face tattooed. He threatened not to fight, but when he did he stopped Etienne in only 48 seconds.
"I don't even know how I made it to the fight," he said.
Williams is hardly a step up from Etienne, in fact he's probably a step down. Even the British bookies don't think much of the 31-year-old journeyman.
"He's very powerful and can take you out at any time," Williams said of Tyson. "But I don't believe he's the threat he used to be."
Tyson doesn't appear to be the personality he used to be either.
There's no entourage, no angry tirades and no bizarre new tattoos. Tyson is coming back once again, but this time he's aging, broke, and seemingly determined to show his gentler side.
On the verge of his fight with Williams, Tyson can't even bring himself to say anything bad about his opponent.
"I'm trying to be a decent man," Tyson said Wednesday.
Some might say it's way too late for that after years of watching Tyson self destruct. In a larger than life career, he's become notorious by biting ears, serving a prison term for rape and threatening to eat Lennox Lewis' children.
Tyson returns to the ring Friday night for the first time in 17 months more a freak show than serious heavyweight contender. But, perhaps knowing his time is running out at the age of 38, he seems determined not to blow this chance.
"My future seems so much brighter than my past," Tyson said. "I'm a different person than I was 17 months ago."
So far, at least, Tyson has been just that. Even Kentucky's governor and Louisville's mayor, who didn't want him here, can't complain about his behavior leading up to the first big heavyweight fight here in 37 years.
Before arriving in Muhammad Ali's hometown this week, Tyson trained three months in Phoenix. He believes he can still fight, and hopes people still care.
Many still do, as evidenced by the crowd of 5,000 or so who showed up to watch Tyson work out Tuesday at a downtown entertainment complex. Some are also buying tickets for the fight, though it's highly unlikely Freedom Hall will be anywhere near sold out.
The fight will be televised on Showtime pay-per-view, and if enough people buy it, Tyson will be able to pay off some of the $38 million he owes.
They won't be paying to see a heavyweight contender, though it's likely Tyson could be one in a few fights. They're paying to see the circus and potential train wreck that now surrounds every Tyson fight.
TITLE: Roddick, Federer Notch Up Easy Victories
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: TORONTO, Canada - U.S. tennis star Andy Roddick beat French qualifier Julien Benneteau 6-4, 6-2 on Wednesday night to reach the second round of the $2.5 million Masters Canada tournament.
Benneteau had a 2-1 lead in the second set when he was forced to duck abruptly to avoid being hit by Roddick's passing shot. He required treatment on his neck and returned with the score tied 2-2. But he didn't have enough to match up with the hard-hitting Roddick, the second seed.
"It's unfortunate he got hurt because I think it was pretty high-level tennis until then," Roddick said. "He wasn't going to rally too much, he was going to go for his shots and win or lose going for it."
Top-seeded Roger Federer of Switzerland beat Morocco's Hicham Arazi 6-3, 7-5 in another first-round match. Federer, who defeated Roddick in the Wimbledon final earlier this month, won the first set against Arazi on Tuesday night before play was suspended due to rain.
"I was in a good position, which makes it much easier," Federer said. "I was happy to be up a set because I didn't know if we were going to play [on Tuesday night] and the first round is always tricky, especially with rain delays like this.
"Today, I just tried to serve more consistently and it worked out. He played better from the baseline, I thought, and made it tougher for me in the second set."
American Vince Spadea beat 19-year-old Canadian Frank Dancevic 6-1, 6-4 in a first-round match at the Rexall Centre. Dancevic, ranked No. 225, never found his rhythm against the 21st-ranked Spadea.
Dancevic played despite being bothered by whiplash and a sore back, injuries sustained in a car accident Sunday night in California. Dancevic said the injuries affected his serve and forehand throughout the match, but he never considered withdrawing.
"Canada doesn't have many opportunities like this and I tried to gut it out," Dancevic said. "It started to loosen up near the end of the match, but I felt it quite a bit.
"It wasn't great."
Spadea controlled the first set, using his solid baseline game and deft touch to move Dancevic around the court. Dancevic looked more comfortable in the second set and had three break points trailing 2-1, but couldn't take advantage.
"Vince came out and played a great match," Dancevic said. "He served well, he didn't miss much."
Four seeded players lost Wednesday.
Fernando Gonzalez defeated No. 8 Rainer Schuettler 3-6, 6-4, 6-3, while Thomas Johansson beat 13th-seeded Nicolas Massu 6-4, 6-4.
Massu was originally scheduled to face Taylor Dent in the first round, but Dent withdrew Tuesday with a calf injury and was replaced by Johansson, the '99 Canadian Masters winner and 2002 Australian Open champion.
Gregory Carraz beat Sebastien Grosjean, the 12th seed, 6-2, 7-6 (7) and Nicholas Keifer got past No. 15 Marat Safin of Russia, the 2000 champion, 6-7 (3), 6-4, 7-6 (3).
"The depth in the game is pretty impressive," Roddick said. "It's really, really tough these days, especially in tournaments like this where everybody is here.
"There aren't a lot of easy matches."
In other matches, fourth-seeded Carlos Moya beat Fernando Verdasco 6-7 (9), 6-3, 6-4 and Frederic Niemeyer defeated David Sanchez 6-1, 6-4.
o
In women's tennis, Alicia Molik used a dominating serve to upset second-seeded Amelie Mauresmo 7-5, 3-6, 6-3 Wednesday in the second round of the Acura Classic in Carlsbad, California.
Molik, unseeded and ranked 29th in the world, overcame Mauresmo in the third set by using her strong serve to control play, losing just two points on her five service games and none in the last three.
