Windows to Russia

“Peyton Place” A saying in America for a situation that is like a soap opera! In fact the saying comes from a book written in 1956 and ensuing prime time soap that was aired from 1964 to 1969…

“The term “Peyton Place” became a buzzword to describe the duality of middle class life, with its deep secrets and rampant sex beneath a hypocritical veneer of propriety.” (Link)

Last night I used that term and Svet used a term that Russian’s use, “Santa Barbera!” It seems that Russian’s loved the soap Santa Barbera!

It all started: I had just walked the dog at around 1:30am and thought that going to bed would be a great idea. Svet was finishing up on some computer programing and I had battened down the hatches on the flat.

That is when the soap opera started outside our flat. In our building is a young lady that has a child. She lives with her mother. The young lady is still married but they do not live together. So I have noticed that this young lady has a multiple of boy friends and they all some how seem to coincide together? Until last night…

The husband that does not live with her anymore got upset with the situation and it escalated from there…

We had the cops outside. Plus we had at least 5 of her boyfriends that I have seen making the rounds. 🙂 We also had her real husband and we had all their friends. All together about 25 people. Oh, and also her mother was in the middle of all this. Everyone was screaming in the middle of the street. The young lady was the center of attention and you could tell that she was so happy to play the part of the distressed mistreated female.

She had all her guys ready to fight for her and she was the damsel in distress. It was a great show and better than any soap opera on TV. This was real life and after 2 and a half hours of drama. The young lady and her real husband walked off into the sunset (really sunrise at this point) hand N hand discussing how much they loved each other…

That is when I said: “Oh Brother – What a Peyton Place!”

Svet said, “No – What a Santa Barbera…” 🙂

Windows to Russia!

Two muggers attacked Natalia Osipova the world famous Russian international ballet star, as she left the American Ballet Theater in NYC (New York City) early one morning this week. They hit her in the nose and stole her bag: I then proceeded to check all the sources in America on this happening…

Yes it happened and these are some of the comments from the many postings at the news sights, that the articles received from readers in America:

So, why was she walking alone on a NYC street
at night? That is my main question! Shocking!

How Stupid! Oh yes, she is Russian, what do you expect.

She was alone? What a stupid female!

Send the Russian home, that just shows you how naive they are!

She deserves to be mugged, everyone knows that you do not combine alone female and NYC. Plain dumb!

Poor girl, Hope she is OK! Someone needs to tell her that she is in America and she needs to get her a bodyguard!

I thought about the comments that I just read from a dozen websites on this story. I then realized that the people in America do not realize that Natalia Osipova could walk alone in Moscow and never be bothered. She has been safe to walk alone all her life in Russia!

I would never let Svet walk alone in an America city. I have a hundred stories I could tell about the murder, rape, muggings and such that occurred just in a city of 150,000 people in America much less million of people like in NYC. Atlanta, Georgia which has a lot less people than NYC is a very unsafe place to walk alone at night. (I know I have been robbed there.) I also have lived across the river from Cincinnati, Ohio and if you know anything about “Over The Rhine” then you know a small city like Cinn. is a crime ready to happen.

But in Moscow Svet has walked alone all her life and she has lived in Moscow all her life. So if Svet was in America she would expect to walk alone wherever she felt like. It does not work that way though…

So when I walk at night in Moscow at around 2 – 3 am, I am still amazed at the freedom and peace that you have. It is like a small town with 15,000,000 people. By the way that is Boza and I’s favorite time to walk… 🙂

Windows to Russia!

This is interesting and includes blogs like mine in the ruling:

Russia’s Supreme Court ruled on Tuesday that Internet media outlets which refuse to remove reader comments when requested to do so by the federal media watchdog will be prosecuted.

No action will be taken if a comment that the watchdog considers to be an “abuse of media freedom” is removed or “expeditiously edited.”

Vasily Nechayev, deputy chairman of the Supreme Court, said the ruling was “the first attempt to explain the responsibility of the Internet media” and the way it is regulated.

