The president of Russia, Vladimir Putin, supports Dmitry Medvedev (currently 1st deputy prime minister) to become the next president of Russia, Russian business daily Kommersant reported today (see http://www.kommersant.ru/doc.aspx?DocsID=834759).

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So, it became a bit more clear who's going to be the next president of Russia...

There's a peculiar fashion in Russia where some men love to carry around a male purse (nicknamed "murse" by Exile newspaper, which transformed it into a fashion item among Moscow expat community -- see http://blogs.waytorussia.net/item/21 ).



We at Way to Russia strongly endorse this fashion (and murse especially), so here is a music video about it starring me (Dmitry - aka Supaflex Supadelicious), Dan Perushev, Pasha Rassadkin and our friends. Russki Beat style...

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Russian fashion
How much do you know about Russian Fashion?
Perhaps you envision fur
coats and hunting boots with a speck of Italian brand names here and
there?

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Russians are some of the most annoying tourists showed a recent study by Expedia.Com conducted among hoteliers in major tourist destinations. Only French, Indian and Chinese tourists were found to be more annoying than Russians, who are closely followed by British.

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Denis Simachev is perhaps the most interesting contemporary Russian fashion designer. Taking his inspiration from old school USSR style, 90s gangsters, and modern high life heroes from Russia, he successfully mixes the concepts together producing cutting edge, provocative, sexy, and often funny clothes. For example, his recent Summer 2007 collection was recreating the atmosphere of the popular Soviet resorts of the 80s: Black Sea and Sochi. Men wearing newspaper hats, leather jackets, shabby shorts, and trashy tops, all immaculately cut and fitted. The t-shirts had the slogan "???? ???????", which means "Nothing Sacred". Take a look at the fashion show video here:



The most recent collection explores the world of gangsters and crime.

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Estonia is main theme right now!
We have two positions. But it’s not all minds. One more fight new Cold War?
Who knows…
What do you think about?
Read more...

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Way to Russia presents the new feature: interviews with artists, musicians, and writers related to Russia. It follows the original idea of the Russian People interviews, which we've done over the last few years, but this time it's not random people in focus :-)

This first interview is with Vlad Sokolov, dj and producer, the founder of Sokolov Sounds breaks music label. He's currently based in London performing in various city's venues as well running his own weekly radio show. You can hear some tunes from the recent Perestroika album on Vlad's MySpace page.

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Kommersant newspaper published an article, which has interesting stats about the income of Moscovitans in 2006.

It turns out the average income in 2006 was 365 832 Roubles (about $13 549 US or about $1120 per month - 22.5% higher than in 2005 and more than 300% higher than in 2001).

More than 30% Moscovitans have income of more than $1000 US per month, and the top 10% earn more than $5000 US per month.

13% of Moscovitans live below the poverty line ($100 / month and less).

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Ok, this may sound a bit surprising, but do you know that it was Russians who actually invented hip-hop?

Back in the 18th century Russian villages witnessed the birth of a new genre called "Chastushka" (a short verse or a song). The content of these songs is usually quite explicit and sometimes even vulgar, but always funny. The strange thing is that this genre enjoys a huge popularity among old people in Russia today and you can still witness them gathering in city parks. They dance, sing, get together and basically freak out in a positive way.



The way Chastushka works is astonishingly similar to freestyle MC and breakdance "battles", except that there's an accordeon and folk singing involved. Usually, old women (Babushkas) gather together in a tight circle, put an accordionist (a man = Dedushka) on the side, and start moving and clapping rhythmically to his music. They encourage any two people to come in the middle of the circle for a competition of wits and dance. And once any two Babushkas come out, they invent a short song (Chastushka) and shout it one after the other.

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