Rashn for Dummies

What are the kids saying these days? Free weekly Bolshoi Gorod published a double plus good lexicon of newspeak in Moscow’s dangerously jaded fashion community. Can’t say I’ve heard many of these neologisms in the wild, but then again this is a rarefied crowd we’re talking about. Below are MDBIT’s official summary translations.

Блядопровод — Blyadoprovod
Literally “ho pipeline,” in the oil & gas sense. Used to refer to fashionable Moscow establishments frequented by professional women looking to pick-up johns.

Вертушка — Vertushka
A Vertu cellphone. Also the name of an old Soviet phone network system connecting government lines.

Деревня — Derevnya
Literally “the village,” referring to Baravikha Luxury Village, a focal point for the fashion crowd.

Данила — Danila
Synonymous with freak, a “strange passenger.” The term derives from red-haired Danila Polyakov, who successfully models both man and female lines. Possible to use in the neuter gender — i.e. “polnoe Danilo” (completely Danila) — which is extraordinarily convenient in our new gender-ambiguous world.

Дяга — Dyaga
Russian national nightclub Dyagilev decorated with the Order of the Red Banner. Frequent visits lead to rehab.

Минигарх — Minigarch
Also know as “Oligarch Lite,” “mini-oligarch” or “ruble millionaire.” The term refers to men worth somewhere in the vicinity of $50 million. Not really hip Russian newspeak, since it can already be found in Webster’s dictionary.

Рубль — Ruble
Rublevo-Uspenskoe highway and the surrounding area, which is a natural reserve for Forbesmen (those listed on Forbes Magazine's 100 Richest list).

Тюнинг — Tuning
The main past time of women in the “antique erotic” category. “Zhetskii” (hard) tuning indicates over-saturation with Botox.

У Дини — U Dini
Nickname of Denis Simachev’s bar-café-store on Stoleshnikov Pereulok. Also doubles as a password for feis kontrol — “Is Dinya there?” categorically disarms guards.

Russian — Russian
Describing grandeur and flamboyance, rarely of a constructive type.

Again, THEY SAID IT, NOT ME!

Photo: denissimachev.com

See, We Have Nice Things

Oh, you know. Moscow is retarded expensive. This June saw the opening of the third outlet of Globus Gourmet, Arkady Novikov’s high-end grocery store, in Baravikha Luxury Village, where people are serious about their luxury.


There was already a GG on Bolshaya Yakimanka and one on Arbat, which I had the misfortune of wandering into last week trying to make a curry. I emerged with no lemongrass, no “soy cheese” (tofu), no acknowledgement by the staff that soy cheese existed, an obscure claim that they only stocked "natural food," a $12-can of coconut milk and an impotent zucchini. As Jerry Seinfeld would say, “N-N-Novikov!”

$40 Green Pepper Tastes Like Progress

Blame the French, this time, though. Arkady is just the medium for luxury food line Fauchon to force its gourmet chocolate, wine, coffee, tea, jams and Dead Sea salt meat rubs on a country that’s fine squirting ketchup on pasta. Yo, where's the kholodets?!

Despite the pain of a curry deferred, Globus Gourmet, targeted at “young professionals with Western shopping values,” says it aims to make the shopping experience as comfortable as possible. The Baravikha opening, at least, was a Wizard of Rublyovka customer service wet dream.

And Duma deputy Alexei Mitrofanov was there, cutting Andalusian cow flanks.

And pop singer Anita Tsoi was there, bagging groceries.

And the president of World Class Fitness, Olga Slutsker, was manning the milk department.

And Star Factory contestent Yuri Titov was there, handing out eggs. Mmmm. Almost makes me want to eat again.

I don't know what this is about, but it's funny:



Globus Gourmet, Zhukovka, House 201, Tel. 418-3385

Photos: Elite.ru

Summerfolk (or There Goes the Neighborhood)

You bet it gets hot in Moscow in the summer: 36 degrees today and climbing. In times like these, poor people take a dip in the Moskva, rich people drive to their dachas and very rich people drive to their dachas in Zhukovka, 10 km outside the city center on the Rublyevo-Uspenskoye highway. In this village's elite settlements, new cottages start at $1 million, with things like helicopters thrown in to sweeten the package. These gated communities bear spacestation names — Zhukovka-3, Gorky-22 — or else evoke faraway American suburbia: Green Hill, Apple Garden, etc.


Subbing birches for beaches, Zhukovka is Moscow's Hamptons, a pretty place soured by urban vs. townie, richy vs. poory tension. A long time ago, Tsar Aleksei decreed that no industry shall ruin Zhukovka's natural beauty, making it the prime destination for black-lung city dwellers in the years to follow. Standard-issue huts were distributed among the proletariat in the late Soviet era. In the present day, many owners have held onto these and tend chickens in them year-round, despite the creeping onset of very important neighbors. At the neighborhood potluck you'll find the political elite (many members of the State Duma and the FSB (ex-KGB), Ukraine opposition leader Yanukovych), captains of business (Roman Abramovich, Nornikel head and skiing whore-monger Mikhail Prokhorov) and pop singers (Eurovision loser Alsou). Putin's brigade, heading deeper into Rublyovka, chokes the highway twice daily.


Poor people living in huts, rich people complaining of the livestock smell — a class war is a'brewing, if you listen to the old man on the porch in the rocking chair. As demand for luxury housing in the suburbs increases, things are getting nepriyatnie. The Guardian reported in February of mounting land grab "casualties," including the car-bombed Valery Yakovlev, formerly a community property official. The more civil are leaving it at strong suggestions that stubborn people surrender their land titles. The plebes have responded with harshly worded graffiti.


Before the Revolution comes, don't forget to enjoy Veranda u Dachi (Summer Terrace of the Dacha), part of Zhukovka's upperclass retail/dining neighboorhood, which was named the Best Out-of-City resturant by Menu.ru the last two years. The theme is pre-revolutionary country living — owner Arkady Novikov calls the restaurant a love letter to one's own home — but there's no Chekovian idyll. Cozy details like rustic cupboards with marinating cloves are undermined by perversely expensive prices and a degenerately rich clientele. A conservative estimate for dinner (Italian, Japanese, Uzbek and Chinese cuisines) is 70 euros.


The restaurant is attached to Dacha, an art gallery started by collector Yemelyan Zakharov and Sasha Vertinskaya, granddaughter of the ballad singer Alexander Vertinsky and niece of director Nikita Mikhalkov. It sells provincial knickknacks, and hosts haute couture shows like the one below.


The entire point of this article when I sat down to write it, arms sticking to the desk, was that it's now summer veranda season. Moscow is really cold more often than its really hot, so we really care about these things, yo. Veranda u Dachi's patio opened; people went.






Veranda u Dachi, 70 Rublyovo-Uspenskoye Shosse, Zhukovka village, Tel. 418-3394, www.artdacha.ru

Photos: readrussia.com, novikovgroup.ru, elite.ru