The publishing house Individuum published a book about the Russian style of education "Shapka, Babushka, Kefir". Its author, American Tanya Mayer, who once gave birth to her first son in Russia, shares her experience. Love for a strange substance called “kefir”, for all ready-made grandmothers and nursing mothers with manicures and high heels - all this, Tanya believes, are strange and wonderful signs of Russian motherhood.

After endless venomous Russian-language Internet squabbles about not letting people with children into restaurants and planes, changing diapers and breastfeeding only in an isolated windowless bunker (otherwise everyone around will feel sick), after endless horrific news about beatings and murders of children , about bullying in orphanages and boarding schools, and even after a walk in the park. during which you hear a lot of different “what are you, stupid? Who said, come here. Now it will fly in the ass” - after all this, it is very pleasant to open a book in which Russians are described as wonderful, kind, tolerant and child-loving people. That is, at first the author plunges slightly into the abyss of the gloomy Soviet past, noting in passing that kindergartens and nurseries were “not always good”. And then somehow you are waiting for the conclusion, they say, those who were handed over for a five-day week and forced to eat cold porridge by force cannot become involved, empathic parents - but no, Tanya, on the contrary, says that now this is not the case and that’s all ok, it's different.

If in Russia you saw dad on the playground on the weekend, then he ended up there not because his wife forced him, but because he wanted to

or here's another

Russian mothers do not drown in guilt. Do not spend evenings reading books about how to raise children. They comprehend it on a more intuitive level.

No one - neither the husband, nor the girlfriends, nor the relatives - expects that the mother will raise the child alone. Nobody needs a heroic mother - they need a contented life. A grandmother who sits with her grandchildren in her free time, a nanny on a salary and a husband on maternity leave - there are other people in the life of a child besides the mother

And even the strange Russian food “kefir” (“Little Russian children often drink a glass of kefir before bed. I never dared to drink kefir, but my Russian friends just pray for it”), hats preoccupation (“For every season, a Russian a child has a separate hat. In winter it is woolen, in spring and autumn they put on a lighter hat - because it can “slip through” (another purely Russian concept). ready to help endlessly (“I tried to hire a nanny,” says Olga, “so that my mother would have free time, I tried to persuade her to do something, but the poor nanny did not last a day, her mother sent her out. And she was very offended, so I’m more of this topic didn’t raise”) - all this seems to Tanya, although unusual, but absolutely wonderful.

By the way, Russian grandmothers admire Tanya, it seems, most of all. She writes that for several years of marriage, she and her husband never really managed to go somewhere together, and even a romantic weekend was very difficult to organize - therefore, the presence of a grandmother seems to her an incredible luxury. “In Russia, as I understand it,” Tanya writes, “it’s simply not customary to refuse help. And if the mother-in-law offers to sit with the child, it means that your task is to build normal relations with her, because your children are her grandchildren, she loves them and wants to help, and you cannot help her.” The only thing that caused Tanya a negative reaction was the unpopularity of vaccination among Russian mothers: “This is such a position: I don’t trust and I don’t vaccinate. This is especially unfortunate given that these mothers are traveling all over the world with their unvaccinated children.” Stop! At this point, everything becomes more or less clear. Mothers traveling all over the world, mothers who can take a nanny from the first months of a child's life - the heroines of Tanya's book, from which she draws the image of a Russian mother, lead a certain lifestyle. All of them - her friends on a closed Facebook group and Russians living abroad, these are people of a certain, considerable income. Of course, Tanya, who received an excellent education in America and worked in a large bank, had an appropriate social circle. “Russian mothers prefer to give birth abroad” - for example, in Miami or Zurich, they can afford to hire a governess - a teacher from St. preferred to wait out those six months that there is snow in Russia, in warm regions. Even single mother Karina, whom Tanya also cites as an example, “receives such good alimony from her husband that she can not work and spend all the time with her three-year-old daughter.” Tanya herself bitterly admits, they say, yes, it was hard for her to stay at home with the weather, and Russian mothers don’t seem to have such feelings at all - they joyfully and enjoy spending time with the kids, not in a hurry to give them to the garden, relaxing on alluring coasts.

Russian mothers feel seductive, can lead an interesting life, spend time with family and friends, and of course take care of children without losing their individuality.

Tanya admires. The world of Russian motherhood for her is a beautiful Instagram picture in which children do not yell, parents are not tired, sad, angry or lonely, mother is always smart and smart, and her husband always looks at her with burning eyes, organize a ready and romantic dinner and change the baby's diaper. And, no, Tanya's book is not a lie. There are a lot of well-aimed and flattering Russian observations here - she sincerely admires how seriously Russians take the education of their children, how responsibly they approach issues of their own and children's health, how Russian mothers are obsessed with healthy food in a good way - there are always vegetables on the table, cereals, cottage cheese and healthy soups. But in general, if an employee of a foreign bank living in a rented apartment on Tverskoy Boulevard were asked to write an essay about what kind of city Moscow is, something would come out the same: in Moscow there are many expensive restaurants with delicious food, beautiful shops of famous brands , at every step - museums and theaters, and in the evenings street orchestras play classical music. And - yes - all this would not be a lie, but there would not be a whole "Moscow" either. So it is with Tanya's book - yes, she really talked with Russian-speaking mothers when she collected material for the book, but they are not “Russian mothers” as much as Moscow is not Russia, and the Boulevard Ring is not all of Moscow. Although, why hide it, it's nice that in other countries this book will be read in this form - after all, even realizing that both the cheeks are drawn in and the hair is fluffed up more magnificently - it's still nice to look at yourself in a successful photo.

