# Russian Gift Shops **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [August 11, 2010, 11:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-gift-shops/549923 "2010-08-11T11:09:54Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Kilmore](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/a6a055/32.png) [@Kilmore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kilmore)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2010, 11:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-gift-shops/549923/1 "2010-08-11T11:09:54Z")
Do Russian gift shops have little pictures and statues of Siberians and Central Asian dudes like American gift shops have that stuff for Apaches, Cherokees and other Indians? ---
**Author:** ![psychonaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/psychonaut/32/4655_2.png) [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2010, 11:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-gift-shops/549923/2 "2010-08-11T11:41:06Z")
Not in Moscow or St. Petersburg, no. Maybe in Siberia. ---
**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2010, 12:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-gift-shops/549923/3 "2010-08-11T12:26:21Z")
> [@psychonaut](#): > > Not in Moscow or St. Petersburg, no. Maybe in Siberia. I’ll bet you could find them in the big western Russian cities if you looked hard enough. The usual Russian tourist tat, though, seems to be fur hats, [matryoshka dolls](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matryoshka_doll) and Soviet memorabilia, much of it fake (hammer and sickle army badges, caps, patches etc etc). ---
**Author:** ![qazwart](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/5fc32e/32.png) [@qazwart](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/qazwart)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2010, 1:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-gift-shops/549923/4 "2010-08-11T13:12:23Z")
> [@Kilmore](#): > > Do Russian gift shops have little pictures and statues of Siberians and Central Asian dudes like American gift shops have that stuff for Apaches, Cherokees and other Indians? No Siberians or Central Asian dudes. We have statue of Lenin. Give you special deal. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2010, 1:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-gift-shops/549923/5 "2010-08-11T13:26:46Z")
In general, the Soviet Union did not idealize its aboriginal people or folk cultures. This has changed somewhat in some of the former Soviet nations which now are re-embracing their roots, but not much in Russia. I have lived in Moscow and Siberia and been all over Russia and you don’t see much revelry for folk culture. ---
**Author:** ![psychonaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/psychonaut/32/4655_2.png) [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2010, 1:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-gift-shops/549923/6 "2010-08-11T13:41:38Z")
> [@Colophon](#): > > > [@psychonaut](#): > > > > Not in Moscow or St. Petersburg, no. Maybe in Siberia. > > I’ll bet you could find them in the big western Russian cities if you looked hard enough. You’d have to look pretty damned hard. I’ve been to Moscow twice in the past few weeks, and was in St. Petersburg a couple years ago. On all three trips I went gift shopping. None of the gift shops and souvenir stands in three airports, three major train stations, countless Metro stations, two hotel lobbies, a couple main shopping streets, and an outdoors arts and crafts market had any pictures, statues, figurines, or dolls of aboriginal or Siberian people, unless you count ethnic Russians. It was all, as you mention, fur hats, matryoshka dolls, and Soviet memorabilia, along with all the standard localized jewelry, paintings, knick-knacks, keychains, magnets, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2010, 2:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-gift-shops/549923/7 "2010-08-11T14:09:08Z")
Where are you shopping that you’re finding “American gift shops have that stuff for Apaches, Cherokees and other Indians?” If it does exist in gift shops, I’m guessing it’s because American Indians are mythologized and known throughout the world due to Western movies (cowboys and Indians and all that). ---
**Author:** ![flyboy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/4da419/32.png) [@flyboy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/flyboy)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2010, 3:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-gift-shops/549923/8 "2010-08-11T15:03:04Z")
I’ve traveled through both western Russia and Siberia from 2005-2009 and have never seen anything like what you’re talking about. Things can get locally cultural, but not along the lines of what you’re describing. ---
