http://www.cdi.org/russia/johnson/6406.htm

Moscow Times

August 16, 2002

Three Sartorial Generations of New Russians

By Michele A. Berdy

Novye Russkiye: New Russians -- entrepreneurs and businessmen differing in style and income from the "old Soviet" model; very wealthy, often through illegal or dubious means.

Where did all the New Russian jokes go? Are they just not funny anymore? Or maybe New Russians aren't funny anymore. In the fast-forward of post-Soviet history, New Russians change every few years. Remember the first crop? Guys in maroon polyester jackets, with gold necklaces so heavy the ocean liner Queen Elizabeth II could use them for ballast, and a tendency to cross the line between more-or-less legal and outright fraud. Prikhodit v nash yuvelirny kakoi-to Novy Russki -- kanaet, pokazyvaet pachku zelyonykh, i khochet kupit samy dorogoi persten (This New Russian comes into our jewelry store, swaggering, flashing a wad of greenbacks, and wants to buy the most expensive ring in the store).

The second batch had a bit more polish: gray suits, smaller chains, but the same love of spending money. Nepriyatno bylo s nim obshchatsya. On vsegda paltseval (I didn't like hanging around with him. He was always playing the Big Shot). U nego dzhentlmenski nabor Novogo Russkogo -- Mers, zolotoi krest i yevroremont. (He had the usual for a New Russian: a Benz, a gold cross and European-style remodeling in his apartment.) These are the folks who brought us biznes po-russki, business Russian-style, a blend of illegality, absurdity and fraud. They made it hard for the other Novye Russkiye -- the hard-working ones, who left their research institutes to open their own shops and production companies -- to do business. And harder still for them to do business with foreign investors, who thought that anyone in a decent business suit was a crook. By the late '90s, Novye Russkiye were a spectrum, not a type.

The newest Novye Russkiye are indistinguishable from their Western business partners, complete with: kostyum ot luchshego londonskogo portnogo, "diplomat," zolotye chasy (a suit from the best London tailor, an attache case, gold watch). (Note that a diplomat in Russian is a hard-sided attache case; a soft leather case is called a portfel.) They've given their Benzes to their fathers and now drive Jeep Cherokees. But there's still a bit of flash: They've gotten bored with the yevroremont in their city apartments and have abandoned them for their kottedzhi. Nothing could be farther from a "cottage," which implies a cozy little country house. These are better translated as "country homes," "country estates" or even "mansions." And since they've still got money to burn, they build them for their relatives too. A building foreman once described his latest client: "On stroil sebye ogromny kottedzh -- tselaya rota mogla tam zhit i drug druga ne videt. A potom poprosil menya postroit kottedzh pod klyuch dlya svoyei tyoshchi. Nu i nu! U bogatykh svoi prichudy. " (He built himself a huge mansion -- an entire company could live there and not see each other. And then he asked me to build a "ready to move in" cottage for his mother-in-law. I'll be damned! Rich people have the strangest habits!)

By the way, other countries in the former Soviet Union have their own home-grown versions of New Russians: Novye Belorusy, Novye Ukraintsy. In Kazakhstan they have them too, only there the local wits have named them Kazanovy.

Michele A. Berdy is a Moscow-based translator and interpreter.