main readers. Russian mothers all over the world have become admirers and critics of the book Motherhood, Russian-style. “Why are you so eager to read about yourself? I wondered. What is so NEW that I can tell you about dachas and cereals, hats and walks in ten-degree frost? As it turned out, my Russian readers were very interested in what I. foreigner, I can understand about them
and tell. Many have written to me. that they showed this book in their English. American, German husbands and mothers-in-law with the words: “Here, I’m not crazy, we all do it!” They wrote how pleased they were to read something good about the Russians, especially given the much worsened relations between Russia and the West. Reviews of the book appeared in several publications, and I gave them interviews, explaining again and again that I really think the Russian approach to education is very interesting, unusual, and certainly worth writing about.
My book does not pretend to be complete - of course, the weight of the family is different, but, in my opinion, I managed to find some common values ​​and traditions for modern Russian (not by nationality, but by cultural affiliation) mothers. Here we will talk about them.

A very brief history of motherhood in Russia.

Today's mothers living in large Russian cities are not much different from their Western "colleagues". They have iPhones and iPads, Facebook and Instagram, great cars, nice apartments, foreign travel experience. They will tell you where to dine in Paris, buy clothes in London, explain in detail how best to “winter” - skiing or lying on the beach, and how to generally arrange a vacation for yourself at any time of the year for any number of days. These women may look like us (and quite often better than us), but you need to understand that in their twenties, thirty or forty they have witnessed incredible cultural, political, economic changes, such as we Western mothers, and imagine can not.
A Muscovite in her thirties lay down. raising children in modern Russia, she herself was born in a country that no longer exists. The only experience, the style of upbringing, which was owned by this mother, was Soviet. When it comes to children, absolutely everything has changed. If in the USSR everything was aimed at ensuring that a woman could return to work as soon as possible, then when the Union ceased to exist, women were forced to re-invent the rules and cultural norms of education. This vacuum provoked by the change of system is being filled by women "]" to this day, including at the expense of Europe and America. Today's Russian mothers speak two or even three languages ​​and tirelessly study and adapt world experience to Russian realities.
When I started discussing the idea of ​​this book on Facebook, one of my interlocutors outlined the history of Russian motherhood in a few precise phrases. Elena wrote: "It seems to me that there is no" Russian system
There was a village way, a Soviet way, and now there is a constantly updated mixture of all this with Western theories. Of course, a book about strong Russian women, heroic single mothers, is very lacking, but can you write it?


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Tanya Mayer's book published by Individuum “Hat, grandmother, kefir. How children are brought up in Russia. Tanya worked in Russia for a long time, fell in love with a Russian colleague here and became a mother for the first time. Alas, she did not succeed in becoming a Russian wife: the father of the child decided not to continue the relationship and disappeared from Tanya's life. After some time, Tanya met a new love - a divorced Austrian, married him and gave birth to two more children. Today, their family lives happily between London and Vienna, but Tanya has not forgotten her “Russian period” and has written a book about what it means to be a mother in Russia. In the book, she sometimes quite strongly criticizes Western approaches to education and praises Russian ones, and therefore there is a feeling of some kind of catch: no, this is not about us, are we really that cool? In general, we are used to doubting ourselves, and there is something to argue with in the book, in any case, it is very curious to look at ourselves from the outside. The editor-in-chief of the Domashniy Ochag magazine, Natalia Rodikova (mother of three children), met with Tanya to ask a few questions.


First, why Tanya? It sounds so Russian.

Honestly? Do not know! My dad is from Yugoslavia, maybe there is such a name there? He emigrated to Canada before I was born, met my mother there, and when I was born, they called me Tanya. We immigrated to America when I was little, I grew up in Arizona,

Did your parents read the book?

No. I didn't even particularly want it. There's a lot of personal stuff in there, and not everything will be to my mom's liking.

You lived and raised your children in different countries, observed different parental approaches. How do mothers and fathers in Russia differ from American or European ones?

What I found interesting in Russia is that if you are now 35 years old and have small children, you bring them up in completely different conditions than your mothers brought you up. Russian mothers love to try everything new, read everything, study everything, search for information - they cannot just copy the previous generation, because the situation is completely different. In the same America or Austria where my husband is from, not much has changed in 30 years. Well, maybe, except that there are more women in America now working. When I was growing up, half of the mothers were at home.

And now, due to the financial situation, all women in America work and after giving birth they go to work quite early, like my sister, when the child is about 3-4 months old. A nanny is a very expensive pleasure in the States, so most give small children immediately to a private nursery. Of course, in horror, I tried to explain to my sister that maybe you would still think about a nanny, so that the child would be at home, so that there would be one familiar person next to him ... But since this is not accepted in her social circle, she did the way everyone does. In Russia, it's not like that.

Does Russia have its own way of parenthood?