**Author:** ![Tastes\_of\_Chocolate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tastes_of_chocolate/32/3232_2.png) [@Tastes\_of\_Chocolate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tastes_of_Chocolate)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2010, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-gift-shops/549923/9 "2010-08-11T15:15:40Z")
> [@Dewey\_Finn](#): > > Where are you shopping that you’re finding “American gift shops have that stuff for Apaches, Cherokees and other Indians?” If it does exist in gift shops, I’m guessing it’s because American Indians are mythologized and known throughout the world due to Western movies (cowboys and Indians and all that). In the last year, I’ve seen them in the Black Hills of South Dakota and the Garden of the Gods in Colorado. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2010, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-gift-shops/549923/10 "2010-08-11T15:34:39Z")
So in places where, I’d imagine, these tribes are nearby. Not so surprising. ---
**Author:** ![code\_grey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f4b2a3/32.png) [@code\_grey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/code_grey)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2010, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-gift-shops/549923/11 "2010-08-11T17:01:14Z")
in Russian culture the stereotypical “Central Asian” is a hardworking peasant. If you were to depict him, he would be no different from a Russian peasant (well, maybe dressed a bit differently) or Egyptian peasant and so forth. Now, who would want to have figures of boring peasants when you can have figures of “noble” Indians? In reality many Central Asians were (in the past) steppe nomads. Some even had exciting careers in the cavalry of Ghenghis Khan, Mamay, Tamerlane and similar. But of course, for an enemy to be considered “noble” like Indians, it has to be a pretty tame, not-so-scary enemy. And the invaders from the steppe were anything but. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2010, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-gift-shops/549923/12 "2010-08-11T17:13:32Z")
Also, Russia is still fighting in Chechnya and there are ethnic tensions between Russians and non-Russians in Central Asia, Moldova, Azerbaijan, and Georgia with actual fighting. Current armed conflict is never as romantic as 100 year old armed conflict. ---
**Author:** ![psychonaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/psychonaut/32/4655_2.png) [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2010, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-gift-shops/549923/13 "2010-08-11T20:26:06Z")
> [@madmonk28](#): > > Also, Russia is still fighting in Chechnya and there are ethnic tensions between Russians and non-Russians in Central Asia, Moldova, Azerbaijan, and Georgia with actual fighting. Cite that there are ethnic tensions and actual fighting between Russians and non-Russians in Central Asia? It’s the first I’ve heard of it. (None of the countries and regions you listed are actually in Central Asia.) I’d also like a cite that there are such tensions in Azerbaijan. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2010, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-gift-shops/549923/14 "2010-08-11T20:36:50Z")
> [@](#): > > The usual Russian tourist tat, though, seems to be fur hats, matryoshka dolls and Soviet memorabilia, much of it fake (hammer and sickle army badges, caps, patches etc etc). Amusing story: The father of one of the other grad students was in Russia on a business trip, and decided that one of those little nesting dolls would make a nice souvenir. So he asked at the front desk of the hotel where he could buy a matryoshka. The hotel clerk assured him not to worry, that he would just have one sent up to his room for him. Apparently, “matryoshka”, in addition to meaning “nesting doll”, is also slang for “prostitute”. ---
**Author:** ![Eva\_Luna](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e495f1/32.png) [@Eva\_Luna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eva_Luna)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2010, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-gift-shops/549923/15 "2010-08-12T00:52:49Z")
I did go to a hilarious and quite surreal academic conference in 1995 outside of Novosibirsk, though, on the indigenous peoples of Central Asia. One poor Hungarian guy had prepped his entire talk (on shamistic practices among Central Asian indigenous peoples) in English, which he spoke fluently, because he had been told it was an international conference. Imagine his panic, then, on being informed an hour before his talk that a) he had to do it in Russian, which he didn’t really speak; b) he had to cut it form 45 minutes to ten; and c) he would be following the bizarre lambada performance by a bunch of Russian teenagers, which we had to sit through because we were borrowing their summer camp facility for the conference. So no, although I spent an entire summer in Siberia and a semester in western Russia (mostly St. Petersburg), I never saw anything like you describe. I did pick up a nifty copy of the [Red Book of the Peoples of the Russian Empire](http://www.eki.ee/books/redbook/introduction.shtml), though (it’s sort of an endangered species list of the indigenous ethnic groups of Russia, and it’s actually yellow). ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2010, 8:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-gift-shops/549923/16 "2010-08-12T08:30:07Z")
