Superstition

Russia – a country of various fears and superstitions
Inner fears that are culturally anchored

To be or not to be a Woman – that is the question

As we saw previously, I always have the feeling that Russian women are constantly under pressure to find a man.
And it got to the point that in big cities such as Moscow or St Petersburg, a woman is also very anxious of staying single. Not being married or worse, if she’s not married and even didn’t forge a career either - it is the end of the story.

The other huge fear of women is not becoming a mother. While trying to achieve these goals (marriage, baby), they don’t care anymore about their dream of “getting married to the ideal man, making a baby with love and living happily all together.”

I won’t go into the details of the way they sometimes use to get pregnant - I couldn’t believe my ears about ploys to do it, but usually after 30-35, if not married yet, they’d do anything to give birth, even if the baby will stay without a father; they usually count on the help of the family then.

It is as if a woman doesn’t think of herself as a “Woman” if she did not give birth once in her life. What about women who cannot have a baby? Isn’t she still a woman? I never got an answer on that, except from men: “Not to have problems, we try to make a woman pregnant before marriage; if it doesn’t work, we won’t stay together: the man will leave her.”

What about married couples who cannot have babies? The essential is to be married; after that, people around already don’t worry nor care so much about these people; they’ll just feel compassion for them, but won’t be able to put pressure anymore.

View on Life

I guess that in a country where religion was forbidden for many years, people are progressively turning back to it, not because they start to believe more in God, but because of the fear of a future, which until now was politically, economically and socially unstable. That is a reason why people in Russia are usually superstitious, pessimist and fatalistic, even though, as we’ll see later on, they know better than us how to live the present moment.

It reminds me of a Russian joke: a pessimist man and an optimist are at the summit of a mountain. The weather is terrible and the way back is impossible as the paths are broken. They know they won’t have any other option than jumping in the gap. Doing it, the pessimist man jumps first, shouting all the bad words he knows because of his fear of depth and death. The optimist one bursts out laughing and yells: “yeaaaaah!!! I’m flying!”

That’s Life. The only way to happiness is to look at Life the right way, and accept things as they come, thinking: “Everything is for the best.”

As a matter of fact, Russians are more fatalistic, irrational, even if they keep saying: “everything will be ok”, the whole day long, they don’t really believe so. And even if they are strong and have survived hard times in the recent centuries (wars, revolutions, inflation, crisis), still finely adapting peacefully to the present and all new situations that Life and politics offer them, time goes by, and people slowly lose faith, turning therefore more to religion, refusing to admit that Life is in everybody’s hands; they stay irresponsible, living in the fear of the future, with no hope of a better-to-come.

That’s why, when something didn’t happen, they usually use one of their lovely proverbs: “It looks like it just wasn't meant to be”. And with humor, people add: “You cannot escape Fate. And if you did, it wasn’t meant to be!”

Which superstitions exist in Russia?

Who never opened an umbrella at home without hearing a voice (or oneself): « Don’t open it at home because it will give us bad luck! » Who never thought about « going under a ladder or not going »? What about 7 years of unhappiness if you broke a mirror?

I guess these are common examples of superstition spread around the world; but coming to Russia, I got to know many more, and people live according to these signs, usually commenting them when a situation occurs. Russians are almost “victims” of these beliefs for a long time already, as it probably came before Christianity.

And if something happens and you don’t respect the “laws of superstition”, saying: “What would happen if I don’t do [it]?” They usually can’t answer anything. It’s like automatic reflexes that give bad conscious if people don’t do them.

So here is a list of the most common fears and beliefs I heard:

If you are walking outside and let another person accidentally pass between you and your friend, it may cause a big argument between you two. So you better say “Hello” to each other as soon as possible – it will release all risk of discord

If you drop a fork, someone is on his way to you - a male

If you drop a knife, a female is on her way to you

If you drop a spoon - who knows?

Hiccups mean someone is thinking about you right now

Never give something over a threshold: both people should be either outside or inside - negative sign

If you break a mirror, there will be seven years of misfortune. Well, that’s no news! BUT if you break dishes, something good will happen! However, don’t keep the broken ones – bad sign.

If a black cat crosses your path, something bad will happen. That is why you’ll have to patiently go behind until it changes direction… and yes, you can then miss a couple of buses or trains!

Don’t put an empty bottle on the table, always on the floor - bad sign

If person A steps on person B's foot, they will have an argument. To undo this problem, A should gently step on B's foot

If someone doesn't recognize you right away, you'll be rich. Just like that!

If you have cooked too salty – you’re in Love. Who’s the lucky person?

If you come back home after you forgot something – you’ll have to look at you in the mirror if you don’t want to have any trouble

In order not to give bad luck to someone else while talking about him/her, you should touch a piece of wood or 3times split over your left shoulder (just do as if!)

