Monthly Archives: February 2016

March 8th is nearly here!

International Women’s Day is annually held on the 8th of March to celebrate women’s achievements throughout history and across nations and it is widely celebrated in Russian speaking countries such as:

• Russia
• Ukraine
• Belarus
• Armenia
• Belarus
• Kazakhstan
• Moldova
• Azerbaijan

Background

It’s interesting to know that the holiday originated in New York in 1908 when women went on a strike to demand equal rights, voting rights, shorter hours and better pay. The first National Women’s Day was celebrated on 28th February 1909 following the declaration of Socialist Party of America. Since then and up until 1913, International Women’s Day was celebrated in the United States of America on the last Sunday of February.

In 1913 Russian women observed their first International Women’s Day on the last Saturday in February. Although there were some women-led strikes, marches, and other protests in the years leading up to 1914, none of them happened on March 8.  In 1914 International Women’s Day was held on March 8, possibly because that day was a Sunday, and now it is always held on March 8 in all countries.

How March 8th is celebrated in Russia today?

Today the International Women’s Day is a public holiday and is one of the favorite holidays in Russia. Men and women celebrate important women in their lives by giving them flowers and gifts. The most popular flowers to are mimosas and tulips. International Women’s Day is often celebrated among family or friends with a festive meal and drinks.

All women give and receive a lot of attention on this day. They celebrate their friends, mothers, sisters and grandmothers just as men. Even something as small as an e-mail, Facebook post or a card is appreciated (and often even expected) among friends and family. More expensive or complex gifts are exchanged between people who have a close relationship. Many men also take over the housework on this day as a token of their appreciation.

Women’s Day in Russia is as important, if not more important, than Mother’s Day elsewhere – it is even a recognized public holiday, so many workers get the day off.

Don’t forget to wish a Happy March 8th to the women you met online! Surprise them by saying it in Russian: “S vos’mym Marta!” (Happy March 8th!)

Some people say that traditions in Russia are more important than their laws. Learning the traditional roles of men and women in Russia is an essential process if you are about to enter a relationship with a Russian lady. Here is some helpful information (source: eHow Discover).

History

In traditional Russia, men provided for the women. The women tended to the family, such as raising the children, cooking and cleaning. As Russia has become more liberal, the traditional family culture has changed (much like in other countries). Women are now able to live on their own, are more educated and independent. In a modern Russian marriage, generally both men and women work, yet the wife still cooks, cleans and tends to the children.

Traditional males

Russian men conventionally have seen themselves as superior to women. Historically in Russian families, women were expected to serve their men, take care of the children, and perform all household chores. In turn, men tend to be quite chivalrous with the women in their lives – being particularly crafty at eloquent compliments, bringing flowers, and showering with affections.

Traditional females

Customarily, Russian women put up with this attitude and pride themselves on their hard work and the ability to care for their men and children. They are strong, caring, and hardworking women who also like to be feminine and attractive. Traditional women in Russia want to marry quickly, as single women are often looked down on and pitied.

Chivalry

The Russian culture still thrives on male chivalry. Men should hold doors, help the women in and out of cars and offer to carry heavy things. Russian women love this exhibit of manners and will appreciate any charm shown to them. This chivalry extends to men asking women out on dates and paying for any entertainment on a date.

Being a guest

If you are invited to someone’s house for dinner, take a small token such as wine, candy or dessert with you. You can also take flowers, but if the function is for a date, be sure to not take yellow flowers. Yellow flowers in the Russian culture signify the end of a relationship. Also, take an odd number of flowers, because an even number of flowers are used for funerals.

Shoes

In the Russian culture, if you go to a man or woman’s house, take your shoes off when entering. Russian hosts usually offer slippers for their guests when they come to visit.

Conversations

As a people, Russians tend to stand close together and speak softly during conversation. They touch often while talking and see this casual contact as a sign of friendship. Kissing is particularly common and occurs frequently between friends, including the same gender. Russians are known to be opinionated and emotional, especially in their interactions with friends, business partners and lovers.

Pride

As life in Russia is known to be difficult, the Soviet people are used to suffering. Through this they have developed a strong sense of pride in their culture and nationality.

Russian Orthodoxy religion

For many Russians, religion provides a powerful influence. The Russian Orthodoxy is the most common sect, but other religions are prevalent in their culture. The Orthodoxy worships the Trinity, Isus Christos (Jesus Christ), Bogorodista (the Virgin Mary), and numerous saints. Each saint has different powers and depending on the worshipers needs, they pray to different ones each time.

Visiting a Russian Orthodoxy service is a true window into their culture. If you do decide to attend one and are not a current member of the church, keep the following tips in mind:

• Women must cover their head with a headscarf
• Men should not wear a hat
• Don’t wear shorts or sleeveless shirts
• Women must wear modest skirts or dresses, never pants

Dates

Just like in many other countries, when a Russian girl is comfortable with the guy she is dating she will take him to meet her family and friends, and then vice versa. Dating in the Russian culture is all about making the female comfortable and made to feel special. Affection is often liked, if the female is comfortable with it.

