I Love Me Some Vodka
The elixir of Russia!
Cultural Hints: Russian Vodka
Let’s
talk about vodka, which is an important product in Russian culture. There
are 1,8 million officially recognized alcoholics and over 10 million Alkashy
(people who drink at first opportunity) in Russia. Teetotaler may look like
a black sheep at many Russian parties. Why is that so? Let’s take glimpse
on Russian drinking history and traditions.
In XI Century Kiev Price Vladimir feeling a necessity to strengthen statehood
in pagan Russia decided to introduce a new strong religion. He met Moslem
messengers and favored much a heterogamic family traditions (Harem). But
when Prince Vladimir was told, that Allah does not allow drinking, he said,
that Russians will not understand such religion. In this way Russia accepted
a Christianity, which allows drinking.
Many old Russian fairy tales heroes celebrate a happy end by drinking Medy
(Honey alcoholic drinks), which was an old Russian tradition. I found in
an old book a version that Russia lost its first battle with Tartar-Mongol
hordes near Kalka river, because Russian Princes, who united for the battle,
went on a drinking spree (Pyr). When Mongol troops attacked them, many Russians
were unable to fight, and some of them even could not understand where they
are.
At the beginning of XVIII Century Tzar Peter the Great in his effort to civilize
Russia introduced vodka, tobacco smoking and potatoes. He even issued a special
reward: Vodka Order, which gave a right to its bearer to enjoy unlimited
free drinking of vodka in all Russian Traktirs. Before that Russia imported
small amounts of vodka from Germany, which was used as a medicine. Tzar Peter
was a famous heavy drinker and died from liver problem.
Despite a strong opposition from Russian Old Orthodox Church, which pronounced
vodka and tobacco a “Devil’s Stuff”, Russian people fast accepted vodka as
a strong and cheap booze. While Russian Bonde Monde drank Champaign and French
wines, Russian people drank vodka. In old Russia vodka was often sold by
pails (about 10 liters). Together with bread it became one of the main Russian
food products .
Russian Tzars had a tradition to celebrate a special events
by feeding people with free vodka on the streets. For example in 1913 during
celebrations of 300 Anniversary of Tzar’s Romanov’s Dynasty in Ordynka Pole
many people were crippled and jostled to death in a crowd’s rush to barrels
of free vodka, established by Tzar on the square. In his memoirs about Bolshevik
October Revolution commandant Malkov writes, that after take over of Winter
Palace and arrest of Russian Provisional Government, people rushed to the
Palace’s cellars with big stocks of wine and vodka. A drinking bout continued
for 3 days, until it was stopped by Bolshevik Red Guards.
It’s widely known fact, that Stalin often arranged heavy drinking parties
with top ranking government officials in his country house (Dacha) in Kuntsevo.
Red Dictator used the practices of some Russian Tsars to monitor thoughts
of his underlings when they got drunk. There’s a famous Russian saying: “What
a sober person has in mind – that he will have on his tongue when drunk”.
During W.W.II Red Army soldiers were provided with 100 g. of vodka per day.
Often before a serious attacks soldiers and officers received a weekly norm
to raise their morale. One of my father’s (he is W.W.II veteran) favorite
war stories is about an old Hungarian castle with stocks of good wine, which
happen to be right between Soviet and Germans battlefront positions.
Russian and German soldiers concluded a wine truce agreement. Russian messengers
visited the castle’s cellar for wine before noon, and Germans in the afternoon
and both sides were happy.
During Khrushev’s and Brezhnev’s times vodka was pretty available to ordinary
people. Khrushev liked to drink cognac and during 1962-1964 often showed
drunk in public. I remember my mother’s indignation, when Nikita was shown
on a movie clips evidently drunk. Now old people often remember Krushev’s
rule, as the days “when vodka was cheap”.
Leonid Brezhnev tried to limit consumption of vodka by raising prices for
alcohol, unsuccessful propaganda compaign, and by limiting its production.
