Новый годоM! or The Irony of Fate

I've mentioned earlier that New Year's is the Russian mother lode of holidays. The city itself is stunningly beautiful. Moscow cedes nothing to any city anywhere as far as raw seasonal gorgeosity is concerned. Again, sorry there's a dearth of photos. I was designated driver last night and it's a bit like driving in New York here -- you have to be on your toes. So photography wasn't possible.

I passed the stroke of midnight at Marius' girlfriend's parent's house. Did you keep track of all those apostrophes? Marina and Marius live together in Los Angeles. They met in Los Angeles four years ago. But each are from Moscow. Marina used to model when she was a teenager. At one point she ended up the model for a huge series of detective novels. Each cover featured Marina as the main character, usually wielding a gun against some exotic background.


So we bundled into Marius' car and drove to a Moscow suburb where Marina's parents live in a typical Soviet era apartment block. Marina and her parents hadn't seen each other in more than a year so it was quite a lovely reunion.


Married for 37 years, Marina's parents are warm, welcoming people. They don't speak a word of English but greeted me with Russian kisses and bear hugs. They had set up a table in the living room and New Year's dinner was set out. The TV was nearby. This is an important detail, especially in the Russian way of celebrating the holiday. See basically, it all comes down to The Irony of Fate.


We may have It's a Wonderful Life but Russians have a 35 year-old romantic comedy called The Irony of Fate. The movie caught fire when it came out and became a treasured seasonal tradition. You must watch at least part of it when it's aired on New Year's Eve. The Rewin household was no different.


Marina's father, Pyotr, is retired from a lifetime of service in the Russian military. The apartment is filled with artifacts of his lengthy career. He served in Chechnya and in other theaters of war. We looked at photos of him across the decades, standing there with some major bang-bang looking quite fearsome. Seriously, even now at 70 years-old, the man could kill you with his pinky. The apartment has displays of knives he has collected, knives made by prisoners mostly. I did not ask 'prisoners of what'?

Oh, I should mention that I finally got my slippers. A cabinet just inside the front door flips open to reveal a whole range of guest slippers. I chose holiday red.



So we sat down for dinner, The Irony of Fate playing in the background. Russians seem to come armed with jokes so Marius is always trying to translate the joke for me.


Marina's father (and I deliberately don't use an honorific such as "Mr." Rewin because such things as Mr. and Mrs. don't exist in Russia), so Marina's father told a joke which perfectly represents something of the national outlook of your typical Russian, the way it used to be. It goes something like this:

So a man comes home one night and his wife says, "How was your day?" And the man says, "It was shit." The next night the man comes home from work and again his wife asks, "How was your day?" The man replies, "It was shit." The next night the man comes home and his wife asks, "How was your day?" And the man says, "It was shit. But at least the situation is stabilizing."

There. That was the joke. Think about it. Think about everything the Russian people have been through in the past 110 years and you'll get a sense of why it's funny. Anyway, I laughed.



After the turkey and the Fish in a Fur Coat (growing on me) I thought the meal was over. But then out came these massive dumplings. You eat them with your hands. I had something like 76 of them. Oh, boy.

Once The Irony of Fate ends, the TV switches to several live shots of the Kremlin. And then the President comes on for his traditional New Year's Eve address. Tonight, the Vladster.


The New Year's eve presidential address is a tradition that began with Brezhnev on December 31, 1970. Since then, every New Year's eve the sitting president addresses the nation, not so much with a political speech but more along the lines of a friendly state-of-the-union. He tells everybody how good things are and wishes the people a healthy and prosperous coming year. I liked it. Seemed civilized.

Then the clock strikes midnight and the city erupts in fireworks both legal and decidedly not. And everyone has them. Sitting at the dinner table, the reports of rockets and fireworks far, near, and right outside our 10th floor window filled the house. And it goes on and on and on. A particularly loud explosion gets everyone out of their chairs as the stroboscopic detonations flash across the living room.


Soon we crowded around the bedroom window where we had the best view of the park below and the city beyond.



When it came time to leave, Marina's father presented me with a gift. A book cover made from real Birch. It's truly beautiful. It's hard to describe the feeling of getting a gift from a retired soldier in the Soviet army whom you don't even know and who doesn't really know you. I don't mean to sound glib. Marina's father also wanted to give me one of his best knives from his collection but knowing how impossible it would be to get it on a plane, the effort was abandoned. I was touched, though.


Marina's mom gave me a box of chocolates. I can tell you that as of this writing it's down five chocolates.

Marius was given a new bana hat. When you go to the traditional Russian baths, you wear a bana hat. This one has a Russian star on it.


After many hugs and the return of a slipper or two, we headed back into central Moscow as fireworks streaked over the roads from people lining the sidewalks. Object: Prado.

By now it's nearly two. But in Russian time, you may as well have just gotten up and had your morning cheekoo. But I had already gotten up early and worked all day and was, well, je suis fatigue. But I drove Marius and Marina to Prado, went in, watched some bad karaoke, some enthusiastic dancing and revelry of a general nature.



So from the shimmering streets of Moscow, let me wish all my friends, family and loved ones the happiest of new years. And I mean that in a most ungeneral nature.