Yes, in many ways. For example, in relationships with grandparents. In Russia, it is considered absolutely normal that a grandmother helps a lot, participates in life with children. And she does not consider herself a victim, for her this is normal. And in the West they live for themselves. Maybe they are more independent financially, there is such a moment, of course. They are also older than Russians, because they themselves gave birth late and their daughters gave birth late. Plus, other relationships, because we in America often leave to study in another state after school, and this is absolutely normal, but it turns out that we all live in different cities. And grandmothers can come, there, once a year, to look at their grandchildren. But to help, no. These are your children, your problem. I rarely saw my grandparents myself. And now my mother, for example, is traveling from Africa to Australia on a cruise ship, she has her own life, she has a good time.

This is probably the other side of the fact that people in America can keep their social lives longer. In Russia, when women retire, they grow old morally very quickly, because they cannot find a use for themselves, they do not understand what they should do now, and if they understand, then there is no money for it. What remains is to help with the grandchildren.

Yes, and the conditions in Russia were such before that it was impossible without the help of grandmothers. And there was no separate housing, and your college marriages ...

Are we still getting married and having babies earlier than in the West?

Yes, the average age of women who have become a mother for the first time is much less here than in the West. In London, it’s generally terrible, I think, when you first become a mother at 40.

Why is it bad?

Well, now I'm 40 - and I'm much more nervous than at 29, when my first son was born. Thank God that I was young and did not worry so much at every step, as, for example, I am now experiencing. I'm more tired now. When you are 29, it means that you have more strength, and you still remember well how to be a child. My youngest is 6, and I hear myself from the outside and understand that I'm not trying to put myself in her place, I no longer remember what it's like to be in first grade. And it also means that your parents are not so old either, that they can also participate and help.

One of the things that struck me about the book was an observation about attitudes toward pregnancy. You write that in Russia a pregnant woman is treated more carefully. We are accustomed to believing that this is not the case at all.

But it is so! For example, in London, mothers are given baby on board stickers, because if you just enter the subway without them, no one will give up your seat. Even when they see that you have a huge belly, they still won't get up. And you stick and wear this sticker every day on your coat to show you need to get up. In Russia, if you have a belly, everyone starts to take care of you. Neighbors see that you are walking with packages from the car, they say “let me help you”, especially men.

But there is another side to this attention: for example, in the hospital you are watched more, more often they ask you to take tests. In the West, it is believed that if the general health is normal, then everything is fine with the child, you can not be particularly observed.

In Russia, I had a good doctor, but she made me give blood and urine all the time, fifty thousand tests! And in America, we do this, maybe once in the entire pregnancy. I'm Rh negative, maybe that's why she was worried? But in principle, this is a very simple thing: you give an injection at the seventh month and an injection after the birth of a child - and there are no problems. When I was about to fly to America for Christmas, my doctor looked at me and said: “Well, don’t eat too much, look.” In England, for example, with my third pregnancy, I was never even asked to stand on the scales for the entire pregnancy. And here - every time a check.

And if you are in Russia with a stomach, absolutely everyone gives you advice, even strangers. And when you are already walking with a small child, it does not stop.

I left to give birth to my first son from Russia to the States, and we returned when he was two months old. It was May, and the nanny said: let me take him to the dacha for the whole summer, and you will come to us for the weekend. For me it was a shock: how can you even offer such a thing? The child must be with his mother! In general, as an American person, I was immediately offended and said: no, by no means. And the next day I go for a walk and meet my former colleague, a Russian. He congratulates me, and then he just starts yelling: “Why is the child in the city in the summer? Aren `t you ashamed? The child should be in the country! I was simply dumbfounded.

In Austria, for example, we have such a culture that you can’t say anything, you can’t interfere. There are huge boundaries, and no one gives advice to anyone, even when you see that a person is doing really bad things. We had -11 two weeks ago, and one mother stops the car near the pharmacy, enters it with her child - and I see that the child is absolutely not dressed, he is just in pajamas, without a jacket, without a hat! What do you say? You can't say anything, it's completely unacceptable. She will send you somewhere else, and other people will support her, why did you get into a personal matter.

By the way, why did our hats strike you so much that you even put them in the title of the book?

Hats surprised me by the fact that a Russian child wears them all year round, they are just different: that is, a winter hat is removed, a spring hat is put on, then in the summer it is necessary to wear a thin hat, and on the beach in a panama hat. When we arrived with my son, he was two years old, in London, to my husband, and it was such a warm day, the son stood at the door and pointed at his head (he still spoke badly then), did not want to go out without a hat. And we had to go to the store and buy him a cap, because he is so used to having something on his head before you leave the house. But it just kills me in London when I meet familiar mothers, English women, myself in a coat and hat, and the child is almost naked, in some kind of blouse that is still left from her childhood. And this is absolutely normal for an English child!

But they say that Russian mothers wrap their children excessively. But the English children will grow up more hardened.

I don’t know… They wear coats themselves!

Russian moms want to be an authority

What about Russian dads? Were there any observations?

I wanted to write a book specifically about Russian mothers. But those mothers with whom I spoke, I asked them to describe the role of fathers in families. There were many words, but one thing surprised me - "getter". We don't have it in English. Russian mothers have an understanding that children and the house are, as it were, their history, and “his affairs” are his affairs. And if she needs help, she will tell. And so the woman takes responsibility for all this somehow to steer. Even if she does not do everything herself, she organizes it. I realized that Russian mothers want to be an authority in the family.