People’s humor often fooled him. Russians had a lot of anecdotes, like:
<During a visit to industrial plant Brezhnev asks a turner:”If I shall
raise a price of the bottle of vodka to 10 Rbls., will you continue to drink?”.
“Yes” – was the answer. “But if I shall raise the price to 20 Rbls?”. “Yes
Leonid Illyich. You may raise it as high as you like and I shall continue
to drink”. “Why?”. “Look at this spare part. It costs one bottle of vodka
today, and it always will cost one bottle of vodka”.
To understand this joke, you must know, that many people used their working
facilities to make products and sell them besides a regular earnings. It
was a common practice, when a turner who made left-handed spare part for
private car was repaid with a bottle of vodka. Those days vodka was a kind
of convertible hard currency. Old Babushka’s paid few bottles of vodka to
a man who helped them to cut firewood. We paid a bottle of vodka to plumber,
who repaired our water tap, and to electrician, who repaired a switch. People
called vodka a “Liquid Currency”.
In
June 1986 Gorbachev, in an effort to civilize Russian people, introduced
Prohibition. He started a compaign of “civilized drinking”. As Russian Ex-Premier
Chernomirdin mentioned one day “We (Government) wanted to make it better,
but it went on as always do (i.e. wrong).” In 1986 police and Communist Party
structures started a war against alcohol in Russia.
Gotta have another!
At first Russia was in shock. The situation can be described by the following
popular Russian anecdote: Raisa Maximovna (Gorbachev’s wife) came up to Gorbachev
and said: “I have a terrible news for you about Shevarnadze (Foreign Minister)”.
“What is the news???”. “Shevarnadze is a CIA agent!!!”- said Raisa Maximovna.
“Uph, it’s not a terrible news. You much scared me, because I thought that
Shevrnaze went drunk.” – answer Gorbachev.
I know many people who were hit by this Prohibition compaign. In 1986 my
friend Stanislav, a chairman of Khabarovsk Krai Importing Company, was expelled
from Communist Party (Those days it was similar to civic death) and lost
his job. But he was a highly respected and skilled professional. His crime
was, that after signing a good contract he drank vodka with Japanese in the
Intourist hotel room. Somebody reported to the police and Stanislav was taken
by cops, when he left the hotel.
Or chief accountant of Khabarovsk Promstroi Bank after hours arranged a a
small birthday party in her office. Police raided, crashed the Bank’s door
and after spending a night behind the bars all “criminals” were expelled
from Communist Party and lost their jobs.
But Russians are fast in adaptation to new laws and conditions. Government
offered every Russian a coupon for 2 bottles of vodka per month, and Russians
offered the government a huge bootleg Samogon industries. They started to
produce Samogon (Moonshine) at home. People exchanged Samogon recipes, invented
modern moonshine distillers and that became some kind of national sport.
I’ve made myself a good stuff.
A
low level authorities closed eyes to people’s “drinking under the table”.
For example, CPSU arranged a “Sober Wedding Parties” compaign. But in Russia
a wedding party means at least two days of drinking with friends and relatives.
So, people brought on the tables a colored booze and pretended that they
drink tea and juice. Some Russians drank everything containing alcohol, and
we had a number of reports about people poisoned to death by alcoholic
surrogates.
Production and sales of vodka always was a Russian state’s monopoly, which
made up a major share of state budget. In 1992, after dissolution of the
USSR, a New Russian government allowed private production and import of alcoholic
drinks. Bootleggers Mafia received a legal ground for its development. In
conditions of government’s corruption and fraud, Mafia organized a stable
alcoholic drinks import and shadow production industries. Russian markets
were filled with cheap and low quality booze (Often counterfeited) coming
from Western countries USA, UK, France, Italy, Germany, Poland and etc. Vodka
Mafia arranged a stable illegal traffic of pure alcohol spirits into Russia.
A wide network of small illegal plants all across Russia use this spirits
for production of cheap vodka. Until 1997 import of alcohol was controlled
by so called Russian Sports Mafia.