"I was impressed with the way I served it out," Molik said. "Forget the match. To serve it out at love against someone like Mauresmo, I think I can pat myself on the back."
It was only the second meeting between the players, but Molik still had a 7-5, 7-5 loss to Mauresmo at the Australian Open fresh on her mind.
"Revenge a little bit," Molik said. "In saying that I didn't win last time, I was more determined this time. I knew that if I did get my chance, I would work that much harder and make sure that I would close it out."
Mauresmo, who had a first-round bye, did not play like the No. 3-ranked player in the world. She certainly did not resemble the player who reached at least the quarterfinals in each of the three Grand Slam events this year.
"She played great, especially on her service game," Mauresmo said. "It was very difficult for me to break her because she was serving so well."
Fourth-seeded Lindsay Davenport staved off an early challenge before winning the final nine games to beat Karolina Sprem 6-4, 6-0 in her opening match on Wednesday night.
Davenport, who has won her last two tournaments, extended her winning streak to 10 matches.
The American traded early service breaks with Sprem in the first set and then held her serve at 4-all to start the streak. Sprem, who upset Venus Williams at Wimbledon before losing in straight sets to Davenport in the quarterfinals, hurt herself with six double faults in the first set alone.
Davenport, fresh off an easy victory over Serena Williams in the finals of the Carson event on Sunday, also won the Bank of the West Classic at Stanford the week before. Davenport is attempting to win all three California summer WTA events for the second time in her career. She pulled off the feat in 1998 when she went on to win the U.S. Open, the first of her three Grand Slam titles.
With three more wins on Wednesday, seven of the eight Russian players entered have advanced to the third round. No. 7 Svetlana Kuznetsova beat Daniela Hantuchova 6-1, 6-2; Elena Bovina defeated Eleni Daniilidou 6-1, 6-4; and Elena Likhovtseva downed Barbora Strycova 6-4, 6-3.
Mauresmo is the highest ranked player Molik has ever beaten. The victory was only the Australian's fourth against a top 10 opponent.
Molik, winner of two career WTA titles, was down 3-0 in the first set. Molik rebounded with a break, and the players were back on serve with Mauresmo holding a 5-4 lead. With a set point facing her in the 10th game, Molik served an ace, won the game and finished off the set.
"It was probably a key moment when I was a break up and I wasn't able to keep it until the end of the set," Mauresmo said.
After Mauresmo won the second set by winning the first three games, Molik started the third set by taking a 3-0 lead with a break in the second game. The players held serve the rest of the way.
No. 9 Paola Suarez lost 6-3, 6-0 to Marion Bartoli.
In other second-round matches, eighth-seeded Ai Sugiyama defeated Shinobu Asagoe 6-2, 6-2, and Conchita Martinez, making her 13th appearance here, was a 6-3, 6-4 winner over Iveta Benesova. It marked the 10th time that Martinez, the 1995 champion, won her first two matches here.
TITLE: SPORTS WATCH
TEXT: Iran Crisis Solved
CHONGQING, China, (Reuters) - Iran's Asian Cup campaign is back on track after the team was thrown into disarray by suspensions during the first round of the soccer tournament, coach Branko Ivankovic said.
The Croatian hailed his team, who closed ranks after losing three players following a volatile 2-2 draw with Oman to hold Japan to a goalless stalemate on Wednesday, sending them into the quarter-finals.
"We had a problem to deal with and we dealt with it among ourselves," he said. "We kept our heads and nobody was sent home. It was an internal issue."
Pitcher Gomez Dies
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - Former San Francisco Giants pitcher Ruben Gomez, who won baseball's first regular-season game on the West Coast, has died. He was 77.
Gomez died Monday in San Juan, Puerto Rico, the Giants said. The team said he had been ill for a long period.
Gomez started the first game in San Francisco history, beating Don Drysdale and the visiting Los Angeles Dodgers 8-0 on April 15, 1958. The two teams moved from New York after the 1957 season.
The right-hander was 76-86 with a 4.09 ERA for the Giants, Philadelphia, Cleveland and Minnesota. He pitched from 1953-62, and then returned to make seven relief appearances for the Phillies in 1967, when he was the oldest player in the majors at 39.
Gomez also was the first pitcher from Puerto Rico to win a World Series game.
Gomez had his best season in 1954, going 17-9 with a 2.88 ERA. He also won 13 games as a rookie in 1953 and 15 in 1957.
Cyclist Quits Olympics
BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Belgian world champion mountain biker Filip Meirhaeghe has pulled out of the Olympics after admitting testing positive for a banned substance.
The 33-year-old, considered one of Belgium's best hopes for a gold medal at the August 13-29 Games in Athens, said on Thursday he was quitting the sport after testing positive for the blood-boosting substance EPO (erythropoietin) last month.
A silver-medallist at the Sydney 2000 Olympics, Meirhaeghe said he had tested positive two days before a mountain bike cross country World Cup race which he won on June 27 in Quebec.
Ronaldo to Marry
SAO PAULO, Brazil (Reuters) - Those playboy binges and extra pounds of weight might be about to end for Real Madrid's Brazilian star Ronaldo.
The striker has asked his girlfriend, model and MTV presenter Daniella Cicarelli to marry him after dating for just a month and a half, according to Brazilian media reports.
Ronaldo proposed during a vacation in Greece and they will get married in Paris in a few months time, O Estado de S.Paulo newspaper said.
"I don't confirm and don't deny," said Rodrigo Paiva, Ronaldo's press agent.