Isn't it the same in the West?

In London, for example, I often hear wives say: we are the same, we are on an equal footing. And they point out to the father: now you go swimming with your child, and now go to the playground. That is, they start giving assignments like this, and it turns out that these unfortunate fathers, they also worked a full week, they are also tired, they don’t have time for themselves, because they are either at work, or his wife says that they need to be with children. And those who do not know how to say “no”, what should they do? It seems to me that this creates a kind of not-so-good moment in marriages.

However, I noticed this is a good thing. Ten years ago, when I visited Europe and returned, it was striking that we don’t have dads with children on the street ...

Yes, it wasn't, I remember it wasn't at all!

Not with strollers, not by the handle, only mothers and grandmothers. Look, in Spain, children are in dads' slings, or a man is walking alone, with two or three children, his mother is somewhere with her friends, or maybe she is doing laundry at this time. But dad goes with these children with an absolutely normal, not suffering face. And now in large Russian cities there are also a lot of dads with children, and it's nice to look at them, these young fathers. They feel that they are in the right place next to the children, and they enjoy parenting ...

Yes Yes Yes! Everyone now began to see a lot of dads who walk with their children. Now in Russia there are even dads who stay at home with their children, because the wife has a cool job. In Moscow, there is such a schedule and such a rhythm that it seems to me that if one person has a good job, then this is enough for the family and the second one can work at home.

And in London, do you often meet dads who sit with children?

I meet, but I feel uncomfortable when I see that, for example, dad came to the ballet with a four-year-old girl. I have seen many cases when mothers work, and father does not cope with the task at all, that is, children are not dressed, hungry, cry, behave badly. It seems to me that when they are very small, this is still not quite a man's job. Not for every day. But that's just my personal opinion. Many men simply do not have the patience.

About kefir and buckwheat on the beach

When you are going abroad with a child, on any parental forum you find questions - what to do, what should I feed my child there, there is no kefir, there is no cottage cheese, that's all. The child will die of hunger.

Yes, and it all messes with itself. I remember we were with my friend, she has a house in the south of France, we are standing in Nice with children on the so-called "Russian" beach, and listening to the company of women nearby. They are in trendy swimsuits, beautiful, elegant, beautiful weather, the sun is shining, the sea, and they are discussing where to buy buckwheat! It just killed me! Heat, 30 degrees, and they are talking about this buckwheat.

But did you feed the children with buckwheat and kefir?

I learned it here because I didn't know what to do at all, first child, I have no experience. And Russian nannies explained to me that we needed porridge, soup, and we had all this in full. My son ate 4 times a day, and the last time, before going to bed, he ate porridge again. I don't even know why. And then I came to London - and I understand that all the other children of this age already have a normal dinner. And he has porridge. I then reorganized, but I still can make such a big bowl of porridge all in the morning before school.

What?

I add oatmeal and fruits. I often make soups, and when I have time, I make pancakes, pancakes, pies. That is, I learned to do some things here, and the soup, for example, simply saved me, because the third child, my daughter, was born with a very strong allergy to everything dairy. She was so skinny, and it was hard to get her to eat anything. I was the only mother in London who stood at the stove and cooked soups, because no one does it, they don't eat it. They already begin to give regular food at 8-10 months. And they constantly offer children these snacks, all sorts of snacks, and they ask me: does your child want it? And I'm like, no, we're like having lunch in an hour, thanks.

And in America?

In America, food is generally bad, a lot of unhealthy things. Only wealthy people eat well in the States. They can afford "natural" food, go to an expensive supermarket, where everything is bio, organic. And if you go, for example, to the supermarket where my sister buys food, it is huge, but you can’t buy anything healthy at all, only in a circle - fruits, vegetables, meat, milk, and everything else is complete garbage.

And what do they feed their children?

Anything your parents eat. I mean, baby food is at the beginning when they can't chew anything. And when the sister’s child was about 8 months old, she already made him a french toast - this is when you take white bread, inside an egg, and fry it like that, and also with cheese ... Once I even called her in the morning, she was taking the child to the garden, and from some kind of remark I realized that the child had not had breakfast yet, that he would eat for the first time now in the garden. This cannot be compared at all with the approach here in Russia. When my son was small and I worked, a nanny came to me every morning at 8 am, and now the child is still sleeping, and she is already preparing breakfast for him. And at the same time, my child is at home, they won’t take him anywhere now, a familiar person will be with him ...

Not everyone can afford a nanny here either, and you still have to drag the unfortunate child to the garden ... Tell me, you praise Russian mothers so much in the book, you can argue with a lot, but in short: what are we really the coolest in?

Oh… (laughs) Very good question. You know, it seems to me that I have not met other such mothers in the world who, from the beginning of pregnancy, think a lot, analyze how and what they do and why. So, on the one hand, you have a very scientific approach. On the other hand, you have so much love. And this is very natural, Russian, or rather Russian, mothers are very emotional, they talk about love for children, they don’t forget to say “I love you” to the children themselves ...

You speak?