Russian Athletic organizations were provided by the government with import
and taxes benefits. The raised profits were supposed to be used for development
and support of Athletic organizations and programs. After a number clashes
between different Mafia groups and a chain of killings, the Government cancelled
this benefits. But traffic of illegal alcohol continues today.
For example, in May 1998 Nakhodka Customs stopped a big party of barreled
pure alcohol spirits from USA. A similar smuggle parties were reported by
Leningrad Customs. Last spring Russian border patrol troops tried to stop
continuous traffic of illegal spirits delivered by heavy trucks across
Russian-Georgian border. This caused political tension between Russia and
Georgia and Commander of Russian Border Guards was dismissed by Kremlin.
According to some mass media reports 80% of alcohol and cigarettes export
into Russia today are controlled by Russian Orthodox Church. I don’t know
if it is true, but somebody at the highest level controls this business.
Russians are a collectivist society and alcohol plays an important role in
Russian social life. Most parties are traditionally arranged at home, where
people drink, sing songs, dance. Men usually drink straight vodka and women
are offered wine or Champaign. The only Russian cocktails I know are Bloody
Mary (Vodka and tomato juice), Polar Lights (Vodka mixed with Champaign)
and Eyrsh (Vodka mixed with beer). This stuff make you drunk fast, and you
get a lot of headache next morning.
Usually Russians have plenty of food on the table. The most favored food
for vodka (one drink of vodka is 100 -150g.) are salted pork fat (Salo) and
pickles. When you attend a Russian drinking party, the only way to avoid
vodka is to tell, that you do want to drink, but the health problem doesn’t
allow you to do that. Many Russians can hardly understand how a healthy and
strong man does not want to drink vodka. And if you decline their proposal
to drink they may consider this as an act of disrespect. Russians usually
have a specific good feelings towards Americans and try to arrange “Who can
drink more” competition.
The growth of alcoholism and drinking in Russia during the last years is
the result of growing social stress caused by fear, economic instability,
unemployment. Police reports that about 80% of crimes are committed by drunk
people. All this of cause does not mean, that Russia is the country of alcoholics
and you will meet many drunk people on the streets. There’s a lot of sober
minded nice people and this country must have a better future.
Russia Today Press Summaries Novye
Izvestiya October 14, 1998
The Great Vodka Redistribution Will Start Again in Russia
Whenever the state treasury becomes empty, the government suddenly remembers
alcohol production, the daily wrote on Wednesday.
In
the history of the new Russia, three prime ministers have attempted to impose
a state monopoly on the production and sale of alcohol — Victor Chernomyrdin,
Sergei Kiriyenko and Yevgeny Primakov.
Although they may have believed what they were saying, such a measure cannot
be, the daily argued. After several years of war for markets among vodka
kings, they will hardly surrender to an enemy as weak as the state.
The previous 70 government resolutions and decrees on alcohol were openly
sabotaged, so one can hardly expect that orders of First Deputy Prime Minister
Yury Maslyukov will be observed. For instance, a new order would check production
volume at every plant and block production between shifts. This would require
an army of inspectors to be present at every plant. But the director of one
alcohol plant told the daily it is easy to bribe a tax inspector. It only
cost himself $2,000, while a single production line gives him $60,000 of
profit per night.
Chernomyrdin tried, in vain, to impose similar measures in North Ossetia
in 1996, where they earn millions of dollars on illegal vodka production.
Experiments on controlling wholesale trade of liquor will also fail, the
daily predicted. Attempts to control retail trade in vodka will be detrimental
for the sector, because it will increase the price of vodka and lead to outbreak
of fake liquor in the country.
31 Oct 1998 Johnson’s Russia List
Radical Statistics: The Russian Morality Crisis
By Ray Thomas
The average male expectancy of life in Russia declined from 65 years in 1986
to 57.5 years in 1994.
A fall of this magnitude must be unprecedented in world history for any country
capable of maintaining a statistical system capable of measuring such a decline
with any accuracy.
Irrespective of matters of accuracy a decline of such magnitude must also
be unprecedented in that it was not the product of famine or from some kind
of plague. The only major epidemic suffered by Russia in this period has
been the outbreak of capitalism. Russian pundits and journalists reports
put the decline down to demoralisation. Millions of men in Russia have lost
their work and their purpose in life.
