Russian Brides Dot Com

There are two noticeable features of the Russian population: (1) There are hardly any old men (2) the women dress very brightly using as little fabric as possible.

The reason for the first is that male life expectancy is just 61, largely due to poverty, poor diet and alcohol. Women live, on average, thirteen years longer. The second may be related to the first. Apparently there are over 10 million more women than men in Russia. Of the men that are available, my Russian girl friends tell me that it is hard to find a man who is educated, doesn’t swear or drink to excess. From my experience most of the Russian men I have met have been drinking or drunk and the majority belonged to the armed forces, but then most of these encounters happened on the train and I have no idea how clean their language was. So perhaps this is why the women decorate and preen themselves in the hope of attracting one of the few good men?

These factors could be contributing to Russia’s declining population, of approximately 750,000 people each year. To counter this, the government is apparently encouraging couples to have children by giving women 250 thousand rubles (approximately £5,500) for every child they have after the first. Despite this, I was astounded to read that the average Russian woman will have ten abortions in her lifetime. I wasn’t able to get into the reasons for this other than the historic lack of sex education. I am told that in the Soviet Union propaganda proclaimed ‘Don’t have sex, just work!’

Russia is a man’s world, but the emphasis on masculinity seems dated and immature. Men are supposed to look and behave tough and women are supposed to look sexy and behave submissively. But perhaps things are changing. In the thirty minutes that we walked along the seafront today we witnessed eight meringue brides and their new husbands posing seductively against defunct naval guns. It would appear that Russian brides are becoming a popular export too, with the repeated invitations from spam websites to wed a Russian lovely. However, not all women here are so inclined. For example, the Great Baikal Trail staff are predominantly female and those leading our project definitely had the seeds of ambition and dreams beyond stilettos and low cut tops.

More than fifteen years since the fall of communism the general picture seems to be that many Russian women are caught between a communist hangover of sexual ignorance and manufactured Western ideas of desirability. Perhaps it is this confusion or the lack of good men that is leading women to advertise their availability on-line.