Well, I forget, I try to remind myself.

You know, I was sure that we in Russia learned to say “I love you” to children, to family members in general, from you, from the Americans. We often saw this in films, and at first it was very unusual that everyone there said this to each other ...

Well, no one in my house said that! And my husband, an Austrian, says the same thing: he didn't have it either. And now I’m on Instagram, on Facebook, I see how Russian mothers post pictures with their children and write: “my love”, “my sun”, “honey”, that's all. We don't have that, really. This can be heard from the outside: when Russian people talk to a child, a completely different language even begins, they even use other words. What are they called... These "shushu". We caress children too, but not as much, and then it ends abruptly when school starts. Six years, first class, everything.

mom said "should"

By the way, do you do homework with the kids?

I try not to do it, I just tell them what to do.

Do you know, yes, this problem in Russia? Homework with parents until night?

Yes, and I read that the psychologist Labkovsky wrote on this topic, it's amazing! He says: why are you all doing homework with children? Another interesting point: in Russia, all mothers teach their children to read at home, even before school, and then the children go to first grade - and they already know everything, they are not interested. In the West, it is not considered that parents should do this themselves.

Perhaps this lack of preoccupation with early reading does not turn European children away from books? I recently saw something in Oxford that surprised me greatly: in bookstores, children are alone, without mothers. In our country it is impossible to imagine, our children do not go to bookstores themselves. They can go to the supermarket, buy themselves a chocolate bar, chips. But I have never seen children alone in bookstores in Russia. And there - the children are lying, sitting on the floor, in backpacks, in bicycle helmets ... That is, it is clear that he was driving from school and stopped on the way. There were about twenty of them in the store, without parents. And they stuck each in his book and did not notice anything around. So how did they do it?

Yes, and in London it’s absolutely normal to leave a child alone in the children’s department, you go, watch something adult, while he looks at his books, and then you go to the cashier together ... I don’t know, after all, both Oxford and central London - it is considered safe, but in Moscow, children, probably, simply cannot be left alone with these considerations? By the way, in Vienna all children go to school alone. Here is my son, 10 years old, he travels through the whole city by public transport, alone. And in Moscow they tell me that many are afraid to let their children go far away like this.

Still, I think the point is that English children are less tortured by early reading...

Do not know! (laughs)

They don’t buy cubes with letters when the child is only a year old ...

No, they buy both in London and New York. It does not depend on nationality, it depends on whether you live in the capital or another large city, where everyone is obsessed with education and where everyone wants children to be just champions. Here are the stories about Asia - it's just terrible. For example, Koreans - there are many of them in the West, because Korean companies - Samsung, LG - send their employees here to work, and their children can study at an international school in English, say, for up to three hours. And then they have another school, Korean, evening. They have no childhood at all! Here I was at an international school in Vienna, and there one Korean mother, in all seriousness, explained to us that we need to take an additional English teacher, because the level of English here is not high enough. That is, the teachers are all native speakers, but this is not enough for her. It's terribly scary. Have you read Tiger Mother Battle Cry? (A book by Chinese-American Amy Chua about the Chinese method of raising children, which is quite harsh - ed.)

Yes, among our parents, it produced the effect of an exploding bomb.

It was such a bomb in America too, it caused a lot of negative emotions, because Americans like everything to be fun, fun, easy, with pleasure. For a child to study well, this is not so important for most American families. Everyone, in general, does not care what your grades are. Sports, well-being of the child, relationships are more important.

And here I am talking about this book at the presentation of my book in London, where there were many Russian mothers. And I say: “Can you imagine, this Chinese woman made her children play the piano every day, and even when they were on vacation, she was looking for hotels where there is a piano ...” Here one girl, Russian, psychiatrist, lives in London, and says: “Well, yes, it’s the same with us, we work every day at the dacha with my grandmother, but what is it, of course, there should be music every day, but how else?” And I’m like this to myself: oh, dear mother ... That is, I didn’t expect that Russians are also fixated on this, on education, on grades.

It is enough to take a look in the summer on a plane in which people from Russia fly on vacation with their children: many have textbooks with them, so that during the holidays the children decide, write ...

I know, I saw such Russian families on the beach with textbooks, yes. We are given assignments for the holidays, but still this is something not entirely mandatory, and the teacher will definitely not check, and the children know this. Once, at the end of the school year, I stood with my mother from Austria and my mother from Russia, and the Austrian said: “How do you make your children do these tasks that we are given, so my daughter knows that they will not be checked, and refuses to do ". And my Russian mother, Lyudmila, my girlfriend, answers: “But I don’t understand what the question is?” Austrian: "Well, how do you force?" “I say: you have to do it. And that's it, period." These are Russian mothers! (laughs)

In Russia" about what it's like to be a mother in Russia. And you know, apparently, she liked it! There are a lot of things in her biography - learning a language, moving to Moscow, love, a man who left, leaving her pregnant, a child, whom Tanya gave birth to in America, then again returning to Russia, meeting with her husband, the birth of two more children, life in Russia, England, America.A real blockbuster.

Tanya herself admits that motherhood in Russian is not the easiest way, but very exciting.

"I love Russian mothers! I'm the same!"

- The title of the book is catchy. Why it was decided to make these 3 words. Are these the most vivid impressions of Russian motherhood?