The ILO unemployment rate is only 10%, but that conceals massive underemployment
and massive wage arrears. This decline has not yet been the subject of
investigation by social scientists. But Professor Martin McKee gave a paper
in September that dealt with the medical aspects (as part of a programme
of public seminars held by the International Centre for Health & Society
at UCL). McKee is the leader of a research group at the European Centre on
Health of Societies at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine
which has reported extensively on Russia’s mortality experience – which is
parallel to that of many other former soviet countries.
There were only two items of good news in McKee’s lecture. One was that the
team did not find anything wrong with the statistics. Any major errors or
fiddling, McKee argued would reveal inconsistencies. But no inconsistencies
were found. The other positive point was that there was a sharp rise in the
male expectation of life of nearly three years over the period 1984 to 1987.
This is attributed to Gorbachov’s anti-alcohol campaign and the vigilance
of the KGB in regulating the market for alcohol.
After 1987, illicit brewing of alcohol is believed to have become widespread
and much of it is said to be of such poor quality as to be a special danger
to health. Commentators in and outside Russia have long attributed that low
male expectation of life to drinking vodka. Russian sources estimate that
Russian men drink nine times as much as Russian women, and this must go some
way to explaining the large difference between the expectation of life for
men and for women. Russian women have an expectation of life ten years greater
than that for men – a difference greater than that in any other country in
the world. But relating consumption of alcohol to the statistics on cause
of death is another matter. If alcohol is the cause, it is well disguised.
The number of deaths from accidents, injuries, drownings, murders and suicide
are all high – but alcohol is not included in the statistics as a contributory
factor for these categories.
The big medical puzzle, as McKee explained, is that the major cause of death
among men is diseases of the circulatory system including heart disease –
that are not usually associated with heavy alcohol consumption. The theory
developed by McKee’s team is that the pattern of drinking in Russia is different
from that in other countries. High alcohol consumption in the west is usually
associated with regular drinking.
But in Russia, McKee asserted. The pattern is one of binge drinking.
The
Russians do not sip wine with every meal, but on the occasion gulp down lots
of vodka. The statistical evidence supporting this conclusion flashed on
the screen in a chart showing deaths by day of week. The peak day for deaths
is Sunday. The number of deaths per day declines through the week until Thursday,
and then starts to climb again. Another chart, presumably from the Walberg
article cited below, showed a close correlation between the rate of labour
turnover and the increase in the death rate over the period 1987 to 1994.
I suspect that this chart is just the beginning of the important story. Bingeing
on vodka may be part of the Russian male soul, but a large increase in bingeing
that may help to explain the massive increase in the death rate over the
period 1987 to 1994 has to be attributed to social and economic factors.
The obvious sets of factors are the economic disasters associated with the
transition to capitalism. Russia has suffered from all the problems of
Thatcherism writ large.
Privatisation there has produced what was described a few years ago as a
million millionaires and 149 millions living in poverty.
The economic crisis of 1998 seems likely to give a new lease of life to that
description.
31 December 1998 The Globe and Mail (Canada)
Russia’s vodka culture
by Geoffrey York
MOSCOW — There is perhaps nothing quite so hopeless as a Russian anti-vodka
campaign.
Mikhail Gorbachev proved it in 1985 when he launched a futile crusade to
limit the sale of vodka. Today the Kremlin is about to discover it again.
In a rash burst of optimism, the Russian government is trying to ban the
distribution of cheap bootleg vodka — the mainstay of working-class drinkers
for years, and the main cause of an estimated 30,000 deaths from alcohol
poisoning every year.
Russians are unfazed by the latest crackdown. Illegal vodka is still available
at 60 cents a bottle from elderly women who dodge the police outside Moscow’s
subway stations. Street kiosks offer the bootleg stuff under the counter.
Market vendors sell illicit bottles to their friends and trusted customers.
‘The state will never win this fight,’ shrugs Andrei, a 41-year-old labourer.