He added that an Internet outlet officially registered in Russia will be treated in court the same way as radio or television channels that broadcast live. Such media outlets will bear no responsibility for comments made by news makers live on the air.

He said, however, that unregistered outlets, for example, blogs, will be held liable for offensive, extremist, libelous or false information that they may post.

Looks like the next thing the world will do is try to take our internet from us…

America is doing that very same thing…

Things that make you go Hummmm…

Windows to Russia!

• Russia clarifies media laws (variety.com)

http://kylekeeton.com/2008/08/russia-medvedev-at-shanghai-cooperation.html

Bulgarian Prime Minister Boyko Borisov on Friday sharply criticized the two largest Russian-Bulgarian energy projects, according to local media.

He said after a meeting with EU ambassadors that Bulgaria was pulling out of the Burgas-Alexandroupolis pipeline project and suspending construction of the Belene nuclear power plant. By way of explanation, he said the pipeline was routed across an environmental reserve and was not supported by the residents of the Burgas area, while the project’s effectiveness was also questionable.

Looks like too me that Bulgaria wants more money from the Russian side or more control of the projects…

Once again we weave a web and what it looks like when we are done, no one knows…

Windows to Russia!

Yelena Baturina, the wife of Moscow Mayor Yury Luzhkov, is officially one of the three richest women in the world with an estimated wealth of $2.9 billion…

Only 14 women in the world have amassed personal fortunes of $1 billion or more – just 2% of the 1,011 self-made billionaires on the Forbes list. She is # 342 on the list of all billionaires…

Net Worth: $2.9 Bil
Fortune: Self Made
Source: construction
Age: 47
Country Of Citizenship: Russia
Residence: Moscow
Education: Moscow Institute of Manag
Marital Status: Married, 2 children

Powerful wife of Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov started out as a factory worker, then entered the Moscow Institute of Management. Met Luzhkov in 1987 when they were both serving on the Mosgorispolcom, a Soviet-era municipal commission. In 1991 started plastic-products company Inteko, which produced furniture and crockery but has since expanded into construction and construction materials. Has a new company called Patriot, which is focusing on affordable housing. They also helped restore the gigantic monument – Worker and Collective Farmer, reinstalled in November 2009, at a cost of $100 million.

Hummmm… (Interesting)

Windows to Russia!

Svet and I had a good weekend and stayed away from posting any articles. At least very many articles. 🙂

We went and got two tires for our Volga and we need to have them put on this week. We picked up Russian made tires and got a pretty good deal on them. We have elected to go with a very heavy tire that has one nylon belt, two polyester belts and three steel belts. This assures better protection against the famous Russian roads, also since we travel to the village a lot which is located literally on a goat trail, (that we have to crawl through mud and deep ruts), we elected to get an aggressive tread that has some deep biting lugs…

But now after a fairly sunny weekend we are dealing with rain, rain and more rain. Our weekend was extra long this week. Day of Russia was celebrated this weekend. Some seem to call it Independence day in Russia but as Svet says: What were we independent from?

That is a good question and I have found out that no where in official documents do they attribute independence day with Russia day. But I do not care because any holiday is good to me anymore. So the more the better… 🙂

So Svet and I just took it easy for a few days and I tried to ignore all the stupidity that we call news in the world. 😉

Windows to Russia!

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev in February 2010 announced the establishment of a modern center for research and development, which the media quickly dubbed Russia’s Silicon Valley.

It is officially located in the town called Skolkovo. Skolkovo already is home to a very prestigious business school and other highly advanced facilities. The facility is around 20 km outside of Moscow and the research center will focus on five spheres of priority: energy, information technologies, communication, biomedical research and nuclear technologies. Russia considers the development of the high-tech and innovation sector a top priority, pledging billions of dollars to finance the sphere.

Today on Russian news it was announced that the first official project for Russia’s new research center has been verified. All we are being told is:

The Almaz Capital fund has financed a project that is based on cloud computing, an Internet-based technology that allows complex mathematical calculations to be performed using hundreds of thousands of computers around the world.