- When the book came out in English, its title was Motherhood, Russian Style. For the Russian version, the publishing house helped me with the title, and it seems that it turned out to be more successful, capaciously reflecting such key words of Russian childhood. It's funny that the words are in English, it immediately becomes clear - the book was written by a foreigner.

In the English version of the book, it contained a small dictionary of all Russian words that you need to know in order to understand what motherhood is in Russia. It included "porridge", "nanny", "soup" ...

- Now, as we understand, you live in Vienna. In our opinion, in Austria there is a much more adequate balanced motherhood, without excesses, as in Russia. We constantly hear - do not run, you will fall, do not get dirty, you will sweat, you will freeze and so on. You yourself write about hats for any weather and uninvited advisers on every corner. Children are constantly being bullied. In Austria, children are allowed to play with water, get dirty, sit on their buttocks, on their knees, even on their heads, if the child is so comfortable and safe, to run barefoot on sand and grass in parks and playgrounds. They are easily fed on the street. And they do not pull on any trifle. So why did you write about Russia while you were in Austria?

Yes that's right. It is very interesting that here in Austria, local mothers are usually very relaxed (too much, I would say), but Vienna - big city and there are a lot of mothers from Eastern Europe, and of course, they also talk about hats and soups...

But the Russians are undoubtedly winning among moms who worry about everything. That's why I love them! I am the same!

The idea to write a book came to me when my best friend from Moscow added me to a mom group on Facebook. I decided to write about Russian mothers in English - well, as an American wrote about Paris (Pamela Druckerman "French children do not spit food" - editor's note). And I wrote about Moscow. Although at that moment I no longer lived there, I had not yet managed to forget how it all happened. In addition, she closely communicated with Russian mothers in London and Vienna.

It seemed to me that the experience was valuable and interesting, but, frankly, I did not expect that the American view of Russian education would be so in demand in Russia.

"I'm lucky that I have a mother Olya"

- You write in a book about Russian grandmothers, about their role in raising children. Why do you think our grandmothers are so actively involved in the lives of their grandchildren? Compared to European and American grandmothers.

There is nothing better in the world than a Russian grandmother. It is sometimes difficult with her when she teaches everyone how to live, but without her it is even harder! The first year of my son's life in Moscow was very difficult for me. Although I was lucky, I had nannies and good jobs. But I often went on business trips, and every time it was very difficult to leave the child with strangers.

My friend's mother, I call her "Olya's mother", helped me a lot then, she just came to visit, "to see" how the nanny was.

But, like a real Russian grandmother, she did not always take into account my feelings when parting with a child. Once I was in London for work, she calls me, tells me what a terrible nanny I have, and you are sitting in London and the last thing you need now is problems with a nanny. In general, this desire to help from the last strength - it seems to me that only Russian grandmothers have it.

Russia is generally a country of the strongest women. In the West - everything for yourself. My mother loves her grandchildren, but does not take part in everyday life. There is no such tradition.

In addition, she is also financially independent. I'm lucky that I have
there is mother Olya, whom you can call at any time of the day and ask for advice. About everything in the world! And she, like a real Russian grandmother, always has an answer for everything.

"Russian mother is distinguished by an intellectual approach to motherhood"

- What was your social circle in Russia? The impression was that these were wealthy families living within the Garden Ring or in elite settlements near Moscow. The image of a Russian mother who raises a child, works, does housework and at the same time looks luxurious, after all, is not entirely applicable to the average Russian woman.

Yes, I absolutely agree. So it is, I worked in banks and large companies in Moscow, lived in the center, my friends graduated from Moscow State University, etc. But it seems to me that this is very interesting, because the more money a mother has, the more opportunities, the more decisions need to be made: what kind of nanny, what kindergarten, what school, what sports / music / cultural program.

I lived in the same circles in London and Vienna, but it seems to me that a Russian mother is distinguished everywhere by how carefully she always thinks through every step she takes.

It's such an analytical, pragmatic approach to motherhood. I am a former banker, so this approach is closer to me than emotional. But if they make decisions with their heads - they think, ask, collect information, consult, then Russian mothers themselves are very emotional! They have so much energy!

- If we talk about the traditions of motherhood, what are the main differences between Russian mothers, in your opinion? From European, American, Asian?

As I said above, Russian mothers are distinguished by an intellectual approach to motherhood with such a healthy balance between the relaxation of a Western mother ("let it be as the child wants, as long as he is happy") and Asian "tigers" who have one goal - success, this is happiness! Russian mothers abroad are visible to the naked eye. Their children study well, and they usually have a lot of extra activities - sports, music, chess, dancing, just everything.

Russian mothers are not lazy and always take care of themselves. Is always. They are women, and then mothers. And in the West, often, if a woman becomes a mother, she often forgets about herself. Straight victims of motherhood. I have not seen this in Russia.

This is a difficult question, because after all, education is something very personal. But if we talk about general trends, then, for example, there are trends that I personally do not agree with. One of them is the refusal of vaccinations or traditional medicine. Although I understand where these trends come from (distrust of medicine in the Russian Federation), but as a person who believes in science and medicine, they scare me. Recently there was an outbreak of measles in Yekaterinburg - it's scary. Of course, refusal to vaccinate is found not only in Russia, but it seems to me that it is Russian mothers who trust alternative medicine more than others.