‘There’s a lot of money at stake, and nobody is going to lose this money.’
The campaign against bootleg alcohol has merely confirmed the obvious: vodka
is as inextricably Russian as snow and ice, and just about as impossible
to abolish. The national drink has been inseparable from Russia’s cultural
identity for centuries. For millions of Russian men, the vodka bottle is
at the very heart of daily life. It is a social and business necessity, a
medical panacea, a faithful friend, and the quickest method of escape from
the hardships of post-Soviet poverty.
The most famous vodka drinkers are heroes in Russia. Next month the Russians
will proudly erect a bronze monument to their leading vodka philosopher,
the alcoholic author Venedikt Yerofeyev, who eulogized the spirituality of
booze in his classic underground novel (italics) Moskva-Petushki (end italics).
On the 60th anniversary of his birth in October, a Russian television channel
devoted six hours of programming to his memory, while 1,500 of his biggest
fans crowded into a suburban train to retrace the alcohol-fogged odyssey
in his famous novel.
Yet vodka is also Russia’s deadliest scourge. An
estimated 10 million Russians are alcoholics, and half of all deaths in the
country are at least partly caused by vodka. Of the 2.1 billion litres of
vodka consumed annually in Russia, more than half is the bootleg variety
— illicit, untaxed, unregulated, and often highly unsafe.
Prime Minister Yevgeny Primakov points out that Russia suffers more deaths
annually from vodka than it endured in the entire 10 years of the Afghanistan
war. About 30,000 to 40,000 annual deaths are caused by alcohol poisoning
— three times the total in 1990. (By comparison, only about 350 Americans
die from alcohol poisoning annually.)
Russians know that vodka can kill them, but their loyalty to the national
drink is unswerving. ‘I love vodka because it’s the strongest drink,’ said
Vladimir Nosov, a 41-year-old Moscow maintenance worker. ‘Russians need their
drinks to be very strong. Even when they make homebrew in the villages, it’s
not less than 40 per cent alcohol. Otherwise you’d need to drink too much
to get high.’
A few years ago, Russians surpassed the French to become officially the world’s
heaviest drinkers. By some estimates, the average Russian man consumes 18
litres of pure alcohol annually — the equivalent of a full bottle of vodka
every four days. (Surveys of Russian drinking habits, however, can be difficult
to conduct. In one survey, as many as 2 per cent of those approached were
too intoxicated to respond.)
Alcohol has been vital to Russian life for at least
a millenium. When Grand Prince Vladimir of ancient Rus was searching for
a religion for his pagan country in the 10th century, he chose Christianity
— rather than Islam — because it allowed his people to keep drinking. ‘Drinking
is the joy of the Russes,’ he said. ‘We cannot do without it.’
By the 15th century, a European ambassador in Moscow observed that the Russians
were ‘great drunkards and take great pride in this, despising abstainers.’
Two centuries later, even Russia’s priests and monks were notorious for heavy
drinking, and another European diplomat remarked that Russians were ‘more
addicted to drunkenness than any nation in the world.’
Mikhail Gorbachev’s campaign against vodka in the mid-1980s is believed to
have saved the lives of 600,000 people. But it also taught millions of Russians
how to get drunk on potato-based homebrew and hundreds of other toxic substances,
including perfume, shaving lotion, insecticides, anti-freeze, toothpaste,
shoe polish and varnish. Soviet military recruits drained the de-icing fluid
from fighter jets to satisfy their cravings. By 1988, the anti-vodka campaign
had collapsed.
In the 1990s, vodka drinking surged to record levels, accelerated by the
human dislocation of the post-Soviet transition and the drastically cheaper
price of alcohol in the new capitalist economy.
The new era of vodka liberation was symbolized by the president himself,
Boris Yeltsin, who became notorious for drunken performances in public. He
opened the floodgates for cheap vodka in 1992, allowing almost any kind of
cheap booze to pour onto the Russian market. Indeed, this was one reason
for his political popularity. One poll found that daily vodka drinkers were
50 per cent more likely to support Yeltsin than those who drank less.