This has made Medvedev very happy and he has in the last few days been promising to pay special attention to the innovative high-tech research hub in Skolkovo and that Russia considers the Research Center a priority.

This is one of Medvedev’s projects that he has started and sees this a future for Russia…

Windows to Russia!

No – you got the title correct. deliminator: “A string or pattern used to delimit text into fields, but which is itself eliminated from the resulting list of fields.”

That is how I look at these new sanctions against Iran and with these sanctions are so many promises not to do this and not to do that. But these promises are not really that visible because backroom, under-table and slight of hand techniques were used to get the job done. Nothing is as it seems and everything is what it seems…

{The Obama administration fears tough U.S. sanctions against companies doing business in Iran would anger foreign allies.} (Read More Here)

I will let the article above stand for what is happening in America. I can tell you what is happening in Russia first hand though…

Russia has three or four articles on every subject to do with the Iran sanctions. One minute they can sell defense missiles to Iran, the next minute they can not, the next minute Medvedev has to decide and then the next minute we start all over again. This has been a pattern on all subjects associated with the sanctions, since the sanctions were voted on and that seems to be a quandary that will extend for a while… (Guilty feelings anyone?)

I see by the news from China that the same issues are happening and one minute this is the way it is and the next minute it has changed. China also is “Gung-Ho” on staying buddies with Iran. (Guilty feelings anyone?)

Also to top this all off – Europe is wanting to run ahead faster and increase the sanctions on a sorta a personal level associated with Europe only… (Read Here)

So here is what I see: America is fretting over what they have done will piss off the other half of the world that is not already pissed at them. Russia is running around like a chicken with its head cut off and has no idea what the bottom line is. China keeps saying, We are Iran’s Friends and buddy. The the “icing on the cake” is Europe who wants to beat the war drums and impose their own sanctions to the evil Iran. (Which Russia has made clear – You better not do that and bother us…)

Then there is Iran’s words of wisdom: “These (U.N.) resolutions have no value…it is like a used handkerchief that should be thrown in the waste bin. Sanctions are falling on us from the left and the right. For us they are the same as pesky flies.”……

You gotta admit Ahmadinejad has a way with words…

Windows to Russia!

PS: My Grandma use to say, “Do not do anything that you have to worry about after you do it, because it means it was not right in the first place!” Hummmm… (Seems to be a whole lot of worrying going on…)

What? Who Me!

Hello,

The second cup of coffee brought my attention to: One of the oldest and most respectable U.S. newspapers has published an article on the political situation in Georgia following the South Ossetian crisis. According to The Washington Post, “Georgians inside and outside the government have begun to question the wisdom of the costly confrontation, and of the leaders who set it in motion”.

Title of Article: Georgians Question Wisdom of War With Russia, President’s Future At Stake, Some Say! (Link: you must sign up)
By Tara Bahrampour
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, September 9, 2008; Page A12

Initially, questions made by Georgia’s opposition to Saakashvili were raised quietly. Now they are growing louder and louder. While Russian peacekeepers are still in Georgia, some opposition leaders have spoken out about what they call ‘failures in diplomacy and warfare’, claiming that Saakashvili’s own actions have damaged his standing in Georgia.

Others predict Saakashvili, who reclaimed South Ossetia and Abkhazia back in 2003, will be forced from office by a war he hoped would earn him a place in history.

“Through military force, and all kinds of provocations, Saakashvili tried to show that he had the ability to reclaim these territories”, said the leader of the opposition New Rights party David Gamkrelidze to The Washington Post.

Saakashvili is blamed for not having a clear outlook on the situation due to the information provided to him by ‘his small circle’ of intimate followers.

Though an anonymous official quoted by the Post predicts that Saakashvili will be out of office this very year, the president himself is convinced that he will survive this crisis politically.

Kyle & Svet

comments always welcome.