"I'm not crazy, we all do it"

- And what kind of mothers do you personally consider yourself to be? If we talk not about nationality, but about the state of mind. Whose methods of education are closer to you personally?

Well, it’s probably already clear that the Russian approach is very close to me, although I grew up in the States. I have a Serbian dad, and I always had to bring home "one five", although my friends never had such a requirement in childhood. Everyone didn't care what the grades of the children were, except for my family.

Now I am a mother myself, and since I didn’t know anything at all when I gave birth to my eldest, my first experience of motherhood was just in Moscow in 2006. Then there was neither Facebook nor Instagram, and I learned everything from the nanny, from the mothers of my friends, because I was the first of us who gave birth.

Everyone came to look at us as if we were some kind of experiment. I realized that it is impossible to live without porridge, soup, festivities, even in cold weather. We put my son on the potty from the age of 6 months, because they said - it is necessary. And it worked! Then I came to London, gave birth to 2 more children and was very surprised that everything is so different with them!

I had a real shock. Therefore, of course, the Russian approach is more understandable to me, although this is far from the easiest way.

In the photo: Tanya's children - Nikolai, 10 years old, Katarina, 9 years old, Elizabeth, 6 years old

- Do you position your book - for Russian mothers or for American and European ones?

- My native language is English, so I originally wrote the book for English-speaking mothers. Then I was introduced to the Individuum publishing house, and they translated the book into Russian and published it in Russia. I think the Russian version of the book turned out even better! I hope it will be interesting in Russia. In the West, many Russian mothers who are married to foreigners gave the book to their mothers-in-law to say - "I'm not crazy, we all do it!"

The presentation of the book "Shapka, Babushka, Kefir. Like in Russia" by Tanya Mayer will take place

Preface to the book "Shapka, Babushka, Kefir. Like in Russia"

I am writing a preface to the Russian edition of this book and I am thinking about the reaction that its publication in English has caused. Russian mothers all over the world have become the main readers, admirers and critics of the book Motherhood, Russian-style.

As it turned out, my Russian readers were very interested in what I, a foreigner, could understand and tell about them. Many wrote to me that they showed this book to their English, American, German husbands and mothers-in-law with the words: "Here, I'm not crazy, we all do it!". They wrote how pleased they were to read something good about the Russians, especially given the much worsened relations between Russia and the West. Reviews of the book appeared in several publications, and I gave them interviews, explaining again and again that I really think the Russian approach to education is very interesting, unusual, and certainly worth writing about.

My book does not claim to be complete - of course, all families are different, but, in my opinion, I managed to find some common values ​​and traditions for modern Russian (not by nationality, but by cultural affiliation) mothers. Here we will talk about them. But before you start the first chapter, I would like to tell you about how Russia came into my life.

I speak fluent Russian, and I still remember my first tattered Russian for Everybody textbook, which I studied at Georgetown University. According to my passport, I am an American, Canadian and Serbian blood flows in me, but it is in Moscow that I feel at home.

My husband is an Austrian, the children do not speak Russian, but the Russian word "come on" has firmly entered our family lexicon. "Davaj!" - I push the children when the clock is already 7.38, and they are still sluggishly picking breakfast. "Davaj!" - my husband exclaims when it's time to go home from a walk ... But I'm getting ahead of myself.

I was 23 in August 1999. I quit my job on Wall Street and bought a one-way ticket to Moscow.

I had 18,000 dollars in my bank account, and in my bag there was a leaflet with the phone numbers of apartment owners collected from friends and acquaintances who were ready to rent a room to an American woman. Fortunately, the first to respond was "mother Olya", the mother of my future best friend Sonya, one of the heroines of this book. We met on Mayakovskaya. Mom Olya, an artist of 50, greeted me, taking a handful of seeds from her pocket.

It was the end of August, the last blessed days of summer, and as we walked along the noisy Sadovoe, I suddenly felt that moving to Russia, to the other side of the Earth, was absolutely the right decision.

For several years I lived and worked in Russia. In the spring of 2005, I returned to America to study at Harvard Business School. And immediately began to miss the Moscow fun life. I did not like to sit in a huge audience at all ... So in the summer of 2005 I happily went to London for an internship from an American bank.

07/07/2005, the day when the explosions in London, I realized that I had a delay. All pharmacies were closed because of the terrorist threat, so I saw my first positive pregnancy test the next morning, in the bathroom of the mall. That day, I threw out a pack of thin Vogue cigarettes (another Moscow habit) and told my future father the good news.

It should be noted here that, in fact, the biological father of my son organized that internship. We met periodically for many years, although he was married. I can’t say that I’m proud of it, but, firstly, I was young, and secondly, that’s not the point. He sat on a bench in the mall completely crushed by the news.

For the next few weeks, he urged me to have an abortion. He was even ready to pay for my flight to New York, so that everything would be "normally done" there.

I refused and he just vanished. Forever.