The vodka epidemic is the biggest single reason for the drastic decline in
the life expectancy of Russian men in the past decade. Their life expectancy
has plunged from 64 to 59 — the steepest decline of any nation in peacetime
conditions — and Russia’s population is falling by 400,000 every year. Studies
have concluded that alcohol is linked to 80 per cent of Russian murders,
half of all suicides, 60 per cent of fires, 75 per cent of absenteeism and
half of all car crashes. Heavy vodka consumption by Russian men is also the
main reason why Russia has the world’s biggest life-expectancy gap between
men and women. On average, Russian women live 15 years longer than men.
In the Soviet era, vodka was controlled by a state monopoly, which provided
as much as 35 per cent of all state revenue. Today, with the monopoly dismantled,
alcohol provides only 3 per cent of state revenue, and the Russian government
is losing as much as $2-billion in potential annual revenue as a result of
bootleg sales.
Most of the illicit vodka is produced in underground factories that spring
up as fast as the police can shut them down. Half of the vodka at street
kiosks is of dangerously poor quality, often made from industrial-grade methyl
alcohol. Some Russians routinely use cheap vodka as a windshield-wiper fluid
for their cars.
Because
of its low production costs, the vodka trade is one of Russia’s most profitable.
Much of the cheapest stuff floods across the unguarded border from Ukraine
and Belarus, where the cost of production is even lower. Indeed, vodka is
so inexpensive that it has destroyed much of the traditional moonshine industry.
Nobody needs to make their own homebrew alcohol when they can simply buy
vodka on the street at 60 cents a bottle.
Mr. Primakov, desperate to increase government revenue, has now imposed a
state monopoly on the distilleries that produce pure alcohol for vodka bottlers.
His goal is to reduce and eventually eliminate the illicit production of
vodka.
But the rulers of Russia have been vainly trying to control the vodka industry
for centuries. The first recorded anti-vodka campaign was in 1652. (It failed,
of course.) Throughout the 1990s, the Kremlin announced dozens of new measures
to license and restrict the vodka trade. Whenever it ordered a new licensing
rule, fake excise stamps and labels were available on the underground market
within days.
‘We can’t fight this competition,’ said Sergei Lukashuk, production manager
of the famous Kristall vodka factory in Moscow. ‘It’s very easy to produce
vodka in underground plants. You can set up a factory in a week. It’s easy
to get bottles and spirits. All this chaos must be profitable for someone.
It’s big money.’
The Kremlin is facing an immutable law: Russians will always insist on a
ready supply of cheap vodka, and the underground industry is the easiest
source.
‘If the government tries to make the price too high, the illegal market will
increase,’ said Maria Katkova, a Moscow art-gallery curator who helped build
the bronze monument to the vodka philosopher Venedikt Yerofeyev. ‘Russians
will find a way to produce illegal vodka,’ she said. ‘They live in very difficult
conditions — a harsh climate, wars, revolutions. They need a different emotional
reality. When they have problems and sorrows, they need something to forget
about life.’
Later this week, millions of Russians will gather around their televisions
to watch a pre-taped New Year’s Day television show, featuring a host of
Russian show-business celebrities. The show, fittingly enough, is sponsored
by a vodka company. ‘When it was over, the guests could hardly stand,’ a
Russian newspaper reported. ‘We are a drunk and talented people!’
St. Petersburg Times October 16, 1998
House of Hope Puts a Cap on Russia’s Drinking
By John Varoli
“I am an alcoholic,” said artist Dmitry Shagin, making a deep and heartfelt
admission before a crowd of hundreds at a recent rock benefit concert. In
response, the crowd burst into wild applause. When the clapping died down,
Shagin added, “But I haven’t had a sip in five years.” The audience answered
with moans of disappointment.
Despite their enthusiasm for unabated boozing, with the money these concert-
goers paid for their ticket, they were effectively supporting the House of
Hope the Hill – an alcohol rehabilitation center organized and attended by
several of that night’s leading names.