If you are leaving for holidays, just before leaving the house, you should sit in silence with people “for the path” – like a little meditation for your journey to be safe

Don’t ever give money from hand to hand. Just lay it down on a table or something, even in a shop

Never give money in the evening either – you’ll be poor(-er)

Don’t whistle anywhere inside (house, Banya) – you’ll have money problems

Never bring out the garbage at night – bad sign. That was a big argument with my ex-boyfriend… bad luck or stinky house? Choice is yours

If someone sneezes while speaking – the person who was talking was telling the truth, so many people tell the truth in spring, but so many liars in winter!

If you buy something new, you should “wash it off” – it means drink in its favor, like a blessing

Don’t show a new born child to any people for 40 days (or a month) – people could have a negative influence looking at it

If your right hand itches, you're going to get money soon or meet someone soon

If your left hand itches, you're going to give money away

Knives should never be pointed towards a person (nobody told me exactly why, but according to some readings, it is linked to a future argument with someone)

While telling a story about a bad injury that happened to another person, you should never demonstrate it on yourself. (If you forget about it don’t worry, everybody will remind you, yelling with big wide eyes: “don’t show on yourself!!!” If you did, spit 3 times over your left shoulder (or do as if you take these bad influences with your hand and throw them away)

Russians try not to speak about future achievements and good luck: it could attract the “Evil Eye”. When someone is talking about something good that happened, is happening or will happen, he/she should touch a piece of wood or spit 3 times over the left shoulder

Pregnant woman should not cut their hair or die it during pregnancy to help protect their child and its health. But eating Mc Donald’s –no problem!

Many “lucky places”, “lucky bronze sculptures”, “lucky bridges.” You can find everywhere in Russia, even in metro stations in Moscow – rub a special place of a bronze sculpture and you will be rich/healthy/pregnant. There are even touristic excursions about it

For money to come into your life – you better buy a red wallet (if it is not red – it can explain your financial position)

Here is also what I found on the Internet:

When you have alcohol, it must be drunk until it’s gone (Russians are good at it!)

One should not put a glass with alcohol back on the table

Traditionally alcohol is poured out to all the people present, though they aren’t required to drink

One should not make a long interruption between first and second shots That explains a lot!

Many other superstitions exist in Russia (marriage, funeral), but I think we should stay on the daily-ones, more common.

And if listing all the superstitions – they could form a book by themselves!

Superstition controls the Russian life

From the moment I learnt Russian, I’ve been very surprised to hear so many sentences, sayings, aphorisms, and proverbs related to God; they also exist in the other languages I know, but not so wide-spread. Interesting once again to point out that Religion was forbidden for many years in Russia.

Here are the most common expressions you could hear from anyone during a conversation: God loves the Trinity (all things comes in threes), God’s words (= Thank God), May God give you Health, May God be with him, May God not […] (= Heaven forbid).

I can remember a colleague of mine in Perm. We were talking about superstition and she came to the conclusion that “it was totally stupid and nonsense”. A couple minutes later, I asked how her baby was doing: “everything is fine, thanks” she said, touching some wood and splitting above her shoulder 3 times. We laughed about it for a long time. But what does it prove? Superstition is so anchored in people that even though they don’t deeply believe in it, they are still noticing it, and are torn by the fact of following it or not.

Psychics and the End of the World

Mid-December 2012. Moscow. I come home from work; I go to the kitchen and see one of my roommates (a 46-year-old philosopher and psychologist), mourning, lamenting and crying her eyes out. I thought something unhappy happened in her life: bad news about her family? Close friends? Her?

As she won’t talk with me, I asked her 23-year-old daughter if I could be any help for her. She said: “My Mum is crying because The End of the World is in two weeks.” I was shocked and didn’t even know what to say. How could such an intellectual woman believe in that media crap? (Sorry for judging).

I had heard people talking about The End of the World of December 21st 2012 for several months - as we heard in Europe in 2000, but didn’t realize it would become such a thing here. The difference is how many more people, sites, blogs, pictures and videos were dealing with the End of the Light (translation from Russian) in Russian and in other languages (English, French, German). Moreover, Russian videos (f.i. on YouTube) were very serious about it, sometimes looking like an advertisement for sects.

I personally never had a TV at home and happened once to be a guest, once where my friend was looking at a famous TV debate-show: the discussion turned around this End of the World, where a man showed bunkers for sale where it would be possible to live and protect oneself. It’s obviously an extreme example, but shows how far things got here.

Another very new fashionable famous TV show is called: Extra-Sense. I guess I won’t have to explain what it is about, except that “heroes” are usually women in their forties wearing so much jewellery that they look like a Christmas tree (French idiom), stereotyping Gypsies. The principle of the show is to go back to the murder-place with the victim’s family and friends and to resolve the mystery of a person’s death. The show can have various stories with different heroes and last up to 5-6 hours in a row! And it's unbelievable what a success!

And this is just another example. Many Russians go to psychics to heal, learn about their future, and make decisions; clients are mainly businessmen and politics.

I talked about this phenomenon around me and many people are shocked, saying that it’s a new tendency. By the way, Ural is very famous about white and black magic. People all around the world are going there to participate in Psychic Energy conventions or courses. It is also said that when the World will collapse (at first geographically), Ural will stay on its feet...