I decided to keep the child. I was very lucky: that same summer I found a job in the largest supermarket chain in Russia. They had just entered the IPO, and they needed someone to negotiate with Western shareholders. Before accepting their offer, I contacted Harvard and asked how they could give an MBA student parental leave. "Classes can be skipped for five days," they answered me and added that they would have to live in the same dorm room as before, sharing a bathroom with a neighbor. So in a way, Harvard Business School made the decision for me.

I told the Russian owners of the company that I was pregnant, and we must give them their due: they were not at all impressed.

Even when I said that I would go to the USA to give birth. However, promising that I will try to reduce the decree to a minimum. Fast forward... I met my love when my son left for almost a year. I wrote a brief for investors about the Russian securities market. After the meeting, my future husband approached me and offered to meet me the next time I was in London. Indeed, a couple of months later I ended up in London and went to a meeting, naively believing that we would discuss the shares of Gazprom and Lukoil, but it turned out that this was our first date. By the time my son and I moved to London, I was already seven months old, my daughter was born in January 2008. In 2010, I became a mother again.

My husband is the legal and only father of my son. In 2013, we moved to Vienna with him and our three children.

This story has a happy ending, but I kept thinking back to the beginning. Both in London and in Vienna, I recalled that first sleepless Moscow year. I returned from Cincinnati with my two-month-old son, having gone through childbirth all alone. My mother and sister took me to the hospital at 10 pm and appeared in the morning to solemnly cut the umbilical cord. I will never forget how bad I felt that night all alone. Many things have happened to me in my life, but this experience is incomparable.

During contractions, I called my Moscow girlfriend on my mobile and made her swear that she would always, always use condoms!

The work did not stop for a second: journalists, analysts, investors called me at an American hospital at night - I worked for Moscow! When I returned, I immediately went to the full schedule, without having time to rest and sleep off. Even before that, I felt what it was like to leave a tiny baby: when my son was a month old, I had to fly with my superiors to negotiations in Stockholm, London and New York, leaving the child to my grandfather and nanny in Arizona. And now I threw it every day - even without any business trips, I left in the morning and returned in the evening.

In the book, I talk in detail about my nannies who saved me during this period, but still it was a very difficult life, full of worries and feelings of guilt in front of my son, whom I hardly saw.

During this first year I was learning to be a single mom, and the women around me were always ready to help - both in deed and in word. Some of the advice was very good, some seemed completely crazy to me, but the main thing I learned is that there is no "correct" way to raise a child. I learned to listen to my Russian friends about what seemed reasonable to me and ignore everything else, no matter how convincing the arguments sounded.

When I left Moscow for London, pregnant and with a small child, I again had to study - to be not only a mother, but also a wife, and then - almost immediately - I turned out to be a mother of the weather, and all this in a completely new environment for me. London mothers scared me. They firmly knew what, how and when to do with the child. They seriously explained that if you didn’t enroll your baby in the right educational institution from birth (“After giving birth, I first called Weatherby, and then my mother!”), then his life would undoubtedly go downhill.

In later years, of course, I got used to the English and American style of upbringing.

I never returned to work, Wetherby, a prestigious London private school for boys, joined, which traditionally enrolls five children every month: whose mother calls first, that one will be included in the lists of future students. (Here and further note. Per.) in the circle of London wealthy housewives, enrolled her daughters and son in kindergartens and schools, in general, figured out what was what, and learned to enjoy this life.

In 2013 we moved to Vienna and I met several Russian families. And then my beloved Moscow friend Sonya (the same one I called screaming about condoms) added me to a "secret" Facebook group, to which almost 2,000 Russian mothers were subscribed. Just an amazing collection of modern Russian women living all over the world - from Siberia to New Zealand.

Communication with these smart, beautiful, educated mothers not only constantly reminded me of my experience in Moscow, but also made me think that there are things that we Western women could learn from Russians.

And so the idea for the book was born. The first thing I did was report it to the group. Someone liked the idea, and one woman wrote that she didn’t understand what I was talking about at all ... But I am convinced that there are purely Russian features in the approach to raising children that can and should be adopted. That is what my book is about. And although I tried to interview mothers of different age, place of residence and social status, I understand perfectly well that this book describes only a small part of what can be called modern Russian motherhood.

Last summer, my husband and children rested in the south of Austria, in Carinthia. We found time with great difficulty: and now, a long weekend in an expensive resort: clear skies, white sand, private beach. In the haze of sunshine, I see a familiar face: a Russian mother, with whom I crossed paths several times in Vienna.
- How long are you here? she asked.
- For two days, and you?
- For a month.
- Month! - not holding back, I exclaimed. - Where is your son?
- He's at the hotel. He's just having a Chinese lesson.
- ?
- Well, we used to spend the whole summer in China so that he could study with the carrier, but it's still very bad with the environment, and we invited the teacher here. My son has Chinese in the morning. And then, of course, he enjoys the bath.

I became numb. This ten-year-old Russian boy already speaks fluent English (he goes to an international school in Vienna), and in the summer he studies Chinese for four hours!

I imagined how he looked longingly at the blue lake while the teacher tortured him with his hieroglyphs... Having wished my Russian friend a good day, I returned to my family. The son and daughters laughed happily, splashing in the warm water, and I looked at them and said to my husband: "You know, dear, we are in full ... Our children have no chance. The future is theirs."

Photo: Tanya Mayer's personal archive, Individuum publishing house