The reaction Shagin received is endemic of attitudes toward heavy drinking
in this country – regardless of the fact that Russia is widely considered
one of world’s most alcoholic nations. “Alcoholism is a national tragedy
in Russia,” says Dr. Yevgeny Zubkov, an official who helped found the House
of Hope – known in Russian as Dom Nadezhdy Na Gore – one of Russia’s first
private alcohol rehab centers.
Evidence to support Zubkov’s claim abounds – in scientific reports, official
statistics and casual observations. Since Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev
began his anti-alcoholism campaign in the 1980s, consumption has jumped 600
percent, according to the Russian National Academy of Sciences. The average
Russian adult now annually consumes the equivalent of 38 liters of pure alcohol.
Meanwhile, the life expectancy for the average Russian man has been declining
throughout the 1990s, dropping to the current low of 57.4 years, primarily
due to binge drinking. According to Zubkov, about 50,000 Russians die each
year from alcohol poisoning and accidents due to drunkenness, giving Russia
a per capita rate six times greater than that of the United States. In addition,
about 80 percent of all crimes are committed by people under the influence
of alcohol.
Yet few officials want to admit publicly the true
severity of the problem and take effective measures to tackle it. “The problem
of alcoholism in Russia is more severe than any financial crisis,” said St.
Petersburg businessman Valeri Gusev, a House of Hope sponsor. “The financial
crisis will eventually pass, but the problem of alcoholism will persist,
and in the end, we cannot talk of rebuilding Russia when half the population
is often drunk and raising their children under those conditions.”
Bucking the trend, a number of medical specialists, prominent cultural
personalities, and businessmen have been teaming up to fight the disease.
The House of Hope, which opened in summer 1997 on the initiative of the
American-based International Institute for Alcoholism Education and Training,
has the backing of several leading pop cultural figures – from Yury Shevchuk,
the lead singer of the popular rock group DDT, to Shagin of the famous Mitki
art collective. And most have gone through the Alcoholics Anonymous program
in America.
Though the House of Hope is a separate entity from Alcoholics Anonymous,
which first appeared in Russia in the late 1980s, it fully uses AA’s 12-step
program as a guide to recovery. “Our hope is that slowly the House
will become an model of successful anti- alcohol treatment in Russia,” said
Shagin, who serves on the House of Hope’s board of directors. “The goal of
the center is to bring humane anti-alcoholic treatment to Russia,” said Zubkov.
“Russia’s problems are quite specific and have their roots in spiritual crisis.”
Treatment at the House of Hope lasts one month, during which time patients
take their first four steps. The remaining eight are to be taken in the three
months after the patient returns home. The first step along the path
to help is to admit loss of control over one’s life, and the second is to
admit that there is a higher power that can help, said Yakov, a councilor
at the House of Hope, who himself has gone through the treatment. Yakov declined
to give his complete name due to an AA tenet that members preserve their
anonymity.
“Our treatment will only help if the patient wants to help himself,” he said.
“We do not force anyone.”
The House itself – a three-story, solidly built building of red brick – was
purchased for $28,000, funded by private donations. Still, some expensive
renovations are needed. Construction is underway to build a Russian bath,
a chapel and a wing for women, who are currently not allowed to take part
in the program. Right now the House can accommodate 16 inpatients; 10 are
currently living there, though Yakov hopes the number will grow.
As much as $120,000 is needed, said Zubkov, in addition to the center’s
$70,000-per-year operating budget.
While alcoholic treatment did exist in Soviet times it often consisted only
of imprisonment in the brutal detox centers, widely known as LTPs. The House
of Hope takes a much gentler approach, and one that relies greatly on
spirituality. “The idea is come to God, clean oneself, and then go out and
help others,” said Shagin. “There are no strict rules that one has to believe,
but in the end many come to understand that it is only possible to overcome
one’s alcoholic problem with God’s help.”
“It is important to have the House,” said a Russian singer who went through
the treatment and wished to maintain her anonymity. “It is a place where
one can go when there [seems to be ] no more reason to live and no way out.”