Tips for Russian interactions

Even if you are Russian, it might be good to keep the following traditions in mind – as you may come across a variety of backgrounds in a Russian dating experience.

• Russians are known to be some of the most serious social drinkers in the world – vodka anyone?
• It is considered rude to sit on the floor and it’s a bad luck to whistle indoors.
• Russians hide all body noises and avoid talk of bodily functions.
• Culturally a very superstitious group – so never give your date an even number of flowers as it will bring her misfortune.
• In a social setting, wait for a toast before you begin to drink.

According to recent surveys, more than 40 million single people out of 54 million singles in the US use online dating sites. In the UK, 9.1 million people have used an online dating site and one in every five new committed relationships starts online.

With more users, comes greater demand for these sites to match the right people together. The Conversation online journal posted a study of the the behavior of 200,000 people on one Chinese dating site with more than 60 million registered users. The researchers found out that people are in many ways predictable in their dating habits but they also often bend their own rules.

Not that picky

Online dating site users usually specify what kind of partner they are looking for, but they don’t actually stick as rigorously to their preferences as they might have thought they would though.

The research showed that 70% of the messages sent by women and 55% of those sent by men were to communicate with people who did not meet their original criteria. Women, it seems, are more flexible than men about matching people to their criteria.

Living up to stereotypes

Female users of online dating sites often bemoan the fact that men look for younger dates and men criticize women for being too concerned by money and education. And the results of the research show users living up to these stereotypes.

Profile photos affect men and women differently too. While women with a larger number of photos are more likely to get many messages, the number of photos on a man’s profile has little bearing on the number of contacts or replies he receives.

Predictable behavior

Dating sites can track your behavior and predict which dates might be right for you, possibly even better than you can. It’s possible to predict whether a user would reply to another’s initial contact message with 75% accuracy using factors such as a user’s age, height, location, income and education level as well as their activity, popularity on the site and their similarity with other users in terms of taste and attractiveness to others.

Romance by numbers

Internet dating is not like a recommendation on a shopping site. To suggest a book to a customer based on their previous purchases is a single directional process but a dating site needs to match users who might have a mutual interest in each other so they are more likely to hit it off.

Internet dating sites use collaborative filtering as the best option for matching users according to content-based algorithms, which are based on factors that include a user’s age, education and income – and another, collaborative filtering-style algorithm, which is based on prior communications: both of the user and of other users with similar interests and attractiveness. Collaborative filtering algorithms not only learn the preferences of an online dater but also take information from the behavior of other similar users.

Since the number of people relying on dating online constantly grows, the process of online dating gets studied more and more.  Here are some results from the recent studies (according to the mental_floss journal).

1. 81% of people lie about their height, weight, or age in their online dating profiles.

According to a study conducted at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, women tended to claim that they were 8.5 pounds lighter in their online profiles than their actual weight. Men lied by less—only two pounds—but rounded up their height by a half inch more often. People lied the least when it came to age.

2. People who have the word “love” in their profiles are more likely to find love.

One of the studies showed that users of online dating sites who have used the word “love” in their profiles more were more successful in finding it, the researchers also discovered that men benefited from using the words “heart,” “children,” “romantic,” and “relationship.”

3. Men spend 50% less time reading online dating profiles than women.

The research company AnswerLab conducted a study in which they recorded the eye movements of subjects who were reading online dating profiles from 2 dating sites. As it happens, men spend 65% more time looking at the pictures in the profile than women do.

4. Race and class are the most important factors to online daters.

One experiment showed that when someone viewed the person in the online profile picture as “working-class,” they would swipe “yes” 13% of the time. But, when they considered the person “middle-class,” they swiped “yes” between 36 and 39% of the time. The study also found that people preferred a potential partner to be of mixed or ambiguous race instead of a blatantly different race than their own.

Another recent study showed that the majority of heterosexuals on dating sites did contact people of another race or at least answer messages from them.

5. The algorithms can’t predict whether two people are compatible.

The dating sites wouldn’t share their specific algorithms with the researchers, but the U.S. psychology professors stated that the sites couldn’t predict whether a relationship would last just because two people had similar interests and personalities.

6. One-third of online daters never go on dates with people they meet online.

This surprising statistic comes from a survey conducted by the Pew Research Center. Even more surprising, this is actually a significantly lower number than it used to be. In 2005, over half of people with online dating profiles never went on an in-person date with someone they had met on the site.

7. 30% of women consult with a friend about their profile. Only 16% of men do.

This accounts for a total of 22% of people with online dating profiles who ask a friend “to help them create or review their profile,” according to the Pew Research Center.

8. Couples who meet online are less likely to divorce.

Obviously this phenomenon needs to be studied a little more, but one of the studies claims that couples who met online have a 6% separation and divorce rate whereas couples who met offline have an 8% rate.

9. Online dating saves people $6400.

If you believe that people do marry sooner when they use online dating, then you can also believe that online dating saves you money. A group of researchers calculated that couples who meet online get married after 18.5 months, on average. Couples who don’t meet online, on the other hand, wait an average of 42 months before marrying. Researchers factored in $130 per week for dates, making total cost $23,660 versus $12,803. If the pair is splitting bills, that’s around $6400 each saved before marriage.