> [@psychonaut](#): > > > [@madmonk28](#): > > > > Also, Russia is still fighting in Chechnya and there are ethnic tensions between Russians and non-Russians in Central Asia, Moldova, Azerbaijan, and Georgia with actual fighting. > > Cite that there are ethnic tensions and actual fighting between Russians and non-Russians in Central Asia? It’s the first I’ve heard of it. (None of the countries and regions you listed are actually in Central Asia.) I’d also like a cite that there are such tensions in Azerbaijan. I did not say that Chechnya, Georgia, Moldova, or Azerbaijan were in Central Asia. In fact, I listed Central Asia as a separate location in that sentence, making it clear that I was not asserting that they were part of Central Asia (if I was saying they were in Central Asia, I wouldn’t have, you know, listed Central Asia as one of the places). My point was that there are active ethnic conflicts (or recently active conflicts) in Russia and along its borders. As for cites that Russia has been involved in conflicts in Central Asia: > **[Tajikistani Civil War](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_war_in_Tajikistan)** > > / Russia > Uzbekistan > / Kazakhstan > / Kyrgyzstan > Central Asia > Central and Eastern Europe > [@](#): > > With the aid of the Russian military and Uzbekistan, the Leninabadi-Kulyabi Popular Front forces routed the opposition in early and late 1992. The coalition government in the capital was forced to resign. In December 1992, the Supreme Soviet (parliament), where the Leninabadi-Kulyabi faction had held the majority of the seats all along, convened and elected a new government under the leadership of Emomali Rahmonov, representing a shift in power from the old power based in Leninabad to the militias from Kulyab, from which Rahmonov came. While the recent conflict in Kyrgyzstan, does not involve Russia, it is serious violent ethnic conflict in Central Asian FSU: > **[Latest news & breaking headlines](https://www.thetimes.com/)** > > The latest breaking UK, US, world, business and sport news from The Times and The Sunday Times. Go beyond today's headlines with in-depth analysis and comment. > [@](#): > > 200 killed in ethnic fighting in Kyrgyzstan > The death toll from ethnic fighting in Kyrgyzstan jumped dramatically today when an Uzbek community leader said that at least 200 people had been killed. > Government figures have put the number of dead at 117 with more than 1.500 injured after three days of clashes between ethnic Kyrgyz and Uzbek groups in the south of the country. But Jallahitdin Jalilatdinov, who heads Kyrgyzstan’s Uzbek National Centre, said that 200 Uzbeks have been buried so far. As for Russian involvement in the conflict in Azerbaijan: > **[6.2 Diplomatic Series: Karabakh, The Armenian-Azerbaijan Conflict](http://azer.com/aiweb/categories/magazine/62_folder/62_articles/62_karabakh.html)** > > Azerbaijan International - Spring 2002 > [@](#): > > The conflict was escalated by Russia’s political and military support of Armenia. Russia is using the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict as part of its long-time policy of “divide and conquer.” Since 1993, Armenia has received $1 billion in arms shipments from Russia. These arms, including the most modern Russian tanks, armored personnel carriers, SCUD missiles and tons of ammunition, were shipped through Armenia to the site of the conflict inside Azerbaijan. > > A series of Armenian offensives, beginning in 1992 and backed by Russian arms, resulted in the Armenian occupation of almost 20 percent of Azerbaijan territory, including Nagorno-Karabakh and seven other districts. As a result, Azerbaijan is left with approximately 1 million refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs) who were forced to flee for their lives. My point was that for Russia, Central Asian cultures (and indeed, many of the FSUs ethnicities beyond Central Asia) are not only not romanticized, but actually feared, in part, because conflict in the FSU among ethnicities is still fresh. ---
**Author:** ![psychonaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/psychonaut/32/4655_2.png) [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2010, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-gift-shops/549923/17 "2010-08-12T21:55:03Z")
Whatever… none of those cites demonstrate ethnic tensions between Russians and non-Russians. They’re just military conflicts that Russia has been involved in; if they have any origin in ethnic tensions, then they’re between local non-Russian populations, one of whom is supported by the Russian government. The Kyrgyz conflict is between the local Kyrgyz and Uzbek populations; the Azerbaijani conflict is between Azeris and Armenians. The Russian population of Azerbaijan is negligible and, by all reports I can find, suffers no persecution. Russians form a large minority in Kyrgyzstan which was recently granted constitutional recognition and protection. Your example of the conflict in Tajikistan shows no evidence of being ethnically motivated and in any case happened nearly twenty years ago.